Thursday has come and gone… always a busy day we managed to amp it up even more. First with a family trip to the local stitching store… the children had a blast in the playhouse and Ken and I have come to the realization that by Trinity’s 2nd birthday at least we MUST acquire one. My suggestion was that Ken speak to my step-father and see if he could help Ken make one (he recently finished a dog house for Harley). We had to drag her out of there kicking and screaming literally!

I  can’t disclose EVERYTHING I bought as the majority of it was for my advent exchange but we did get a great deal on 3 bags of tri cornered beads in Halloween colours – 99 cents a bag! So tomorrow guess what we will be doing? Yup, stringing beads. The boys LOVE making bracelets and necklaces!

99 Cents a Bag!

For school today Ken went over insects and I took pumpkins! We worked on the life cycle of a pumpkin from seed to pie and I figure since they had so much fun putting the images in the right order instead of stapling it into a book I will put them in a pocket. Tomorrow we will discuss pie. One of the final activities to do is make a wheel with each of the spices in the pie glued on.

Prayer

Halloween Card and Pumpkin Life Cycle

It took a bit of research but Ken found out the specific type of pumpkin you need to make pie from absolute scratch (apparently a lot of the mixes you buy in the can are actually SQUASH! Ken was aghast!) and then to make things even more complicated he up and FINDS ONE! So much for my simple pie recipe! So tonight I make up my grocery list and do as much prep work as possible. And of course look into the requested apple pie recipe.

Pie Pumpkin!

Our afternoon consisted mainly of the twins working on beading projects of their choice. Gavin decided on a spider for his insect lapbook and Zander did another side on his box. They both did an amazing job with Ken only needing to do minor alterations to Zanders to make it perfect and Gavin’s to make sure one of the legs ironed correctly.

Sorry Such a Fuzzy Picture!

The coup piece of beading actually is an original creation Ken made last night of Emanuel’s beloved Pocoyo!!! I am so impressed as was all 4 kids! Now I need to make a matching one up to send to the friend that sent Trinity her wee Pocoyo doll! Oh, and send an image to Perler.

Pocoyo Times 3!

I did up two pieces of furniture for a little girl who lives in California. I changed the colours a bit from the Perler pattern but am excited to package it up and send it off to her. That just leaves the lion and figuring out a few more for other kids. Tonight I plan on making some ornaments as well as a couple of tops the boys wish to give out as gifts.

A Couch and Table

So I posted my completed stitch on DeviantArt … since it has a swear in it you DO need to have an account to see the image, but I plan on posting it on here as soon as Ken gets my paypal sorted so that the pattern will be up for purchase! Apparently there was a little glitch last night so my free patterns won’t be up until tomorrow but I am cracking the whip to get everything going ASAP!!! My newest project is a personal one and a first time – a perforated paper ornament! I am loving it!

A Nice Start

Oh, let’s not forget about Ken – he over cooked his sugar this time but he is still working on making candy! Look how proud he is!

A Sheet of Candy!

So tonight, as I mentioned, is Ken’s gaming night, game of choice – Talisman borrowed from Chris and Chris. Added bonus – my Cousin David is now a part of those! So we have a bunch of friends over and they play games while I do other things. Tonight – baking, beading and sewing. Tomorrow baking, beading and babysitting the guys as they drink and play computer games!!! Birthday party!

Thank You For Letting Me Share With You!

I have to say the biggest accomplishment today was the completion  of our first major lapbook… Colours and Shapes. This one has been worked on for weeks… doing a bit here, a bit there and mainly just going over concepts we had covered the previous year when we used the Calvert PreK curriculum. We covered everything from specific colours to colour blending, from simple shapes to making pictures out of shapes. I don’t know that I would let another non seasonal lapbook take so long but for our first truly major project I am very happy with it.

Books for in Pocket on Reverse Side of Flap

I am not sure if I have ALL the links but I do have some for sure:

The match the colour pockets, make a train from shapes seen on the top, mixing colour mini book, our colour mixing experiment, the rainbow the boys coloured, I can draw shapes book and then you can do a search for a colour wheel. We had a lapbook I got for free from Currclick to make up more of the activities and the rest was made up by us. I am sure I can hunt down more links if someone is interested! The next book will have much more organized links I am sure!

We did not make our projected mini field trips to the library and the thread store but made a family run to Michaels to check out the Perler bead options and to stealthily pick up a small kit (1.50) to go into Emanuel’s stocking this year (pirates!) and a set of tweezers (under 3.00) for the twins. I also ran into Toys R Us where I got a terrific deal on some Word World merchandise. If you get the chance and live in Alberta do go check out for clearance items. The Word World big sets are still 30.00 but the 3 bird characters – owl, duck and bird and their eggs are marked down from almost 8.00 a piece to under 3.00! So I picked up all 3 for a little over the price of one originally AND of course caved and got the bag. It still blows my mind that gift bags are 4-5.00 but these reusable shopping bags 99 cents. Granted it has the store name on them but they are so cute! This is Zander’s Christmas present since he is the most vocal about words and letters… I hope he still is when Christmas comes around!

What a Deal!

With the weather chilly and the boys restless we sat them down at the table and had them bead to their hearts’ content. Emanuel messed about but decided not to leave anything to iron – he wants a Pocoyo though, but done WITH Daddy. Gavin and Zander each made leaves to paste in their Fall lapbooks… and then got creative – Gavin reproduced the two dinosaurs I printed out in his own colours and Zander started the first of 6 pieces to make his very own 3D cube!

Boys' Creativity!

