Wonderfully Made Giveaway!

 A few days ago we received an awesome new book to review. Wonderfully Made: God's Story of Life from Conception to Birth is a brand new book by Danika Cooley. The book begins with conception, and then progresses through the pregnancy week, by week, presenting, in simple language, how the baby is growing and developing, preparing for birth.

This would be an ideal book for any family preparing to welcome a new baby into their family. While we aren't planning to have any more babies in our family, we ARE excitedly awaiting the arrival of some new babies into our church family, so Little Bit is enjoying learning about how those babies are growing.

While you wait for my full review of the book, coming soon! I want to tell you about an amazing giveaway you can enter to win your own copy of the book and so much more!

GIVEAWAY

To celebrate the release of Wonderfully Made: God's Story of Life from Conception to Birth by Danika Cooley, I am hosting a wonderful giveaway with the rest of the launch team. The giveaway includes a hardcover copy of the book, along with several other books and products your family is sure to enjoy. The total value of the giveaway is nearly $600! Here is what you could win: 

Wonderfully Made: God’s Story of Life from Conception to Birth by Danika Cooley – hardcover $9.99 value

Wonderfully made is an excellent book that introduces a young child to the wonder of God's creation - the wonder and miracle of birth. From conception in the womb through the nine months within the mother's womb Danika Cooley takes us on a journey of discovery... the discovery of life. "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb." Psalm 139:13

Touch of Life First Trimester Fetal Models $89.95 value

Sculpted from real-life photos, these four fetal models representing weeks 7, 8, 9, and 10 after conception have a personality of their own, and the life-like feel of the skin brings home the humanity of the preborn baby in its first trimester of life. Accurately portrayed thanks to medical descriptions and photos, these little samples of life are a great educational tool for helping to understand the wonder of the early stages of human development.

Bible Road Trip Year One Curriculum (includes Lower and Upper Grammar Notebooking Journals $60 value

The Bible Road Trip Year One Curriculum is a 463-page digital PDF download of the full Bible Road Trip Year One curriculum for all five levels, preschool through high school. The Bible Road Trip Year One Curriculum includes the Parent / Teacher Guide and 32 weeks of curriculum schedules for all grades.

$100 Amazon Gift Card $100 value

Enjoy shopping amazon.com with a gift of $100 + an adorable bookmark.

Big Bible Science: Experiment and Explore God’s World by Erin Lee Green (Ages 5-11) $12.99 value

Big Bible Science helps children and those who teach them to explore God's World and God's Word through real live science experiments. There are twenty-one different units taking students through scientific concepts such as Gravity, Friction, Animal Classification and the Nervous System. 

My 1st Books and More by Carine MacKenzie and Philip Ross (ages 4-7) $15.99 value   

Who is God? What does he do? Can I know Jesus? Why did he die? Children always have questions about God. They want to know what it means to be a Christian and who Jesus is. My 1st Books and More gives a year's worth and more of bible readings, devotions and memory verses.

Living Water in the Desert: True Stories of God at Work in Iran by Rebecca Davis  $8.99 value

One man was overcome by the missionary's kindness. Another was stopped by a vision of men in blue.  One became sick and tired of his own religion. Another saw a man named Jesus in a dream, coming to him on a donkey.  A girl found a strange book on the floor of the library and visited a secret prayer meeting. All of them eventually came to Jesus Christ for His full and free salvation, becoming missionaries to their own people. Seventeen chapters tell true stories of the Living Water pouring out on the country of Iran, even up to the present day.

Lights in a Dark Place: True Stories of God at Work in Colombia by Rebecca Davis (ages 7-12)  $8.99 value

Colombia has been known as a land of violence, but God is at work! Even though the Colombian people have reacted with violence to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, God has delivered people from burning houses . . . God has healed ones who cursed . . . God has given people dreams and visions . . . God has rescued kidnapers . . . God has conquered demons of darkness. Read fourteen true stories of the Light of the World shining in the land of Colombia, South America.

Jungle Doctor’s Monkey Tales by Paul White $8.99 value

The wisdom of monkeys is proverbially small. They never could remember not to get too near to the hind feet of zebra, nor to throw coconuts at Chewi the leopard, nor to look into the eyes of snakes. Luckily for his little nephews, Uncle Nyani, the only survivor of a family of seven, is always near at hand to tell them how they can live to be as old as he is!

