Sweeter than Honey

Last week Aaron was a camper at Hays Hills Baptist Church’s Heroe’s Camp. He had an awesome time each day from 9-12 pm having fun and learning about the Lord with his friends. Each age level learned a song with actions. What a cutie!

Every teacher and parent’s hope is that the things they are teaching their kids are sinking in. The teachers sent home little notes each day telling a little bit about what they discussed and the memory verse for the day. On Friday afternoon Aaron came up to me and said very casually, “Mom, did you know that God’s word is sweeter than honey?”…we haven’t talked about that at home, so I’m sure he picked it up this week at Heroe’s Camp. What a blessing it was for me to hear my son quote scripture! Thank you teachers! You’re planting seeds for God’s Kingdom! This morning I found the verse that Aaron was referring to…

How sweet are your words to my taste,

Sweeter than honey to my mouth!

Psalm 119:103

It was a much needed reminder for me that even in this season of constant tasks I need to be in God’s word daily. And now I’m thinking about a homeschooling unit on bees and honey and relating it to this scripture. Hmmm.….

The Rainbow and the Storm

Lately I’ve been turning my “official” teacher brain on more and more and trying to get a bit more organized in our day as we prepare to begin homeschooling sometime in the next year. My thinking is I’d rather ease him into a routine rather than wake up one day with a morning full of workbooks and learning activities. But, then again, I get on these “let’s get in a daily routine” kicks every now and then and they fade away. So, we’ll see if this one fades away like a rainbow (pun intended).

I purchase the book “Let’s Play Science” at the Homeschooling conference Greg and I attended last week and today we got to work on our first of these very simple science experiments. It was just filling a glass with water, putting it on a table in front of a sunny window (we’ve got plenty of those in Texas right now) and seeing how a rainbow is made.

At first we weren’t able to get the rainbow to appear…

But a little tweaking and moving around and we got a double rainbow!

We discussed in very simple terms how the water glass breaks the light into these colors and how that might happen in the sky after it rains. If I really had my thinking cap on I would have inserted how God sent a rainbow after the flood, but I lost my thinking cap a few weeks before the twins were born.

Right after we made our rainbow with the sun, we made a rainbow with some paint. Actually, a homemade finger paint recipe I found on a great blog I discovered today…icanteachmychild.com.

I certainly didn’t encourage the twins to eat the paint, but since it’s just made up of flour, salt, water and food coloring, I did take the time to take a picture before the “icky, don’t eat” was announced. I was surprised that Eric didn’t really try to eat the paint, since that child can smell anything edible a mile away.

It’s not a ROY G. BIV rainbow, but it’s a keeper!

And he’s a keeper, too!

In conclusion, lest anyone get too impressed with our day, let me tell you how things progressed after this activity. Usually, the rainbow happens after the storm, but today the storm came after the rainbow with babies whaling for no particular reason, acting really tired, but not wanting to take a nap and finally ending with mommies’ meltdown and sending everyone to their rooms regardless of crying because mommy just couldn’t take it anymore! I spent all my patient mothering skills in the hour it took to do this activity, because there sure wasn’t any left for the rest of the day.

But, momma said there’d be days like this, and God’s love  and forgiveness is constant and never ending, so this mamma will live to spend another day full of surprises with her boys again! 

A Little Adventure

 

It was another fun-filled week of reading and movie watching and this time the star of the show was Stuart Little. The book is fifteen chapters of adventures that this mouse-like boy (or boy-like mouse) has in the big world. Aaron listened to the imaginative stories intently as Stuart figured out how to make the best of the situations in which he found himself.

This link gives a much more thoughtful analysis and includes study questions and assignments for older students. We are just enjoying reading E.B. White and will give “The Trumpet of the Swan” a turn next.

We finished the book last night and so this afternoon was time to enjoy the movie. It was cute family film full of adventure, but nothing like the book in terms of story line.  I’ll never understand why Hollywood feels the need to add a couple of incidental curse words (d**m) and (what the HE double hockey sticks) that were so quick and unimportant that Aaron didn’t notice them, but an older child likely would.  But, besides the potty mouth cats, it was an enjoyable story of acceptance, friendship, family and courage.

