A Night Of My Own

Last night our Ward had their annual "Sisters in White". Many of the sisters went to the Temple together and did different assignments. We were treated to dinner when we first arrived at the cafeteria. Had a very yummy asian chicken salad. Then we split up to our respective areas. I did a session. It was such a special night. I loved going and being with the sisters in the ward, but I have to say I really missed Travis. This was my first time without him~ever! We are going to have to go soon together to help me get over my withdrawls. It was also very nice to not have the kids with me. Aah, peace and quiet! (o: Travis had the day off, so he stayed home with the boys and they drew pictures, played in a sleeping bag, and made a giant traffic circle in our living room. It was a good night for everyone!

For those who keep asking~Fluffy is alive and well and growing! He loves to eat and poop and be held by everyone. So, thank you all for asking and we will try and get a picture of the little guy up asap.

That's all for tonight. I am still working on revamping my entire school year. I just keep finding really great stuff. The boys aren't protesting because their "school days" are consisting of watching "Magic Schoolbus" dvds, reading stories, and playing board games this week while I get it all in order. I have felt very blessed and guided in my planning for this new schedule. Don't know what I was doing this summer when I was doing my original plan, but I'm grateful that things are coming together.

A Little Bit of Everything

(first of all~I published this post and then looked at it~they made it all one giant paragraph! I would like to stress that I am not a poor writer nor did I have a brain fart in the early hours~Google made me do it!)

It's very early in the morning~before 6am. Anyone who knows me knows that this is not my time. I am a night owl. I could stay up all night and be fine. I've been staying up until all hours lately watching Ken Burns' new documentary, "The War". (I highly recommend it) But mornings~not for me. Once I am in bed and sleeping, I like to stay there. I am reminded of all those times (I think there were 3) when I drove from Rexburg Idaho to Provo Utah and then on to St. Louis Missouri. It would be a non-stop 28 hour drive for me. I was always with friends. The reason for the stop in Provo~it was my friends who had the vehicle or we were picking someone up. Imagine driving that many hours without sleep. Can I just say that by the time we hit St. Louis, we were singing some pretty silly songs and beginning to see little green men. (o: I loved it~fun memories.

Anyway, Travis has an opening shift, which means he has to be out of the door before 6. I get up with him and make sure he has everything he needs for the day. I have found that I can't go straight back to sleep, so I thought I would ramble a bit on my blog. (o: I was also working on refining my homeschool goals. In Washington state, we have to cover 11 subjects a year. It sounds like a lot, but since I don't have to do each subject each day, it's not bad. But, I didn't do a very good job in my planning and decided to take a closer look at and revamp my plan. Especially since Joseph has decided that numbers are his biggest enemy and completely shuts down at the mere mention of them. I told him that he at least needed to know his phone number and address~he refuses. He won't even learn the specifics of telling time because it involves numbers. I asked the advice of some seasoned homeschoolers. All of which advised me to not push him, be sneaky with getting some in here and there, and try again next year. Spencer, on the other hand, cries whenever I say no math or numbers in a day. That kid is going to have Travis and I passed up in the math department very quickly!

The boys are, however, excelling in their reading. They love words and are fascinated with being able to figure out what things say. They've cracked the code! It's so fun to watch them discover all the cool things that are out there~just by reading signs. They love reading all the signs when we go for drives. As you may know, we like going for drives, so they get plenty of opportunities to practice.

I've got some pictures below that are just some fun pictures. Sorry about the less than stellar quality of the one with them on the couch. That was Monday night after family home evening. They are eating their dessert. Please take notice of the CTR rings on their fingers.(the shiny dots) Spencer got one in Primary Sunday, so we had to drive up to Deseret Bookstore by the Temple and get each boy their own ring. (Can you believe they charge a whole dollar for those little metal things?) Then we have Travis's birthday cake~cute smile! Then Spencer. Travis took that one on Joseph's birthday. He is such a ham! Lastly, one of the boys playing with their trains next to Fluffy the guinea pig. (pay no attention to the messy room around them. I did my best to crop it out!) (o:

Have a super day everyone! Now I'm going back to bed. (o:

Happy Birthday Travis!

Happy 36th Birthday to a wonderful Daddy and husband!!!! We love you very much!!!

Still Alive!

I believe Joseph has some anxiety with his new pet. This morning he got up, ran to Fluffy's cage and said, " Oh good, he's alive!"

In our studies of guinea pigs this past month we learned that they don't live as long as humans. (of course) Their average lifespan is about 6 years. It was not great news to the boys that our new pet wouldn't be living with us forever, although to a 7 &5 year old, 6 years is forever. I guess Joseph was just pondering this fact in bed and got concerned.