Jungle Doctor’s Tug-of-War by Paul White (ages 5-11) $8.99 value 

Even by monkey standards, young Toto is pretty dim! Those baddies of the jungle, Crunch the Crocodile, Mbisi the Hyena, Slinki the Jackal, Vibi the Vulture and Gnark the crow look as though they are going to have an easy time finishing him off. However, Toto soon finds himself in the middle of a tug-of-war, for his real friends, Elephant, Giraffe, Parrot and Hornbill are determined to rescue him from the clutches of the jungle underworld.

The Bible’s Big Story: Salvation History for Kids by James M. Hamilton Jr. $4.99 

With easily remembered rhymes and Bible verses take your child through the span of Salvation History from Creation to the Fall, the Flood to the Exodus, the Exile to the Crucifixion and beyond... James M. Hamilton writes about real history, God's Salvation History, and our future.

Notebooking Pages Lifetime Membership $97

1000s of topical pages, themes, and designs . . . Perfect for any subject or study A to Z! Art Study ♦ Copywork ♦ Character Study ♦ Famous Men & Women ♦ Geography (state/country studies, continental, world maps) ♦ History of the Ancient World, Medieval, Renaissance, Reformation, and Modern Times ♦ Music Study ♦ Nature Study ♦ Science ♦ Timelines ♦ and more!

Mom's Toolbelt Lifetime Membership $24.95

A customizable home management planner for every area of your life that craves order.

Hal and Melanie Young: Mom & Dad Special: Raising Real Men (book + audiobook) plus a free registration to both Boot Camp 9-12 AND Boyhood Boot Camp. $101 value

If this is God’s chosen gift to us, then why does it seem so hard? How can we prepare these boys to serve God when we can barely make it through the day? Isn’t there a better way? The answer is yes.

When You Lie Down: Lullabies and Scripture Songs CD $12.97 value

These twelve songs remind us that true rest, comfort and hope come from God alone. This music is an awesome way to experience God’s Word with your baby, kids and family. You will discover that this album will be a powerful addition to use in your personal time with God.

Seeds Onesie- Psalm 139:13-14  $14.97 value

Seeds Family Worship Onesie featuring Psalm 139:13-14 on the front with a small Seeds logo on the back.

Cultivating Responsibility: Parenting Wisdom for Ages 9-12 by Dr. Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller, RN $14.99 value

The later elementary age years are among the greatest times to build responsibility in children. Heart transformation takes place when parents use other tools than behavior modification.

Elementary Foundations: Parenting Wisdom for Ages 5-8by Dr. Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller, RN $14.99 value

Many new things happen during the ages of 5-8. Children start school, develop significant friendships, learn to think abstractly instead of just concretely, and have a greater ability to draw close to God. Parenting during this stage produces a number of challenges and opportunities so you'll want to be prepared.

To enter the giveaway, use the Rafflecopter below. Giveaway open to residents of the U.S. and Canada, age 18 and older. Giveaway will end on Wednesday, April 20 at 11:59pm EST. Winner will be announced at the Wonderfully Made Facebook Release Party (winner does not have to be present to win, but we hope you'll be there!)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

You're Invited!

Join us for the Wonderfully Made Facebook Release Party on Thursday, April 21. We'll have even more giveaways and freebies, too! The party begins at 9pm EST, and you can RSVP on the event page Please RSVP!

 

Little Bit Turns 7!

I'm behind again . . . sigh . . . after traveling, we spent Thursday and Friday settling back in at home , and getting ready for Little Bit's Birthday.

Her birthday was on Sabbath this year, so this made it a bit different from normal. We eat breakfast at church since Lexie & Ashlyn help serve it, so rather than having breakfast ready for Little Bit, I just fixed some strawberries and hot chocolate for a special birthday morning treat.

I also got her some cut flowers and a tiny little potted rose bush.  Lexie made her a "rosebud circlet" to match the one with Samantha's birthday outfit. Her "big" gifts were all the American Girl stuff, but she still got her annual teacup from us. And, a couple weeks ago someone offered Lexie and Ashlyn some old costume jewelry they were getting rid of and one piece was a heart shaped necklace that the girls, correctly, thought Little Bit would like since Samantha wears a heart shaped locket, so that's the little white box.

Little Bit and Lexie dressed Samantha in her birthday dress, that Lexie made, first thing, since of course, Samantha was coming to church with us.

At church, I asked Lexie and Ashlyn to play the parts of Abraham and Sarah and act out the Bible story for the Kindergarten class.