RIP Scrapbooking

It’s been a long-time coming, but it’s time to say goodbye to scrapbooking forever. Really, what has kept me going this long is the 50+ scrapbooks that my Grandma Brown did during her lifetime. Before scrapbooking was a popular hobby I remember her sitting at her kitchen table sticking all the pictures in with those little corner thingies. She always did them on black paper, so she had a silver pen to write with and I always wanted to use that silver pen, but she never let me :( . We used to laugh at my grandma because she would take pictures of pictures on the wall. But, now as and adult, I understand her desire to preserve all the wonderful memories of life. She was a meticulous record keeper and probably would have loved to blog, or at least read mine :)

I did my first scrapbooking page 11 years ago during my senior year of college. I actually remember sitting up all night at my apartment in Roanoke, IL (where I student taught) because I loved this hobby so much. Since then I’ve completed 10 full albums. But, with a fourth child coming, I just don’t have the time to keep up with it. And, I don’t have the brainpower to get into digi-scrapping. But, I do love taking pictures and preserving memories, so I hope to do that with this blog. It’s easy, mess free and money free….what more could you want? In the time it takes me to scrapbook one little page I can write an entire post about our week. We’re planning on getting a nice new camera sometime soon and I’ll try to recruit one of my photography gals to teach me a little something. Also, I’ve been writing more here and really enjoying it. I’ll be the first to admit that I stink at grammar, so I’m not even going to try. In high school they kept putting me in advanced placement English classes and I never understood why because I never understood all the million grammar rules. So, I’m just going to write what comes to my mind. And, it does help to know that people are actually reading this. So, make a comment every now and then so I know I’m not just talking to myself.

Dino Daze and Family Fun *Free* Day!

 

Well, it feels like book report week here! This week we also read “Finding the First T. Rex”. It was a much shorter chapter book about…well, obviously. It was filled with facts and Aaron and I had another great time reading another great book. So, on to the field trip…

This isn’t where we went, but this is a building in downtown Austin that Aaron has claimed as “his building”. We’ll have to figure out what it is and maybe do another field trip there someday. Now onto the real field trip…

We went to the Texas Natural Science Center on the campus of the University of Texas. Four floors of old stuff from Texas. Entry fee…$0! There is even free street parking right outside the museum on the weekends. Here is a Pterosaur found in Texas and Aaron claiming that he doesn’t like to get his picture taken.

And here is Mommy next to a T. Rex skull and Aaron still not wanting his picture taken, but mommy holding him against his will…you know…to preserve the wonderful memory forever. But, really, he did want to be there!

Some more Texas animals on another floor. And, daddy!

Ahhh….that’s better! Nothing like sitting on a replica dinosaur vertebrae to brighten your day!

After the museum we headed back South to the Austin Science and Nature Center for a picnic and to let the kiddos run. Entry fee…$0!

Lunchtime!

Exploring inside the museum.

My little paleontologist digging for dinosaur bones in the Dino Pit.

And my even littler paleontologists.

And here is Aaron learning a valuable lesson that algae grows in slow moving water and is slippery. This is what I love about boys. When I was little I would have come up screaming and crying, Aaron just says “Can I go swimming now?”

We had a great family fun day, and did I mention it was all *free*!! And, one of the best moments was a nice quiet ride back to Kyle. Even though Aaron is completely faking sleeping here, he was tired out from all the fun.

But this tuckered out picture is completely genuine!

Charlotte’s Web

About two weeks ago I read a homeschooling mom’s e-book(yes, we are seriously considering homeschooling, but more about that later!) and she emphasized the importance of reading to your preschoolers. Of course we’ve all heard this and I’ve read to Aaron a lot, but I really hadn’t considered chapter books for a four year old. One of the books she recommended at this age was Charlotte’s Web. I didn’t think he would have the attention span for it, and I wasn’t sure how he’d handle the main character dying at the end. But, I loved that book when I was younger and was eager to give it a try.

