He rocks!

I know I write quite often on here about my husband and how great he is. Well, he deserves the kudos.........so here's another post about him. On Friday night I went out for a while to work at school and run a few errands. I had prepared dinner before I left and had eaten with my oldest son. My husband and younger son were going to eat later. So when I left there were dirty dishes all over the counter and all the food was still out. I figured that my DH would package up the leftover food, but wasn't expecting to find all the dishes washed and the counters wiped down when I got home. It was a great surprise! We don't have a dishwasher, so we hand-wash everything which I don't mind (since I do it about 3-4 times per day), but my husband does NOT care for washing dishes. He totally does his share of work around the house, but dishes is one of my usual chores. Anyway, when I got home I told him he rocked. He was not sure of what had warranted the compliment. I reminded him about washing the dishes. He said, "Oh yeah, I forgot I did that." He's so awesome!

Some ideas for Lent

I wanted to write about some ideas I've been tossing around in my head about how to approach Lent this year. To be honest, although I was born and raised Christian, I have never really done anything special during Lent. I've tried, halfheartedly, to give something up a few times. In the past year or so I read somewhere of doing the opposite of giving something up and I liked that idea. Basically, the idea is that instead of NOT doing something, you try to DO something you don't normally do. So I've been ruminating on that for a while and last night I came up with what I want to do. I'm really excited about it!

Here's the background before I tell you my idea. I am TERRIBLE about staying in touch with people when I change jobs or move to a new place. I mean, truly TERRIBLE. I am also TERRIBLE about writing thank-you cards. It's embarrassing to admit, but I just really don't do it very often. I always THINK about doing it, but I don't. So............I was thinking about all the women who have been important to me at different times in my life and I decided to take time EACH DAY during Lent to write a card to one of those women, telling them what impact they've had on me. I just got done jotting down a list of names and am up to 36 so far. I am planning to make some special handmade cards that I will use and there will be a handmade bookmark in each card along with an individualized hand-written message from me. That way, the recipient will have something to keep to remind them of the impact they've had on me. I already have my card idea picked out and am hoping to make up a sample tonight. I'll post it soon.

My other ideas for myself for Lent are trying to spend at least 10 minutes a day in silent prayer/meditation and restricting myself from using the computer until after 9:00 p.m. at night. That will be hard. Although I do the majority of my blog writing and reading after the boys are in bed, I DO sneak over to the computer quite a bit to check email and see if anyone is leaving me comments on the blog. So..........I am going to try to scale back on that.

If you have any ideas for Lent either for yourself or your children, I'd love to hear about them. Many of you left me such thoughtful comments to my "Gentlewoman" post. I so appreciated reading and learning from them. My sincere thanks to you for taking the time to write.

Oh........I DO have an idea of something I want to do with the boys during Lent, but I will write more about that later. Right now my little boy has gotten up from his nap and wants to go play outside.

If not for HIS (and his) mercy

I think I've said here before that this blog is kind of cathartic for me. Cheaper than therapy at any rate. I am the type of person who easily and readily shares personal information with others. It's just the way I am. My husband is the complete polar opposite. I don't think either way is "right"; we're just different. Anyway, I wanted to write a little bit about something that happened last night. In a nutshell, the DH (dear husband)and I had a fight, and it was pretty much my fault.

Here is the scenario: it was about 9:15 p.m. and I had gone downstairs to walk on the treadmill to put in my daily 2 miles. (Sidenote: I was NOT very motivated or excited about starting a workout that late and I was hungry because I hadn't eaten much in anticipation of the workout.) The DH was also downstairs doing some ironing of his work clothes for the week. I won't give you the details of our argument, but in hindsight I can see the insanity of someone starting a fight with a man who is IRONING HIS OWN CLOTHES!!! I mean, c'mon people, I probably should have been kissing his feet or something. I'm just so used to him doing his own ironing that I wasn't fully appreciating that fact in the moment if you know what I mean. Anyway, I hopped up on the treadmill and started my workout and in the process proceeded to get steamed about something he said and there you go. I am not at all proud of it, and I've apologized to him three times already. I first apologized in person after my workout. Then I apologized through email today, and again in person tonight while our boys were having their swimming lesson. I am writing this post to tell you about the last apology, because his response to it was quite meaningful to me.