We also celebrated Little Bit's birthday in Sabbath School and then, at the end of class, had a special prayer for Little Bit and her friend, K, on their last week in Kindergarten before promoting to Primary.

After church we hurried home to greet the grandparents and get lunch on the table.

Little Bit's first request had been for petit fours like Samantha had, but Lexie convinced her to go with one "big petit four", otherwise known as a square layer cake. Lexie made the cake on Friday, and then when we got home from church, she made whipped cream and sliced strawberries. She put strawberries between the layers, and then used strawberries and M&Ms to make flowers on top, as per Little Bit's request. I thought it turned out great!

Meanwhile, Little Bit was busy setting up all her Samantha goodies on the hearth to show the grandparents.


After lunch, and cake (with candles, but no singing, because she does NOT like being sung to!), we enjoyed a nice afternoon visiting with the grandparents. Lexie showed off her new violin and gave the grandparents a nice "concert". Little Bit showed them her American Girl goodies. A good time was had by all :)

Wrapping up the Week of March 20 - The Traveling Part!

Whew! What a busy week! 

We had planned to go to my parents' house on Sunday, but then there was a chance of snow on Sunday, so we decided to beat the snow (we didn't get any) and drove down after church on Sabbath.

The nice part of that was that we had a nice, quiet day at Mama and Papa's on Sunday. "Mr Cat" came out to say hi. He's a brother (I think) to Ashlyn's cat, Moccasin, and it's funny because their coloring is so similar, but his face is very different. He seemed to enjoy getting lots of love from the girls.  Little Bit also enjoyed riding her bike a bunch. She almost got up the courage to learn to ride without training wheels. 

Monday was "Ice Cream for Breakfast Day" normally I just buy some ice cream and call it good, but Mama made chocolate waffles to have with the ice cream. Yum!  After breakfast Lexie and Ashlyn and I headed out for a fun day at friends' house. As always, the kids spent the day playing in the woods, and with the animals.  This time Little Bit opted to spend the day with Mama & Papa instead of coming with us. They rode metro into Washington DC so Papa could get some National Park stamps he wanted. And while they were there, they went to the Rosslyn metro station to ride the really long escalator (207 ft) there (because what kid doesn't love riding super long escaltors?!?). So she had a fun day too.

Tuesday was the reason for our trip to Mama and Papa's! Little Bit's seventh birthday (which was the 26th). When her sisters turned 7, we went to the American Girl Store in NYC. So we had to follow the tradition and go to American Girl for Little Bit's 7th birthday too. But now there's also an American Girl store in Northern VA which has the huge advantage of being to drive to it instead of navigating the subways of NYC.  As an added bonus, it meant my Dad could drop us off and go do his own thing, since spending a few hours in a 100% pink & girly store isn't really his kind of thing, he went and collected National Park passport stamps instead. Little Bit spent the first while just running around looking at everything. One thing I liked a LOT better about the NY store (when we were there, they may have changed it), is that everything for one doll was in one area. So we could go to the Kit area and see her and all her accessories on display, and then choose the doll & accessories Lexie wanted and be done with it. The DC store had things scattered. I think the idea was that similar accessories were in the same area. For example, in one area there was a display of each doll wearing her nightgown/pajamas with her bed and "bedtime accessories" set. But that meant that, to find Samantha (Little Bit's doll of choice) and all her accessories, we had to go all over hunting down the various accessories. It wasn't a big deal, since Little Bit and Lexie had gone online ahead of time and figured out what she wanted, but if we'd gone in there without having researched, it would have been very frustrating. 

After we made our purchases, we went to tea at the American Girl Bistro. I had called and made a reservation and I KNOW that not only did we say our reservation was for tea, but the woman on the phone repeated back to me that it was for tea. However, apparently that information was not passed on to the actual restaurant. The website says to call an 800# to make reservations rather than calling the individual store directly (after this experience, if I ever do it again, I'll be calling the store directly).  The people at the restaurant did their best (and said we were actually the second table that day who'd made reservations for tea and that information hadn't been passed on. Our reservation was for 2:15 and "tea time" doesn't start until 2:00, so it sounds like ALL the reservations were not being made properly), but because the "tea treats" are typically prepared in advance AND to further complicate things, we'd requested vegetarian, we did have quite a long wait. I was impressed though, I was expecting that "vegetarian" would just mean they'd leave off the meat items and maybe give us more of the non-meat options to make up for it but they actually created a vegetarian equivalent for the meat options. There was a miniature veggie burger to replace "Josefina's rancho burger" and a little heart shaped grill cheese sandwich to replace Julie's "pigs in a blanket". 

