Our Busy Little World

Jul. 25, 2008 - Contest Winner and Random little pictures

Well, courtesy of an online "number randomizer" (who knew such things existed?!), we have a winner of the Young Living Essential Oils contest. Drumroll, please . . . . . . . Keri - you have some goodies coming your way! I'll send you a message now, but feel free to email me your address if you'd like. I truly wish I could send a prize to all of you who entered, but feel free to email if you'd like any more information about any of these products. My email address for this is honeybeegarden (at) msn (dot) com. And, lastly, here are some pictures just for fun:
My little five year old bookworm. Here she's reading Wulf The Saxon - I promise I didn't pose this, just thought she looked so cute and cozy!
Miss Alyssa is officially able to stand up!!
And she's just about big enough to wear my favorite baby Classic Pooh overalls!!!
The lighting on this picture turned out pretty funny, but it was such a good Juliette picture!
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Jul. 23, 2008 - Belle's Hair

Isabelle loves to have me do pretty things with her hair! I was gone the other morning, and daddy is admittedly not the expert in doing little girls' hair. Yet Isabelle decided she wanted a Gibson tuck, so she looked it up in the hairstyle book. After gaining daddy's help for a high ponytail (step one of the Gibson Tuck), she set up her own little hair station, read the instructions in the Klutz Hair book, and managed to create her own lovely style!

 PS: Don't forget to enter the contest to win some lovely bath and household goodies from Young Living Oils!

 
 
 
 
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Jul. 18, 2008 - Contest Time

Posted in Family News

I'm in the mood to host a fun contest, and tell you about my new venture, so I thought I'd share some products with you that I have come to love! A few months ago, some friends of ours' introduced us to Young Living Essential Oils. I have to admit, we weren't too sure what to think about them at first, having never used essential oils before, but in a moment I shall tell you why we've come to love them so much!

 

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So, here's the contest: The winner will receive a goody-bag of Young Living products - such as a bottle of one of our favorite oils, as well as some fun personal care products like lovely smelling shampoos, baby diaper ointment, toothpaste, mouthwash, foaming hand cleaner, hand sanitizer, home cleaning solution, and more! Just leave me a comment if you'd like to be entered, and I will randomly choose a winner in one week.

If you aren't the winner, you can still enjoy some Young Living products by visiting my new little website, Honeybee Garden  - the link is on the button to the right. I am SO thankful for these oils (read on to see why) that I decided to help make them available to others! I hope they are a blessing to your family as they have been to ours. While we love using the personal care products when we’re able to, we feel the best treasures from Young Living are their pure therapeutic grade essential oils. We have been amazed to see the results of using some of these oils – particularly by using a diffuser. Our favorite example is that of RC and Raven oils. Our daughter has struggled for years with a whooping-type cough nearly every time she gets sick. It keeps her and us up all night, and makes it very difficult for her to breathe when she has it. We’ve tried just about every over-the-counter or doctor-given medicine we could, when our friends loaned us a diffuser with some RC and Raven oil. Though we were a bit skeptical at first, we were very pleasantly surprised! Literally ten minutes after we started diffusing the oil, her cough stopped – it didn’t just get better, it stopped completely! She has yet to struggle with it again when she’s been sick (we keep that diffuser on!), for which we are so very thankful! We have some other favorite oils which we’d love to share with you, but this is what got us hooked! We wanted to let our friends know about Young Living Essential Oils, and invite you to peruse our website or get in touch with us if you have any questions or you’d like to try out some of the lovely oils!

Again, all you have to do is leave a comment if you'd like to be entered to win some Young Living Essential Oils goodies!

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Jul. 11, 2008 - Some July Pictures

I think I've given up trying to post all of my pictures from June. I suppose I'll sneak them in here and there . . . . But here are a few from July:
Four little bathin' beauties!
Naomi Bear
Who's that handsome fella with all those little girls?
The big girls showing how we "tweaked" their church dresses to give them longer life. And silly me, I didn't extend the picture far enough down to see! Well, if you look in the previous picture, you can see a calico pink band of fabric at the bottom of Naomi's dress, and in this picture you can see the matching band across the empire waist. I'd gotten the idea from a dress I saw in the store, and my wonderful mother-and-sister-in-law helped me pull it off while they were here! Many thanks - we LOVE these dresses and are so happy to enjoy them a bit longer!
That's all for today - I'm off to get some breakfast before I wake the girlies!
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Jul. 9, 2008 - Quotes Of The Day

From Isabelle, who was simultaneously eating Winnie The Pooh animal crackers and practicing memory verses:

"Once upon a time, in the land of Uz, there lived a man named Tigger."

