Time flies!

So much has happened since the last post nearly a year ago. Stephen and Dallas are eager to return to school. Stephen's birthday is on the first day of school this year instead of during the summer. I should try to talk to the teacher about that before school starts. Stephen will be nine and has earned (almost) his wolf badge in cub scouts, along with several silver arrows, and one gold arrow. The pack meeting awards "ceremony" will be the day after his birthday. Not just another day for him this year!

Dallas has been doing much better after we found out he has an allergy of sorts to wheat, including products made from wheat like chicken nuggets. He has adjusted to being weird pretty good. I guess that is all he will be doing for the rest of his life - weird kid with a weird family. *sigh*

The kids are not going to kindergarten this year, thank goodness, because their birthday falls after the deadline. Brenden is a little awkward with taking directions and listening to teachers, although he can read small words like bus and stop.(He wrote stop all over the walls and his bed when he learned how) Evan and Marek would do great in school. Both have good attention spans and ability to take directions but Lily would not be ready yet.

She is not very interested in learning her letters, or anything else for that matter. When I wrote her name she started screaming and yelling, “NO!That’s not a flower! Then she promptly scribbled over her name.Yes, she is a diva. Just the other day her brothers were trying to tell me that I need to stop calling her “princess”. (Of course I was not the one who started this. Daddy did.)I asked the boys why.

“She thinks we are her slaves because she thinks she is a princess and you just need to stop calling her that so she will stop thinking she is a princess!” There was one voice speaking but they all agreed, loudly. When I reported to Daddy that night he turned to Lily and asked, “Lily, do you think you are a princess?”

“Yeah” giggle and a grin.

“Does that mean your brothers are your slaves?”

“YES!" Big smile and a laugh.Did Daddy correct her? No. Did I correct her? Not really. It’s hard to discipline when you are busy laughing.

I tried extra hard to be strict today. We have finicky eaters that won’t eat much if they don’t want to, and then they are hungry five minutes after we put the food away. (I am sure I am not the only one with this problem, or this reaction when such strictness is involved.) I made blueberry oatmeal pancakes for breakfast. Yummy, hearty, easy, quick, and wheat free. They had a bit of color in them from the berries.

“EEEeewww! What is that?!?!” Came the first voice.

“Oh Gross! I am NOT eating THAT!” Came voice number two. And so on and so on till voice number six agree that the pancakes were not edible. Around 11:30 they started getting hungry enough to try it – almost. I told them every time they asked for food there were pancakes on the table. If they would eat one bite they could also have a banana, etc. This was easy for me to monitor today since I was working on food storage and tamales.

Brenden won the stubborn war again and did not eat anything until about 3PM when I gave in and let him have apple sauce. The others tasted the “Miracle Pancakes” as I decided to call them. It would be a miracle if they ate them and hopefully with the extra oats in them they would miraculously not be hungry until lunch time if they ate them.

Dallas said, “Wow Mommy! How did you get something that looks so disgusting to taste so good? Make these every day!” My lesson for the day – don’t give up, it might turn out good. The tamales I made today were good to me. I left for school before they were tasted by anyone else. They are sure to look disgusting too.

There's so much more going on but my class is starting. I really should tell about our summer adventures. Hopefully it won't be so long between posts next time. Thanks for reminding me to post Karalee!