Home School Pre-school

That's what Allie calls it. A few months ago we got together with two other girls her age and decided to have pre-school at home with them. We had a good thing going on our own, but I didn't mind trading off with the other moms and sending her out the door a few days a week too.
Allie has loved it.
This cute picture is from the day they worked on "H" and did a hair theme.


Last week when it was at our house we had the letter "I" and I made them icee's in our little blender thing. I guess they were pretty good and they were totally excited by the whole process of it. One of the girls, Maryn, could hardly contain her enthusiasm and said "Now you might be our new favorite teacher instead of Hannah's mom!"
I thought that was pretty funny and if I can be the favorite just by making a snow cone...come on over!

Jake's School Christmas Program

I attended my first school program for Jake. I was so excited to go see him singing in his cute little reindeer shirt. They combined with the other kindergarten class too, so there was quite a crowd of spectators. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't what I expected. First of all, I was so hot that I thought I would melt right there on the spot.
Second, they sang forever! I can't believe how many songs those kids learned. I was filming it at first because it was just so cute. Then I started to get bored and I couldn't imagine ever turning on this video and watching it without being even more bored, so I put away the camera.

Mike was able to come too and he wrestled a bored Allie while I filmed. It was nice. We were surprised that they were allowed to do songs about Jesus. Mike talked to the teacher after and she said that in the rules it says you can do religious songs if they don't take up more than 20 percent of the program. I thought that was interesting.

Anyway, Jake's favorite songs were "Jingle Bells" (of course), "Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer", and "I'm Getting Nothing for Christmas". They got to use kazoos during Rudolf, and that was the talk of the week. When they were done with the kazoo song, they put all the kazoos back in a basket and promised they would get them after the program. I was a little grossed out thinking that they would just get a kazoo back, no matter who had used it. But found out later that they had identifying stickers on each kazoo:)
They also had a bell to ring during "Jingle Bells". So life at home, after Jake returned with the kazoo and the bell, was awesome for a few days:)

(That's Allie dancing to the lovely music of the kazoo)

Jake is a pretty cute little guy. He comes home from school talking about the things that he has learned (good things from school...not so many good things from other kids). It always makes me laugh, and sometimes I roll my eyes, when he says "I know" to something I am trying to teach him. He is smart, but sometimes he can be a "know it all" too:)

I wanted to write down a few of the things we have talked about lately.


Baby talk...

Me: "What do you think this baby will look like? Will he look like you or Allie?"

Jake: "He's a boy, so he'll look more like me."

Me: "Do you think he'll have brown or blond hair?"

Jake: "He'll have brown hair because more people in the world have dark hair than blond hair."

We read a book the other day about love and at the end they say, "I love you all the way to the moon". Jake and I were saying how much we loved each other and I said that I loved him to the moon and back, then he told me he loved me to Mars and back. I continued it with love from Pluto and back. I can't even repeat where he went from there because it was all this talk about other galaxies and stuff that only the people who made the nerd space movies he watches would understand.
We couldn't really end the conversation because there was no way I could refute that he had just told me that he loved me the biggest distance :)

We also ran into a bit of an outer space problem this year on his birthday.
I got him a set of glow in the dark planets to hang from the ceiling. I failed to notice that they hadn't made the planets correctly. For one thing, the sizes weren't right according to his space movie. Some were too big in proportion to the other planets. Then they didn't get things quite right in color. Earth and Mars were colored in a way that you could tell what they were, and Saturn had the appropriate ring, but heaven forbid...they left the great red spot off of Jupiter. It is his favorite planet, so I can understand his disappointment.
We spent way longer than I would have liked trying to position the planets on his ceiling according to where they should be in the solar system. That's where all the stress came in with identifying planets that didn't look quite like they should. There was one that I kept was insisting was the sun, but Jake told me it couldn't be because the pack only had 9 in it so it had to be one of the planets...he insisted that one was Jupiter (minus the red spot).
In the end, the putty they included in the kit failed to hold up the perfectly placed planets and I woke up to a sad boy at 4:30 in the morning who couldn't get Pluto to hang back up after it fell down and woke him up. Curse those planets!

Anyway, I love this boy and his fun personality. He is getting more and more responsible every day. He still fights with Allie as much as ever, but he is also really good to help her out when she needs it.

I love the conversations we have and the way his mind works. He's a fun boy to have around.

More Names

Allie and I were driving around in the car the other day and we came to talk about names for the baby. She was suggesting her favorite again (Sherman) and I was turning it down...again.
She reminded me that Jake really likes the name Tanner and then suggested that we name another baby Jake since she likes that name so much and obviously I do too.
Then she was quiet for a minute and said "Why do you think Dr. Strebel's mom and dad named him Dr. Strebel. That's a weird name."
This turned into a 20 minute discussion on what is a first name, a last name, and what is a title. These things are surprisingly hard for a 4 year old mind to master and she was left with many questions. She was worried that Jake was a Schwab and she wasn't. For some reason, she can pronounce "Schwab" when it accompanies Jake's name. But when she tries to say her full name, it comes out as "Schwart". So she thinks she has a different last name.
Then it was a whole new can of worms when she asked me why my name used to be Johnson and now it's Schwab.
Anyway, I was grateful when we reached our destination because sometimes I just get tired of explaining stuff.

Later, we were driving to dance and we had Allie's friend Lily in the car. She has a great grandma that they call Grandma Chicken. They also call one of her grandpas "Bugs". The conversation between the two girls was hillarious...
Allie: "Why do they call him Bugs? Does he like bugs a lot?"
Lily: (laughing) "No, we just call him Bugs"
Allie: "We once had a frog that we called Bugs (not true...we had a Bob the frog) but he died and went to frog heaven"
Lily: (laughing) "Now the frog eats bugs in heaven? Maybe there are bugs in frog heaven"

The conversation about Grandma Chicken was similar. The laughing was the part I loved. I love to hear kids laughing over silly things that don't involve annoying sounds or potty talk.

Exterior Illumination

I think Grizz has a little inner alarm bell that goes off when he senses Christmas light distress. The kids had been asking me to get the outdoor lights up for days. I think it has become a must around our house because it simply wasn't an option to skip it this year. Anyway, Mike was out of town and the day was somewhat warm (although this blasted rain hasn't let up till the last of our beautiful snow has been turned to icy yuck), so we decided to get going on the project.

I think I had time to get the bag of lights out and start wrapping the pole when Grizz was here with his ladder and his years of experience. We had beautiful lights, complete with a timer, in no time at all.

The kids were eager to "help". As it was a dress up day at our house, (what day isn't a dress up day with Allie?) Allie was too cold to stay out and opted to sit and direct from the window sill.


Jake was a great clip boy. He found every possible way to get in the way and yet be helpful at the same time.

I just stood there and held the string of lights. Every once in a while I would suggest that things didn't have to be so perfect, but that just won't do for the Christmas light guy.

He made sure each light was pointing in the same direction and replaced all the bulbs that burned out last year. He has extension cords and timers, ladders and knowledge. I benefited from all of it. Everyone should have a Grizz in their neighborhood. He sure comes in handy around here. Thanks Steve! I hope you enjoy the glow coming from our house!

Late birthday stuff

I thought I'd add some pictures from Jake's birthday. I think he had a great day.
It started out healthy with his favorite cereal Cinnamon Toast Crunch. His chair was decorated too...long live Johnson family traditions :)


Then he was off to school where his embarrassing mom came and made him pose with his teacher and in front of his box.

We also got to do the traditional lunch date with our friend Aubrey. All of us tried to talk him out of A&W, but that's what he wanted.

Then it was home to make the cake. It's a good thing that 6 year old boys are so easy to please. To save you from wondering just what this is, it's a Lego Star Wars cake. Mike and Jake have been playing Lego Star Wars lately, so suddenly we have a lot of Star Wars talk at our house. So naturally, his cake should be this cool...


Check out the professional frosting job. Oh well, it tasted good.

Grandma Johnson was able to come up for dinner and gifts. She gave Jake a Hot wheels toy that has bought me many moments of quiet bliss.

I think Jake had a great day. I sure do love him and am so glad to be his momma.

Happy birthday boy! I hope you have many great birthdays to come.

More Pictures

I took the kids out with me on a photo shoot because Mike was out of town. I brought their Leapsters and things would have been great, but Jake's batteries died within a few minutes...

Oh well, the people were understanding.

Anyway, I anticipated having time to take my kids pictures so I got them dressed up cute. We were losing light fast, but I still feel like I got some that I will love forever.
I think this was the first time I have looked through the lens and actually "looked" at Jake and Allie the way I look at other people I take pictures of. They are getting so old! And they are also really cute. They are cute because they are my kids and I love them, but they really are cute. I dare you to argue.

6!

The boy is 6! I can hardly believe it. The days are long but the years are short. It seems like yesterday that we went into the hospital to have Jake, but I guess that was 6 years ago.
I went into labor early with Jake and they held it off for as long as they could (two weeks). When my blood pressure went up and the contractions still weren't stopping, they said to come in and have him. He was breech so I had my first c-section. I remember driving to the hospital and talking to Mike about names. We had narrowed things down to Benjamin Robert when Mike said "what do you think about Jacob?" I loved it. So when he was born at 7:00 that night, we named him Jacob Robert (after a pretty cool guy I know:)
Jake was a really good baby. We didn't really have to change our lives much at all. We took him to movies with us, out to dinner, over to friend's houses, anywhere we went, he came with us.
I continued to work a few nights a week and Mike took care of him. That's where the countless hours of couch time came in. That boy learned to snooze anywhere, just like his dad.
Life was great with baby Jake. We love that boy.
Now he is in the stage where he likes to make silly noises and poke us when we aren't looking. He torments Allie and wants to eat candy 24 hours a day. He is also very kind and loving. He still snuggles me daily and gives great hugs before he leaves for school. He helps Allie when she can't get something done that is frustrating her. He plays hours of "kitty" as the cat on the leash for Allie because that's her favorite game. He is learning to read and has an incredible capacity for learning science and math.
He has great neighborhood friends and has established a fun pattern of playing outside through every season.
It has been fun to see him change and grow. I love him more than I would have ever thought possible. Happy birthday boy!