Happy 2014!

Amelia's preschool project from last week. Sadly, it has glitter on it, so it did not make it into the house. I did grab a quick picture of it though.

Note to self

I was cleaning off the table I use as my work desk when I am at home. It was a disaster and I've been avoiding it. I found many interesting things including several cryptic notes mixed in with the fraction worksheets. Is it some kind of code? Or perhaps a hidden message?

I also found a notebook with a diagonal black marker line drawn through every single page. The whole page, corner to corner. There was also a long lost original copy of mu favorite fraction activity that I painstakingly put together a few years ago that has been highlighted on every other letter with every color of the rainbow.

Never boring, my life.

Routine

It is looking like tomorrow is going to finally bring us back to the reality of routine! We have been out of the daily grind for 3 weeks or so and school looks like it will be on for tomorrow....we can only hope! We were scheduled for a nice 2 week break, but then the snow and cold temperatures earned us 3 bonus days here at home.

I'd guess posting here will go back to the irregularly random intervals as well!

Sent from my iPhone

Conversations

Gemma was in the kitchen playing and fell off a chair. She made a beeline for mama with big crocodile tears steaming down her face. She looked so sad I thought my heart might break.

Amelia: mom?
Mama: yes Amelia?
Amelia: mom! Gemma is crying!
Mama: yes, she bumped her head and she is crying. (Ohhhh, what a sweet, kind, caring big sister she is! I am mother of the year and it is only JANUARY!)
Amelia: Gemma's face looks all weird when she cries.
Mama: what?!? (What happened to my caring child?)
Amelia: when she cries, her face gets all weird. And it is loud. Does she have to cry so loud?
Mama: Amelia! She is hurt!
Amelia: (big sigh). Ok. I just don't know why she has to make that weird face all the time when she cries.

(I may have to do some more work to fully earn that mother of the year badge.....)
Sent from my iPhone

In the last week, Gemma has shown some interest in the one puzzle I have upstairs. Before now, she liked to throw the pieces around, but never really sat down to figure out how it worked. We have about 30 other wooden puzzles, but who needs that many pieces to pick up at the end of every day?

This morning, I went down to grab 2 puzzles I thought might be a little more challenging for her and brought them up.

She was delighted. She did this farm puzzle over and over again. This evening, John got this video of her working the puzzle. Keep in mind, she has has this puzzle for less that 1 day!

I don't know what is up with the jacket. She loves it and insists on wearing it all the time. She brings it to someone and follows them around until they help her into it. If her first pick for help doesn't work out, she'll bring it to someone else who will.
This morning, Amelia put the jacket on Gemma at least twice (I won't let her eat with it on) while I was working on other things.

Williams science fair

We have been plugging away at Williams science fair project. He is learning about the conditions for best making a fossil by experimenting with soil types and amounts of water. So far so good!

Snow-cream

We made snow cream yesterday with some of the 10 inches of snow that fell. After shoveling, I collected 8 cups of the pristine-est snow I could find. Back inside, I separated it into 2 bowls for William and Amelia to mix up.

Then we added to each bowl:
1 cup of half and half
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla

It was delicious! Everyone enjoyed it. The only problem was there wasn't really room in the freezer for the container. I just stuck the container out the back door and left it on the deck until after dinner (I planned on letting the kids finish it up). When I came back, the container was completely buried in the snow! I ended up just making more snow cream for everyone!