Miles and the Math Multiples

What do you see in this group of numbers? 

Miles was looking at the cover of this booklet (when he was supposed to be doing something else) and then announced that he saw a few patterns.  He proceeded to show me how the numbers were in order by their “endings” (or units digits) when he listed the multiples of 3, 7, AND 9.  Here he is explaining it…

(He wanted to do the beginning and ending dramatically like that.  :)  )

Aren't numbers cool???

Snowstorm of 2016

It seems like it never just snows here... it's always A BIG SNOW EVENT!  So the big event of 2016 has happened, and it was a wonderful, unplanned complete break.  Pete and Strider both got off from school, so Poplar Streams decided to close as well.

There was a lot of this:

...and some investigation of tracks in the snow...

.... and hot chocolate and games and books and... well, I'm not sure what else.  I spent a day and a half of THE EVENT holed up working on my blog book from 2015 (which is now ALL DONE).

On Sunday our church was even cancelled, so we had the Burkes over for Family Worship.  After Blair's sermon and some half-hearted singing, the kids ran off to play for a few hours.  So, it was an unusual, but very good weekend!

Now, it's back to temperatures in the 50's and back to school!

Strider's speculations

Strider:  What’s that Tom Hanks movie “Big” about?

Me:  It’s about a boy who wishes to be big, so then he finds himself in a man’s body, but he’s still really a young boy inside.

Strider: Oh - -like Cam Newton!

**

Strider: Mom, I’ve started getting really good emails from colleges and they REALLY want me to come there!  I mean, they’re, like, hand-written emails!

Me: Hand-written, Strider??

Strider: Why are you laughing?  Oh, I get it now.

**

Strider: I don’t like how my teacher does the math extra credit points.  He starts us off with negative 5 points off our next test and then gives us extra problems in class, and if we get them right we get more points, but if we get them wrong, we lost points. But they’re super-hard, so only the smart kids can get them right.  It’s like hyper-capitalism!  The smarter kids just get more points, and the weaker kids get even less!

Milo's Remarks

Miles walked up to me and sweetly said, "Mom, you're pretty."  He hugged me and then started to comment about how his arms wouldn't reach all the way around me.  "Are you trying to tell me I'm fat?!" I asked him.  "No," he tactfully said, "You're just....um, what's the word?.... WIDE."

*I would just like to note that he was hugging me around my HIPS - -not my waist.  :)

**

Miles when he wanted something he couldn't have:
"I BEGGETH THEE, Mom.  I beggeth thee with 2 Pretty Pleases and a cherry on top, and a cherry on top of all THAT!"


**

Miles brought this home from his class this week. The kids were all told to create a design out of wax sticks for art -- most made flowers or landscapes or whatever. Miles wrote “POTUS.” I asked him what it meant and he responded, “You know -- President of the United States.” Then I asked him why he chose to write this instead of making a picture. He said, “It’s all I could think of.”

Personal school facts

I knew we named him Miles for a reason -- such as for today when the kids are learning linear equivalent equations for their Classical Conversations memory work.

And the name Cole came in handy today, too -- for teaching that coal is a sedimentary rock.

Rayna didn't want to be left out, so we added another equation to our memory work:

"2.54 centimeters = 1 inch;
12 inches = 1 foot;
5280 feet = 1 mile;
4 feet, 9 inches = 1 Rayna."

Colsen's critiques

Photo by Kharis Photography

Colsen:  Mom, do you think Germans are stupid?

Me:  No!

Colsen:  Well, I do.  I mean, who thought of the idea of letting a cabbage ROT and then eating it?!  I mean, I guess I like the taste of sauerkraut ok, but who thought of that idea???  Why would they just let it rot??  I like how they came up with streudel and bratwurst, but rotten cabbage… that’s just weird.

****

While we were driving in the car a couple weeks ago, the song "Tender Tennessee Christmas" came on.  Pete turned to me and said, "Colsen doesn't like this song."
Just then Colsen piped up from the back seat, "Oh no!  I don't like this song!"
I thought it was weird that he wouldn't -- it's not like him to not like sweet things.
Then he explained:  "This song is so weird!  It says she would rather be in Tennessee than COLORADO!  Why would anyone want to do that??  Colorado is awesome!"

****

After seeing part of a Presidential debate...
"That Bernie Sanders, he's just horrible.  He says all the millionaires and billionaires should pay the poor people!"

Me (trying to see what he really thought):  But doesn't that sound good?

