I'm trying to be more tolerant of Christmas before Thanksgiving this year. I am not accepting it, but I am trying my hardest to tolerate it. I've already seen a Christmas countdown, listened to my lovely husband hum Christmas carols, watched a family purchase a tree, heard a Christmas song on the radio and listened as people talked about the "Black Friday" deals that were going to be in stores this year. Christmas items have been in stores since September. Yes, September. As I was looking for school supplies the boys were ogling candy canes and stockings. I think the fact that I made it to November 6th without writing a huge rant about it is a good sign that I am tolerating it just fine.

I promise you this though...if I get Merry Christmas-ed before November 27th, I'm going to lose it. I'm hanging on by a thread as it is and that would push me over the edge.

My boys have put on some serious muscle mass in the last few days.

I can still pin them on the floor though. Even muscular Spiderman can't get away from fingers that know just were all the tickle spots are.

Today was an uneventful day.

• We went to the gym.

• The boys and I did lessons. Max is working on penmanship and can write letters A-G (capital and lower case) very nicely. Russell is plugging away at 1st grade. He is reading at a 3rd grade level and blows my mind with how well he reads.

• I got the boys snow pants and spent a whopping $5.50 total. On two pairs! That is a fraction of what 1 pair would normally cost. Now we just need snow.

• The boys and I spent 3 hours at the park today with some good friends, and made some new ones while we were at it.

• We had a delicious supper of roasted chicken and beet/goat cheese salad. If I had to choose one dish to eat for the rest of my life it would be beets and goat cheese. Hands down the best food combination I have ever had.
  

• R.C. has been working busily in his studio all day, and had an appointment with the eye doctor. His eyes have improved in the last year. (That is how uneventful our day was...things like this get a bullet on the list.)
  

• It is now 9:00 pm and I am just finishing a cup of coffee. Nice.
  

What would you do if you were at the gym, minding your own business, working out to your own music, when you notice a seemingly "crazy gym person" right beside you?

You all know the type. Flailing arms. Crazy "I'm going to beat my best time" smile. Feet moving so fast they are a blur and you are just waiting for them to trip. Eyes bulging and nostrils flaring as they concentrate as hard as they can so as not to fall. After this wild spectacle that you just witness, you watch as this person gets off the machine and casually looks around and does a little stretch as if there was nothing to see there. They then pretend to not be winded (which we all know is a lie) as they walk to get a towel to wipe down the machine.

You try not to stare. You try not to snicker. It's hard though because these people put on such a show.

What would you do if you knew all along that this "crazy gym person" was your husband on the machine right beside you?

You do what any loving, supportive wife would do and you laugh. You laugh until you almost fall off your machine. I am so happy that R.C. goes to the gym with me now and I hope that there are many more days of him trying to beat his personal best. These days are great for him because he feels "tough" and "fit", and these are great days for me because I get my fill of laughter in before I hit the showers.

Guess what this month is?
National blog posting month! That's right, for the month of November bloggers are encouraged to blog a little something each and everyday. Some days will be full of great information, other days you might need to listen to me ramble about absolutely nothing (there may be more of these days than you would like). Nonetheless I am determined to make it through the entire month, even though I am off to a bad start with missing the first day.
So, lets get started....
Last weekend my mom and dad came from Wisconsin for a visit. We had a beautiful weekend and kept quite busy. Here's a run down of what we did:

• I took mom and dad and the boys to Mystic Seaport on Friday. R.C. had to teach so he was unable to join us. We spent the day in the fresh air exploring boats and all the other shipping history. We have been there at least 6 times now, but each time we find something new to explore and always have a great time.
• Friday night mom and dad stayed with the boys and R.C. and I went out for supper and coffee. We had a great time out and the boys still have not stopped talking about the fun they had that night with Grandpa and Grandma.
  
• Saturday we spent a few hours roaming the RISD art museum, and gorging on free pickles at a little sandwich place.
  
• After lunch we walked down to R.C.'s studio so mom and dad could see his new space. They were very surprised with what they found. That's all I can say here. R.C. will reveal his latest piece to everyone in his own time.
• Mom, dad and I took the boys to a Halloween party at the park later that afternoon. The boys had a great time decorating trick or treat bags, playing some games, and listening to a band play music. They were most interested in seeing their friends dressed up also and getting to play at the park.
• Later that evening the boys got to go trick or treating. Max knew exactly what he wanted (candy) and he was not going to let scary decorations slow him down. He marched right up to each door and yelled trick or treat and took seconds and thirds from some of the treat bowls, while Russell was timid and hung back if there was something he found scary near the door.
  
• We ended the night with WaterFire downtown. It was a beautiful night and very few people were out for WaterFire so we had no trouble finding a place to sit for awhile or a standing place to watch the origami man. We walked from the very last brazier almost to the first and were looking forward to a good nights sleep.
  
• Sunday morning we had to head to the airport and say goodbye. I set alarm clocks the night before, but for some reason (I have since figured out the problem, but will keep it a secret since it was a very very stupid mistake on my part.) none of the alarms went off. Luckily, Russell truly is a human alarm clock. We were wanting to wake up at 6:30 am, and at 6:34 Russell climbed down from his bed and made just enough noise to wake me (I was sleeping on his floor) and realize that we had almost slept in. Russell saved the day! :)

Helping Grandma put the finishing touches on a Halloween costume.

Nate the Great (a detective from children's books. Although everyone thought he was Sherlock Holmes. At least they knew he was a detective.) and a skeleton who didn't want to wear his mask the right way.

One more thing for the evening. You know, while I have you here and all....

If you have the "Wild and Scenic Illinois 2009" calendar, then rest assured that you were not the only person thinking they got to sleep an hour extra this morning.

Yes, that's right, there is a typo (or something) on the calendar and we were told, by said calendar, that this was the weekend we were to turn our clocks back an hour. We had been looking forward to this day for the past week. Who doesn't love an extra hour sleep? The joke was on us I guess when we woke to find the rest of the world doing what they do at 9:30 am, when we were doing 8:30 am stuff. Things just weren't adding up for my dear husband, so he googled the time change and found we had been let down by our beautiful Illinois calendar. One more week to go until we are rewarded with our extra hour of sleep.

Illinois is scenic. I get that. But wild? When I think of wild I think of a lion prowling across the savanna. Not a muskrat slinking into Bond County Lake.

(Say hello to a super long blog that I really should have condensed into a few paragraphs, but didn't want to. Bear with me folks, or just skip to the pictures...I'll never know.)

Saturday we took the bus to NYC for another fun filled day. All week we had been watching the weather and kept hoping that the rain that was predicted would magically disappear before it hit the East coast. Unfortunately, we went to sleep Friday night knowing that there was a 100% chance of heavy rain and thunderstorms for the next day.

After a bus ride, that Max slept through and Russell talked through, we were dropped off at The Met (The Metropolitan Museum of Art). As we stepped off the bus into the drizzling rain, I had one moment of "ugh! This is going to be a crummy day." That thought lasted about 5 minutes and 5 minutes only. As we stood waiting in line to get into the museum, I looked at Max with ketchup covering his face as he enjoyed a hot dog from a street vendor and I realized that rain was not going to slow us down. He was unfazed by the drops of water falling from the sky, landing on his bun and making it soggy. He was enjoying his time in NYC already, and nothing was going to keep us from having a great time.

We spent a few hours in The Met admiring the art work. The boys had been given an assignment (Yes, there was schooling involved. Not all fun and games.) to complete during out time at the museum. They were to pick out 5 pieces that they enjoyed, draw it, write who it was by and the title, and then do research on them come Monday morning. Luckily we had an excellent tour guide (aka, RC) who also gave the boys a fantastic lesson on colors, shapes, perspective, etc..

(I could not use a flash, so these are a bit blurry.)

If you look at the pictures you will notice that Max really took his drawing seriously. He was always drawing and seemed so studious. When we were getting ready to leave the museum and I took a look at their sketch books I noticed that Max had been drawing bits and pieces of things he saw, and then drew a circle around everything and put arms and legs on the circle. He then wrote his name on each drawing several times to make sure we knew who it was by. Maybe someday it too will be in The Met...

Both boys LOVED the arms and armor wing of the museum. They bounced from exhibit to exhibit pretending they were knights using the swords and armor they saw.
We then took a walk down the street to see The Guggenheim. The line was out the door, around the corner and down the street, so we admired the building from the outside and then headed to the subway to catch a train to the Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge was definitely the highlight of the day. It was drizzling, then clear, then pouring, then drizzling, then pouring, and we were all DRENCHED by the time we made it across, but we had a great time. We stopped to watch cars whizzing below us, we were able to make out the Empire State Building when there was a break in the fog, and we were also able to see The Statue of Liberty in the distance. We quoted The Newsies movie and stopped for Maxwell to take our picture, which he had been wanting to do all day. He did a good job...
By the time we got to the Brooklyn side we were soaked and needed something to eat other than granola bars, nuts and dried fruit I had stashed in my purse (makes us sound like squirrels). We walked a bit in Brooklyn and tried to imagine ourselves living there. Some of us could picture this more clearly than others. We went back down to the subway were it was warm and dry and took the train back to the Manhattan side to grab a bite to eat. We ended up roaming the streets looking for something to eat that was not a chain restaurant and close to where our bus was to pick us up. We found a little shop, got some sandwiches to share and enjoyed a break from walking.