After we left Tyson's Corner, we took a rather circuitous route back to Mama and Papa's house by way of Columbia, and our all time favorite Chinese restaurant, Hunan Manor! YUM!!! While the heavy beltway traffic is something I most definitely do NOT miss about living in Maryland, I do, very much, miss getting to go to Hunan regularly! When Rodney & I were first married I worked a few miles from the restaurant and when I wasn't traveling, my co-workers and I went there often for lunch. Now it's a rare, much appreciated treat.

Once we got back to Mama and Papa's house Little Bit, with help from her sisters, got right to work checking out all Samantha's accessories.  Once they'd opened everything up and set it all up and generally checked it out thoroughly, it was bedtime.

So, they changed Samantha into her new nightgown (that Lexie sewed for her) and made a bed for her on the sofa.

Wednesday, the girls packed up all of Samantha's stuff and all of their stuff and loaded it all into the car, and we headed home.  . . and I think I'll stop here and do a separate post about the rest of the week :) 

Wrapping Up the Last Week of Winter

We've been enjoying the spring-like weather this last week or so of winter (and now that we're to the first day of spring . . . Brrrrr!!) The girls are finally getting to enjoy our nice big yard and I'm trying to figure out how best to add a garden without detracting from the nice big open expanse of grass for playing in :) 

We also had our first grill out of the season. I think I want to move the grill to the back deck, but it works nicely on the front porch too. Either place is much more convenient than in the driveway at our old house, which involved carrying all the food down the back steps from the kitchen and carrying all the dirty dishes back up the steps afterward. 

Last fall we were supposed to take Lexie's rental violin in for a "check-up" but with moving and such (actually not only did WE move, but the violin shop moved too so things were hectic for all of us), one thing led to another and we FINALLY took her violin in week before last. As I suspected, he immediately confirmed that she had outgrown her 3/4 size and was ready for a full size. Which led to the discussion of renting vs buying. He showed her 3 different violins and she played them all but decided to think about it before making a final decision.

So, we went back in on Tuesday and after much playing of all the violins, and thinking she chose her violin and bow. The violin is approximately 100 years old, from Germany. The bow is also old, refurbished (apparently different bows sound different, and will sound different depending who's playing them. I have to admit, to my decidedly NOT musical ear, all the violins and bows sounded the same, so I was no help). Interestingly, from the first time she played the various violins, the shop owner said that this was the one that was the best fit for her, but she had to decide it for herself.

Thankfully we managed to do this while Mama and Papa were here, helping us get our old house ready to put on the market, so Little Bit got to spend the evening with Mama and Papa's undivided attention instead of being bored at the violin shop for the almost 2 hours that we were there.

Little Bit and I went to a friend's house during Lexie & Ashlyn's music lesson this week. The plan was to let Little Bit and her friend listen to the first Herb Fairies story, and then go hunt for Chickweed in their yard, but their attention span isn't long enough to listen through the whole story in one setting, and it was rainy so not a good day for harvesting. So they listened to part of it and then ran off to play.  Still a fun playdate, definitely preferable to Little Bit than grocery shopping during music lessons :)

Much to Ashlyn's delight, the same friend asked if we wanted to watch their dog on Wednesday. They were going to be out of the house all day and figured he'd rather come snuggle with us than be home alone. He got much love and attention :) And when they came to pick him up, Lexie got to show off her new violin, and Little Bit got to play with friends, so it worked out well for all of us :)

As soon as Little Bit decided on the American Girl doll she wants for her birthday, Lexie started talking about sewing doll clothes for it. She found patterns online of most of the original clothes (from when American Girl was owned by Pleasant Company), and spent a good bit of last week sewing Samantha's birthday dress. She got it done, all ready for Samantha to wear on Little Bit's birthday next weekend! Now she's busy again, working on Samantha's nightgown :)

I think that pretty much sums up our week. We finished the week off with the threat of snow, the perfect way to welcome spring, right?

Busy Days

As always seems to be the case, when life gets busy, blogging is one of the things that tends to not happen. . . which means that, when I have time to blog, I don't have much to blog about and when I have lots to blog about, I don't have time to blog . . . sigh . . . 

Here's at least a brief summary of our recent adventures . . . 

