The Great Poop Flood of 2016 and Other Tales

So this is cute...
and the poop flood was not.
Alexander did enjoy the extra trip to the grocery store and
all of the boys thought the day was fun b/c we let them use screens all day,
which almost never happens. Not even on our rest day.


We need to write out the whole story because it will be much funnier in a decade,
but basically a diaper got swept down the squatty potty by the bath water
(lesson #1 bath tubs draining into toilets is really a bad idea),
and the toilet started backing up.
And kept backing up and then the other toilet in the other bathroom started backing up...

Eventually,  Nate found someone who was able to point him to the number of a
plumber. The plumber thought he would be able to snake the pipes
just through our toilet, but that didn't work. So they had to go downstairs
and cut through display cases and walls in the tile shop on the first floor below us.

Then he had to chisel this cap loose to get it off of the pipe...

and it exploded all over the poor plumber and tile shop.
Yes, he raised his price. No, we didn't bother negotiating.
Yes, we would have paid at least twice again without blinking to just make the flood go away.

But thankfully after that he was able to unclog the pipes
and after a lot of cleaning everything is back to normal.

Lessons Learned:
#1 We thought having the bathtub drain into the toilet was one day going to cause big trouble, and we were right.
Don't design a bathroom this way.
#2 Always pick up everything off of the floor before taking a bath.
#3 If you see a diaper go down the toilet begin to make plans to call the plumber or move (just kidding) very quickly.
#4 Someone needs to chew their peanuts more thoroughly.
#5 So glad for freedom in our schedule that when our rest day was, well
literally a poop flood, that we were able to take the next day off to rest after all of that cleaning.

Moving onto to more blessedly mundane tales...

Aaron's handwriting

Aaron's math:
Math as art: Repeating pattern line tree

So one day Aaron decided to play chess against 3 different computer engine at once.
He did this 3 times.
He won (all) 9 games.

So we might be concerned about double (or triple?)
screen time in this picture, except...

He is playing 3 games of chess!!!

Aaron playing with Abigail nicely!!!

Abigail really likes Aaron.

Aaron trying to do his handwriting in half of the normal time.

He appears to be remarkably good at multitasking.

Abigail is such a daddy's girl.

Abigail cuteness time

He wants to read the LOTR so bad he keeps pulling it off of the bookshelf.
This week he decided to just make up his own version.

Andrew handwriting

Andrew helped make lunch

Andrew reading the LOTR with ease now

Andrew the Viking Warrior
by Andrew

Aaron volunteered to hold the baby for a baby sister
reading card picture.

Chess brothers watching a lesson

We started something new this week.
Choose your own adventure school day
where you can choose any job you want
or choose any reading, art, chess, or parentally approved activity.
Basically, not just a rest day with tons of minecraft and King's Quest,
but we'll approve almost anything semiproductive.

Aaron spent most of his day reading SO MANY BOOKS!
He lost count.
Yes they were super easy for  him,
but he had so much fun and read so much.

And surprisingly it was Andrew who spent most of the day playing chess
against Play Magnus.

Alexander drew a lot on Choose Your Own Adventure Day

Dinosaur by Andrew

Triceratops coloring sheet by Andrew

Do you like my hat?
Aaron has been doing a lot of funny things
(like wearing odd "hats" and "juggling")
to entertain Abigail.

Grandma Mary Book Club!
Finished Roverandom!

I love the juxtaposition of this picture.
This is Aaron age age.
He is wearing footed pajamas
and...
reading the Illiad with his dad.

(I love that he both loves his glow in the dark PJs and the Illiad!) 

Playing with Scooter the ostrich

Alexander is quite a fastidious table setter.
He loves to remember the napkins and get everything just right.
"Mom, this looks like Thanksgiving!"

Science experiments:
the senses and how they can adapt.

We'll keep the brothers pic for our family's reading cards,
but we need one for siblings too now!

The boys made viking longships for a history project this week.

And here is one Andrew drew based on an instruction page.
I think it is really good for a freehand drawing by
a 6 year old boy!

Alexander also wants more reading card stacks with him in them.

So we decided to try to get pictures for an emotions stack.

These aren't the best ones. But they are still pretty great!

We were also super happy to get some great videos of
him reading sentences/stories really well
while he is still 3!