A Boy and His Dad

Abe scored two tickets to the BYU game last night.  A friend offered them on Facebook and Abe quickly called and snatched them up.  Then came the question of who he should take with him.  We both agreed that it was about time Cannon had a night with his dad all to himself. 

I got one look at these pictures and I couldn't believe how old he looks.  Cannon told Abe, "This is probably the best thing you've ever done with me!"  He loved it and was so happy.  Cannon is such a cheerful little guy that the whole family was really happy for Cannon to get to be the one to go with Dad.  Lots of hugs and well wishes for him as we said goodbye. 

And since Abe and Cannon were off to have such a fun time, I decided to take the rest of the gang to the discount theater to see Maleficent.  We hadn't seen it and I was a little bit hesitant because I don't feel comfortable when stories are twisted so that evil is portrayed as good and vice versa.  However, I was very, very pleased with the movie.  It was excellent and we all enjoyed it and had good discussion on the way home.  Good post-movie discussion is what makes a good movie for me!

The little kids' family room fort that served as their sleeping quarters for a couple of nights. 

Peter's baby toes.  They are one of my favorite things in the world. 

 The latest generation of Little Kids' book club:)  This was our second meeting and we're missing a couple of kids, but we had a wonderful time discussing Caddie Woodlawn and playing games and eating turkey for our snack (it has to do with the book).  I think this was our third time reading this one aloud, but it one of our favorites.  Do you like that spit up mark on my shoulder?  Yep, that's how I roll.  I cannot be slowed down by a bit of spit up.

Here is a picture of our first meeting of the year.  We read another favorite that is really funny and the kids loved, Little Pear.  It's about a five year old boy in China. 
I didn't do any kids' book clubs last year because I just felt I ought not to.  That was the right decision considering the pregnancy and new calling-- it would have been too much.  I couldn't help myself this year and we're back at it.  I missed doing it last year and I missed reading as much to the kids.  When I didn't have a scheduled book club it was too easy to skip our read aloud time.
Now the trick is to balance out reading books that are directed to the older kids with those for the younger.  We just finished reading The Legend of Sleepy Hollow last week.  It was great fun and good for October.  Now we're onto a very sweet book I highly recommend called Wonder.

The main character in Little Pear is rather naughty and disobedient.  So we played "Mother, may I?"

We all pretty much agreed that "one giant step" isn't really fair if you can do the splits!

The kids made tanghurlers for their snack.  In the book they were fruit on a stick with a candied syrup.  We used bamboo skewers and sugar covered gummy fruits.  It worked.

Lois is a good friend of Faith's.  Her family lives down the street and Lois's older sister is good friends with Elinor.  I really like their mom and they homeschool.  AND THEY ARE MOVING!  Not terribly far away-- still in our same city, but far enough that parents would need to transport them to one another's houses rather than a quick independent scooter ride.
Blah.
Having grown up in the military and having frequently been the one to move away, this shouldn't be such a big deal to me.  But it is.  It seriously bums me out when people move away.  Logically, I really do know it is nothing personal.  But it kind of feels like getting dumped.  I guess I'd rather be  the one moving away and doing the dumping.  I suppose it would not be in good taste to pray that their house closing falls through and they decide to stay?
Yeah, I didn't think so.