March 8-12

Another weekend, another series of visits. Saturday afternoon/evening Ken and the boys went to a sleepover at Joe and Faithe’s. Total boy time. That left Echo, Trinity and myself to dinner and a rather quiet evening of a movie and popcorn.

Oh and dress up!!

We have some fairy hackers coming along it seems.

Trinity and I even took some time to start her Hello Kitty scrapbook.

And at bedtime we called Daddy to say good night.

With our ride gone overnight there was no Sunday school for us. Just some quiet play time before we had to get ready to go out.

Ken and the boys picked us up around lunchtime so we could head over to Aunty Judy and Uncle Jim’s for a visit. And to return their now fixed computer. Robbie and Jessica were there also, along with all sorts of puppies, a kitty, ducks… fish… and so forth.

We had pizza for lunch and hung out until almost dinner time. It was a great visit on a beautiful day.

Monday was the last session for the  twins’ first set of swimming lessons. With all the weather delays we actually went almost a month late. So the next session that we decided to schedule all 3 boys into gives us only one week grace to get Emanuel’s swim gear ready. They are all very excited to get to it. The twins have a little more work to move out of the beginners group to advanced beginners. But they are learning and loving it. Which is all we can ask!

Trinity was so excited… she completed her first addition AND subtraction book! With minimum tears and fuss no less!

With all the visiting and excitement we had gotten behind on our Art for Kids (HERE) drawing instructions so we had an art session using a variety of the newest ones.

We had penpal letters to illustrate…

And India to learn all about… a light lesson as sadly EVERYONE was getting sick.

Oh and I have to share our follow up on Paul Bunyan! Quite the interesting legend and a perfect chance to discuss how a story can be real or really cannot. I used two library books:

• Paul Bunyan by Steven Kellogg
• The Story of Paul Bunyan by Barbara Emberley

We had three worksheets from Education.com:

• Tell Fact From Fiction HERE
• Coloring Page HERE
• Write a mixed up fairy tale HERE

We are finally seeing some spring like weather… Perfect opportunity to go out in our light clothes and scrape some of the muck off the driveway. Now let’s not get too excited about this sudden warmth… it IS Minnesota and spring is not something winter allows easily here!

Ken and I got around (finally) to assembling a long forgotten shelf and organizing our school stuff even further. Organization is always a calming influence on my soul I swear! And now with some labels thanks to my Christmas present from Ken I even have some spiffy LAMINATED labels for three of our section. The kids were impressed by the fact that they could now SEE some favourite games and puzzles on the bottom row and keep better track of their workbooks.

Pre labels

I am loving the bigger boys helping the little kids. Their reading skills have smoothed out enough that at time they will VOLUNTEER to read the other two their workbook assignments!!

Ken and Trinity did our grocery shopping for the day on Wednesday… and Trinity made sure to come back with a special treat just for me! So sweet!

We finally got around to decorating our Valentines Day folder. It is also more full than expected! But everyone had a blast colouring hearts and messages on our folder.

Of course Echo had to bring out our 100 day markers and draw us up something nice. I think the past 100 school day have had their rough patches but were honestly very nice!

We are forging right on through the weeks with school mixed with fun! March is certainly following February’s lead!

February 3-5

First off – HAPPY 8TH BIRTH DATE TO EMANUEL on the 3rd of February! It was doubly official with the yearly Grandma birthday call. Though it was brief since she called on break from work.

Of course we still had school. There was a party to reflect on in our journals…

Zander drew his special gift from Aunty Holly that came on time – a Unicorn

Chocolate bars to enjoy from their Aunt and Uncle and cousins. There was some lovely examples of sharing going on.

We had a very timely delivery of a Panda focused National Geographic Kids magazine. I love it when we get something in the mail that furthers our learning spontaneously.

And our drawing of some foods we saw on a Food Network special.

The girls were busy bees with their Nana braids, playing their games together.

I especially loved Trinity’s combination of many patterns and colours in her outfit.

She, Echo and myself joined Emanuel at the Novak’s for Scouts. It was my first time going. The girls hung out in the basement with the other 3 Novak boys while Emanuel and Aidan did their thing. They learned all about the new food pyramid. It is a rather good group of boys that all seem to get along relatively well. Ken and the twins were out at swimming lessons so we had to hang out afterwards until we could be picked up. It was nice to have some adult visiting  time and get to know the Scout troop leader Pam a little better.

Tuesday was our in between birth DATES day. And the three littles took advantage of some of our downtime with getting ready for Nana and Baba leaving and Daddy’s sudden tooth extraction (thank goodness we DID do it while they were still here… he reacted more strongly to the meds they used and could not have driven home) and had a COSTUME dance party! I especially love Baby Batman!

Miss Trinity followed Art for Kids’ instructions to make a lovely heart card HERE. It turned out TERRIFIC…

Then she noticed that one of the left over scraps of paper looked like a bird so we had to put it in her journal! Very creative eye there!

And then…. HAPPY 10TH BIRTH DATE TO ZANDER AND GAVIN on the 5th! Since when were you two allowed to become double digits??? And this from 10 week preemies who came into this world at 3 lbs. 1 3/4 oz. each!!!

This was also the last day with time with Nana and Baba so school was super light. The girls worked with some old catalogues and magazines to clip out pictures to glue together for fun.

Emanuel and Ken got to work on their very first pinewood derby car! This is exciting – the road to Emanuel’s very first badge!!!

The twins worked on pictures from the newest instructions from Art for Kids. I honestly will continue bragging on this site for as long as they put up things! I have never found better instructions for the kids. Trinity even gets results without frustration!!!

As we are now planning for Valentines Day I had the kids make a wreath to replace the one we had up for Christmas out of hands. This was a kit I bought on clearance last year from Walmart!

In between helping out Nana and Baba where they could the kids also watched the Wild Kratts episode on Groundhogs.

And then it was time for hugs, kisses and bye byes. Nana and Baba ALWAYS fly out in the middle of the night/super early in the morning. 9 weeks at Roatan! They are going to come back so tanned and relaxed!!!

February 1-2

It is hard to believe that the twins are finally double digits… 10 years old! And Emanuel… 8! Where has the time gone???

Of course there was a day or two before that. On the 1st, which also fell on the first Saturday of the month was Home Depot Saturday. We actually had forgotten all about it with Ken’s surgery the week before, Chinese New Year and planning for Ken’s dental extraction. Thankfully a family friend called Nana to talk about something and mentioned her husband was out at it with one of their grandsons and we still had time to make it in! Ken and myself had birthday party errands to run for the 2nd which was the best day for a family party for the boys what with Nana and Baba leaving for 9 weeks on the 6th. And while we were gone Nana had a full out hair parlour going… cuts, blow dries… it was great. We came back to some very dapper kids!

Sorry these are not my camera

Of course the 2nd was a busy one… Sunday school first which leftmyself, Echo, Nana and Baba to get the final stuff done for the party. Balloons and cleaning – Skylanders colours!

Note the matching socks!

We had the party at 11 am as Ken’s aunt Judy was working that weekend and Uncle Jim had to head off to work late in the afternoon. They brought Robbie and then we also had Joe and Faithe and their kids. My friend Shandai was supposed to come but was sick so we are hoping for a rain check with her before too long! We had lunch first. And presents…

And then cake…

It was a great day ending in a quiet evening/afternoon with the Super Bowl. And we start the countdown to the great Nana and Baba exodus in earnest. Lots to do and little time to do it in!