altarflame (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
altarflame) wrote2010-05-14 02:37 am
altarflame) wrote2010-05-14 02:37 am
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I am sore and shivering with the worst freaking sunburn I've ever had in my life. I don't think I was aware I could get this sunburned. Apparently my Cuban skin has gotten used to a nocturnal lifestyle and 10-4 on a Miami beach was not in it's cards. I slathered all of my children in sunblock, and then maniacally reapplied it to Isaac every hour...putting any on myself never even occured to me o_O
The beach today was wonderful, though. It was the PATH year end party. Ananda ran around with 3-5 girls her age or older without even speaking to me for five hours straight, and Aaron found a few boys to hunt sea creatures with; they got urchins, slugs, a baby jellyfish and some sort of albino crab. All of the little kids had a blast, and I was SO PROUD OF ISAAC!! He had a great time playing in the water all day, which is just amazing for him. I kept having to call him back so he wouldn't drift out too far or run off beyond where I could see him. Which is...quite a change.
Perhaps best of all, I had a couple of really wonderful conversations. My (PATH...there are several) friend Michelle was there and it's just so easy, with her, we have so much in common but she also just exudes peace and welcome in this way I don't even know how to describe. I don't even have to think as things exit my mouth around her.
Then I talked in depth with a newer mom there for the first time, and it was just...incredible. One of those rare moments of deep connection. She is an unlikely, won't-live-on-base military wife who seeks out Orthodox priests within the bases and overwhelmingly reminds me of Dama. She has four kids. I DO NOT MEET Orthodox Christians IRL, people. But this particular one is in a huge crisis of faith because her oldest has had leukemia...twice. And both times it's been a 3 year rollercoaster (he's 14) of epic, gut wrenching proportions, and she is now at a point in life where she can't even say the Lord's Prayer without crying at the "Thy will be done" line. I know exactly what she means, because I had some serious trust/faith/anger issues when Elise was very small, that are still not completely worked out. But being so candid, and getting goosebumps for each other, to see her son digging a big trench in the beach as Elise runs up to me asking for more carrots, but mostly just LAUGHING. Is great. I was "testing the waters" today, with her and with a 3rd mom I have liked for awhile, to see what would happen if I started cursing and gossiping a bit, and was happy with what I found ;) In my natural parenting group that is par for the course but in PATH I usually keep it a little more professional because I go there more for the kids.
Elan. You can't see his boobs and nipples well enough here; they were pretty outlandish.
Michelle, slaving away for Adam and Aaron.
Another great thing about today is that I really feel I found another great beach. I hate most Miami beaches; they're LOUD and impossible crowded, what little parking you can find costs too much - it just isn't worth it. This place is great, though.
Huh, imagine that, Jake's bathingsuit. Or is that someone else's?
Some of my favorite things from this week include:
-Ananda has been giving Isaac "art classes" every morning after they've had breakfast and done their chores. Sometimes this is just her guiding him through a step by step drawing challenge from one of the learn to draw books we have. One day they made faces out of sequins on paper, with glue sticks. The best was probably the day that made sun prints. It's so good for both of them.
-Jake is all about his Kumon First Book of Cutting. He has these little red safety scissors and he takes it so seriously with his folder to put all his cut pages in.
-Ananda and Aaron's Tuesday science class was great (again!). They RAN from the van when I dropped them off and came back talking a mile a minute. When I asked Aaron what they learned about this week, he answered, "Mass, and force, and how they combine to make acceleration". I was impressed.
-Elise keeps randomly, casually saying things I had no idea she could say in ways that make me laugh...I said, hmm, I haven't seen your baby today and she said "Me either!" She fell down and hurt her face at the playground on Monday, and then fell out of the bench she was sitting on with me, afterwards, and RANTED, "Me hurt and hurt more more more MORE! No play! Go, car, now!"
-Aaron is taking an empty glass bottle - an izze bottle, so similar to a beer bottle - outside and coming in with it inhabited. He's gotten moths, a butterfly, a lizard, FOUR BEES AT ONCE (??). It's his new favorite thing.
-We're listening to an audiobook in the van whenever we're driving places. I, Coriander. It's very enveloping and well done, in writing and in voice work. Ananda and Isaac like it best, but Aaron and I do too. Jake hates it but just kind of has to deal.