I thought it would take several weeks to read the 22 chapters one at a time, but we got through the book in a week. I was pleasantly surprised at how interested Aaron was in the story and his willingness to sit and listen to chapter after chapter, begging me to read one more like he begs to watch shows or play on his computer. My mommy brain thinks, “It’s like him begging for more vegetables, how can I turn him down and not encourage him to be in a book more?!” Our progress was also sped up after I learned that a theatre in Austin was playing the recent re-make of Charlotte’s Web. Ah, Kismet! It was meant to be…Let’s get this book read! I was little discouraged along the way when he wasn’t able to keep straight who the pig and who the spider were, but I kept plowing through because he really seemed to enjoy it.

This might be stretching the Kismet thing a bit, but yesterday morning (the day that Charlotte was about to die for us in the book) she came to visit us on our back patio. I hate to admit it, but I smashed “Charlotte” soon after taking this picture, and dozens of tiny baby spiders starting running out of their mother I had just sent to spider heaven. In my defense, we live in Texas and I don’t know what is a cute little Charlotte-like spider and what is going to bite me and make my leg swell up or worse. But, after doing a little research I found out it was a good spider for keeping away other pests and I really regret ending its life. I just hope there isn’t a pig, goose, or sheep in a barn somewhere wondering where is their next word in her web.

That night we read the end of the book and Charlotte taught us what it means to sacrifice for others, to do whatever you can to keep those you love safe, the meaning or true friendship. Did my four year old little boy find these lessons? Well, after we read that Charlotte had died, his first question was, “Are they going to eat Charlotte?”. (Long sigh of “is he getting anything from this?”), “No honey, they didn’t eat Charlotte.” So, no I don’t think my son picked up on any of those life lessons, maybe he will when we read it again in a few years. He did learn a few more vocabulary words, learned to sit still and be quiet without being entertained by lots of action and he got to spend lots of snuggling time with Mommy. So, yes, it was still worth it!

And, the grand finale of this week-long adventure was our trip to the movie theatre. I had promised him a snack at the theatre and promised myself I would follow the rules and not sneak anything in to avoid paying the ridiculous prices.

So, at the end of it all it was $0 to borrow a book from the library, $2 for movie tickets, $4 (after $1 coupon) for a smidge of popcorn, laffy taffy and Sprite…starting a season of reading timeless books to my boys, priceless!

As promised, the pizza crust

 

Whole Wheat Pizza Crust!

I don’t know why they don’t include baking instructions. I just roll it out to just past the sides and then pinch around the ends to make a raised crust. I bake it about 8 minutes at 425, add sauce and toppings and bake another 10 minutes or so.

This time I sprinkled in some oregano. I haven’t tasted it yet, but it smells great. Next time I think I’m going to substitute honey for the sugar. Also, I’m going to try baking it on the grill tonight.

I even impressed myself

 

I’m not one to brag about my cooking…because I never have anything to brag about. BUT, yesterday was different. We were having grilled chicken for dinner and needed a bread to go along with it. We’ve been out of the ‘ol Pillsbury crescent rolls I usually grab, so (since the babies were taking a nice nap after a morning at the pool ) I went to the computer and looked up a homemade roll recipe. It was a total hit! I’m planning on making a bunch of these to freeze and I’m sure they will become a family favorite. I also split it in half to make a chicken sandwich and can’t wait to use these as slider rolls, or rolls for Italian beef, and the list goes on and on! Yes, I am getting this excited about bread. It’s pennies to make and healthier make with Whole Wheat flour and yummier then any roll I’ve ever had. Here’s the recipe…

Quick and Easy Yeast Rolls

I just substituted half the white flour for whole wheat flour.

I’ve also been making a great whole wheat pizza crust. We usually have pizza on Fridays, so maybe I’ll post pictures of that later.