Emma's 7th birthday

Emma celebrated her seventh birthday on July 23. We had a party for her with family and her neighbor friends on the day before her actual birthday.
I know that every parent says this, but I truly can't believe how quickly children grow up! It seems like a short time ago I was holding her up in the air and saying, "So big!" and she was staring down at me with big eyes, wearing an infant sleeper. ☺

Emma is a huge help around the house. She loves things to be organized, and I'll often here her say, "Mom. Come look at the back door." and she'll have all the shoes organized on the rack. Or she'll ask me to look in the toy room, and all the toys will be put away. Of course she likes to rearrange the way that I have things organized, so I can tell that she's like me in that she wants things a certain way, and she feels her way is the best. But we all know that MY way is actually better. ;-)

Em is a huge Harry Potter fan. Last year she told me that she was going to marry Daniel Radcliffe when she got older. :-| Then we had a conversation regarding how Mr. Radcliffe is not a perpetual twelve-year-old; he's already an adult. ☺

Emma received two of the Potter movies, a poster book, and a LEGO H.P. sticker book.

It's Auntie Beth with dark hair! The little girls are two of Emma's neighbor friends.

This was THE present Emma wanted most. She's been begging for an American Girl Doll for several years now. Both Grandparents went in on this gift, and when Emma saw the gift tag and who the present was all from, she KNEW it was her doll because, "I know the doll costs a lot and all those people helped get this present so it must be expensive and the only expensive gift I wanted was an American Girl Doll." Nothing gets past her!

This doll is the "Emily" doll. Very fitting! Of course now Em wants more clothes for her doll.

Miss Gooby

Always have to have a picture with one's cake.

**I had taken more pictures, but apparently I am not the most tech-savvy, and I had the camera on the wrong setting. Thus most of the pictures were blurry. "Just point and shoot." Uh huh.

Great friends

The girls and some of their neighborhood friends were seated at our picnic table playing Apples to Apples. Much laughter ensued!

This little nugget made my day. ☺

Two weeks ago my five-year-old nephew Nathan spent the night at our house. I had to pick him up from his preschool in the afternoon. Nathan took the girls and I to his classroom to collect his things, and that's when I saw this:

I grinned! How sweet that he was so excited for the sleepover that he told his teacher about it, and they wrote it down!

Paige's 9th birthday

Many thanks to my mom for taking pictures. ☺

Paige celebrated her ninth birthday on June 6. We had some family come over and two of Paige's friends for cake and ice cream. After that I took Paige and Emma and Paige's friends swimming at the local indoor pool.

The birthday gang AND Auntie Beth!

Mom, Ron, and Paige

Miss Gooby and "Papa"--as she calls him

Myself, Dave, and Paige :)

Cherished Teddy number 9 from Gram Gram

Mosaic box from Gram Gram. Paige begged to stay up late and work on it. I found her still awake and working at midnight!

I had to include this picture because I feel that I am often smiling and laughing. :) I also have to admit that I cropped David out of the picture. But I'm sure he won't mind as he had a very "interesting" look on his face. *wink* ☺

Science Museum Field Trip--May 16, 2011

We went to the Science Museum of MN for a home school field trip. We saw the King Tut exhibit while we were there. They didn't allow us to take any pictures in the exhibit, but seeing as I hardly ever take pictures this was fine with me. ;-) The kids seemed to enjoy the trip. I know they liked the musical staircase. Beth and I liked the broadcast booth ☺ except that the kids kept speeding up the teleprompter. After the museum we headed over to the Mall of America.

This chair was huge! You were supposed to figure out how many times bigger all the furniture was versus the scale model. Yeah, I decided it was a great photo opportunity.

There was a mirror across from the chair. I was trying to snap a pic of the reflection. As you can see it didn't work the best.

Thankfully Beth jumped in and got an actual picture. Paige was not in the picture because she was over at the chemistry counter, learning about water.

