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Here are a few special memories from our 2008 Christmas celebrations.....

The kids in front of a real gingerbread house at Disney World:

Dressed up for the Christmas service on Sunday morning:

Baking cookies on Christmas Eve:

 Tree on Christmas morning:

Claire loves soccer:

All Anna wanted was this parrot:

Audrey loved the horse costume:

Drew and his Little People Rescue Chopper:

The remains of the day:

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Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

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This was our first year actually taking the kids through the neighborhood trick-or-treating.  In prior years, our church has hosted a Fall Festival the same night as Halloween, and of course we did that, instead.  This year, our church's function will be on November 1st.  So, since we had the costumes ready, I decided to let the kids go around the block.

Claire was a pop star, Audrey a pink leopard, Anna a pink princess, and Drew a race car driver.

The first couple of houses were fine.  The kids had a blast!  But as we pressed on, feet started to hurt and bones started to chill.  It was 60 degrees outside.  I remember back in the day, way up in the great white north, wearing winter coats under our costumes and braving snow to get our treats.  My kids are soft....wimps....dare I say, southerners!

All-in-all, the consensus seems to be that trick-or-treating is okay, but fall festival at the church is GREAT! 

We all look forward to the fun and games tomorrow!

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Happy 5th Birthday, Audrey Rose!

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This is our first year attending a homeschool co-op.  I was against the idea initially, thinking about the extra time it would take from my week, but my husband thought it sounded like a good thing.  So I did some investigative work, trying to find a group that meets our needs.  I wanted something that would supplement our curriculum, not dictate it.  I found a co-op, thanks to the recommendation from a friend, that does just this.  It offers multiple choices per each time period.  I was able to give my oldest daughter opportunies for art, music and cooking, while the younger ones enjoy a variety of standard sessions with their own age groups.  All this for a very reasonable price!

The kids all love co-op!  Even my two-year-old gets excited when we discuss going to co-op, though I think he is more eager to wear his very own back pack than to stay in the nursery ;-)   Four-year-old Audrey asks every morning if today is co-op.  Anna is making friends (okay, Anna makes friends everywhere, so this is no surprise!).  And Claire is excited to have actual homework.  Did I mention she's a bit goofy?  LOL

This Saturday, our co-op had it annual Harvest Festival.  It was held at a member's beautiful property.  First, there was a candy hunt through the woods:

Then the kids played games.  There was a three-legged race...

spin your head on a baseball bat (after finding all that candy in the woods!)....

balancing an egg on a spoon....

blowing up then sitting on a balloon....

and running back to the team....

And some gleeful rejoicing when their team won...

Later, we roasted hot dogs and marshmallows over a campfire. 

The kids had never experienced a bonfire before, so they were thrilled!  Even Drew can't wait until next year's Harvest Party!

All-in-all, a co-op has been a good thing!  I guess that's why God gave me a husband who will push me out of my comfort zone every now and then :-)

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We are studying birds in science this year, using Exploring Creation with Zoology 1: Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day. 

This week, our focus was on eggs.  The kids have been learning a lot and they have been having fun doing it!  They especially enjoyed this experiment:

Have you ever tried to squeeze an egg before?  I have to admit, we were dubious at first.  We didn't trust that it would work, so we began squeezing over the sink, gently closing our hands around the eggs.  But as we progressed, we began to realize that these eggs really were durable!  As long as you apply equal pressure, you cannot break an egg when squeezing.  And trust me, we squeezed hard! 

Who knew?  

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Drew has had several haircuts during his first two years of life.  Until yesterday, all were buzz cuts given by Mommy.  With school pictures pending, I decided to have a professional cut his hair for a change.

He sat right down and let the hairdresser do what she had to do.  I was a bit surprised, because it seems that most first haircut pictures feature screaming, thrashing boys frantic to be anywhere else.  No so our Drew.  He sat very still and seemed to enjoy the process.

Of course, as you can see from the above picture, he did age with this haircut....he's growing facial hair now ;-)

Later, at home, he showed off his new do:

Today, we had school pictures taken.  I'll share those when we receive the finished product.  I'm so proud of my little man and how well he did with his very first haircut!

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We are in the midst of finishing an unfinished bonus room above our garage.  Once complete, this will give us one extra bedroom, turning our three-bedroom home into a four-bedroom home.  The girls are currently sharing a rather large bedroom, so it hasn't been a problem.  But recently, occasionally, as our oldest falters through the journey of puberty, sharing a room with two younger sisters has become more of an issue. 

So today, my husband began the first step of this home improvement project:  Lay the sub-floor under the eaves, so that we can use that space for storage.  After the first half of that space was in place, we were impressed with how much extra storage this will give us.  We went downstairs to get lunch, leaving the kids upstairs to play for a few minutes.

Can you guess what happened next?  See if this helps you guess:

Or maybe this shot from below:

In case it isn't obvious, one of the kids (name withheld) decided to check out the space below the eaves.  The plywood we put down for storage was sturdy.  But aforementioned child won't win any long jump competitions:  As this child was leaping from one section to the next of the storage area, she lost her balance and a foot went through the drywall separating the garage from the area above.

