New Home for our Aquatic Friends

Just a few glimpses of last week's project to "upgrade" the environment for our four African cichlids. They moved from a 10 gallon tank to a 55 gallon tank. What rock and decorations used to fill the tank now look pitifully small, so the upgrade will continue for the forseable future.

Just getting started. Cleaning the gravel was hard work.

Admirer of my handiwork.

Chief decorator.

 Decorations in place; keep on filling those buckets.

 

 The fish exploring their new home.

 This poor critter was the impetus for the move. We think it has an infection known as fin rot. Hopefully the clean air water and open space will help it recover.

Investigations

Eddie investigating fruits

"Now we need to take them into the kitchen and make an apple smoothie".

Eddie decided to chop a large apple, using a rather dull table knife. Despite this handicap, he did a fine job. His first cut exposed a heart-shaped air pocket around the seeds in the core. As he was eager to continue chopping, I didn't capture it on camera.

The spikey fruit in the picture above (Kiwano, or African horned melon) didn't yield so easily to the butter knife. Here is what it looked like when we cut it with something sharper.

I thought it tasted flowery. A mild, sweet flavor. Viktor & Eddie also tasted, but declined to eat any. Nothing left but to add it to the smoothie.

 Eddie's handiwork

Although somewhat gritty (that may have been the protein powder), we all enjoyed the watermelon-apple-kiwano smoothie. I thought the kiwano shell looked like a funny face after scooping out the pulp. The boys agreed, "sort-of".

Kiwano face



Interesting things

Here are a few of the things that have been interesting us in the past few weeks:

Roller coaster tracks. 

Playing Zoombinis (and Zuma and ...)

Playing Wii LEGO Star Wars III ( and other Lego games, LoTR games, guitar hero, mini-golf ...)

Robots, circuits, and magnets

Of course, there is a lot more - scootering around the neighborhood, living-room bowling, Gungan Frontier, building castles, protecting the castle, Settlers of Catan, making palacinky, battle boss, Fish Tycoon, word scrambles, email, box beds (too small for forts), voice changer, wood building projects, reading Warriors (6th book of 2nd series) and Hobbit and Highlights and picture books, and the comic that came out of the cereal box, puzzles, watching Star Trek: Enterprise, NCIS, The Incredible Hulk, playing hotel, feasting on salad bars, breakfast buffets, waffle sundaes, Daddy's bread, Indian food, and monkey trays.

Our life is rich with interesting things.



Alone together

M. left yesterday. It was hard to leave her at the airport. Change makes all of us uneasy, I think.

Since the airport is so close to my parents house, we spent a relaxing afternoon visiting.

So far so good.

And then I woke up today, feeling somewhat empty, routine having flown out of the country with M's plane. What would the day be like?

Shower. Sit. Read email. Dress. Fold laundry. These quiet moments help me gather strength and courage to be MOM all day.

And what a beautiful day it turned out to be.

We had leftover pancakes and Chinese dumplings for breakfast. Something new and silly. Except R, who asked for "Eggs Lox-edict" (the famous eggy dish with Hollandaise sauce over the top, but with lox in place of ham).

Pause. Start to find excuses. Breathe. Why not? What else do I have to do today? Too frequently, the answer is the dishes, the laundry, finding a nanny, work, errands, cleaning my room, the laundry, the dishes, changing a diaper, reading my email, trying to make plans for ANOTHER time, instead of being HERE at THIS time.

Okay. No English muffins? No problem. We'll use a bagel. Who wants to help make the Hollandaise? All of you? Okay, I love having your help.

In between making the sauce the boys played hide and seek, and then a new version of superheros-and-villains based on a movie they watched last night and their current favorite show. I love to hear them laugh together. I got out the long disused video camera.

