Game Night Liar

Game night is our Friday night tradition. We have been going at it for about a year now. The girls really do look forward to it, but they refuse to have game night when Daddy is out at sea. They say we aren't a family when daddy is not here.

As a preface to this story. I believe heavily in making sure that my girls lose games on a regular basis. I rarely 'let the girls win.' The only time I will purposely mess up to give a daughter advantage is when the game skews constantly to one kid so I will set the other kid up for success. For example, in memory if one girl gets all the matches for the 5th game in a row, I will try to show the other where her card is through a pretend mismatch. Anywho...

Last weekend, we played Brady and Reese's all time favorite game night game...Life. At the end we were counting money, First Karl announced how many 100,000 bills he had: "13" then Brady speedily proclaims "I have 19!" Reese jumps in with "I do too" (I thought I heard her count only 18, but I think it was an honest mistake). There I sat with 21 100,000 bills in my hand (yes I know that is 2.1 million but I am working with 4 and 6 year olds). No one looked my way, but I was completely okay. No need to claim victory here. I am not competitive and what ensued is much better then claiming victory. The girls SQUEALED in delight that they had "the same exact money and they BOTH are the winners". They danced around for at least 15 minutes singing the victory song of the dual champions. I cleaned up the game with Karl and then snapped pictures of the closing ceremonies in the game night festivities. They were so excited about the tied 'wins'...now who could break the news to them with faces like these. So, yes, on this night I 'let them win'!

Spotlight on Reese

Reese is our easy going comedian. She has the natural ability to make us laugh without even trying. She will make faces or say things that just has me rolling. For example, just tonight, she comes out from her bedroom and says "I need a band-aid right here (pointing to her upper arm),, Brady almost bit me!"

I recently asked Reese's school teacher how she was doing since we have had listening issues at home. Her teacher said she is doing great but runs on her own clock. All I could think was, if you only really knew. Reese knows how to make a 30 second task take 15 minutes. After she goes potty, she will just sit there and stare into space for five minutes. I wish I knew what she was thinking when she does all that! I bet it is pretty interesting...

I also love watching Reese dance to music. Her smile as she floats across the floor is so contagious. She gets into her own world and just loves life, which makes me seize the moment.

Reese has a great interest in board games these days. She is a natural at board games. In Guess Who, she is able to ask the correct questions to whittle down the crowd. In memory (when she is attentive), she can honestly win the game. But all the while, she isn't in it to win, she enjoys the act of playing. I love that about her. It is about the journey not the destination.

Reese, you are my middle daughter. I think you are perfectly sandwiched. You are the peanut butter in the Orthner sandwich. You have always loved the peanut butter more then the bread, therefore I think it is the perfect spot for you. You know how to play the games that Brady makes up for you, and share selflessly like none other. But at the same time, you are great at being role model for Elliot and looking out for her whenever you can. You are the best big/little sister ever. My wish for you is that you continue to love being the 'lucky' one that gets to have an older and younger sister. Thanks for all the smiles, Beautiful!

A Night Full of Laughter

We started our Friday Family Game Nights. The first night was a HUGE success. We were able to successfully introduce a couple new, but classic, games to the girls this week: Bingo, Go Fish and Guess Who.

When you are in Florida you have to play bingo...especially using dabbers (for you BINGO novices, that is the dot markers that are like a giant marker that you use on disposable board). And don't you know we have a cage to mix up our number balls too.

 Go Fish was a bigger success then we thought possible, the girls were able to hold their cards and easily understood the concept and even developed basic strategy.

 The always competitive Karl taking advantage of the photo op ;)

 The girls just loved the way Karl told them to "GO FISH"

 One of my all time favorites as a kid was Guess Who.

Elli Dew sat in her bouncy chair the entire time and just enjoyed the family laughter while using two hands to suck her thumb. 

Now I said it was a night full of laughter...that is because after the games were cleaned up and the girls were in the shower, Elli laughed for the first time! It must have been her observing all the laughing we were doing while playing the games.

So I was giving her her nightly antibiotics, which is a two person job. Someone has to hold her at a certain angel so she doesn't choke, someone has to slowly squirt it in her mouth and then someone has to wipe the medicine she spits out. Well, I asked Karl to be on wiping duty. For some reason tonight she was actually swallowing all the meds. Karl said to her "You didn't need me to be on wiping duty" in a fun daddy to baby voice and she laughed at him! Karl has never been home for the first laugh so not only was he here but he 'caused' it! YAH! I think she is going to be a daddy's girl!

What a great night we had as a family of wholesome fun 

As of late…

Brady’s latest obsession is puzzles. She is doing like 5-8 a day now. She is actually doing a puzzle as I am typing this post. She has two princess 50 piece puzzles that we mix together in the same bag and she completes both of them in one sitting. Here is a picture from yesterday morning, first thing after breakfast.

Yesterday, I had out a shirt for Reese and she kept running away from me, but there was Dewy (my velcro dog) staring right at me, so guess who I dressed…. Apparently Reese and Dewy currently wear the same size clothes

Last Thursday the girls went to the dentist. The hygienist gave the girls a glove each, man did that make their day. They have played dentist everyday since. I heard Reese calling “Brady, come here, Brady come lay down”. This is the scene that soon followed. Now, Karl and I have to be patients too.

Good Gift for Preschoolers…

We have been playing with Reese’s birthday gifts all last night and all day today. We of course love them all, but I wanted to share one gift that is different and lots of fun…

 

SKY HIGH SCOOPS! It is from Target and all four of us love to play it. You evenly distribute plastic ice scream scoops. The object is to get all your scoops stacked on the ice cream bowl. If any scoops fall on your turn you have to put those back in your stack. It is electronic and tells the player how many and what color to stack. Therefore they have to count and recognize colors while using hand eye coordination.

 

If you have a 2-4 year old  I really recommend this game! I haven’t gotten any pictures of us playing (we were having too much fun to pause for the camera) but here is a YouTube video created by the distributor.

 

http://www.youtube.com/user/LearningResourcesInc#p/search/0/HUOZe7C0aGU