A Busy Week

Today was a very busy day. Greg had hernia surgery, and it was an important conference day for me, so I couldn't miss work. Aunt Sarah came down with Grandma Toni to help with the boys while Greg had his procedure, and look who she brought with: Sophie!

Nick loved snuggling with his cousin Sophie. He kept asking to hold her. 

The boys were thrilled when they saw our visitors this morning. They were showing off for Aunt Sarah and Nick kept asking all sorts of questions. Henry was quite jealous of his cousin, especially later when I came home and was holding her. Unfortunately, I only had time to snap the one picture.  This whole week has been incredibly busy. Besides the boys having their first full week of school, I spent three days unpacking my classroom (34 boxes) and getting set up. Also, Henry's school had curriculum night, Greg started working an extra day each week, and I had to be back to work starting on Thursday. Whew!

Nick came back from Kindergarten on Monday with this neat picture he colored. I like his purple and green color scheme; it is both creative and a little eccentric, just like my firstborn son. He also made this funky raccoon puppet for the story The Kissing Hand, by Audrey Penn.

Nick also worked on his writing this week. As you can see, he needs lots of practice with his letters, but he's showing a little more perseverance. I've been helping him with his handwriting each night. This is my fifteenth year of teaching, and I've had groups of Kindergarten and First Grade students for the last seven years. In fact, writing is often my focus. It's a whole different ball game, though, when it is your own child!

Let's not leave Henry out--he has been doing some great work as well!

His teacher doesn't believe in cookie-cutter artwork, so these creations are all Henry's design. He told me all about them, too. "Um, I did a dot here--green, green, green. Then I went like this (swooshing his hand) red, and dot dot dot yellow."

I told Henry the red streak looked like a shooting star. "No," he said. "Is a dot." Well, he's right, I guess. In case you were wondering, Greg's procedure went very well, and he's at home recovering.  See? He even did story time with the boys tonight. I'm sure he'll be sore for awhile, but Greg said the pain wasn't too bad.

I didn't have anything planned for dinner, so I did a quick inventory of the pantry and fridge and decided to make pizza from scratch. I used the dough function on my bread machine and topped it with fresh basil and tomatoes from my garden. I found spinach, mushrooms, and tomatoes in the fridge. Oh, and I had leftover ricotta in the fridge, so I dumped some on, too.

I think it turned out pretty well for an improvised recipe. I made the same mistake I always make, though: I added way too much cheese. It always looks fine before I bake the pizza.

The boys liked my pizza, anyway. The basil was sweet and it was tasty with the ricotta.

Henry said this picture should be called, "Darth Vader eats pizza." 

Not only did the boys eat their pizza, but while I was making it, they kept "stealing" mushrooms and peppers and tomatoes off the counter. It's my trick for getting more veggies into them. I won't give them any other pre-dinner snacks, but they know I'll let them sneak veggies. Henry took a whole plate of spinach and was walking around eating it like a little bunny rabbit.

This weekend, I'll try to write some more about our trip to Wisconsin Dells. I couldn't resist posting my pics from today, though.  :)  Happy Friday!