Yes, I am still here! We are getting back to life as "normal," albeit a bit more full now! Owen is now seven weeks and doing great. He sleeps almost all of the time, and is quite content when he is awake. He is most awake from about 7pm - 11pm, which is nice, because it gives Brad and me some time with him on our own after the other two kids head to bed.

Riley and Quinn love to snuggle on him and hold him! It's amazing how well he has just slid into our lives - its as if he's always been here. I think we all love to sit and hold him for hours at a time...you can't spoil a baby, right?!?

We only took three weeks off of school, so we have been back at it now for awhile. We finished our study of grasslands, are currently finishing up our five-week study of the rain forest, and next we will move on to the desert! I've got to run, but I will be back soon to add some pictures to my entry.

Happy Thanksgiving!  I've had such a wonderful year and am blessed in so, so many ways. I've got *plenty* to be thankful for!

Announcing the newest member of our family...Owen Nicholas! He is doing great and we are so glad to have him finally here! And can I just say - he's absolutely adorable!! We are all in love with him!! Owen was born on Tuesday, October 3rd at 2:37pm and weighed 6 lbs., 8 oz. He was 20" long with a 13 1/2" head and chest. The labor and delivery went really well, but we are glad to be home from the hospital. Other than our first night home(!), he has been a great sleeper and eater! More pictures...

Daddy & Owen - love at first sight!

Mommy & Owen the day we left the hospital

Our new family of five!  (When Owen was just 4 hours old!)

Baby will be here any day now and we still don't have a good boy's name! Please leave a comment with your baby boy name suggestion if you can...we are taking everything into consideration!

School has been great this week - we are trying to get lots in before the baby gets here. We are finishing our 6th week of study on the African grasslands and its animals. It's been a fun study and the kids have learned a lot. Today we also got to make Bison masks, and we will be making an African diorama later this week. Riley's handwriting is improving and she is enjoying it more as well! PTL! Quinn wrote his name (legibly!) for the first time today too!  I really like our new curriculum this year; everything ties together and flows well. For example, while we are studying the grasslands, our readers, science, read-alouds, language arts, crafts, Bible, etc. all correlate. The only additional things I need to add are handwriting and math.

The kids also had their weekly co-op today and it is going so well! This week was "book club" and they studied Johnny Appleseed. They each got to make lots of apple crafts, puppets, a tree and more. It's a fun co-op and the kids really enjoy it.

I snuck in some late afternoon "me" time with a run to Auntie Anne's while I was out running errands by myself....yum!! Oh - need I mention that Auntie Anne's was nowhere near where I was running errands??  Ahhh....the simple pleasure of some time alone! I love their garlic pretzels and their yummy lemonade!

The kids started Awana tonight and seemed to like it. It is not at our church, but we do know some families in this Awana program already. Quinn is old enough to attend now and he was very excited! He seemed a bit timid at first, but was quite happy when we picked him up.   They each got their own book and will get their own vests soon, as well. Brad and I spent some time together on a quick date while we could! We had about an hour before we had to pick up the kids so we ran to the mall and went out for dessert...it was just a nice day!

Off to sleep peacefully while I can before the baby gets here!

Yes - I am still pregnant and hanging in there! My due date is still 3-4 weeks away, but I have been having a lot of contractions. I actually went into labor on Sunday night with contractions just four minutes apart, but they ended up stopping my labor with medication (a shot) for fear that this baby (like Quinn) would have to spend time in the NICU. I've seen my doctor since then, though, and he says now that when I go into labor, they won't try to stop it. I am getting so uncomfortable and am ready to meet this little one! Quinn said on Monday morning - "Mommy, you can't push the baby out today because we don't have a NAME yet!" Too cute!

School is still cruising along. Riley is doing sooo much better with her handwriting patience! She even worked ahead on Tuesday! That is a biggie for her as practicing her handwriting is like pulling teeth! She enjoys everything else, though.

And somewhere down the line, Quinn also memorized Riley's "Rhinoceros" poem that she had to learn for last week's co-op! He just blurted it out at dinner one night and as we sat there shocked, he was grinning from ear to ear - too proud of himself!

We finished decorating Quinn's room last weekend with a TON of help from mom and dad. It looks incredible! I will try to post pictures of it soon.

Off to keep cooking my baby! Baby name suggestions are still welcome - we can't agree on anything yet!

This fun site puts together a snapshot of words on your blog...too cool.

Thanks to everyone who entered a guess for when our baby will arrive! Shame on my brother who guessed I would go LATE! Ugh!!! Let's hope not! I'm feeling well and getting excited to meet this little one! We have all of our baby things ready, washed, etc. and are just waiting for him to arrive. We had to purchase several new things since we sold all of our baby things last summer (we thought we were done - ha!), and we also received several kind donations of baby clothes, etc. from friends and family. Thanks for the adorable clothes, Kristy!

