Monkey See, Monkey Do

We have been in the year 2011 for 7 days now.  Britton and Jenna have been back to school since Monday but Korinne gets to hang out with me until Jan. 18th when her school finally starts again.  My brother Taylor and his family stayed with us for a few days while they were in town from China but I forgot to take pictures, of course.  My kids like playing with their cousin Will who is 15 months old (but looks like he is about 2).  When they left the kids were upset because they wouldn't see Will again until summer.  With Adam and mine's siblings so scattered they don't get to see cousins very often.

Ever since a huge printer box was placed under the counter in my small "mom office" Korinne has moved in.  She usually sets up shop in Adam's office but one day this week Adam wasn't working in his home office on the same day the perfect desk-sized box showed up in mine so she decided to make the switch.  Before I knew it I had an office-mate.

Since her big office move I have been able to get a better glimpse as to what she really does while she "works" at her desk for hours at a time.  Yesterday she played the games on her Barbie computer (not so shocking). Today after going through flashcards for awhile she started scanning things using a "magnetic fun" container.  So, when the magnetic fun container is not being used to tell the story of Noah's ark with colorful animal magnets it doubles as a pretend scanner. One by one she put in flashcards to "scan" them into her computer.  The magnetic container/pretend scanner is about the same size as my portable scanner that I use all of the time.  Hmm, I wonder where she came up with that idea. . .

As my kids get older it is kind of interesting to see their different interests and talents emerge.  Britton has really taken to the piano and will stop by the piano several times a day just to play a few songs.  On days when I've heard the SAME (slightly annoying) song a MILLION times I just have to tell myself how wonderful it is that he enjoys playing his songs. . . a lot.  Even when he isn't playing the piano he has started doing this weird thing with his fingers.  He walks around touching each of his fingers to his thumb one at a time.  I couldn't figure out why he started doing it and then one day I noticed that when he was sitting at the table he was moving his fingers like he was playing piano keys. He didn't even notice he was doing it.  That is when I realized the finger movements started about the time he started playing scales on the piano.  He likes to play scales.  It sounds kind of fancy and he is all about sounding fancy.

Jenna really likes to read.  Britton reads because he is stuck in his room for 2 hours every night before he goes to sleep.  If there was anything else he could be doing he would, but since there isn't he logs in some serious reading time.  Jenna reads at times when she could be doing something else, but isn't.  I often see her walking home from the bus reading a book. Right now she is on the couch reading. She stays up at night to read while Britton reads because he can't fall asleep.  Big difference.  Jenna has decided to give gymnastics a break while she tries her hand at violin lessons.  (She wanted to do both, but I have a strict "one extra activity at a time" policy so she decided to take violin).  Her first lesson is today and she is really excited.  She tried her hand at piano when Britton started but didn't enjoy practicing with Mom.  We decided to back off while we were still on speaking terms. :-)

Korinne is our tech girl.  Britton and Jenna can't figure out why their friends want things like ipods and MP3 players.  They don't get it. And since the "accidental calling of 9-1-1" incident they won't go anywhere near cell phones.  Korinne, on the other hand, knows how to do things on Adam's cell phone that I have no idea how to do. . .and she is 5.  Adam has a fancy cell phone--I can't even make a phone call on that thing (I'll stick with my blackberry, thank you very much.  It actually has a keyboard).  Korinne will grab Adam's cell phone whenever he isn't using it and pull up Pandora and start listening to her Hannah Montana music channel.  If she doesn't like a song, she'll skip it, and when she has had enough music she'll start playing one of the games or puzzles she has downloaded. Yes, you read that right my 5 year old has downloaded puzzle and game apps BY HERSELF.  Today she was showing Britton the "Despicable Me" puzzle she was working on and then said, "Oh, I've got something for you."  She starting flicking the screen on the phone and before I knew it was saying, "Here it is, Star Wars for you, Britton!" Adam was with her and when I said, "How did she just do that?" he told me that this morning she downloaded approx. 15 apps for herself.  Wow. I don't even know what to say to that.

I'm sure the kids will do a lot of growing up in the year 2011. Bring it on.