-Isaac had a quarter the other day, and we were at Party City looking for little rubber snakes for Ananda's Medusa costume. They had big bins of candies and lollipops and things for .07 each. SEVEN CENTRS APIECE! He was able to get himself, Jacob and Elise each their own chosen thing, and then get 3 pennies back as change. It was like his dream come true. I also had to laugh a lot in Party City when he asked, as he does everywhere he goes, if they had quarter machines, and I said no...but then pointed out the WALL of quarter bins. Leaping plastic frogs, tops, small rubber frogs, bouncy balls, tiny pads of paper, you know...but 30 choices. He started jumping up and down with his eyes bulging, unable to believe it.
-we have their costumes all done for Historically Speaking tomorrow...Ananda will be in head to toe black (including gloves and socks) with snakes pinned throughout her hair. She will, at one point, look at Aaron,a nd he will stiffen and fall over. Aaron, as Orpheus, will have a sheet toga look with people helping him act out his story (i.e., Ananda and Isaac holding tree branches and following him around, and me rolling a rock towards him from the audience). Isaac's cracks me up the most, as Narcissus he's going to be holding this little hand mirror and gazing at himself lovingly. Which actually comes very natural to him ;)
-I'm finally, actually reading A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and really digging it. I can be seen lolling about on park benches reading when I've finished whatever phase of Annie's birthday sewing I brought with me
-Grant and I watched Sherlock Holmes. It is silly and Hollywood but totally entertaining the whole way through. I could have DONE WITHOUT THE PIG SCENE *surgical shudder*
This is big!! I will probably be talking it up semi-often in the coming weeks so bear with me, ok? I'm now selling Usborne Books! Usborne publishes books with vivid, awesome illustrations, wording really geared to pulling reluctant readers in, and nothing "commercial" - there are no tv, movie or video game characters to lead your kid back to a screen. They range from board books to chapter books, with lots of fairy tales, science and everything you can think of in between. We have plenty, purchased from our hometown bookstore over the last couple of years. I'm seriously considering doing this indefinitely, but for now it is a marvelous fundraiser set up by the illustrious![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mommydama. All profits are going to help Aaron get to New York, so his Hip Hop class can compete in Break the Floor's JUMP finale. This is the link to my store:
http://www.myubam.com/ecommerce/default.asp?sid=H3224&gid=98260652
Usborne is loved by homeschoolers, but NOT exclusively. They often make great gifts because some are loaded with "extras" - pull out posters, general "features" kids love. And they are very reasonably priced, I think - my mother in law bought a big "Illustrated Dictionary of Math" for my niece the other night, and it was $12.99. Anyway, feel free to ask any questions you may have here or by emailing me. Please feel free to pass that link on!!
The beach today was wonderful, though. It was the PATH year end party. Ananda ran around with 3-5 girls her age or older without even speaking to me for five hours straight, and Aaron found a few boys to hunt sea creatures with; they got urchins, slugs, a baby jellyfish and some sort of albino crab. All of the little kids had a blast, and I was SO PROUD OF ISAAC!! He had a great time playing in the water all day, which is just amazing for him. I kept having to call him back so he wouldn't drift out too far or run off beyond where I could see him. Which is...quite a change.
Perhaps best of all, I had a couple of really wonderful conversations. My (PATH...there are several) friend Michelle was there and it's just so easy, with her, we have so much in common but she also just exudes peace and welcome in this way I don't even know how to describe. I don't even have to think as things exit my mouth around her.
Then I talked in depth with a newer mom there for the first time, and it was just...incredible. One of those rare moments of deep connection. She is an unlikely, won't-live-on-base military wife who seeks out Orthodox priests within the bases and overwhelmingly reminds me of Dama. She has four kids. I DO NOT MEET Orthodox Christians IRL, people. But this particular one is in a huge crisis of faith because her oldest has had leukemia...twice. And both times it's been a 3 year rollercoaster (he's 14) of epic, gut wrenching proportions, and she is now at a point in life where she can't even say the Lord's Prayer without crying at the "Thy will be done" line. I know exactly what she means, because I had some serious trust/faith/anger issues when Elise was very small, that are still not completely worked out. But being so candid, and getting goosebumps for each other, to see her son digging a big trench in the beach as Elise runs up to me asking for more carrots, but mostly just LAUGHING. Is great. I was "testing the waters" today, with her and with a 3rd mom I have liked for awhile, to see what would happen if I started cursing and gossiping a bit, and was happy with what I found ;) In my natural parenting group that is par for the course but in PATH I usually keep it a little more professional because I go there more for the kids.
Elan. You can't see his boobs and nipples well enough here; they were pretty outlandish.
Michelle, slaving away for Adam and Aaron.
Another great thing about today is that I really feel I found another great beach. I hate most Miami beaches; they're LOUD and impossible crowded, what little parking you can find costs too much - it just isn't worth it. This place is great, though.