This video was taken by R.C. when I stopped with the boys to play a "guess what color car is coming next" game. The rain had let up for a few moments and you could see the skyline of the city pretty well.

By the time we were ready to head to the street our bus was to pick us up at, it was just barely raining. We grabbed a cup of coffee for the ride home and tried to figure out where in the world our bus was. As we were standing around waiting, a man walked up to Max and handed him a balloon, smiled and walked away. Later, as we were still standing there waiting, he walked by again, patted Max's head and expressed his joy in seeing he still had the balloon. R.C. and I were certain he was trying to impress the beautiful lady he had with him. Finally our bus came, and just in time. As we were waiting outside it began to thunder and lightning and we were not on the bus 5 minutes before it began to pour and really storm. Max was asleep along with R.C. before we left the city and Russell and I played the alphabet game. We got all the way to Y and then Russell got quiet. I thought he was asleep so I didn't say anything, but then he turned to me and said, "how about we tell people we got all the way through the alphabet, and just forget about Z." No sooner had I told him that we didn't have to lie, but we could be done playing, and he was zonked out on my lap. (R.C. did wake up shortly after he fell asleep. He did not sleep the entire way. If I don't mention that, I will not hear the end of it...:) ) The ride home was long and stormy. It took almost 5 hours due to the storm!

The boys did wonderful! I was so proud of them for walking so long and not complaining. Many kids would have wanted to be carried, but the boys were troopers and kept up with the hustle and bustle. Max would get bumped periodically while walking and we tried to instruct him (as all good parents would do, right?!) to yell out, "I'm trying to walk down here!" in an annoyed voice, but sweet Max would not do it. Good for him.

Random/pointless things I noticed, or thought of, during our trip:

1. I actually uttered the words, "Hey, R.C., did you notice how good that subway car smelled?" 98% of subways smell like pee (Sorry! I know! But it's true!), but for some reason on one of our subway rides we had a car that smelled like butterscotch. Yummy!
2. Scary, gangster looking people don't look so scary when they are using an umbrella to stay dry just like me. They may be tough, but they hate to be wet and soggy like the rest of us. It really knocks them down a notch or two.
3. On the ride to NYC there was a guy on our bus who had his hair "nicely" styled. It was flat all around, except for right in front. He had a patch of hair that he had spiked straight up. I wondered what he was going to look like when he got on the bus to come home after being in the rain like everyone else, but to my surprise he sat in front of me with his hair still standing tall. I don't know how he did it! Everyone else looked like they had a bucket of water dumped over them. This guy really knows what he is doing in the hair styling department.
4. Art students don't go to NYC to see art. They go to shop for clothes at stores that we have in the mall a mere 4 blocks from the school. (This was a bus charted by RISD so all passengers were students. That's how I know they were all art students)
5. I have gotten to be quite good at ignoring people yelling things in the streets, homeless people asking for money, and vulgar things happening around me when I am out and about. I did find it hard to look away when I noticed a man licking (yes, licking!) a bus stop wall though. I guess I am still a work in progress when it comes to gawking.
6. I'm not old, but I sure felt like I was when I listened to conversations being had around me on the bus. Was I really like these kids when I was 18-22 years old? Surely not, right!?? :)
7. All kids should be done with strollers before or by the age of 5. We passed a kid just chillin' in a stroller while his mom (poor thing!) pushed him and he looked to be about 5-6 years old. (I know some kids have health issues and need to be in a stroller/wheelchair. I'm not trying to be rude or insensitive to these kids. Stop writing your hate mail now, please.) It's strange to see a kid pass you in a stroller and give you the "I'm lazy and don't want to walk, you got a problem with that" look. I will quote R.C. and ask, "how old is too old?"
8. I have a super awesome little family!

I knew things would change once Russell turned 7. I was prepared for him to mature a bit more over the course of the year, but things seem to have moved in fast forward.

He hates to wash his own hair...I sure hope he can learn to shave his own face. I'm not ready to teach that yet, or ever.

Happy birthday Russell!

This is a little slide show I put together for Russell (and all of you).
Some pictures you have already seen on the blog, some may be new to you.
The song playing is one of Russell's favorite songs.
Enjoy!

