Growing Everyday

A few months ago, our church asked for donations of books. That donation process got me thinking about what our bookshelf and books say about us and what we enjoy reading. Our bookshelf is eclectic to say the least. The top picture is of our bookshelf and if you really look at it you see anything from Dr. Seuss to Harry Potter to Radioisotopes to Chronicles of Narnia. I have a whole shelf full of my comfort reads (the books I go to when I just need a break from real life.) Those comfort read include romance, urban fantasy, and historical. We donated 60 children’s books to the church and I still have three shelves full of books for the kids and that doesn’t include the box of books from my childhood that is hiding in the closet.

You might say my bookshelf shows that I have a tiny addiction to books. I read almost anything I can get my hands on. And gradually, I am passing this addiction onto my children. Beka has discovered Bunnicula by James Howe and Jared loves Captain Underpants. For the most part, I don’t care what the kids are reading as long as it is kid-appropriate. I don’t really care for some of the humor in Captain Underpants, but that is the main reason why Jared likes it. And he is reading and enjoying it! I never want Beka and Jared to feel like reading is something to be suffered through. I want them to anticipate getting to read something.

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I have started letting Beka and Jared invite friends over every Friday after school. There is no homework to do and I think everyone needs to blow off a little steam after sitting quietly in school all week. It is like a weekly reward for good behavior. Anyway, the kids seem to really enjoy it and some of them can’t wait for Friday. The plus for mom is once all activites are out everyone pretty much entertains themselves for 2 hours.

Each week I try to make a goody after-school snack for everyone. Beka requested what we call kid’s sushi one week. It looks pretty cool and tastes really good, but I think Andrew and I ate more of them than the kids.

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We took a family walk in the woods last weekend. Well, only sort of to the kids because the paths were paved and that doesn’t really count in their minds. I got some cute pictures of everyone and the kids and dog were tired afterwards.

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Sometimes the things that are utterly boring at home can become exciting and entertaining again if you just do it somewhere else. Beka and Jared are getting bored with drawing and the playground. So I decided to take art stuff over to the playground trying to make it more exciting. It worked for about 30 minutes and that was totally worth it.

We have also taken some old games we used to play and added new twists to them. Andrew and Beka will play “follow the leader”. The change is Andrew will be on his ripstik and Beka will be on her bike. Andrew and I have taught the kids how to play four square. I had to google the rules to make sure I remembered how to play, but it was worth it.

It is a challenging some days to keep my little sponges engaged in something other than the TV, but we try.

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Beka’s teacher sent home a printout on Friday describing an activity called Bugfest that was happening at one of the Indy parks over the weekend. Of course, my children were eager to be a part of anything having to do with bugs. Now, Andrew and I thought this would be a smallish event. We were completely and utterly wrong. There were parents and kids everywhere. First, we went to the check-in where both kids were handed a card to keep track of the stations they visited. There were probably 15-20 stations to visit all dealing in some way with bugs. We were able to see monarch caterpillars and monarch butterflies, bees and beekeepers, an entomologist, and worms. The kids really enjoyed watch the fly fisherman make their own flies. Then we come to the "grossome" part of the day. The Bugfest included a bug cafe where the children and Andrew tried bacon/cheddar crickets, salt/vinegar crickets, sour cream crickets, and chocolate covered crickets. They also had these silkworm things that you could eat. Apparently, those tasted the worst.

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We spent alot of time doing nothing in August partly because mom is lazy and partly because school started and that cut into fun time a bit. So I decided to end the month with picture spam. We took Jared to a skatepark for the first time to play on his skateboard. He was intimidated by all the big kids but he did okay. That same day Beka brought her bike to the park and rode all over. Then both kids decided to climb and tree.

I tried one afternoon to get some posed brother/sister pictures. That didn’t work out so well. Jared hates to smile for pictures and if I have Beka pose, her smile looks so fake. Anyway, it was fun for me to play photographer for awhile.

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I took pictures the last time we went swimming. We only made it about 30 minutes because it was cold. Beka and Jared really do love to swim though. It is even better when Daddy is there to play with them.

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We took a random drive before school started to Falls Park. There are hiking trails that we walked and a mountain bike course. Also, of course, there are waterfalls. It was a very pretty park, and you could tell many people visit it often.

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Along with Grandma and Grandpa Westberg, we took a day trip to Squire Boone’s Caverns. Squire Boone is the brother of Daniel Boone. There is a whole little kitschy town set up with a place to mine rocks, a bakery, and even a candy shop. To get to the cave you have to walk down a spiral staircase consisting of 73 steps. Now, it is dark and damp going down these stairs. The kids were very brave and with a little coaxing from Mom and Dad made it down into the cave. The cave was amazing. There was an underground waterfall that we walked over, rim dams, soda straws, and so many other formations. It was really worth the drive to see the caves.

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Beka and Jared have inherited a love of Fishing from their Grandpa Westberg. Grandpa and Grandma Westberg bought them their first rod and reel and will forever be their heroes because of it. Jared and Beka just love to go to the pond and fish. The pond in the neighborhood is wonderful for kids fishing. There are a lot of hungry little fish, so you never have a long wait between casting and pulling out a fish. Andrew gets run ragged putting worms on the hooks and taking fish off the hooks. I can put the worms on but I still haven’t figured out how to get the fish off. To give Andrew a bit of a break and to spend sometime together, Grandpa and Grandma came over to fish with us. I think a good time was had by all.

We caught a glimpse of a turtle while we were out there.

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