the schoolroom

We cleaned up the schoolroom today so I could finally get pictures. Of course it doesn't look like this now. ;)

Here is the view from the stairs.


And from the otherside in the hallway.




And standing in front of the sliding glass door.


The chair I recovered in Michael Miller Dick and Jane fabric.


I love these curtains. I took yellow polka dot quilters fabric and bleached it to a mellow yellow and then used the back side to further mellow it out.


The kitchen that Brian built for Ellie and Grae. Molly plays with it everyday.


View going up the stairs. This is the kids gallery. It's just clipboards that we covered with decorative paper.


And there you go.

Fun outside...

We're prepping to paint the house this week (or we were when it decided to rain for the first time in months). I was taking a break and thought I would take pictures of the kids playing.



Ava's a little big for the slide.


I asked Grae if I could take his picture and he said I could take a picture of his Crocs. I really wanted a picture of his hair.


Extreme close up of Molly.


Ellie in her new dress.




The other girls being "boring" according to Ava.

Not a threat....

I noticed Grae had a penny in his mouth. I quickly went to him and told him to spit it out. He did.

Me: "Don't put money in your mouth. You might swallow it and it could get stuck in your throat. Or it will end up in your tummy and you would have to poop it out and that might hurt. Do you want to poop out pennies?"

Grae looked at the ground for a minute and then up at me with a big smile on his face.

Grae: "Yes."

Oh great, I'd better guard the change jar.

My pirate is 3

My sweet little boy is 3. I love him so much that everyday I want to just eat him up. When I tell him this, he just tells me I can eat his arm and then he can have a hook.

So what did my birthday boy want? Let's see if you can guess....yep, a pirate ship, a pirate cake, a pirate shirt, oh and a Spiderman shirt. He has no idea who Spiderman is except that his colors are red and blue.

Brian took the morning off and escorted Grae, Ellie and Ava to the Children' Museum. The even rode Max all the way there and back(our lightrail tram thing). When they arrived home, it was Grae's naptime. Then the fun began. Ava and I decorated his pirate hat cake. Maddie actually made the cake but the recipe she used made the cake crumbly. So Ava and I did the best we could and it was delicious but not very pretty.



He was thrilled and kept opening the refrigerator to see it. Like 20 times an hour. After dinner couldn't come fast enough for him.

Look at that face:


He ended up with a pirate sword and knight shield from Brian, an amazing pirate birthday card (with $15 in it) from Grandpa B and 3 birthday spankings from me. We haven't a clue where the shield ended up, the sword isn't far from him and the pirate birthday card goes under his pillow at night.

Happy Birthday Grae - please stop growing up.

We don't like Bratz

Overheard at our house:

Grae to Ellie: "Put down my pirate sword down or I'll get you a Bratz doll for your birfday."

Ellie promptly dropped it. She may have shuddered at the notion of owning one of those nasty looking dolls.

Hey, it's July!

Wow, it's July and my last blog post was June, oops. This will probably be a totally random blog post as I'll just type as I think.


First, Molly is walking! There's nothing cuter than a baby walking with their hands up in the air for balance, a big smile on their face and a staggering step. She loves this new freedom. She thinks she's quite the big girl! I do have a video of her first steps and maybe I'll get that posted later.

Graedon is such a good boy. Just yesterday I gave him a pop tart (I know but they were on sale) and I reached back in the package to give Ellie one. I turned to hand it to Ellie when I noticed that Grae had split his in half and gave one half to Ellie. So sweet. Molly has a runny nose right now and I was looking for a "snot" rag. Grae piped up, "I have one." He got it out and wiped Molly's nose for me!

He is sure to tell us if a boy hits one of his sisters, he will protect them and hit the boy and tell him to leave his sister alone. That's my boy! However he does embellish the story sometimes and tells me that he will have a flaming pirate sword and will run after the bad boy.

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On a completely unrelated note, what's up with this? I admit that I think sposies are gross now but this is one of the most disgusting things I have seen. You change the pad at the back but leave the diaper on. Pampers claims that the moisture is pulled to the back leaving the front stay dry. How? Magic? There has to be some urine soaked in the front. I'm going to buy some stock in Desitin as this is sure to give babies/toddlers even more diaper rash. Do you know that ever since Molly has been in cloth, she has not had one diaper rash? I'm sure it's because her skin can breathe in the cotton or bamboo and we change her right after she wets.

Anyway, they are trying to promote this as a quick thing to do. Hey you don't even have to look or interact with your child to change their diapers. Wohoo! I don't know about you and your baby but Molly and I have fun at diaper changes. I sing to her, play short games and give her lots of kisses. Okay, done with that rant. ;)

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We've been having fun in school lately. I really enjoy teaching the girls. (we do school year round so no summer break). Our science curriculum is really good. It's Apologia and the Exploring Creation series. Very comprehensive but understandable. I love doing the experiments with the girls. The best thing is that it acknowledges God as creator. Very important to us as we do not seek to seperate God from our studies. That would be impossible as God made 2+2=4, as well as ordered history, made all things, created language, laws of science, etc.

I'm going to be adding an art series to our school program but I need to find a time to squeeze it in. The following may not seem like a lot but it takes all morning to get through. We don't do these all on the same day.

Right now we're doing (with links):
Saxon math 65 (Maddie and Ava)
Saxon 76 (Lauren)
Student Writing Intensive Group B (Lauren, Maddie, Ava)
Exploring Astronomy (Maddie & Ava)
Apologia General Science (Lauren)
Proverbs study (Lauren, Maddie, Ava)
Catechisms (all kids)
Veritas Press History: Ancient Greece and Rome
Beginning reading/writing (Ellie)
Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing (Lauren, Maddie, Ava)

Will be adding back Shurley Grammar 7
Lauren will be starting Traditional Logic

We just finished a world geography course and will be adding in a poetry course. There is so much more that I want to do but it's so hard with Grae, Ellie and Molly awake and roaming the house, lol.

Okay so this post was totally random and I've had to get up 4 times to tell the girls to be quiet so Grae can sleep. Off to make Bri and I some dinner or at least to dish up the low carb cheesecake ;)