13 posts tagged “rayna”
Yesterday was Miles' 3 month birthday, so I whipped out the camera to take what has become my goofy traditional 3-month shots of the boys. They all have worn the same outfit (given to Strider by Aunt Katie and Uncle Dan, back when they were students and shopped at the Nike Outlet in Grove City! Thanks, Kate and Dan -- it's been a long-lasting gift, as you will see below) They also all have the same silly toy bat in the picture --and is anyone else, besides ME, impressed with myself that I have been able to find that same toy for each photo shoot? Usually this house is a black hole for toys and other items -- things disappear, never to be seen again when I actually want them!
Anyway, see if you can match up the right boy with each picture (answers below):
I'd venture to say they look like brothers!
And, thankfully, they have a sweet sister that they can take care of -- and who can take care of them! It's a big task for her, but she says she can handle it.
[Answers to the picture quiz: 1.) Colsen, 2.) Strider, 3.) Strider, 4.) Miles, 5.) Miles, 6.) Colsen ]
Last weekend my dad took Strider camping, along with 80% of the Dreschers. Then, on Saturday, my mom brought Rayna up for the day, too. Needless to say, both kids LOVED it. I've been hearing stories about it all week. And just like I used to, Strider gets most excited about the food when camping. (When dads are in charge, we all know what kind of "meals" are made) My favorite quote from Strider, though, was "Then for breakfast, Uncle J. made pancakes, and then he drownded mine with 2% maple syrup"
"2% maple syrup? What's that?" I asked.
He said, "That's what it said on the bottle! The other 98% is all chemicals."
So there you go.
Here are a few pictures of them loving the outdoors this past weekend...
Heard randomly throughout the day sometimes...
Rayna: Sports. Sports. Sports. Sports. Sports.
Me: Why does she keep saying that?
Strider (with his devious grin): She's trying to annoy me. I told her I didn't like that word, so she keeps saying it. But I tricked her.
Upon learning about adverbs (that most of them end in -ly)
Strider: I guess Dolly Parton is an adverb.
As I was serving some salad
Rayna: I want some of those....those... leperchauns! (She really meant "croutons" -- we don't have them in salad very often, obviously!)
During a conversation in which Colsen and I were pretending he was 38 years old:
Me: Where do you live these days/
Colsen: California
Me: Oh. What job do you have?
Colsen: I'm a goldfish
This morning:
Colsen: Hic… hic…. Hic
Pete: Colsen, do you have the hiccups?
Colsen: Yeah. Can you buy me a new mouth?
Said about 10 times a day:
Me: Go put the…. in the….you know what I mean.
Said about 8 times a day:
Me: I just need to ….. get the.... you know.... for Cole-I-mean-Ray-I-mean-Miles.
[NDD (Noun Deficiency Disease) is evidently stronger than ever with me.]
Funny things said by Pete recently
N/A
[He's been too busy and stressed to be funny lately. Apparently students aren't the only people who find the end-of-semester time hard!]
Today at lunch, completely out of the blue
Strider: I really wish I could find the area of a circle.
Me: What? Why?
S: Because then I could have PIE!
Talking about his future in baseball
S: Well if they aren't going to let me play, I'm going to sit on the bench and chew tobacco.
Me: Great.
As we're driving in the car
Rayna: This is the most beautiful country!
Strider: Rayna, this is the only country you've ever been in.
While sitting in her "time out" chair after doing something she shouldn't have
Rayna: Mom, can I get down now? I forgive you!
.
After hearing Strider tell me something I that was excited about
Rayna: Mom! Mom! I wanna tell you something!
Me: What?
R: Umm...There was this man.... and let's see.... what did he do?....
On his truck
Colsen: Look, Mom, I'm on my skateboard! Can you take a picture of me so I can see it?
Twenty minutes after I sent him up for a nap
Colsen: Hi Mom, I'm awake now!
Me: Cole, you did not sleep.
C: Yes, I already did!!
But this is what he looked like.... I think I was right.
Today was the Closing Ceremony for Classical Conversations!
For 24 weeks, Strider and Rayna have been part of this academic program (here's the national web site if you're interested), and today was the end for this year. All the families gathered together for a program that all the classes put on, and for the handing out of awards. Here are a few short videos of the pieces our kids were in.
