Our Family Project

My first day of teaching preschool was like a train wreck! I had no clue what to expect. Things were much different my second day. And, the children were awesome! We started out talking about what day it was and season and all that. Then, we painted "trees" on papers to dry before adding the "leaves." I don't remember where I saw this activity, but the children LOVED it! They each chose their favorite season and used their fingertips to paint leaves on their handprint trees to depict their chosen season. This last picture is the best example ... this student chose to do spring leaves. Adam did autumn leaves ... hence the reason most of them are on the ground instead of the branches. By far this was the best activity we've done at my house. (At least as far as art projects go ... they really enjoyed dressing up in articles of clothing that we wear during the different seasons too.)

These are the new craze in our elementary school. Seriously. Eliza started coming home each day with a new one, explaining that she had bought them from her friends. Before I knew it, she was selling them to her friends in the neighborhood, and then giving them to her brother. And, all of this was happening at school ... she'd never been to the store to actually purchase one herself. When I finally took her to the store with the "squisy" vending machine, Eliza ended up getting four more bears (the one on the far right) and other frog. Ironically, she got a better variety from her friends at school than when she bought them herself. I think we'll just stick to the school yard for her bartering.

After years of trying to figure out how to "help" my children to do their chores, I finally have come up with a way to do it! Each week they draw their chores out of a jar, and we write down which chores they are to do for the following week. Then, during the week when I need them to do their chores (i.e. unload the dishwasher), I remind them and if they don't do it, their computer time is taken away. Works like a charm! Who knew?

We went to an apple orchard for Adam's preschool field trip. It was a lot of fun. Andrew got to come along because we went in the morning (we barely made it make in time for the bus). They fed the goats, watched the different kinds of chickens there ("Look, there's a zebra chicken!" ~courtesy of Adam), and even got to hold little chicks. They had these not-in-use tractors sitting out that a bunch of children were climbing on for pictures. I couldn't keep my boys away from them. What? Keep boys away from something like that? No, I don't think so! They climbed right up there and went to work ... well, they would have gone to work if the tractors were running. There was also a corn pit that they were able to play in. I LOVE these things! They are the best ... way better than the ball pits. I mean, how many balls go home in your pants and hoodies when you play in the ball pit? ;-) No, these are lots of fun. When we got around to picking the apples, the boys wer...

It's been a really long time since I last posted something that's not about what's going on in our lives. But, I just have to today. Turning 30 has really made me think about all of the expectations and stereotypes we (our culture as a whole) have for one another. My friend turned 30 in May and really hated it. I asked her why and she and I talked about the different expectations for people in their thirties as opposed to people in their twenties. Almost as if turning thirty means that you can't use certain phrases (my friend used "awesome," "totally," and "cool" as examples), or you can't act a specific way. It makes me sad to think that we let our culture and society dictate how we feel about ourselves to the extent that when we have a birthday we don't want to acknowledge our age or be happy about turning a year older. True, there are specific traits, limitations, and behaviors that belong to certain decades (for example, I don...