Interview the Kiddos -- September 2017

The kids finally went back to school yesterday and I have to say that I am totally, totally sad! I'm glad to have the kids back with friends, learning new things, getting into a routine, etc. But we had a great (and really quick) summer and I am absolutely going to miss them while they are at school (and so is Penny!). Kane is heading third grade and Cam will be in second grade, both of which are totally blowing my mind. But in an effort to take a snapshot of them at these ages, I thought I'd do another interview. I asked them these same questions about a year ago (our Interview the Kiddos -- August 2016) and totally intended to do it every three months. No big surprise that didn't happen. But here's what they had to say this year ....

Cameron -- age 7 years, 4 months
FAVORITE COLOR - blue 
FAVORITE BOOK - I Will Always Write Back
FAVORITE SUBJECT AT SCHOOL - math
FAVORITE SONG - Charlie XCX—all of hers
FAVORITE FOOD - watermelon
FAVORITE MOVIE - Baby Boss
FAVORITE TV SHOW - Just Add Magic
FAVORITE TOY/GAME - Stare! Board Game and Penny
WHAT ARE YOU SAVING YOUR ALLOWANCE FOR? - to buy stuff for homeless people
FAMOUS PERSON YOU'D LIKE TO MEET - Mommy!
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? - a veternarian
BEST FRIEND - Penny, Kaney, Mommy, Daddy, and Zoe
FAVORITE THING TO DO AS A FAMILY - hike up waterfalls in Yosemite
FAVORITE PLACE TO GO AS A FAMILY - Chicago, New Jersey, California
FAVORITE THING TO DO AFTER SCHOOL - play with Penny and art
FAVORITE GAME TO PLAY WITH KANE - LEGO
DREAM VACATION - Hawaii
FAVORITE MUSEUM - the Color Factory
FAVORITE SEASON - summer, spring, and winter
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO THIS FALL? - have a family olympics and movie night
FAVORITE MEMORY FROM THIS SUMMER - getting Penny
FAVORITE SPORT - swimming 


Kane -- age 8 years, 11 months 
FAVORITE COLOR - green 
FAVORITE BOOK - The Westing Game 
FAVORITE SUBJECT AT SCHOOL - Social Studies 
FAVORITE SONG - Shut Up and Dance 
FAVORITE FOOD - oysters
FAVORITE MOVIE - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 and Part 2 
FAVORITE TV SHOW - Just Add Magic 
FAVORITE TOY/GAME - Monopoly, Etch a Sketch, LEGO, and Pokemon. 
WHAT ARE YOU SAVING YOUR ALLOWANCE FOR? - a toy under $100 and my college fund.
FAMOUS PERSON YOU'D LIKE TO MEET - President Obama and maybe Jimmy Carter (I really like peanuts). 
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? - Can I just say the name of some of the PhDs, MD, JD, or MBA I want? OK, I'd like to be a doctor or a lawyer with a PhD or a civil engineer or an architect. 
BEST FRIEND - Do I have to answer that? Oh yeah, Cami. And Penny. And mommy and daddy.
FAVORITE THING TO DO AS A FAMILY - spend time together 
FAVORITE PLACE TO GO AS A FAMILY - either out of the U.S., a staycation, or a different state. I also just like to stay at home and go to Dave and Busters, the movies, bowling, hikes, and museums.
FAVORITE THING TO DO AFTER SCHOOL - ooooh, that's tough. Maybe spend time with my family. Play with my friends. 
FAVORITE GAME TO PLAY WITH C - we play lots of games—can you be more specific? There are lots of different categories. Monopoly, soccer (not traditional soccer, but the wrestling game we came up with. You could also call it street fighting). 
DREAM VACATION - Turks + Caicos. Or a world tour of all the sunny places with my family and friends. 
FAVORITE MUSEUM - oh that's hard. I'm going to say the California Academy of Science has a good chunk. Also Ben Franklin Institute. The Color Factory was also cool. I also like all the museums on the mall in D.C. except for the Air and Space Museum (but I like the one at Dulles). 
FAVORITE SEASON - fall and summer 
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO THIS FALL? - celebrate my birthday with Giordano's pizza, play laser tag, and eat Eli's cheesecake. 
FAVORITE MEMORY FROM THIS PAST SUMMER - vacation and spending time with family. 
FAVORITE SPORT - swimming, lacrosse, and wrestling.

Interview the Kiddos -- August 2016

Even though I constantly chronicle the kids' lives on the blog and in our book, I am the WORST at printing out photos, keeping baby books, and the like. One of my most favorite family activities we did was the Q+A a Day we kept up for a while -- it was such a great way to document the kids' personalities. But, alas, I failed at doing the daily task. We originally borrowed that idea from our friends at No Monsters in My Bed, so I decided to borrow another from them! A regular interview of the kiddos. I'm going to try and do them every three months, but we'll see how it goes! Thanks No Monsters!!

