Sunday School Treat & Musical Instruments

I apologize for the long blogging break. For some reason I was unable to upload anything to blogger last week. We have short periods where the internet is sluggish for us. So now we play catch-up!
A week ago we had our Sunday School Treat. Ezra is in Miss Bonnie and Miss Jennie's class along with many of his friends. He loves all of the other kids and talks about them frequently at home. He also has fun telling us what they talk about in class each Sunday. It's so wonderful to know that he's really listening and taking it all in.
The kids were supposed to learn John 10:27-30, "There Were 12 Disciples" song, "the Books of the Bible" song, and the 12 sons of Jacob. Ezra got through John 10:27-30, "There were 12 Disciples" and a few of the sons of Jacob. He did lots of practicing and took it quite seriously. I was planning to post a video, but we can't seem to get the video from the camera to the computer....so, use your imagination. He didn't have stage fright. Not an ounce of it, shucks. Imagine our high-energy boy making big alligator jaws and doing somersaults and touching his toes and making faces. Yep, it was fun. However, he wasn't the only one and so we laughed until tears ran down our faces and tried not to be too embarrassed. It was a lot of fun to watch. Also, John 10:30 says "I and my Father are one"...Ezra's rendition was "My daddy and I are one".

Look at all those cute faces. I was having trouble getting the whole class in the frame from where I was sitting, so our one and only cute little Miss A is missing from most of the pictures.

JMJ 4 says his verses.

Ezra saying John 10:27-30

J.D.

Look at those hands going while he sings. Somehow Ezra ended up with the microphone in his hands for the "Books of the Bible" song, which he didn't know any of.

The older kids' class each chose aspects of King David's life to talk about. They memorized a lot of verses and were very impressive. Here is JMJ 1 doing his thing.

Caroline sacked out on the floor halfway through. She woke up just in time for the treat bags to be passed out.

And here is JMJ 2 with a cute little smile.

We really enjoyed the SS treat this year--perhaps because we finally got to watch our own little man perform.

Now then, onto the musical instruments. I have all sorts of fun spring projects ready to go for the kids. But, with snow falling (and some days accumulating) I just don't have the heart to get started on the cute little flowers and butterflies. Last week we decided to work on musical instruments. This is an easy project and anyone can do it. We collected toilet paper tubes, sour cream Tupperware, baby food snack containers, etc. for a few weeks. Then we got those out along with some noisy foods such as: black beans, unpopped popcorn and rice. We also had some rubber bands on hand. This time of year is a great time to make "noise makers" aka: instruments, because Easter eggs are available. They are also cheap. I bought a package of sparkly pastel ones at Target for 75 cents.

We spent an hour filling the eggs and containers with the popcorn, beans and rice. I used duct tape to seal all the containers so that they couldn't open. We also used rubber bands, duct tape and plastic containers to make our own "guitars". Long narrow containers work best for these.

The older your kids are, the better this project is for the learning side of things. You can discuss vibrations and low vs. high and all that jazz. The younger your kids are, the easier they are to please. An Easter egg filled with rice is enough to entertain them : ) After the instruments are made, turn on a kid cd and jam to the beat.

All the necessary tools.

Shake those shakers!

Ezra plucking his guitar. It was real high tech : ) As a bonus--the noise is barely audible.

Pacific Science Center

The rest of our trip to the Science Center was fun as well. Ezra would have stayed there until it closed. As it was, we pushed it and skipped naps...not leaving until nearly 4. I had hoped that Caroline would sleep during the IMax--hahaha, naive little mommy. She didn't wear her 3-D glasses, but she still enjoyed looking at the blurry "shishies". We saw "Under the Sea 3-D" and Ezra spent a good portion of the show screaming things like "I'm done, let's go" and "I want out of here now, now, now!!!!" and "NO--don't let him eat me!!!" We tried not to laugh so loud and encouraged him to take off his glasses so that it didn't look quite so much like the water snake was actually biting him. I finally convinced him to reach out and "touch" one of the colorful 3-D fish and right at that point a cuttlefish snapped it up. Hehe. Anyhow, it's a good show and we all had fun. But no one took any naps.

Water exhibit in the tot zone--I knew it would be a favorite. Other parents kept looking at the front of Caroline and informing me that she was "soaked" and I'd always confidently respond "Oh, I know, I brought extra clothes for both kids, it's okay" and smile. So, after I wrung the water out of her shirt and took her to the bathroom to change her diaper, I brought her back and dug through my backpack for dry clothes. Hmmmm...it seems my day-cooler leaked all it's melted ice and the "dry clothes" were even more wet than the wet clothes. Oops. Grandma took the driest of the wet clothes to the hand dryer and dried them for Miss Caroline : ) Thanks, Grandma!

The music room. Both kids enjoyed making a joyful cacophony.

