The Sweetness of Sisters

LB is spoiled rotten by his sisters.  For example:

That is Pilly's lollipop.  She didn't have to give him any bites at all, but she chose to, and once you start, it is hard to stop.  That boy ate over half of her lollipop and followed her around the house squawking at her.  She never got impatient with him but just kept sharing. 

Everyone keeps telling me it will end, but it hasn't stopped yet!  I'm thankful for the sweetness of my children:)

I can't believe it is only Wednesday.  This seems like a really long week for some reason.  It hasn't been bad, just long.

We cleaned for my mom today, and the girls got to play outside a little.  Pnut wasn't feeling very well and complained all day that her belly hurt.  Hopefully she wakes up feeling better tomorrow because I don't know what to do.  Eating doesn't seem to have an affect, and it doesn't seem that it is related to the bathroom in any way.  I squeezed her belly and released it to check for appendicitis, and she said that didn't change the feeling at all.  I don't know, it is so hard to know what to do!

LB discovered ketchup and BBQ sauce tonight, which he loves!  He repeatedly dipped a french fry and sucked it off.  Disgusting but hilarious!

It is almost 9::00 and I haven't even gotten anything done at home today and I'm ready for bed!  Oh brother...

Big Stuff

See my dish-washing partner from last night:

He thinks he is big stuff.  Tonight he walked down the stairs holding his daddy's hand.  Yesterday he was gnawing on raw carrots.  Doesn't he still need his food pureed?  Who gave him permission to grow up?

Now when I turn the camera on, he wrinkles his nose and squints his eyes...just like Pilly squeezing one eye closed when I turn it on.  These turkeys!

I don't think the girls understand death and related things very well.  We took a walk yesterday and there was some ivy on a tree.  I told them not to touch it just in case (I actually think it was plastic).  Pnut said, "Yeah, it will make you die."  So I reassured them that it would not kill them!  Then Joel let LB have some ice cream at supper.  We are mostly trying to keep him off of pasteurized milk.  Pnut got very worried because she thought he was going to die from eating the ice cream.  Sometimes, it is hard to explain things to children!

Things are Coming Along...

We didn't get to have our yard sale on Saturday as it rained.  So now there are boxes of things sitting around our house driving me crazy.  Our friends are willing to let us keep our stuff in the garage until this Saturday, Joel just has to get it there.

We started long vowels today, which went well!  Pnut really is enjoying reading and wants to do it before math; she used to like math more.  We also are on our last chapter in Basil of Baker Street and will probably start Peter Pan next.  Read good, unabridged books to their kids!  Their minds can handle it:)

LB is starting to say some more words, although I think we are the only ones who can understand him.  He said tractor and diaper today.  His little voice is so cute.  He liked supper tonight (skirt steak and potato pancakes).  It is amazing how much nicer meals are when he actually likes them!  Babies can be such tyrants!

We had our annual members' meeting at church last night, and it was so nice.  It is a celebration of the past year, and it always makes me so thankful that we belong to the church that we do, for the Godly leadership who lead by the Word, and for the people who attend there. 

Apparently, the temperature is going back down this week.  We took a walk but didn't go to the playground.  I thought things would probably be wet still, and it was very windy.  The girls enjoyed walking around and looking for pink trees and blooming flowers.  I am growing in my knowledge of flowers a little as we take these walks since the girls want to know the names of everything! 

Brrr, I have resisted turning the heat back up, but that does make for a cold evening!  I think I am going to go find my slippers now!

Face Tattoo

The other day Pnut told me she wanted her heart tattoo on her face, and I told her face tattoos weren't a good idea.  Then I came home to this after the library:

Apparently, the girls warned Daddy several times that Mommy said face tattoos were bad, but he did it anyway. 

I took another picture of it this afternoon as well as Pnut in her cute new hat, a very dirty boy, and Pilly on her bike.  She has a new hat too, but she managed to get it all wet.

Tonight's funny thing:  The girls were in the bathtub, and LB was playing with Joel on the bed.  I was watching them play and LB got down and went into the bathroom.  Within seconds, "Mom, he fell in the bathtub!"  And there he was with all his clothes on sitting quite happily in the tub.  Now I'll have to watch him because he thinks it is funny!

Our Day

We gave Joel's Grandmother her birthday present today in taking her to Sight and Sound to see Jonah.  It was a really neat show, and we all enjoyed it a lot.  The day went so fast, although I think that days off during the week do go faster than the weekends.  We managed to get two days of school done this morning, but I'm not sure if we will do any tomorrow morning or just try to rest.  With co-op in the afternoon, the girls aren't going to get a nap again, and they don't do well when they miss nap two days in a row.  I'm just going to play it by ear.