Oh my word! This picture made me laugh so hard! My nephew Casey was trying on glasses that supposedly showed you how a newborn baby sees. His eyes were so huge from the magnification that I had to get a picture of him!

Beth took a picture of me at the music station.

Beth also got this picture of the kids and I participating in a lab. The kids were looking at their cheek cells under a microscope.

At the Mall of America we were looking for Angry Birds shirts, and we stopped at this t-shirt shop. There was a cardboard cut-out of Justin Bieber at the entrance, and Beth and Paige playfully posed by him. ☺

"Amerikids!"

Our home school group, New Ulm Area Scholars at Home (NUASH), presented our annual play on May 15. The play was called "Amerikids!", and it discussed how the United States was founded by people of faith. I thought this play had a WONDERFUL message! The play made so much of God and brought Him much glory and honor! The children and young adults did an excellent job performing, too.

That first picture showed our stage. The children were attending a convention. Each performer was a delegate from a specific state. Paige was the delegate from Illinois, and Emma was the delegate from Oklahoma...or was it Alabama?

The kids walked in and shook hands with the audience.

David built this spectacular little house for one of the songs in the play. The young boys had to build the house on the stage during the song, demonstrating how a family ought to build their home on a foundation of God's word.

This year marked the first year that I took an active role in helping with the play. I was sort of an assistant director, and I have to say that even though I was very nervous about helping out and having to lead a practice or two, overall the whole experience was very good for me. It helped me to grow and be more outgoing. And I just thoroughly enjoy watching children perform on stage. Their acting and singing had me grinning constantly! They have such great ideas. And their costumes were fantastic! Lord willing I'd like to help again next year. In this picture the kids presented Gig and I will beautiful hanging baskets of flowers! My basket is gracing my front step. ☺

Listmania!

Greetings! Well, if you've checked my blog anytime in the past two months you've probably wondered where I drifted off to. Maybe you've thought Ugh! When will there be a new poll?! Or perhaps you've pondered Hasn't she done anything post-worthy in the past two months? In short, Yes! Yes, I have! But I have also been very busy with finishing up our school year.

I discovered about April that we were behind in our schooling, and we would not be finishing in the middle of May like I had originally planned. This was mostly due to the fact that we were participating in our local home school group's annual play. Now, I'm not complaining about being involved in the play; just stating the fact that once we went to two practices a week our school lessons went down to about three lessons a week. o_O This put us grossly behind. But after we finally had our play performance on May 15, the girls and I were able to buckle down with our lessons, and we finished school last Friday. Yay!

On to my actual blog post. ☺

♥♥♥♥♥ (Side note: I love when people add hearts to their Facebook postings. If you add at least one heart to your status post you can be assured that I will probably *like* your posting. Another side note: isn't it interesting that Facebook has changed the word "like" from a state-of-being verb to an action verb?)

Every school year I learn more as a teacher. I truly enjoy seeing the girls discover new facts and remember things I've taught them. And it's a blessing to be able to watch them grow and mature.

Now, I love lists. And since this post is titled "Listmania!" that means there is a list coming, and here it is: a compilation of 50 of the things I've learned or thought about, etc. throughout this school year. ☺

1. God's creation is simply amazing.
2. So many aspects of our natural world point to His hand in forming our earth.
3. Both the tallest and the oldest trees in the world can be found in California.
4. Bees see ultra-violet light the best.
5. Bees are fascinating.
6. But still scary.
7. Hummingbirds see ultra-red light the best.
8. I just spelled the word hummingbirds as "hummingbURds." :|
9. The English language is irritating.
10. The "schwa" sound is not necessary.
11. So are silent letters like "Kn" or "Gn" or "CK".
12. "Ph" should not be a sound.
13. Squanto used fish as fertilizer.
14. Squanto made a dandy corn-on-the-cob.
15. Louis the 14th had a chess board lawn.
16. He liked to use his noble court as the chess pieces.
17. The Native Americans had a lot of reasons to dislike European settlers.
18. There is a TON of home school material published.
19. My wonderful friend Lisa Jeske knows about a lot of it. ☺
20. It is wonderful to have a support group of fellow home schooling mothers.
21. No matter how good my intentions I am not able to start school before 9:30AM.
22. My two-year-old has the ability to greatly hinder our school lessons.
23. So does my six-year-old.
24. And my eight-year-old. **wink**
25. Dora the Explorer, Thomas the Tank Engine, Bob the Builder, and Barney the Dinosaur movies have become my school saviors.
26. Paige and Emma will try to sit by the toy room door so they can sneak a peak at whatever movie Abby is watching.
27. Neither of them realizes that I am fully aware of what they are doing by the door.
28. My basement is bitterly cold in the winter.
29. My girls and I do not like having school in our basement past November.
30. Having school upstairs in the living room is a workable alternative.
31. I ♥ Apologia Press.
32. Songs help Paige remember facts.
33. It's a blessing that she and I like to sing.
34. Emma truly understands Biblical concepts and ideas.
35. What's more she ENJOYS them and applies them in everyday situations.
36. My childrens' favorite subject is art.
37. I am not an artsy person.
38. I like using cardstock to make cheat-sheets for my girls.
39. I ♥ my laminator!
40. I have to ignore my phone during school.
41. I also have to ignore the computer.
42. By early May I had finally learned the best way to teach Science to my girls.
43. It's a good thing that copy paper is cheap.
44. Taking a few days instead of one day to complete annual testing works very well!
45. We enjoy our local library.
46. You can put together and perform a play in two month's time.
47. The play songs will get stuck in your head.
48. After the play is over you will continue to sing all those songs.
49. Every time Abby sees anything red, white, and blue she will think it's part of our play.
50. Watching children and young adults act and perform on stage is so much fun!

Toe Day!

...not to be confused with other holidays. ☺

For my birthday my generous aunt/godmother sent me a surprise birthday gift in the mail: two gift cards to a nail salon and one to Panera Bread. In honor of my 30th birthday she wanted my mom and I to be able to spend a day together doing something special. What a treat! My mom and I were floored! Right away Mom suggested we take Paige and Emma as well so they could join in the fun. The girls have never had a pedicure before.

Today the four of us went to Nails by Jordan and had our toes done. Afterwards we had a delicious lunch at Panera. (And I snagged some cinnamon crunch bagels and hazelnut cream cheese to go. Yum!) Then we shopped a little. Despite the un-Spring-like temperature of 35° and the blustery wind we had a great day! As soon as we got back home from our day with Mom Paige made her own nail salon in our bathroom! She even filled the bathtub up with warm water and laid out various lotions for our feet. Inventive! And now Emma wants to have a pedicure party for her birthday in the summer. :)

Emma kept laughing while the lady massaged or buffed her feet.

The four of us. This was the only group picture we had, and of course I closed my eyes. *sigh*

My stylist (or whatever you call him) told me that I was too sophisticated for a flower on my big toe. He made an intricate sweeping design-- complete with jewels--instead. I think he just wanted a nice tip. *laughing to myself* I'm kidding. He did a very nice job!

Wow! Is that ever a closeup of my big toes!?

Emma was the first one done. Here she is at the drying station.

They are so sweet in this picture!

"Hi, Mom!"

My face doubles as a reflective panel for lunar landing crafts.

Toes: Emma, me, and Paige. Mom and I thought for sure that Paige and Emma would choose wild colors for their toes, but they both chose reds like us. Actually, the color that Emma chose was exactly the one that Mom and I were eyeing. Em certainly has a flair for style!

Girls and I. It was just the right amount of cloudy to make us all squint our eyes, thus giving us the goofiest faces possible.

Hey! How did this picture end up last?! Well, Emma's smile is a great way to say, "Good bye!"

☺