Cameron -- age 6 years, 3 months
FAVORITE COLOR - rainbow, and green, gold, and silver. and multicolored.
FAVORITE BOOK - Mercy Watson 
FAVORITE SUBJECT AT SCHOOL - reading, art, and writing
FAVORITE SONG - Barbara Streisand/Llorenzo Llama version
FAVORITE FOOD - mom’s lamb meatballs
FAVORITE MOVIE - Jem and the Holograms
FAVORITE TV SHOW - Wizards of Waverly Place
FAVORITE TOY/GAME - Penguin game 
WHAT ARE YOU SAVING YOUR ALLOWANCE FOR? - buying stuff like for art and books for the poor.
FAMOUS PERSON YOU'D LIKE TO MEET - Mommy — you’re famous!
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? - oceanographer
BEST FRIEND - mommy, Kane, daddy, Zoe, Uncle Steve, my cousins. I have lots of best friends.
FAVORITE THING TO DO AS A FAMILY - sidewalk chalk paint
FAVORITE PLACE TO GO AS A FAMILY - Ireland + Scotland — I bet it will be fun.
FAVORITE THING TO DO AFTER SCHOOL - hang out and relax with my family.
FAVORITE GAME TO PLAY WITH KANE - me and Kane do like playing Artemis and Apollo with pretend arrows and swords.
DREAM VACATION - Ireland + Scotland. And Hawaii.
FAVORITE MUSEUM - The Renwick and History Museum Innovation gallery (National Museum of American History).
FAVORITE SEASON - Winter because I love snow.
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO THIS SUMMER? - kiss the Blarney Stone.
FAVORITE MEMORY FROM THIS SPRING - playing with my friends.
FAVORITE SPORT - oooh, that’s a hard one. Basketball.


Kane -- age 7 years, 9 months 
FAVORITE COLOR - green
FAVORITE BOOK - The Unwanteds (audiobook)
FAVORITE SUBJECT AT SCHOOL - social studies 
FAVORITE SONG - Shut Up and Dance 
FAVORITE FOOD - Pizza 
FAVORITE MOVIE - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 and 2 
FAVORITE TV SHOW - Just Add Magic 
FAVORITE TOY/GAME - LEGOS
WHAT ARE YOU SAVING YOUR ALLOWANCE FOR? - most recently, Pokemon cards. 
FAMOUS PERSON YOU'D LIKE TO MEET - That’s physically impossible, but it’s Benjamin Franklin.
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? - A billionaire. Someone who owns a lot of businesses. No, the president. 
BEST FRIEND - Harold
FAVORITE THING TO DO AS A FAMILY - Spend time together — I don't care, as long as we’re together. 
FAVORITE PLACE TO GO AS A FAMILY - New Jersey 
FAVORITE THING TO DO AFTER SCHOOL - It depends on the season. In winter it's having a snow ball fight. 
FAVORITE GAME TO PLAY WITH C - Tag 
DREAM VACATION - Going to the moon. 
FAVORITE MUSEUM - Museum of Natural History (National Museum of Natural History) 
FAVORITE SEASON - Fall 
WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO THIS SUMMER? - go to Jamaica again
FAVORITE MEMORY FROM THIS PAST SPRING - Jamaica 
FAVORITE SPORT - wrestling 

Back to School! Breakfast

Happy back-to-school day!!! (well for us anyway). We were all so excited to get back that we had a little celebration last week. Head on over to Honest to Nod today to check out our back to school! breakfast and our hilarious interview answers.

ps .... and head over to A Feteful Life for your own free printable interview!

Disclosure: The Land of Nod provided us with Meri Meri partyware and a growth chart in exchange for this post. No other compensation was provided and all opinions herein are our own.

Miscellaneous Madness: Q&A a Day For Kids

We owe a huge thank you to No Monsters in My Bed for posting on the book "Q&A a Day For Kids: A Three-Year Journal." When mom spotted their post on it, she went out and bought the book immediately. Literally. And we started right in that night.

The book provides one question a day, 365 days a year, for 3 years (the questions repeat annually), and prompts a total of 1,095 conversations with your kiddos. Sometimes mommy gets short, to-the-point answers. And sometimes we want to talk about an answer at length. It's entertaining. And surprising. A great way to capture our personalities day to day. And we LOVE it. We remind mommy almost every day and look forward to each other's answers (we take turns daily as to who answers first and we generally hear each other's answers, which frequently colors our own).

And since mom is completely defunct in the baby book department and has not yet done the family interviews from our summer bucket list, we thought it would be fun to share a few highlights each month of mom's top 5 favorite answers. Some are sweet and some are just downright hysterical (to mom, at least). So, here you go!

September 23
Q: The best thing about being a grown-up is _______.
As:
Cameron: to eat food, to eat veggies. I like to eat oranges. Um ... polka dot.
Kane: I think grown-ups are boring because they don't play. They just work, work. Well, we could cook.

September 26
Q: What did you have for breakfast today?
As:
Kane: pancakes. I mean french toast -- I wanted to fool you, but I couldn't!
Cameron: cereal {laughing as she's eating french toast}. Kane: You fooled her Cam, thanks!

October 1
Q: Whom are you worried about? Why?
As:
Kane: myself. Because I couldn't bring things to school. My teachers are going to fire me {worried about homework}.
Cameron: someone else -- it starts with the letter B. Actually, piggy -- he needs a blanket. I'm worried about that picture.

October 13
Q: If I had a magic eraser, I would erase ______.
As:
Cameron: I would sneak into my brother's room and take something.
Kane: a drawing of a princess castle -- I'd sneak into my sister's room and erase a pretty princess castle that she drew.

October 14
Q: Are you more like a monkey, a tiger, a fox, or a rabbit?
As:
Kane: a fox. I'm fierce, I like to play, I like new things ... to eat. And that's why I'm like a fox.
Cameron: um ... a giraffe. Because I like rescue robots. I get to rescue people. And they get to glow in the dark. I like horsies.