We're still here!

Wow, what a month. Work has been hectic, we took the kids to my in-laws, and we've all taken turns at being sick. But we're back, and as dangerous as ever!

Xavier took his test for his Kempo Karate Yellow Belt this past weekend. I was afraid that he would be the little maniac we all know and love, and that he would fail his test. Much to my surprise, though, he was very focussed and listened closely to what his testers were telling him; that was when I realized that he must be sick. No, seriously, he was fine, and he got his yellow belt, and he is very proud and psyched about it.

Gwen is getting over her second cold in as many weeks, but it hasn't slowed her down much. Although I allowed her to "skip" karate yesterday, she had to tag along because Xavier went, and she ended up standing on the sidelines, showing Xavier how to do things. She still wants to be a paleontologist, though, and not a karate instructor like Xav.

The kids have said and done many funny things in the past month, but none come to mind immediately -- perhaps I need more sleep. In the "funny in an expensive sort of way" category, it appears that Xavier's tricycle and the garage door had a disagreement, and that the tricycle won. We don't actually know for sure that the garage door broke because it hit the tricycle (for that matter, the trike doesn't have a mark on it), but when I look at the facts:

• Garage door seemed fine when I pushed the button and went in the house
• Garage door was bent when I went back in the garage later to collect my purse, and there were pieces of garage door all over the floor
• The tricycle seemed to be in the path of the garage door

... the circumstantial evidence seems overwhelming. Moral of this story? Don't trust a four-year-old to park the car (or anything else on wheels.) That's okay, we'll just take the cost of the new door out of his allowance.

Gwen finally got the coveted honor of being Star of the Week in her kindergarten class the week of Valentine's Day. This is good, because even though we assured her that this was a "turn" thing and not based on merit, every Friday she was having a meltdown because "she hadn't been good enough." Hopefully she will continue to bask in the glow of this award until the end of the school year.

Gwen also is continuing on her quest to become a paleontologist. She brought home the Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs from the school library over the weekend, and you can guess what lucky individual got to read it to her. She started making connections (even though we started with the A's -- and, now that I think about it -- are still in the A's), so she was screaming out "meat!" and "plants!" as she listened to the beasts' scientific names as she indicated what each ate (and she was actually frighteningly reliable.) Every time she screamed, though, Adam would jump and have a heart attack or a migraine. Maybe we should have gone light on the expresso.

Anyway, take care! I'll try to be more observant so I can post more soon!