From Hannah, who was attempting to dress herself in a unicorn costume which is far too small for her. It should be noted this was frantically shrieked at the top of her lungs, in between cries of fright, and of course in utter panic:

"AAAAAhhhhhh, mommy, mommy!!! I couldn't find you, mommy, I didn't know where you were (I was in the next room) - I was afraid because this unicorn is so tight on my neck that it will cut off my head and I will die!"

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Jul. 3, 2008 - Summer Of The Horses

Posted in Family News

This has been quite the horsey summer for us! Thanks to a generous riding instructor, some wonderful friends who own and breed lovely Arabians, and visiting family who had never ridden but wanted to try, we've been able to spend quite a bit of time on the back of a horse. Given the fact that I've always been a lover of horses, this is quite a nice thing indeed! Here are some pictures of our past month on horseback (they're a bit smaller than they used to be - still getting used to picasa).  Give us a few weeks and we may have a little horsey surprise to share! Oh, and I have to say my favorite pictures are at the bottom for a very special reason . . . you'll just have to scroll down to see why!

I got to ride with Hannah for this one- probably one of my favorite hours spent with that girl! We got to snuggle, ride a horse, and have uninterrupted conversation together (a rare thing indeed!)

Matt's mom, sister and nephew getting ready for some good trail riding! 

Don't know why, but I just like this picture of our little trail group

I had to get a good shot "for the record" of my sweet mother-in-law riding!

Horses, donkeys, any hoofed animal who will lend Isabelle his back makes her happy! Here's her cousin Teddy leading her around on Jezebel the donkey (perhaps aptly named, Jezebel did bite Miss Isabelle by accident whilst receiving a treat - no worries, though, you should have seen how thrilled Isabelle was with all the sympathy!)

I am riding Safar, the fabulous (no exaggeration!) Arabian Stallion owned by our good friends.

More on Safar

 

And Miss Hannah enjoying a ride on Safar - did I say Stallion? Well, yes, but you'd never know it when the little ones are on him - he's so very sweet!

A favorite horse trip this summer: we took a rode trip to watch Miss Bryony in her first show with this stallion - they were lovely and won 2nd place! And the road trip was wonderful as well - nice long, beautiful drive with a good friend- I came home that day refreshed and ready for the next day's work!

Miss Isabelle enjoying Safar after the horse show

Matt joined in the fun, too. This picture reminds me of a line from one of our favorite stories: "She looked up at St. George, sitting there on his horse, straight and tall and beautiful. 'Oh, Sir Knight!' she cried . . . ."

 

And here's everyone else getting in a little ride on Safar - no one could resist! For the record, my mother in law rode TWO horses the week she was here!

 

Teddy riding Safar, with Nancy kindly leading.

Teri, Matt's sister enjoying a ride.

A breathtaking view of the area!

And now for my favorite pictures: The first is a "Before" shot from a few months ago. Remember how terrified Naomi is of animals?

 

Well, she is still cautious, but one day up at the ranch she decided to find out what she was missing. Completely of her own volition she came up and asked if she could ride the donkey. So I took her, thinking she'd want right off, but no - just look at that smile! We were all SO very proud of her!

Then a bit later in the day, she surprised us again by asking if she could ride the horse. I put her up thinking she'd want right down, but she amazed me again - look, another smile! We're so proud of you, Naomi! 

What a big girl!

 

PS. if you didn't get a chance to read it, take a peek at the post below - my girls sure make me laugh! The post was a bit lost in bloggyland for some reason for a short time!

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Jun. 28, 2008 - Giggles

I know it seems forever (again) since I've written anything here! We're sort of having a 'vacation' in our own home. We've had just over two wonderful weeks of different family visiting, and spent such sweet times together! In the process we've discovered many great things to do in our own hometown - we've been enjoying horseback riding, swimming, a kids' horse museum, shooting, cooking and eating, playing tennis, and all manner of other fun things! I have so many photos to post, but I have to warn you all I might eventually look at switching over to google blogger or something else, as apparently shutterfly is not wanting me to post my pictures on the blog. We'll see - as I get it figured out, there will be plenty of pictures - I'm only a few hundred behind now! But today I had to try and preserve some funny memories by posting a couple more stories from my little ones. I'm sure they won't do justice to the actual funniness involved, but it's worth a try! (as always, I type the words as best I remember them!)