Picture the two of us sitting on the concrete pool deck leaning back against the wall. Our youngest son is on my lap. Our oldest son is having his lesson in the pool. And I say to the DH, "Hey, I'm sorry for all the PB stuff last night." (The funny sidestory to the "PB" thing is that one of our cats is nicknamed PB, short for Prince Bob, a story unto itself. My first verbal apology last night after I came upstairs was, "Sorry for all the PB stuff downstairs." He didn't understand what I meant, and I knew he wouldn't. Still.........I gave him a better apology and then today in the email apology I said something like, "Sorry for turning into PB (AKA PsychoB _ _ _ _) last night." I think you can fill in the blanks.) So anyway, his response to that was, "I don't even know why you bring stuff like that up again. Once it's over, it's over." And he truly means it. He just forgives that easily. And that's where the title of this post comes from. If not for God's mercy in giving me such a wonderful husband that I often feel I don't deserve AND the DH's mercy in forgiving me so quickly, this girl would be in a heap of trouble. So tonight, I am thankful for the blessing of a great mate and the mercy of a loving God.

PS: In case you are wondering, I'm going to forward a link to this post to the DH so he knows how I feel. He doesn't currently have a subscription to either of my blogs because I DELETED his email subscriptions a few weeks ago in another PB moment. Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh.......I feel so much better already. True blog catharsis.

Today's Little Joys

I had the day off today. It was not as productive as it could have been, but I was able to slow down enough from my normal somewhat frenzied pace to notice and experience a few things that brought me joy. And I thought I would share them with you.

Joy #1: Nuzzling my chin against the bristly cowlick on my three-year-old's newly cut hair while we cuddled on the couch watching "Charlie Brown's Christmas" DVD for the umpteenth time.

Joy #2: A huge snow "bear" that I observed in a yard when driving to pick up my oldest son from school. The coolest part was that as I drove past, the bear was actually in the process of being created by a man. And even cooler was the fact that the man was an older gentleman (by my best guess he had to be at least in his sixties) and there wasn't a child in sight. I thought that was so awesome!

Joy #3: My oldest son has acquired the confidence and skill to move onto the next level in his YMCA swim lessons. This is big for him and I'm so proud of him.

Joy #4: I spent about an hour of uninterrupted browsing and shopping in this Christian bookstore. I am going to write a separate post about my purchases. But please rest assured that it was VERY joyful to spend time in a bookstore by myself. YAY for me! (And thanks, Mom, for watching my little guy so I could have this outing!)

A Blessed Moment

I had a special moment within the last hour that I would like to share with you now (even though I have MANY other things I should be doing!). I wanted to write it down before I forget it because it was very special.

After the morning preschool session, my youngest son and I went out for lunch at McDonald's. This is a special treat since we don't do this very often. As we were eating I noticed a song that was playing in the restaurant. Usually I kind of tune out background music, but this one caught my attention. I am not sure the title or artist, but it was sung by a female and the lyrics went something like, "In my daughter's eyes, I am a hero......." Anyway, it was kind of making me feel emotional, not in a good way, because it made me think about how I am still kind of a hero to my youngest son who is three, but I am pretty sure my hero status has already plummeted in the eyes of my older son since he has a.) lived with me longer and b.) seen a lot more of my not-so-heroic moments than his little brother has. I have often thought about how bittersweetly sad it is that the longer we know someone, the more they disappoint us and the more we, in turn, disappoint them. I guess it is part of our bumbling human existence that we tend to have high expectations of others and that we are inevitably disappointed when these expectations aren't met. Even sadder is the realization that we have very likely been a source of disappointment to those who know and love us best.

