Ok, so it's been a few weeks since I've posted about school....what can I say?  Life's just been busy!  I'm still trying to get into the swing of taking care of a newborn (LOTS of diapers and LOTS of time nursing), schooling, meal making, dessert baking (no that won't exactly help me lose the rest of the baby weight, but hey, it's fall...the cooler crisper air justs BEGS for apple pandowdy and apple cake and apple pie and ....oh you get the idea!), house cleaning, going to co-op, going to dance class, grocery shopping, spending time with hubby, more house cleaning (it NEVER ends...and I'm not even talking about laundry!!!), somewhere in there I need to find time to eat!  So while I can get online to read a bit, it is harder to sit down to spend time actually typing!  But to everything there is a season....and as overwhelming as this can seem, I wouldn't trade it for anything!  I love being a wife and a mom, although let's face it....each has it's moments that make you want to pull your hair out (that's why I sometimes chant around my house "children are a blessing from the LORD" (psalm 127)....just to remind myself!), but the rewards far outway the trials.  I mean if I wasn't a mom I would have no one to give me fresh dandilions daily in the summer to put into a little plastic cup.  I would have no one to call to me from down the hall when they are suppossed to be sleeping to say "you cuddle with me?".  No one to fall asleep on my chest.  And no cute little squishy tushies to pinch!  

Oh yes, back to school...

We've had a few really good weeks...like usual (I'm using HOD...how could it NOT be good?).  See now Lillian wants to be held...another blessing...hen peck typing with one hand!  Let's see if I can remember what we've done....

We did do an apple/Johnny Appleseed mini unit and lap book.  That was the first real lap book that Evelyn and I have done together...it was fun.  We'll be doing lots more of those! 

And of course a trip to the apple orchard with Nana & Bumpa.

We took a small break from the formal phonics lesson since Evelyn was starting to get frustrated and discouraged with it, so we made games with her phonics sounds and words.  We also made a couple of books with some of the words that she already knows.  I wrote the books, she illustrated them.  And she LOVED reading a book all by herself.  Boy was she proud of herself!  And she loved getting to read to her little brother!

  We read about David and Goliath.  Here we made a picture of Goliath's face (don't you dare laugh at our drawing!!!  I think he's kinda cute!  If you look closely you can see that she even gave him a sword and armor.), and taped it 9 feet high (or as close as I could get to 9 ft. standing on Evelyn's 4-wheeler) so she could through rocks at him pretending to be David.  She yelled "you trust in your armor and sword, but I trust in the LORD!".  Joshua played along with this activity too.....afterall, what self-respecting 2 yr old boy wouldn't jump at the chance to throw rocks and not get into trouble for it?!?!

We also read about Absalom (David's son) and how he got caught in a tree by his hair.  For some reason, this story absolutely facinates Joshua.  Everyday he takes the bible off the shelf, searches till he finds the right page and then tells me the story of how "Abslom got stuck, then he got dead." LOL!

Evelyn doing her project on the ark of the covenant inside the Holy of Holies in Solomon's temple.  She did really good I think!  The two angles guarding the ark are suppossed to be her and her brother she said!  LOL!

Evelyn and Joshua pretended to be ravens and had to bring me (Elijah) food with their beaks (tweezers).  It wasn't easy but it sure was fun...we all laughed quite a bit.

Lining up her horses in order from biggest to smallest as part of her math work. Joshua heard and saw what we were doing so he did the same thing with some of his cars/trucks.

Evelyn  being a little silly while doing her copy work for one of her memory verses.  Psalm 56:3~"When I am afraid, I will trust in You."

And some updated pictures of Lillian...she is growing SO quickly!

I'm not really sure why I'm writing about this, but this is the neatest looking catipillar I have ever seen.  It is in the back yard at my mom's house on the rhododendron bush.  Currently it has been there for at least a month (could have been there longer I guess, but that is when my sister first discovered it while she was sitting up on the deck....she could hear it munching on the leaves and decided to investigate).  From what I've read it is in it's 5th (and final) instar before it will spin itself into it's cacoon. 

This is the Cecropia moth Cecropia Moth aslo known as a robin moth.  The moth itself is quite pretty too and it is the largest moth in North America.  I'm hoping we will get to see it!!!

First I would like to thank everyone who was praying for her....God heard!  Everything looks good and they have no concerns.