Hannah was wearing a *new* dress which a friend passed onto us. It is the sort that buttons up and has many pockets - front and back pockets like jeans, as well as two pockets on the bodice. My girls tend to enjoy pockets, so as I was telling Hannah how pretty she looked, I asked her if she had seen all of her pockets. She eagerly let me show her each one, and had to put her little hands in them as we found them. A pocket here for your right hand, one here for your left. Then a pocket in the back for this hand, and one for that hand. As we finished the lower pockets she put her hand into one of the bodice pockets, and a look of wonder crossed her face. Pulling her hand out with a giddy smile, as if she'd found some secret treasure, she excitedly showed me a dried, orange noodle and said, "look mommy, there's a macaroni in my pocket!" "Oh," I said, "we'd better throw that away, since it's old and hard and yucky." At that, she looked at me with the deer-in-the-headlights look, and sheepishly said, "Oh, heh, heh, I already ate it."

The other night we had let all of the older girls skip their nap to go swimming and play tennis (or whatever variation of tennis my three little ones managed to create!) with mommy and Grandma Karen. In the evening they were pretty exhausted, so they all went to bed when baby Alyssa did, leaving Miss Juliette to stay up late with us. After a good forty minutes, we put her to bed also - all of her big sisters were completely out! Sometimes little "Jooey" can be a stinker in bed, so we weren't overly surprised when we heard her little talkings and whisperings. I went in and told her to lay quietly and go to sleep.  A bit later I heard Hannah mumbling something in a stressed voice, and crying, apparently in her sleep. I opened the door to investigate, and saw little miss Juli turn and run at full speed from Hannah's bed back to her own. I went in to, ahem, rebuke her, for not being in her bed when I noticed a tiny object in her hand which explained the whole scenario. She had managed to find a bobby-pin in or around her bed. I suppose in her little mental gymnastics she remembered that Hannah had been wearing "Victorian twists" in her hair that day, secured by bobby pins. Apparently she felt the need to replace Hannah's bobby pin while she was peacefully sleeping, so she toddled over and began her work on Hannah's hair. I must have walked in just in time to save Hannah from being mercilessly stabbed by a two year old with a bobby pin! And of course, with the combination of Juli's little body flying across the room to her own bed, and figuring all of this out, I was trying so hard not to laugh that I'm pretty sure I didn't discipline her very effectively. After telling her in no uncertain terms to stay in bed and go to sleep, she indignantly grabbed her blanket, grabbed her horsey, and grabbed her book, all the while pinning me with a rather perturbed look which I'm pretty sure meant: "how dare you interrupt me from styling Hannah's hair?!"

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Jun. 27, 2008 - Fun With Mom And Photo Test

Posted in Family News

My mom (the girls' Grandma Karen) was here for the past week and we had such a great time! We played tennis (I'm horrible, but it was good fun!), swam with all the little ones (they all officially love water now!), and in general laughed and enjoyed ourselves all week. In fact, we were so busy enjoying ourselves that these two pictures are the only ones I took! Here's the test part: I'm trying out a new way of posting them - can you all see the pictures?
 
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Jun. 6, 2008 - More Funnies And Pictures

Isabelle was having a conversation with her grandma about a movie. I had rented one while Matt was out of town, and it was definitely more of a girl movie (hence why I rented it while he was away - didn't want to subject him to it!)  Anyway, Grandma Karen was trying to tell Isabelle the slang for a girly movie, and I thought it was pretty funny how it translated to my Belle. She came up to me giggling and asked if I had enjoyed my Chicken Flick!

And in other silly stories:

I was enjoying watching the girls play some prince/princess thing yesterday. Apparently Hannah (who was styling herself as Prince Stephan, since we have no boys to fill the role) had been facing some grave dangers which, sadly, overcame her (rather, Prince Stephan). She dramatically flopped to the floor and announced that she was dead. Isabelle, also quite dramatically, attempted to come to the rescue of her "Prince". After trying various and sundry remedies - such as lifting Hannah's arms and wailing a lot, the "dead prince" moaned, and then muttered: "Ugh, stop it, you're making me more dead!"

And here are a few more pictures of such fabulous things as Matt's birthday and the one summerish day we've had (seriously, today it was about 42F degrees when we went out to play!)

We borrowed a dog for a day, and the older girls had a blas dressing her up as the Queen of the couch.

