PALS Profile - Luke

Favorite Color: It's always been red, but lately you've been saying orange. I think this is largely due to most construction equipment being this color!

Favorite Food: Food. Seriously, you love to eat. You have gotten slightly pickier with some things as you have gotten older, but you're not a picky eater. You love any kind of pasta and pizza like everyone else, but your favorite food is probably any kind of fruit. You LOVE fruit, especially grapes.

Favorite Book: Definitely Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site by Sherri Duskey Rinker and Tom Lichtenheld. It combines all of your loves in one place: Excavators, backhoes, dump trucks, dirt, and rhyming.

Favorite Song: Anything by Fresh Beat Band but you also love "C is for Cookie" (by you favorite blue monster) and "Shine Your Light" by David Crowder.

Likes to: Do anything involving construction equipment. Playing with it, pretending to work on the machines, driving to the construction site to watch the excavators ... if it's related to construction, you love it. You started pretend playing really early because you had three older influences to draw you in. You love to play with them and pretend. You also love your mommy. My quest to make you a momma's boy is complete!

Does not like: Being told "no." You are just entering the whiny stage where you whine about everything you want. While I'm glad that you seem to be exiting the "I do it myself" phase, this new phase really hurts my ears. You also still struggle a bit with being left somewhere. You don't cry, but you're always slightly reluctant to go to school, the Y, Sunday school, etc. You are fine once you're inside, you just have to be prodded to enter. I'll have to chalk this one up to me and my momma's boy quest.

Things you can do: Ride your bike with training wheels (you taught yourself to pedal that bike really early), recognize all of the letters, buckle yourself into your car seat, working on writing letters but you are still a little ways from that.

Things you can't live without: Your excavator, food and snacks, your momma

Lazy Sunday

Picture of the Week - April 29

Just by looking, you'd never know that she was just face to face with a water buffalo. More later!

PALS Profile - Adah

Favorite Color: Purple, but mostly because Peyton has laid claim to pink and we all know that two people absolutely, positively cannot like the same color. The horror!

Favorite Food: Definitely cheese pizza. Unlike most kids (or anyone), you usually eat the crust first. Same goes for your sandwiches. You definitely have the oddest eating habits of any of your brothers or sisters.

Favorite Book: You love to read any of our children's Bibles. You enjoy looking for all of the Bible stories you hear in church. You are still probably our biggest "reader", though you don't do it quite as much as you used to because of the influx of pretending games that take up most of your time.

Favorite Song: Anything by Fresh Beat Band but you also enjoy a little Britney circa 1998.

Likes to: Pretend, color, and draw. After  not showing a lot of interest in drawing, one day you just took off and have never looked back. You've surprised us by starting to write right-handed when everything else you do is left-handed. You love drawing pictures with complete scenes and story lines that can be pretty off the wall. You also love to play pretend games all day long. I can only imagine the things you are cooking up in your room during nap time (which is now just "rest" time for you)!

Does not like: Having your feelings hurt. You are definitely the most likely to cry if you are hurt emotionally (as opposed to physically). You are still fairly sensitive and have your feelings bruised very easily. However, this always makes you the most empathetic of the group. I have heard you many times telling people, "Don't be mean to my sister!" or hugging people who are crying or upset.

Things you can do: Ride your bike with training wheels, write all of the upper case letters, skip, still working on swinging yourself, buckle yourself into your car seat

Things you can't live without: Kitty (your blanket), stuffed animals (there is a new favorite every week), your nightly tucking-in routine, hair products (for keeping the fro under wraps)

Today's Lessons, Vol. 1

1. Do not mention or talk about Disney World with your children unless you already have a trip planned to go there in the very near future (this is 2 weeks or less for preschoolers). I have made the mistake of talking up a Disney trip that isn't even planned yet and I am paying for it every second of every day.

2. When there is a puddle in front of the toilet, do not smell it to make sure it is pee. It's a puddle. In front of the toilet. It's pee.

3. When your kids won't eat something, chop it up, put it between two tortillas, and call it a quesadilla.

4. Boys can scream just as loud and as high-pitched as girls when there is a spider in their car seat.

5. Buy washable dry erase markers if you do not intend to directly supervise your children while they are using them.

           5A. Green dry erase marker dots on a child's leg do not come off
                  after scrubbing them in the bath.

6. Eating two oatmeal raisin cookies for lunch is healthy because it covers three of the five major food groups (butter = dairy, raisins = fruit, oatmeal = grains, me = happy).

7. You have ordered too many things online when your kids line up at the door at 4 o'clock every afternoon to wait for the UPS truck to come down the street.

8. Around age four is when kids start noticing that YOU don't have to eat all of the vegetables on your plate to get a dessert ...

9. The month before school starts is an eternity. The month before school ends lasts barely more than a moment.

10. You do not need to be embarrassed when your son is the only boy in his class that had a purple shirt in his closet to wear to Purple Day at school. Real men (and annoying dinosaurs) wear purple.

PALS Profile - Sam

Favorite Color: It's usually blue, but lately you've branched out to black?? I can only assume that it's because of your recent fascination with Gotham City's caped crusader.

Favorite Food: You say it's pizza, but you can put down the french fries as well. You are also my true chocolate lover ... a boy after Mommy's own heart.

Favorite Book: You like a variety of books, but one of your current favorites is Pete The Cat by Eric Litwin.

Favorite Song: Anything by Fresh Beat Band but you also have your special favorites. You can chalk all of this up to Mom when you get older. You LOVE Firework by Katy Perry, The Edge of Glory with Lady Gaga, and your current favorite ... wait for it ... Miley Cyrus' Party In The USA.

Likes to: Build, build, build. If we didn't make you put your blocks away every once and a while it would be the only thing that you would ever do. You are a great builder and make all kinds of planes, tools, and buildings with your blocks. It really is pretty amazing how good you are ... maybe a future architect or engineer?? We'll see. You also like anything and everything related to airplanes.

Does not like: Losing. We are working on this but you do not like it when you don't win any type of competition. You also don't like listening (this is my own personal observation) as evidenced by how many times I have to tell you to do something before it actually registers in your little brain! I was warned about this trait in little boys and it seems to be holding true for you!

Things you can do: Ride your bike with training wheels, write your full name (you lucked out with a short one), swing yourself, buckle and unbuckle yourself in your car seat (hallelujah).

Things you can't live without: Those blocks! Blankie, Taggie (the tag on Blankie), your roommate (nightlight), sweets (you love desserts).

Picture of the Week - April 22

What do you get when you need a dinner for four kids in a hurry?? That's right, Stick Dinner.

Fish sticks, carrot sticks, sweet potato sticks ... it's what's for dinner.