After breakfast we played some old favorite computer and video games. V & I cut out a memory game and played. We found some cool weather clothes for V from the hand-me-down pile in the closet. We moved some warm weather clothes to the hand-me-down pile on top of his dresser. We washed diapers. We ran the dishwasher. We listened to music and danced. We juggled stuffed animals. We caught grapes in our mouths. (I never knew I could do that!) We ate leftover Chinese food for lunch.

Thoughts start creeping into my head. I should get out of the house. I should do some virtual grocery shopping.

R started coloring some Halloween wood cutouts he picked out at the store. E & V want some too. Ok, we'll go to the store and pick some up. We picked up more monster (alien) cutouts and other fun things, too. (I love craft stores.)

We colored. We had ice cream for a snack. We looked at the letters Daddy left for the boys - little projects to engage them while he is gone.

The boys go out to the back yard to play. Ok, finally, I'll get a chance to write that blog post, and maybe order some groceries, and oh yeah, I have that newsletter to work on ...

Two sentences into this post, I hear crying in the back yard.

Ok. I get it. When I am with the boys, I need to be WITH the boys. Then we have a good day.

Now ... I can write now because J is reading with the boys. I don't need to be with them if someone else is with them. It's okay for them to have fun with Dad, too.

And, it is okay for them to have fun with an au pair, or nanny when I attend to other needs. I have a hard time accepting that I put other needs ahead of theirs, but that is why I am looking for the right person to take care of their needs while I take care of mine.

ps.

I forgot to add;

Before we began our "Mommy-R" day, I brought down a stack of state quarters for R to place in our Kids coin collecting book. I pointed out how you can learn about the states by looking at the quarters and the facts in the book.

I told R that I had purchased a new timer - a digital version of a kitchen timer, which we had primarily been using to time how long we were playing games, but also for timing such tasks as emptying the dishwasher, getting dressed in the morning, or timing how long someone ELSE is playing games. Our old one broke from being well-used. When I told Remy I had obtained a new one for the family, I was pleased to hear "Thank you, Mommy", even though he was engaged with the quarters at the time, and I wasn't sure he had heard me.

Here we are again

In the course of unschooling, it is easy to occasionally start thinking that you aren't doing anything. Or, rather, that your kids aren't doing anything. And that maybe they should.

In an effort to remind myself of all that we do, as well as to cherish those special moments when they come, I return to write about today. And maybe, I'll be back tomorrow.

Today, R came with me to the vet. Our cat Jeda had a checkup, after some dental work. He had been losing weight, and the hope was that the dental work would help him feel better and eat more, but his weight was down again. I'm not sure how much R was paying attention, but the vet went into detail about what it COULD be and what our options MIGHT be if Jeda keeps losing weight. In the interim, we will try to make sure he gets plenty of food that he likes.

After the vet, we searched online for toys and games related to the boys' latest passion, "Ben lO".

R & I rode to our favorite sandwich shop for lunch, and as is our way, spent a long time there eating. R told me "It takes me a long time to eat because to me, meal time is not just for eating, it is also my time to think." We also discussed the sandwich shop's reading program - if you read 500 minutes in 6 weeks, you can win a free kids meal and be entered in the drawing for a bigger prize. After we calculated that 10-15 minutes a day would cover it, R very astutely pointed out that it would be easy, because he is reading all the time - road signs, sandwich shop menus, posters on the vetrinarian's wall, game prompts, etc. I'm sure that is not what the sandwich shop had in mind ... but perhaps the reading challenge will still help to broaden R's current thoughts beyond the show mentioned above and his current favorite game involving botany and the undead.

After the sandwich shop, we rode to a playground to play characters from the show ... not something I was fully present for, I admit. I made the realization (again - maybe one day it will stick) that I often prefer to engage with R in video games than in his complex world of pretend play, or the games he invents. What do I want to encourage? I find the video games more entertaining. So, why shouldn't he?

While R & I were out and about today, M took the other two boys for a scoot/ride to the park and around the neighborhood. They also made chocolate chip cookies -yum!