Parentheticals

Monday night Rea taught family night with flannel board people to act out the story of the brother of Jared.  She told it very well and remembered a lot more details than we expected.  The girls had fun moving the characters, although it was frustrating to try to keep Timmy out of them. Tuesday was Sara's date night, but Alison also had to be at a Stake Auxiliary Training meeting, so Mike took her to get ice cream right after dinner and then came home to be with all the kids while Alison was gone. Thursday evening we decided to have a fire and roast marshmallows.  We've had S'more supplies since June, so it was good to use some.  We all enjoyed the fire, and Timmy was pretty good about understanding that it was hot. On Friday, we went out to go to the park with the homeschooling group, and the car wouldn't start.  The kids had turned on the dome lights and Alison hadn't noticed to turn them off, so the battery was dead.  Our jump box battery was dead, too, bec

On Tuesday night we went to the temple with the ward bishopric. Apparently the ward financial clerk is invited to such events. It was good to go. We don't get there enough because finding babysitters for an extended period of time is difficult. We also went to dinner afterward. It was fun. On Wednesday we had Science Time with Daddy. The subject was gravity. We had a fun time talking about why we build walls vertical (and not diagonal or horizontal). We also talked about how on the moon you can jump higher, and how every planet has gravity that pulls things that are near the planet to the planet. On Thursday Rea and I went out to the library for a daddy daughter date. She wanted to get more fairy books. It is great that she loves reading chapter books. Hopefully she can pick some that are higher quality some time :). I also went to do some home teaching. Friday we made apple sauce as a family date. It was surprisingly easy, and the results tasted great. Saturday we

This week we... Certainly we did something. Wednesday for Science Time we talked about the particulate nature of matter.  That was an interesting one.  Rea seemed to get it, though. She did, at one point tell me that particles are called atoms, so apparently we had talked about it before. Thursday was Rea's birthday.  She requested homemade macaroni and cheese and asparagus for dinner, and chocolate cupcakes for dessert.  We at it as a picnic in the backyard.  She made little fairy decorations for the cupcakes, and she got some lovely presents: a kit to make flower fairies, a set of laminated paper dolls of horses and fairies, a coloring book, a toy Dalmation puppy, a doll with a dress modeled after Elsa, and Quints dolls.  It was a very fun day and she was very happy. Saturday we went and picked apples from a neighbor of Amy's.  Amy told us the apples were falling off her tree, so we asked if we could pick some and clean up the ground for her.  It was fun.  Rea was quite

Last Tuesday was Sara's daddy-daughter-date. She chose to get ice cream at macey's and to go to the playground and go on the slides. This last week I also worked on my tower defense game that I am making for a programming competition. It is coming along decently. You can play the game, but it isn't complete yet. I also finally convinced Scott to make a board game. It is moving quickly. It is a game where you play as villains, sending monsters to fight heroes. A unique idea. On Wednesday we had 'science time with daddy' again. This time we talked about energy, and what it was. It went well. On Thursday we had another Board game design group meeting. I presented my changes to Space Game, and there wasn't much feedback (perhaps I need to make some bigger changes or get it played with another group before I get more feedback). Friday Alison went out and bought treats for General Conference as well as stuff for Rea's birthday while I took care of the