Still nothing

The aircard internet connection we ordered didn't work out so we're still witout internet or rather I'm without internet. Buddy still has internet at work and the internet connection works outside at night but only sporadically during the day. I've been affected by this more so. Someday we'll get a connection again and I can post regularly.

Buddy left for West Virginia yesterday and will be back on Friday. On Sunday he flies to Syracuse. I'm getting left behind in our summer travel plans. I haven't been anywhere. Part of that is because I'm the researcher and without the internet I can't really find a place for us to go. The other part is that Buddy has been gone quite a bit. We can't go anywhere this weekend since he'll be between travel. Last weekend he was sick and the weekend before that was too hot. I have been able to do a bit of sewing and reading though since I can't be online. I'll post some pictures when I can.

A few days ago Bohdin decided to finish his workbook that Paul bought for him. It required him to circle the pictures on the page that began with a certain letter sound. I was surprised that he was able to do this. He would just say "mmm moon yes" or "mmm ball no". Now I have to find him some new workbooks. When I get internet time again that is one of the first things I'll look into.

Bohdin is also doing better with simple math. He can only do it in a practical sense. If I asked him what 4-2 equals he wouldn't know. When we were making banana bread together yesterday he knew that after we put in 2 of the 4 cups of flour we needed 2 more. That's the kind of math he is capable of but I think it's important. When I was substituting the fourth graders would look at word math problems like they were written in Chinese.

Bohdin won't be going to preschool this year or probably ever. It's a very competitive market out here and Bohdin wouldn't interview well. Not only that I don't want to shell out $10,000. It's insanely expensive here. There are some free or low cost ones but we don't qualify. I may get together with some other moms and do a homeschool preschool type of thing. I've mentioned to a few people that Buddy wants to homeschool Bohdin. I'm pretty much on board with this idea. If that were the case we would start him with a kindergarten curriculum next fall when he's almost 5. If he went to a regular public school he would have to wait another year. Homeschooling is not an easy decision to make or it doesn't feel that way to me. I don't know if Bohdin would ever be able to make the switch to a regular school if we start on this path. He's not going to be tall and he doesn't have an outgoing personality. I think he would have a hard time fitting in. School can be tons of fun if you're popular but if you don't fit in then school can be lonely or even hell.

My mom asked the other day if Nyla is just as curious as Bohdin was at this age. I said yes but in a different way. When I talked to Buddy about it later he said that Bohdin wanted to know what things are while Nyla wants to know how things work. I'm not sure I 100% agree with this assessment. I know that Nyla is interested in what other people are interested in. She studies human behavior. When we were at the playground the other day Nyla walked over to the group of 5-8 year olds who had congregated on some of the play equipment. She just put herself in the middle of all of them. Later she tried to recreate some of things they had done. She was very mad at me that I wouldn't let her climb down the chain. Bohdin was off playing by himself on a different play structure. He prefers to stay away from large groups.

All of Nyla's copying comes with the comprehension of a one year old. She throws things in the toilet that don't belong. She throws things in the trash that don't belong. She is getting better at turning the pages of a book without ripping them. She has eaten everything she is not old enough to have yet. She won't drink out a sippy cup, she prefers Bohdin's sport bottle. In some ways she's less of a baby than Bohdin since he didn't have an older sibling to learn from. In other ways she's a typical toddler. She drops food from her chair. She is fascinated by taking things out. I had forgotten what a messy age this is. I spend an enormous amount of time cleaning and I can't keep up.

Nyla is awake now so I'll go outside and see if I can get a connection and post this message.

Quick

The pictures didn't upload the other day because I was at the library and the connection wasn't good enough. Hopefully this works. We should be getting our new internet connection today.

Buddy and Bohdin were sick this weekend and now Nyla is sick. The weather is really nice today and Bohdin has been cooped up for the past few days so we have to take advantage of it. It's one day only.

 
 
 
 

Sandy Point State Park

Bohdin has been asking to go back to the beach ever since we went to Virginia Beach. Although the Chesapeake Bay is quite close it doesn't have a beach. The beaches on the Atlantic Ocean in Maryland and Delaware are about 3 hours away. I did discover a state park in Annapolis that had a beach. The charge was $5 per person which I thought was pretty high for the short time we would be there. Yesterday was a beautiful day and I thought we would give it a try. It turns out that children are free so it only cost $5 to get in. It's only 10 minutes past the mall so the drive wasn't too bad for the area. When Buddy saw the pictures he said it looked like they dumped construction grade sand and made a beach. I felt the same way. The beach looks completely artificial. The sand is very coarse. Bohdin liked it okay but not as much as Virginia Beach. One of the things he didn't like was all of the jellyfish in the water. Some boys caught one five feet in front of us. We were five feet from the water. Those suckers were coming practically on shore. Nyla didn't like it there at all at first but she warmed up to it a bit. Bohdin enjoyed it. We might try to go later in the day sometime when the sun isn't so high. Nyla refuses to wear a hat and I was worried about her burning.