Last weekend we wanted to get out of the house so we took a trip to......Bass Pro Shop. I never would have thought I would say that this was out big weekend outing, but there, I said it. We took the trip to look at their aquarium, animals, and hiking trails. The boys had a great time feeding rainbow trout, practicing their rifle shooting (no sure shot in this family!), looking at taxidermy, and looking through aisles of camping gear. After seeing all there was to see inside, we headed outside to walk through the Ocean Spray cranberry bogs. We enjoyed the fresh air, beautiful trees, and a massive acorn fight.

Russell's camo shirt was no accident. He wanted to fit in....

Throughout the bogs they had animal statues which were great for climbing on.
Max found a good spot to hold, but then realized he didn't like his position.

Recently I read an article about blogging. To sum it up: Women (particularly mothers) read other blogs and believe that other families are "perfect". No fighting kids, no tantrums, perfect marriage, always clean house, etc.. It told how unhealthy it is for women/mothers to think this way because, come on, no family is "perfect". But, when they read other family blogs they begin to feel they are failing because their family is not "perfect" like these others seem to be.

I'm sure no one thinks that my family is "perfect", but just to make sure, I wanted to share with you a few reasons why we are far from "perfect".

1. Our good ol' family rules sheet is smudged and wrinkled due to little boys crying on it while standing in time out so often.
2. Some nights the boys are in bed by 7:15 pm because I just need the day to be over.
3. I try to make everything from scratch, but I still have fish sticks and french fries in the freezer for when I just don't want to cook.
4. I do laundry on Monday. I fold it on Monday night. It usually doesn't get put away until Thursday...or the next Monday when I need the laundry basket to carry the dirty clothes downstairs.
5. Many family outings don't happen. People (I'm not naming names here...) get cranky so we turn the car around and go home.
6. School is a chore some days. Russell is good about doing work most of the time, but there are days when he cries and whines about every little assignment I give him. These are the days when I want to cry and whine too.
7. R.C. and I have a very happy marriage, but there are times when we argue and don't speak for days. There are days I am thankful he has a studio to go to. :)
8. I have told the boys we are going on a nature walk to find leaves, mushrooms, nuts, insects...but my main goal is to get to the pharmacy up the street to get a diet coke.
9. Max has rule #3 on our rules sheet memorized because he has been in timeout so many times for breaking the rule. ("Do what you are told the first time you are told.")
10. Russell is sometimes up for an hour before anyone else stirs in the morning, and I'm ok with that. He is the only morning person in this household.
11. I have thrown toys away in anger because they we being fought over/not picked up.

The list could go on and on.

You see, those things would not be fun to read about. But, even though we are not a perfect family, we are happy, have fun together, and love each other. I don't compare my family to others, so I hope others don't compare themselves to us. We are far from "perfect" and loving every minute of it!

Someday, this little fellow is going to have a girlfriend....
And he will regret posing for pictures this way...

Last week nothing exciting happened. I really shouldn't even be blogging now because there is nothing to blog about. We had a very uneventful week of school and living, which is not always bad. The boys are doing great in school. Russell has not been thrilled with the fact that I give him homework to do on his own after we are done with our lessons, while Max longs to find an extra worksheet hanging on the fridge with his name on it. R.C. is working working working. It's been hard getting used to having him gone a lot again. It is hard to believe that in 8 months he will graduate and we could be moving again.

Russell lost his 4th tooth. Once again, I am very thankful to see his new tooth coming in already because it's weird to look at your kid and see a toothless gap in their mouth.

Hopefully something blog worthy will happen this next week. If not, well, we have a birthday coming up, another trip to NYC planned, and my mom and dad are coming at the end of the month. Surely there will be something to write about then.

Well, here's the best I could do. You get the idea. They're cute (crazy, but cute) and make a blazer look good.

Now, we're off to find nachos(??!!), art, and maybe R.C. along the way.

Tonight is the first art opening of the year that the boys and I are attending. There are usually snacks which consist of: fruit, veggies, cheese, crackers, wine, beer, and ginger ale.

Russell just got his blazer out the the closet in preparation for the evening and announced, "I hope they have nachos tonight."
I love the way this kid thinks, and I will be following him to the snack table just in case he does find nachos.

Both boys have awesome blazers now, so after they get dressed for the night I will snap a picture so you can see my nacho hoping, art loving, blazer wearing boys.

Last Saturday we took a trip up the road to Lincoln Woods State Park. It was a BEAUTIFUL day for a hike and picnic. I don't know why we had not been to this park before, but we will definitely be visiting there more often.