Things are piling up for the yard sale!  I know it will be good once it is all out, but ooh, I do hate the mess that it is right now!  Joel is collecting boxes of things and putting them in the computer room, and my instructions are to keep LB out of them.  Very easy.  The best way to do that would probably be to just not be here at all!  At least he naps a lot!

I think I am going to sell the rest of my stamping stuff.  I only have a few sets left, and I really like the ones I kept, but I never, literally never, use them.  We should be able to get a fair amount for those.  We are also selling our patio set and a neat settee.  We are trying to get rid of all the stuff off of our back porch so it will be easier to paint.  We are undecided about whether to fix our grill or just get a new one.  That will really be up to Joel as he would have to do the fixing.

Isn't this boring?  How do you read so much of this blog?  Sometimes I want to make this more about important stuff, challenging stuff, but it just has never been that so I don't make the change. 

Yard Sale Time!

I am in full clean-out mode!  We are having a yard sale Saturday, and I do love to get rid of stuff.  It is almost a hobby of mine so the opportunity to get rid of so much stuff really makes me happy!  Of course, we will still have more than enough stuff in our house, but it is nice to get rid of anything that I can!  I still have to work on the kids room and the basement playroom.  I went through movies today and now need to go through games.  It is hard to remember that eventually we may way to play some of these things with LB so I can't just get rid of things willy-nilly. 

We are supposed to pick up our first raw milk tomorrow, and I'm really excited about that.  LB hasn't had milk for 2 weeks, and I would like to get him back on it.  He doesn't seem to love the almond milk.  He will drink it if it is the only thing in his cup all day, but he doesn't seem to love it.  I tried ti this morning, it is almond with coconut milk, and I didn't care for it at all.  I don't like the taste of coconut water either, and the coconut came through really strong!  I told the guy I only needed two gallons of milk, but I kind of want another one so that I can make yogurt.  LB's diet has really been lacking since he has been taken off the pasteurized junk! I am very interested to try the milk as the cows are grass fed not grain fed, which is supposed to change the taste.  Hopefully the girls don't rebel!  Joel isn't even willing to try it.  I'm trying to figure out how to sneak it to him because I think he would really like it!  He loves whole milk, and this should be even better because it still has the cream!  Husbands can be so stubborn sometimes!

I've been making Ezekiel bread for our sandwiches, and I have to make a loaf every other day.  I am purposely not buying bread at the grocery store so that I don't have a choice.  It does make our days interesting sometimes, and I need to make sure I plan well.  Monday I had to do it first thing when I got up at 6 as we were going to the nursing home.  I prepared 11 bags of dry ingredients so that they are ready to just throw in the mixer when it is time.  Of course, I forgot to buy yeast.  I have some, it just doesn't seem to be very effective.  Oh well, it still tastes good.

Well, I am going to go get rid of some more stuff!

My Favorite Show and Tell

Pnut had her awards ceremony for basketball tonight.  Thankfully it was at a church about 5 minutes from our house.  LB, Pilly, and I stayed for part of it but then had to come home as LB was falling apart in the lobby.  So Joel and Pnut walked home when it was over, which thrilled Pnut to no end!  They brought in a Harlem Globetrotter to give his testimony, which was pretty neat. 

We also had co-op today, and I offered the kids a chance to do show-and-tell if they wanted.  About half of them did, and it was very entertaining.  My favorite was a little boy Liam who forgot his show-and-tell in the car so he stood up and showed us his "action figure."  He had his hand clenched like he was holding on to a toy, and he told us all about this imaginary action figure.  Preschoolers crack me up!

We have a fun weekend ahead!  We are rollerskating tomorrow afternoon, which will be welcome as it is supposed to rain and we won't get our outside time.  Saturday will hopefully be dedicated to getting ready for a yard sale, and then Sunday after church in the afternoon we are getting together with some friends for a picnic.  Hopefully the weather is as beautiful as it was all week!  Hope your weekend is looking just as enticing!

Sneak

Another gorgeous day today!  We went to the playground today, of course, and also rode bikes outside for a long time.  I think we are all just so relieved to be outside after being indoors for so long that we can spend hours outside. 

When Joel got home, he brought a box of Lego robot things.  Someone was very excited about them!

He was really funny.  He let them girls take a few out and then sneakily slid the box across the floor to the outside of the room so that he could play with the rest by himself. 

Such a squirt! 

Tomorrow is our second to last day of co-op and an award ceremony for Pnut for basketball.  Sounds like a busy day!

Happy Birthday Mom!

Today is my mom's birthday, and we spent the day at her house.  I clean for her every other week so that is one reason we went over, but it worked out that we could do it on her birthday too!  The girls made her cards, and LB terrorized her house.  He knocked the phone off the hook several times, got the toilet brush, and was just a busy boy!  It was a beautiful day, and we had a lot of fun!

