The Mom & Oliver Uno Challenge

We battled it out during Elliot’s nap times-- five games a day for the past 12 days. In the end it was close, but Ollie pulled out a clutch 4 game streak to become the first official Halverson Uno Champ. His reward: a bag of Skittles. I lost out on frozen yogurt. Oliver wisely pointed out that had I won I would have had to buy my own frozen yogurt anyway since he has no money. True enough.       Oliver is THRILLED with his victory, can you tell? I, on the other hand, am so sick of Uno. Does anyone have a suggestion for another game that might work for a 5 year old?

Summer Art

Last summer my friend Suzy and I had such a great time doing weekly art projects with our kids that we decided to continue our tradition and do a long distance version this summer. Although we don’t get to enjoy gourmet lunches together after the projects, we are collaborating on ideas and giving each other inspiration. I talked my friend Anna McFadden into doing it with me here in California so we have a small actual art group in addition to our virtual art group back in Nashville.

Today I taught a lesson on symmetry and we made flower mandalas. I tried teaching symmetry last summer when we made paint butterflies (you know, when you drip paint onto a piece of paper and fold it in half and gently press the two sides together. Viola! A butterfly!) Anyway, my explanation of symmetry went wildly off track last year when I said that “if I were to cut this picture in half, both sides would be the same.” They freaked out because they thought I was going to cut their pictures in half and even though I explained emphatically that I was not going to cut their art in half they couldn’t get beyond that. 

So this year went better. I first had them do a symmetry exercise before I tried explaining it with words. I drew a line down the middle of a piece of paper and created a simple shape with geometric pattern blocks one one side of the line. I had them repeat the pattern on the other side, to make it “same on the other side". I explained that this type of pattern is called symmetry. Then we made some asymmetric shapes and talked about what made them asymmetric. We looked at some pictures of animals (crabs, butterflies, people) and talked about symmetry found in nature.  I also introduced the concept of “lines of symmetry,” and “radial symmetry.” My explanation of radial symmetry was a little rough, but they got the concept, despite my poor explanation. We then went out in the yard and hunted for symmetry in nature.

Then we came back inside and made these awesome flower mandalas which are examples of radial symmetry. I got the idea from The Artful Parent. All it took was some paper plates, contact paper and some flowers and leaves. Easy peasy and the kids really, really enjoyed it!

   

Crazy Balls and Mud Pies

Have I described how much I love our backyard? It is the perfect backyard.  And by perfect I do not mean perfectly manicured. It has weeds galore. But it is perfect for our family. It is fenced, flat and not too fussy. At one point it was nicely landscaped so there are still flowers in every season and fruit trees. It retains some its former glory but it is slowly reverting to its natural state. The boys, no doubt, are hastening this process. They throw “mud bombs” down onto the basketball court, they re-routed the flagstone path according to their own whimsy, dismantled part of the dry-laid retaining wall, and dug up some old irrigation lines. [Did I mention how much I LOVE renting!! I hope our landlords don’t blogstalk us…I’m doing my best, I just can’t watch them ALL the time.] They have a booming mudworks construction operation with all their diggers, dumptrucks and backhoe loaders.  They have several excavation efforts underway, too. I think they are building a quarry.

Now that the days are longer we spend most evenings hanging out in the backyard. Ryan and the boys invented a game called “crazy balls.” The object of the game is to hit all the balls (tennis balls, footballs, whiffleballs, basketballs, soccer balls, etc) into the hula hoop with croquet mallets. It replaced “dingleballs” (aka “red-neck golf”, a.k.a.  the “bonk-on-the-head-game”)  as our backyard game of choice since Elliot  kept bonking himself in the head with that game.

I have to go to bed since I re-committed (just this morning!!) not to stay up late. I am in the middle of a great book and a huge DIY project so it’s been very tempting to stay up late. I would write more about our backyard fun but here are some pictures and an open invitation to come visit and hang out with us in the backyard and experience it yourself.

          Our neighbors have a plum tree that hangs over into our yard. Tonight I gave Anwoo his first taste of plum…he ate the whole thing. I was reminded of an image from Ann Lamott’s book Operating Instructions in how she describes the first time her son ate a plum he slowly pushed the peel back out of his mouth like a dollar bill being rejected from a vending machine. I really like that image and was tempted to see what Anwoo would do with the peel but reasoned that he might choke on it so I didn’t let him try it.