A couple weeks ago we spent a day at Franklin Institute (a museum in Philadelphia). Their special exhibit was on Egypt. One of the hands-on exhibits was trying to put "pottery shards" together into a bowl or vase. It was pretty cool, the "pottery shards" were magnetic and the form that they were supposed to put the "shards" on was also magnetic. Lexie and Ashlyn worked on it for quite awhile. I have to say, I was rather annoyed at the employee/volunteer in that area, we're not talking about toddlers here, they're almost 13, old enough to figure it out by trial and error but she kept telling them if they put a piece in the wrong spot or putting a piece in for them. URGH!!! But they enjoyed it despite the unwanted help. Little Bit "helped" Lexie a little, but pretty quickly moved on to other parts of the exhibit.

Like riding the camel. What's fun is we have pictures of Lexie & Ashlyn riding the same camel (or a very similar one) at a the COSI museum in Ohio when they were a few months younger than Little Bit is now (see them here).  How fun is that? 

Little Bit also loved being able to walk through Franklin Institute's giant heart (you get to be the "blood" and follow the path blood takes through the heart). And they had another exhibit that was supposed to be traveling through all the connections in the brain, but was basically just a big climbing thing for kids. She didn't like that there were flashing lights in an otherwise rather dark room, but once she got over that, she did it several times while her sisters read the other exhibits in that area in more detail.

Another favorite was an electricity exhibit. Fitting at the Franklin Institute huh? Though as one of the big girls pointed out, it's rather ironic that Ben Franklin gets so much credit for being the "Father of Electricity" when he was actually doing an incredibly STUPID thing by flying a kite, with a metal key on it, in a lightening storm. One of the exhibits had a metal ball that transmitted low voltage electricity to you when you touched it. You were then SUPPOSED to touch various other things in the exhibit (like a "windmill" looking thing and I don't remember what else) and transmit the electricity to it so that it would move. That didn't actually work well, but the girls discovered they could do some pretty impressing "shocking" of one another while one of them touched the ball. 

Another day recently, Lexie went on a baking spree. . . the night before, while watching a BBC series on life in Victorian England, she announced that she was making baked custard for breakfast. Which she did. The flavor was rather bland. I'm not sure if it was the recipe she used, or if our vanilla extract is old enough to not be as potent as most. But otherwise we all (well, except Daddy, but he doesn't like anything sweet, so we didn't expect him to like it) liked it ok. 

While searching for the custard recipe, she apparently came across a lemon curd recipe, because when breakfast was over she asked if she could make lemon curd. Our "history" that day was an audiobook, so we turned the volume up a bit and she made the lemon curd while listening to history. Once it was done, her sisters asked what she was going to use it for, so she decided to make scones to eat the lemon curd on. They turned out great, as did the lemon curd, and made for a yummy "lunch"! She made a half pint of lemon curd and I think it lasted slightly over 24 hours before it had all been eaten . . . once the scones were gone, the girls ate it on bread, so it was a big hit! 

Little Bit is enjoying her new "school" set up. And it's doing a pretty good job of achieving it's purpose of forcing me to actually get stuff together for her to do. One of her Bible stories was the wall of Jericho, so that week's activity was building "Jericho" out of toothpicks and marshmallows. It's hard to see because of the pattern on the table cloth, but she had fun building it.  

And then marching around it 7 times before tearing it down (and, of course, eating (some of) the marshmallows)!!

Lexie joined her in building a marshmallow/toothpick city, but her's was much more elaborate and after it was done, she didn't want to tear it down (and so, 2 weeks later, it continues to act as our centerpiece LOL). 

I discovered a homeschool/unschool facebook group that plan various field trips and get togethers and everyone just joins in on the ones that work for them. Perfect for us! Last week we went to a Maple Sugaring demonstration at a park. It was very well done. The teacher did a great job of keeping it simple enough for the preschoolers in the group, but explaining things in enough detail that the big girls and I found it interesting as well. The kids got to taste sap dripping straight from the tree, and learned about the various ways that trees have been tapped, going back to the way the Native Americans did it before Europeans were here, to the modern methods used now. Then she showed them how the sap is cooked down into syrup and finally cooked down even more into maple sugar. And everyone got to taste a little piece of the maple sugar. Very interesting, and well done! 

