Happy Valentines Day!

I didn't do too much for Valentines Day this year (not feeling too good these days) but tried to make a fun dinner for the kids, heart shaped quesadillas and jello jigglers along with a box of chocolates for each of them. Dad surprised them with a Valentines gift, a badminton set! Braeden and Star were so nice to us though and convinced us go out to dinner and a movie telling us that we needed to go out since we won't be able to after the baby comes. What thoughtful children we have, they are so easy to love!

Cate's Swing

Cate came to me the other day so excited, "Mom, come see what I made!". She grabbed my hand and dragged me outside to show me that she made a swing all by herself. She is so creative, always working on a project! I'm not sure how she got it to stay in the tree since she can't tie a knot but she had the rope twisted all up and "tied" around the board many times and it actually stayed and held her up. She had a great time swinging all day and couldn't wait to show dad when he got home. Have I mentioned how much I love the trees in our yard? They are definetly a highlight of the house, the kids can't stay out of them and I just love that!

Bird Watching

The kids think we live in the wilderness since we have so many birds in our yard everyday. They love to watch them and try to figure out what kind they are. Almost daily someone yells through the house "Come and look at this bird!" followed by "Its sooo small", "it has a red head", "it's a woodpecker", "the tree is full of birds", "this one is blue" or just "it's so beautiful". I have woken up several times when the big tree in the front yard is full of them, its quite the sight and it does give us the feeling of living out in the country somewhere even though we don't. Here are some of the pictures the kids have just had to take of the birds (not all of them are in our yard but in our neighborhood)....




Not exactly professional shots but I love that they are enjoying nature and feel like they are really living in it. I just purchased a few field guides, one of them about birds, to go with our new science curriculum. I believe they are Golden Guide books. The kids love them and can now rush to find what kind of bird they are looking at.

Meet Sammantha

This month we learned about Sammantha and had quite a fancy affair. Of course I forgot to take any pictures! The girls came dressed in their finest attire and we were served (Star and Ali were our servants for the day and did a fabulous job) a five course meal. During our meal we learned about proper etiquette and I taught the girls how to set a table. The girls loved it! They were especially excited by the sherbet in between one of the courses, "dessert in the middle of your meal!". Hopefully they remember at least a little bit of the etiquette they were taught as well. Because Sammantha enjoyed giving service to others we did a small service project. The girls each brought items to put together hygiene kits that we donated to the LDS Humanitarian Center. Being so close to Valentines Day the girls also made old fashioned style valentines which turned out really cute. They are all so creative and its fun to see how different their projects all are. I'm so bummed about the pictures!!