Huh, imagine that, Jake's bathingsuit. Or is that someone else's?
Some of my favorite things from this week include:
-Ananda has been giving Isaac "art classes" every morning after they've had breakfast and done their chores. Sometimes this is just her guiding him through a step by step drawing challenge from one of the learn to draw books we have. One day they made faces out of sequins on paper, with glue sticks. The best was probably the day that made sun prints. It's so good for both of them.
-Jake is all about his Kumon First Book of Cutting. He has these little red safety scissors and he takes it so seriously with his folder to put all his cut pages in.
-Ananda and Aaron's Tuesday science class was great (again!). They RAN from the van when I dropped them off and came back talking a mile a minute. When I asked Aaron what they learned about this week, he answered, "Mass, and force, and how they combine to make acceleration". I was impressed.
-Elise keeps randomly, casually saying things I had no idea she could say in ways that make me laugh...I said, hmm, I haven't seen your baby today and she said "Me either!" She fell down and hurt her face at the playground on Monday, and then fell out of the bench she was sitting on with me, afterwards, and RANTED, "Me hurt and hurt more more more MORE! No play! Go, car, now!"
-Aaron is taking an empty glass bottle - an izze bottle, so similar to a beer bottle - outside and coming in with it inhabited. He's gotten moths, a butterfly, a lizard, FOUR BEES AT ONCE (??). It's his new favorite thing.
-We're listening to an audiobook in the van whenever we're driving places. I, Coriander. It's very enveloping and well done, in writing and in voice work. Ananda and Isaac like it best, but Aaron and I do too. Jake hates it but just kind of has to deal.
-Isaac had a quarter the other day, and we were at Party City looking for little rubber snakes for Ananda's Medusa costume. They had big bins of candies and lollipops and things for .07 each. SEVEN CENTRS APIECE! He was able to get himself, Jacob and Elise each their own chosen thing, and then get 3 pennies back as change. It was like his dream come true. I also had to laugh a lot in Party City when he asked, as he does everywhere he goes, if they had quarter machines, and I said no...but then pointed out the WALL of quarter bins. Leaping plastic frogs, tops, small rubber frogs, bouncy balls, tiny pads of paper, you know...but 30 choices. He started jumping up and down with his eyes bulging, unable to believe it.
-we have their costumes all done for Historically Speaking tomorrow...Ananda will be in head to toe black (including gloves and socks) with snakes pinned throughout her hair. She will, at one point, look at Aaron,a nd he will stiffen and fall over. Aaron, as Orpheus, will have a sheet toga look with people helping him act out his story (i.e., Ananda and Isaac holding tree branches and following him around, and me rolling a rock towards him from the audience). Isaac's cracks me up the most, as Narcissus he's going to be holding this little hand mirror and gazing at himself lovingly. Which actually comes very natural to him ;)
-I'm finally, actually reading A Tree Grows In Brooklyn and really digging it. I can be seen lolling about on park benches reading when I've finished whatever phase of Annie's birthday sewing I brought with me
-Grant and I watched Sherlock Holmes. It is silly and Hollywood but totally entertaining the whole way through. I could have DONE WITHOUT THE PIG SCENE *surgical shudder*
This is big!! I will probably be talking it up semi-often in the coming weeks so bear with me, ok? I'm now selling Usborne Books! Usborne publishes books with vivid, awesome illustrations, wording really geared to pulling reluctant readers in, and nothing "commercial" - there are no tv, movie or video game characters to lead your kid back to a screen. They range from board books to chapter books, with lots of fairy tales, science and everything you can think of in between. We have plenty, purchased from our hometown bookstore over the last couple of years. I'm seriously considering doing this indefinitely, but for now it is a marvelous fundraiser set up by the illustrious
mommydama. All profits are going to help Aaron get to New York, so his Hip Hop class can compete in Break the Floor's JUMP finale. This is the link to my store:http://www.myubam.com/ecommerce/default.asp?sid=H3224&gid=98260652
Usborne is loved by homeschoolers, but NOT exclusively. They often make great gifts because some are loaded with "extras" - pull out posters, general "features" kids love. And they are very reasonably priced, I think - my mother in law bought a big "Illustrated Dictionary of Math" for my niece the other night, and it was $12.99. Anyway, feel free to ask any questions you may have here or by emailing me. Please feel free to pass that link on!!
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Love the one where Isaac is not touching the ground. And Elise is so beautiful in that first one.
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Usborne book site
Anyway, fyi, there's a typo in your email addy on your Usborne book site.
I really enjoyed your formspring video q & a.
Re: Usborne book site
Thanks about the other things, too.