Fun day trip #1

Today Dan and I took the boys to the Pittsburgh Children's Museum. It's so nice going there on a weekday, because it isn't so crowded. Today was my third time there, and I saw things I hadn't seen before. Last time we were there, Sam was just a few weeks old and did nothing but sit in the stroller the whole time. Today he crawled all around the museum, exploring everything! How fun! We just had a nice, relaxing time.
I made an interesting observation. For the four hours we were there, I didn't see one child misbehaving. There's just so much for them to do! I wonder how often kids act out because they are bored. I know Isaiah certainly does at home, but I have a hard time coming up with things to keep him busy.
Anyway, here are some photos from the day.

Best day in a while

Any day I get to spend a lot of time with Dan is a great day. My mom always comes over on Tuesdays to help with the boys. So yesterday she watched Sam while Dan and I took Isaiah to preschool. Isaiah was so excited to have both of us walk him to his classroom! Then we went to Sheetz and got some coffee, etc for breakfast. We headed over to church and spent the next two hours packing up his books and other things from his desk. We filled up 27 boxes with books, and then we ran out of boxes. We went together to pick Isaiah up from school. Again, Isaiah was thrilled to see both of us.

After lunch with the family, I left to teach band and piano lessons. Then Dan and I went out to dinner ALONE, which was such a treat. Just to have adult conversations without kids whining and not eating their food (Isaiah!) or throwing food on the floor or smashing it in their hair(Samuel!) was so wonderful. They're cute, but sometimes you just have to get away.

It has been so nice to have Dan around this week. I know in my head that his job at the Lighthouse will mean a lot of changes for our family, but I haven't totally accepted it yet. (I'm really good at being in denial...) I think the biggest change will be the predictability factor. For the last several years we have had fairly regular weekly schedules. We're not really sure what it will be like once Dan changes jobs.

But for this week and a half, we're just appreciating the family time we have together.

Quote of the day

During a piano lesson today, my ten-year-old student sat down to play a song that had the directions "Fast and Fun" at the beginning. She said, "Well, I didn't play it fast, but I sure had fun!"

Ridiculous!

On our way to see my grandma, we drove right past Thiel College. Right on the front lawn, there was a see-saw-a-thon. I'm not sure what they were raising money for, but it certainly was unusual. What impressed me the most was the way they had attached recliners to the see-saw.

Double trouble

On Friday, I was packing to go to my aunt's house for the night (see post below), so the boys and I were all upstairs. Sam and Isaiah were playing in Sam's room, and I had shut the door so Sam couldn't get near the stairs. I was packing our clothes, going between the other bedrooms, and I could hear the boys playing nicely, laughing and giggling. So I wasn't worried about them. They were only alone in there for about 10 or 15 minutes.

When I went into the room, I was in utter shock! The ENTIRE CONTENTS of Samuel's closet were pulled into the middle of his bedroom floor! Clearly, Sam was not capable of doing all that destruction by himself, because he couldn't reach all the shelves. Isaiah would not have thought of taking stuff out of the closet, because he wouldn't have any interest in baby clothes, blankets, old maternity clothes, etc.

What I thought happened was that Sam crawled in there and started pulling cloth burp diapers, various crib sheets and blankets, etc off the lower shelves. Isaiah must have thought that looked fun and joined in, totally devastating the closet. The story I got from Isaiah later confirmed my thoughts.

This, folks, is exactly why having more than one kid is so crazy. They are more destructive together than either one of them would be on their own. Maybe 1+1=3. =)

That's not the end of the story, either. On Fridays I have a babysitter who comes over to watch the boys while I teach band. Knowing that the babysitter was coming shortly and that I didn't have time to reorganize the closet, I just had to shove everything into the closet and shut the door as best as I could. I dread opening that closet! It will be a whole morning's work just put everything back in its place!