I think LB must be getting another tooth.  He barely ate anything today, but he chewed on his fingers a lot and went to bed at 6:00.  He has already gotten two of his molars so is probably getting another one.  Yay.

So I have some laundry that now must be folded (hopefully in front of the Dick Van Dyke Show) and some hot tea to drink for my sore throat.  Hopefully I will have some pictures tomorrow!

I went to my curriculum meeting Saturday night, and I am really excited about what I think we are going to start doing.  It is a big commitment, but I think anything is going to seem that way starting 1st grade as we are only doing math and reading right now! 

Pnut had her last basketball game on Saturday, and she made a basket!  Everyone was so excited, it was really cute!  I am thankful that she got to play and also thankful that it is over.  I do not deal well with parents who are competitive over kindergarten basketball. Of course, I did forget to take the camera, but at least I remembered the one game! 

Joel fixed the bigger bike we have today and Pnut and Pilly are now both riding regular bikes, and they are having a ball.  Up until now, Pilly has been riding a 12 inch bike with pedals on the front tire, which worked well, her legs are just getting a little long.  Yesterday we took a walk and the girls rode their bikes.  I had the backpack on, but LB walked most of 6 blocks.  He was having a ball and did not want to get in.  He kept trying to climb up on the porches we passed.  When he was tired, he was beat.  He had no desire to walk anymore and cried when I tried to put him down so into the backpack he went!  Joel wants to try to teach Pnut to ride without her training wheels...we'll see!  She is very afraid of falling.  Pilly may master that skill first!

Well, I have some more reading about this curriculum to do! 

Lovely Sunny Day!

It was another lovely day today, and the girls again spent over 4 hours outside.  Tonight, however, it totally caught up with them.  The girls went to bed a little after 6:30 since they haven't had a nap in two days.  Pnut was a mess!  I'm not sure how people with kindergarteners in full day school handle it!  Aren't the kids exhausted every day?  Needless to say, we will be having nap tomorrow, and even when the weather is nice, we will still do it every other day!  I let the girls eat their lunch outside today:

They only made it halfway through as it was so windy that all their food was getting dirt blown in it!  LB just ate inside, which he probably preferred anyways:)

Once he went to bed, we took the bikes into the alley:

It is nice as there isn't too much traffic, and since it is the middle of the day, there aren't other kids out there. 

You can't really see it, but I made Pnut's skirt last night.  I need to fix the waistband once it goes through the wash.  I didn't put elastic in as it is a knit material and I hoped it would just be tight enough, but I think to prevent any mishaps I'll put some in!

Pilly brought the car out after a while and was being especially funny in it.  They are all just a trip:) 

Spring Day in March

We had such a lovely day today!  The weather was absolutely wonderful, and we spent an hour at the playground this afternoon.  Then when we got home, the girls rode bikes in the alley for half an hour and then played outside all afternoon.  In total, I think they were outside about 4 hours.  And they went to bed and didn't make a peep!  (Especially since they missed nap!)  I got some fun pictures!!

LB played outside for about 45 minutes after he got.  He loves to be out there and gets really mad if he knows the girls are out without him. 

He was crying when they first put him in the wagon, and I asked them if he liked that.  They said yeah!  Ha!  After Pnut started pushing it around he started to like it, but he was not thrilled at first!

Apple Raisin Bread

So very good!

1 apple, shredded and squeezed dry-ish
1 c (or up to 1 3/4 c) raisins
1 1/4 c flour
3/4 c sugar
1 t baking powder
1 t salt
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t cinnamon
1/2 t nutmeg
2 eggs
1/2 c cooled melted butter
1/2 c plain yogurt or sour cream
1 t vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 and butter or spray bread pan.  Combine all dry ingredients and raisins.  In separate bowl, whisk eggs, butter, sour cream, and vanilla.  Whisk in apple.  Combine with dry ingredients until just wet.  Put in pan and bake for 55 minutes or until knife comes out clean.

I really enjoyed this bread, especially with the cinnamon and nutmeg in it, but I couldn't taste the apple really.  It was still very delicious.

I realized why I have no pictures....Joel is taking the camera to work every day to take pictures of things for his etsy shop.  Hopefully one of these days he will let it here!

An Inside Day

Today was a pajama day for the kids.  For some reason, it was really cold outside.  Goodness, isn't winter over yet?  I wanted LB to be warm enough so I was putting pajamas on him, and the girls wanted to wear them too.  Since we weren't going outside into the frigid air, that was okay!  We finished school quickly today, and they played a lot, especially with the princess tent.  I think they enjoyed the day quite a bit.  LB loved having the tent up and was giggling about it.  He also giggled, danced, and clapped his hands when he turned a bag of pretzels upside down on the kitchen floor.  Then he made a mad dash to eat them before I swept them up.  That boy just won't stay out of the cabinet! 

