January in Michigan and it’s 45 degrees!

skoral    Family Life     the kids, weather

I cannot believe the nice weather we’re having this winter. Part of me is thinking that we’re going to pay for it later on, but the kids are enjoying it!

Alex is riding his new scooter he got for Christmas as I write this post. It’s really cool cause it has a skid plate that makes sparks as you brake!

Andrew is up to his favorite outdoor past time of hunting for worms, and Izzy is just trying to keep up with her older siblings.

45 in Michigan!

Christmas Fail

skoral    Family Life     christmas, photography

So we get the kids loaded up in the car and we head over to mom and dads house. The 15 minute car ride was no problem, and it was perfect timing because when we got there, the relatives were pulling in just as we were.

I helped unload the car that full of presents, and everyone got situated. Mom was making lunch and everyone was in good spirits.

Until…

Ji called me from the living room, not so much in a panic, but 1 of discovery. Apparently somehow for cameras have been left at our house. In there she was a photographer with no cameras! What was I to do, but offer to run home and grab the cameras for her. I had been the one who was responsible for breaking out all the bags in stuff that we were going to take, and somehow I had forgotton to bring her cameras. So here I am running home grabbing. the cameras, and I am reminded:

When you really love somebody, there isn’t much that you wouldn’t do for them.

Christmas Round 2

skoral    Family Life     christmas, family

Its Christmas all over again at the parents! The Extended family coming in to town.

Kids are excited and were getting ready to head over there. Before heading over, Ji set up the karoke app. Musical Mayhem ensued!

The First School Open House of Horrors!

skoral    Family Life    

My Son's 1st Grade Classroom

First of all, there was no ‘open’ about it. The room must have 95 to 100 degrees, and about 25 parents, exhausted from work, stinking up the room with good ‘ole corporate B.O. (yeah, I fall into that category)!

The school was having a book sale in the library, so naturally, my son wanted to go check out the books. On one table, there were the tried and true classics… Charlotte’s web, The Boxcar Children, Nancy Drew and Sherlock Holmes. To a true bookworm’s shock, a violation so horrific that it surely would have caused humpty dumpty to fall in shock greeted me…

A Captian Underpants book tossed haphazardly on the mountain of classic fairytails, novels and Caldecott award winners, no doubt by an irritated parent resisting their child’s impulsive buying habits.

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Family Story Night at the Library… FAIL

skoral    Family Life     bill peet, library, reading

There cannot be anything worse than expecting a quiet, child-lulling story time at the library but walking in to a mosh pit of four year-old ‘screamers’ with parents in a twisted Stephen King-ish version of romper room! It is even worse when you and your boys are exhausted from a long day of learning and just not up to the energy required of such an event.

Amidst the chaos of crying, screaming and general discord, my boys and I sat, motionless, just observing it all. It really was too much, from singing “This old man” to “5 little monkeys” to doing jumping jacks to get the blood flowing (of which we had no part in), there was just too much activity for the boys to handle. Right at the point where everyone was running in circles (like cheetahs), Andrew decided he’d had enough and just keeled over and curled up in the fetal position to go to sleep. Alex was staring off into the middle ground, a kind of deer-in-the-headlights look that he makes when he’s too tired to think. I suggested that we go over to the kids section and play games on the computers for awhile. Both the boys slowly got up and we left this seventh circle of hell.

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