Welcome to the Wizarding World

This is the scene most days in Burnstopia:

Like I said, some days they're children and some days they're Jedi knights.*


But some days...they're wizards.  Wizards with wands**  running around shouting spells, some from Harry Potter and some they've just made up.  Well, the Boy's are intelligible, the Girl just squawks.

In other news, the Boy and I have been reading the Harry Potter books.  I got a little burnt out on C.S. Lewis and needed a break, so I suggested Harry Potter.  I wanted to read the Hobbit with him, but he was really struggling with the language and total lack of pictures.  Harry Potter at least has the valuable illustration at the start of the chapter, and then the added bonus of his cousins who love Harry Potter and talk about it quite a bit.  The Boy loves the feeling of knowing what they're talking about.  He genuinely enjoys them, and I absolutely love our bedtime routine.  We cuddle and read and then cuddle and talk about what we read.  He hides his whole head under my arm and shoulder when we get to a scary part, and when I cry (which happens), he rubs my face with his woobie.  It's absolutely funny and heartbreaking all at the same time.

He just walked in with a lightsaber in one side of his belt and his wand in the other. He's well prepared in case of any emergency, extraterrestrial or magical.  We're all set.

 ***

In the interest of full disclosure, I get tired just like any other mother.  We've had weeks where the Boy watches entirely too much television.  But since we got back from Savannah, I've been trying to get us back on track.  Turn off the television, get back to schooling, get back to eating vegetables, get back to reading every day...all of the normal stuff.  And it's amazing to me, how, when we turn off the television, my children's imaginations blossom.  And when they blossom, they are HILARIOUS.

There's no story here, this is just a gratuitous picture of my darling girl.  Who is not a baby anymore, but not quite a toddler.  She is entirely made of mischief and caramel, and has a surprising capacity for injuring people around her.


*There's no way I would actually pay money for them to have the battery operated, light-up toy light sabers.  We use the emergency flashlights, that have a small flashlight on one end and a glowstick on the other.  The boy LOVES them and only calls them lightsabers.

**You guessed it, there's no way a 4 year old is playing with an actual wand either.  He's got one of my knitting needles and he calls it his wand.  I find myself reminding him every 30 minutes or so to be careful or "you'll put your eye out!"