The dollhouse

Klaire received some money from her grandparents, and with the money I thought it would be sooooo fun to get her a doll house. Check this baby out!!

Klaire

How did she get this big already?? Crazy to think in just a few more weeks, she'll be a big sister!

ER Visit

Well, it happened, finally. We had to take one of hte kids to the ER to get staples. Funny thin is, I always thought it would be a boy that it happened to, but nope, it was Klaire, the little dare-devil herself. I'm telling you she's gonna be the death of me.
We were at Taco Bell, and she decided to climb on a stool like her big sister had. I remember watching her climb up there, and thinking, "This is not a good idea, Klaire." Next thing I know, she was on the ground with the heavy stool on top of her. I picked her up trying to soothe her and then I saw blood everywhere. Ahhhh!!! I'm so not a blood person. So, I rushed home, had Eric look at it, and then took her to the ER. Of course, by the time we got to the ER you wouldn't have known anything was wrong with her at all. She was completely back to her own self. Ha!

She required two staples, and man, are those grossing me out. I want to put a bow on top, so I don't have to see them, but I guess that wouldn't be such a great idea, huh?

Still Missing him!

This post might be a little old, but it still says everything I feel.

First Day of co-op

We love co-op . It's kinda like the first day of school for us. For those of you that don't know what a co-op is, it's when a whole bunch of homeschool families get their kids together and offer a whole bunch of classes that they might not get at home or simply just for fun classes. For instance,


Blake is taking: Botany, Science Fun, and Lego Mechanisms. (For those of you who know me, know that I hate science, and Blake loves science. All of these classes are great for him!


Luke is taking: Ohio History, Zoom Science, and Bee Alert. (He is not thrilled about Ohio History, but the kids have to take it. Bee Alert is awesome because every week kids have various topics that they have to answer 100 questions to. On co-op day they go and have a competition on what they've answered. One of the mom's at my co-op developed the whole curriculum. It's fabulous!)


Jakeb is taking: Ohio History, Science Experiments, and Math Games and More. (His favorite is the Math Games!!)


Kaleb is taking: 7 Days of Creation Activities, Gym, and Math Games


Makenna is in the preschool class, and...

Klaire is in the nursery.

The mom's are usually required to help out in two classes each, but some also teach. I have the huge responsiblity of teaching SCRAPBOOKING this year. Whoo! It might be a little hard for me! Ha!

Museum

This past May when we went, they were showing signs of their new exhibit "Hidden Treasures" or something like that. Anyways, Blake was dying to go to see the tomb and Egyptian stuff. Well it never worked out over the summer, but we were finally able to make the trip to see the exhibit a couple of weeks ago. outside view of the muesum



This statue dude was a puzzle that the kids put together.



Makenna excavating for hidden treasures

Here's Klaire in the Barbie exhibit runway showing off her outfit and her fancy princess twirl







Afterwards we were able to meet up with some friends, the Welch's, and we had such a nice visit. I can't wait to come to Indy again to hang out, Beth! (PS. I'm bummed that I didn't get a picture of you guys to include on here. Next time!)

Homemade Wooden Blocks

We're going green! Not! I saw this cute idea for the wooden blocks on a blog a good while ago, and I had just been waiting for an oppurtunity to ask Eric to make some. Recently, in the past month or so, we had a storm that knocked down a huge branch, and so while he was taking care of that branch, I finally got my chance. He didn't mind one bit using his chainsaw toy for some of the big pieces. For the smaller ones, he just used his miter saw. Klaire had fun with them today. and shoot, it's a fun toy, and what could be better....it was free!!!

Happy Birthday, Blake!

He's 11! Can you believe it?? Ahhhhh.... And, he's celebrating his birthday in Florida with us right now. Hope he doesn't mind!

Felt Fish

Here's some felt fish I made. I got the idea from here. Each fish has some deocrative items on them all the way up to 10. I drew them freehanded on the felt and then cut them out. Then I glued the washer to one side, decorated the other side with objects, and the quickly stitched them together. Don't look too close or you'll see some really horrible stitching. Each fish has a different amount of objects on it, so they'll be great for counting.

We didn't get to use them as much last week as I had planned because of some unplanned doctor's visits and sick kids, and well..if you homeschool, you know how it goes, but I will definitely be using them a lot in the future. They'll be great for counting.

Ocean themed sensory bin and I Spy Jar

Here's our sensory bin that I put together filled with blue rice, some ocean toys that we had around the house, and some seashells.

I Spy bottle

And I made a quick I spy bottle, and I printed out the bottom picture so the kids will know exactly what to look for.

Glue paint

We made our very own Glue paint which we did a projects with...the first art project of the year. We just mixed the 1/2 filled glue bottles with some acrylic paint, and voila...makes for some fun crafts.

Basically on these pictures, you simply draw your picture with pencil, trace it with the colored glue, and then wait for it to dry. The next day, you use water colors to color it all in. Fun!!!

Play Doh Mats

I found these fabulous Playdoh mats from here.And they have a ton more. They have them for everything: numbers, cursive letters, printing letters, addition, subtractions, clocks, and just a bunch of other fun activities like the ocean theme. They're awesome, and they're FREE!

Now let me be clear. I HATE/ABHOR Playdoh. We've had Playdoh in the past and I ended up throwing it all away because it just ended up all over, dried up, or all mixed up. I vowed I would never, never, never buy Playdoh again. So for me to break my vow of never buying Play doh again, well...they must be cool mats. They even have face ones that you can make your own faces on the mats. How fun is that? I'm loving them, so I broke down and bought not just one package of Playdoh, but 3 packages of 4 meaning I'm now the owner of 12 cans of Playdoh. Ahhh!!!! The kids love them though, and so far...it's not too messy.

Homeschooling week 3 - Ocean themed part 2

Here's a continuation of our homeschool week which, of course, didn't go like I was hoping. They never do, do they? I missed a day of teaching because of three doctor's appointments, I had three days of sick kids (one on each day), and emergency doctor visit including an xray, and I don't think we opened our history books or reading books all week. And of course, we're packing up getting ready for Florida. Oh, and did I mention that I had to have two stress tests on the baby too because of the gestational diabetes? But somehow, God got us through it all, and man, am I looking forward to vacation.

pattern cards for Makenna - another free printable

Jakeb and Klaire enjoying the felt fish that I made. Yes, it even involved some stitching. Gasp!!! I'll talk more about them later.


This was a fun project - Glue art - I got the idea from a blog, but I plan on posting more about that later.

Day 2 of the Glue art project - Painting with watercolors


Kaleb building
Klaire's little lapbook from here
Play dough mats from here


Shadow matching from one of the printable packs I downloaded.
Magnet Worksheets - Some people do these on cookie sheets, but frankly I didn't feel like going up stairs and getting them, so the girls did them on the board. It hink they might have like it more this way anyways.

Luke and Klaire making a home for a worm that Luke found. Too bad I refused to let them keep it.
a few outside races because it was so nice out