 This week we joined the group for another field trip. This one was at a wildlife conservation area only about 10 min from our house! I didn't even know it was there, will definitely be going back for nature walks and such regularly! Every year the snow geese "rest" on the lake there during their migration. So this week there were thousands (literally) of snow geese on the lake! One of the dads in the group is an avid birder and had the day off, so he brought his super fancy binocular-thingy and led the group, pointing out any birds he saw, including a blue heron rookery that he'd discovered (it was way far away, only visible through his binocular-thingy, and sooo cool!). He was great at answering questions and explaining things and did I mention THOUSANDS of geese . . . it was very impressive!

The weather this week has been amazing! Up into the 70s, sunny . . . heavenly! So instead of our normal weekly co-op, we all met at a park. Some of the swings were high enough for the big girls and moms to be able to swing without dragging their feet, so we had fun with that.

 And Ashlyn was pretty proud of herself when the baby, who was much too interested in everything going on around her to actually, willingly, take a nap, finally fell asleep while Ashlyn was holding her.

One of my reasons for setting things up in this house with the litter boxes in the garage, and a cat door between the house & the garage, besides the obvious (keeping the mess out of the house), was so that, when the weather is nice, I can open the garage door a little bit and hte cats can come and go as they please. So we've been doing that this week. Overall it's worked well, but I discovered an unexpected down side when we got home the other day and I walked into the laundry room and discovered a dead mole laying on the floor. My first thought, not thinking about the fact that I'd left the garage door open  enough for the cats to get in and out, was that they'd caught it IN the house, but then I realized that it's much more likely that one of the cats caught it and brought us a present, sigh . . . I guess as long as they deliver their presents to the laundry room and not, say my bedroom, AND that all presents are thoroughly dead, I can live with it, but EWWWWWWWWW!!!!

Experience Based Unschooling

It's always interesting to me how different my children are from each other. Whereas, by age 5, Lexie and Ashlyn had fallen into a "school" routine.  I have to admit, I keep expecting Little Bit to fall into a similar routine, but so far it hasn't happened. Once in awhile I'll create a schedule for her, but she just hasn't had the natural interest in formal learning that her sisters had by much younger. 

Recently I came across this article, and thought it might be an approach that could be adapted to work well for Little Bit. Not so much because I feel like she HAS to be "doing school" yet (while I tend to grumble extensively about the many hoops we must jump through to homeschool in PA, the one positive is that we don't have to start jumping through those hoops until age 8, so she still has another year before I have to actually keep track of any "school"), but because it would give me the structure *I* need to have a variety of options available for her on a regular basis instead of her randomly asking me to do something and me scrambling to figure out if I have what we need for it. 

So, over the weekend, I set up her new school system. I had this little 4 cube shelf in the entryway and hadn't really done anything with it (not sure it will live permanently in the entryway, I'm still figuring out furniture placement in this house, but for now, it works.  The basket on top is a book basket, I included her Jesus Storybook Bible that we're currently reading once a week for her Bible anyway, some picture books the correlate with what the big girls are doing in history, and some other random picture books off our shelf that I think she'd enjoy. I also had a Jim Weiss audio that correlates with the big girls' history that I think she'll enjoy, but I have it as an mp3 on my computer, so didn't have a "book" to put in her basket for that one. So I printed off a picture of the cover and laminated it, we'll see, going forward if I decide to print off all the Jim Weiss covers as we get to them, or if I make that the generic "Jim Weiss audio" indicator. 

The other basket on top of the shelf is her reading stuff. Lexie has been working with her on reading, somewhat sporadically. She uses the McGuffy's Primer and the foam letter tiles we have in the basement and spells the letters out with the tiles for Little Bit to read. I also have a .pdf that is copywork to go with the McGuffy's Primer so in this basket is the McGuffy's Primer, the copywork to go with the lesson they're on, and the plastic container has a combination of salt and glitter that she can trace letters/words in if she wants. I ask that they do at least one lesson per week.

One bin is the "Watch" bin. I didn't put much in this bin, because honestly, she watches plenty of TV on her own. I don't mind, it's mostly educational. Wild Kratts, Martha Speaks, Magic Schoolbus . . . but because she watches it without prompting I don't feel the need to encourage it, per se. But I did put in a science video that we have, the Samantha American Girl movie (Lexie just finished reading the Samantha books to her), and, since we were planning to go to an Ice Harvesting demonstration Sunday, but didn't because of weather, I printed out a picture of them harvesting ice, and laminated it, to indicate that we can watch a YouTube video on that this week. 