Before you start typing me a nice, comforting comment reassuring me and stroking my self-esteem (and don't think for a second that I don't appreciate all the thoughtful comments people leave), I want to be clear with you that I am not wallowing in self-pity here, nor am I beating myself up, even if it sounds like that. I am just trying to be very, very honest in this blog about the things I think and feel, even though that sometimes makes me seem needy and vulnerable. So..........I want you to know that I am fine; I don't think I'm a horrible person. I just tend to reflect on myself and to be uncompromisingly honest about what I see. I think it is our responsibility as humans, and even more so, as Christians, to reflect on how we are presenting ourselves to the world and how we are going about our interactions with our fellow human beings. We are supposed to live our lives the way Christ did as much as is humanly possible. I don't take that charge lightly, and I have no problem admitting when I don't measure up. I think it's healthy.........it pushes me to try harder. Anyway, I'm digressing.............I just wanted to explain all that before I tell you the really cool thing that happened while I was thinking all of the above. So.............

...........there I sat in my self-reflective fog, listening to the song. Across the table from me, with sunlight on his sweet face, my youngest son tilted his head to the side and said, "Hey, Mommy. This is happy music." Mind you, I hadn't been talking out loud AT ALL about the music. I smiled at him and said, "Yes, honey. It is happy music." He smiled back and said, "This music makes me happy. Happy is when you are happy about your mom and your dad and your brother." It was really so sweet and innocent and precious and so many other adjectives that I could keep going. And it was just what I needed to hear at that moment. Thank you, God, for giving me that moment with my son. YOU are MY hero, and it looks like I may just hold onto my Mommy hero status for a while longer.

All about the big boy

I have been writing a lot about my littlest boy lately. So tonight I am dedicating a post to my older son. He is 7 1/2 and attends a private Montessori elementary school. He is really an amazing child. He has an incredible mind and is always coming up with self-initiated projects to do at home. He never ceases to astound us with his thinking. Over the past few days, he has been working on setting up his own Montessori school in his bedroom. The photo below shows the sign on his door which tells the hours the school is open as well as what ages are allowed to attend. In case you can't read it well in the photo, the school is open to ages 3-adult (anyone). He put the anyone in the parentheses. I love it!



The first area of the classroom that he developed is the "language" area. He has a list posted on the wall which tells what "works" (that is what Montessori activities are referred to in the classroom) are available in the language area. Below that list are some of the activities he developed. He cut out and labelled his own pockets to contain the cards for the activity. Additionally, he has made worksheets to go with the various activities and skills. Below you can see the "Antonyms & Synonyms" pocket, the "Suffixes & Prefixes" pocket, and the "Compound Words" pocket, along with some other materials he developed. My husband and I have both been invited to have lessons and complete work in his classroom. It is so fun to see how he is reflecting on and extending the learning he is experiencing at school.






All the language material pictured in this post was completed last night (Wednesday). I wrote a whole post on my other blog about another language activity he developed after school today. If you are interested, click over there to read about it. I explain a little more about Montessori education in that post. The photo below shows him stretched out on the floor working hard on developing his materials for the "math" area of his classroom. I am so proud of him and what a creative spirit he has. I hope that I can always do my best to nuture his many talents..........he is truly a treasure!!

The PERFECT Friday night

Last night was the best Friday night I've had in a long time. And not because I went to a fabulous new restaurant, saw a great new movie, or went shopping. No, it was the perfect Friday night because I was home with my family spending time together. Our lives seem so rushed and hectic. Every morning it's a stressful rush to get everyone dressed, fed and out the door on time. Then when we get home, there's dinner to prepare, eat and clean up, spelling homework to oversee, piano lessons to practice, baths, and bedtime (and usually a load of laundry to fold and put away!). Rarely do we have an evening that doesn't feel rushed. I had the opportunity last night to go to a Moms Night Out that was hosted by our MOPS group. I do love to go to these and I'm so glad our group sponsors them. However, this week what I really needed was a relaxing night at home. And, luckily, that's exactly what I got. (I hope the moms in my MOPS group were able to have a good time without me......haha)!


Here's what we did............we had frozen pizza and salad for dinner because by the time we get home from my oldest son's Friday evening piano lesson, it's after 5:30 already. Then, my husband and I played around with our playlists from playlist.com and basically jammed out to great music all night. My youngest son LOVES LOVES LOVES to dance and was very into dancing with us. He assigned my husband and I each special "air instruments" to play. For example, he would say, "Mom, you play drums" and "Dad, you play trombone" and we had to play those "air" instruments for the whole song. He was usually the air guitarist. It was very cute and fun. After quite a long jam session, he decided to find a "real" instrument to play. The photo below shows him playing his little drum. Also interesting to share is that he is shirtless because he spilled bubble solution on his shirt during the "bubble jam." As I said, it was the PERFECT Friday night.





By the way, if you usually just pop in and read my most recent post, you probably don't get to listen to my full playlist. Take time this weekend, if you have it, to click on one of the songs you may not have heard. There's some good stuff there. (NOTE: The playlist is at the very bottom of my blog, so if you scroll all the way down, you'll see all the songs listed. Just click on a title and it will switch over to that song.) And don't hesitate to comment and recommend a song you love. I'm always looking for more good music. Also, if you haven't already done so, checkout Playlist.com for yourself. It's FREE!!!! Have a great weekend!

Project 365 Update

There is still not a clear answer about whether or not Becky Higgins' Project 365 kit will be available for more of us to order. However, I am happy to say that I am still committed to the project, even though I don't yet know how I'll showcase my photos. I thought I would share with you a few recent photos that don't show faces. For those of you who personally know my children, try to imagine the sweet face that goes with each picture.





To document the history-making moments of this past week, I snapped a photo of the Wall Street Journal from Inauguration Day along with a VERY cool Inauguration Day necklace my friend, Amber, made me. (THANKS, AMBER!)





It was warm enough yesterday for us to play outside and even ride bikes. I love this photo of my little boy's shadow against the garage wall. He strategically stopped the bike at the same place on the sidewalk on each "loop" so he could watch his shadow.





And here's a "hind" view of him pedalling down the sidewalk.




This one cracks me up! I took it just tonight. My little boy loves to look at catalogs and was busy studying the Mindware catalog that we got in the mail today. Since he was a baby, he has been mildly obsessed with his belly button. He often pulls up his shirt and pokes it, or places his finger into it. I have thought so often that I should take a photo of this to document his little "obsession" before it disappears. And I finally got around to doing it tonight. Those of you who know him have probably seen his belly more times than you can count! Sorry!

And lest you think my older boy is forgotten, fear not. I have the sweetest photo of him sound asleep on the couch.........he has had a bad cold all week and has missed a few days of school. Each day he napped for a while on the couch and one day I caught him in mid-slumber. It has been a long time since I've had a photo of him sleeping. He looked SO amazingly sweet and also looked so much like Daddy in that photo. I won't be sharing it here because I always maintain our privacy; however, please know he hasn't been left out of the photos!

He makes my heart beep

I just sat down here after putting my little one to bed. I wanted to share with you the most adorable prayer that he just prayed. Our bedtime routine includes reading 1-3 stories, then turning off the light and saying a prayer. I want my children to think of prayer as a truly personal conversation with God. So instead of praying a "canned" prayer, I model a heartfelt, off-the-cuff prayer at bedtime. My little boy always wants me to pray first. And more often than not, he declines praying on his own after my prayer, which is fine with me. I don't want to put any pressure on him about it. However, I admit I was very happy tonight when he decided to say his own prayer. I'll share it with you here:

"Dear God, Tank (thank) you for our games. Tank you for the pwesents we got from Santa at Bwock's (Brock's) house. I yike (like) Bwock's house. I yike Bwock and Ammer (Amber.......Brock's mom) and even Bwock's daddy. Tank you for my brain and my howt (heart) beeping (beating). I yike my howt beeping (heart beating). We love you too, God. Amen"

Couldn't have said it better myself!

