St. Patrick's Day

Lydia was so exciting about St. Patrick's Day.  I was very surprised to see that. When I was a kid, it was always an afterthought for me. Lydia woke up on Thursday morning and told me she had dreamed about eating the Lucky Charms that Mom bought (which they had never had before and couldn't eat until St. Patrick's Day).  By Thursday night and Friday morning she was so excited she was giddy talking about what the leprechaun might do to her classroom (he has a tendency to mess their classroom up for them). Then on Friday and Saturday she was talking about the best day ever.

Today (Saturday), the actual St. Patrick's Day, I woke up early to make a work call to India to a prospective student, and while I was up the leprechaun visited our house.  He hid shoes all around the house, spelled "Hi" out of green building blocks, and left some chocolate gold nuggets.  I'm surprised I didn't see him while I was up.  The kids were thrilled by the visit.

Swiss Alps

I went to Zurich for a conference two weeks ago.  Quite a nice trip.  On the day after the conference I went to the Alps for some skiing.

Lydia and Tyler Update

Everything is about video games for Tyler now.  He really took to the NES that I got for Christmas.  Now he uses his hour a day of electronics to play Super Mario Brothers and Kirby.  We were at a social dinner at the church the other day and Tyler kept talking about the “Triforce of Wisdom.”  I said, “Everything is Zelda to you.”  And he responded, “No, some things are Mario and some things are Kirby.”

Lydia is a diligent planner.  She usually has Family Home Evening planned out for us a week in advance (including which dessert we will make).  She has great ideas for birthdays and how we will spend our Saturdays.  Last week she was very upset to go to school on Friday.  I couldn’t figure out why, since she’s liked school most of this year, but I finally found out that she woke up thinking it was Saturday.

Poison Ivy

We found Poison Ivy growing on a tree in our backyard this winter.  It actually killed the poor pine.

Ba-Ba-Ball

Nyle has an infatuation with basketballs.

Sometimes he won’t even let the basketball go for us to buckle him in his car seat.  He likes to stand under a basketball hoop and toss the ball a foot above his head.

Future stunt man

Our baby Nyle already picked a profession for the future, though we really hope he will reconsider. The way he climbs and throws himself around, it is pretty clear for all that he is going to be a stunt man.

Today we gathered ourselves on the stairs, watching Tyler play checkers on daddy's iPone. He won so many games in a row.  We were totally amazed and occupied with watching him.  Next things we know our 18 month old is flying over our heads, heading head first for the bottom of the stairs. We barely caught him by his ankles. And he was mad! We decided to relocate after he tried to attempt the same stunt the second time. He cried and cried, dragging us back.

I've always known I had to watch that kid closely, but after today I understood that I was naive. I thought Nyle is a bit calmer than Tyler was at his age.  Obviously I largely underestimated my little man.  Dread is what I feel when I think of the next year and a half, though I have to admit that with that comes a bit of a chuckle.