Another bin is the "play" bin. This is really a way to "force" me to take time to play games with her (though if she gets her sisters or Daddy to play with her instead, that's fine too), and a way to draw her attention to some games that she's old enough for, but hasn't noticed yet. I put 2 games she hasn't played, an "old favorite" (Sorry), and a puzzle in the bin for this week.

The "Create" bin will, not doubt, be a favorite bin for her, and was one of the main things that attracted me to this idea. She LOVES doing anything arts & crafts related, but I'm really bad about taking the time to pull things together for her to do crafts. My hope is that this will "force" me to pull together all the "pieces" for several art projects each week. I want each week to include a variety of different art medium. For this week I included: Sculpt - a package of model magic, Paint - a suncatcher paint kit, fiber - the "learn to tie your shoe" thing the big girls had when they were little, the printable (make a booklet by drawing pictures) that goes along with this week's Jesus Storybook Bible story, and the other thing for this week, that I still need to pull the pieces together for, is a ladybug craft (milk carton lids, black paint, googly eyes, glue). Also, when I was looking for videos for the "Watch" bin, I was reminded that we have some See the Light DVDs that Little Bit might be ready for, so I put one of them in too. Only problem is, I'll have to hunt down the required art supplies AFTER we watch the first part of the DVD. But we'll see how it works out. 

 And finally, the "Active" bin. Again, a big part of this is to get ME to be more intentional about having activities ready for her. The plastic bag has a "toss game" that the big girls had when they were younger. I found it when I was unpacking. Another activity that goes with this week's Jesus Storybook Bible story is a version of "red light, green light" so I printed a picture of a stoplight & laminated it. I have directions saved for how to dance the Virginia Reel, and figured all 3 girls could try that out as a part of history, so I printed out a picture of people dancing the Virginia Reel and laminated it and added it to the bin. I also have a geography game where I printed out full page pictures of each continent and laminated them. The game is a poem that names all the continent and then mom calls out the names of random continents for kids to jump to. I was still working on laminating the pages when I took these pictures but it's in there now.

She doesn't have to do all the bins every day, I told her she could pick 2, and she said "is that all?" so I changed it to "at least 2". Some days she might do all the bins, some days, not so many. I'm hoping to keep at least 3 or 4 things in each bin (adding new as she uses some of them), so she always has plenty of options. If she consistently passes over something for a couple weeks I'll pull it out and assume it doesn't interest her.

And one final basket. The basket on the floor next to the shelves is our "done" basket. After we read a book or she does a craft or plays a game or . . . anything she is to put it in the "done" basket. That way I can check in the evening and know for sure what school she's done, and what bins I might need to replenish. It also means that art supplies that we'll use again (paint, etc) gets put where I can find it,  library books don't get lost, etc. It will also be useful if we continue with this approach long-term because I can use the "done" basket to keep records once she's old enough that we have to report to the state.

I used chalkboard labels on each bin, and for the baskets I stuck chalkboard labels onto colored paper and punched holes in the paper to tie the labels onto the baskets. I'm hoping to get chalkboard markers soon, which will, I think, be "brighter" and less likely to wipe off, but for now I used chalk pastels to write on the labels.

Catching Up . . .

I'm not doing well with blogging regularly, am I? We've been busy, but not doing anything too earth-shattering. Here are a few pictures from the past month or so . . . 

Don't think I ever posted pictures of the wall decals Little Bit got for Christmas. This is the wall under her loft bed, isn't it perfect? 

As some of you might remember, for Lexie and Ashlyn's 7th birthday, we went to the American Girl store in New York City and they each chose a doll and some accessories, and we had tea in the cafe.  I was starting to think we wouldn't be doing similar for Little Bit's 7th birthday. Whereas Lexie and Ashlyn enjoyed the American Girl books starting when they were 5, it was just recently that Little Bit has decided they're interesting. But, just in time for her birthday next month, she has dived head first into the world of American Girl.

So we WILL be having another American Girl 7th birthday after all. She has decided that the doll she wants is Samantha. And she wanted to get Samantha's bed since both her sisters have a bed for one of their dolls. However, while Josefina and Kit both had reasonably (for American Girl stuff) priced beds, Samantha's is much less reasonable. So, Lexie to the rescue! She has made a bed for Samantha. She made it in an afternoon out of a cardboard box! And then went through our fabric bin and button box and made a comforter for the bed over the next couple of days. Little Bit rearranged things under her loft bed in preparation for Samantha's arrival :)

While our BIG snow of the winter was the topic of my previous post, we did get a beautiful snow storm a couple weeks ago. It was truly beautiful, snowing most of the day, and turning the whole world into a powder-sugar covered landscape. As an added bonus, the temperatures were near freezing so, while we enjoyed a quiet day at home, we COULD have gone out if we'd had to.

