Vegetarian

Sarah came into the kitchen and got a bowl of carrots and some fruit.  She said, "This is a snack for Noah.  He decided to be a vegetarian today."  I always knew this day was coming....

When Noah was two, we told him that ham comes from pigs.  We didn't give him the graphic details, so he came up with his own explanation.  He thought pigs pooped the ham out.  He thought pigs pooped little strips of bacon too.  We let him believe that for awhile.  

I still remember the day when the lightbulb went on for him.  We were reading Laura Ingalls’ Little House in the Big Woods to him.  In the book, Pa shot two deer and hung them in the trees outside their house so the wolves wouldn’t get the meat.  Noah looked confused and asked, “So did the deer protect the meat from the wolves?”   Mike said, “The deer WAS the meat” and then we had to have the whole discussion about where the meat we buy in the grocery store really originates. He was three years old.  As I watched his face go from horrified to teary, I thought, "This kid is going to be a vegetarian."

Back to the present...
He was a vegetarian all day, but when I made bacon-wrapped chicken for dinner, it got the best of his vegetarian convictions. 

Kid writings

Every day, I give Noah a list of five words and tell him to write a sentence or two that uses them all.  I just recently started Sarah on it too.  On her first day, she wrote a poem that was so weird and lovely that my English professors in college would have approved.  Here it is:
The rainy day is melting quickly, 
dripping with ponds.

Today Noah wrote:
The farmer made his living milking the littlest cows that wagged their heads.

Monopoly Noah-isms

Noah, Sarah, and I were playing Monopoly.  Sarah had a monopoly on the big blue properties, and she had three houses on each.  Noah said, "I'm going to try to take her down, but it will be like chipping away at Pikes Peak with a toothpick."  After she won, Noah said, "You're so lucky, you should move to Kentucky!"

Snow ice cream

I went out in the blizzard to get snow to make ice cream.  Whipped it up with some sugar, vanilla, and milk, and this is what my family had to say about it:

Sarah: It's disgusting.  Tastes like clam chowder. (which she's never had, by the way)
Noah:  It tastes like banana spaghetti.
Mike: It's ok, but not worth wasting the calories.

I thought it tasted like whipped cream, so I put it in the freezer and will serve it on brownies or something someday and see if anyone recognizes it. 

Jealousy

I'm using a curriculum to teach the Bible to the kids, which at first seemed unnecessary to me, because isn't the Bible all you need to teach the Bible?  But the curriculum just organizes it into easy chunks to teach, and suggests good discussion points.

This morning, we were reading in the book of James about jealousy.  The curriculum guide said, "Tell your children about a time when you were jealous, and then confess it to God and ask for forgiveness."  The incident that came to my mind was one that I don't think I've ever told anyone, and I certainly never planned on telling my kids.  It was something I did in an unreasonable fit of jealousy.  I took a deep breath and started telling the kids. I immediately had their full attention.

Their eyes widened as they listened to how foolish their mommy was.  One of them asked in disbelief, "How old were you?"  And I said ,"Old enough to know better, for sure.  I was almost thirty."  Then I confessed to God and asked His forgiveness, and it was very freeing.  To my surprise, Sarah piped up and told about a time when she was jealous, and then she spontaneously prayed and asked forgiveness.  We both glanced at Noah, and he volunteered something that makes him jealous (which I didn't even know about), and then he said a great prayer.

Muskrat Love

It's late at night.  I'm the only customer at Kroger.  I'm strolling along, putting food in my cart, and listening to "Muskrat Love" on the muzac.  After awhile I realize I'm singing along (very quietly, of course, because even though I'm the only customer, an employee could come around the corner at any time).  I start wondering how I know the words to "Muskrat Love".  I guess everyone who grew up in the seventies just automatically knows.  Then I listen to the lyrics and think, "What IS this song about?"  Is it really about mating muskrats, or is there some deeper meaning I'm not getting?  Why was it so popular?  Then it gets to part where the muskrats are squeaking, and I think this is the stupidest song I've ever heard.

Creative math

I told Noah to write his name on his math workbook, and this is how he did it: