Days with the Dorans

On Tuesday morning I went to Zumba and it was spring. I came out an hour later to a snow covered car and horrible roads. As soon as I got home, we bundled up the kids and went outside to play. This has been the strangest winter and so when the snow falls, you need to get out quick to enjoy it or it could be gone! The Bigs got straight to work making snowmen. I helped Z a bit with his, but spent most of my time shoveling the driveway (with a few breaks to snap a picture here and there). Even while I was shoveling, I felt like the temperatures were rising again and I wondered how long the snow would stay. It made for perfect packing snow and I have to admit that I do like that the Bigs are at an age now where they no longer need my help making their snowy friends. Sean could feel the rise in temperature too and he immediately lost his mittens (as in~ threw them to the ground), and went in to grab a cone (his version of a baseball tee) and bat. I usually have the kids keep all thei...

In my classroom we are studying insects and to tell you the truth, I think it is fun and these little guys don't bug me at all (now if they were spiders... maybe... but then we all know that spiders aren't insects, right??). The only two insects we have had in my classroom so far are mealworms and wax worms. We are currently on our midwinter break and with the schools shut down, so (obviously) is their heat. The mealworms that we study seem to do OK with the cold and just go dormant for a while, but the wax worms never make it. They never even formed a cocoon (they turn into the wax moth) last year so it was my hope this year to try to keep them alive a little longer which meant bringing them into the warmth (aka my house). Z was so excited when I picked him up from school the Friday before break and I showed him a jar full of wax worms. He held them all the way home and I told him all about the wax worms... what they eat... what they like... what they turn into... I told ...

We (as in the Bigs and I) are currently on mid-winter break. It is a break that I treasure and I would gladly work longer into the summer in order to have this time. Jeff's district had Monday and Tuesday off and so on Monday, after we took the Littles ' to school, we took the Bigs to lunch and then headed off to play some ball. We had hoped to hit a batting cage but when that fell through we went over to our church gym to have a catch (and hit some tennis balls). I worked mostly with Al while Jeff worked with Joe. I am still nervous throwing to Al, but she did pretty well. Joe has been playing winter ball and I feel like it has been a horrible experience for him. He sits around for an hour and a half on Saturdays, watches pitches and gets walked (as in no one really hits so no action at the plate or in the field). He is by far the smallest on his team and is even playing with fifth graders (this is not a good thing in our eyes). Not only has he not learned anything (as we ha...

I've been trying to catch up on blogging and had thought that this could be an easy "wordless" post, but I realized I still should say a few things about it... The hundredth day for school was last Friday and so the second graders at Joe's school dressed up as if they were 100 years old. This was the recipe for a 100 year old Joe: 1. Glasses and Beard from Joe's old Merlin (Halloween) costume 2. Gray Eye Shadow for Eyebrows and Mustache 3. Baby Powder for Gray Hair (Joe's hair is so thick it didn't stay easily.) 4. Collared Shirt and Pants way too high. And while this post wasn't wordless, I didn't follow my usual motto... Why say in 10 words what you can in 100...

Joe had been wanting to get on the ice for some time, but with the mild winter, I wasn't sure we'd be skating at all this year. Thankfully, we did have a weekend that was cold and though I had a million things I NEEDED to do, I dropped them all to take my boys (plural) skating. The Goose decided that he wanted to follow Joe to the lake too. What he DIDN'T know, was that we had some skates that would fit him! They were clearly the hand-me-down variety and had double runners which are wonderful for learning on. Joe was filling his little brother in on some skating tips, most importantly~ do NOT walk on Nana's floors in your skates! So Z stood there waiting while we snapped some pictures and then I lifted him outside. He was such a sight!! Especially since the four gloves I found (that were all his) happened to be for the same hand, so I made do and turned one around. My dad took the boys down to the lake and my mom and I followed with camera to document this momentous occ...

A week ago (I am so late keeping up on this blog and hope to do an entry a night to catch up now that I am off school for a week... YEAH!), we went to a Whaler's hockey game. I don't really understand levels in hockey but these guys seemed pretty good and the best part for me (Ms. Frugal) is that it was FREE! My dad's buddy got tickets for my folks and all six of us, so it was a great night out. The kids LOVED the game and I was worried for a second that Joe might decide he wanted to play hockey (he loves playing on the ice at my folks' house and was VERY into the game). Thankfully there was a fight and I think that secured in Joe's mind that he will be a wonderful watcher of hockey, player of baseball (again Ms. Frugal is happy for this choice). During intermissions the boys went and saw the whale mascot (I'm sure he has a name) and overall had a wonderful night. Ali wasn't too keen on seeing some strange thing in a black suit walking around, so she stu...

