Weekly Happenings

"Peter Rabbit"

Hey there! Just checking in with a few updates on what we did this week. It was a pretty "normal" week with nothing too exciting going on. Just the usual...cleaning, cooking, laundry, homeschooling, playing, reading, running errands...that kinda stuff. Still so much to be thankful for.

We took lots of walks around the neighborhood getting some vitamin D and fresh air. We found some more tracks in the snow too. Some little bird and another mammal. We also have been seeing our little bunny friend a lot. He lives somewhere in our backyard and hangs out there all the time. He is so adorable and the girls love watching him. It's the closest thing we have to a pet right now so it's pretty entertaining.

In our homeschooling we've been learning about the Middle Ages in our history lessons. We checked out several books from the library and the girls have had fun looking through them to see what life was like back in those times. After our history reading one day we decided to make some of our own swords and shields. That was a blast and the rest of the afternoon they pretended to be kings and knights.

We've enjoyed having Daddy around more too as he has been doing more local work for the moment and not traveling as much. He's great for tickle parties and snowball fights. And he brought home some flowers for me one day too. He's the best! Love that guy!

This weekend we got to spend some time with my mom, AKA Nana. We hit up the 50% off sale at Goodwill, the mall and the library. And I had to get her caught up on Downton Abbey. We always have so much fun with her and are so blessed she only lives 5 minutes away!

The girls also got to play with some of their neighborhood friends this weekend too. We live in a pretty great neighborhood. And even though we don't have our acreage in the country yet, we couldn't have asked for a better place to live in the meantime.

There was also plenty of playtime for the girls with each other too. They love to play with their dolls and stuffed animals. Beanie Boos are their latest thing and it's possible we may have a slight obsession with them. LOL! Ellie woke up early the other day and came and asked to borrow my phone so she could use the camera...this is what I found afterward:

Don't tell me you don't think these little critters are adorable. And remember, we don't have any pets, so.....*smile*

Anyway, even in the ordinary there are so many gifts to be found. I hope you had a wonderful week and make sure to take time to look for the gifts around you in this coming week. No matter how small. 

Blessings!

Wednesday Outdoor Hour

Hello! Hey! It's the middle of the week! And I'm writing on the blog! What do you know! I missed writing a weekly update last weekend...and perhaps the one before that. I'm trying, I really am. But cooking dinner and spending time with my girls is a bit higher on the priority list than blogging. And I just can't do it all. So you'll have no choice but to put up with my random and meager blog posts. You'll be fine though. You've got bigger priorities than my blog too. At least you SHOULD.

Anyway, we had so much fun today with our nature walk that I thought I'd through it out there for y'all. And who knows, maybe it will become a regular thing...sharing our weekly nature time. Or maybe this is a one time deal. But I'm not gonna stress over it.

With our homeschool we have quite a bit of mish-mash going on with our curriculum. We use lots of free resources online, things we've picked up at the Dollar Store and Target dollar bins, garage sale finds, etc. However, even though our curriculum is pulled from all over the place we are attempting to follow the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling which focuses a lot on nature study and reading "living" books. (You can read more about it here.) 

Wednesday is one of our favorite days of the week because we devote most of our school day to nature study. Of course we do our math, reading and writing as usual, but for the most part, our Wednesdays consist of taking a nature walk, making observations, recording in our nature notebooks (drawing, painting, writing), and just enjoying being outside.

That does become a little more difficult in the winter because, well, it's just too cold sometimes! But we still attempt to get out as much as possible. You know, shoveling snow when it's below zero. Taking a walk around the block on icy sidewalks. The possibilities are endless...

Today, though, the weather was absolutely gorgeous for the middle of January. I never paid attention to how warm it got, but it was warm enough to start melting the great polar ice cap on the neighborhood streets. And we didn't need to bundle up to the point where we could hardly move. Which made taking a nature walk so much easier. 

This term in our nature studies we are focusing on weather. Of course, we never limit ourselves and we will study and observe anything that tickles our fancy. Like today. We watched a Mister Roger's Neighborhood show about wind and weather stations. Read about wind in a science book and even did a little experiment.

