"About Will" by Elsa Arnold

Just so you know what real life around our house is like, the following was found in Elsa's mini notebook downstairs:

Will is my little brother. Whenever I tell him to go to sleep in the night he gets mad and crys. And then I tell him to go upstairs and when he walks past my room he still looks at me with an angry face. Will likes to fight after playing video games. When he is don playing video games he fights me and Henry. So now if he hurts us he dos not get to play video games. He is crazy some times he chases me and when he catches me he hurts me. And some other times Will hurts us to. Some times he is mean and gets so mad that he tells on us. But some times he is nice. The End.

I love that Elsa tried to end on a positive note. Oh my little Will--so sweet, so crazy.

6 months old

At her 6-month checkup she weighed 18 lbs. 10 oz. (89th percentile) and was 28 1/2 inches long (99th percentile). That makes her my smallest child, even though she started out the biggest. Maybe it's because she doesn't like to eat baby food very much and refuses to take a bottle. She got her first tooth last Sunday, though, and she's learning how to use it--biting me and arrowroot cookies and noodles.



She has recently become my newest kitchen appliance. She loves to sit on the counter and watch me bake and wash dishes.

iris at 5 months

She can sit.

She can roll.

elsa can spell!

She got second place in the second grade spelling bee after hardly practicing. She was in the top 4 of her class, so we got to go watch her compete in the grade-wide spelling bee. I was amazed at how riveting a spelling bee is. Even Will stayed interested the whole time. She got out on adamant and treachery--third grade words she had never seen before. But, she made it through all the second grade words and even a couple of the third grade words she hadn't studied. I was so proud.

christmas

It was so good to go back home for Christmas. It had been a year since we'd been there, and there were some cousins and aunts and uncles that Iris hadn't met yet. We got to spend 2 weeks surrounded by family, and it was luxurious. We have very few pictures because Brandon forgot his camera and my new one was set on some weird settings. But, we got to go to the Christmas display downtown--my favorite childhood Christmas activity.


We went to the zoo. Here are the kids looking at the gibbons (my favorite exhibit at the Minnesota zoo). And, the new creature we discovered--a leafy sea dragon.


We had a wonderful Christmas Eve at Chuck and Kris's house--soup, homemade egg nog, treats, songs, scriptures, and stories. A fun Christmas morning with lots of presents from Santa. And, the family Christmas party at Grandma's with amazing food and the kids acting out the Nativity. Best present-opening reaction: Will had been talking about how he wanted a Big Foot since November, and Grandma succumbed to his wishes. When he opened it, his jaw dropped open and then he jumped up and down shouting, "Big Foot. Big Foot! BIG FOOT!" It was a very merry Christmas.