All in one Day

Daisy is Nana and Poppa's new puppy. She is chihuahua, jack Russel terrier and we are pretty sure Papillon too because she has the little butterfly ears.

Victoria and I were helping Nana cut grass out for a new flower bed and Daisy was under foot finding all kinds of things to do.

 Watching Victoria throw chunks of sod into the trailer was like watching her ice skate.

With each toss she flung her leg out like a waltz jump.

 It seems like every day we work from sun up to sun down. For the past 8 weeks we have spent hours on end reinforcing goat fencing. I think we have the Evil Elf completely contained only to have Mr. Peabody....Jacks, to push his way through the fencing to the neighbors weeds. I guess theirs look tastier than ours. 

Now we are working hard on the garden. Year after year we try to support our tomatoes only to have them fall over due to the weight no matter what contraption we use to hold them up.

This year we have ....wait, I showed Kirk a picture of structure to hold tomatoes and he built this awesome tomatoe trellis. I found these awesome clips on Amazon and bought 6,500 ft of tomatoe string pretty cheap on Amazon too. Kirk and I were stringing them up last night only to have a little helper try to take off with our twine. Sometimes our lives are taking a step forward only to take two back. It's a good thing we aren't quitters.

 Lightening was sure that he could walk off with the twine. We had to work at it to get it back. He is really quick for a little cat.

 I love that when ever we are out in the yard our little helpers come out of who knows where to see what is up. No sooner did we get Lightening down from sabotaging our efforts, Thunder appeared and was trying to think up what she could get into.

 When Lightening wants to cuddle and be pet by you he wants it when he wants it. He doesn't care if you are busy doing something.

 Isn't this beautiful?

I really think this is going to work this time.

 This is why there isn't any food in the house ever! It's because of him.....or him!!!

Last I looked he had the cereal box.

Which I am sure is officially empty now.

 Thunder loves to accept the next challenge...even if it's walking on the water irrigation pipe...or maybe it's to keep her feet from getting wet.

Skatefest June 9

Victoria competed in Skatefest in the West Valley

We all got up and were out the door at 6 am for a 9 am practice session.

She skated a number to Wunderkind from Narnia and 

won First Place in Free Skate 1.

All of the pictures were during her practice session.

We decided earlier to not get distracted during her performance with trying to get pictures.

It brought tears to my eyes thinking about how far she has come.

A long way from when she was 4 doing "polar bear" slides with her friend Hannah.

 She always looks so calm even though she claims she is really nervous.

Her coach even changed part of her performance a few days earlier and she nailed it perfectly!

 We are going to miss Betz. She is moving to Montana!

Take Aim

This girl has been making her own bow and arrow since she was really little.

Now that we have a real one that really works, she has improved her aim and is 

willing to challenge any of the boys in the family.

Party Crashers

 Victoria's Lego Friends were having a beach party one day. So the boys (Jared and Kaleb) decided that they would crash the party with this motley crew.

You have to look closely to see all the details.

They even showed me a 6-pack of soda hidden under one of the seats.

The crew included a steward with a pineapple, a pearl diver, a navy officer, a scuba diver, a surfer, an oil driller, a life guard and a treasure hunter. The contraption hanging off the back next to the shark is a lobster cage.

Just when you would think that Victoria would have opposed the boys crashing her beach party, she actually welcomed the extra party goers.

I am always interested in what they come up with next.

I like the huge speakers on the side of the vehicle.

It brings back memories of the 80's.

Elementary Art Class

I added teaching elementary art to my schedule this fall at our Homeschool Co-op that I Co-lead called Cache Valley Star Academy. It was a little crazy teaching four classes for twelve weeks but I figured that I would want to teach the classes to my kids at home so I might as well do it for a class of 10 or more? These kids are pretty awesome. I have grown to love them all. I can give them direction and then they just get down to business.

I don't consider myself an artist. I have never really been trained as an artist. I took some classes in High School and loved it. I do know I have it in my genes. Truthfully, I knew that I would make more money as a nurse (which I did do) than working as an artist. Unfortunately, I am still living the life financially that I was trying to avoid by becoming a nurse.

I am married to an incredible artist.

The whole "starving artist" thing...

It is true.

 

 This was the our project.
A Pear.

The kids really were excited about the idea of "painting" with real acrylic paints. They really wanted to just paint whatever they wanted but unfortunately, I made them follow directions. I kept reminding them that they are learning important skills like blending, and the importance of the process.

 By the time we got to the background, I encouraged individuality.

There were many happy faces.

 Some of the kids were being shy showing off their paintings that they worked on for the past three weeks. We didn't have much time between classes to get them to loosen up and smile.

 I missed a few kids in this class.

I am so impressed with the results.

I am so thankful for Pinterest too. I run out of ideas sometimes or I just don't have enough down time to come up with more ideas on my own. . If you would like a tutorial on painting a pear check it out HERE! If I can impress my husband...the artist of the family, then I knew I did pretty good.

I will post my painting that I used for an example and the paintings from my teen class of 20+ kids soon. I am still waiting for Kaleb to finish his. He has the advantage of taking his time.



Laura Ingalls Wilder

 It only took me a few minutes to figure out why Victoria scooted her chair close to the heater with her desk stool next to her. We had been reading The Long Winter by Laura Ingalls Wilder this past month and Victoria is loving it as much as I did when I was little.

It has been fun to experience the books all over again. I love that she is sewing. She has even put together a sewing basket with projects lined up. That's my girl.

 She and her friends even play that they are pioneers.  They spend quite a bit of time debating who gets to be Laura this time.  Hopefully they are taking turns.

I think if they could get closer, they would.

Snowshoeing

Victoria's homeschool class that she attends once a month at Stokes Nature Center went snow shoeing this month.  We both had never done it before so we were looking forward to it for the past few weeks.  I have always seen nature studies that you can do where they just tell you to go out in the wild and look for animal tracks and observe nature in the winter.  I have always loved the idea but wasn't too successful.  So I was hoping that we would actually see some tracks.  We have lots of deer tracks around our house but that is about it.

Well, we saw....mouse, moose, elk, deer, rabbit, ermin and evidence that a beaver had crawled out of the river and walked around on the bank as well as a couple trees that it had gnawed down.

We were very pleased with our outing.

The kids went on a scavanger hunt to find a red stick, a brown stick, a leaf, a piece of grass and a berry. They also played a camouflage game that they have played previously. Victoria's hat came in handy for hiding.

Needless to say, we both loved snowshoeing.  It was much easier than anything we could imagine. It was hysterical to watch the kids run in them.....arms, legs and snow flying.

It is first on our list to obtain snowshoes. It would be an awesome way to just get out in the crisp cold air and breathe in winter.

Beautiful

Gymnastics

 The kids in this group get to do some pretty neat things in this class.

 She has learned to "skin the cat" on the uneven bars.

 One of her favorite parts is getting to smather her hands with chalk!

Victoria lost her nerve the first time it was her turn to

jump to a higher bar.

The instructors are awesome with kids and very inspiring.

Our Newest Bike Rider

Given the right opportunity, Victoria rode her bike for the first time

without help like she had been doing it for years.

Our street in Phoenix always had so many cars and obstacles on it that
Victoria had a hard time getting enough open space to work on bike riding.

And it always seemed to hot to take her to the park to try there.

The thought of sweating and
helping her stay upright just didn't sound too appealing.

So, I took the training wheels off and we carried her bike across the field

to give it a try in the library parking lot.

Before I even got a chance to steady her bike for her

she just got on and started pedaling. 

"I guess you don't need my help".

She is very proud of herself and all smiles!



Sewing Project

This is Victoria's sewing project. 

She came to me with the fabric and said that she wanted to stitch a christmas tree to hang on her door.

I drew out the pattern on a piece of paper and showed her once how to work the cross stitch.  She picked it up quickly and was done lickety split.

I did have to fix a couple knots on the back.

She learned that the back is just as important as the front.

I always hated that lesson.

She was pretty proud of herself and couldn't wait to show her Dad. 

I am proud of her too.  She really stuck with it and finished the whole idea.

I also loved that she found everything she needed in a few plastic boxes.

Pinkalicious!

The women's gym that my Mom works at had a Pinkalicious Party for little girls and their mothers on Mother's Day weekend.
They needed cupcakes so I made these cupcakes just like the cupcakes in the story.

This is the cutest story. It is about a little girl who eats too many pink cupcakes and turns pink. The only remedy is to eat green vegetables. Victoria thought it was a good thing she likes vegetables and salad so she wouldn't ever turn pink. Though I do remember the kids turning orange as babies from eating carrots and sweet potatoes.Victoria had a great time. She made a pretty glittery crown and made a princess wand. It was nice spending the time with her one on one. She even got to spend a little time with Nana behind the desk and even go grocery shopping with her.

100 Days of School

There are so many fun things to do when you are in Kindergarten.

I love this age. There are so many "firsts".

Learning feels new to Victoria even though she has been learning

and doing school for quite a few years now.

There are so many accomplishments and achieving milestones.

Victoria feels like a "big kid". Which is very important to her...to be a big kid.

It is hard sometimes to help her be satisfied being a little kid who can do big kid things.

Well, we celebrated 100 days of school...a little late due to my work schedule

and over a week of a house full of sickies.

It was fun preparing for the day. She counted and grouped so many "things". Kaleb was constantly finding more things to count. She counted pom poms, glass rocks, pebbles, shells, fishy crackers, pretzels, fruit loops (which we discovered doesn't mesh well with her already active personality).

It was fun watching her weigh the items to see which ones weighed more,

or how many bags would equal the weight of a few others.

The gears were working and she was very proud of herself and her discoveries.

She also discovered that 100 piece puzzles really aren't as hard

as they once were. Now she is putting puzzles together right and left.

Everytime I turn around there is a completed puzzle on the table

in the midst of the school books.

I remember when the other kids discovered the same thing.

It is hard to believe that my baby is at that same milestone.

Jared helped me hide garage sale stickers numbered one to one hundred on them all around the house. We couldn't find number 98 for about three days.

Of course it was in a very obvious place that we had looked several times on the book case. I thought for sure that he hid it in some abnormal remote place of the world.

With Jared you never know.

Well, it took her half the day to find 99 of the stickers and place them on a hundred numbers chart in their proper place. Great learning activity. Kept her busy.

We discovered this book "The Wolf's Chicken Stew". The wolf decides to try to fatten up a chicken by making her 100 pancakes, 100 donuts, and a 100 pound cake. When he decided it was time to snatch his fat chicken he discovered that she had 100 chicks who ate all the goodies. They loved him for making all the goodies so he befriended them.

It was really cute.

Kirk helped Victoria make 99 little pancakes and 1 huge pancake to make 100.

The boys had not a single problem helping eat all those pancakes. They loved that they were bite sized. No cutting needed.

Veggie Tales

This is the funniest audio CD of 80's music.

Victoria has found this several times at the library and has forced her siblings to obsesively listen to it. It is actually pretty well done.

Instead of Girls Just Want to Have Fun by Cindy Lauper, it is "Gourds" just want to have fun with Jerry the gourd singing.

I think the best one is Larry the cucumber singing Everybody Have Fun Tonight. He sings "everybody wang chung tonight" and then says he doesn't even know what "wang chung" is. He says it is a "combination between Kung Fu, chow mein and fried rice".

It cracks me up that our youngest daughter is rocking out to the same songs I listened to in high school... just veggie style!

Arctic Exploration

I love Kindergarten.

Victoria has been learning about the Arctic and the difference

between the Arctic and Antarctica.
She did a lapbook on Polar Bears and read one of our all time favorite story

The Three Snow Bears by Jan Brett.

It is pretty much the story of Goldilocks but with Polar Bears.

In her lapbook she made a comparison between the two books using a venn diagram.

We did an experiment using vegetable shortening where you coat a ziplock bag with it and then cover it with another bag. You then put your hand into the "blubber" bag and stick it into ice water to see how long you can tolerate the freezing water. It was worth seeing the look on her face when she discovered why arctic animals have a layer of blubber under their fur.

We had to put all of this left over styrofoam to good use so Jared helped Victoria build an Arctic habitat complete with a penguin slide and seal blow holes...or what ever you call them.

The Pizza Man

A Victoria Creation.

Help Yourself

Hmmm, what shall I do today? Printing?... Nah.

Phonics?...ummm uh uh.

Dot to Dot?... maybe.

Math?...Yeah.

Coloring?...okay.

Driving my brother insane?...Definately.

Pickles!

Santa brought me Pickles!
Santa also brought a huge barrel of pretzels, kind of like the ones you get at Costco.

Sammy saw the pretzels and was staring at them through the container.

He started to slowly lick the outside of the container as if he would actually taste them through the plastic.

He cracks me up.

Crawling the Walls

Victoria is driving us insane...! She has an enormous amount of energy that I wish I could bottle on a daily basis for myself! Anyway, she was telling me something which I cannot even remember what she was saying because as she was talking she was moving higher and higher up the wall. I was just watching her wondering just how high she was going to go? I am not even sure she was aware that she was doing it until she read it on my face and we were practically eye level. She managed to keep herself put long enough for me to grab the camera. She is one busy little girl. Kirk and I often think about what it will be like when she is 16 and we will be in our mid 50's!!!!! I shutter at the thought!

Learning about Pizza!

I love Kindergarten! It must be the 4th time that we have learned about pizza in our house. So this week we read stories about pizza. We baked our own pizza from scratch. We were all happy to eat it.
Everyone got to make their own personal pizza. That always goes over really well here. Daphne only likes cheese on hers while Kirk and Jared like the works on theirs.

This was an experiment with how yeast works and puffs up the dough in the oven. Victoria is really in to experiments lately. So she really liked this one. Kaleb did a good job of shaking the bottle every time he passed it which ended up making the balloon grow even more. It was Victoria's idea to add the face.

Here is the lapbook that she put together. Even though pizza actually comes from ancient Greece it was too confusing for a kindergartener. So I left it with Italy which had adopted the peasant pie later by Queen Margharita in the early 1900's. We found a box that curriculum had come in long ago that was kind of like a pizza box. She dug out her felt pizza that I sewed her last year. It fit perfect. She set out to be a pizza delivery girl delivering pizza to the kids doorways over the course of an hour or so. She even drew up receipts. Her pizzas cost only $2. I would love to only pay $2 for a whole pizza. What a deal. To top off the week, while I was at work on Fri. Daphne and Victoria baked Daphne's famous Giant Pizza Cookie. It never lasts very long because it is so good. The crust is a chocolate chip cookie. The sauce is raspberry jelly. The toppings are grated white chocolate with peanut butter chips and chocolate chips.