Drains to the Bay

The boys are fascinated by the storm drains in our neighborhood. They always stop and announce cheerfully, "This drains to the Bay!" and then they shout, "Hello, San Francisco!" as they peer down into the drain. I don't know where they got that idea that the people of San Francisco can hear them through the storm drain but I think it's hilarious.

Big and Little

This afternoon as I was unstacking the dishwasher Oliver and Elliot were outside getting down to work of their own. They were methodically removing all the tomatoes on my plants before they had a chance to ripen. One was picking, the other was squishing them with his sneaker. These are my favorite Sungold little orange cherry tomatoes. I was so mad. I said, "You guys are little rascals!!!" Oliver got upset and objected to that appellation. "Mom, we are NOT little rascals. That's mean. We are BIG rascals."

So now I've put my big rascals to work. Elliot is unstacking the dishwasher and Oliver is folding laundry. Too bad the way they do it is actually just creating more work for me to do later.

Good as Gold

This is such a sweet video that our good friend Bryan Kenitzer (wwww.bayareavideographer.com) made of Andrew. Bryan is really talented and we wish that he could just follow the boys around and record these fleeting moments of their childhood all the time.

I haven't posted too much about Sweet Anwoo, apart from how he gets mauled by his brother, because it's almost unbelievable how easy this little guy is. And, really, I know no one, least of all anyone with children, wants to read about that so I'll make this brief. The truth is, he has got to be one of the happiest babies out there. He smiles and coos and kicks his feet and chews his fingers and mostly loves to get any attention at all from his brothers-- even when it involves being sat upon and results in copious amounts of goober all over his head and face from their enthusiastic kissing. The boys love to get him laughing which they can do by yelling "Roar!!!" which Anwoo thinks is comic genius. This little guy is just good as gold and I love him with all my heart.

Thoughts on Mother’s Day

So, I am up late writing out my Mother’s Day letters to my kids. With three I thought I needed to start early. Last year I didn’t finish (ok, didn’t start) Oliver’s until the middle of June. I was completely wiped out from the flood and early pregnancy so I had some excuse. Anyway, as I was writing tonight I had two thoughts that I wanted to post here.

1) Ryan is out of town this weekend. Some people I have told are shocked, “Out of town on Mother’s Day?!? What are you going to do??” But the truth is I am actually enjoying his being out of town this weekend. I know he is having a fun time (SCUBA diving in Honduras with a buddy from Raleigh) and that makes me happy. And I can do my own thing this weekend, which may be an adventure, or may be nothing.  I can set my own schedule. After the kids go to bed I can stay up late and work on projects and read and putter (I am a world class putter-er) and just relax.

So for Mother’s Day this year I am going to be engaged in Mothering—and that’s exactly how I’d like to spend it. I am really enjoying my kids right now. I know I used to feel this way a lot, but I haven’t felt so happy in being a mother lately (like since before Andrew was born). But I think it’s due to a combination of their getting a little bit easier and my getting better at not sweating the little things (like the giant dust bunnies under the furniture or dirty greasy fingerprints everywhere).

2) As I’ve struggled in my role as a mother, I gain new respect  for my mom. She did a lot for us growing up plus she had a full-time job. She kept so many balls in the air, it’s true, but the really amazing part to me is that I don’t remember her ever being cross or acting stressed out. I’m sure that she was often cross and stressed out, she just didn’t act that way around us. I don’t remember her yelling or blowing her top. I think I’m doing a better job in recent weeks of not losing my temper but I’m still not where I’d like to be.

I remember once, when I was about 3 or 4 and had just learned to write my name, I carved my name with a penny into the side of our car door. I remember that my parents were quite upset but I know they didn’t freak out or spank me or put me in time out for the rest of my childhood. I feel sometimes that I am so tightly wound, with absolutely no sense of humor or perspective, that someone would literally die if one of my kids were to pull something like that. But instead my parents got appropriately mad (I can’t remember what they did but it didn’t involve screaming or physical violence), I learned a good lesson, and I wasn’t permanently scarred by the experience. You see, I wasn’t trying to be naughty. I honestly thought they would be proud of me. I was thrilled that I could write my name and was so surprised that they didn’t think it was as just wonderful to see my name etched permanently into their automobile. I feel like Elliot does stuff like that a lot. He is just exploring his world, trying out his new skills and spilling /breaking things/tracking mud all through the house in the process. It is a real lesson in self-restraint. I need to have more patience. I know I have little patience when I’m tired so I’m going to sign off.