I have been so busy that it seems I have no time to keep up with the documenting of our family happenings so I am consolidating some recent events. A couple weeks before Valentine's Day, I found the note (pictured above), in Al's backpack. Ali didn't really understand what it meant to be someone's Valentine, so we had a little fun teasing her. I realized during recent conversations that Ali may also be oblivious to boys liking her (which is wonderful news to me since she is only in first grade). She was annoyed when in writing she wrote that she would love to dance with a snowman in the twinkling moonlight and another boy wrote that he wanted to dance with Ali in the twinkling moonlight. She rolled her eyes at that because the boy was copying her... I don't think she thought it odd that a boy would want to dance with her in the twinkling moonlight. She has said some other things about boys saying they like her but thankfully at this time she seems to not talk...

Last Saturday Jeff was busy all day at church and so rather than drag everyone to watch Joe's indoor baseball scrimmage, I opted to skip and take them for a visit to Great Nan's. Early in the morning, the Bigs worked on making Valentines and then we bought some balloons (three frogs and one monkey that all said "I love you") at the Dollar Store. The four kids and I were on our way. I felt like the Mama duck with her ducklings in tow. I kept looking back and sure enough there they all were, walking single file with their balloons. So many residents and guests got a kick out of the kids, that it made me smile. Great-Nan was taking a snooze on the couch when we got there but she was soon up and laughing. The kids are for sure her best medicine. She read their cards over and over and she loved the balloons. The kids had fun chatting and eating cookies. My Nan kept saying, "I wish I had some cookies or something to give them." I reminded her that they ha...

Jonasen has been learning about the past in school and he had to interview someone who was "old" and create a Venn Diagram comparing and contrasting schools from the past, with schools of the present. I thought for sure that Joe would pick Great-Nan and wondered how she would do with the questions seeing that she is 93 years young and has a fading memory. But when Joe told me about the project, he said, "I have to interview someone old, so I am going to interview Papa!" It made me chuckle a bit (and I thought my mom would be pleased that when he thought "old" the first person he thought of was my dad and NOT her). Joe got his interview questions ready and with pencil in hand, he Skyped my dad (who Joe sees regularly but this seemed more 'official'). Joe did a great job and I learned quite a bit about my dad's early school years that I never really knew about. My dad grew up a strict Catholic~ as in school and then church on the weekends. M...

While our four children get along wonderfully~ play together, sleepovers in the Littles' room every weekend... they couldn't be more different. Sean though (at least it seems) is the most different. He is not a great listener and can be quite stubborn. I am hoping that that is the "two" in him. Often I find myself shaking my head and whispering, "This too shall pass." But Sean is getting older and just yesterday I thought, maybe I'll give him a regular cup, see how it goes. Well he took the cup and drank down his milk like he'd been doing it for years. No more sippy cups for this house! (YEAH!!!) A few weeks ago, I was playing "Words with Friends" and Sean came and sat next to me and started pointing at the letters and naming them all (correctly!). I was shocked and wondered if this had come from Elmo or something because I have certainly not been teaching him his letters. In fact when it comes to reading with Sean he will read next ...

It was back on July 4 th that Dan and Steph asked Jeff to be Timmy Ziggy's Godfather and on January 29 th , I got to see my nephew baptized. Jeff had to play electric guitar for the church service, but I managed to get everyone ready (along with gifts) and it turned out to be a wonderful day. When I think about my life, everything is centered around God. I can't imagine living my life without him at the center. Seeing my brother and sister-in-law hand in hand as their son was baptized brought tears to my eyes. I know that not everyone believes in infant baptism, but I remember so clearly feeling the presence of God the day I delivered Joe and Andrew. I remember how so young, Joe would talk about God and I would listen. It always seemed he knew something and I often wondered if we are closest to God when we are born and then spend a lifetime trying to get back to him. Timmy Ziggy was as sweet as can be. The way he looked at Pastor Paul as he spoke to him, and the way he smiled...

This week, Joe got to be the "Star" of his class. One of the things that we got to do, was write letters to Joe so I thought I would put those letters here so they could be included in our Family Book. Dear Second Graders in Mrs. Brown’s Room, I was asked to write a letter to you in which I explain why my son, Jonasen Doran, is very special to me. I suppose the first thing you need to know is that I love Joey very much. He is a great kid and it has been a lot of fun being his father the last eight years. One of my fondest memories of Joey was back when he was only two years old. We used to have an old, out-of-tune piano at our previous house when we lived across from Commerce Elementary School. Joey used to struggle to climb onto the piano stool (after all, he was only two years old, and very short in height), and would then begin to pound on the piano keys and sing words that no one could understand because he hadn’t learned too many words yet at the age of two. Thi...