Martin's Big Words lead to LOTS of words

Today one of the students in my Montessori preschool classroom brought the book Martin's Big Words for me to read to the class. I had planned on reading a book about Martin Luther King, Jr. to the class, but didn't have this one. I didn't have time to preview it first either. I was pleased to find out that it is a really great book with beautiful illustrations. There is one page in it that briefly states that Martin was shot and died. Not surprisingly, this was a major point of interest for my students. My own little boy, who is in my class, was very taken with the story. In fact, I rushed to the computer as soon as I put him to bed so I could share with you some of what he was talking to me about at bedtime tonight.

To give you a little background, after I read the book in class my son kept saying that he wanted to talk to Martin (he calls him "that man in Kate's book"). He also kept talking about how one person shot Martin and he died and went to heaven with God. Tonight at bedtime he brought it up again on his own. I am going to try to paraphrase what he said because it is so precious. I will refer to him as LO (little one).

LO: Mommy, that man got shot by a person. He is in heaven with God. Maybe we can get some men tomorrow to build him back up again and make him live so I can talk to him.

ME: Well, he is kind of alive with God in heaven. And tonight when we say our prayer we could tell God thank you for putting Martin Luther King, Jr. on our Earth to say such good big words and do so many great things for people.

LO: Yes, but I want to talk to him. Tomorrow you can come to God's heaven with me to build him up.

ME: (trying to change the subject) Hey! Guess what tomorrow is? Tomorrow is when Barack Obama is going to become our president. (LO loves seeing "Brock Obama" on TV and makes us run and look each time he sees him.)

LO: Maybe tomorrow we can take Barack Obama in our van up to God's heaven door and he can meet that man so I can talk to him.

ME: Well, see, Barack Obama is here on Earth and Martin Luther King, Jr. is in heaven now. Maybe someday Barack Obama can meet MLK, Jr. in heaven.

LO: Mommy, maybe we can get some maps. Hey, Mommy, we can get some small maps so we know how to get to heaven.

ME: You know, it's getting kind of late. You have school tomorrow and swim lessons. You need to get some rest now and go to sleep. We can talk more about Martin Luther King, Jr. tomorrow. We can even read some more books about him that Mommy has at school.

LO: Tomorrow when I wake up I'm going to talk to you about that many berry berry (very very) much.

At one point I asked him, out of sheer curiosity, what he would say to Martin if he COULD talk to him. He said, "I would say thank you to him for talking to all the people."

I wish I could have tape-recorded his little voice speaking so seriously to me about such a serious topic. It has impacted him in a big way, more than I would have imagined it would. It will be interesting to see what he says tomorrow about "that man". Knowing my son, he won't forget about it........and come to think of it, I wouldn't want him to!

Mercy

I am turning to Webster's again for a definition. Mercy is defined as: compassion or forbearance shown especially to an offender (i.e. as God shows mercy to a sinner). That definition best fit what I wanted to write about today. However, it led me to look up the definition of forbearance. That is defined as: 1. a refraining from the enforcement of something that is due 2. the act of forbearing: PATIENCE 3. the quality of being forbearing: LENIENCY.