But the wind wasn't actually blowing outside today. at. all. So when we took our walk today we observed that the wind was definitely not blowing. And then we just enjoyed the sunshine, the snow and everything else. Animal tracks in the snow. Shiny snow crystals. A flock of birds singing sweetly. Bare branches of the trees highlighted by the blue, blue sky. 

It was glorious! And I highly recommend spending some time out in nature every week. You won't regret it.

Blessings!

Happy New Year!!!

 Well, here it is!!! 2015!! Can't believe it is already another new year...where does the time go? Hubby had to work this year for New Year's Eve and the boy had plans with my brother so it was just me and the girls. Since I'm not really into letting my kids stay up till midnight (cuz I don't even want to stay up THAT late!), even for a holiday, we decided to make the most of our late afternoon and early evening. I came across such a cute idea over at Not Consumed and we had so much fun with it.

 We did a photo booth, had a tea party, wrote letters to Jesus (another neat tradition that I found here.) played a dance game on the Wii, made some yummy snacks together, had a bubble bath, wrote some memories of the year, and just had lots of fun!

Tea party! Complete with Cream Puffs! AND candles!

My little chefs...Hannah made deviled eggs and Ellie made guacamole. And they worked together to make kale chips.

Hannah was so sweet and took a picture of Ellie working so hard and thoughtfully on the picture she was drawing for Jesus.

Lovely princesses! They had fun dressing up in their fanciest dresses for our party.

We also had a lovely time finishing up the end of our year celebrating the birth of our Savior. We got a wonderful new Advent book that we went through each day. That was definitely one of our most special activities. 

We also enjoyed a light parade, Zoo lights, going to the Nutcracker ballet with Nana, reading our Christmas books we bring out of hiding each year, building snowmen with marshmallows and much more. 

Bookworms

Ready for the Sugar Plum Fairy!

The biggest excitement was getting to go back to Oregon to spend Christmas with hubby's family and also getting to see some of our dear friends. So blessed to have so many amazing people in our lives. We had such a wonderful time...even if it WAS raining ALL. THE. TIME. :)

I told you it was rainy! :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas celebrating our wonderful Savior, and a blessed time rejoicing in the gift of a new year! May you put your hope in God as this new year opens before us!

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future."

Jeremiah 29:11

Blessings!

Amber

Weekly Happenings

So, trying something new again here.

I thought it would be fun to share a few pics and update on what we did this week. The plan is to do this every week, but, well, you know how good I am at posting on my blog. Ha!

Anyway, here's a bit of what we did this week. We've been having unbelievably nice weather for December, so we've been spending lots of time outside. LOVE it!

 The beginning of the week we got out our tree and did some decorating for Christmas. We have a small fake tree that we had for our small Oregon home. Last year we went with a real tree which was amazing, but decided to be lazy and just use our fake one this year. Since it's so small, there's not really room for everything on it so we decided to put up a string on a bare patch of wall to hang all of the cute ornaments the girls have made over the years. I love how it turned out, and the girls like that all their work is on display.

Ellie is our little artist and was messing around with our dry erase boards one day and came up with this. She has been working hard on writing her letters and asked her sister to help her spell "Merry Christmas". Then she added a reindeer (Rudolph to be exact) and a tree.

The girls also helped me make our favorite peppermint fudge this week. They love to be in the kitchen learning how to make things. You can find the recipe for our fudge here.

Since the weather was super nice all week, we hurried to get our school work done in the mornings so we could spend the afternoons outside. We took a walk or bike ride almost everyday.

We had fun checking out the plants and how they look this time of year, and also just enjoying the scenery. The sky has been so amazingly blue!

 

On one of our walks we gathered a bunch of sticks for making rustic stars. I can't take full credit for it as I saw something similar on Pinterest. But we certainly had fun making them our own.

 

Hannah came up with the idea to make hers into a snowflake instead. She did a fabulous job! And of course I somehow don't have a picture of the finished product. *sigh*

Ellie had to have a little help, but she did great too!

 

It was great to sit out in the yard in our t-shirts and soak up the sunshine while we worked!

 

This next week is looking like it's going to be a fun one too...

Working on Christmas presents, making "crystal" snowflakes, maybe some ice skating, and then going to the Nutcracker ballet with Nana!

Hope you all have a blessed week! Be sure to check back in case I follow through with another post! LOL! 

Blessings!