I had to bring her to the appointment tired and cranky....not easy to do with a newborn and an 1.5 hour drive.   All babies do in the car is sleep!  So I didn't feed her before we left (they advised this to help with the tired and cranky), so that we would be nice and hungry when we got there.  I had to fuss with her when we got there because honestly she is such an easy going young lady, but eventually I did get her cranky!  Who thought I would ever be proud of making my daughter cry??? 

They brought us into  a dimly lit room, let me feed  her and rock her to sleep.  That's the point of them wanting the babies cranky....so that after they eat, they will go into a nice deep sleep for the hearing test.  They hooked up little sticky tabs to behind each ear and one on her forehead and attached wires to those.  Then they put a little ear plug type thing into her ear for the sounds, and  the wire things (I'm so technical!!!) measure the brain wave activity with the sounds.  I got to hold her through the entire test which was comforting to me (and I assume for her too!).

There were two other tests as well.  One to measure the "echo" her ear produces and the other to check her ear drum.  All looked really good and appears that she has no hearing loss at all Praise GOD!!!

Another good week in school.  We only got 4 days in as it was a holiday week, although, I think we will be staying with a 4 day week anyhow as Evelyn will be doing some classes at the hs co-op on Mondays starting next week.

 It is amazing to me to watch Evelyn learn something new and to see her grasp new concepts!  What a blessing to be able to be home, teaching her and getting to see this all first hand!  God is so good!

Her memory verse for the week is Psalm 121:2 "My help comes from the LORD, maker of heaven and earth.".  We had fun learning that one and enjoyed some outdoor time as well (Sept. in NH means we don't have too much longer of really nice warmdays...waaaaaa!).  Here, we made a hop-scotch, that if Evelyn could say her verse, she got to jump the whole thing.  She thought that was SOOOO much fun!  And as an added bonus....she got more practice writing her numbers 1-10!  Of course Joshua joined in on the fun!

One of the books we use in the Hearts of Dakota curriculum we are using is called "do it carefully".  It is a fine motor skills book, that teaches writing skills, patterns, matching, cutting & glueing...all that type of stuff.  Evelyn really enjoys it.   In this picture she is cutting, coloring, glueing to make a stop light.

We read about Gideon, Samson, Ruth and Samual this week!  She really enjoyed the day that we set up "idols" and then threw rocks...uh...I mean socks at them to knock them down.  I set up a toy horse, a stack of coins, a bag of brownie mix, a baby doll, and a dvd.  Then we talked about what they might represent to people, who we can make our "stuff", money, food, people and entertainment into things we worship and how sad it makes God and how we should never love anything or anyone more than we love God.  I think this was her favorite thing this week.    She couldn't wait to tell Daddy all about it when he got home.

When reading about Ruth, we made a project that shows grass, oats and barley. 

 Then we made  barley bread so we could talk about why Ruth walked in the fields and picked up the grains left behind the harvesters.  And while this bread is nothing like the bread that Ruth and Naomi would have made, it was very good!

My too little chefs!

Isn't licking the spoon and spatula the best part of baking???

Joshua happened to make quite the mess...thank goodness for aprons...although that didn't protect the back of his clothes...my counter...the chair...the floor ...our dog Maggie...

The finished project...

On another note...Lillian wasn't feeling well this week. Poor little thing.  She was throwing up for a couple of days and ran a very small fever.  She is better know and even went to the doctor's office.  When they weighed her we found out that our not-so-little pumkin' is 10 pounds already!!!!!  Good golly miss molly, what is in that milk I'm feeding her???  That's 2 pounds in a month!  Evelyn and Joshua never gained that quickly.  They were both peanuts for the longest time...it took them probably 3-4 months to reach 10 pounds.  But Lillian isn't  a pudgy, rolly-polly baby, she is just solid...and long....and so so so SOOOOO kissable!

If you remember, please keep Lillian in prayer this week. She failed her hearing test (right ear) at the hospital, so she is going in on Thursday the 11th for more in depth hearing tests.  Thank you.

Labor Day weekend always brings the Hopkinton fair. And every year we look forward to it! Of course what’s not to look forward to??? Fried dough slathered with butter and cinnamon or powdered sugar, tempura fried veges., ice cream, homemade doughnuts, buffalo steak & cheese, Italian sausage, hot apple cider (and whatever else catches your attention…..who knew one person could eat so much food in one day???!!!!).

Then of course there are the rides…I don’t care for rides, but the kids LOVE them! Any of the rides that involve a parent to go on fall to my husband. And he is such a good sport about it. Actually I think he loves it too! Not sure who has the bigger grin…him or the kids!

The best part of the fair this year was the new “Wild West Frontier Show”. It was at the back part of the fair so it was pretty quiet over there….not too many people had found it I don’t think. They had pony rides, which Evelyn LOVED….she is horse-crazy! And because it was evening, they had a large bonfire going with a big kettle of something cooking over it (not sure what….might have just been a potpourri type thing…smelled good anyway) and rough wooden benches around it and a couple of old rocking chairs. A large open area so the kids could have room to run around (not something that the kids get to do a lot of at a crowded fair ya know?).

So we sat around the fire for a while, drinking hot cider waiting for the show to begin. They were having some technical difficulties so they started late, but we sure didn’t mind…it was cozy sitting around that fire! Once the show started we were all impressed. They talked about early American history (including stuff I didn’t know) and how the west was settled. They brought out oxen and a real covered wagon.

They then had they grandmother introduce the granddaughter (it was a family run show) who was a trick rider. She talked about how her granddaughter would never be able to do this stuff if she turned to drugs or alcohol, but that she could do it because of her faith in Christ Jesus.

After the show I got a chance to talk with the mother, and turns out that she homeschools her 3 children and they travel doing this show. They are Christians and feel that a large part of their show is to also talk about Jesus (which they did). It was so great and refreshing to have such faith based show to go to….especially in that environment! I sure hope they come back next year!

It such a good day! There is something so magical about going to the fair. I love just watching my kids get excited about everything . I remember that feeling of awe from my own childhood. Something that I’ve lost somewhere along the way to adulthood. Seeing it through the eyes of my children takes my focus off of the crowds, the busyness , the way overpriced food, and the gimmick games. It allows me to see the wonder of it again and makes it unforgettable for me as well as the kids.

Evelyn started soccer this year.  She and dad have been practicing out in the yard and she is loving it!  These are just some pictures of her first practice/game.   The kids are all so stinkin' cute!  Evelyn even scored her first goal (which she was rewarded with a trip out for ice-cream....that's my kind of treat...we all win!) 

Last week was our first week back to school after taking a couple of weeks off after the birth of our newest family member.  Evelyn was so excited to get back to doing school that she talked about it all weekend prior to starting.  Infact she missed school so much that during our break she cried a couple of times about how much she missed it and "could we pleeeeaaaassseee start school again????"

It went better than I expected!  We were able to get right back into the swing of things and having a newborn really didn't disrupt things all that much.  I think there was only one day that we needed to take a break so I could nurse her.....and that is because a certain little someone who shall remain un-named decided that she wanted to kiss her baby sister and woke her up.....hard to be mad at that isn't it??? 

This week we learned about Rahab and Joshua.  Evelyn really loved this portion of the bible.  The day that we read about Joshua's march around Jericho was her favorite as we built a city out of legos (as best we could with the amount we had) and marched around it 7 times and blew trumpets and yelled so the "walls came tumbling down" (we also had the song playing in the background of "Joshua fought the Battle of Jericho") and we all got to kick the walls down!  Our Joshua got to join in on the fun for this and they rebuilt it after school to do all over again....I don't think she will forget this bible story anytime soon!  One of the nice things about this week too was that the scripture was a review of the previous five units of scripture that she had memorized...I know that that wasn't planned but perfect timing to come back into!

Notice the "soldiers" on the tower walls to keep guard of the city.

"and the walls came tumbling down." (the tape on the floor is from a previous lesson we did counting sides and corners of different shapes).

 This is the brick wall that Evelyn made and the red rope to signify to the Isrealites which house is Rahabs so that her and her family would not be harmed.  This too was really fun...Evelyn loved painting on the "mortar", I loved the end result....the shaving cream mixed with glue made a neat texture that really looks like mortar....but smells so much better!!!

We also learned about different layers of soil.  (God promised a land flowing with milk and honey...) Here is Evelyns science project that shows the layers of soil and she added some grass and a "tree".  And since all but the grass and tree were edible (see the chocolate chips???) she had a snack after!...so did mom!

Evelyn is doing very well on her phonics lessons.  Here she copied out a sentence that she just learned to read.

Here Lillian is in school too.....learning to sleep through the sound of her big sister and big brother!!!

We have had busy couple of weeks.....WE HAD A BABY!!!

Ok....well I  had a baby.  But that made it busy for all of us. 

I was scheduled to be induced on Thursday morning, but when I called that morning to confirm, I was told that they had had such a busy night that they couldn't take me afterall.  I was first to get bumped since my due date was still 8 days away.  My midwife wanted to induce me early because I was strep B positive and needed to be on IV antibiodics for at least 4 hours before delivering and I tend to go quickly. 

