More of Charlie

"Propel" "Precision" "Price" "Pretzel" "Pterodactyl".... I am writing this post to the sound of Elena and Charlie going back and forth stating words starting with the letter P to see who gets stumped first.  This has been going on for several minutes with no indication of slowing down anytime soon.

Although this anecdote doesn't have much to do with anything, it does relate nicely to the topic of this post, which is simply to share some of Charlie's recent Charlie-like behavior. 

I recently showed the boys how to use Canva to create posters/flyers/etc. for a school project. Last night Charlie suddenly started working on the computer making "Vote for Charlie" posters for Student Council Elections. He kept spitting out idea after idea until I finally had to kick him off the computer to get ready for bed. I feel I should add that elections will be sometime next fall. If he keeps going at this rate all summer, the school isn't going to have enough wall space to hold all of his flyers. I'll share them below. (You have to look closely to find his face on some of these)

Side note: I'm not sure if the P competition is still going on, but I assume it is. I thought Elena was going to give up when she said, "Ok, I really need to work on some stuff upstairs," but then she continued with, "so you're going to have to come with me." 

I should explain that he often goes by Dr. Charles at school. It all started when he titled his Google Doc assignment "Queen Anne's Mashed Potato Sauce" and made some comment about pickle smelling salts. His very artistic teacher created these advertisements and hung them up in the classroom.  (I recommend zooming in to read the fine print on the smelling salts.)

And then the other day, we left a bag of little hair-ties out right next to the game of Mouse Trap. And Charlie noticed. When I came back into the room later that day, there were various Star Wars and superhero characters trapped in the game:

And lastly, there is this impersonation Charlie did of Elena. Frank was telling Elena she should get married by 20 so he can be a young uncle. And Charlie said, "That's never going to happen because she's to picky." He started imitating her, and she quickly grabbed her phone and took a video.

Charlie!

Although Charlie is getting older and we see less of him during the day, he continues to entertain us with his imaginative mind. Like his description of the "Man Cave" he wants some day, complete with a bear skin rug and a little cave for his cats featuring a little "mouse skin" rug. Or the other day when I heard him singing for an extraordinarily long time, only to finally realize what he was singing: all the words on the tinker toy box, including the list of all the parts and pieces found inside.

Coco was featured in his science fair project this year. She was allowed to attend the fair as long as we kept her in her carrier. I wasn't sure how she would do since she doesn't typically like being in the carrier, but she loved it. Between the judging and public viewing, Charlie let her outside.  Once it was time to come back in, I brought the carrier out behind the school expecting Coco to be long gone. As soon as I came out, she ran right for me and climbed into her carrier. She sat calmly purring throughout the fair and seemed to enjoy all the kids poking their fingers in at her. 

And the most recent Charlie story is the new name he gave their lamp that's paired with their alexa. He likes to set the lamp to go off in the morning to helping wake them up. Whenever he sets it, alexa responds "OK, I'll set Boys' Lamp for 7:00am." Just for fun, he decided to change the lamp's name. And of course, being Charlie, he thought to himself, "I wonder if there's a limit to long I can make its name?" So now whenever he sets a timer for the lamp, this is what Alexa says:

Happy 18th, Elena!

We somehow managed to raise a Boomer. Well, not exactly a Boomer, but Elena is basically an old lady in an 18-year-old body. I guess "Old Soul" sounds nicer, doesn't it? We'll go with that.

While she does stream music on apps like Spotify, she prefers using CDs in her car, which I'm pretty sure many of my students have never even heard of. And the CDs are mostly things like Hits from the 60s, Elvis and Frank Sinatra. When asked what she wanted for gifts, she requested DVDs (!) of black and white movies. We called her the night before her birthday and asked what she was doing with her last night of being a non-adult. She was watching Casablanca. Of course. She goes to 7:00 am Mass before school and adoration once a week (as do several of her friends, which is awesome.)

She's as likely to be hanging out with women between the ages of 40-90 as she is to be hanging out with other teenagers. She recently had to postpone an appointment to visit one of her friends because Kay had shingles. She even took an afternoon off of school about a month ago to join a woman from our church on a 2 hour drive she had to take. To a medical appointment. And she had a great time. I'm pretty sure this woman is the reason Elena & friends go to Mass every Thursday - she's an amazing woman. 

She just turned 18 this week and it dawned on me that she could now get social media apps like Instagram or Facebook. I asked if she was going to get any accounts, and she said, "No, not for now. They're all dumb." And then she went upstairs to sew herself a skirt. 

We love her in all her uniqueness and gifts so very much. It's been an absolute joy getting to raise her, and although we hate to see her move onto to a life that means we will see her less, we are looking forward to seeing what this spunky girl does with her life. 

Republica Dominicana

Seth and I were able to enjoy another getaway with the Knights this month. This year was the Dominican Republic - I always enjoy getting to go somewhere where I get to practice my Spanish. It was a great week to go - the kids had 2 early outs and 1 late start while we were gone due to snow. It was also not a great week to go since we missed Elena's 18th birthday. Our parents once again took care of the kids while we were gone, and it sounds like they all had a great time. Grandma made homemade donuts for Elena's birthday so she got spoiled a bit at least (plus the early out!)

Seth wore a "Minneota Vikings State Champion" shirt from our recent football season, and a shocking number of people asked him about it. We never imagined it would be such a conversation starter. He's realized that wearing it out of Minnesota might not be the best idea. For one, several people thought Minnesota was spelled wrong. Most thought it said MN Vikings and couldn't figure out how they would be their own state champs. 