(Miles is trying to sing along in the background of the video above)
Each child received a character award: Rayna got an award for "enthusiasm" and Strider's was for "wisdom." Rayna also received an award for memorizing John 1:1-7 in English and in Latin, and Strider got an additional award called "Memory Master" for learning all 562 facts (comprised of geography, math, English grammar, Latin, history, science, and timeline cards) that the kids worked on throughout the year. We are very proud of them both for working so hard.
This program was so good for our kids -- we're very thankful they got to do it this year. And our friend Kate did a GREAT job directing it all -- I think the program is about 90 kids big, so she had a huge job being in charge! And it's her 40th birthday tomorrow -- HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KATE!
I am becoming increasingly convinced that Rayna is the live version of Curious George, and Colsen is Dennis the Menace incarnate. And the 2 of them together result in Bad Ideas Squared.
Inevitably, when I sit down to feed Miles, or am in some other way occupied, Colsen and Rayna will silently melt away into the nether regions of our house, so I find myself yelling "Colsen and Rayna, what are you guys doing??" every few minutes throughout the day. (I think I'm starting to yell it in my sleep now)
And sometimes I'll hear back, "Nothing!" which is not good, and sometimes I'll get no response at all, which is downright terrible. And then there are the classic responses like, "Colsen is brushing his teeth with your special lotion!" or "We just got glue everywhere!"
A few days ago, George and Dennis were upstairs while I was downstairs feeding Miles, and Dennis/Colsen yelled down to me in his I-think-something's-wrong-here voice:
C: Rayna gave me that!
Me: What??
C: Rayna gave me that.
Me: She gave you what?
C: THAT!
Me: What's that?
C: THAT!!
Me (finally realizing defeat on this front): Rayna, what did you give him?
R: I gave him THIS!
Not only do these two have mischievousness mastered, but they are becoming experts in the art of being elusive.
So Rayna is Curious George, Colsen is Dennis the Menace, and Strider is Calvin, (as in Calvin and Hobbes, but that is a whole other set of tales). I wonder who Miles will turn out to be....?
Life is definitely colorful around here!
We went caroling tonight with some friends, which was a highlight for all of us. On the way home, we were trying to talk about how meaningful it was and asked the kids about their favorite songs.... but Rayna just kept singing "Shrek the halls with boughs of donkey" all the way home. This was NOT a song we had caroled.
And last week, the ever Mr. Literal-and-Practical Strider was listening to "What Child is This?" The only comment he had about this beautiful (and rhetorical) song was, "This song is weird. It's too easy! It's Jesus!"
He also doesn't like one of the Oak Ridge Boys' Christmas songs (this album from 1982 plays daily at our house throughout the whole Advent season) called "Christmas Carol" because he thinks it's dumb to write a carol about a carol.
So, the kids' wackiness notwithstanding, the merriment continues. And we wish you all a Happy Christmas Eve Eve!
It’s been quite a surprise to find the azalea bush on the side of our house suddenly blooming over these last few weeks. Up until this year it has always behaved like the standard azalea that it is, and bloomed in the early spring only. I don’t know if this summer it just started to get jealous of all the blooms on the hydrangea bush next to it or what, but here in the hottest stretch of the summer, it’s been blooming away!
It’s a fun thing to catch garden plants doing unexpected things – especially blooming – at unexpected times. And whenever I see flowers blooming out of season, I think of Rayna.
Anyone who knows me well has heard this story (probably several times), but it still is very meaningful to me and I ponder it often. When I was pregnant with Rayna, we bought an Easter lily in her honor from our church, brought it home and planted it in our garden, where it promptly looked dead. Then, very strangely, it started to grow over the summer, and the week Rayna was born (in August) it bloomed again!
As the months went by after Rayna’s birth, and it became clear that she was missing several developmental milestones, that story about the Lily kept coming back to me, as if God was telling me that this child was on her own timetable, and would bloom in her own season. And He was definitely right!
She is still on her own timetable, and much as that frustrates me at times, I am very thankful. It is a beautiful thing to see her bloom whenever she finally chooses to. The first time she finally walked, the first time she said “Mama,” the first time she dressed herself – all were events to be celebrated and I appreciated them far more than if she had done them when the books all said she “should.”
