California Day 8

Aunt Erica arrived late last night from Oregon, so the kids were in for a big surprise when she popped into our bedroom minutes after they woke up. After breakfast, the kids drew artwork and, when John drew his first-ever balloons, he asked, "Can we upload this picture online?"

Then we tumbled into the back yard to let the kids play. Boy, are they getting so much more outdoor time here than when we're at home! It is so good for them! Above are the latest additions to John's Ant Castle.

Mary climbing the little bridge

Aunt Erica is a new person to throw the ball . . .

. . . and a new person to chase little people!

She caught him!

One wonders, will the trellis survive our visit here?

Erica brought the keyboard she uses to practice singing for her parish choir, so she gave the kids their first piano lesson. John can now tell you that those things are called "keys," they can be black or white, and the black ones come in groups of two and groups of three.

We went for a walk to visit yet another of the four fabulous, public parks-with-playgrounds within walking distance of this house. I don't have the energy, but I know that if I looked up the last several years of blog posts about our California visit, I could find photos of John petting the above gregarious cat.

John showing us his stick, standing in front of the shrub variety of St. John's wort

Following lunch, nap time for the children (during which time I did more pruning in the front yard), the children did water play in the back yard. Both were highly cautious of the sprinkler.

The kiddie pool was more their speed.

Brother to sister: "Let's swim!"

Mary's language is increasing by leaps and bounds as she says sentences. Little Miss imitated her sassy older brother today and it was good John wasn't there to see me laughing. You see, in the last two days I've been trying a new phrase to get John to pay attention to me instead of running maniacally in circles and ignoring me: "John, now listen with your ears. We're going to do ABC and I expect XYZ behavior from you or 123 is going to happen." It worked for about one day but on the second day, John responded by holding his hands over his ears and saying, "I don't hear you!" Well! Mary must have been watching closely because later when she and I were alone, she began imitating that, hands over ears and everything, over and over. "I don't hear you!" and she'd burst into peals of laughter. (Another thing Miss Smarty Pants does when she's trying to disobey is to pretend to be asleep. For example, if Mary is running into a room without me in this house--which isn't babyproofed, so I have to keep her by my side--I'll chase after her saying, "no, ma'am." Then she'll lay down, close her eyes, and say "I sleep." Like playing possum! Additionally, if I catch her doing something she knows full well she shouldn't do, sometimes she'll close her eyes and smile, saying, "I hide!")