Forging a path through the woods.

The path led us beside this rock, but Max decided to go down the rock. It really wasn't that steep, but he pretended he was repelling off the side of a cliff. After a hike, we stopped for a picnic lunch and a game of catch. R.C. and Russell had brought their baseball mitts, so as they played, Max and I took a walk down to the lake and relaxed atop a giant rock.
When everyone was refueled, we found another place to hike. This time we were climbing mainly on rocks. We had a nice break when we found a swan and Russell just happened to have a scrap of bread in his pocket (who is this kid...Hansel?) to feed it.

Earlier in the week the boys had me take this picture of themselves after they ate suckers from the bank. They wanted me to post it for Aunt Chrissy. They are blue tongue lizards. She may be the only one to get this...

And finally, due to the cooler weather we have been having, the boys were able to enjoy a tea party with hot cocoa and marshmallows. They are so polite when the tea set comes out. They pour for each other and share marshmallows. Maybe the Queen will join these gentlemen someday for cocoa tea...

As the boys and I were sitting in traffic yesterday, Russell noticed the car ahead of us had a license plate that read, RI 1. He then thought that that must be the first person to ever get a license plate in the state of RI. Maxwell then screamed "it's Roger Williams! Get him!". I'm thrilled that Max has learned that Roger Williams was the first to settle Providence, but it makes me laugh to think that Max assumes he is still around and driving a car. Russell tried to explain to Max that Roger Williams didn't drive cars, but Max was not buying it.

I FINALLY GOT ACCEPTED!!

It had been over a month since I sent in my "intent to home school" letter and I had not heard anything from the state of RI. I started teaching Russell 2 weeks ago and began to get nervous/anxious that they, for some reason, decided not to approve my lesson plans I turned in. Finally, today I received my approval and can checkout textbooks from the school district if necessary. I am so relieved! RI takes FOREVER to inform you of important information so I guess waiting a month is nothing, considering I waited an entire school year to finally be told that I didn't have to turn anything in for kindergarten. I was quite angry about this since I kept EVERY piece of work completed last year and VERY detailed notes about everything we did so I could turn it in at the end of the year. I guess I can chalk it up as practice for this year.

Here's to an amazing school year!

We belong to a gym (YMCA) and I finally convinced R.C. to go with me in the mornings. It's been fun working out together every other morning while the boys play with other kiddos in the kid area. I think we have a good workout. We start by doing a brisk mile on either the elliptical machine or the treadmill, then we pump some iron on various equipment, and R.C. does some extra weights while I finish with another run (or quick walk, depending on how my knee is feeling) on the treadmill. We spend approximately an hour to finish our workout. Some weeks we go each day, some weeks we go every other day. Some days we spend less than and hour, some days more than an hour, but the above routine is "normal".

Now that R.C. is back to being at the studio until late late late, I am enjoying quiet evenings alone doing yoga or pilates. I find this to be a good way to end the day. R.C. has a different way to end his day (or should I say his time at home. He still has quite a night ahead of him in the studio). It's called "boy on a baseball bat lifting". This is a bit too physical for me in the evening, but both the lifter and the "weight" seem to enjoy this form of exercise.

Recap of last week:

• Max mastered name writing.

• R.C. and the boys played baseball.

• R.C. "youtube-ed" a Christmas song and proceeded to hum/whistle it for half the day. He almost didn't make it to the end of the day....
• I got nailed in the nose with a baseball. I learned my lesson to never play without a hat or sunglasses when the sun it out.
• The boys had their yearly physical and Max was annoyed to have to go to the doctors office. He smiled once during the 45 minutes we spent with the doctor. This smile came about only because he was told to take his clothes off...he loves to be naked.
• Russell was very talkative last week. I know, he always is, but last week he was more than usual. I almost didn't make it through the week.
• We cleaned our section in the basement. Fun...
• It's cool here! Fall is just around the corner!! This makes me so very happy!

• We walked up to the "Hope St. Festival" (the "main" drag in our neighborhood) and decorated cookies at the bakery and listened to drummers.

We were surprised to see these big "monsters" come to dance to the music. They are from a place downtown that makes these costumes. The boys love to walk by the store, and even like to go in, but Russell was not thrilled with seeing them dance. Max thought it was pretty cool though.


This week R.C. officially starts classes. I and the boys are not looking forward to this. We go back to seeing R.C. rarely, packing lunches and suppers for him to take to the studio and longing for one day on the weekend when we can have him to ourselves. One more year of grad school and then....