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Family, birds, art, and Valentines

children's drawings for their cousin

Valentine’s Day this week took a jolt when we learned that my brother’s four-day-old baby S had to have emergency surgery, that night. Luckily he came through without complications (definitely not a given with the problem he had) and is recovering beautifully. He’ll be in the hospital for a while yet, but is out of the NICU. All three kids drew S some pictures for him, and it was fun to see their perceptions of what a newborn baby would like. Lily’s drawings are on the left, Johnny’s in the middle, and Emma’s on the right. Johnny was positive that S’s favorite colors are green and brown, and all three kids agreed that he loves green – incidentally, his mother’s favorite color! We were very worried for a few days, and it is fantastic to see S doing so well!!!

Valentine's Day card for dad
Valentine's Day card for dad

Valentine’s Day was a Daddy love fest around here – Emma made him this card, and both she and Johnny worked hard on wall decorations. Emma’s heart (on the right) is a robot rendering of her heart guy. Johnny (photo on the left) cut out several random letters, but if you look closely you may be able to make out his robot guy at the bottom of his decorations, on the left center.

wall decor for Valentine's Daywall decor for Valentine's Day

Both Emma (left) and Johnny (right) drew family portraits for Valentine’s Day:

loving family on Valentine's Dayloving family on Valentine's Day

Johnny was very busy drawing this week! He drew these two monster robots:

robot drawings by Johnny (aged 4)

And this very creative guy! I love the originality in Johnny’s drawings – and they they are very happy!

"guy" by Johnny (aged 4)

I bought my kids Melissa and Doug Sticker Collection books after reading about them at Mouse Grows, Mouse Learnspink for the girls and blue for Johnny. All three kids have thoroughly enjoyed them, but Johnny absolutely ADORES them! They’ve provided some great downtime for me over the past couple of weeks! I was especially happy to see that the boy version was (mostly) weapons free. I get so tired of weapons on boy toys – and my non-violent Johnny doesn’t like them either!

playing with stickers

I wish there were more books like these – my kids adore them, and it was so fun to hear the stories they made up to go along with their scenes! Do you have any sticker recommendations for me?

wild turkey

We’re still working on the Great Backyard Bird Count – I highly recommend participating, it’s free (you can even win prizes!) a lot of fun!

How was your week? Link up to the Afterschool Blog Hop, hosted this week at Mouse Grows, Mouse Learns!

MaryAnne is a craft loving educator, musician, photographer, and writer who lives in Silicon Valley with her husband Mike and their four children.

21 thoughts on “Family, birds, art, and Valentines”

  1. What a scary thing for your whole family to go through! I hope Baby S is much, much better.

    I love your kids’ valentines! They’re always so creative!

  2. Kim @ The Educators Spin On It

    Thanks for sharing your week, I’m so glad to hear your nephew is going well. I have a close friend who’s 6 month old twin daughter who went in for heart surgery today. It’s amazing how their tiny little babies can be so strong and brave.

    1. I hope her surgery goes well! It is hard to see such invasive procedures on such tiny people, even if they are life-saving.

    1. Pirates (some weapons there, I think), cowboys (also some weapons), race cars, construction trucks, sports, outer space, knights (again some weapons), dinosaurs, rescue vehicles, and one page I’m blanking on. Bugs, maybe?

  3. Crystal @ Growing A Jeweled Rose

    Baby S has been a constant in my thouhts and prayers! So glad he is out of the NICU. I loved all of yor children’s illustrations! I can not wait to have similar works of art spanning my walls. My oldest just turned two, so for now, we have lots of paintings and cirlcular motions with crayons :)

    1. Thank you, Crystal! They are much appreciated!

      I started blogging when my oldest was two, and it has been a joy to watch her art (and that of her brother and sister) develop over the years!

  4. Oh no – I hope baby S will be OK. This must have been scary for all of you. I love seeing your kids’ art – it’s fun to see how their personality and talent unfold over time.

    1. I love watching my kids draw! In this sequence, it was fun to see them inspiring one another’s drawings, also =)

      Baby S should be okay – the thing keeping him in the hospital right now is that he needs to work on eating, after such a rough start to life.

  5. I’m so sorry to hear about your nephew. I’m glad he did well with surgery.

    Their drawings are cute. The Melissa & Doug books sound fun!

    1. Abby would love those sticker books – if you’re ever looking for a way to entertain her =)

      I was SO relieved my nephew did well in surgery. He’ll be able to go home now, once he starts eating better!

  6. Valerie @ Glittering Muffins

    So sweet! I love the no weapons policy, same here. His “weapons” are tools, hammer, screwdriver, saw (plastic kids one) that’s what we get here. We had a love fest when we had our Valentines day card swap. That was fun, we were a heart factory for a morning. For stickers, I like those (see link) cause they are reusable and they are also educational, I found them in different stores here but online I only found french site from France who had them (http://www.decitre.fr/recherche/resultat.aspx?recherche=refine&collection=Autocollants+des+b%u00e9b%u00e9s) I just gave Nico the farm one and he loved it! Can I say something not blog related? I LOVE your chair!!!

    1. I’ll have to see if we can get those stickers in the US.

      As for the chair, it’s a hand-me-down from Mike’s childhood – and I agree, it’s lovely. Also un-tippable, which is very nice with small children!

  7. Oh my gosh, how scary for your brother! I’m so glad the baby is OK!! Kevin loves sticker books too. Does Johnny like Legos? We bought Kevin a lego mini figure sticker book for Christmas, and a cheaper Lego City one recently, and he enjoys those. This week he’s been using the usborne dress up one constantly. He doesn’t seem to think it is girly. :) But they have some more boyish ones, like a “heroes” theme that I’ll probably get soon.

    1. Baby S is doing pretty well – just needs to start eating so he can go home, now…

      Johnny does love Legos! I’ll have to look for those – and I’ll look into the Usborne sticker books as well =)

  8. My kids got those sticker books about a year ago and we loved them!!!

    I LOVE Johnny’s drawing of the creative guy!

    Poor baby S – makes me so sad hope baby will be okay.

    Love-fest here too!!! Daddy got everybody a heart shaped box of chocolates and especially my daughter kept bringing me love notes!

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