So, for all of you who have been asking how Fluffy is doing~he's alive. Connor hasn't killed him, though he has offered Skittles and ham to the poor thing. We made a chart of the things that Fluffy likes (carrots, celery, apples, hay) and stressed that Skittles and ham were not on the list. (o: We will keep you all updated on our ultimate science project, or classroom pet.

Have a great day!

Joseph's Birthday!

I am finding that I have to give up on getting any pictures to come up that are decent size on the blog. It is only allowing me to bring up pictures in the small mode and then I am only getting about half of those even. Luckily I got a couple of pictures from Joseph's birthday to come up.

Joseph woke up to his favorite breakfast of pancakes. Only these weren't ordinary pancakes~no, these were birthday pancakes! Get it? (o: He thought that was pretty cool. Then, we skipped school-cause we could-and went to Grandma's house to pick her up. We had lunch at Taco Time (thanks grandma) and then went to the party store. Joseph picked some firefighting items to decorate with and then off we went to the pet store. Good old Petco had about a billion guinea pigs to choose from. We picked fluffy because he was one of the younger ones and because he is so colorful. (sorry about the stinky picture quality. The better photo wouldn't download-of course) We brought Fluffy home, got Little Caesar's pizza for dinner,(I know~we are the healthiest eaters around!) then opened presents. Joseph got some awesome clothes from Grandma Teese-including a Seahawks sweatshirt (GO Hawks!) and Cars pj's which he needed desperately. He also got some cool art stuff. Then his gift from his parents. We reluctantly bought him a dart gun. Not that we try to completely shelter our children, but we have never spoken about guns in our home. The kids have seen plenty of Civil War and WWII footage in our house to know what a gun is, but never have they wanted one. Until~the neighbor boys got them. Oh lovely. I just love other peoples kids sometimes. Joseph has picked up some lovely language from kids that he goes to church with too! Again~lovely!

Needless to say he was thrilled with his dart gun (his words) and has had a lot of fun shooting all the pictures in the house. Connor loves to shoot the thing as well, but Spencer would love nothing better than to throw the thing out the window. Kids are funny.

So, there you have Joseph's birthday in a nutshell. Oh, and we had cake and ice cream too. Grandma and Grandpa Nelson came over for the event~even though all my family was invited, none of them wanted to travel thousands of miles for a dry piece of cake and sugar free ice cream. Go figure! (o:

Fluffy

(I have been fighting with good old blogger for two days now. I can not get the pictures to come up. I apologize for not having a photo of our new little guy. As soon as I can get pictures to work, I will post plenty. That goes for Joseph's birthday too.)

Our new guinea pig is named Fluffy. He is 8 weeks old, has dark brown, black and a little bit of white fur. He is so super sweet. He has quickly captured the hearts of our entire family~including Daddy! He has begun chirping when we hold him and he loves Timothy hay.

More to come later.

Oh, and Joseph's birthday was great! I can't believe that my sweet little boy is 7!!!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yesterday I turned 33! It's not that old, but it's not all that young either. (o: I desired to go to Seattle for my special day, so Travis (who had the day off) and I took the boys down to the waterfront. We walked all along the businesses and had some lunch at the ever-famous Ivar's. That fish is goooood! (and expensive) Then we walked back along the water, stopped in the specialty candy store and got some penny candy for the boys, then went up to good old Pike Place Market. Yes, they were throwing fish when we got up there. The boys were most intrigued by a little donut making machine. We watched it drop little circles of dough into hot grease (yuck!) and then when they floated to the top a conveyor belt caught them and spit them out into a big bowl full of sugar. Oh, the boys thought they were in heaven! So, I bought them a little bag of these little bits of heaven and they were happy.

After Seattle we went to Travis's parents home and had a little bbq and sugar-free pie. (since I stopped eating sugar) It was a lot of fun. Next~Joseph's birthday. I can guarantee there will be many many pictures from that day. That is the day that our new guinea pig will arrive!!!!
(yes, this picture of me was taken Saturday at the in-laws)

One of the many cool things you find on the waterfront in Seattle. (It's wood)

This is Mr. Ivar Haglund. He was the founder of the Ivar's fish bars. We have an Ivar's restaurant near our home, but nothing beats eating on the waterfront. And it's a rule that you must never eat all of your fries~you have to go out and feed the bagillions of seagulls that are watching you eat. (o:

Happy 50th!!

Travis's parents were married September 12, 1957 in the Logan Utah Temple. Saturday (the 8th)his parents, his oldest sister Tracey and her 3 boys, and his older brother Jeff came up for a celebratory dinner in their honor. Here are a few pictures of the night. It was a lot of fun and we were very proud to celebrate such an accomplishment.

The first thing we did was we met at Black Angus for dinner. It was very very yummy! Travis and his brother and nephews ended up getting in a food fight at the end. Made Grandpa kinda mad and our boys ended up lecturing their dad about not behaving in a fancy restaurant. (o:

After dinner, we went back to his parents house for cake and gifts.

