The Amazing Magna-Tiles ~ Toy Recommendation

I have to pass along this amazing toy that my kids love ~

(drumroll please)

 MAGNA-TILES!

They've received Magna-tiles for several birthdays and Christmases, 

adding to their collection and expanding their building possibilities.

They play with it every day constructing houses, flying ships, 

horse corrals, castles, and other feats of engineering.

 

 The tiles are basically indestructable plastic shapes with magnetic edges 

that click together to create all sorts of wild and useful (for play) structures. 

Jack and Elizabeth almost never use the buildings and sets that come 

with their Playmobile kits, because Magna-tile buildings are so much more versatile. 

Action figures of all sorts can make themselves at home in magna-tile land.

 

Yes, I do believe that is Lord Aragorn and his friend, the Playmobile guard.

And here we have a knight ready for take-off in his fighter spaceship.

Magna-tiles are a little pricey, but I definitely think they're worth it.

If you want to order some, the cheapest place I've found online is here.

(OK, now I don't feel so bad for keeping such an awesome secret.)

Have fun!

Hobbit Party {or what happens when both your parents are nerds}

Last weekend we celebrated Jack's sixth birthday. Love that kid. 

In the last three years we've read The Hobbit (twice) and most of The Lord of the Rings 

(we're half-way through The Return of the King). He has an awesome attention span 

and he loves to snuggle up and hear a good story.

(Please excuse the ridiculous number of photos in this post. 

I wanted to provide some details for all you Hobbit party-planners out there.)

Scott and I had a great time coming up with how to have a Hobbit party. (We're nerdy like that.)

I penned (with my fountain pen--nerd again) invitations using the text from the note Thorin leaves on Bilbo's mantle, inviting all the burglars on the adventure.

When they arrived at "The Green Dragon Inn" we fed them a hobbit-y kind of a lunch: 

sandwiches on freshly baked biscuits, 

fruit, pumpkin scones with cream and jam, and cups of root beer.

Over lunch, I gave the kids a little summary of the story ~ 

a quest to defeat Smaug and win back Thorin's treasure. 

Each "burglar" received his own map with the trail marked in red. 

I labeled each of the challenges they would face on their quest.

Our party activities were as follows:

• Stone Troll Tag
• Riddles in the Dark
• Spiders and Flies
• Barrels out of Bond
• The Black Arrow

 After each activity we consulted the map and I had the kids figure out what came next. Then I explained a bit of the story to go with that activity.

Stone Troll Tag: We played a game of freeze tag. Scott was the "troll" trying to freeze the kids by tagging them. They played until I announced that the sun had risen and Scott was turned into stone. Then I gave each child a blue glow-in-the-dark sword ("Sting") from the trolls' treasure trove. (Gotta love the dollar store.)

Riddles in the Dark: We asked the kids riddles which gave them the right to go into Gollum's cave. Scott constructed a cave out of six large black garbage bags, opened up and duct taped together to make a giant bag. (This may qualify him as the biggest nerd, or coolest dad, you decide.) 

He left a large hole (child-size) at one end for the entrance. He left a small hole (the size of our fan) at the other end. Duct tape the small hole around the edges of the fan and when it's turned on it should fill the "bag" with air, inflating it into a giant cave.

Disclaimer: I thought this idea was insane when he described it to me--it sounded like a death trap. 

(What? We're going to have a bunch of kids crawl in to a giant garbage bag?) 

Once he had it set up, it made perfect sense and didn't seem risky to me. 

That said, make the evaluation yourself and do this activity at your own risk.

We put the gold rings (on brown ribbon) around inside the cave and I painted a gollum to go at the far end. The kids had to crawl inside with their glowing "stings" and find their rings.

I found a package of the gold rings in the jewelry section at Michael's. They are key-chain-type rings.

Spiders and Flies: Halloween cobweb decoration and dollar store spiders 

made a spider tunnel for the kids to break through.

Creepy!

Barrels out of Bond: I picked up Arrowhead water bottles to serve as our barrels. I wished I could have found something that looked more barrel-like, but no luck. The kids had to get the barrels from the elven king's hall (the spa) to the end of Long Lake (the pool) using pool noodles and other tools (no hands).

This required some good teamwork, and luckily no one fell in.

The Black Arrow: The final challenge was defeating Smaug by shooting him with Jack's archery set. (Not a nerd to be seen here--this is just cool!)

Each child had a few chances to shoot at the target.

And after the thrill of victory . . .

each child got his share of the treasure (a bag of chocolate gold coins).

