Surprises and Showers

A month+ ago, I was asked if Lori and Katie (friends from church) could "take over" the nursery and throw us a shower. Well, since I had no plans for the nursery...baby #3, no energy, no plans...um, yes please!! :-) They asked if an owl theme would be okay...again, yes, that would be adorable!! And they wanted to make the shower a surprise. E.x.c.e.l.l.e.n.t.!!!!

 Weeks later, I started pestering Andy for clues of when would the shower be...today, tomorrow, next week? Then he planned a "Family Outing" to our local museum. And did not put any info online. Which seemed so obvious!! If you know Andy, he is the geek of the family (and of many of our friends) and every event goes on Facebook. So obviously the surprise would be Saturday morning.

Saturday came and we went to the museum, (shower must be tomorrow I thought) ...we had fun, and had a weird experience: my friend Lisa was attacked by two pigeons. Two birds literally collided into her back and feathers flew everywhere!! She was fine, but it was just really strange.

Then we went home and: S...U...R...P...R...I...S...E!!! 

There were so many adorable owl decorations: owl balloons, an owl cake...to eat, and a diaper cake, owls on a tree...

Katie made a favorite of mine: a diaper cake!!!

Diana made this adorable cake

And it was tasty too!!!

My helper Lori helping me keep track!

I started out with several helpers...all the "big" kids that were there, Hannah, Noah, Ella, Matthew, and Marlie...they soon disappeared, but a few came back at the end!

My friend Lori really wants this boy to be named after her...even if it's the guys name from Little Women!!

The kids had their own table...colors and all!!

This is called a "Pee-pee Teepee" 

Need I say more? ;-)

Having a little fun with my friend Lisa who was trying so hard to keep things picked up and fold the paper...

I just couldn't help myself!

The gift table...yes, I unwrapped it all! ;-)

And when we came home I took a nap and this is the decoration I woke up to...

My kids used some stickers and tape to hang up the balloons ;-)

Thank you to all who came out and showered Elijah Something with lots of gifts, we certainly appreciate the support and love we received. 

'Readin' and 'ritin' and 'rithmetic

School Days, school days....dear old golden rule days....

Her Snowflake
(from previous blog)

His Snowflake

Now don't get used to this....I won't be blogging everyday...or week, especially when baby comes!!! (or maybe I'll do this more often since it will only take an hour or less instead of the typical 3 hours+)

I just wanted to share about some school days: some Reading and Writing and Arithmetic, not to mention Art, music, and more!!

This is the "More!!"

We celebrated 100 days of school this week: with brownies (what else?) that said  "100", a song about 100 days and a few other 100 day things. It's actually been over 100, but we didn't count each and every day in our counting jar!! (Oops...don't tell)

Also, at Noah's school, his teacher was bragging to me about him and numbers...how in class she would say a number and then ask for a number higher or lower. She was intrigued by watching Noah's mind working and then he'd throw out some random, huge number! (Have I mentioned how much we love this teacher?? We have been blessed by her teaching Noah the same way we were last year with Hannah's teacher!!) The day before he was measuring things (yes, with a real measuring tape!!) and would make up some crazy number like 100-million-thousand-kajillion-49-8. I don't know whether he will be a math whiz and find some new, huge number or become an architect like Andy wanted to be when he was in high school. Hannah was also measuring for a little bit, but was singing while doing so!

Now I have to talk about my current little homeschooler...we have been studying "World's Famous Artists" and looking at Picasso for the past 2 weeks (about 2x/week). Today's lesson Hannah was to pick out one of his paintings and copy it, however she wanted...and I was to make sure she knew it wouldn't be exact, which was smart on the author's advice because my little perfectionist might get annoyed bothered upset that it didn't turn out right. She actually ended up picking a picture of his friend whom Picasso painted...not even what he painted! 

You can also see what letter we are learning!

Another thing we did today was creative, uh, drawing/coloring/cutting! I put some paper, crayons, scissors, and stickers in one of her workboxes without directions and this is one of the things she made:

 It's a girl who is excited about her first Christmas!! She apparently is old enough to not be a baby, but hasn't had Christmas' before...she is very happy and this is what she would look like according to Hannah:

Another day, I put in the box some things to decorate a Barbie dress, which was a Christmas gift from Papa & Kim Fleming....

I guess that's about all I have to say about my budding artist!!

Ice Skating Pictures (plus more)

A few weeks ago we took the kids ice skating.....

And Daddy had to do all the hard work! He took both kids out at the same time, which was pretty tough since they have never ice skated!!!! So they held tight to his hands...or the wall while he took one a little further.

Eventually Hannah would let go of the wall and the safety of Andy!!

It's hard to tell in this next picture, but Hannah did really well and would skate all by herself!!! She built up quite the confidence and, while Andy had Noah, she would skate a few times around the rink, sometimes going the wrong way, but she became quite good!!!

Yes, don't worry, I kept baby Frazier quite safe on the bench!

Noah on the other hand would venture off:

Bold and quite determined...

And a little fast...

And then fall!!

But he loved it!!!