I made some apple raisin bread today, and I'll have to post the recipe for that because it is good!  I am trying to come up with some different things for breakfast.  I don't really like cereal very much so I'm trying to make some things that are more appealing.  We enjoyed the bread tonight, and I'm sure we will tomorrow morning as well! 

Joel took the camera to work today so I'll try to take some pictures tomorrow to spruce things up around here!  Now I have to go fold two loads of laundry!

I got sick yesterday...sort of.  Joel had this yucky stomach bug that lasted for about a week and the girls kind of had it too, but not quite as bad.  I felt really awful yesterday and laid on the couch most of the day, but nothing ever happened.  I'm thankful to not actually be sick, but it wasn't a fun day!

We had co-op today, and we only have two more weeks of it.  We are off next week and then on the following two.  With today, I officially used all of my ideas for the class and now have to come up with two more.  I'd also like to start coming up with some things for next semester so that I am not scrambling for activities then!  I think I will try to find two more animal activities as we have done animals all semester. 

I'm starting to do some really thinking and planning for next year with school.  I think it is going to be fun to add some more things in, and I am also planning to change up how we school, not taking all summer off so we don't forget everything we have worked so hard on!  I have some ideas for introducing Spanish as well without actually buying a Rosetta Stone curriculum yet!  I think as we get closer to the end of the school year I'll write a post about all my plans!  I have a curriculum meeting with some friends from the co-op in a couple of weeks, which I am excited about too.  I don't know if I ever mentioned it, but I actually entered college to be a teacher, but I realized quickly (read...the first day) that I didn't want to do that.  I don't enjoy other peoples' children that much.  But I do enjoy my own and enjoy teaching them.  So curriculum and school things really get me excited!  A little weird, but hey, you don't have to read this!

I read a really good response to how it is that home-schoolers can think they are giving their children a better education than sending them to public school and I thought I would share it here.  I thought this man explained it very well!

A friend of mine asked me to give him answers to a public school administrator who claims that homeschool parents can't possibly teach as well as teachers with multiple specialized degrees. In the case example he posed, the issue was a chemistry teacher vs. a homeschooling parent. I thought that some of you might like to see my answer. I don't think anyone (at least not Brian Ray or me) would claim that an average homeschooling parent can teach chemistry better than a person with two chemistry degrees. If a person with two chemistry degrees would teach a student one on one--there would be no comparison. But that is not what happens. The public school teacher is teaching 1 on 30. We are teaching 1 on 1. That is the comparison. And the comparisons from standardized testing are not in course-specific comparisons like chemistry. We need to remember that in K-12 education there are really three goals: 1. Master the tools of language 2. Master the tools of mathematics and 3. Get a good broad exposure to other key topics--history, science, foreign language, etc, etc. No student is going to become a specialist in any of the these subjects in K-12. English and mathematics are the two languages of learning. Math and science fields use the language of math. All other fields use the language of words. Students must have mastery in these two languages if they are going to succeed at the college level. The success of homeschooling comes from the mastery of the two languages. It is a demonstrated fact that homeschoolers do better in these core competencies than institutional schools. It is not because we are smarter or better looking than public school teachers. This is true because one-on-one instruction works better than one-on-thirty instruction. When it comes time to teach mastery of a specialized topic--that is where a specialized instructor cannot be beaten. But, homeschoolers even have somewhat of an advantage here. Because homeschool students have mastered the tools of learning to a greater degree, their ability to learn the specialized subject benefits from this advantage. This hypothetical example makes the point--I am just making up all of these numbers but I believe they reflect the truth. If a public school chemistry teacher puts out 100 units of chemistry per hour to students only capable of absorbing 40 units of chemistry per hour, but because there are 30 students there is a distraction which results in a slower rate of absorbtion, the average chemistry knowledge acquired might be 30 units of chemistry per hour. The homeschool parent trying to teach chemistry is only capable of producing 65 units of chemsitry knowledge per hour. But because of mastery of the tools of learning, their child is actually capable of absorbing even more than this--perhaps 80 units per hour. Since it is one-on-one instruction there are no distraction factors and so the average student in homeschooling acquires 65 units per hour. So the net amount learned in homeschooling is greater than in public schooling, not because our teachers are better, but because we have students with better tools of learning and we have fewer distractions. This is why homeschool kids do so well in college and why PHC is so successful. At PHC have specialists who are teaching specialized knowledge. Our students have mastered the tools of learning and they suffer from fewer distractions. And they do very, very well. Homeschooling works.

To wrap that up succinctly, the biggest benefit to homeschooling is that it is one-on-one.  No matter how good the teachers in school are, they just have too many kids to deal with!  

If you have made it this far, I am amazed!  I hope you have a lovely weekend!