I was mainly busy baking today – Trinity’s Oatmeal applesauce cookies, another batch of beans, sugar cookie dough and a new recipe!! Banana chocolate chip muffins… of course a hit! I found the recipe online so here you go:

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

1 1/2 cups flour

2/3 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 2 large)

1 large egg

1/2 cup butter, melted

1/4 cup milk

3/4 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 F. Line 12 muffin cups with liners. Mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Mix mashed bananas, egg, melted butter and milk in a medium bowl. Stir banana mixture into dry ingredients just until blended (do not over mix). Stir in chocolate chips.

Divide batter among prepared muffin cups, filling each about 3/4 full. Bake muffins until tops are pale golden and tester inserted into center comes out with some melted chocolate attached but no crumbs, about 32 min. Transfer muffins to rack; cool.

Banana Chocolate Chip!

Ken managed to put together an ornament kit we had received a few months ago in a package of craft supplies. I plan on putting it with a mesh bag that is decorated with the mini cross stitch I did and give it to out god-daughter. Apparently it was a bit of a pain in the bum to make but I think it is rather cute (not too sure on the mouth though!).

Little Flutterfly

I did some beading myself late last night, a larger piece that I can’t show that is a Christmas present for a dear friend… all the pieces to assemble a die for a little boy in California, another top (though I REALLY need better, pointier toothpicks) and another dinosaur! Tonight I am hoping to get a start on furniture and a lion.

Top and Dino

Die Pieces

The big excitement tonight was a new game to celebrate the finishing of the lapbook – red light green light! We all won! And of course ALL got excited. (that is symbolized by the traffic light symbol in their labook)

Red Light Green Light (Zander left)

Trinity’s accomplishment for the day was to give it a go with a baby fork… she seems quite enamoured with it, almost enough to relinquish her ever ready spoon. She is growing up so quickly!!

Working With a Fork!

I have started a new stitch, I don’t think I will post it here as it contains basically a swear or at least REALLY obviously hints at one… BUT I will post it over in my patterns when I have done it up – as one of the ones for sale (I think we figured 2.00). That is another bit of excitement for me – Ken is hoping to get my free patterns up by tomorrow with the for pay ones following close behind. He thinks he has finally resolved the problem with paypal and the site. I will be announcing this over Twitter and Facebook. If you want to follow me over Twitter I am: Ayjah on Facebook Lisa Reinsch-Johnson. In fact, I post my updates on this site each night on those two sites as well! So feel free just be sure to send me a message on Facebook saying that is why you want to be added!

I am still waiting on Ken for the ok on my pumpkin and apple pies recipes. He is determined to find a pumpkin one from scratch… but with time running out we shall see – I am partial to using the one in the Company’s Coming Holiday book. That will mark the end of our pumpkin unit and shift us into the Halloween fun! Where has the time gone???

Can You See the Frost!! Brrr

Another minorly confusing day – mainly due to the fact that the entire crew had to be dressed to the nines and out the door by 5:30 to make our 6pm photo appointment! Early dinner for the kids, quick nap for Ken, the usual mass confusion getting dressed and out the door. Of course once we get there Trinity decided to have what best could be termed as a strop (thank you Cheryl for the awesome British term!)… This year they did the photos in a smaller room which was dark with the lamps and the flash she full out FREAKED, but our photographer Morris was calm and cool and got some terrific shots… even a couple of sweet ones of Trinity. I was just happy all the kids were dressed and in the picture!

I will not have the pictures for a little bit but I do have a few we took at home afterwards to share here. Trinity’s dress was a gift from my mom (a total deal – 4.00 tags still on!), the boys all wore what they wore to my mom’s wedding, Ken wore his one of two dress shirts and I wore the top I actually bought and wore for our first Anniversary back in 2002!

Zander Had Suspenders On Too

At Home She Smiles!

A Favourite Outfit

I got a package in the mail, in a plastic bag no less! Open carefully it said and I did and WOW! Thank you Michaella!!! I had mentioned to her that Trinity kept stealing Emanuel’s Pocoyo dolly (we really lucked out with that one as we got it the one time Toys R Us carried the merchandise) and low and behold what was crammed in the box?? A tiny perfect Pocoyo dolly… a card game AND skull lollies! How spoiled do I feel! I cannot wait until I have the postage to send off the stitches and craft I have waiting for her and the kids!

Tiny Box!!!

Thank You!!!

School wise the boys worked on their shapes and colours lapbook – completion is imminent and I feel we have learned enough to NOT have it drag out  this long next time (ie. FALL). Sadly I ran out of toner so now only black and white printing until we can scrape together the 100.00 (GULP) for the new one – the thing is we just ran out of the one that came with the printer 6 months or more ago… and our brand new black one is still too full for it to even know how many pages we have left. It is so worth it but it is that initial 100.00 that makes  you go OUCH! Luckily I got all the Pumpkin stuff printed. And of course we took some time to glitter some pinecones!

Glittery!

Pumpkins was the other focus today – we mixed red and yellow to make orange, coloured P is for pumpkin and the twins coloured the stages of a pumpkin from seed to pie… I will cut those out, mix them up and then have the boys sort them to make into the little book.

P is for Pumpkin

From Seed to Pie

With the mixing of paints we also painted… today was more of a one colour day – Emanuel blue, Gavin brown and Zander purple… water, water and wall… creativity abounds! They had fun for sure!

Finished Paintings

Tomorrow is going to be a baking day… two different kinds of cookies AND the soon to be birthday boy has requested Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins! I will definitely post the recipe… that and a trip to the library and I am hoping the local thread store for some advent exchange hunting will keep us busy.

So Busy We Wear Out the Baby!