Stuffed animals, lions, and whales!

I am ready for a spring break!  How about you??  Too bad we do not have spring like weather here yet…but I know it is coming soon.  I can’t wait to go to the park, play outside with the kids…or better yet go to the beach!  Well spring break has officially begun for us….well sort of.  We did a few school related things this week, but mostly Jocelyn and I have been working on getting her ready for next weeks homeschooling science fair.  So stay tuned, as next week I am sure I will post something about it!   

This week we did a few animal related activities.  Raise your hand if you LOVE stuffed animals.  I don’t see very many hands raised (besides my kids).  My hand wasn’t raised.  I keep them, because my kids like them, but we tend to cycle through them quiet often.  We have held onto ones that have been given as gifts for certain occasions, but others we just can’t keep and they just magically disappear from this house.  I wanted to see where our stuffed animal count was and evaluate if any needed to disappear…unfortunately I couldn’t make any disappear this time as they are all pretty precious to the girls…and don’t you hate it when they have named them??  Ugh.  Anyways, I made a little board on the floor out of masking tape and put flash card numbers in the board.  The girls then had to toss their stuffed animals onto the board.  They then had to add up whatever numbers their animal landed on.  Jocelyn had to toss four animals so should could make double digit problems and Katelyn two. 

The girls then made flashcards with a few different animal names.  I then called out the names and they had to match it up with the corresponding animal. 

 I then hid the flashcards around the house and they had to find the flashcards and find the corresponding animal. 

 After we finished our stuffed animal activities, we read about Daniel and the lion’s den.  Good story if you haven’t read it yet…it is in Daniel 6 in the Bible.

The kids then made lion masks.

 The next day the kids learned about whales.  They are really neat mammals.  We talked about the different types of whales and the characteristics of each.  We also watched a few videos on YouTube included an entire Sea World show.  We also read about Jonah and the whale in Jonah chapters 1-4 in the Bible and then the kids made these:

 That is all for this week!  This weekend I am off to a homeschooling conference with some friends…super excited as it always gets my mind going and excited about the possibilities with our adventure.

This link has been linked up with Homeschool Creations Blogspot.

Week 2 of the Healthy Body Challenge!

Well I am in week 2 of a healthy body challenge that 32 ladies and I are participating in.  So far there have been up and down moments.  I am still a little weak on willpower when I am around sweets.  If we don’t have them in our house I do ok.  We don’t exactly live near fast food or grocery stores, so I can’t exactly swing in and grab something.   Katelyn was sick during the first week of the challenge and Easton during the second week, so I was a bit more grounded and forced to stay home.  It was Easton’s birthday last week so I made a pie and a cake…not good for the losing weight thing!  We also had a few get togethers with a wonderful array of food, fruit punch, and soda.  Yikes….so hard, because I love food.  The good thing about being forced to stay home was that I found time to work out.  I have been doing a variety of things for exercise.  I love the Jillian Michaels 30 day shred.  We also have a training bike that I have ridden a bit.  I would love to try to enjoy doing my Hip-Hop Abs DVD, however the instructor kind of freaks me out.  Sad…I know.  Since the kids are better, we can finally go back to the Y!  Yeah…a break for me from the kids!  Oh and I can workout there too!  I love swimming laps and doing water aerobics with their water weights.  I also enjoy doing their elliptical machines.  I also have a great accountability partner that I e-mail everyday to keep her posted on how I am doing and she does the same in return.  That has helped knowing that someone is tracking me.

So where am I at weight wise for this challenge?  Not as far as would have liked to be.  I got all the way down to 158, but now I am back up to 160.  Bummer…must have been the weekend of sweets.  So I have lost a total of 5 lbs and hopefully more to come!  I have noticed my pants are fitting better and are loser...so that is a good sign!

Easton's 2nd birthday pictures!

My poor little Easton was sick on his 2nd birthday.  Thank goodness that I haven't started potty training him yet...if you know what I mean.  Anyways, he opened a few presents here at the house from his grandma Karen and from us.  I made him a vanilla pudding pie.  The girls some how think that it is their birthday too???  I had to keep reminding them it wasn't.

Not sure if this was before or after he touched the flames.

One of his favorite types of toys

Opening some farm animals

The box is almost bigger than this little guy!

The girls sporting their new cowboy hats from grandma Karen

The following Sunday we had a little lunch with my parents and my aunt Nan.  I made a really good chocolate mousse crunch cake... click on the name and you can find the recipe.  Luckily he was feeling much better for this little get together.

All about Clouds and more!

I am getting a little stir crazy here.  We have been home since Sunday night and Lord willing we will be leaving this house on Friday!  Katelyn was sick last week and Easton was sick this week.  I think he is better...today will be the day to figure out if we are stuck inside for another day.  I really hope not!  Poor little guy was sick on his 2nd birthday!:(  Since we were home bound and couldn't get out, we focused quiet a bit on school activities.  The girls learned about clouds as our theme for the week.  Here are a few fun activities that we worked on...and oh, yes sometimes we stay in pajamas until bath time and yes the girls have pretty messy hair...sorry if you are mortified:)

Bible Verse for the week:  

Matthew 7:7:  Ask and it will be given to you.  Seek and you will find.  Knock and the door will be open to you.

We picked a Seeds Family Worship song for our bible verse.  If you haven't heard of Seeds, they are awesome.  We all love their songs.  They are bible verses turned into wonderful music.  Click on the link below and find out more.  The nice thing is, that when you buy one of their CD's you actually get two copies so you can share the other one with a friend.

My friend Erin, also shared this great website with us that has some awesome printables that correspond to a few of the Seed's CD's.  You can visit this site here:  Bible Story Printables

Of course back by popular demand...here are my cheesy little girls saying their Bible verse.

A Few Learning Activities:

I labeled various size jars with numbers and the girls stood behind a line and tossed pennies into the jars.  Once they got two in the jars we worked on adding those two numbers together.  Jocelyn had to write her problems down and Katelyn and I just used our fingers to count.  They had a ton of fun and Easton loved chasing the pennies around the living room (these girls have horrible shots...I guess we have a lot to work on with Jocelyn before she starts t-ball this summer!)

Jocelyn worked on her addition problems on our Uppercase Living chalkboard.  I like to use a variety of different tools for when we do math.  Sometimes it is a simple notebook, dry erase board, workbook, manipulatives, or the chalk board in this case.  Helps keep the kids interested when I switch things up.

Katelyn then worked on some of her reading words.  I laid them out with our letter cards and called out some of her words and some random ones.  She then had to put a block on the correct word.

Jocelyn had to spell her words out with the same cards.  I called out the words and she found the cards.

The girls love playing Minute to Win it.  I laid out four words each and they had one minute to find the letters that matched the words.  Always a favorite here!

 The girls made little story books titled:  While taking a walk I saw...and then each page they wrote what they saw and drew a picture of the word.

 The girls then went around the house and found words on different items.  They then had to write those words and read them to me.  (Thanks Megan for that idea).

Cloud Activities:

We started off by talking about what the girls knew about clouds and what they wanted to learn about clouds.  

We then read about what a cloud is, how they are formed, the different types of clouds, and looked at various pictures of clouds.  We then looked outside and sure enough...it was a cloudy, stormy looking day.  Here is a view from our back porch of what we saw.

The girls and I then tried to make clouds in a glass jar.  It actually worked.  I filled the jar with about an inch of hot water.  We then covered the top of the jar with a thin cloth and put ice cubes on it.  The girls were really excited.

We then talked about why it is when we walk outside on a cold day and breathe, we see a little cloud.  Since it wasn't cold outside we did an activity with a spoon.  I put a spoon in the freezer for a few minutes and when we took it out, the girls blew on them...and saw how condensation (not sure if that is the right word) formed.

The kids then painted storm clouds and white clouds.

and last but not least we made cloud play dough using 2 cups of flour, 1/3 cup of water and 1/3 cup of vegetable oil.  

Fun times!  I love being able to teach my little munchkins at home.  Such good times and good memories.

This blog post has been linked up to Homeschool Creations.  Click on the link below to get other great ideas!

Easton is 2!

 My little guy is two!  When we first found out that we were having a boy (Easton), Sean and I were very excited.  I was also really nervous, because I had no clue on raising boys.  So far Easton has been a sweet little boy....but mischievous at the same time.  He is a very busy and if you have read other posts, he likes to get into just about everything.  He is getting better as long as I keep him busy with an activity.  He enjoys playing with Katelyn and loves to be outside.  His best friends so far are our dog Maggie, Sean, and my dad.  He has become my little helper boy and will help me with whatever I need.  He listens to key words and tries to race his sissies into completing tasks.  His favorite household chores are sweeping the floor (he is really meticulous...kind of funny to watch) and emptying trashes.  He also likes to clean things with wet wipes.  He definitely keeps us on our toes, but we love him to pieces!  Happy 2nd Birthday Easton!