27 August 2020

We have a picture of Rose Pink helping her papa fix the bathroom sink by holding wrenches when she was a little girl (maybe three?).  Here Rosebud is also helping her papa stain the bench by pointing out all the spots he missed. Their physical positioning reminded me of when Rose Pink helped him out at a similar age.

 We have a picture of Rose Pink riding on the Hitchhiker when she was five or so.  Rosebud rides it now (but not TOO fast, Papa!) and Mr. Brown talked Rose Pink into climbing back on to it for a quick ride.  She was a good sport about it.  I remember how pleased she was when she rode it for the first time as a little girl.  Rosebud is almost ready to learn how to ride a bike independently and then we won't need the Hitchhiker any more.

24 August 2020

Sometimes cuteness just happens.  It happens a lot with Rosebud in the house.

 

The other night Mr. Brown called me Sweetie Pie as I was going to put Rosebud in bed.  She asked me, "Why did Papa call you Sweetie Pie?" and I said, "Because he loves me."  She replied, "Oh, so this is a sex thing?"  The things she picks up!

19 August 2020

fun activity during quarantine, especially for Nut Brown - building with Structure blocks

 

18 August 2020

I forgot to mark our family birthday.  I recently hung up a family history chronology next to the fireplace (above photo).

We celebrated with a meal that had dishes that remembered all the places we've lived: sweet corn for Iowa, shawarma from Michigan, taiyaki from Florida and homemade ice cream from Texas.  It also marked something that Mr. Brown and I love to do, which is try new dishes.  The shawarma and the taiyaki were both experimental.  The shawarma didn't turn out very well, but the taiyaki was a big hit (see below photos).

 

Also, the photos in our kitchen, which we love so much.  It continues to bring us so much joy!

15 August 2020

Nut Brown celebrated his birthday on the first day of school. (Happy birthday, you get to go to school)

For his birthday this year, he wanted to eat a lot of meat, and he wanted to eat as much birthday cake as he wanted without me telling him he had to stop.  So we made brisket and Mr. Brown made him a cheesecake, and I didn't say anything about how much of it he ate.  

He did share some with the rest of us but enjoyed most of it himself.  This was all the weekend before his birthday.

On his actual birthday, we had homemade pizza and a chocolate raspberry poke cake.  We are going out of town this weekend, so after Nut Brown blew out the candles, Mr. Brown handed us all forks and said, "Eat as much as you want because we are not keeping this over the weekend."  (which is in keeping with Nut Brown's birthday theme of eating without restraint)  Nut Brown said he's always wanted to have his face pushed into a cake, and he kept bending over as if to lick the whipped topping over the cake. I said, "Do that again and I might just push your face into it!" and he did it again, so I did.

 He was very pleased with the experience.

14 August 2020

 We started public school yesterday and this is what it looks like. Except Bobo isn't wearing his headphones.  It looks like two boys at desks with laptops and headphones on.  How is this different from homeschooling? Here is an illustrative story: yesterday we heard Nut Brown say, "How do I put my hand down after you've called on me?" (this is a feature in Zoom).  Mr. Brown got up right away to go help him figure it out, but then realized that Nut Brown was asking the teacher, and she was helping him.  SOMEONE ELSE IS HELPING OUR KIDS FIGURE THINGS OUT.  This has never happened to us before.  This is going to be good for our family.

Bobo really enjoyed his time with his class online yesterday.  Nut Brown is more anxious, but he's also got more to figure out than Bobo does.  We are all helping him get started.  He's already good at this, so we just have to help him make up some of the skills he didn't learn as a homeschooler (how to make powerpoint charts).  I'm so glad that he gets to start virtually so he can learn how to be a student first, and then when we go back to school in person, he can learn social skills, instead of trying to do both at once.

12 August 2020

School starts tomorrow.  We spent a good chunk of today making sure everything is in order for tomorrow - desks set up, computers logged on to wifi, kids connected with their online classes, notebooks and pencils available, and so on and so on.  Bobo is excited.  Nut Brown is really anxious.  Rose Pink is excited. Mr. Brown is really nervous.  I'm ready for the anticipation to be over and to get the actual change from homeschooling to public school underway, so we can get through that as well and adapt to the new way of life we've chosen.

Mr. Brown has reframed our choice from "restrictive" to "a framework that we can grow against" which I think will help us adjust.

Tonight everyone went to bed at 9 pm (after our last family movie night - sad! We watched Abominable).  I was totally wound up, really really anxious.  I told Mr. Brown that this was way worse than Christmas Eve.  He was helping me calm down as we were laying in bed in the dark, and then the phone rang (at about 9:20 pm).  The school district is cancelling the first two days of high school due to technical difficulties.  We are off to a great start!

11 August 2020

 Some fabulous art from Rosebud.  She's really into coloring at the moment.

10 August 2020

 I set Rosebud up at the kitchen table with paints this morning while I was teleworking in the kitchen (love telework! and slow work days!) and when I took a picture, she said, "Send it to Papa please! He's upstairs!"

9 August 2020

 The other day I was riding in the backseat of the minivan with Bobo, and he started telling me all about the fabulous hotel that he was going to build (this is an ongoing story that has origins in the apartment buildings behind our house) and how it was going to have the perfect spaces in it for each member of the family.  He likes stories like this and we always enjoy discussing what sorts of things each person would like to have.  He always discusses my space first and he always includes lots of plants, which I think he has figured out is a surefire way to get my attention - start talking about plants.  Anyway, he had moved on from my space and was talking about how the lobby would have an endless slush machine that could give you every flavor, and an endless potato chip machine, but NOT an endless candy machine.  "No?" I said.  "Why not?" and he looked at me and said in all seriousness, "Because I don't want to lose all my teeth."

7 August 2020

 Today I got off work and went downstairs and discovered a plan to make kolaches for dinner.  The girls and I went to HEB, where Rosebud got to push her own tiny shopping cart around the store.  Then Rose Pink insisted that she was going to make the kolaches by herself (which she did) and we watched Kung Fu Panda together as a family (Rosebud's choice for the week) and then we ate mango pops for dessert on the trampoline.  The kids did dinner chores while Rosebud and I watered various growing things and picked tomatoes.  I helped Nut Brown finish the dishes and then we went for a walk in the dark as a family all together and the whole evening was very lovely.  My family is pretty dang awesome.

Rosebud is really growing up this summer.  Her body's changed from being a large toddler to being a kid.  She doesn't like for me to pick her up on my hip any more, and she doesn't like to sit on my lap or hold my hand quite as much as she used to.  I am proud of her growing up but I do miss her little-ness dreadfully. 

5 August 2020

Tonight putting Rosebud in bed, she says: "Mom, how old are you?" (41) "Wow, that's old.  That's like a grandma.  But not quite.  But you have two kids that are almost married, so soon you'll be a grandma.  And then you'll be dead." (pause) "I'm going to miss you."