But it’s something I have to remind myself often – that it’s good she develops when she does. Sometimes my pride is in such a rush. It’s been hard over the years to have hundreds of strangers come up to us on playgrounds, at church, or wherever, and try to guess her age (why do people always feel like they need to do that?) and to have them always guess way below her actual age. It’s hard to sit at gymnastics class and watch her be the one who can’t do a lot of the activities. It’s hard to watch her in children’s church be the one who doesn’t understand what she’s supposed to do. But then I have to realize most of the difficulty for me stems from my own pride. Rayna is the happiest child I’ve ever met, so how can I want anything different from, or for, her?
Plus, she makes me smile thousands of times a day. Yes, she knows how to dress herself now, but she has gotten to the point where she tries to make her clothes “match” – and to her this only means black shirt with black skirt, or blue shirt with blue pants, etc. My little monochrome girl. And she gets excited about everyone and everything… “What? We’re having brussel sprouts for dinner?? You’re kidding me! Thanks, Mom!” Her enthusiasm is hard to beat.
So, while the waiting seasons are hard…. waiting for her to ride a 2-wheel bike, waiting for her to read, waiting for her to understand even the first concepts about math… I know that the eventual blooming is always worth it. Just like my azalea in August, her timing is unexpected, and beautiful.
We celebrated Rayna's birthday last week in Keuka Lake as well. She had insisted ahead of time that she wanted a "Girl Party" so we invited all of her girl cousins to come over for some activities and cake. The girls were all good sports -- even the teenagers! Two of the boys, Strider and Nate, were persuaded (both financially and with the promise of cake) to be the "butlers" for the party -- a responsibility they ended up taking quite seriously. Rayna had a fantastic time and loves to talk about her party. Here are some of the scenes:
Strider has been gone the last few days (at Cousins Camp) so our house has been a bit quieter than usual. While we definitely miss Strider's enthusiasm and funny comments, this has also been a good time for Pete and I to actually hear our other 2 kids. :)
Colsen, especially, has been quite funny to talk to lately. He's definitely in the "Telegram" stage of talking. He tries to get his point across in 1 or 2 words at a time. My friend Jarod recently had the idea to try to tell a story in only 2 sentences, which I thought was pretty fun. But Colsen tries to do it in even fewer words. So we hear things like:
"Hurt! Back! Rayna! Jail!" (which turned out to mean "Rayna hurt my back when she was trying to put me in her pretend jail" for those of you not quite up on toddler-ese)
And he definitely takes after his father in his love of the use of the colon in a sentence. I've often said that Pete is not capable of composing a title for a paper he writes without the use of a colon. (For example, his latest work is entitled, "Non-Market Entrepreneurship: Interdisciplinary Approaches") Colsen has patterned his speech likewise. So here's a typical conversation we had yesterday:
C: Paci: ur-is-it?
Me; I think it's upstairs
C: Oh main! [using his Southern pronounciation of "man"]
And here's another:
C: Phone: ur-is-it?
Me: I don't know.
C: [pointing happily] Up air!
Me: Oh you're right, it's up there.
C: Get it! Have it! Hold it!
Me: No, you can't have my phone.
C: Peeeeeeeaaaasssee?????
Me: Sorry, sweetie
C: [Wailing and throwing himself on the floor]
(And just now as I'm typing this, I heard him say, "Balloon: get it!" He definitely loves that colon.)
The "ur is it" gets a lot of use around here. Yesterday he even asked where his grandmother was by saying, "Nonna: ur-is-it?" Time to start working on pronouns.... I think my friend Trey is writing a toddler pronoun course, so we may sign him up for that.
And Rayna also is providing her share of the entertainment around here. When Strider was gone the other night, we sat down to a pasta dinner. She pushed her food around on her plate a little bit and then whined in a perfect Strider imitation, "Do I have to eat the sauce??" Pete answered her, "Yes you have to eat the sauce. But Rayna you LIKE sauce. Strider is the one who doesn't like it." She said, "I do like sauce? Ok." and promptly picked up her fork and ate it all.
If only all the wills of our children were so pliable.