Now I am going to explain why I'm writing this post. Last night our family was dealing with some unpleasant child behaviors (as I'm sure many families may have been, if not last night, sometime within the past week). I will not go into details or tell which child was the offender in this case. However, I will fully admit that I was not feeling MERCIFUL or FORBEARING last night when dealing with the behaviors, nor was I feeling either of those things even this morning as I woke up and thought about it all again. Actually, I was still hanging onto my anger. I know I should have let it go by the morning, but I am sinful and human, and I hadn't. At some point within the first hour or so after I had awoken in a bad mood, it hit me hard that my feelings of disappointment and anger may, in fact, be very similar to what God feels when we, his human children, fail to live up to his teachings and expectations. I would fall into that category pretty much on any given day at any hour on the clock (well, maybe not when I'm asleep!). And I was humbled, again, by HIS MERCY and love. And I was reminded that God provides the ultimate parenting example for all of us struggling to raise our children to be kind, respectful, compassionate people. We must first remember that we ourselves on a DAILY BASIS are the recipients of His love and mercy even though we probably don't deserve it. And we must remember, in turn, to show that compassion, love and mercy to those around us, even when we feel that they don't deserve it. Today I am thanking God for His mercy, and asking for His help in becoming a more merciful and compassionate parent, especially in the thick of it.

Nuff said.

Wait, no, not enough. I want to say one more thing (DH claims I always have to say one more thing and I guess that's true. However, he may appreciate THIS last thing.) I've written before about what a great guy my husband is. And I want you all to know that HE is naturally much more merciful and forbearing than I am. Sometimes this causes "clashes" between us as we try to process how to best handle our children's behavior. However, I am very grateful for these special qualities in him. And I know our boys will benefit greatly from being raised by such a loving and compassionate father.

Wistful

Webster's defines the word "wistful" as follows: 1. full of unfulfilled longing or desire; YEARNING 2. musingly sad: PENSIVE. The first definition pretty accurately describes something I felt this evening. I was downstairs walking on the treadmill when my littlest boy came downstairs to talk to me. While I was very mildly irritated by the disruption to my workout, I was still glad to see him. He was being very sweet and was concerned that our cat was too close to the treadmill. He chattered to me for a few minutes before heading back upstairs where Daddy and big brother were. As he paused by the door before going up the steps, it struck me how very little he still is. His head only comes up to about the height of the doorknob. And then it immediately hit me how quickly time is passing. I briefly tried (unsuccessfully) to imagine him as a teenager in the exact same spot, towering above the doorknob where only the top of him reaches today. The adjective that popped into my head at that moment was wistful. I know that when he is a big (teenage) boy, I will have many moments of wistfulness, thinking about how small and needy he used to be. Perhaps there will come a time where he won't have a pressing desire to talk to me in the middle of my workout, but I would gladly take the disruptions if only I could keep him small a little longer.

Meet Scoop

Isn't he cute? The boys made him today with their Daddy in our front yard. We got some fresh snow last night and they were excited to try out their new skis with Daddy. Although I don't like to be cold, I would really miss snow if we lived somewhere that didn't get it.

Fleeting.......

..........are those precious little moments where all is good with the world, your children are home, safe, and snuggled up next to you. I have been blessed to have many of those moments over my break from work, and I'm so grateful. I became really conscious of it this afternoon. My little boy woke up from his nap and crawled into my lap to cuddle. He remained there for a LONG time, much longer than usual. As I bent over to kiss his sleepy little head, I was reminded of his babyhood and that of his older brother's. I remembered suddenly and with clarity how it felt to have an infant snuggled against my chest in full-out slumber. The weight of their little bodies completely relaxed and pressed tightly into mine. And I realized, sadly, how fleeting these little moments really are. When they were babies and snuggled against me as I've described, I often thought about how quickly those days would pass, and they did pass quickly. I am trying very hard to not get caught up in worrying about how fast these years fly by, but instead to treasure every moment like those I had this afternoon. They are truly among God's greatest blessings in my life.

The Mumps Quilt

I have a GREAT story about this quilt that I blogged about a few days ago. If you remember, my aunt gave this to my mom to give to me. It was a completely unexpected gift, but a very welcome one since I love quilts. I did not know much about the quilt when I received it other than that it was made by my paternal grandmother. Today after our Christmas meal, I asked my aunt about it, and this is what she told me. I LOVE this story!

