Quick catch-up

The past few days have been busy, as usual.  Here's a very, very fast run-down:
Thursday (last):  Our busy day with school lessons, then piano lessons, then violin lessons.  We forgot Brigham's recital piece at home, so Joseph and Mosey and I raced home to get it during Brigham's lesson-- getting it to him just in time with 5 minutes to spare.  The boys are working on their Halloween recital pieces and sounding awesome.  Brigham and Mosey had good violin lessons.  I was especially proud of Mosey who did a really good job of focusing and listening to his teacher (his teacher has a dog that is almost irresistible to Mosey, and just a little distracting during lessons).  After violin lessons we went to Home Depot for "just one thing."  The boys don't love going to Home Depot or Lowes because it inevitably turns into a much longer shopping excursion, and this was no exception.  The boys were good and helpful, though, perhaps encouraged by the promise of frozen custard at Shakes on the way home.  :-)
Friday:  Our slower "off" day.  We went to Ben's work for their fall work party.  It was Oktoberfest-themed, I think, with great German food, and various event-planning employees walking around in lederhosen.  :-)  This year families were invited, but the boys were still among the very few children.  I guess most other school-aged kids were in school!  The boys especially liked the caramel-apple making station with apples, caramel, and various toppings to roll them in.  What a fun idea for a party!  That night was the Fathers-and-Sons outing, postponed from last Spring when it got rained out.  The weather was perfect last weekend, and the boys were so excited.  We went to HEB and got camping food (tin foil dinners, hot dogs, s'mores), and then went home and got packed up.  I was excited, too, because I got the whole evening to myself for my own projects.  I reorganized our hall closet food storage shelves, and then made Mosey a VIP poster like the ones I made for Brigham and Joseph when they were in 1st grade.  I've been meaning to do this for him, and managed to get prints made a couple of weeks ago.  It is fun making these, but very time consuming.  I was up until after 5 AM finishing it, and then getting the house all picked up and ready for a Relief Society activity in the morning.
Saturday:  In the morning we had a family history workshop at my house for the Relief Society, learning to use www.familysearch.org.  It was fun, and I think I was coherent, despite my 3 hours of sleep.  :-)  The boys and Ben got back around noon and I sent them all straight to the showers to banish the campfire smell, and then I took a nap myself.  We had a quiet afternoon and evening the rest of the day.
Sunday:  Typical Sunday.  Went to church, came home, made dinner, ate dinner, cleaned up dinner, tidied up for Monday, and went to bed!  The boys enjoyed the weather and rode their bikes out in the driveway/basketball court.  Mosey is determined to learn to ride a two-wheeler.  I feel like a negligent mom that I haven't facilitated his learning to ride a bike until now...  He's always been happy with the Big Wheels and his scooter.  But his friend Joseph, just a few months older than him was spending the afternoon with us after church, and he is a hot-shot bike rider and I think got a bike-riding fire burning under Mosey.
Monday-Wednesday:  Typical weekdays.  Lessons are going well.  We did a fun science experiment with limestone and vinegar, showing how acid rain works and demonstrating the metamorphosis of rock into sediment.  We finally did our scratch-tests with the minerals we bought at the State Capitol a couple of weeks ago.  Mosey took a trial Tae-Kwon-Do class on Monday evening and loved it.  The only problem is that the class is held at the top of 19 very steep stairs.  I wonder if I can get Ben to take him?  Joseph came with me and actually got kind of interested as well.  He and Brigham quit Tae Kwon Do at about the same age Mosey is now, and I can see how much more coordinated they are after a couple of years.  They probably would be much better now, and might get more out of it.  I'm not sure if I should encourage them to start up again, though, because I like that Mosey has his own activity.  We'll see.  For family home evening we had a lesson on tithing, and set up our new bank balance for the boys-- we're moving to a fancy Excel version, an upgrade from my poster-board chart on the wall system we've been using up until now.  Today the boys had art (my unit on drawing is done and the boys are doing a sculpture unit at another mom's house), and Mosey threw a fit when we got there, not wanting to go in the house.  He hid under the seat in the van telling me he felt like he was going to throw up.  I couldn't figure out what was going on!  They were making pinch-pots with clay, for heaven's sake!  What kid doesn't like to do that?!  Finally I got it out of him that he felt like he wasn't as good at art as the other boys and was afraid he couldn't do it.  I asked him if he wanted me to go in with him and help and he nodded.  As it turned out, I didn't help a bit.  He did a great job, and turned out one of the better pots.  I hope that helped his confidence.  He is the youngest boy there and I think feels a bit intimidated.  I don't expect that of him since he's otherwise such a very confident, outgoing, fearless kid.  I think the fact that he is so good at so many things kind of works against him in some ways-- he is more afraid of not being good enough, because he really doesn't have any experience with it!  :-)
Tonight I spent a scintillating couple of hours folding laundry, and now I'm going to bed because 6:20 comes awfully early, and Thursdays are our marathon days!