April 19-26

Three weeks ago we made a deal with some friends: Both of our families would stay home from everything including grocery stores for two weeks and if we were all healthy at the end of it then we would get together for a couple of days in person. This past Monday our deal ended and the Miroglios came over for half of Monday and all of Tuesday. They have a daughter in first grade at St Charles, a son who was in Kaitlyn's catechesis class, and a daughter about a year younger than Matthias. It was fabulous. The kids were all so happy to see each other and play together. The adults were also happy for in person interaction. We played board games, watched the kids play outside on the driveway, and chatted while we cooked meals. 10/10 highly recommend.

Matthias refers to the girls collectively as "your sisters" instead of "my sisters." He talks about playing with your sisters and going into your sisters' room.

Gretchen had a birthday! She turned 7 on Friday. We had pancakes with a square of butter for dinner and a chocolate mint cake for dessert. Her friend Leon from school had a birthday on Saturday, and he dropped off birthday cookies on the porch. We left him a piece of birthday cake. :)

Kaitlyn has been working on recognizing letters and now knows all of them at least some of the time. We've started working on letter sounds because she wants to be able to read.

Matthias knows about 75% of his letters. We have some of our foam letters out on the living room floor and he walks around the edge naming letters as he goes.

Last Sunday I reported that Theodore could not move forward, could not pick things up, and could not transfer things from his hands to his mouth. On Monday he achieved all three. By yesterday he was completely confident in his ability to go wherever he wanted and was (usually) not discouraged by distance.

Pictures:
Painting miniatures after bedtime:

Trampoline time:

Egg hunt:

This is the look Bryan gets when we sing about Pascha in church. We're singing about the day, he's thinking of the cheese:

Six stranded challah bread and Pascha cheese that has the consistency of fake butter:

Art time:

Matthias drew a face. On purpose!

A sibling photo shoot:

Birthday girl Gretchen:

An Easter from ages past: