Today

Pretend these pictures are in order.

This morning, as I cleaned the house, the kids "played" Heroclix. Notice Alynna is sitting right in the middle of the game board. She soon got shoved off by Kaeley. The teams were chosen, lined up on either side, and one would throw a dice at the other time. Whoever was knocked over was out.

We did a craft I found on the blog "Frugal Family Fun". I had purchased a huge pile of coffee filters at the Dollar Tree. The kids painted many of them. Nathan and Alynna lasted about twenty minutes. Kaeley knew I was hoping for as many as possible, so she was there for more than an hour. I did have to sit down and roll some out of my own, because she was getting burnt out.

While those dried we tried out the pool. Now that's what I'm talkin' about! The water was in the seventies, I think. That is my kind of water! I did my best to "exercise" with Alynna in my arms. She has her own floaty, but she thinks she's a big kid, so she doesn't often let me push her along. So I did what I could. That took about an hour.

Lunch time. Nap time. Kaeley and I read our "Pray for Muslims" for the day, and then I read from Nancy Drew (since she's not in official school yet) for a little more than an hour!

Now for the dried coffee filters. Kaeley cut them in half and then one half in half again. We added some wings and faces with markers, taped them on the windows, and then added dry-erase legs and feet. Our front and back windows are now stuffed with birds, some of them love birds. It was a fun and super cheap craft. Just the decorating took us about an hour! That part was a bit frantic at times what with the two little ones.

Alynna was not allowed to even look at a marker, what with her reputation for disappearing and suddenly there are marks all over the bedrooms. She got to one and I told her no. After I took it from her she came up to me quite happily and offered me her arm. She squeeled, "Arm? Arm?" I could only assume she was expecting me to discipline her for getting to the marker. I usually just pat her hand a couple of times while seriously saying, "No! No!" It hurts her feelings and after about five minutes of getting the pouting lip out she finally bursts into tears. So I asked her if she wanted me to smack her hand. She happily told me yes. So I super gently patted her arm twice and said, "No. No."

It wasn't for her regret for breaking the rules. It was her sense of planning. She was standing right in front of my open, but turned off laptop. As soon as she got her discipline she went straight for the laptop! That little stinker tried to get it out of the way. Don't worry. She didn't get it twice. The laptop was safely put away.

After we recovered a bit from that activity it was time to make dinner. We tried a new recipe that I got off the soy sauce bottle. The whole meal cost us around eight dollars, perhaps? So the kids helped me make dinner. Nathan was so excited to cook that he took out the stool and put on his apron before I even had the recipe out on the counter. Kaeley handled the skillet and the little ones and I took quick turns seasoning and measuring and cutting. We spent a lot of time learning how to take turns. I spent a lot of time saying, "No. It's not your turn." "Nathan, stop pestering. I will find you something to do in a minute." "Nathan, if you ask me that one more time you're excused from the table."

Alynna peeled the garlic. I had to watch her, because she would try to take a bite if I didn't grab it from her in time. Nathan helped mince the garlic. Another one of their jobs included detailing the shrimp. Nathan was fairly good at it. Alynna just broke them in half and threw them by handfuls into the bowl. I was doing damage control and in the end only one shrimp tail snuck by us.

This recipe is called "Snake Alley Noodles". I'll post the recipe later, just in case anyone is interested. It was a huge keeper in our family! Everytime I turned around someone was asking for seconds. Kaeley had two good-sized bowls, Nathan had one and a half, Alynna had three smaller servings, and Brad had two!

The day flew by. My laundry still isn't folded and my stack of to-do papers has untouched. Well, that's not true. I added to it. :( I knew August 16th was going to be good. I just knew it!

Now for the 17th.