Lily Can Read!!!

Lily has learned one letter each week for the past six weeks. She learns the name and sound of each letter, and how to write the capital and lower case. Since she had learned enough letters to put together a few short words I thought we'd give reading a try today... and she read 4 words!

I know I sound absolutely pathetic in the video and that's because I am. I found out on Monday night that I have the flu - type A - and I was informed by my friend, Kristy, that there is a 97% chance that it is H1N1. Lovely. It is no fun. This is the worst I've felt in a very long while! So the rest of you out there need to stay healthy - take your vitamins and wash those hands :)

Random Blessings

We are so blessed to have such wonderful friends in our lives. I truly do not believe in coincidences, but instead I think that God puts people in our paths for certain reasons. One special person we have known for a short while is Barbie. She is a mom that I met at playgroup who is a very sweet soul. We have had so much fun getting to know her and her son in the past year. Little did I know when we met that she has a tremendous gift - art! Not only is she talented at creating things, but she also has a wealth of knowledge in it's history and a love for teaching children. She is also generous enough to volunteer an afternoon of her time each month to teach Zora some art & art history. This past week we went to her house for our first lesson.

First we talked about the who, where & why art was started. Then Zora made a "cave drawing" of her own...

Then, they explored many different aspects of Egyptian art from hieroglyphs (this is Zora's name in hieroglyphs!)...

...to pyramids...

...and finally a clay creation (Zora chose to make a little bowl for her jewelry)...

All in all she learned a lot and had a lot of things reinforced that we've been studying about ancient Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt.

As I mentioned in the last post, Lily is learning by leaps and bounds. She is doing much more right now than I originally intended for her to do, especially in writing. She loves to try to write letters all by herself. Not only does she write her name, but she is writing almost her whole name! I only have to help her with s, u & e in our last name. She also surprised me a couple of days ago when she said, "Mommy, I just wrote your name." I looked at the page not expecting to see anything that actually resembled my name (because she didn't even ask me how to spell it) and I saw...

She actually wrote it, just from right to left instead of left to right. With a little bit of instruction she tried again and got it perfect :)I'm so thrilled that she loves to learn!

Lily also has a fashion statement all her own. I now understand why there are children at Walmart sometimes with the craziest things on... sometimes clothing is just not worth a battle. Anyhow, Lily loves to pick out her clothes every morning. Sometimes she does a pretty good job and sometimes it's hilarious. If we have somewhere important to go I do enforce an outfit change, but if we're not really doing anything I usually let it go. I recently got down some boots from the attic that used to be Zora's that Lily is now old enough to wear. They were an instant hit. She loved them so much that at bedtime while she was getting ready for bed she just couldn't hardly bear to take them off...
That's all my random thoughts for now :)

Back to School!

So we've been "back to school" now for 4 weeks! We have been having a lot of fun so far. Zora's favorite subject is History & Geography. We just finished a unit on ancient Mesopotamia and this week we started a unit on ancient Egypt. She also still loves to read, read, read! She got so many new wonderful books for her birthday and she is very excited about them. The Wingerter family got her some Magic Tree House books which she loves and the Voss family got her several Boxcar Children books. As soon as she finishes one book she picks out another one to start.

Lily has also started school with us this year. In the past we always did school work while Lily napped, but now that she has outgrown her nap we have work for her to do too! Our main goals for her this year are to learn to recognize all the letters of the alphabet, their sounds, and hopefully begin reading some small words. We are also working on our numbers, introducing tiny bits of Spanish, and coloring within the lines. So far she is doing a great job! Her attention span is very short so she does a little work, then plays a little, then comes back for more "homework". She's so cute because every day she gets so excited and begs for "more homework, Mommy". Today she wrote her name completely by herself!!!

We have also started a very exciting new adventure with our homeschooling... we've joined a co-op! Zora is now in classes with 7 other homeschooled children, and the moms are taking turns teaching different extra-curricular subjects. We have completed two weeks so far and Zora is loving it! Right now she is taking Speech, Psychology and Computer Programming. In October the classes with be Spanish, Art and Science Lab.

And speaking of art, I have to brag about Zora just a bit... she has two pieces of artwork on display at Gilcrease Museum! She made this one out of watercolor and sponges...

The Windmill

This one is colored pencil... The Fishing Boat

Her artwork was put on display August 18th and will be there until September 13th.

Another change in our school schedule this year is their extra-curricular activity. As much as they loved ballet and tap dancing, they decided to try something new - gymnastics! They had their first lesson on Monday and did a fantastic job!

Ready to start

Practicing "the big finish" pose

Cartwheels!
Backward on the balance beam

Lily learns "the scoop" on the balance beam

These last two pics aren't school related, but I just have to post them because the girls love it so much! Joel has been slowly building a 4 wheeler and he's got it running. He gave them a few rides on it around the yard, but I wouldn't let him take them in the street or very far until they got helmets. He bought them the cutest pink camo helmet! It makes me laugh to see them in it because it squeezes their chubby little cheeks and makes their heads look huge compared to the rest of their bodies! Their my own personal little bobble-heads :)

Lily rides with Daddy

Zora rides with Daddy

I'll leave you with this thought. My friend Elisabeth got me a little plaque for my birthday that I absolutely love because it says exactly what I feel about our homeschool.

"While we teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about."

Birthday Update

I had an absolute blast for my 30th! As I posted earlier, my husband surprised me with a weekend getaway to Hot Springs, Arkansas. The town is absolutely beautiful and I love all of the old bath houses, the architecture, and the neat little downtown shops. On Saturday we went sightseeing & shopping. Here are some pics...

This was our hotel. Very beautiful, historical building. The Arlington Hotel...

This is a hospital/rehabilitation facility...

These are a few of the bath houses for which the town became so famous...
I just loved this building...
There were so many neat stores on the main strip, but this is the store I will never forget. This is a real poodle that walks around the store and even greets the customers at the doorway. What a sweet, sweet dog! She even has her own facebook page where her fans can post pictures and keep up with her. Too funny!
On Sunday for my actual birthday we stopped in to visit a rock garden. I know that sounds strange, but there are so many rare and unusual rocks in that area and they are beautiful. I also had to stop here because Lily's latest fascination is with rocks. I had to buy her a souvenir from this massive rock garden :) This is just one of about 30 tables that were loaded down with these enormous rocks...After the rock garden we went to an amusement/water park. There were no lines and the weather was perfect. We rode every roller coaster and water slide in the park. We had such a blast. I would recommend this place to anyone... it would be great even for families with little ones. They had great kid areas! I didn't get pictures of the amusement park because we didn't want to risk breaking the camera or losing it on all the rides.

Later that evening Joel took me to a very nice dinner...


... and I had the best chocolate cake for dessert! I cannot even describe how amazing this cake tasted! The best part was that it was complimentary for my birthday :)
On the way back home we took a slight detour to Little Rock to visit the Clinton Library. We had never been to a Presidential Library, so we thought it would be interesting and informative. It was a neat experience, but I'm not sure it was worth the $7 per person to get in.They have different rooms set up inside that are made to look just like the rooms in the White House did during his presidency from the furniture, paint, rugs, and even decorations. Here is the Oval Office... (trying to refrain from any Monica Lewinsky jokes!)


And here is the Cabinet Room with Joel seated in the President's chair...
Thanks, honey, for an absolute fabulous, fun and unforgettable birthday trip. I love you!

Surprise Getaway

I'm so lucky to have such a wonderful, thoughtful hubby! Tomorrow is my 30th birthday and he wanted to surprise me with a weekend getaway! We were supposed to leave yesterday afternoon, but we both had a lot of things to get done before we left, so we didn't get to leave until after 9pm. We ended up in Hot Springs, Arkansas at 2 am this morning! We really love this neat little old town. The last time we came here it was a few months before I got pregnant with Zora. We always said we wanted to come again, and here we are!!! I love the history of this place and the scenery here is absolutely beautiful! It is so relaxing to be here and I've really been pampered today. We shopped all morning, took a 2 hour afternoon nap, had a delicious steak dinner, and then he treated me to a pedicure :) So far this weekend is looking pretty good! Tomorrow I think we're going to try an amusement/water park... should be fun. We miss our kiddos, but I have to admit that I needed some away time!

We took some really neat photos of today, but I forgot the cable that connects to my camera so I'll have to upload those when we get home this week. Check back soon for more updates!

Six Years Ago...

...I officially became a Mommy. Now, I have a beautiful little six-year-old!
Where has the time gone? When you are pregnant and your child is a newborn everyone tells you, "Enjoy every moment because they'll be grown before you know it." What a TRUE statement. Even though I am so blessed to be able to stay home with my girls they are growing so fast I feel like I'm missing it!

We had a birthday party for Zora this past Saturday and we had so much fun! Over 50 people showed up to celebrate with us, and the kids had an absolute blast :) I think the Jupiter Jump was a hit and I know for a fact that Lily loved the cake!Zora got some really, really cute things... lots of clothes, some fun toys, and lots of books!

Her big surprise at the end was a dollhouse. I was kind of bummed out because it didn't get here in time for the party, so I just wrapped a picture of it. By the look on her face she was excited anyway!

It actually arrived yesterday and I put it together while she was visiting her Mamma Dee. I was doing pretty well putting this huge thing together (it's over 4 feet tall!) until the very last step and the cross dowel nut and the screw that were left would NOT fit together. I twisted, turned, pulled, etc. until my hands hurt trying to make it work and it wouldn't budge! Very aggravated at this point I decided to go to the hardware store to find something else that would work. I get the part, come home, still won't budge! ARG! So I make another trip to the hardware store, get another part, get it in the dollhouse and it works but the screwhead is too big and looks kind of tacky, but I'm ready to roll with it because I'm exhausted. Then, Joel comes home from work, takes one hard twist on it and says, "Here, I fixed it for you!" WHAT?!?! I was very grateful because now it looks perfect, but I was also very aggrivated that I spent almost 2 hours on the LAST STEP of the assembly. So, after 4 hours of work and 2 trips to the hardware store we have a very cute dollhouse...This afternoon Zora celebrated with her good friend Aub. These three cuties just love playing together!
Tonight we celebrated at Incredible Pizza. We always love the food there...and both of the girls had their first experience playing miniature golf. They absolutely loved it!


And of course, we can't go to Incredible Pizza without riding a virtual roller coaster! What's so funny to me is that you'd think they were riding a real one. This is NOT a posed picture... these were their actual facial expressions during the "ride"!


My dear sweet Zora... Happy 6th Birthday beautiful girl. You are so funny and smart that you amaze me. You truly are our pride and joy and we love you more than you can ever, ever, ever imagine! Six years ago today you gave me the best gift ever...parenthood. I still remember the first time I ever held you and the tears of joy that streamed down my face, just as they are right now as I think about how big you've gotten and how much I love you. As you grow up and mature, here is some advice I'd like to give you: always be yourself, continue to be a leader, set high expectations for yourself, but most of all, LOVE GOD and LOVE OTHERS. We Love YOU!!!

Peaceful and Angelic

Is there anything more precious than watching your children sleep???