Firemen, chapter books and drawing...another week in the Laukkanen household

So it can be hard enough trying to get a picture of three moving kids, but add in the pets and it almost never works! But tonight I got lucky and snapped this one before bath of the kids with Tillie. Note the small stuffed animal Tillie in Markku's hands as well. We sure love our Tillie. She is the best dog ever. She is getting old these days, at 11.5 yrs old...I can barely remember the trouble she used to get into! She is great with the kids especially. But so often, she tends to sleep these days and stay off to the side when the kids get silly...so hence never in any photos! But we still love her! Allie is even harder to photograph, but she will be my next challenge.

 

 

Tonight Kai decided to play fireman. He has his firefighting uniform on and is holding the hose, spraying out a fire.

 

The hat is too big, so getting a photo without movement was hard...he kept trying to push hat back on his head. What a cutie. He does everything Markku does. He was even holding the imaginary hose and trying to hook it to a hydrant ( Markku was directing him and telling him what to do more than he was really doing it though).

 

Kai has another new obsession-play dough. He can spend over an hour playing by himself with the play dough. I can cook, clean up after dinner, etc. It is great-except major tantrums when I try to take the play dough away. Geez, you would think I was killing him instead of cleaning him up to eat dinner...

 

 

Markku is learning to read (well, that really started last year in kinder). He really wants to read chapter books, as that is the next level he will be on in school. So close! So, he told me that he was reading a chapter book, at night in his bed with a flashlight. Turns out, it was this book. He actually was reading a Finnish-English dictionary (see below) and was on page 24 (it did start on page 18 however)! I was pretty impressed, but will admit we went straight to the library and got a few chapter books for the poor kid! 

 

Also new this week, he scored a basket in his basketball game yesterday! First one of the season! He is usually more of a defensive player. But he took a shot and in it went!

 

 

Suvi on the other hand is an artist. She LOVES to draw. She spends hours drawing each day.Here is a sampling of her art work. If anyone would like to purchase any I have hundreds in stock. All over my house. I even have some that I am not supposed to look at until Mother's day! 

This is our family. Heikki, me, Markku, Suvi Kai, Allie and Tillie

Not a great photo, but this is Ariel and Rapunzel.

Another photo of our family and our house

And this is a sticker fish and then butterflies. I guess the house is on stilts, in case of hurricane.

 

 

This is only a small sample of her stuff. She is getting noticeably better each day, with more and more detail being added. This comes from Heikki's side of the family. Markku did not inherit the drawing gene. He likes it well enough, but does not do it often and is not quite as good.

 

Anyways, just a sampling of our week, and another blurry picture of kids and Tille. See what I mean?!. Hope everyone is enjoying this new year!