an update

since I haven't posted in forever...a post to try to at least get some things down before I forget them.

• Ben says "are you?" instead of "where are you?" I love the existentialist quirkiness of it.
• Kaia has been taking excellent care of her friend Ben's rats for the past week. They are cute, but MY GOD THE STINK!
• Ben has been saying "up! down!" and "1!2!" and "lay down!" and all sorts of other concept type things. He also loves "GO AWAY!"
• Kaia is moving out of the constantly morose phase! She is frequently cheerful, and has even said "yes, mom" and not argued a few times!
• Ben is in a hitting phase. I have not found a punishment that does not make his laugh.
• Kaia lost 3/4 of the stuff in her room. Though I said I would slowly give it back, she has not seemed to miss any of it, except her art stuff, and her room has stayed looking like a room, rather than a tornado site.
• Ben is doing awesome in his mattress-on-the-floor bed. Even when he protests sleeping, he stays in bed.
• Kaia just got her first legos. (damn, they're expensive!) She has spent several hours already building things, and they are a toy I will happily spend money on in the future.
• Both kids slept with us last night to take advantage of our one fan. I love having my whole family in the same room, all snuggily together. Our king size bed helps make it a happy thing, and not a get-your-elbow-out-of-my-ribs thing.
• Mike has next week off, and we are staying home! We will be going to parks and such, but mostly relaxing and spending time together. I am going to try to talk him into severely cutting our computer time that week.
• Kaia's reading skills are through the roof. Except for an occasionally mispronounced word, you'd never know she was only 8 if you heard her read. There are adults who consider themselves educated who can't read as well.
• Ben also loves to read. We'll sit in the car waiting for Mike after work, and we'll all be looking at books. I love it.
• Kaia starts school in a few weeks with her new teacher. She's unhappy about it, and I hope that her new teacher is better than anticipated.
• Ben knows his colors if you have him show you "red", etc, but not if you say "what color is this?" He can show you red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple (sometimes). He still thinks anything other than "one" is "two".
• Kaia learned how to do the "twist" the other day, as well as the arm motions for "YMCA". She's very proud, and will do them for you if you ask. or even if you don't!