Ethan Bowls

Ethan bowls with the NJ Hawks bowling league. It's on Saturday mornings and a really nice time. He is usually grouped with a bunch of guys his age and I enjoy watching them interact.

Ethan bowls because the weather is always good, he never gets a sunburn on his bald head, and there's no killer downtime that invites all kinds of naughtiness or the desire to just go home. As long as there's a Pepsi offered after game two, we can get three games in.

The season ends with the possibility of competing with Special Olympics in a regional bowling tournament - I'll let you know how it goes!

3 boys, 3 forks....

one cake.

Mom: Boys, can you can help me with something?

Boys: Sure, mom!

Mom: Wow, that was a nice response. I just wanted to know if you could finish this chocolate cake for me?

*All is well*

Math for fun

I told Mikey he needed to find something to do for a for a little while. He asked, "Can I play with math?" I asked him what he would need and we picked some things out. I believe mathematics is one of easiest subjects to allow kids to learn at their own pace and at their own level. When it has not been forced on them by high pressure or boring or repetitive methods they can come to appreciate solving the puzzle. My kids ask lots of good questions about the price of gas, mpgs, time, cost, banks, taxes, bills, paychecks, allowances, etc. There is never a lack of interest. That leads us to alot of activities that you might consider "educational"! Speaking of boring and repetitive, Gavin decided that knowing the multiplication tables by heart would be of great use to him with his interest in math, building, chemistry and lego. After two different computer games geared to committ those to memory - he decided he likes doing flashcards! I think if I would have suggested memorizing multiplication tables from flashcards....well, let's not think about it.

Just Do The Math, by David Albert

p.s. After I published this post, a friend linked these two articles to my FB page. I wanted to include them because the information is amazing.

When Less is More: The Case for Teaching Less Math in Schools

Kids Learn Math Easily When They Control Their Own Learning

Forever Families

I was excited to attend the adoption festivities surrounding the adoption of our friends' little girl from the foster care system. It was in the same courthouse, with the same attorney and case worker as Mikey's adoption. It was interesting to see it from the outside this time.

I feel like an adoption from foster care is very different from an adoption that happens shortly after birth or one that happens in a foreign country. In one way, I felt like Mikey's adoption was so much more of a formality at the point it happened. I felt like Mikey was "ours" long before signing a set of papers. For us, we had been parenting him since he was 20 months old and his adoption was not formalized until he was 4 1/2. I just wanted to get in there, do what we had to do and get out! I did not feel the 'festivity' factor that was so evident at this adoption.

But later, as we hosted his adoption party, and case workers stopped coming by checking if we had clothes in his dresser or food in the fridge, I felt the full impact of the legal renderings. It was like being able to finally exhale. So what I thought was so initially so anticlimactic, turned out to provide the security that had been missing for so long.

The Costello Boyz on Mikey's Adoption Day - June 7, 2007

Trains Galore

We visited Northlandz in Flemington, NJ. I had no idea what was in store for us. I asked the gentleman who was chatting us up at the start of the tour how long he had been at Northlandz and he said only since he deisgned and built it! He told us not to rush through it and if you get to a section and there are no trains - just wait - they're coming.

I can't do it justice with pictures, so just go see it. At the end of the tour he asked the boys how closely they had paid attention. Gavin said he had and Mikey said not so much. Mr. Zaccagnino asked Gavin if he had found the 4 little ghosts - Gavin had and told him right where they were. We were told most people don't find them. He also asked what year was the height of the railroad - 1919 - replied Gavin. Phew! Glad he didn't ask me.