Big Brains and Birthdays

First off, let me just tell you that I am now the proud parent of a 5-YEAR OLD GIRL! I've been calling her "almost 5" for ages, but now it sounds really weird for her to tell people that.

For her big day, I surprised her with a trip out to get her ears pierced! She's been asking ever since her Fairy Friend got hers done for her 4th birthday. She was happy and brave and very grown up about the whole thing... until they did it. Oh my, she went from happy and excited to a puddle of tears almost instantly. These were no crocodile tears either; it really hurt. But they were quick on the draw with lollipops for everyone and that made it better pretty quickly.



Unfortunately, one of the backings fell off in her sleep last night and so the back closed up on one of them. I had to re-pierce it for her this morning and she didn't like that very much either. Luckily, as a girl of many piercings, I've had that happen many times and knew it wasn't a big deal to just pop it through again. She must really, really like her earrings for putting up with it and then not complaining when I cleaned the second ear. And then happily went for her afternoon cleaning as well. She really is a big girl now.

So that took up most of our day yesterday. We actually had to go back to the piercing place twice so that they would have two employees to do both ears at once. In the meantime, we went out for "tea" (hot chocolate or lemonade and scones) and played at the mall playground. Then we hit the grocery store and I'm sure you all know that that did me in for good. Her special birthday dinner request was for green beans and peas. We convinced her that she needed a main dish too so she chose macaroni and cheese (boxed, of course) and fruit salad. She had the BEST time helping me to prepare all that. I really should plan more time to make dinner and let her help more often.

Today was back to the grind (as if, lol) after the Official School Holiday. We started out with Science... ok, it was a dentist's appointment. The kids did great. Great teeth all around, except for me. I had a hole in one tooth where my filling needs to be replaced but she said it can wait until I'm not pregnant anymore. I really like that she doesn't pressure me into getting x-rays while pregnant. Technically, they should be fine at this point but why risk it, right?

We came home and got lunch and then put Grey down for a nap - a challenge in itself today. We started with Cassia's phonics and she started out okay but then started just guessing silly things. I got so frustrated with her that I told her that we were done and it was Cameron's turn. She cried and cried! And then she did the rest of the lesson with good effort. I wasn't even trying to trick her into doing better. I really was done - but I'll take it. Cameron struggled through his lesson, but he put in a good effort. They were hard words. For grammar they learned about linking verbs and then did another page for their poem books. They drew pictures for the month of March with daffodils blowing in the wind. Somehow, it got mentioned that Easter is sometimes in March so the daffodils are harboring a few Easter eggs too. They both complained a lot when I asked them to do it, but then both ended up spending about an hour working on it. Next was math where Cameron did some subtracting of money. He was having some trouble focusing and ended up taking forEVER to finish. I'm thinking that we need to move back to the dining room table to work instead of the couch, at least for a bit. Cassia insisted on doing her Explode the Code Primer "for math" and finished up the letter Q. She wanted to keep going and finish off the book with X but I asked her to save it for tomorrow. We finished up with history and I read about the Roman gods and a bit about their thirst for new lands and new technologies. They didn't seem as impressed as I had hoped with their invention of concrete, paved roads, and aqueducts, but I think I have an episode of What the Ancients Knew on TiVo that might help with that.

Right now they're playing Big Brain Academy on the Wii. They've been watching me play on Facebook lately and begging me to let them try (not on MY game, lol) and so I dusted off BBA today and they're happy as clams with it. They're doing pretty well too. I bet that game helps with standardized testing skills. ;) Too bad we don't take them.

Tomorrow the plan is ballet, grocery store, and then cake baking! I'm off to make dinner now.