Daddy had a birthday and the girls each got him a gift. Since I tend to spend more than I should on his birthday, and the girls are so little, we've made it a tradition to let them shop for him at the dollar tree with their piggy bank money. They did great this year - Isabelle found him a celtic cross box to keep his guitar pics in, Naomi and Juliette got him a nice candle and wrought iron-looking candle holder, and Hannah proudly found him an etched wine goblet (made by Libby glassware, no less). Fun, fun!

Having a little hill in the backyard is so handy for toddlers who like to sled in the winter and slip n slide in the summer.

Julie "training" a little dog from our dog class.

Matthew with his traditional birthday crepes.

My little Lucy-Goose

Isabelle's freshly cut bangs.

As our "prize" to her for finishing the Veritas Press Reading Contest, we presented her with a porcelain doll which I found in an antique store. She has named her Susan.

This lady was so sweet with Naomi, and really helped her face her doggy fears far more than I thought was possible!

One more slip n slide shot -I couldn't resist the facial expression!

 

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Jun. 1, 2008 - More Spring Pictures

Here are some of our recent pictures - like I said, I still have tons more I haven't posted! Most of these are pictures I took at our house during a going away party for some dear friends of ours. It was rousing good time of feasting, psalm singing, and millions of children all over the place! At one point we let fifteen or twenty of the little ones hang out on the floor of the tea room and watch old Pink Panther cartoons!

Juliette and Naomi can have their bickerings, but they're awfully cute when they play together!

Farewell, dear friends, we will miss you!

Good times singing . ..

Still singing . . .

and yet more singing . ..

the afore-mentioned Pink Panther room

Little Mona sharing mommy's food

Isn't she such a cutie?

Hannah is becoming quite the four year old tree climber:

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May. 27, 2008 - So long . . . .

Posted in Family News

It's been ages since I last posted, and I do apologize! Funny how life creeps up on me, and suddenly everything is so very busy. I think the next few posts will be largely pictorial, since I'm about one hundred pictures behind. Incidentally, does anybody have an idea as to why all my pictures mysteriously turned into thumbnails, instead of their normal size???? I'm rather perturbed by it all. 

Oh well, as I mentioned we really have been very busy lately, but with good things. We had a lovely going away party for some dear friends, a little mom's and kids' road trip to an Arabian horse show, and we finally were able to take the kids and visit with some elderly gentlemen and ladies at a nursing home here in town. I wish I had some more time to post right now, but at some point I'll try to get more pictures and stories up. I will be in and out, I think, as this seems to shaping up to be our busiest summer yet. Family visiting, our first real vacation, swimming, baby showers and all sorts of other things shall keep us enjoying the season. But for now, spring is finally here, and we are loving it! It's such a delight to one's soul to be able to lay in the grass listening to munchkins playing around you.  Here are some of our spring flowers and our little flower girls to go with them:

 

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May. 11, 2008 - Flowers For Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all of you wonderful mothers and grandmas! We hope you all enjoy a lovely day of rest with those you love. And a very special "Happy!" to our own beloved moms and grandmas: Grandma Karen, Grandma Anna, Grandma Pat and Grandma Berneta! We love you so much, and are so thankful to God for you all!

Now for some Mother's Day 'flowers' from the girls:

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May. 7, 2008 - Odds N Ends

You know you've been reading old books when your five year old comes up to you and says "Mother, may I have my water, for I do thirst?"

Hannah continues her habit of making us smile with her choice of words.  She loves coloring pages, and upon inspecting one particularly lovely one, she announced that it was "enormous pretty!"

Hannah also seems to be having a hard time figuring out the word chiropractor. I had an appointment one day, and each time she mentioned it, the word came out differently. Our two favorites were "are you going to the firecracker?" And "what doctor is it? The piletractor?"

Tonight, I wasn't feeling very well. I started to get a little woozy at the table (think I'm fighting a bug), and I turned toward Matt and said something to the effect that my head felt heavy, I thought I was getting a fever, and I felt like I was just going to flop over. Isabelle, who was sitting next to me, stared at me intensly.  I asked if she thought I was getting sick. She stared yet more deeply into my eyes for a moment, then a big grin spread across her face as she announced, in all confidence, "Allergies!"

When I'm feeling better I've got to post about our new school books for Autumn. I'm so excited about school this year! Instead of a package I hand picked everything out and we just can't wait to dig in!  But for now I have some pictures to catch up on, so enjoy:

Juliette found a blanket in the hamper, so she just crawled right in to rest!

Alyssa's graduated to a big high chair, and she's making it clear she'd much prefer "big girl" food to go with it - "no pabulum for me!"

Our good friends Matt and Hilary came out for a little visit - we were so thrilled to see them and had a wonderful time together!

Isn't it so sweet to catch up with dear friends?

Isabelle just loved Hilary - how could she not? She's beautiful as well as sweet and kind!

Ok, so I may have posed the hug, but I still thought it was cute.

Daddy picked these flowers out for Isabelle after her dance recital. She loves them so much that they are still in a vase by her bed, even though they're now completely dead and dried out! We've got to rescue them from the vase and find a good place to hang them!

We finally have some spring flowers bringing color to the yard!

 

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May. 2, 2008 - Belle's Movies

I shall let Belle be a blog star on mommy's blog today. Sorry for any repeat, but I think I finally figured out how to get these videos to work and keep working. Here's a fun "last year and this year" of reading, as well as what Isabelle described as her "beautiful moment": her very first little dance recital. We were so proud of her, because daddy and I each gave her a particular piece of advice about a part of her dance, and she worked so hard to remember them both! And she smiled the whole time - she's third from the right.

PS. Please do be cautious about clicking on any video links that may pop up at the end of the videos - these are hosted on youtube and I have no control over what other videos they may have one their site!

Ballet/Irish Dance Recital

Reading St. George Last week (we LOVE this book - this was the day it came in the mail!)

Reading a Bob Book around a year or so ago

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Apr. 30, 2008 - Fixed

To all of you firefox users, I think I got the blog to work correctly. It may not be quite as pretty as it looks in msn or explorer (though they look a bit different now, too), but the words should all be there! Please let me know if it's hard for anyone to see, and I'll try to tweak it a bit more! I never realized things looked different in various browsers!

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Apr. 30, 2008 - My New Blog Look

  Many thanks to Ali from Mission Field Designs for making my blog look so beautiful. It's lovely, Ali, thank you so much!

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Apr. 30, 2008 - Fresh New Reader

 

We officially have two little readers in our home! I have been teaching Hannah letter sounds, but didn’t really try to have her decode any words, as I didn’t figure she was quite ready to do it. Well, she sure proved me wrong! Today I told her to try just the first sound of the letter and see if she could figure out the word. She read all of these: sat, at, in, is, man, and a few other similar words. I guess I’ll get out the Bob books – such fun!

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Apr. 29, 2008 - Speech Therapy

Here's another of our "homeschool electives": we took Naomi in for an evaluation and discovered she has a moderate to severe speech delay, which was more than we had expected. We're still trying to figure out things that may be causing or contributing to it, like food intolerances, but for now she's started a little speech therapy class with a couple of other three year old girls.  She's so thrilled with it! It's funny how basic it is, and one of the big reasons we have her in it is simply to guide us in what we can practice with her at home. But it seems to be good in all sorts of ways other than just speech improvement. Naomi is so thrilled to have a little class that only she goes to. She proudly hops back in the car afterward, holding her prized paper projects. The older girls beg to be the first to see what she made! In fact we still have the first little booklet she made there, and when she "reads" it to us now, she actually uses an ending sound for each word - a big deal for her!

When we have schooltime in the morning, we all start out at the dining room table. The girls each get to pick a "school game" (anything from teeny plastic horses and riders, to special blocks, stacking pegs and memory games) to use when it's not their "letter lesson" turn. I practice Isabelle's TATRAS phonics and read alouds with her, Hannah's Penny Primer and letters, and Naomi's speech sounds with her. Of course, Juliette has a turn, too, and we work on speech sounds as well, since she's not an early talker by any stretch. It really works quite well, despite the necessary reminders to play quietly so sister can think! I do hope it is helping Naomi to speak more clearly, but at least I'm pretty sure it is helping her feel special and be excited to learn!

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Apr. 23, 2008 - Doggie Homeschool and Rent A Dog

Recently we had another one of those days at the park. I'm sure we all have a different definition of those days, but for us it meant that I took all the girls to a park and there happened to be a dog there. No matter if the dog was on a leash and not really that close to us. You should have heard the wailing that ensued! If I've failed to mention this, I had three little girls who were terrified of dogs, one big girl who loves them (interestingly the only one of our girls who was around when we had a dog) and a baby who doesn't think much more of them than perhaps, "hmm, that's a gooey sort of kiss". Hannah at least has pretty good reason for her fear, and even if she didn't she's good at inventing reasons. Naomi and Juliette just have fear! After trying to console, calm, bribe, and threaten, and finally plopping the wailers on a park bench (whatever it took to stop the hysterics!), I came home and told Matt I was quite certain we needed a dog! I didn't really care if I wanted a dog (although many days I think I do),  I didn't try to remind myself we may not have the time for a dog around here (pish, posh), and didn't think at all about doggy potty on the floor (our dog would be perfect!). All I could think was "I must be able to take my girls to the park, where there is ALWAYS a dog!" And the fact that I wouldn't have to vaccuum under the lunch table was nice, too. 

Well, as my husband wisely reminded me, until we actually have a fence around our property we can't get a dog. So I invented doggie-homeschool. We have some friends who happen to teach a dog handling class by a park near our home. So with their kind permission, every Wednesday evening we put dinner in to cook late, and we head to the park for just a few minutes. Then it's on to doggie school. Oh, this has been such a delight! I made the rule that no matter how afraid anyone felt, no one was allowed to cry! They can stick by me like glue, clutching my hand, but they can't wail! Then we asked if the class minded us dropping in each week for fifteen minutes. Thankfully, as we are trying to train our children not to be terrified of dogs (wise, yes, but not terrified), many of these people are trying to train their dogs not to be afraid of little children, so it works quite nicely. I'm happy to report that a month into it, I officially have two big girls who LOVE dogs (Hannah being one of them!), two small girls who tolerate dogs, and one baby who still thinks no more than "hmm, that's gooey". Daddy got to come today and see Hannah and Isabelle "train" their favorite dog. The dog's kind owner lets the girls lead her around on leash, feed her, and tell her to sit. These dogs really tower over the girls, so it's pretty funny to see Hannah saying "Kalina, sit, noooooo, sit, noooooo SIT, hmmm, oh, you laid down, good girl . . . . Mommy, I TRAINED her!"

Today this wonderful lady managed more than I thought was possible and had Naomi leading the dog on leash. Nao kept dropping the leash, and the lady would say "Pick it up, or she'll run off" - all I could think was "I'm sure that's what she's hoping for!" But she did it, she was so brave! And Juliette wanted to try, but without help (this is the girl who says little more nowadays than "I do it myself"), so she stood there, looked this dog in the eye and said (in a cute and stern voice) "Doggie, walk! No, no, walk doggie! Doggie walk!" We finally convinced her she'd have better luck if she started walking!

Our next step is borrowing a dog for a week. We're really looking forward to seeing how that goes, but hopefully by the end we shall have no trouble visiting any park we'd like to! Isn't homeschooling great? Who ever heard of doggie school electives otherwise!

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Apr. 21, 2008 - Fun Happenings

Posted in Family News

We've come up with some things this week which have thrilled the girls, particularly my five year old. One is a small bit of (I think) actual creativity on my part. The girls accidentally broke my exercise band, and I found some curved branches. That probably sounds like a really weird combination, but with the two I was able to make a couple of very passable bows. We then spent the morning hunting for twigs we could use for arrows - all in all it was quite fun, and we're very pleased with our bows and arrows. We've spent a good amount of time having "archery contests" and are just loving it! Isabelle may be my girliest girl, but she is also pretty fascinated with certain weapons, bows and arrows topping her list! And if I do say so myself, they're pretty groovy - even daddy and I didn't want to put them down!

Daddy made all the girls happy by finishing the bunk bed he was painting for them. It looks lovely, and they are so happy with it! We now officially have four little girls in one room. Juliette is so proud to be in the big girl room. She's funny- potty training is harder with her than any of the others, yet going from a crib to a bed is a delight! They're all so different, go figure.

Next we discovered this fabulous new printing of the Narnia series - large print for reading aloud. Isabelle can read these herself, but it's still fairly slow going as she's only five, and it's a long book! So I put on our audio Narnia CD, which we LOVE, and she was able to follow along in the book for the whole chapter - it was wonderful!

The last exciting thing for Isabelle is that we created her very own blog. Yes, my five year old has a blog. I thought it might make for a fun and different way to do her oral narrations, and boy does she love it! She got to pick out her own template picture and all of that good stuff. I had no idea how happy this would make her!  If you'd like to see a five year old's blog, feel free to visit little Belle.

Here are some pictures of our week:

Belle with her new "archery set"

Mommy and Belle having an archery contest.

Isabelle reading Narnia

Me and my Juli Bunny:

Miss Alyssa

Isabelle actually took this picture of Alyssa- didn't she do a great job - a little budding photographer!

We were all outside enjoying the one warm spring day we've had this year!

The bunk bed daddy painted:

 

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