When my dad and my aunt were young, they both contracted mumps at the same time. Since they weren't allowed to be in school, they were home and needed to be occupied with something. (NOTE: My dad is 87 years old and my aunt is a few years younger..........so this was before you could plunk your sick children in front of the TV or DVD player.) So, my grandma rounded up all the scraps of blue fabric she could find and had my dad and my aunt keep busy by cutting them into little squares. She then used the squares to make a simple 9-patch quilt, the very one that is now on the back of a rocking chair in my living room right now. Isn't that the greatest story? So now I'm calling it the "Mumps" quilt, and thinking about what quilt I'm going to make in 2009.

Snow Day!

We are all four home today for a snow day. Schools all around our area are cancelled due to a big ice/snowstorm that moved through last night. We are lucky that we didn't lose power. The DH took the boys out to sled this morning. We have a nice little sledding hill in our front yard. Since the snow has a layer of ice on top, the sledding was SPEED sledding, and DH had to be at the bottom of the hill to make sure the boys didn't slide into our bushes or into the road! I ventured out to snap some photos of the wintry fun. I have good memories of sledding when I was a little girl. It was so fun to get bundled up and head out into a winter wonderland. It's so calm, quiet and peaceful in the pristine coldness after a snowstorm, especially out in the country where we live.



Both boys are now old enough to pull their own sleds up the hill which is nice. The sled in this photo is a plastic one I bought about 5 years ago at a garage sale for 50 cents!! Best 50 cents I ever spent.



Here is our adopted dog, Magic, whose anonymity is not protected on this blog. :0) He loves to be out in the snow with us.



Our steps were totally ice-covered and treacherous. Luckily, we don't have to navigate these steps to get outside.



Our trees all looked so pretty covered with a thin layer of ice and frost.



I thought it would be fun to show you what I was wearing when I went out to snap the photos. I just pulled my boots on over my pajama pants. Notice the frayed cuff on the left leg. When my preschoolers asked me what I wanted from Santa, I told them I needed a new pair of pajamas.......they thought that was so funny! Another funny thing just happened in the middle of me typing this very paragraph. There was a knock at our door and our mailman was on the porch with the mail. He brings it up to the house if there's a package, and we did have one from Amazon. So........I left the computer and ran to the door in my unshowered beauty (sarcasm here) with my PJs still on. Same ones seen in above photo. He commented that he noticed both cars were home and there must be some "goofing off" going on. Astute observation, sir!! Anyway, maybe I'll post this and go take a shower. It IS past 1:30 p.m. after all!

My Father's Dragon Lapbook

Several weeks ago we received a note from my oldest son's Montessori school that they would be reading My Father's Dragon as a read-aloud. They encouraged parents to read the book at home with their child as well. Luckily, we had a copy, pulled it out and started reading it. The other great thing is that this coincided with our Thanksgiving break AND I had just recently found out about a fantastic website with lots of free printables for lapbooking called Homeschoolshare. AND..............they had a totally great set of printables just for this book. So, we started the lapbook over Thanksgiving break. My son LOVED it. There are printable activities for each chapter of the book, and he was very eager to finish each chapter and do the corresponding activities. For the link to this particular book's activities, click here. I cannot say enough about this amazing website and the resources available, but I WILL say more about it at the end of this post. :0)

My son finished his lapbook a few weeks ago, and he looks at it each day. It is a really special product that he will always have to remember a very special favorite book. In honor and recognition of his hard work on this project, I wanted to showcase it here on the blog.

Photo courtesy of Amazon.com

Here is a photo of the book. There are two more books in the series and we have already ordered the next one. The third one is available in our public library.



The above photo shows the cover of his lapbook. He enjoyed using my scrapbooking alphabet stickers to put the title on the front. I am new to lapbooking, but I think the correct word for how we folded this book is a shutterfold. For the base of this lapbook we used one regular manilla file folder, opened it flat and folded each side to the center fold to make the "shutters." On the inside I cut another file folder in half and taped one half to the top and one to the bottom to increase the amount of space for projects.



