dave & janet horsman ::: keepin’ it real since 1998

They Might Be Giants: Here Come the ABCs…this is our kids’ favorite CD.  Come to think of it… it’s one of my favorites too!  I think every family with kids should have it; each and every song is so contagious.  It’s educational too.  Listen to some.  Here’s a little video of Elijah singing his favorite - “The Alphabet of Nations.”  I love how serious he is about the whole thing.  (Zeke’s favorite is “E Eats Everything.” In the song E eats all the other letters except the letter Z, and then Z eats Es. Can you guess why it’s his favorite?)

P.S. Ok, so the inundation of videos didn’t quite come into fruition for this week. Dave’s been really busy…good busy though.  His main role here on campus is “growing” a 24/7 house of prayer.  (I’ve written about it before.)  His team just recieved an $80,000 donation to redo the prayer room!  Wow! Most of the money (I think) is going towards a new sound system, but they are also doing a bit of remodeling.  Dave and the guys on his team actually did most of the demolition and rebuilding themselves. It’s pretty impressive.

This little geography book has been Elijah’s favorite reading material ever since…well, ever since he could read, I guess!  He has a knack of memorizing otherwise useless information, like a country’s primary language, or it’s life expectancy.  I betcha he’s gonna be one of those annoyingly good Trivial Pursuit players.

“Oh look, Phoebe, here’s an interesting fact…the capitol of the country of Luxembourg is Luxembourg!”

Oh my.  I think Elijah has a crush, and an unabashed crush at that!  I mean, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, Elijah’s never been bashful about anything, but I thought maybe, when it came to an ”affaire de coeurs” he might be a little more demure.  But no, he declared quite matter-of-factly that he was putting Xs and Os on Anna’s Valentine, and when I asked him if he was sure he wanted to do that he said, “Yep, I’m sure.  I really like her.”

The discussion ended there, partly because I was afraid I’d burst out laughing, but also because I wasn’t quite sure what to do or say.  With Elijah, I’ve certainly realized that it works best to “pick my battles,” …and I honestly don’t know if this was/is a battle worth picking!   Should I let him deliver this Valentine?  Seriously, I’d love to hear your opinion, or what you would do.  Help!

For some reason, yesterday I allowed Elijah to drink an entire 600 ml bottle of Coke for a “treat” while we were out and about.  (He and Zeke had no school yesterday because of MLK day.)  I don’t know what I was thinking.  Oh my word…you should have seen him.  For those of you who have the pleasure of knowing Elijah personally, you know that the kid already has enough energy to power a small town.  Add caffine to that…oh dear, he was absolutely berserk!   He really couldn’t control himself…and it was totally my fault.  All I could do was try to stifle laughter.  I guess at least the next time he tries to talk me into letting him drink Coke, I’ll have undeniable proof that he can’t handle caffine!

Zeke lost his first tooth!  Right after his sixth birthday.  If memory serves me correctly, that’s about when I lost my first tooth.  I also remember being so scared to go to school with a loose tooth, and crying, begging my mother to let me stay home!  The boys have been so brave about the whole loosing teeth thing.  Zeke’s tooth actually fell out at school (the reason for the little envelope) and he thought that was so cool. 

(It looks like we’re going to have two lower central incisers growing for the one that Zeke lost.  Phoebe is getting her first tooth…in the very same spot where Zeke lost his!  It will be interesting to see if Zeke’s tooth loss/Phoebe’s teething pattern will be the same.)

Some of you may remember this comment, from way back in April of 2007…

How many teeth has Zeke lost and when did he start? This usually has more to do with small motor skill development than anything else.

I had written a bit about Zeke’s preschool teacher saying that he needed to work on his small motor skills, and about his general disinterest in things like drawing, printing, coloring.  His Grampie left the above comment in responce.  

And then there’s this one from even farther back, in September of 2006, also from Grampie Horsman…

The chemical change in your body which causes you to loose teeth is the same change which helps you develop coordination and concentration. That’s why, in the Academy, we never pushed the children to do what we felt was “good work” until they started loosing teeth. 

I am now truly a believer!  I had started to notice just a couple of months ago that Zeke’s dexterity had gotten much better, and that he seemed to actually like drawing and coloring now!  Very interesting.

And also on the topic of lost teeth, remember this post, about Elijah losing one of his top front teeth, and the little, twenty second video that we linked to - “Elijah The Toothless Whistler?”  Up until about a week ago, it had had about 70 hits, but now, mysteriously, it’s had over 1500!  How wierd.  And some people aren’t very happy about being “forced” to watch a twenty second video of a kid who “can barely whistle!”  We’ve deleted some of the nastier comments, but some of them we left, ’cause they’re just so silly.  I wonder what exactly they thought “Elijah The Toothless Whistler” would be about, anyway?

Overheard last evening…

The sound of running water, and the whir of electric toothbrushes coming from the bathroom.  Then the sound of someone gargling. 

Zeke:  Eli*…how do you do that?  How do you gargle?  Can you show me?

The sound of water being spit out.

Eli:  Oh…Zeke, you just get some water in your mouth and then make the “G” sound.  Just go “ga-ga-ga.”

Zeke:  Okay.

A few seconds pass, then came the sound of the attempted gargle, then peals of hilarious laughter from Eli. 

Eli:  Zeke!  You’re getting water everywhere!  You’re supposed to put your head back!  (more laughter and attempted gargling)  Zeke…stop!  Stop it!  You’re making a mess. 

Zeke:  Oops…c’mon, let’s go to bed.  Can you read me a chapter from The Magicians Nephew**?

Eli:  Okay.

*Zeke started calling Elijah “Eli” a few months ago.  Strange sounding to me.  I guess we knew that he would probably eventually be called “Eli,” and actually, we intended to call him that, but he just always seemed more like an Elijah to us. 

**We got the Chronicles of Narnia box set for Christmas, and the boys and I have been loving the The Magicians Nephew.  (Which I now know is the “wrong” book to start with, but once we started it, we just couldn’t stop!) 

We have a family movie night every Friday night, and this past Friday we watched Meet the Robinsons, a movie about a young inventor who goes on a time-traveling adventure.  So, Elijah and Zeke decided they would like to become inventors, which led to an exorbitant waste of duck-tape as they experimented with various prototypes. Finally, they came up with the idea for a long straw, one that you could drink from while standing (because really…who likes to sit down while drinking?)…

Let me know if you want one.  Supplies are limited.  We only have enough duck-tape to make a few dozen more.