Saturday Nana visit

My mom is here for a visit and the kids were inside out with excitement.  For the most part, things have gone well.  I have to watch as she is a bit prone to favor Lissa over KC.  She doesn't see that although she  is  younger, Lissa is the master of "set up".  Truly the child has it down to a science and KC, just like Charlie Brown and Lucy, falls for it every time.  Literally.  Every time.  Baffles me how a smart kid can do that.  But I don't want Mum doing anything that further empowers Miss Lissa along this path.  Strong assertive woman, you go for it.  Sneaky, conniving back stabbing woman--way less high on the old family goals chart.  LOL
Also, my mom asked KC to read for her and he clammed up.  He told her it would be too embarrassing which I know angered her and probably hurt her.  Realistically if she had gotten a book, sat down and read with him, he would have read fine.  He was reading stuff out of catalogs to her for goodness sake.  But he does have this performance anxiety thing going.  I think in his mind he is a perfectionist and anything less than that would let us down.  So not the case, so we need to figure out how to handle that.

There were lots of plusses though. KC wanted to have a tea party that Nana could come to, so we did that.  I made tiny sugar cookies and raspberry iced tea and we got out the fancy tiny cocoa mugs that were my grandmothers and had tea.    She played games with the kids, admired their paintings, shared two meals with us thus far etc.  I would rather have her visit here as it is an environment the kids are comfortable in and that I in a sense control.  When we visit her apartment I am hyper sensitive to anything my kids do that makes noise because she is always telling me how ill the couple downstairs are. 

We had lots of good food.  Ate the rest of my soup of last night with lunch, made mac and cheese for the kids, made a blueberry coffee cake with Lissa's help, made sweet potato meadow muffins, had veggie burgers and home made wedges (as opposed to pre seasoned store boughts) for supper with pie for dessert.  Man can we all eat!  LOL

Worked on taking down Lissa's braids off and on throughout the day.  By bedtime I had the last of them out.  Tomorrow I'll style it simply for church, probably a couple of french braids or pony tail twists.  We will keep it less styled for a few weeks and then rebraid and bead before Yule as i have red and green beads for the little princess.

I have so enjoyed this long stretch of time to be home with my wife and kids.  That is what I am most thankful for, a bunch of "family days" as my kids label them.