On the drive home, I glanced back in the mirror to see something white on Nyla's hand. She's going through that terrible gagging herself phase so I thought maybe she just had some spit up. I asked Bohdin about it and he said it was the sunscreen. I left it in her reach and she had opened it up. When I asked him if she had made a big mess he glanced over and started laughing. Not a good sign. She did make a mess back there.

Bohdin was naked at dinner (slept in bathing suit, took off after nap but not replaced). I was in the kitchen working on the next pizza to go in the oven and glanced over when he started talking. He said something about tickling a penis. I went over to talk to him about his penis because I want him to know that nobody should touch it but him. I was asking him questions and he finally said that it is a game that you play with one person.

 

 

 

 

Sneaky

We have to get internet soon because lugging Bohdin, Nyla, and a computer outside is not fun. I can't research our options without internet access. How do people live without internet?

I put Nyla to sleep after we came back from Costco yesterday. Bohdin almost always watches tv while I do this. I went in to check on him and he was watching an infomercial instead of Super Why. He was really excited about it and was telling me that the show was about knives. Bohdin's brain was working faster than his mouth but it sounded like they had a lot of other knives and cutting devices in a cardboard box. I'm going to be deleting most of the channels from that tv today including Nickelodeon. Buddy saw a program on it this weekend that he didn't like so we'll just cut it out. The shows on PBS are much better.

After Nyla woke up I made dinner. Bohdin hardly ate anything. As we were getting ready to go to National Night Out on post I asked Bohdin if he ate anything while Nyla was sleeping. He frequently gets snacks for himself so it's not unusual. He mumbled something and ran into the bedroom. I walked out of the room and came back to see him putting something into the freezer. I tried to look but he told me he didn't want me to see. It was the frozen orange juice concentrate. I'm glad he remembered to put it away. His favorite snack is nuts. This morning he pulled green beans from the fridge for a snack.

We went to National Night Out on post and it was okay. Bohdin hadn't taken a nap so he was more prone to crying. He thought about trying the bouncy house but wanted Nyla to do it with him. She's still a tad young I think. Suddenly a bunch of kids swarmed the place and Bohdin didn't want to do it anymore. We thought we might give it a try later but it didn't work out. We did get a few freebies but nothing interesting. Bohdin, of course, didn't want to see any of the equipment set up either. They had a police car and fire truck and some Army vehicles that the kids could explore. If we go back next year it will be quite a bit different since Nyla will probably be interested and Bohdin can feel more secure with her presence.

 

 

Unpacking

Nyla will be a Broncos fan until she says otherwise
 

Playing in the laundry basket
 

The flights are so overbooked I've given up. When a flight looks promising, the 50 people who paid to be on an earlier flight but didn't make up inevitably get the seat. There is no room for nonpaying customers flying to Denver. Perhaps we'll try again in September.

Yesterday morning when Nyla woke up she farted. Bohdin thought this was funny so he farted. Nyla farted again. I'm glad Bohdin didn't pee his pants from laughing so hard. It must be something on the Y chromosome. I'm a girl so I just don't get it.

Our new washing machine arrived yesterday. Our landlady took delivery while I was out at the library. As a result, she locked up afterwards. We have two locks on our door requiring two different keys. I have one of the keys. We get back a little late for Nyla's nap with a bag full of cold groceries and stand outside the door. I called Buddy hoping he would have the other key. He had called earlier and left me a message to check my messages before I got home since I would be locked out. Well too late for me. He met me halfway and handed me the key. Nyla almost fell asleep in the car but woke up completely when I took her out. She didn't go to sleep until 7:30 pm. She was so tired and grouchy. Bohdin didn't take a nap either so he was more emotional than usual.

