Tuesday, November 10, 2009

leaves

What kid doesn't love jumping in leaves? The kids had a blast. I think it's awesome that God thought of the fall. Grant it, I'm sure His main goal for the fall wasn't kids jumping in the leaves, but it sure is an awesome bonus!





Bikes

Yes, my boys are nine, eight, six, and almost five, and we've just started teaching them how to ride bikes. Blake and Luke are two wheelers now, while Jakeb and Kaleb are still sporting some training wheels. We live in a cul-de-sac where traffic is at a bare minumum, but it's a hill and makes it hard to learn to ride the bike at first. And then we have our gravel driveway which also doesn't help matters. Regardless, Blake and Luke are doing great on their "shared" bike. Jakeb is riding Kaleb's bike that I got at a garage sale; Kaleb is riding Makenna's bike that our neighbor gave us; and Makenna is riding Blake's bike from when he was a baby. (I still can't believe we've held on to that thing for that long.)



3 months

cute, huh? She's getting bigger and bigger. About a week and a half ago, she was almost 13 pounds. She smiles all the time, and she's getting pretty close to rolling over. She's got some strong muscles and shows them off by standing (obviously with help), and holding her head up high. (She's gotta have strong muscles to take her stand against those four older brothers!)

up a tree without a ladder

Once again, I proved to the world that I'm a horrible mother. My son climbed up our neighbors tree (with their permission, of course). Then he got stuck. He climbed too high, and couldn't get down. He didn't stategize his exit route. The branch that he thought he could reach, he couldn't. And the his leg that he thought he could lift up over another branch....well, he couldn't lift it up. As you've probably figured by now, Luke got stuck up a tree. Now, had I been in my youth, I would have probably climbed up the tree too. Man, I loved climbing trees as a child. I was like a little monkey. But, alas, I'm not a monkey any longer (more like a buffoon).
Anyways, Luke got stuck. So, when Jakeb came to get me, I rolled my eyes and figured he couldn't be too stuck. But then I saw him. He was quite a ways up there. My very first thought when I saw him was, "I wonder if I could call the fire department. That would make for a great story and some fun pictures." (No lie, that was my first thought.) And then I started to laugh. I started to laugh at my son being stuck up the tree. Am I not the world's worse mother??? I found the whole situation so funny.
Since I decided not to call the fire department because it would cause to much attention to ourselves, I tried to coax him down like you would a cat hoping that maybe he could find a way down. Luke couldn't be budged. He was up there in that tree boo-hooing about being stuck there. I started wishing that a limb would somehow magically grow so that he could step down on it and climb down. But obviously that didn't happen either.
Finally I decided to call Eric. He would offer some piece of advice, right? "The ladder is in the garage, Marshan, but it's pretty heavy." So, off I go to get the ladder. I was half hoping he would just volunteer to come home. That would have been easier in my book.
So, after I pull down this big, awkward, heavy ladder down and start walking to my neighbors yard, my neighbor wearing his Jesus Patrol T-shirt comes out and says, "I'll get him down." Talk about being a hero! (But how I wish he would have came out about five minutes earlier before I pulled down that ladder and carried it over to their yard!) Shoot, the man was like a monkey. He climbed up there in about 3 seconds flat. When he reached Luke, I had a vision of him trying to pick him up and then both falling. I said to him, "He's heavier than he looks." Well, patrol guy looked at me, grabbed Luke, placed him on a lower branch, and said, "Well, I'm stronger than I look!"
Oh my word! I hadn't meant it that way. There has been many a persons that have gone to pick up Luke, and then came close to breaking their backs because they didn't realize what a big guy he is., and I seriously did not want my son to be lying on the ground with broken leg because some guy didn't realize that. After trying to explain that to the neighbor and thanking him profusely, Luke finished climbing down from the tree in one piece although he did say his tookus was slightly sore from sitting up there so long. Ha! Later I asked him if he wanted to go back outside to climb some trees. He looked at me, and said....."Yeah!" Guess the little booger hasn't learned his lesson yet! Of course neither did his momma when she was that age!


Thursday, November 5, 2009

homeschooling activities

We've been studying Ancient Egypt, and the other day we did the whole mummification process, well, not the whole process, but part of it. The kids loved putting the organs into the canopic jars, not to mention they loved the whole wrapping of the mummy! And what could be greater than being junior archealogist? We were able to deciper hieroglyphics which told us where to start chiseling on the pyramid. Once we found the lock on the pyramid, we were able to break in and find lots of treasures inside.
We've also done a few art projects like make a comet and make Caramel apples. No, they have nothing to do with each other, but they were still fun.

Oh, and did I mention that we made homemade pizzas too?