I called my midwife when I knew she would be at the hospital and told her that I had lost my mucus plug during the night and had been having contractions all morning.  They were not too strong or regular, but she wanted me to come just to be checked anyway.  When I got to the hospital for Angela (my midwife)  to check me, I was 5 almost 6cm and 90% effaced. She said there was no way I was going home. They hooked me up up to the IV and I sat in triage for about 2.5 hours till they could get me a room. I wasn't allowed to walk around either because they didn't want me to do anything yet to move things along till I had my first full dosage of meds. I was going crazy just sitting there.....'course it still didn't feel like I was in labor. The contractions were still irregular and not super strong.

About 2pm they got me into a room, just about the same time my family all got there (3 sisters and mom). Angela came in and broke my water around 2:30-ish while 2 of my sisters and CB went to get themselves some lunch. My water was filled with meconium so I was told that a pediatrician would have to be in the room while I delivered.

My sister, mom and I walked the halls for a while, then were accompanied by my other 2 sisters and CB. Quite the entourage!  We must have looked quite the sight!  After she broke my water the contractions started to come on fast and regular. After about an hour, maybe hour and a half, they got really strong and uncomfortable (to say the least right?). I sat around on the birthing ball for a while, my sister would rub my back during contractions, CB sat across for me and held my hands (usually...he gets nervous and starts to pace) or sometimes my hands were already twisted into the sheets.

I kicked everyone out of the room (except CB of course...and by then 2 of my friends had arrived and so had my dad and step mom) around 5pm when I knew it was starting to get close to pushing time. When I told Angela it was time to push and she checked to give me the ok, I pushed for 5 minutes....2 pushes. They didn't have time to get the pediatrician in the room it happened so quickly. She was born at 5:33. Thankfullly there were no problems due to the meconium.   So it felt like only 3 hours of labor....I'm not sure how long labor really was since the contractions were so sporadic.

Baby was great and healthy. Mom....had bleeding issues. It took them about an hour to get my bleeding under control. They couldn't figure out where the blood was coming from....1. 'cause there was so much blood, and 2. 'cause I was SO swollen (TMI?). They had to give me Pitocin to help my uterus to contract down as well as some sort of blood clotting medicine (I'm fine now).

Lillian is just so sweet. Great little nurser. Great sleeper. LOUD cryer though!   Actually she is a very good baby and doesn't cry often at all.  Evelyn is completely in love with her. Joshua I think is still a little scared of her!

8lbs 2oz,  21" long.

My sister Niki rubbing my back during a contraction.

Being  weighed.

Can you tell how much she loves her first tubby???

With her very proud daddy!

Back in Mama's arms.

kisses!

I love swaddled babies!  Can you see the little bubble on her lips?

Evelyn and Joshua meeting their little sister....Joshua can't quite figure her out!

Waiting to go home. Don't ya just love that milk induced coma (as my friend calls it) and they just curl up like a little snuggly ball of love on  you?

With Nana (my mom)

Evelyn diligently watching over her new sister.

so sweet!

Well my baby shower was over a month ago now, but since I just got pictures, I'm just now going to write about it! 

My dear friend Carla and my mom planned a beautiful baby shower for me.  It was an Anne of Green Gables tea party!  Anne of Green Gables is one of my absolute FAVORITE movies (ever since I was 12 years old and my Aunt Linda made me watch it with her!), so having that as the theme was great fun.  Carla set up her house beautifully and even made raspberry cordial!  And if any of you have watched the movie, you will definately remember Anne serving Diana current wine when she thought she was serving raspberry cordial and the trouble that she got into for that.  The food and drinks were foods and drinks mentioned in the Anne movie and books.

I knew about it ahead of time so I brought over my little pink glass tea set that I played with when I was a little girl, my mom and aunt played with when they were little, and my grandmother played with when she was little for the little girls to have tea with (our daughters were invited as well).  And they decorated straw hats with ribbon and silk flowers like Anne (and other characters) wore in the movie.  They were so precious.

This being my third baby, I didn't really need anything, so everyone who came gave me diapers!  That is something that is ALWAYS needed! 

It was such a lovely day!  And to top it off, my husband surprised me with a 30th birthday party when I got home from the shower!  Generally I don't like the idea of surprise parties because I'm always afraid that I'll show up in sweats and a grungy ponytail, looking like a mess and my family/friends know that.  So they figured since I would already be ready for the baby shower, what better time???  He done good!

