Field Trip Fun

We've had so many things going on the past few weeks that we finished our "school" work awhile ago and have just been enjoying the warmer weather and learning through playing and living life! I officially closed out the school year with the state requirements and so now we are free to move on or just take a break! And we celebrated with 2 different "field trips" in one weekend.

Last Monday we enjoyed Homeschool Day at the Shelburne Museum. We've been the museum several times now, but this was a special day with educational workshops throughout the day for homeschoolers and their families. We still got to enjoy all the museum offers, but we got to do some special activities as we went along. We met up there with a few friends from our CC program for even more fun.

They got to learn how train conductors and travelers used Morse code to communicate with each other at the train station.

They learned about predators and their prey by pretending to be a particular animal and searching for the other plants and animals they would need to survive.

They learned about pulleys and how they make work easier on the Ticonderoga steam ship.

They learned about bartering by trading goods and services at the General Store.

Oh, and Jacob was there too. Being himself.

And I locked them in jail.

We had a really great day but still didn't even get to see everything the museum has to offer.

The previous Friday, we went as a family to Billings Farm & Museum, which is about an hour and a half away. We met another family whom Brett met at a pastor's conference, and the kids really loved being together, as if they'd been friends a long time! 

We saw cows.

We saw old farming equipment.

We saw how they would have cooked in an old 1850's farm house. Leah is reading Little House in the Big Woods right now, so she loved seeing some of the things she's reading played out in real life. They all loved the old farm house and wanted to live there until we reminded them there was no electricity or technology!

A worker showed them a demonstration of how she yokes & trains the oxen.

And we saw a set up of an old church meeting room, schoolhouse, and General Store. That was another really fun,  nice day!

Not really a field trip, but we've also been playing a little soccer with a local homeschool group. It's not competitive, and they really don't even play a real game, but they have a real coach who teaches them some of the basics through fun games and drills. They love just going out to kick the balls around and also to play on the playground while they're there.

Jacob doesn't always enjoy soccer quite as much. He certainly doesn't enjoy the swings, which tip him forward!

Abi, in typical three-year-old fashion, sometimes joins the games, but mostly does her own thing. Like roll around on top of the soccer balls. 

Jacob @ 7 Months

Everywhere we go this kid is deemed "the happiest baby." He is always smiling at others and always in a good mood. At least when we're in public. And at home as long as he's occupied. He gets bored quickly. I move him from the floor to his saucer to his high chair and then end up carrying him around- each only lasting 10-20 minutes before he starts whining. He can be distracted if his brother or sisters talk to him or if I give him just a few minutes of attention. He is just very social. He loves to explore and is already getting into things he shouldn't when he rolls around the living room. He gets stuck under the coffee table or the piano bench and he loves going toward electrical cords.

He is officially sleeping through the night now. He was awhile ago, but every once in awhile he would still wake up to eat. Now he goes to bed between 7 & 8 and usually isn't up until between 5:30 and 7. (Of course I would love for him to sleep in a little longer, but I'll take what I can get.) He naps sporadically, but that is only because he's the 4th child and dragged all over creation every day to his older siblings activities. He will usually take a nap about 2 hours after he wakes up, for about 45 minutes, then another longer one after lunch and then another short one around dinner time. 

At last check he was 21.1 lbs. and 29 inches long-- in the 90th% for both height and weight. I'm still not sure how he is getting so big so quick. He is already in size 4 diapers (the size Abi was wearing when she was potty-trained) and some 18 month clothes. 

We went back to his pediatric pulmonary specialist for a follow-up visit recently and since he's had really no change in his breathing noises-- nothing's worse, nothing's better, he didn't see a need to do a bronchoscopy or any further testing at this point. If he truly does have laryngomalecia, which is what the doctor really thinks-- that generally improves and goes away between 9-12 months. So we will re-assess at that point and decide if we need to do anything else. The breathing still seems bad to me at some times (although some times I don't notice it at all, like when he's sitting still on my lap or when he's sound asleep), and he almost always seems to have a cough, but since he's growing so well and otherwise so healthy, I'm really optimistic that he'll improve as he gets older. 

He has not previously liked going outside much. He doesn't care for the cold air or wind in his face. He sucks his breath in like he's suffocating. Now that it's getting a little warmer, he will tolerate it. Maybe once summer is here and he can walk some, he will love going outside as much as the rest of his family.

Also, check out that hair. It is most definitely curly. And in a greater quantity than Andrew had at his age. And so soft to rub! We are still unsure about his eye color. It started out blue but is slowly changing to brown. Now it's stuck somewhere in between-- a combination of blue & brown.

Aside from still nursing regularly at least every 3 hours he's awake, he will also consume an entire jar of baby food at breakfast (because it's fruit and its sweet) and then about half a jar at either lunch or dinner. He's not as much of a fan of the vegetables but really he'll eat anything. He also LOVES his juice in a sippy cup. He's not really too good at it on his own yet (he can't get the part where you have to tip it up for it to come out) but he loves it to be held for him and gets really excited when he just sees his cup.