School has been a lot of fun lately and the kids are loving learning about animals! They've gotten to zigzag like aardvarks, learn about tall termite towers, make paper prairies, and practice "echolocation" like bats (well, until blindfolded Quinn fell and bumped his knee!). Riley even decided that it's not fair that after the lionesses kill the food, they let the lions eat the meat first!

They start their weekly co-op tomorrow and are excited for that. Riley had to memorize a poem for the first week (ask to hear her "Rhinoceros" poem sometime!), and Quinn gets to take an item for show and tell. Here's a photo of them working with the Math-U-See blocks last week. It's a great program and Riley is really understanding her math concepts better. We watch a DVD lesson together once a week, then she practices the lesson each day for the rest of the week. At the end of the week, she has a test that covers the week's lesson that she must master before we go on. It's a very hands-on program, which is great for her. Quinn has even been practicing some math with it as well!

Our other big project as of late has been redecorating our kids' bedrooms! Trying to get finished before the little one gets here! Riley has moved into the smaller bedroom, and Quinn is moving into the larger bedroom with the new baby. Here are the before and after pictures of Riley's new room. HUGE thanks to Brad for all of his hard work and to my parents for helping paint as well!   Here's Brad stripping wallpaper before we repaint in Quinn's old room.

Yes - this is the same window - looking at the room from the same direction! We still have some decorating to do, though, now that her room is finished. And that beautiful furniture? It was once my mom's when she was a little girl, and then mine while I was growing up. How awesome that it is now passed on to the third generation!

We've wrapped up another good day and are really getting into the swing of things. It's nice that we've started school this year before all of our fall activities (dance, Awana, co-op, etc.) begin. It lets us really get into a groove before we become busy again. We're spending about a good three solid hours on school - which doesn't include breaks, lunch, etc. Quinn is good for about an hour and a half before he loses interest - which is pretty good since he's only 3!

Today we learned more about animal habitats and discussed what kinds of animals you'd find in each habitat. Riley does really well with all of her subjects, although she gets easily frustrated with handwriting.

My pregnancy is still cruising right along - less than seven weeks left - woo-hoo!! We started a little game online where you can predict our baby's stats - we'd love to have you join in! Click here to play! Simply put this name in the top left search box: Our3rdBabe. Thanks for playing!

Today was our first day of this school year! And I'm feeling much better, thankfully! Unfortunately, I think Quinn is catching my cold now.

We had a fun day and managed to get a lot of work done. Riley was proud of herself and even thanked God at her dinner prayer for a "fun day of school" and prayed for a good week of school this week. We started with Animals and Their Worlds - here is a photo of some of the books we are using this year.

We studied animals with exoskeletons today. In addition to that for science, we also fit in handwriting (Riley is getting much better at this(!) and Quinn practiced a few letters), math, Bible, art, language arts and reading. I did some reading to the kids for their read-alouds, and Riley did some independent reading to Quinn and me as well. The only thing I'm hoping will improve is that we will do more hands-on projects. It looks like we will hit more as time goes on. We spent about 2 1/2 hours on school today, and celebrated our first day of school with a trip to TCBY after school!

Brad came home from work for just a bit this morning when we started school. He brought an apple for the teacher.  Sweet guy. And spent some time talking to the kids about school before heading back to work.

Here are some more pictures from our first day - enjoy!

Still feeling under the weather - thanks to those who emailed me or posted a comment hoping for me to feel better! Found a medication I can take while pregnant, so I'm hoping that will kick in today.

Church was excellent today - we missed the past two weeks because we were traveling both days. Brad and I both love our pastor - he is very genuine and truly a teaching pastor. Today's lesson was on how we react/respond when God answers our prayers/dreams with a "no." Want to listen to the message online? (I love today's technology!) Click here if so. That will take you to our church's site where you can download the message. It starts with a member's testimony and then moves to Pastor Dave's message.

As we start school tomorrow, I'm reminded of some of the books/items we've used the past two years. Some were great, some weren't so great. Thought I would pass on excellent book suggestion because it worked so well for us. The book is called "Teach your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons." I used it for our 2004-2005 school year with Riley and she was reading quite well by about lesson 40 or so. We completed up to about lesson 65 or so, and then stopped because she was doing so well on her own. I know some people don't care for it b/c the pages are black and white, with very little pictures - but it is an excellent teaching book. She enjoyed it and is now reading very well.

We used Sing, Spell, Read and Write last year to practice lots of sounds/blends/etc, and we are using Winter Promise Language Arts (Explode the Code) this year as we move into phonics rules, more handwriting, etc. Clicking on the book below will take you to Amazon, but you can often find this book at your local library (we checked it out continuously for about nine weeks before I bought a used copy!) or used book stores.

Have a great end to your weekend!