They both loved it and had to realize that this wasn't something we would do every weekend!!! We can't wait until next winter to do this again...unless we find somewhere else to go...especially since I would be able to teach them a few tricks, you know, skating backwards, and, uh, well, without falling. ;-) Then they'll be wanting to teach little brother.

In other "news", I have to admit how much I love workboxes!!! I was really excited about the organizing aspect of using them, but now Hannah gets up and starts her homeschooling before I'm even awake!!! So long as I get the work into the storage cart (look at the previous blog for pictures), it starts our day right. This morning I didn't get anything ready until well after 9:30, which she asked about...otherwise when she gets up around or before 8, she'll start it on her own! And then the rest of the day goes much smoother. And I make sure to add lots of fun learning, so don't
think I'm pushing this girl to be a total nerd, or geek like her dad!!

Homeschooling Fun and Organization (and Pictures!!)

This will be a two-fold blog: (but mostly about homeschooling!!)

First are pictures for those who don't really care or have time to see how we learn, and since Noah is home for 2-3 days because of weather and holiday, you'll get to see both kids!!! Second will be for anyone interested in how we are learning and organizing since I've come across something new (to me!) called workboxes. Plus writing it down, helps me know what the heck I'm about to start!! ;-)   Oh, and since it snowed last night and we play in any amount of snow, there are some snow pictures at the end...plus (yep, there's more!) some bare belly pictures for those who have been asking!

Found a blog http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com telling about how to make snowflakes using Borax cleaner....and seeing as how Noah's home from school due to SNOW...what better time?!?! Will get pictures of the snowflake whenever they form!!!

Working up in the homeschool room: (and bragging a little) Noah knows his numbers 1-100, shapes, how to cut, some of the alphabet (it's hard to know how much because he gets silly when saying the letters), and we are working on using 3 fingers to write...and more of course!! Hannah knows 1-100+, how to count by 2's, 5's, 10's, time, money, learning sight words and how to read, she's drawing clearer (you can usually tell what she drew!), and letter sounds. She has been really good knowing the different uppercase/lowercase alphabet for a while, how to cut and her shapes and more!!

Oh, and just wanted to share that one of the main reasons (out of several) I homeschool is me being a minister to my kids. I just finished reading "10 Days of Homeschooling Enrichment" (the same website as listed above) and the mom hits home with me talking about how we only have so much time with our kids and how precious that time is...so I want to make the biggest impact on my kids...especially now when they think Andy and I are the most important, the coolest, the most fun people in the world...for now!!! ;-)

being silly

Noah doing Time

Hannah doing Temperature and Date

I printed off the alphabet and how to write each letter (the correct way!) for Hannah to see on her desk and she's using it for writing on her worksheet: 

Tangrams (shape makers)

Homeschool Board

"In a nut-shell, workboxes are an organizational system that helps develop independent work habits and a well-structured school day." It was made up by one homeschool mom who wanted to help her autistic child achieve more and found it could help kids on all levels of learning. Basically I will be laying out the whole week for Hannah using little picture cards, so we both know what's going on. Then putting the day's little cards (think stamp-size) Velcro-ed on a box with the numbers 1-10. Hannah will go to box 1 and open the box to see what is her first task. The boxes can be anything, but I'm using a plastic organizer cart just like this:

What I'm putting in each box varies each day. 

For example, she is on a five-day rotation in her curriculum where she learns about one letter each week. On day one, we introduce the letter and the animal that goes with it, like E and Elephant. So we'll look into where elephants live (geography), what types there are and more. This week we came down and got on the Wii because there is a globe and we looked up how far away Africa and Asia were from the US. And from there, I showed her more than she needed to know (like while we were near Africa, here's Jerusalem we talked about on Sunday!!). Also, she learns about the sounds of letters and putting together two and three letter words by sounding them out. There's more, but for time's sake, I'll stop there!!

Other things going into the boxes will be games, like "Letter sounds Go-Fish" and Memory: matching uppercase and lowercase alphabet letters (those are her favs!!). We have tangrams (shape games), puzzles, computer time (of course there will just be a picture!!), and coloring books. Even adding in time for a nature walk, painting and reading. I probably have about 20+ things written down that we'll rotate during the week, plus I'm always on the look out for fun learning activities.

Some of the pluses to this system:
Hannah will be able to see what's going on and how much is left and I will know how much she has done; she will be encouraged to work more independently ~ and work towards definite goals (will be very helpful when the baby is here and I have to feed/change him or whatever will come up!); I will be more accountable to keep things "fun" while learning and not just doing worksheets (she's not a big fan of plain old worksheets!!); being more consistent in our workday; my list could go on!!

Anyway, I'm really excited to be starting this system and implementing it into our days. The organizer cart is on it's way at the end of the month so I'll be taking pictures of Hannah getting into it and what we use...I know there will probably be princess stickers on some of the numbered pictures!!

I hope this wasn't too boring!!! If so...enjoy these pictures and ignore all the writing above!!! ;-)

About to throw a snowball at me!

About to throw a snow ball at Daddy!!

My little Buzz Lightyear

About 31 weeks

Don't even ask...they had to be in the pic!!

Can you see a friendly reindeer??

Well folks, that's all I have in me for now...a bunch of pictures and some writing!