A discovery and a revelation

So on Monday Eli and Jon boarded an airplane to the States. The reason for the trip was two-fold. One, a board meeting for camp. Two, helping out Jon's parents around the house for a week or so. Actually, three-fold....three, giving Eli and Jon some time to spend together on her first Daddy/Eli trip. Since they have been gone I have made a discovery. Logan talks...a lot. A whole lot. I thought that Eli talked a lot, but if it's just me and her at home, she will usually become absorbed in something and not talk that much. Logan doesn't do that. He just chatters on and on and on and on. Incessantly. His conversations are sometimes interesting. He's always cute. I always love him. I have to admit that sometimes I think in my head what Benjamin, the ever loving big brother, says out loud..."Logan, could you just be quiet for a few minutes?" I also have had a revelation since they left. Eli stayed by herself with Grandma and Grandpa for a couple of nights while Jon went to the board meeting. Thinking she may be a little nervous, I called her the second night. My call was tolerated, and she answered my questions with good, yes, no and ok. That was it. Haven't talked to her since. I thought to myself, "What's the deal? Doesn't she miss her mom?” Then I realized, she's just like me. I'm the girl who flew alone to Brazil at sixteen, stayed for two months and called my parents exactly once. Now I have a small idea of what my parents went through. Sorry mom and dad.

Bonjour

For some reason this summer the kids went through a french bonjour phase. Meaning that for about a week they walked around saying bonjour while making the appropriate face and goatee stroking hand motions. Not really sure where this came from. but it was funny. For those of you who can't bring this image to mind, here's Ben's version. He is, of course, sporting the magic marker facial hair.

Here is the swimming pool version with Logan providing the vocals and Eli the motions.

A peek inside the mind of a six year old

Last night at four o'clock in the morning, I felt something soft and warm crawl into bed beside me.  It was Logan.  Here is the conversation that followed:

Logan- Mom, I had a nightmare.  I was getting eaten by a Boa.
Me- Ooh, that would be scary.
L- Are Boas dangerous?
M- They can be if you're an animal. Are you a bunny?
L- No.
M- You're fine then.

A few minutes later as we were walking together back to his bed...

Logan- Look at that light on the floor (it was coming through the skylight).  Why is it green?
Me- Um, I don't know.
L- Maybe a meteor hit it.

A few more minutes later as we were snuggling in his bed....

Me- What was your favorite part of the party?
Logan- The cake. The presents. My toys.
M- We sang Happy Birthday a lot of times. (The party was for everyone in the family that have birthdays in September)
L- Yeah, we sang one, two, three, four, um, five times.
M- That's a lot of singing.
L- There are a lot of people in the world. About a hundred and fifty.
M- That's a lot of people.
L- Yeah. A hundred here. A hundred there and a hundred there.

He's a Lil' Dragon now, and he LOVES it.

Dance fever

Eli, who by the way just turned nine this past Saturday which is incredible to me, was a busy girl this summer.  She went to a complete month of ballet camp from 8 until 3 everyday.  We are homeschoolers who are getting out of bed at 8 (if mom has anything to say about it!), so getting up in time to be in Ponce at 8 took a little bit of getting used to. We did good though, and Eli enjoyed herself a lot.  She had sore muscles for a week  or so as she got used to dancing 6 hours a day. 

At the end of the month they put on a show.  Mostly stuff from the movie Rio. It was cute.  They also did a "fashion show" which I wasn't to thrilled about, but it was pretty tame.  Eli was also very cute trying to be cool.  She is still way to innocent to pull it off....yay!!

In other dancing news, we got the chance to see a free ballet show.  Kaylah, Eli, Shayna  and I got dressed up and went to the show.  We soon found out why it was free.  HORRIBLE!!  We entertained ourselves taking dumb pictures of ourselves. 

Ahh, what a fun girls night out.  It's a good thing that we can entertain ourselves!

Where did the summer go??

I can't believe it's already halfway through September.  We officially started back to school last week.  Well, whatever school is for us, but that is a whole different post. That means though, that summer is definately over.  Sometimes when you live on a tropical island right next to the beach, it's hard to recognize fall.  I thought it might be good to review the summer so that I could share with you all everything that happened and all of the fun things that we did.  This will not be in chronological order of any kind or be organized in anyway.  Sorry Kaylah and other Kaylah type personalities!  That's not how I roll.  Umm. Did I really just say that? What a weirdo I am!

Hmm....what to start with?  Oh, I know.  I think that both Jon and Benjamin will be happy for me to share these with all you fine folk!  I usually cut the boys hair. However, I don't really enjoy doing it. I always try to get them to go to a barber or other haricutting establishment. Jon hates to spend "waste" money on that. I convinced him this summer during the middle of counselor training using the valid excuse that I was too busy and unable to attend him properly. So off to Chapu aka local barber man they went.
(Pause. Kaylah offered to cut their hair, but I declined.  Perhaps you can see why after you look at this picture of the first and last haircut she gave Benjamin a few years ago....I love you Kaylay!)

Unpause. Here in Puerto Rico when boys get there hair cut 99% of the time they use the "maquina" which is that shaver razor thingy. My personal opinion is that those haircuts can look a bit funky. So Jon specifically asked Chapu to use scissors on their hair which he did.  Here are the results:

   

 

 

I laughed really hard.  Actually the entire summer staff laughed really hard!   It was a much needed stress relief to laugh like that. And in reality the haircuts themselves were fine, we just neglected to request no styling products.  Jon of course used this as proof that barbers are waste of money.