We are thankful that no one was hurt.  It could have been much worse.  Instead of a crying, repentant child standing before us making a dramatic confession, we could have been waiting on an ambulance.   So yes, we are very thankful.   But I can't help but lament that this little escapade put us another weekend behind on this project :-(  

Maybe we'll have that room finished before our oldest daughter goes off to college ;-)

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Happy Birthday, Anna Grace!

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A friend asked us to go to the zoo with them this past weekend.  So off we went, Brian and I with our four kids, and Melissa with her four kids.  The weather was perfect, the animals were active, and the kids were all well-behaved.  It was a perfect day!

Here are our three girls with their friend Connor.

We saw elephants.....

.....and giraffes.

Just how tall are these adolescent giraffes, anyway?

The kids climbed trees....

.....and bears.

And everyone left later that afternoon, tired but happy.

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I just wanted to write a word about the music selections which are playing as you read this blog.  We are studying Bach this term, so I have found a couple of Bach selections.  Our hymn study for this month is "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" by Bach, so that is the first selection playing.  You will probably recognize this tune (even if it is a bit fast in this rendition).  It is often played at weddings and in movies.  It's a simply beautiful piece of music! 

Tucked in between the two Bach selections is this term's folk song.  My girls love "Follow the Drinking Gourd".  They love the history behind it.  There were saddened and appalled to learn about slavery in this country.  We enjoyed reading about the underground railroad.  They even acted this song out for us in a play soon after we began this study. 

I love how these songs and stories impress them so much and become a part of them!

I hope you enjoy these selections as much as we do :-)

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Our local homeschool support group's yearly kick-off picnic was this past weekend.  We haven't been to this event before, even after two years in the area, so we were excited to see so many other homeschoolers and enjoy ourselves. 

The first thing the kids saw was the horses!

Claire and Anna couldn't wait to ride the horses....

Audrey didn't want anything to do with the horses at first.  So she and Drew found other ways to entertain themselves.

Well, eventually she decided that the horses must not be so bad, after all, seeing as so many other children were lining up to ride them.  She mustered her courage, swallowed her fears, and got up in the saddle.

Not to be out-done, Drew didn't even look back at me as he took the cowboy's hand and allowed himself to be lifted unto a horse.  Who needs a Mom when there's a horse???

Good food, good friends, good fun.  What else do you need?

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I just love when something we've studied suddenly becomes reality for one of the kids, when they make connections between what we've read in a book and what they experience in real life!

Anna had one such moment this evening.  The kids were outside, enjoying these wonderful autumn temperatures after a long, hot summer.  Anna came running inside after awhile, as excited as she is on Christmas morning:  "Mom!  Mom!  I just saw a bird riding a thermal!  I was watching it fly and its wings were flapping, then it just started to soar on the thermal!  Just like in our book!"

We've been studying birds this year, fully enjoying "Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day" by Jeannie Fulbright.  I know they've enjoyed their study of birds.  I just didn't realize how much of what we read is really sticking.  I guess I shouldn't second-guess our educational philosophy, eh?

Sometimes the kids even think of things on their own out of our lessons.  Take, for instance, their desire to test the quills of several goose and duck feathers we collected by our pond.

Frankly, the quills of these feathers didn't make good pens.  Either that, or paint doesn't work as well as ink!  But that didn't keep the girls from enjoying the experiment, anyway.

Yesterday, as I pulled out "Just So Stories" for Anna's literature reading, Anna leaned toward me and said in a conspiratorial tone, "I used to listen in when you read these stories to Claire and the one about the camel was my favorite--Humph!"  I just thought that was so cute, how she thought she was getting away with something back when Claire went through these books.  And how wonderful that she enjoyed them enough to remember them and get excited about reading the story again!

Count this as yet another testimonial as to why I love and will continue to use the Ambleside Online curriculum!

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Way back in 1876, during this country's centennial, Americans were introduced to a lovely little vine from Japan.  It was pretty and looked so lovely in those Japanese gardens that people spent the next few decades actually paying farmers to introduce it into the American landscape. 

Pretty, isn't it? 

Like many other plants introduced into a foreign soil, kudzu decided it liked it here.  It liked it a lot!

It flourished in our southern soil. 

True, it's good at fighting soil erosion.  And apparently, animals will eat it.  I hope so, since this is where our woodchuck lives.

This nice little vine can grow as much as a foot a day during the summer months -- sixty feet a year!  

All the green you see in these pictures is kudzu.  We're not seeing the pretty leaves on our trees, or the grass, or bushes.  We're seeing kudzu.  Just kudzu.

Somehow, some native flowers were able to flourish through the kudzu.  It's nice to see some color in the midst of all the green! 

These vines take over everything in their path.  Every empty lot in our neighborhood is a solid mass of kudzu.  Trees are no longer visible through the kudzu.  I find it quite amazing! 

I heard someone on the local radio station say recently that if we could figure out a way to turn kudzu into fuel, the south would be the new Middle East.  If only we could harness this fast-growing vine for the good of the economy! 

That's our nature study lesson for this week!

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