Kids in fall and such

Some fall miscellany:

Since the kids have been sick lately, I haven't felt comfortable taking them to the park. As such, we have spent WAY too much time at home, so I've been trying to find ways to break up the mediocrity. On a day when Nikolai was feeling a little better (and complaining about being "BORED!") I put together a little spider web hunt for him in the kitchen. First, I showed him how to draw small alphabet letters (he knows the big ones but not the small ones) and had him write each one on a little square. Then I made him leave the room while I strung up a bunch of string, criss-crossing the room  and taping up the letters as I went. When I was done, he had to come in and find the letters in order by climbing under and over the strings. It was a fun learning activity and I hope to do more things like this in the future!

 

I took these next photos a few weeks ago when the leaves had just started falling (they're mostly down now!). Some of the maple leaves here are GIANT, and Nikolai wanted to pose with this one in front of his face: 

On a different fall day, we went out into the courtyard and played in the leaves, including having a giant leaf fight. Afterwards, Niko and I built this little fairy house:

This photo is even older (and those of you that follow me on instagram or facebook have already seen it). We've started a new tradition of making homemade hot cocoa on Sunday evenings just before the kids go to bed, and I LOVE it. I always sort of wanted to make homemade hot cocoa in America, but it seemed like so much work when I could buy powdered stuff at the store. But I can't find powdered hot cocoa here and I had really been wanting some (especially for that 2 week period when it had gotten cold but the city-controlled radiators in our Soviet-era apartment weren't working yet--brr!!), so I finally got the chance to make it from scratch! I think this is a tradition we are going to carry on long into the future. 

Also, please notice Miriam's frilly floral blouse layered over a stripey shirt. The child has been obsessed with changing her clothes lately and that was what she chose! Obviously, she gets coerced into changing her clothes again before we leave the house ;)