We came home to a giant snowman in our yard, but other than that most signs of the storms were gone by our return.

Here's a few photos from the trip.

Not the best picture of us, but there's a rainbow in the background!

One of our desserts - a chocolate concoction in the monkey's head, topped with cotton candy

The pepper grinder at one of the restaurants!

Me in my happy place: a book and sunshine! We stayed in the shade most of the time, though! We burned way too easily.

Elena's 18th

And since not much exciting happened on the trip other than us hanging around soaking up sun, reading and visiting with other Knights, I'll leave you with a few recent quotes. Our kids are still more interesting than we are.

Olivia: Guys, if I don't get some peace and quiet, I won't be able to draw my letters!!

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Olivia: (singing the Circle of Life from Lion King) Naaa Savanyaaaaa Feliz Navidad!

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Frank: Mom, if sharks ever figure out how to get to outer space, we could probably meet aliens.

Me: Sharks?

Frank: Yeah.

Me: Sharks. Like the large aquatic animal.

Frank: Yeah.

Me: I'm not following.

Frank: Well, if sharks are taken out of the water, they can't survive so they have to stay in the water. And if we leave our atmosphere, we can't survive so we have to stay on Earth. But if sharks can figure out how to get all the way past our atmosphere and into outer space, we could probably figure out how to get past outer space into another universe and meet aliens! 

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Frank: Mom, I'm filling this balloon up with carbon dioxide and releasing it onto our plant so it can turn it into oxygen!  (He must be paying attention in science class!)

Wrestling & Eating

Sam made it through a whole wrestling season without getting severely injured, which was a first! He did have a miss a few meets due to the trip to Rome followed by a bout of influenza. Overall he had a great season. 

He wrestled at 145, which is a little under his typical weight so he spent the season making sure to eat lean and healthy foods, which did the trick at keeping his weight down. As soon as the season was done, however, he did a complete 180. His last match was on Feb 22, and by bedtime that day he had already gained 7 pounds. He's working hard at bulking up for football, which can be a challenge given his teenage metabolism. That same weekend that he gained so much, he came down for breakfast disappointed that because he had lost 5 pounds in his sleep. Now he eats everything in sight, which is quite literally more than our other 4 kids combined. I made a hot dish this week, and after the rest of us each took a normal size portion, he came and put nearly half of the 9x13 pan on his dish for his "serving." His "snack" yesterday afternoon was an entire box of mac & cheese plus 3 eggs. It's too bad this ridiculous spike in egg prices didn't happen during wrestling season instead of right on its heels. I'm thankful we have a 4 year gap between him and Charlie so we're only dealing with one teenage boy appetite for now. It might be a different story when Charlie and Frank get to high school!

Roma!

Elena and Sam had the good fortune to join our former priest, Fr. Jeremy, on a pilgrimage to Rome over Christmas vacation this year along with a few cousins. Grandma Myhre joined at the very last minute as well when someone else had to back out. I don't have a lot of details other than knowing they had fun and they are now disappointed by the inferior quality food we have back in the states. Sam spent much of his time trying to catch a pigeon. Although, he didn't personally catch one, he (and several others) did order one off a menu when it was served at a restaurant. They were not impressed.

They were able to meet up with our Charlotte, our exchange student from years ago. She also happened to be in Italy at the same time! And as you can see from the video, they were able to see the Pope up close as well. 

Sam getting in a little wrestling practice on the beach.

In Assissi near St. Francis's hangout

Enjoying the best sandwiches in Rome (according to Fr. Jeremy)

Quotes

Frank: Whenever I'm old enough to change my name, I think I'll change my last name to Sippi. 

Me: Sippi?

Frank: Yeah, because then if get married and my wife is a teacher, her name will be Mrs. Sippi. 

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Elena: Charlie, can you carry Olivia upstairs? 

Charlie: Not right now. I'm making foot parmesan. (He was using a pedicure file on his foot)

Charlie: (a minute later) This is what this thing is for, right?

Olivia (in the bath): My hands are turning into old ladies!!

And just for fun, here's Charlie walking around with a baseball bat in his hoodie.

Happy New Year!

Charlie supplied us with a couple of good quotes on New Year's Eve.

For New Year's Eve we took the youngest 3 kids out for supper at the local restaurant. After the waitress took our orders, as we were waiting for our food, Charlie suddenly said, "Why are they called waiters? When you think about it, we're the waiters." Very true....

After going out, we came back home and all managed to stay up until midnight (Olivia's 5:30pm nap helped with this). At 11:59, Charlie suddenly left the room so he wasn't with us as the clock turned to the New Year. About 30 seconds after midnight, he returned and said, "Well hello there! I haven't seen you all since last year!"

These are the only pictures I took of Christmas and New Years. Lame, I know. 

Awaiting midnight. Frank was not in the mood to cuddle.

Waiting for our food in the restaurant 

One of Livi's favorite Christmas gifts: a dentist kit!

Elena and Sam are off celebrating in Rome. Sam sent a video of the fireworks at midnight. I knew it was crazy over there, but it was even celebratory than I had imagined. There were fireworks being shot off in every direction, near and far, for well over 30 minutes. With the level of safety laws here in the US, I doubt we'd ever experience anything like that here. Even the best fireworks displays here are controlled and all go off in one general direction. When I told my mom, she said it's the same in big cities in Mexico and Central America. In the past when she has asked people from Latin America what they think of Christmas in the US, they often answer that it's "triste" (sad). Celebrations weren't totally absent here at midnight, though. Someone a few blocks over shot off 2 fireworks at midnight so.....pretty close to the same thing.