Our rather quiet winter has led to lots of creativity from the kiddos. One afternoon as I sat in the living room a piece of yarn dropped down through a knot-hole in the ceiling (which is also the floorboards of Lexie and Little Bit's room). When all was said and done, Lexie and Little Bit had created a tin-can telephone from their room to the living room.

A week ago, Friday, Little Bit and Ashlyn noticed a stray cat in our yard. Ashlyn went out and "made friends" with it and wanted to bring it inside. While it WAS a very cold day, I assumed, especially since it was a very friendly little cat, that it lived somewhere nearby, so vetoed the idea of letting it in the house. However, the next morning when I went into the sunroom for my morning Bible time, I noticed that there were quite a few cat footprints in the dusting of snow we'd gotten overnight right outside the sliding door. It had been down near zero overnight, so not a night for a cat to be out and about :(

We headed out to church, and a busy Sabbath. It was "Jean Sabbath" when we do various community service projects in the afternoon. For the last several months Ashlyn has been asking to go pass out food and other things to the homeless downtown, but Lexie and Little Bit have wanted to help provide crafts and games at Olivet (the Big Brothers/Big Sisters center downtown). For various reasons we've ended up doing the crafts and games, so finally this month I told Ashlyn that I would take her to pass out lunches while Rodney took Lexie and Little Bit to Olivet. It was AFTER I agreed to that, that I realized the HIGH TEMPERATURE that day was going to be 15 F!! Brrrrrr . . . but we survived. People were very appreciative of the food AND coats that had been donated for us to pass out. AND because it was so cold, we didn't waste any extra time outside, so as it turned out, Ashlyn and I got to Olivet just as they were starting the crafts, so she was able to help with that too.

When we finally got home late Sabbath afternoon, the above mentioned cat came running across the yard toward us. Much as we DO NOT need another cat, I couldn't, in good conscience, leave it outside in weather THAT cold, when I knew it hadn't had a place to go the night before. So, I told Ashlyn to bring it inside until the cold snap was past. She's a pretty little thing (Ashlyn is guessing she's around 9 mo old, based on her research), and looks quite a bit like Lexie's first cat, Socks. Socks ran away several years ago, and soon after that one of the strays that came and ate on our porch at our first house in PA looked somewhat similar and was christened Socks Jr. Which makes this cat Socks the Third, or Tre.  It only took her a day to figure out the cat door and litter box, and she's very friendly with people, and amazingly tolerant of Little Bit carrying her around and generally mauling her, but she continues to growl at the other cats whenever they get close, and generally not play nice with them. So we shall see . . . once it warmed up, we put her outside and she ran off over the hill, so I thought that might be that, but at bedtime she came back. And again yesterday, she was outside, but came back at bedtime, so she seems to have claimed us as home base.

We've been having lots of fun with school during the cold winter days, so conducive to indoor activities. We're using the Jesus Storybook Bible for Little Bit's Bible this year, and doing fun hands-on activities and crafts to go along with each story. The activity for the story of crossing the red sea was to create a shaving cream "red sea" for her plastic people to walk through. I'm not sure the sea ever parted or people ever walked through, but she had GREAT fun playing with the shaving cream :)

Lexie came to me last week and said she needed a flower to dissect for science. Ummmm . . . couldn't you have planned things to do that particular experiment when, getting a flower was as simple as going outside and picking a wild flower? Of course not, that would be too easy! However, she pointed out that they had passed carnations out to all the adults at church for Valentine's Day, so I had 2 carnations in a vase on the kitchen window sill. She insisted that one of those flowers was Daddy's and HE didn't care about flowers, so she should be able to dissect HIS flower. And that is what happened. . . it's amazing how different a carnation looks once it's been dissected, isn't it? I was busy with other things when she and Little Bit dissected it, but she said it was really cool!

For supper one night last week Lexie took her first stab at making homemade, sourdough pita bread. They got abit brown, but overall turned out quite well. They tasted great with the falafel and tzatziki sauce she made for supper, and even had the pocket that pita bread is supposed to have! Definitely something she'll be doing again, YUM!

And that pretty much catches us up. As proof of how weird our weather is this winter, last Sabbath's high was 15, and yesterday's high was 60!!!