Grandma was the best at making the pot lids make their loudest noises, though : )

And I finally put the camera away and just enjoyed the rest of the day. Including the part where I had to chase Ezra out of the dinosaur exhibit building and bring him back to look at the dinosaurs. I should have cut his fingernails before entering that room--but he was glad to have such a good hold on my shoulder :)

I could never have survived by myself at the PSC, so thank you so much for coming, Grandma Tractor. Every time Ezra had to go "to the to-let" right now, I was able to drop everything and run there with him and not worry about Caroline and our stroller. Only two more places left to visit on our City Pass now.

Now I'm off to watch the snow fall and practice verses with Ezra for the Sunday School treat tomorrow. This is his first appearance in such an event and we're all a little nervous around here! Let the games begin...

Flutter Bys

I was going to title this "kid-free post!" and shock you all...but then a few photos with kids snuck in, sorry. On Wednesday we went to the Pacific Science Center with Grandma Harbor. The first exhibit we ran to was the Butterfly House. It's my favorite and my mom's as well. It is about 84 degrees inside and right now the flowers are in bloom so it smells extra delicious. It's like walking into paradise! I can't show you the smells, but this post is all about the butterflies and their habitat at the Science Center. Tomorrow I'll show the rest of the adventure.

Oranges and blood oranges--the focus was supposed to be on the brilliant blue of the small butterfly.

Koi pond.

"Remember not to touch!"

She was pretty scared of all the butterflies that kept buzzing her head--some of them are quite large.

You really do have to watch your step for little guys like him resting on the floor.

This is his reaction to my question "How do you like the butterfly house?" They wanted to leave a lot sooner than we did. I think mom and I would have stayed in paradise all day, given the option.

Hello, Snow!

When we crawled out of bed quite late (2 late nights and full days in a row) this morning--we saw an unexpected sight--snow! It was falling fast too. Thankfully it was very wet and sloppy, not frozen and slippery. We expected it to stop at any minute. However, by the time we got back from Ezra's sports class at 11 it was still falling. So, out into the great white, wet slop we went. Praise the Lord they were agreeable to being confined to the backyard : ) One more year and I think they'll be happy to play independently in the snow. Caroline still has a little trouble getting around this year and doesn't ever want to stay out long. Anyhow, we played, we made a snowman, we had a snowball fight (mommy won when she hit Ezra squarely in the mouth--oopsie) and we came back in to enjoy leftover lasagna and hot chocolate (what???? that combo doesn't sound like a winner???).

Yes, she's screaming her head off. She made the mistake of touching the snowman while mommy ran inside to get the camera and Ezra "protected" the snowman.

A little snowman love. Later he kept trying to eat the carrot directly off his face. We compromised and had fresh clean carrots with our lasagna once inside.

This is my helleborus--I LOVE this beautiful plant. Bright green leaves and beautiful blossoms for about 9 month + out of the year. It's such a cheerful patch of beauty in my front landscape.

And these little lovelies stayed dry and snow-free under the front entryway.

Caroline

The photos of Caroline did not turn out quite as well. She has personality too--she just didn't show as much of it for these shots : ) I feel somehow as though I'm selling her short because her post isn't as nice as Ezra's. However, she is 19 months younger than him and is not able to tell us quite as many things as her big brother does. I will share a few photos of her though.

She's our girl. Sugar and spice and everything nice. A little cheesy too.

She loves to cuddle, hug, kiss--makes you feel like one in a million

Her favorite friend is her big brother. Lately, when he's hurt or sad, she rushes over to him and starts rubbing his back softly.

She screeches and hollers and shouts "no!" emphatically until she thinks she might get in trouble at which time she smiles, kisses mommy or daddy and starts saying just as emphatically "yeesss!"

She is quite shy with strangers...

...and has several favorite people, one whose name she calls out often during meeting :)

She is ours. And we love her, just as her brother, more than words can explain. We look forward to watching all the ways she grows and pray that the Lord will give us wisdom to raise her to His honor and glory. Thank you Lord for this beautiful blessing.

Ezra

Yesterday morning while waiting for mommy, daddy had a little photo shoot with the kids before Sunday School (note: They were not waiting for me because I took 2 hours in the bathroom, but because I had to do all the things mommies have to do Sunday morning before I had my own ten minutes to get dressed!). This post features Mr. Ezra with his new haircut.

He's our boy. Our first born.

High-energy, hard to control...

... more loving than I ever knew a three year old boy could be.

He is a man of many expressions and many words.

He has come a looooooong way already.

The tantrums that drove us to our knees all day long a year or more ago are nearly gone.

He knows how to share, to potty in the toilet, to dress himself, to ride his bike, to sing songs and play many sports. He is a wonderful big brother.

He can tell you just how Jesus died on a terrible cross to wash away his sins--and will assure you that his Lord lives in his heart and that he will be joining Him in heaven just as soon as he is called.

He is not perfect--and we do not wish him so.

He is ours--loaned to us by the Lord. And we love him more than any words could ever describe.

Thank you Lord for such a beautiful gift!

(Yes, this blog is a little redundant : ))