And more from Gresham...

The other morning, Gresham was disobeying. I asked him, "Who says that you must obey Mommy?"
"God."
"Yes, and does God love you?"
"No! (pause) Dad wuvs you. Grandma wuvs you. Papa wuvs you. Andy wuvs you."

He wasn't disagreeing that God loves him, he just doesn't understand who God is. It was like he was saying, "No, God isn't an actual person in our house. Dad and Grandma are the people who love me!"

Then at lunch, he pointed to the Jolly Green Giant on the baby carrots bag, and said "Mommy!"
I told this story to a mom of a violin student, and she said that her son pointed to one of the Disney princesses and thought it was mommy. What does this say about me? Or my son?

This morning, I asked him if he was going to have a birthday. This may have been our most detailed conversation so far.
"Yes! Birsday! Yea!"
"How old will you be?"
"2. Tober."
"Yes, 2 in October."
"Cake."
"Yes, we will have cake. And presents."
"Truck. Red one."
"You want a red truck?"
"Yes. Aidan hand." (not sure what that meant)

What a delight he is to have in our house!

Gresham-isms

Gresham's speech has been getting so much more complicated! Today he said "I" to refer to himself for the first time - "Mommy! I back!"

At the dinner table... "sumping (something) eat! Sumping eat!"

He is saying sentences like "peek at doggie."

Mostly, I love having an almost 2-year-old in our house!

Cheap Family Night Out!

Now that we are living on a budget (which is not always fun, although it's getting us the results we want...), we are not eating out much. Last night, I really didn't feel like cooking, but we have already used up more of September's eating out budget than we should have. So... we packed a cooler with leftover raw veggies that we took to a party this week, and packed water bottles, and then bought a $5 pizza from Little Caesar's and took it to the park next to the library! We had a fun time eating and playing at the park, and then checked out some books from the library. It was a great family evening, for only $5!

Our New Favorite CD's

Check out this link to see our new favorite CD's from Seeds Music! We bought the yellow CD (Faith) and the blue CD (Praise) last week at church, and love them! They are scripture verses put to song, and they are a lot of fun to listen to (and don't sound like they are just for kids!). We picked these two discs because Aidan and I have memorized several of the verses already. It's fun to hear him in the van saying, "Mom! It's Psalm 100! Mom! It's Romans 5:8!"

After a week of listening, I am seeing the benefit of meditating on scripture. One of our favorites is "The Word of the Lord," which is 1 Peter 1:24. "All men are like grass, and all its glory like the flowers of the field. The grass withers, and the flowers fall. But the Word of the Lord stands forever." I was reminded of how transient we are in this life, and yet God and His Word are eternal. Why am I spending so much time and effort on the things of this life, when I should be spending more time on things that are eternal? Now I know that I can't give up laundry or grocery shopping, but I do need to approach life from an eternal perspective.

By the way, memorizing scripture has really been helpful for Aidan. Of course it is something we should do, so I'm kind of pointing out the obvious here, but I have really been encouraged in how it is helping Aidan. If we read the Bible out loud to him, he has a hard time paying attention because the words are so over his head. When he memorizes, we can work on the same verses for several days, and he is really thinking about what the words are and what they mean. It is fun to see him "notice" his verses other places - like hearing them read in church. It is our prayer that the Lord will use these "seeds" in his heart to one day bring him to faith!

Random Pictures

Gresham cooperating for a picture - a rare treat!

He LOVES to read

We were taking off our clothes for a bath, and happened on this fun way to wear a shirt!


Awana has started back up, and Aidan is now in Sparks! This is the club for k-2nd grade. He loves it so far. Next week is snow cone night!

Yes, that's my boy!

Coupons are money!

So, I have been shopping heavily with coupons since May. I used to use them occasionally, and I have always looked for sales, but after getting started on this website I have been using a lot more. I now have a nifty coupon organizer, and use 15-20 coupons per shopping trip. We have lowered our grocery budget by $200 consistently for the past 4 months, so all the couponing has been worth the extra time and work. (Well, part of that $200 is also better planning and making sure we don't waste anything.)

My kids have evidently picked up on this, as I've been hearing them say things like "Look, Mom! There's your favorite store! CVS!"

"Look, Mom! This package has a coupon on it!"

The other day, I gave them expired coupons to hold while we shopped, and they were delighted. They talked about them, and what items they were for, and Aidan tried to figure out how much money they were worth. "Look, Mom! This one is 200." "Well, actually that's $2.00." Gresham calls them "poupons." On another trip, Gresham saw me put the coupons on the counter for the checkout lady and said, "Poupons! Money!"

It probably sounds a little weird, but I guess there are worse things they could be saying...

And so fall begins...

And I don't mean the weather! Althought it might cool down after tomorrow when what is left of the hurricane hits us!

I mean the back-to-school germs. No more summer good health! Aidan has a tummy bug today, and I either have the same thing to a lesser degree, or I'm just fighting off something..

Aidan is enjoying a day filled with TV!

The Facts of Life...

Aidan: Mom, how did people get here? I mean, if God made babies first, then who would take care of them?
Mom: God made Adam and Eve first, remember?
Aidan: Oh yeah... so then did they have a baby?
Mom: Yes.
Aidan: Ok, so their son growed up and became a dad, and then that son growed up and became a dad, and it kept going on down to now. So that makes sense. (I was pretty impressed here!) But how did they get the baby out?
Mom: What do you mean, "get the baby out?"
Aidan: Well, where did Eve go to get a doctor to cut the baby out? (Can you tell his little brother was a c-section? We were able to avoid this conversation back then.)
Mom: Wellllllll.... they don't always have to "cut the baby out." Some babies can come out by themselves.
Aidan: Well then, where do they come out?
Mom: God designed moms with a hole for babies to come out of.
Aidan: Oh, wow.

And, that was enough to satisfy him for now!

Gresham Sings

Here is Gresham singing, "Praise Him, Praise Him." I think he is adorable.

Math Time!

We are liking school so far! Aidan has done really well. Dad did school with him while I was gone teaching school this week, so that was a big help. It's hard to come home from teaching strings for 3 hours straight and then start homeschooling!

Yesterday, Aidan and I made a pictograph for his math. We made a graph of how many pairs of shoes each family member owns. Aidan had a great time taking his clipboard around the house and counting shoes. I am thrilled to announce that Dad won on the most number of pairs! He only beat me by one, though. He had 10 pairs and I had 9. We counted everything - even flip flops and yard shoes.

We are doing Saxon math, and I like it so far. Aidan likes the routine of Saxon - he adds to a calendar and a number line every day, and Saxon has a lot of review. We also discovered Explode the Code phonics books, and they are great.

Yesterday, we were in the car, and Aidan asked me how to spell "whoa" as in, "Whoa, that was really fast." I said, "Well, how to you think it's spelled?" He guessed w-o-w. I answered, "Actually, that's wow." "Oh," he said, "then add an e to the end. W-o-w-e." He knows his phonics rule about e making the vowel say it's name! Too bad English isn't that easy!

Burglars?

Last night at 3:00 a.m., I was sleeping quite soundly. This was a good thing, because I don't always sleep real well. I was awakened from my slumber by the sound of someone banging on our house. At least, that was what it sounded like! It stopped, and then started again. I could tell Jordan was awake, so I asked him if he heard it. He was concerned and went to go find out what it was. I got up and looked out our bathroom window at the street to see if I could see anything, and then went around to find Jordan.

He was in Aidan's room, with Aidan who was sitting in bed with his light on. As it turns out, Aidan was awake and needed a tissue to wipe his nose. He went out to get one in the living room, but only made it as far as the hall before he became scared of the dark. (We forgot to turn on the bathroom nightlight...) So (these are his words!) he went back to his room and cried, and then went back down the hall, and came back to his room and cried. He then decided that the best thing to do was to pound on the wall until Mom and Dad came and told him to go back to bed. When we came to tell him to go back to bed, he would ask us to get him a tissue. Dad informed him that it would have made more sense to just get one from the bathroom that is right next to his room, and go back to bed!

Tonight, I am hoping to sleep all night!