Forgive the quality of the pictures...I took pictures of pictures that a friend of mine took.

Isn't that a lovely centerpiece?  It is a diaper cake!

Here are the young ladies having their own little tea party.  Notice my special pink tea dishes....I have such fond memories of them!  And LOVE that this is the fourth generation to use them!

Evelyn right beside me and looking so proper!  She loved helping me open the gifts....I think it made it feel like it was her special day too!

Me and my best friend Karena at my birthday party...she helped my husband with the plans.

It rained this week....A LOT!!!  Everyday since Saturday.  I wouldn't have thought it, but it really did effect our schooling this week.  Too much cabin fever I guess.  I'm a firm believer that children need to get out and run and play and just burn off that energy that kids have in abundance (I would love to have some of their energy!!!).  And since they didn't get out much, there was a lot of crankiness.  Oh, and the kids were cranky too!

Add potty training my little man, which adds lots of interuptions, and school just seemed a bit more chaotic this week than usual.  But Praise GOD we made it through!!!   Actually school work itself was fine, it just seemed to take longer this week with the potty training and nervousness about thunderstorms and whining about not being able to go outside to play.

CB (hubby) finally came up with an ingenious idea!  He took a couple of garbage bags and cut holes for heads/arms and made imprompto ponchos!  What a life saver!   Didn't work out every day, as we did have many thunderstorms this week as well, but it got them outside some.  Infact yesterday, we had a tornado go through the next town over.  CRAZY!  We never get them in NH, at least not real ones.  Sometimes little ones over the lakes, but never ones that touch down on dry land locked areas.  I think the news said it was the first one since 1933.  One person killed, some injured and of course plenty of homes/land damaged.  So last night, Evelyn prayed that God would show her how to help these people....even if they are strangers!

Back to school...

This week history/bible time has been about Joseph and Moses in Egypt.  Evelyn made an Egyptian collar, and Joshua got to join this art activity.  They both loved it!  She wore hers all week during the history/bible lessons.    We picked up a little globe at Target for a dollar last week and she wanted to take it down and use it for school, so we took it out and found Isreal and Egypt.   Now she can find them all by herself (even though on this 3" globe you can hardly SEE Isreal!), how awesome that we got a little bit of geography in too!

.

And this one just because he looks so stinkin' cute with the paint on his nose!!!

Here Evelyn is acting out her 'dramatic play' and is the Egyptian princess deciding to keep baby Moses (see she still has the collar on !)

I had noticed a day or so earlier, that as Evelyn concentrates on her work, she has a habit of sticking her tongue out a little.  So I couldn't help but tease her about it a little and tell her I was going to get her tongue!  So she stuck it out at me!  She really is quite the little character!

Evelyn has now read her first two sentences all by herself!  She has also learned how to make 24 words and 1 sight word.  Here is a picture of her copywork at writing down her sentences and drawing/copying a picture to go with them.    Her handwritting has improved SOOOO much in just the few weeks since we have started kindergarten.  When showing daddy last night, he thought that I wrote it and she traced over it....but no....she wrote it and then traced over it with her crayons! 

I think that one of her favorite things though every week is learning her memory verse.  This week it is Proverbs 3:5-6 "Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge HIM and HE shall direct your paths."  She especially loves the games we get to play to learn the verse.  We also went to the bible bookstore this week and she was looking at different coffee mugs asking "what does this one say?" to the ones she liked, and was tickled pink to find one that had her memory verse on it!!!

We also did a little mini study on skunks.  Yes, that's right.....skunks.  It had absolutely NOTHING to do with the curriculum that we are using  and everything to do with we have a newly aquired resident living somewhere on our property.  A couple of weeks ago, he (or she??) sprayed our dog, Maggie.  And we have now seen him out and about many nights.  A couple of nights ago, when CB went to go out and was just about to let Maggie out, there was the skunk sitting right on our front steps!  It roamed our yard for hours even with CB shining the flashlight on it!  Poor Maggie had to wait till morning to go potty....we weren't taking any chances with her getting sprayed again! 

The next morning telling Evelyn all about "Jimmy the Skunk" (he is now named after the skunk in the "Adventures of Reddy Fox" book that we are reading for school), being in our yard, she decided she wanted to learn all about skunks.  We spent time google-ing (SP???) all kinds of info on skunks and watching youtube videos of skunks!  I'll admit they are cute little critters, but I wish it would find a new home.

Here are some pics of them in their fancy-shmancy ponchos (don't mind that Joshua is wearing one of Evelyn's hats)....