Snow '09

Up in New Jersey for New Year's, we had a good covering of snow. While it upset travel plans for Mark coming up from Hampton Roads, and Amy looking to head back to Plymouth, the kids were able to enjoy playing together.

Here Elizabeth and Andy are constructing a snowman:


Ian enjoying a solo swing in the snow:


And Peter with Dan in the background:

Scottish Games

Three weekends ago we went to the Anne Arundel Scottish Festival and Games.  We enjoyed watching the pipe bands march on:
Jessica's parents made an appearance too. This photo was taken while watching the Border Collies herd sheep around, just before Mom got lost:
Ian, Peter and Tom enjoyed listening to the band competitions, as well as the solo pipers in the Piobaireachd competition (results), while others looked for Debbie.The day was rounded off with eating overpriced haggis puffs, mince meat pies, and "Scottish" pies, as well as shopping for overpriced practice chanter reeds.  As always, it was a good time.

Old Skool: Andy Graduates Pre-School

We uploaded this old video of Andy graduating from preschool in June, 2008 to see how Blogger and our videos get along. It appears that it will work, which may bode well for the future.

Andrews

It appears that Andrew Camden is becoming a regular mention here. The boys were thrilled to see their first cousin once removed. He came through after seeing a buddy from the Naval Academy get 'spliced', and was able to spend a few minutes here.

Future Olympians!

For those who doubt that television affects children's behavior, you have to see this (note what's on TV):

Pajama Party

Tonight we had a pajama party between bathtime and betime. The boys were in good spirits.



Matthew Alasdair is getting quite big these days! He's as long as Peter is from knee to head.

Going Green

Today in Sunday School, Andy's group was invited to draw Joseph's Coat of Many Colors. As further evidence that Andy's love for the color green is approaching an obsession, I present the following:


But as he explained, there are different shades of green! (A coat of many shades of one color does not a coat of many colors make.)

Prunes

[Scene: Jessica is having a prune from a bag of Del Monte prunes.]

Andy: Mommy, don't eat too many of those, because they make you go potty a lot.

Matthew Alasdair Comes Home

Jessica and Matthew were discharged from the hospital this morning. We are all very happy to have them home, and the older boys are especially glad to have life head back to normalcy.

When we set Matthew down, his novelty kept their attention for at least 60 seconds.


Here are my four sons.


Each time we bring a new one home, we are struck with a sudden realization of how much older the others have gotten to be. They all seem happy to have a new brother.

Meeting Matthew Alasdair

Here are some photos of Matthew being met by some "folks" (as Grandfather Barker would say). This will be it for hospital photos.

Andy meets his new brother:


Ian meets his new brother:


Peter meets his new brother:


Ian and Andy pretend to sleep on Mommy's neat electric hospital bed:


Gram (Tom's mom) meets Matthew Alasdair:


Grania (Jessica's mom) meets Matthew Alasdair:

Piper

Andrew MacKinnon Brown was impressed by his father's practice at the bagpipe chanter. He therefore invented his own set of pipes.

Mission: Impermissible!

Yesterday morning we awoke to the following scene (re-created for purposes of this photograph -- the bottle cap was still on).

Andy was the only one up, so he was surely the culprit.

The purple object jutting from the bottle of Sprite (left over from the previous night's Church small group) is a plastic Ikea kids straw.

Andy explained that, after trying to open the bottle with the can opener and the pizza cutter, he finally went for pay-dirt via a knife puncture to the bottle. Frightening. It's hard to discipline when you're humored.

Andy and His Peeps

Last week, we had the opportunity to go hear my (Jessica's) dad performing in a Friday Morning Music Club recital. The boys loved hearing Granda sing solo, and even Peter was pretty impressive when it came to sitting attentively through his first classical music recital. Ian and Andy appear to be old pros at this kind of thing by now.

Also on the program was a performance of a Bach piano piece and a Beethoven sonata for piano and violin. The Beethoven was performed by a rather accomplished husband and wife duo named the Suzukis. I don't have their bios in front of me, but if memory serves, the husband (violin) was concert master of the Ontario Symphony for 15 years, and they have multiple recordings on the EMI label. Pretty fancy company for us amateurs! Andy was in his element talking piano, and charmed Zeyda Suzuki (piano) so much that she requested that he be in this picture taken of all the pianists on the program.

Bibliophiles

The kids found a new good use for our hall bookcase. The love of books and bookcases runs in the family.



Yesterday most of the family fell asleep. Don't be fooled though, Andy's faking.



And on Friday night, Andy was so into the guitar playing and singing we did with our church group that we found he had held his own jam session after going to sleep (that's a lyrics sheet by his feet).

More Christmas Photos

Thanks to Danielle Lee, here are a couple more from our New Jersey Christmas:

Andy wants to name the new baby Snoopy. We told him no. He suggested Schroeder as an alternative. See any resemblance? Even a striped shirt!

Speaking of Andy, he woke us up this morning by yelling at Peter to wake him. I marched into Peter's room to remind Andy of the discourteous nature of waking a sibling before the appointed hour, but discovered that he wasn't in there. But I could still hear him yelling. I realized he was next door, in his own room, hollering through the heating vent, "hey, Peter, woo-hoo!" His explanation? "I was talking through the heater, pretending it was a phone!" Fine, but the receiving end is in mommy and daddy's room. Argh.

And here Ian demonstrates that there's no wrong way to eat a PBJ:

Andy's First Oil Change

Well... it wasn't his oil we were changing, but yes indeed, Andy helped me (Tom) change the Camry's oil (and, coincidentally, it was the Camry's first oil change too).

Andy helped by moving a few loose items in the garage so I could pull the car in, and by handing me the clean filter when I needed it. Otherwise, we worked on basic auto safety, like not placing his head under the car, not drinking the used motor oil, etc. We also learned how the oil keeps the metal (that the "fire" in the engine makes move) from getting too hot. Andy now knows that black oil is dirty, and apple juice-colored oil is clean.

Very academic, and very intellectual.