“A portrait of my children every week in 2016.”

Lillia: This week was the big performance! The night before the show you were a nervous wreck. We were trying to run lines, and you couldn’t remember some of them. I am no help in this sort of situation, as I just feed off your emotions and get myself all stressed out, which just makes things exponentially worse. Luckily, Dad took over and the two of you worked through the script—by the end you were laughing. As I expected, you did fantastically well at the performance. I spoke to the Drama Club teacher afterward, and she said you were a “natural” which, of course, we already knew. Bravo, Lillia!

Zane: This week you ran in your first race—the Sports Medicine Fun Run! The track is about four-tenths of a mile, so definitely manageable for little people. You took off sprinting, which gave you a sidestitch later on, but you did finish. You seem to enjoy running and are a pretty active kid, in general. Next year we’ll probably do some practicing beforehand, just so you can pace yourself a little better. You were very proud of yourself, and we’re proud of you, too.

“A portrait of my children every week in 2016.”

Well, folks, I messed up and wrote this week’s summaries on last week’s post—that’s what happens when I get behind on blogging and can’t tell one week from another. To make up for it, please enjoy these photos of my adorable, wonderful children!

“A portrait of my children every week in 2016.”

Lillia: This week is your last of play rehearsals before performance week. On the way to ballet class on Thursday you were going over your script and counting how many lines you had compared to the other characters. You were thoroughly impressed that you had 153, which was way more than even the supposed “lead” character. I haven’t seen you express much nervousness about the upcoming performance—you actually seem pretty calm and confident. You said everything will go fine as long as the fifth graders can learn their lines. We’ll find out for sure next week!

Zane: This week you’ve really been enjoying reading with me. While you still have a nice collection of board books in your room, it’s clear that you’re ready to move on to “big kid” picture books. In fact, several times this week you’ve requested “the book with the cyclopes” (pronounced sy-clope-ees), which is D’Aulaire’s Book of Greek Myths that we bought for Lillia way back when we were homeschooling. You really seem to enjoy these myths, even though they are quite strange! I’ll attribute your affinity to your 1/8 Greek heritage.

“A portrait of my children every week in 2016.”

Lillia: This week you desperately wanted to take a “mental health day” (staying home from school even though you are not sick). I thought about giving in—mental health is important!—but, in the end I was worried that you would miss too much school work (and a play rehearsal) and you wouldn’t be able to catch up easily. You have a full week of vacation coming up in April, so hopefully you will get some needed respite. ‘Til then, we’ll take it day by day.

Zane: This week you are very excited that Spring has arrived—in this picture you are wearing your amusing “King of Spring” costume. I made the flower crown, but you insisted that it needed to have glasses attached. Not pictured: your “cane” that you made out of an old stick decorated with more daffodils and some construction paper leaves. I really enjoy your ability to add your own quirky twist to everything we do.

“A portrait of my children every week in 2016.”

Lillia: This week was the home stretch for the second school term, and I am pleased to report to our faithful readers that you did, indeed, bring your math grade up to a 90, which means…YOU GOT ALL A’s!!! I am so, so proud of you, not so much because of the straight A’s (although that’s great) but because of how hard you worked to make that happen. You really put your all into it, and you were rewarded for your efforts. I hope you are proud of yourself—you should be!

Zane: This week you have been mama’s little helper! I’ve been trying to keep the house tidier because it has been a bit of wreck since I started working outside the home (it’s not an easy job with four humans and a cat living in 960 sq. feet). Perhaps you’ve enjoyed having more places to play and less clutter to trip over but, whatever the cause, you’ve definitely caught the cleaning bug. It’s certainly nice to have some help picking up! I had already been considering offering you the chance to take on some tasks around the house, so that you can earn a little money like your sister does. But, it’s hard to know what is an appropriate “chore” for little ones—any suggestions readers?