Anyone want an update?

One of my dear sisters gently admonished me for neglecting this blog.  I admit that it is much easier and faster to do all my updates and pictures on Facebook.  However, the biggest problem with Facebook is that it is not as easy to go back and see old posts.  I really love going back and looking at old blog posts.  So maybe this will put me back on track to keep up with the updates.  For now, just a quick update on each family member.

Jason - He has two really busy jobs right now.  One of them is taking care of the kids, especially during the hours that I am away working.  In addition, he is working hard on revising his dissertation, and he is on track to graduate with his Ph.D. this May.  After that?  Who knows.  Jason is searching out and applying for jobs, so really we could be anywhere in the country after graduation.  In what free time he has, he experiments in the kitchen making healthy food - mostly for himself, but the big successes he shares with us :)

Kirsten - The majority of my time is spent with kids - mine and others entrusted to my care :)  I currently have 3 part-time jobs that I truly love.  Here is the breakdown of hours per week - 26 hours spent nannying for a wonderful family (8 of those hours - Tues/Thurs - at our house), 2-5 hours at a church nursery, and 8-16 hours making cake pops at a cupcake shop (or 25 hours in the week before valentine's day).  The only way I am able to work all these hours, and still feel connected to my family, is with the flexibility of all three jobs.  With the cake pop job, I chose what hours I wanted to work, with most of them being early, early morning.  The two childcare jobs welcome me bringing any or all of my own kids, which is really nice.  Violet always comes with me to the church and I usually bring her to my nanny job one day per week.  Keeping up with household work has been a bit of a struggle, but we're starting to get the hang of it.  Often I will bring my dinner materials to my nanny job to get a head start on making dinner, so I'm not scrambling when I get home.  Because usually Violet latches on to me and won't let me go until bedtime, and that makes the dinner prepwork difficult.

Ellie - Most of her time now is spent at school.  Of course we have feelings about this, both positive and negative, but one of the most important factors is that she is happy.  She loves school and is doing really well there.  She has school lunch pretty much every day and we often go to breakfast there as well, and she absolutely loves having school food.  Ellie is a pretty adventurous eater, so the variety excites her.  Right now she is also taking a theater class that she enjoys.  Her free time is spent making up art projects, playing with dolls and toy animals, and playing fighting with Rowan.  She has dramatic mood swings right now; extremely helpful and loving one minute, and then dramatically angry and emotional the next.  Is age 6 the new 13???

Rowan - He attends preschool (the same one we've been using and love) every weekday this year for 4K - for free because Madison started public 4K this year and contracted it out to preschools.  I thought we would have difficult mornings trying to convince him to go to school, because he really enjoys staying home, but he happily goes to school every day and enjoys himself.  When he is home he spends a lot of time playing games on the computer or wii, and the rest of the time asking to play :)  He just finished taking a parent/child exploratory art class that he really enjoyed, and he'll be starting a swimming class near the end of March (as will Ellie and Violet).  Right now he prefers Jason to take care of all his needs, and the other day he said to me, "How about in our family, the boys take care of the boys and the girls take care of the girls." 

Violet - Ah, the ever-changing toddler.  She seems to learn new words every day.  Right now her absolute favorite thing to do is have Jason or I read her books, about 50 a day.  50 times each.  Animal books are what interest her most, as she enjoys pointing out each animal and the sound it makes.  Violet still complains (and often has to be forcibly removed from my body) whenever I leave the house, but she is usually happy and fine with Jason once I'm gone.  She certainly has learned from her big brother and big sister, and she knows how to work a room.  If everyone laughs, she laughs loudly too, even if she doesn't know why.  If someone does something she doesn't like, she will give them a pouty evil eye.  At minimum.  She also is not above screaming or throwing a fit to get what she wants.  But she knows that she simply has to grab my arm, pull, and say, "come" for me to follow her to find what she wants.