New Hampshire, Part 2

Abe-y Baby

Mama Dooligan is in New Hampshire for a long weekend!]
I got to meet my nephew Abe today! Or as Anna calls him, Abe-y Baby. Which I think is so sweet. I can't wait for Jon and Anna to meet Abe. Hopefully someday soon. It was only a 3 hour direct flight here!

Abe with his Mom and Dad, Erin and Cory. We went out to eat and he was so calm and chill the whole time. He is so wide-eyed and watchful. He is very interested in everything around him and I am pretty sure he is brilliant. Seriously. I mean, I don't know the statistics for how many geniuses you can have in one family, but it just keeps happening for us!

We picked him up from school on way home from airport. I sat in the backseat with him. He just kept staring at me, like, "Who is this strange lady they put in the backseat with me?" He was looking at me so intently. I really think he knew it was a new face.

So I will stay until Sunday. I miss Dave and the kids, but it is really so good to be here. Also, it is nice to get a break from the heat. I am wearing a sweater as I type this! A sweater! Those of you who live in Florida can appreciate the novelty of wearing a sweater in September!

Order Out of Chaos

The kids have too many stuffed animals. Many of them are Webkinz and since they have names, adoption certificates, and virtual counterparts, it seems really mean to just get rid of them. Anyways, all on his own, Jon spent some hours sorting and classifying his stuffed animals. How many horses does he have? 5! There are several pages to his book that he made by stapling paper together, and he explained that he chose to use the sticky notes because if he gets another frog, for example, he can just lift that piece of paper off and replace it with "frog 2." Isn't that so stinking clever of my boy???? A 100 on his spelling test for the week in the row, and now he already knows how to spell all the words for Friday today. My son is so smart. Also, a little odd. Like this weekend he asked if he could turn a q-tip into a pet. He put it in a little container and then added water and some soap to nourish it. Then he added more q-tips and said they were his q-tip family. Then Anna had to make her own q-tip family box. Then they spent yesterday and today having territorial showdowns over 2 empty boxes they brought in from the garage into our living room. There is one box that is clearly more desirable, and they have had some good fights over getting time in that box. Why do we buy toys? Seriously!

Okay... as I type, Jonathan is doing his homework. Dave is telling him his words and he has to draw a picture showing the meaning. One of his words is that. He quickly drew an arrow pointing to a circle to symbolize that. Isn't that SO smart! I mean, I have had a really looong day, but if someone asked me to draw a picture representing the word that, I don't think I would have come up with that so quickly!

Jonathan's First Spelling Test!

Jonathan was so proud of his 100% on his first spelling test ever! But then,this week,when we got the next list of words,and I started helping him study, he said, WHAT! You mean I have to do THIS AGAIN???

I barely had the heart to tell him... um,yeah, like every week until 6th grade, probably. :)

Since I was Super Speller Dork Extraordinaire, I always loved spelling tests. And now, I get to help him with his lists. But like he told me when I was helping him study last week, "I just don't understand. How can someone NOT know how to spell words like these?"

Words from Wednesday

Jonathan: Mama! Today's the twenty-two-th day of school!
(getting in the car after school, talking about how he wonders if he will ever get to be student of the week... He figures he will since it is the twenty-two-th day of school and he has never had his name written in The Book. The Book is sort of like the clips of yesteryear.)

Anna: Hold on, Mama. I just have to blog on. Let me get blogged on to my account, OK?
(playing with her Leapster, and wanting to show me one of her new (virtual) pet poodles)

Jonathan: Um..., that's what I usually say to Daddy.
(I fell and hurt my right hand last week, and I have it in a brace off and on, and I was holding a Gatorade bottle out to Jon. I asked him, here Buddy, can you open this for me?)

**Speaking of Buddy, every once in a while, like on Wednesday, I absentmindedly call Anna "Buddy." She invariably replies: Who is Buddy? I am NOT Buddy. Bubba is Buddy.**

Anna

"Yesterday we went to music class and Pastor Tim showed us a lot of instruments. We learned about the different instrument families. There is the drum family, the strings family, the metal family. He showed us a clarinet. There was a trumpet, which was metal but like golden."
(referring to her music class at preschool)

"My nose kept dropping."
(referring to her stuffed up nose)

"Mama, there is only one month left in August!"
(referring to the end of the month August)

"Well that's because you wore flip flops to school instead of sneakers! You're ALWAYS supposed to wear sneakers to school."
(referring to my tripping over stairs and falling at school; she wasn't exactly sympathetic)

"I wish I had a ladder up to God so I could see him. But I could never have a ladder THAT tall. Besides how could you even find him? Where would you even look, North? South? Cause there's clouds EVERYWHERE! Ok... let me get this straight. God has a REALLY big house to fit all the died people. So we are looking for a really big cloud. That might be his house."
(in car today, looking out the windows at the sky)