Here is Travis, his brother Jeff, and his oldest sister, Tracey.

These are Tracey's boys. Jared, Chris, and Ryan. Jared was Connor's age when we got married. Now he's a sophmore in high school! And Ryan's a return missionary! Time really flies!

Field Trip

Thursday, as promised, we went on a "field trip". We went over to West Seattle (Alki) and did a little research. Each boy had to gather a shell, an interesting rock, and a nice piece of beach glass. (see picture above) We also found a big hole in the ground near the edge of the water. We theorized about how that hole came to be. Joseph said perhaps meerkats lived there. We will have to do some meerkat research soon. I don't think they live near the ocean in Seattle. But, hey, it was a good guess. We were also thinking maybe a dog dug it for fun, or that it was a small sinkhole. After the inspection of the hole, we studied ripples in the water with Daddy. He threw a log into the water and then threw rocks just behind the log. We watched the ripples help push the log further and further out. Oh! We also have fun turning over the big rocks and looking for the little crabs. I tried to take a picture of one, but it looks too much like the rocks. I did get one of Joseph looking. (o:

All in all it was a lot of fun and very educational. We have our first entry in our nature notebook for the year.

Okay-I finally got the other pictures to come up. Blogger seems to be having a malfunction. They said I lost my cookies and everything! But, it all turned out good in the end~we can laugh about it now. (o:

Today was day 2 of our school. I went to Weight Watchers in the morning, so while I was gone, Travis did some reading with the boys, then I came back and we continued on. Once again they did very well. I can't believe how much difference a year can make. I remember last year at this time, I was really having a hard time trying to get them to listen to me, but they are actually showing enthusiasm this year. Thank goodness! Of course, it's only day 2, but, hey~I'll take all the good days I can get. (o:

Tomorrow we are going to go out to Seattle on our usual drive, BUT, it is now officially called a "field trip". I do have a Nature Notebook (Yay for Charlotte Mason!) and also a field trip notebook. Each boy will be given a small assignment while on our "field trip". They can't wait. The best part~Daddy will be with us!

I'll report in tomorrow!

First Day of School

I was too excited to post pictures to wait until tomorrow to report. Our first day of school was a huge success! We discussed patterns and sequencing, we practiced writing skills, we played a number game (to see how Joseph is doing with his numbers-answer-not so good), we discussed Renoir and his painting, "The Dancer", we painted self-portraits, we read a couple of new story books, and we read from Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. Joseph got really frustrated about half way through last year so I stopped. Today we picked up where we left off and he did stupendous! Spencer started the book this year and I had to make him stop on lesson 12! Connor was a very good little boy. He just played in the living room (made a big mess), and then when we moved to the living room for painting and reading, he went into our "classroom" (laundry room) and laid down for a rest on the table. (o: Tomorrow we are going to start learning about Beatrix Potter and Peter Rabbit (since he was a naughty little rabbit-I thought the boys might relate) and Thursday we are going to go on a "field trip" with Daddy to Seattle. The boys will have special assignments while we are out and about. Isn't this all so exciting??? Well, I think it is anyway. (o:

Below are a couple of pictures. The cutest ones of the boys with their paintings won't download, so I will have to figure that out and post them later.

Blessings

Last night we had a Family Home Evening all about the Priesthood and blessings. The boys have seen their Daddy giving blessings, but none of them have needed one for a really long time, so we wanted to talk about what they were and why they were given.

After our talk, we pulled out a chair and Joseph sat down for his first before school blessing. He and Spencer folded their arms and were very reverent throughout the entire blessing. Connor, on the other hand, got very busy pulling a chair up next to Joseph and then gathering all of his blankets and sitting next to Joseph and pretending that he was praying too. A bit of a distraction, but cute. Then it was Spencers turn. He wasn't sure at first if he wanted to do it, but with a little encouragement from Joseph, he decided it would be cool. Again, Connor pretended to pray along with his Dad. Then we decided to let Connor have a turn. He sat in the chair with his blankets, but as soon as Travis started, Connor started wiggling and he dropped his blanket and... it wasn't ideal. Needless to say though, it was a good experience and I'm glad we did it.

The other night Travis and I were reading a section on the Priesthood in our "Armor" book. I had a cool thought. In less than 10 years, there will be a whole lot of Priesthood in our house! That just gives me goosebumps to think of.

Well, I'm off to start our first day of school. Spencer is still asleep, so we'll probably start a little later than I had originally planned, but that's the beauty of homeschooling! We are going to ease into things. I have short days planned for this week. Next week we will begin to spend more time sitting and working. So, wish me luck! I'll report back later with the results. (o: