Teaching, Seeing, and Believing

I've been entertaining the idea of formal homeschooling for some time now - researching curriculum, reading blogs, and checking out books on the subject from the library.  After attending a homeschooling curriculum fair over the summer, Mark and I decided to try out Sonlight.  It's a literature based curriculum (vs. textbooks/worksheets) that emphasizes Christian teaching and values. 

The nice part about Sonlight versus, say, piecing together my own curriculum, is that they provide the lesson plans and suggest lots of extra crafts and outings and activities.  Each day's work only takes about 30 minutes, so it's short and fun and simple.  We start off with a Bible memory verse, read a few short stories, do an activity based on one of the stories, practice writing, and sing a song.  Since Taylor is still very young, I'm thinking I might stretch this "Core package" over two years and then move on the the Kindergarten Core when she is five.

Taylor and I have done about a week's worth of school over the last two weeks (usually while Rory takes her afternoon nap).  While the stories and rhymes are interesting, really her favorite part of school is anything that allows her to wield a pencil or scissors.  Like when we were learning about the letter F, we cut photos out of a magazine of things beginning with that letter and pasted it onto a big piece of paper. She has also had quite a bit of practice writing her name and Daddy.

I am really impressed with how easily Taylor picks up the memory verses - what a little sponge of a brain! This week's verse is Hebrews 11:1, "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see." We talked about how, though we don't see God in person, we have faith in Him and trust in His promises from the Bible.

But you know something that you really have to see to believe?


Well, inspired by the book "Jessie Bear, What Will You Wear?" (part of another homeschooling package I ordered a while back) we made a new snack yesterday - celery with peanut butter, raisins, and bean sprouts (from the stanza: Celery crunch, sprouts in a bunch).

Taylor and Rory gobbled it up! I mean, I know "Ants on a Log" is a popular kid's snack, but would you think they'd enjoy bean sprouts on it too? I'm glad I have the photos to prove it.

The two girls also ate a good portion of a tomato, apple-style. Just bit right in and ate it. Amazing! This will help to off-set those Five Guys hamburgers and french fries...

A busy start to fall...and taking it easy

Fall is only half-way through, but already it has been filled with vacation time and new activities and milestones.

At the end of September Andrea completed her second race, the Omaha Half-Marathon. She got the chance to run with her brother, Chris, yet again, which made the experience really fun. How often can you say running 13 miles was enjoyable? No new races on the calendar yet, but Andrea's looking forward to getting back to the gym again soon.

Then we took off for Florida at the beginning of October and spent a few days immersed in all-things-Disney. At Disney World, Taylor got to meet tons of Disney characters, including Minnie and Princess Aurora (her favorite). It was a totally new side of the theme park that we'd never experienced before - waiting hours in lines to get just a couple of snapshots with a character. Taylor loved it.

We also got to ride on Dumbo as a family of four (a tight squeeze!) and get a taste of the annual Food & Wine festival (yum!). Rory slept for a good portion of our outings there, but enjoyed touching all the fuzzy characters and riding the boat through It's a Small World.

Now that we're back home, we've been trying to take things more slowly and just organize our lives. Taylor has moved up to a Junior Gymnastics class, filled with 4- and 5-year-old girls. She's so much smaller than them, but makes up for the lack of height with her incredible strength. The teachers are continually impressed with her abilities at such a young age.

Rory has been making big developmental leaps these last few weeks. She's giving us huge, toothy grins all the time now. She eats nearly every kind of food we put in front of her. And she learned a bit of Ariel-style singing from Taylor, so she breaks into song whenever she see or holds one of the Disney princess toys.

Though she still isn't walking, Rory has been working hard at cruising, climbing stairs and furniture, scooting around on her ladybug wheelie toy, standing on her own, communicating with some simple sign-language, and using the potty more regularly.

Triple Nap

A rare and very welcome afternoon treat.

A Royal Wedding Tea with My Girls

I enjoyed a nice tea party with my girls before 6am today in celebration of Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding (now the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge). Betty, a 5 month old little girl we are fostering for a couple of weeks, was the first of us up - at 4:30am! She must have known the wedding was about to begin. Then Taylor woke up screaming around 5am, but calmed down quickly when I told her the Prince's wedding was on TV and she happily climbed into her princess chair with a blanket to watch. Then Rory realized in her sleep that she was missing out on something and promptly arose to join the party.

I had intended to make scones for the celebration, but did not plan ahead and found myself without buttermilk or heavy cream...fairly necessary ingredients. We settled for banana pudding pie with our tea this morning. I helped myself to Twinings Lady Grey and made some nice pink Sugar Plum Fairy tea for Taylor. Of course, I got out the nice china for the occasion and Taylor and I had a very sophisticated crack-of-dawn breakfast.  Taylor loved the festivities, both on TV and at home.

Now all three girls are sleeping!  What a fantastic mid-morning treat for me.  My royal duties await :)

Taylor, Rory, Betty, and I watch the royal wedding on TV
(in the chaos that is currently our living room)

Taylor in "Her Royal Cuteness" pj's at our wedding breakfast

Sipping pink tea

Rory waves "Hello" to the camera

Rory and Corduroy

Rory and I had a little photoshoot with Corduroy bear this morning. She got a big kick out of looking at him or rubbing his fuzzy fur.  Looking at this picture I was thinking of all sorts of fun captions like, "Doppelganger," or "It's like looking into a mirror," "Hey, we match!," or "First friend."

See more funny pictures from our shoot on Picasa.

Ha! Interesting study about happy moms

Just read an article about moms being happiest when their babies are 6 months old and that that happiness "tapers" until a child reaches age 3.  Seeing as how I have a 6 month-old and a 3 yr-old I guess I'm pretty well evened out...and apparently it's all downhill from here.

:)

A 3 Year-Old and a Messy House

Taylor turns 3!

Happy belated birthday to my most favorite toddler. Taylor had three celebrations this year (in the future we will not have number of celebrations coincide with years of age): one in Omaha with Lolo & Lola, one at home as we Skyped with her cousins in Malaysia, and one with all the Synowiec family in Evansville. That means 3 cakes (2 ice cream, 1 strawberry), 3 opportunities to blow out candles (well, in St. Louis Daddy actually put 3 matches on the cake instead since he despises candle wax on a cake), and 3 times she was sung "Happy Birthday" by a crowd. She tells me her favorite part of it all was the pink cake and the presents.

As for the extremely long gap between posts, I blame my messy house...caused by a combination of caring for two children, being out of town most weekends in Nov/Dec/Jan, and laziness.  Recovery is still in progress, but I figured at least I could get write a little something to let you all know I hadn't abandoned the blog.