Colsen:  No, because then EVERYONE would be saying, "I'm poor!  I'm poor!  Pay ME!"  and then no one would do any jobs and then no jobs would get done!

Hmmm.

Successful school project

With renewed energy after the long Christmas break, I attempted another school project.  This one ended up being fun, simple, AND informative!  At CC this week the kids were reciting the parts of the earth, so we made a play-dough model to see the various parts.

 First we made play-dough -- in the microwave since our stove was broken -- and then used food coloring to get all the different sections represented, and to give our hands that nice "you've been crafting" look.

Then we assembled the inner core, the outer core, the mantle, the crust, the land and the oceans.

Their favorite part was cutting into it to see the cross-section.

Thank you Pinterest for giving the kids something to use for their CC presentations this week!

The things they say and do

Strider's shenanigans:

Me:  Man, this bathroom fan is still broken.  I keep forgetting to have Dad fix it.
Strider:  I can fix it!
Me: Really??
Strider:  Yeah, I think I can!
[He goes and gets a ladder and some tools and his brothers gather round to help.]
Me:  I'm so impressed, Strider!  I never saw you want to fix stuff like this before.
Strider:  It's all because of "Prison Break" (which we recently let him start watching on Netflix).  Now I like to try and figure out all kinds of stuff like this.

(I have also found all of the boys with ladders and various things around the house, trying to figure out which of them will fit through our vents.  We definitely did not anticipate this when we let Strider watch that show.  Rookie mistake.)

Colsen's criticism:

Pete:  .... So just as a branch needs to stay connected to the trunk or vine, so we need to stay connected to God.  If the branch gets disconnected from the trunk, it can't live or do anything. Jesus says we need to abide in Him.
Colsen:  I don't think that's a very good analogy, Dad.  I get what you're saying, but remember how the Coombs gave us a branch of their tree and we put it in water and it ended up growing into a new tree?  So the branch was ok when it was separated from the tree.

Milo's moments:

Me: Let's talk about what we can thank God for today.
Miles, whipping off his shirt:  I can thank God for these MUSCLES!


Miles:  Guess what -- I have President Obama's germs!
Strider:  What are you talking about?
Miles:  I've shooken Andrew's hand and Andrew has shooken President Obama's hand, so I have his germs!

Recently Miles brought my phone to me and had the voice recorder on. “Say, ‘This is Mom, not Miles,’” he told me.  I was too busy thinking how surprised I was that he could figure out how to use a voice recorder on my phone (I can’t) to connect it with the fact that I kept hearing kids slamming doors and locking them upstairs.  It’s now dawned on me that he was trying to outwit his older siblings and gain entry into those locked rooms -- and that I just had my identity stolen by a 6-year-old.

Rayna's round-up:

Meanwhile, Rayna has been our game creator lately.  She recently came up with her own version of our favorite, "the bowl game" and got her younger brothers and dad to play.  She told everyone to write "your favorite food, a planet, and an animal" on little pieces of paper which she then put in the bowl.  Then everyone had to take turns drawing the papers and acting them out for the others to guess.  I hear that acting out the planets was particularly challenging.

She's also gotten a hair-cut lately -- actually she got about half of her hair cut off!

Before:

After:

She looks so cute!

New Year's Day

We celebrated the final night of 2015 with this crew.  So fun to have family so close by to celebrate with!  We played the Bowl Game after dinner... good for any age, anytime!

After the Wrays went home, Pete and I tried to introduce Strider to the movie "Top Gun," thinking it would become one of his all-time favorites as it had for his uncles.  About 2/3 of the way through, though, he pronounced that it had "no plot," and couldn't hold a candle to "Prison Break," which he has been obsessed with this year.  Sigh.

New Year's Day brought yet another party as Ohio State had a big game so we all went next-door to celebrate in style.

Afterwards we did our traditional Year Box painting -- and the boys showered immediately afterwards, having covered (traditionally) themselves in paint as well.

10 years of  boxes and memories now!

We look forward to seeing what 2016 holds!

Sibling Game Night

All 10 of the Wray siblings/spouses gathered for Game Night, some under duress, some already alcohol-fortified (or maybe that "some" was the same person).  Most of us came enthusiastically, though.

 
After several rounds of Beyond Balderdash which brought all kinds of yelling, heckling, defending, and lying, we switched to the Classic Bowl Game.  This game also brought all kinds of yelling and heckling, but at least there was not as much lying.

I love seeing Graham in these pictures.  He was definitely one of the enthusiastic ones.

And then there was Dan...

Always fun to hang with these people!