Abigail loves her little brother. Sometimes a little too much. She tries to pick him up. She rolls him over. She kisses him all over. She gives him his paci. Then she takes it away. She talks to him all the time. They are two peas in a pod. I'm not sure how he feels about her seeing as how she is usually being rough with him, but he's pretty tough and soon he will be big enough to sit on her.

He can push all the way up off the ground with both his arms and his knees, but he hasn't quite figured out how to go yet, other than backwards a little way (which frustrates him because then he can't get his toys). He can also sit up on his own fairly well, although I wouldn't just leave him sitting by himself-- he's still a little wobbly. He likes playing cars with Andrew in their room as long as I help him sit up.

The Busy-ness of Spring (with videos!)

This phase of life we're in now is so FULL. Some days I can't believe how quickly the time went by. Other days I can't believe how it dragged on. Some days I'm not at all sure how we packed so much stuff in, and other days I don't have any idea what we got done. The kids are getting older and they all want to do their own things and have their own activities.

Our newest endeavor is putting Andrew in TaeKwanDo. Since he's 5 now, we wanted him to have a choice of an extracurricular activity. Between taekwando and baseball, he naturally chose the one where he can kick and punch things and pretend to be a ninja. He was so so excited he could learn karate. And after 3 classes he is still excited to go. Thankfully, the teacher has issued a rule that he is not allowed to kick or punch people/ animals/ objects outside of class. I think he will learn so much more than he realizes: self control, balance, patience, and other ways to deal with his frustration.

So Taekwando is on Thursdays, the same day Leah is taking her dance class. So we take two 15-minute trips (one-way) that day. We are at least done with our Classical Conversations homeschool group now-- that took up our whole Tuesday, but now we go to Homeschool Soccer on Tuesday afternoons. Wednesdays are AWANA at church. And somewhere in there we fit in school work and piano practice for both Leah and Andrew, and physical activity outside and stories and baths and doctors appointments and whatever else life throws our way.

Leah is doing amazing in dance. She takes jazz and tap this year and I have seen so much improvement over the course of this year. She really has potential and she really seems to enjoy it.
I will share a video of her recital once that comes around. However, her little sister also loves to dance. And she watches. She watches carefully. She loves to go and see Leah's dance class. We plan to enroll her this fall, but for now she dances on the sidelines. And she knows every move.

And we have another dancer, too. The littlest brother is constantly moving. He loves to jump in his saucer. He loves to kick his legs and flail his arms around. He is so close to crawling. He can scoot and roll his little body all around the floor and rarely stays in one place. He is never content to stay still for long. He gets in the bath and thinks the goal is to kick all the water out of the tub. We are in for trouble once this kid truly starts crawling and walking!

Easter 2016

It seems like every year Easter sneaks up on us, and yet somehow we manage to squeeze as many memories as we can into the week before. We always say we should give it more emphasis, since it is such an important holiday as Christians, and yet somehow it passes so quickly every time!

We had a crazy little Easter egg hunt at home the week before Easter, since there's never time for one on Easter Sunday. The kids didn't even care there was no candy inside! They wanted to all take turns hiding them.

Brett and the kids went and decorated eggs one day at a friend's house and they used some sort of cool dye that involved a flame and a hair dryer-- I still don't understand the process, but they looked super cool. But we still did our usual egg-dying day as well. I ended up getting a different kind where you put the egg in a plastic baggie and drop in the dye and swirl it around. Seemed like an easier method. I also read that brown eggs make for prettier, bolder colors. Apparently not as much with the kind of dye I bought. They were kinda boring looking, but we had fun anyway! Even Jacob got in on the fun with his plastic egg. 

We made & decorated cupcakes, too.

Since Easter Sunday is always so busy, we decided to take some formal portraits of the kids in their Easter attire on the day before. We put up a sheet in the dining room and- voila! instant photo shoot. It was a great time of day and we were so pleased with how they turned out. And just how old does Leah look in these pictures? She got a fresh haircut that day, which makes her at least 12!

Even Jacob cooperated for a little while. I was able to get behind the sheet and hold him up in the chair just like the rest of the kids.

I can't even pick my favorite of all these!!

Sunday morning the Easter bunny had come so the kids checked out their baskets before we headed out for church. They each got one toy, one coloring book, and one book to read, plus some candy and bubbles.

The silly bunny brought Jacob a bunch of toys that looked JUST LIKE toys we already had put away in storage. Can you believe it?

The egg hunt at church is held after the service. This year was tons better than last year because it was so much warmer outside, and because Abi was much more independent. She actually did really well. Even though they usually hide for big kids on one side of the lawn & little kids on the other, they all kind of hunted together and the big kids really looked out for the little ones so everyone got a ton of candy! 

And we even managed to get in a great family shot in the sanctuary before we headed home. Everyone looking and smiling!