Rowan's iMac art

Rowan's classroom has 4 iMacs. Today he brought home artwork done on the computer.

Happy 35th Pat!

Happy 5th Birthday Sweet Rowan!

Too Much Like His Mother

On Friday the parents of Rowan's school were invited to watch the kids at their gym/movement class. Poor Rowan. The second he saw me walk into the gym his little face turned bright red (now I understand why I was teased so mercilessly for blushing when I was a kid. I wish he had been spared those genes). About one minute later he started crying, and would not be consoled. Thankfully the teachers allowed him to come sit with me, not that it helped a lot. He continued crying and said over and over "I don't want you to come." This might have puzzled most people, but I understand as preforming in front of people you know is so much harder than a roomful of strangers. I think he also likes to keep school and home separate, and when those two worlds collide it causes a bit of anxiety. Though I had told him I'd be coming, it turns out he thought I'd be standing outside the gym watching through the windows.

Rowan sat on my lap and cried off and on through the entire class--the crying most often starting back up again when he saw a kid doing something he thought was funny and he had to laugh in spite of himself.


It was still nice to see the type of thing he normally would have been doing, especially since gym is his favorite part of school. The gym teacher played the piano while the kids simply moved in various ways to the music--running, skipping, walking, hopping, etc. Each child had a newspaper they used as a prop. Sometimes they pretended to read it, sometimes they walked with it on their head, sometimes they placed it on the floor and jumped over it, etc.

Here are a couple of videos which I am posting even though they are probably only of interest to the grandparents!

Where's Niamh?

I took this picture of the kids playing hide-and-seek the other day. Niamh is so cleverly hidden, you probably won't even be able to find her in the picture.

Sick Weekend

The weekend before last was not only rainy, I was also sick with strep throat and out of commission for most of the time. That winning combination called for a diversion a little more special than the normal in these situations (TV--not that there wasn't plenty of that too).

First up were these super cool wax-o-glas crayons by Lyra. I picked them up a couple of months ago and had been saving for an appropriately desperate occasion. They wipe off the window very easily, and the kids loved them. The only problem we had with them is that they are a bit too soft, and most of them are now broken, after only being used two times.


After the novelty of drawing on the windows had worn off I pulled out a couple of new toys that I had stashed away. Rowan loved his train conductor set and spent the whole afternoon playing with it, as well as the next day. One of his favorite parts was writing the names of cities onto the blank tickets that came with the set.



And here is Niamh with her new toy--a magnetic dress up doll. But that turned out to be a bust, as all she wanted to do after five minutes with it was to play with Rowan's conductor set.

Need Some Arnica With That?

On Thursday Muriel and I were killing a bit of time at the Migros center before going to pick Niamh up from Jardin d'Enfants. I was sitting on some square backless seats that were topped with metal. While standing on the ground Muriel somehow wedged herself between two of the seats and fell (How was there enough room to fall? I don't know), the bridge of her nose hitting the edge of one of the seats. The cut bled quite a bit for a few minutes, but thankfully stopped quickly.

It wasn't too long before a nice stranger stopped and asked if I needed any help and when I said no asked if I wanted any arnica for Muriel. "For the crying" she explained. Completely flustered, I assured her that we were okay and hurried off to pick up Niamh, pushing the stroller with one hand and holding a wailing, bloody Muriel with the other hand.

When we arrived at Niamh's school it turned out we were a bit early and there were a bunch of parents waiting outside the door, all a little alarmed at Muriel's state. One very sweet woman asked if I'd given her any arnica and when I said no, searched through her purse to see if she had any on her. She didn't, but thought that Niamh's teacher would have some.

Well, by this time I wasn't surprised that once inside the school Niamh's teacher immediately offered Muriel some arnica, without my even asking about it. It can be found in two forms, either a gel for putting on the skin or little granules to ingest, a bit like the Hylands Teething Tablets you can get in the States. Andréanne gave me three granules for Muriel, but Muriel was too upset to eat them, so I didn't even get to see this magical remedy in action. I wonder if arnica is popular across Europe or if it is a Swiss thing?


Anyway, Muriel is doing much better now. The swelling in the above picture (taken the day of the accident) is gone and has been replaced with a nice bruise from the corner of one eye to the corner of the other. Though on Saturday I did give her fingers a nice audible crunch in the lid of our coffee/game storage table. Given her recent wave of accidents I guess I should try and remember to pick up some arnica at the pharmacy this week. When in Rome Switzerland...

Muriel vs. the corner of a metal bench

Halloween Fun

Just a few more photos from Halloween!

Our third baby to wear Grammie Krista's pumpkin hat

festive tattoos and tasty (if not pretty--my black marshmallows turned out brown) treats

the best shot I could get of all three kids


The kids were so excited to go spend Halloween with our neighbors, the Elkos. Rowan especially was thrilled that both he and Sam were knights. Niamh was too shy to leave my side so I couldn't get her in the photo.

trick-or-treating

After trick-or-treating with the Elkos they came over for more sugar (can you have too much on Halloween?) and to watch It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. This was definitely the best Halloween we've had here in Switzerland!

Once again I was thankful that Niamh's egg allergy is not life threatening because I completely forgot to tell her the veggie dip I'd set out on the table after trick-or-treating had egg in it. A combination of chaos, and not thinking she'd actually touch anything resembling a vegetable. So the poor thing ended her night on a sour note with some throwing up and going to bed before the festivities were over. Another mark for me in the negligent mother category. The good news is that I think the allergy is becoming less severe, as she only threw up once (as opposed to the normal 3-4 times) and she didn't get any hives.