I'm way behind on library books. I can't really remember some of these. We get several books from the library and read them all once. Then he'll ask for the ones he likes over and over and over again. I've read How to Catch and Elephant about 100 times now.
Cowboy bunnies by Christine Loomis
Busy, busy mouse by Virginia Kroll
Pirates ahoy! / Hilary McKay - Bohdin loved this book about two little boys engaging in imaginative play in their grandma's backyard. The illustrations show what is really there but the words describe it from the boys' point of view. They battle lions (sunflowers) and dragons (bushes) with swords (rhubarb). At one point they stopped fighting dragons because they ran out of rhubarb swords. Bohdin said they should get some seeds and plant them so they could have more. It was a good book.
Rush hour / Christine Loomis
Pumpkin day, pumpkin night / by Anne Rockwell
Whose garden is it? / Mary Ann Hoberman - I liked this book better than Bohdin. It showed all of the things that help to create a garden from the seeds and the sun to the worms.
I'm Not Cute by - Okay book
How to Catch an Elephant by - Bohdin loves this book and so do I. It is a whimsical tale of a little girl catching an elephant. It's a fun read and unlike many books out there which try to teach lessons or relate to kids. This book is just plain fun. I would recommend this one. It doesn't have any quotation marks so no need to change voices.
I Want A Pet by Lauren Child - okay book
Swimmy by Leo Lionni - Bohdin liked this book okay about a black fish who goes exploring and comes up with an idea to help other small fish work together.
The Conquerors by David McKee - I liked this book but the message was way over Bohdin's head. Maybe when he's in elementary shcool.
Baby Bear's Chrairs by Jane Yolen - Unremarkable book. I think we've only read it once.
Pigs, Pigs, Pigs! by Leslea Newman - Another unremarkable book.
Dig! by Andrea Zimmerman - Bohdin really enjoyed this one. It reminds me a lot of the trash book by the same author which Bohdin also loved.
This is the Pumpkin by Abby Levine - highly repetitive Halloween book. The kind of book that repeats what was on the previous page so by the end you've read the beginning of the book 10 times. I cringed when Bohdin would request this one.
If the Dinosaurs Came Back by Bernard Most - Bohdin isn't really into dinosaurs
Pig On A Swing by Jenny Nimmo - Bohdin liked this book about a boy imagining different animals to play with at an empty playground.

Standing by

Well we're still in Maryland. It's a tough season to get a standby ticket to Denver. I could go anywhere else. I'm still hopeful and packed. We'll see what happens.

On Friday, Buddy and I went to the housing office on post. There are two different housing types. One is a renovated ranch. There are quite a few of those. There are also a handful of new beautiful houses. We were able to see briefly into the nice one. It's luck of the draw what's available when your name comes up. The wait list is 30-45 days. We had assumed that our landlords would let us out of the lease easily but that is not the case. We'll have to see how this plays out as well.

A big storm came through on Saturday and we lost our internet connection. It still works outside but not inside. We didn't discover that until last night. I'm writing this outside with 2 kids crawling all over me. As a result this will be short.

We went to the playground twice yesterday. Nyla can be so fearless. She crawled up the stairs and went down the slide just like Bohdin. Well not just like him since I'm trying to make her go down backwards and she sort of wants to walk down it. She also tries to climb back up the slide afterwards.

Typing is too hard with two kids on top of me so that's it for now. Hopefully the next post will be from Colorado. I do want to add that Bohdin and Nyla have been napping well since Friday so that's going well.

Making Lemonade

Wishing the kids to sleep wasn't working out so we did other activities. I broke down and let Bohdin make that box cake mix I had bought last week. He mixed the batter and spooned it into the mini muffin molds. Afterwards I wet the tops with lemon juice and he dipped it in the sprinkles. He loved them.

 

We also did a finger painting project of fishes. Bohdin drew the fish bodies and I drew the fin. We all helped to finger paint them.
 

Nyla was already messy so we had leftover spaghetti and meatballs before taking a bath.
 

Bohdin wanted me to take a picture of him.
 

Buddy talked to our landlord last night and did a great job talking to him. I'm glad it wasn't me. Our previous neighbors had written a letter to the homeowner's association previously. Writing a letter to our landlord was step 2. Step 3 is a fine. The entire thing is he said/ she said. They can't prove Bohdin is running around at 10pm everynight and I can't really prove that he's not. These people don't strike me as very nice and they don't seem the type to care that they are lying. After discussing it last night we are going to try to find another place to live. We'll be out several hundred a month but we won't have to walk on eggshells. It's too stressful to live thinking that the next dropped toy or fall will get you fined or evicted. Since Nyla is not going to take a nap right now (we're going to have to rework the nap schedule) we are going to meet Buddy on post and look at our options there.

The other day in the car Bohdin was playing with a ball. It went over to Nyla's side and she gladly started playing with it. Bohdin wanted it back so asked Nyla for the ball and extended his hand. I heard from the backseat "Not your hand. The ball." I couldn't help but chuckle. Nyla is used to Bohdin handing her things in the backseat and automatically stretched out her hand to get what he was giving.

When Nyla is playing with something Bohdin wants he will grab it from her but then replace it with another toy. We were on the bed the other day and Nyla grabbed the remote out of my hand and handed me a lotion bottle. That wasn't a fair trade. She has a knack for turning it to one of Bohdin's shows.