I'm hoping these hobbits are inspired to read Tolkien's great book 

now that they've had a little taste of the adventure. 

Jack had a great time. I'm so thankful for his wonderful friends 

and for the sweet six year old he has become.

Why I like Fridays {thoughts on margin}

Fridays are our catch-all day. We use them for finishing up schoolwork, chores, 

piano, P.E. activities, parks, and picnics.

The laundry gets done and the bunny hutch gets cleaned.

And we have time.

Fridays are the built-in margin of our week.

As I learn better how to manage school and kids and classes and home and friends and church and my marriage and myself, I'm learning that I really need more white space than I would think. I have to consciously build-in the margin in order to leave time for rest and focus and peace

and light saber fights.

Glorious Backyard Adventure

 Sorry, Mom . . .

Can't come now . . .

I'm fighting the sun!

Don't Feed a Fool

This bit of advice is pretty familiar among Christians:

Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child;

The rod of discipline will remove it far from him.

Proverbs 22:15 

You've probably considered it, especially the second half which admonishes parents to discipline their children lest they go astray. 

But it is a difficult thing to discipline our children. 
We feel bad about it. 
We wonder if we are doing something wrong when our children are unhappy with us.

I want to focus on the first half of this verse—“Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child.” We can think of this in terms of our own foolishness, as children of God—sheep who are prone to wander, and we can think of it in terms of our children’s foolishness—the tendency of their hearts to run after wickedness and folly.

In the first instance, our acceptance of this truth inclines us toward humility in light of God’s wisdom and gratitude for his gracious discipline.

In the second instance, it can serve to reorient and strengthen our sometimes timid, second-guessing, insecurity as parents. 

Know this:  Children are inclined toward foolishness.

That puts the burden of wise guidance on us, the parents. That’s a heavy responsibility.

And it may make our children unhappy. 

(Although, can’t we all see that our children ultimately—in the long run—will be happier when their feelings are not in control?)

What a mistake to be led by what my child insists that he needs. 

To be a servant to his tears,

his whims,

his temper,

even his sense of fairness.

What a mistake to be led, even, by my memory of my own childhood experience and childish understanding of my parents’ choices.

I think we get off track when we begin to use our memory of our own parents’ mistakes or our interpretation of our own disappointments as a guide for the choices we make as parents. 

It can be a bit of a revelation to suddenly realize that much of the time my childish understanding of my parents’ behavior was limited, immature, and foolish. 

Now, of course, there may be serious, wrong-headed things that your parents (and mine) did—rightly to be avoided. 

But, I’m talking about the run-of-the-mill stuff, 

the things we feel conflicted about doing as a parent 

                                          because of the reaction it causes in our children: 

                                                                                   disappointment, anger, a sense of injustice. 

 

Don’t mistake me, I’m not recommending that we care nothing for our children’s feelings. 

But, really, is that our problem? 
(It's worth considering, it may be . . . )

Are we so callused and strict? Do we err on the side of being detached, harsh, and unconcerned? 

Or are we soft,
worried, 

coddling, 

uncertain,

and involved?

Are we encouraging dependence?

Remember how we can’t control our kids’ behavior? We also cannot control our kids’ feelings. And, just as a child’s behavior often evidences the foolishness of his heart—his feelings often reveal foolishness as well.

So let’s sit up straight, get our heads in the game, think it through, and bring all the godly wisdom we can muster to the task of guiding our children. It is likely that the very thing they need the most will (in the moment) bring an unhappy reaction. 

It is loving to give my child what he needs. 

It is selfish to cater to my own insecurities by bolstering, validating, and strengthening his foolishness—

                                                                                                                                     by feeding a fool.

I love this family.

 The stars (or should I say, the clouds?) aligned on the morning 

of our family photo shoot and we had misty diffused light, perfect for portraits. 

I snapped this one with the self-timer. Do I look a little out of breath?

And it all started with these two, thirty-eight years ago.

 ~Mom and Dad (a.k.a Mimi and Topper),

still crazy after all these years~

 ~my littlest sister, Carrie, her husband Stephen, 

and their kiddos, Molly, Oliver and the youngest of the bunch, Charlotte~

These girls were cooperative little models.

~ my sister Christie and her husband Jeff

with Julia, Dominic and Carrie (Diva) ~

These boys are great buddies.

~me (Laura) and mine, Scott, 

Elizabeth, Jack and Van~

 ~ happy girls ~

~the older cousins~

~Mimi, Topper, and all the grands~

~chillin'~

~the stinkers, these were the stubborn ones, 

but as you can see they cheered up in the end~

 Love 'em all.