Warming up...

The weather has been warming up the past week and it's starting to feel springish. The boys have been loving being outside and they even got the sidewalk chalk out the other day.

And then played a little sidewalk hockey together. I love when they play so nice together.

February 12th...

On Sunday February 12th, Lucius and Daddy went to Lucius' first ever Timberwolves basketball game. They met up with Uncle Hung and cousin Casen & Max. I hear they had fun, though Lucius came home with a fever. He was shivering the night before and during lunch before the game. I guess we should have seen it coming. He was sick for a couple of days and then I took him in. He had a 103 fever and did not look good. They said it was influenza B and gave us some medicine. Of course when we gave him the medicine he threw it all up. Needless to say he is getting better without medicine.

Meanwhile, Oliver and I met up with my cousin Beth for a shopping day at Mall of America. Oliver has been asking to wear dresses again. We started the conversation at school again (like we did last spring) and they were super supportive and helpful. At the end of last summer we went through the boys' dressers and took out all their clothes that were too small or they didn't want. Oliver got rid of all but one dress because they were too small. When we went back to school shopping, he bought girls clothes but no dresses. He currently dresses in anything that's comfy (a texture thing for him) not necessarily another gender specific. Then about three weeks ago he started asking about the dresses again and for girls shoes. SO after talking with the school we took a shopping trip and he found some new outfits to wear. He is SO happy (we've had a lot of talks lately and he had some deep down sorrow he couldn't put into words, but came out as sad tears). Once we addressed his wardrobe and the school showed him love & support- it's like he has a new joy. His teacher has seen a a difference right away.

These gold shoes were a pair we had found last month when we had to take Lucius shoe shopping because a classmate of his put his other shoes in the toilet at school and tried to flush them. Needless to say he needed a new pair of shoes. Oliver did not get these gold shoes but were on his wish list to look for on our shopping trip. Sadly- we couldn't find his size so he didn't get them. Oh well, he did get to share Beth's cinnabon so all is right with the world.

He also spent the last of his Christmas money on a new Harry Potter Backpack, which he was THRILLED about. He is finally reading Harry Potter books and LOVING them. All because his best friend told him he had to read them and catch up to her in the books. Together they talk about Harry Potter all the time. Hooray for positive peer pressure.

 

Oliver trying to finish the third Harry Potter book before bed one night. He was so close he asked to stay up. I let him stay up an extra 30 minutes but he still hadn't finished. I think he ended up finishing the book the next morning.

Another quiet play date...

Oliver and his best friend from down the block are both big readers. When we've had her over for play dates without her younger sister, Oliver and her just sit and read books for most of their play date. It's totally crazy quiet and so awesome that they love to read together.

How amazing to have such a good friend! We love our neighbors.

Statewide Chess Tournament...

This past weekend, on Saturday, I took both boys to the School Chess Association's Statewide Grade level chess Tournament. Oliver wanted very much to play in this tournament because he'd be on a team with his best friend. I couldn't say no, as he'd been practicing for a few weeks now. Lucius of course was very excited that his team of first graders was 5 players strong (and the biggest group of first graders from one school). Oliver's "team" of 3rd graders was just him and his friend but they were full of smiles anyways.

We listened to all the rules and then they were off to their first games.

 

In between rounds (games) we had a lot of tablet time, playing together, chatting and snacks.

After 5 rounds (5 games) over the course of 5 hours, it was time for the award ceremony. The 3rd graders awards were first and even though Oliver and his friend lost all of the five games, he was convinced they still had a shot to win an award. Thankfully he wasn't too disappointed. I tried to tell him all day that it would be really tough to win.

Then 1st graders awards were handed out. Lucius won 2nd place of all the 31 first graders that played that day. I was super impressed.

Then as a team, our first graders scored enough points to win the team trophy. Every single one of those kids earned points and were beaming!

It was a super long day- having arrived at 8:30am and we finally left around 3:30pm. But no one had a bad attitude, everyone did the best they could and we all left still interested in learning more chess. I will call that a WIN!

We even had our first ever friend sleepover on Friday night before this tournament (the friend came with us Saturday morning to play in the tournament and he took 6th place in the first grade division). They wanted to practice chess together on Friday night to get ready for the tournament. I choose to show them a movie instead.

Spending Christmas money...

The other day we finally went out with all the boys savings to do some after the holiday shopping. They've been wanting to spend all their cash and it seemed they'd finally focused onto what exactly they wanted to spend it on. Lucius bought himself a $100 Lego set he'd been talking about for a while. It took him most of the day and into the next to build it.

Oliver spent his on a smaller lego set and a few other things. He was very happy with his purchases.

Now it's time to start saving again.

Simple Pleasures: Chess...

So Chess is kind of a big deal in our house right now. Since the boys got tablets for Christmas we put a chess app on them. Which means they can learn even more chess through lessons, puzzles and videos. They can also play each other, or their friends who are online at the same time as them. I find it amusing when the sit right next to each other and play chess together on their tablets.

I checked out a few chess books for myself the other day so I could learn more as well. I got this one out and started placing the pieces as it's written in the book. Chess lingo is a whole new language almost, but Lucius wasn't confused for one minute. I read it out loud and he put the pieces right where the were supposed to go. He impresses me with all his chess knowledge daily.

The other night I played Lucius and I checkmated him. That might not sound too impressive but with my limited skills and his aggressive chess tactics- it was a hard feat to accomplish. Plus it took me a month of studying chess daily to get that far. Of course once finally checkmated him I never won a game since.

Ice sledding...

On my Nephew Max's birthday we went over to a park to play. He likes going sledding on his birthday but there just wasn't any snow this year. So we played at the playground for a while until one of the dad's ventured to the "snow hill".

They was one strip of ice all the way down the hill and it turned out to be slippery enough to ride down with just snow pants. So slippery in fact that there just wasn't any stopping yourself till you reached the very bottom of the hill. There were a few crashes but a LOT of fun was had by all the kids.