This photo shows the lapbook fully opened. The flaps sticking up on the top and bottom are the two halves of the second file folder that I cut apart and taped onto the original file folder. You can see that we also used the inside of the shutter-flaps to attach projects.

This photo shows the lapbook with the inner vertical flaps folded in. You can lift up the center flap (the one with the dragon and knapsack) to reveal more information on the underside.

This photo shows the top flap (described and shown in the previous photo) folded up to reveal the information on the underside of the bottom flap. If this is confusing, refer back to the fully open photo and it might make more sense.

This didn't photograph well, but I wanted to show a map my son drew of the islands from the book. He drew things from each chapter and labelled them on the map according to what went with each chapter. He totally initiated this on his own tonight. This kid would be completely happy with a stack of blank paper, a pencil, some crayons or colored pencils and his favorite books. I'm serious. That's one of the many things I love so much about him. He gets completely absorbed in something and his creativity is unstoppable.

Tonight he also pulled out some of our toy animals to represent the ones from the book and acted out each chapter. Again, completely self-initiated. I was downstairs for a bit talking to the DH, and my younger son was playing down there. I heard my big boy yelling upstairs and went up to investigate. He was just acting out part of the story where the wild boars are yelling about the evidence of an invasion they have found on the island. It was totally cute and so typical of how he plays. I am so grateful I started this blog to preserve some of the memories of the little wonders like this that go on in our household each day. Now we'll never forget our weeks of being in love with a great book and all the extensions and creativity that resulted from that.

OK........now a little more gushing about the Homeschoolshare website. One thing I am doing for the boys for Christmas is buying them each several new books. Homeschoolshare was instrumental in helping me choose which books because they have a TON of printable resources for the Five in a Row book study series. If you are not familiar with Five in a Row it is worth checking out. I bought the original Five in a Row manual at a homeschool book fair a few years ago. The concept behind this is that you choose a book (the manual lists several) and read it to your child each day for five days in a row. And each day you focus on a different aspect of the story and therefore cover many curricular areas all related to that one book. For example, one day you might study geography by finding the location of the book's setting on a map. Next, you might learn about art by carefully studying the book's illustrations. The Homeschoolshare website has lapbooking resources for many of the Five in a Row (FIAR) titles. (Click here to see the resources they have for the Papa Picolo lapbook.) And that is how I selected which books to buy the boys. For each book I am giving them, we will be able to do a lapbook project. I am WAY excited about this. I haven't decided yet how I will give them the books. On a blog a while back (I can't remember which one, which drives me nuts!) I loved the idea someone had of wrapping each book separately and then tying them up in a stack with a ribbon. What I am thinking is that I will do this, but have the boys open their stacks sometime AFTER the craziness of Christmas. I may even date each wrapped book so they can look forward to opening them gradually over time. I will definitely be doing a post here soon about the books I've chosen for this. What I am really excited about is that I found books that I never would have considered or even known about otherwise. Jane Claire Lambert, the author of the FIAR manuals, has really carefully thought out the books she highlights in her manuals. And I appreciate that so much because I am sure we will make some new book friends and favorites that way that we wouldn't have otherwise!

Joyful Noises

Before I continue, I want you all to know...........the sink is unclogged! YAYY! Also, I should really be downstairs making up little baggies of peppermint playdough (30 to be exact) and tying a cookie cutter to each bag with curling ribbon. I am giving each of my 59 preschoolers a bag of playdough tomorrow night at our Christmas program. I did 29 bags Tuesday night and cooked 3 more batches of playdough tonight before the boys went to bed. Yep, that's what I SHOULD be doing. And instead, here I am, pounding away at the keyboard. I'm telling you right now, God is truly working on me in writing this blog, because I seem to be finding lots of inspired things to write about.

Tomorrow night at this time, I will have finished guiding 59 3-5 year olds through their Christmas program. I have never been in charge of a Christmas program before. So.........I am a teeny tiny bit nervous about it. At the same time, I'm very excited about it. There is something so very touching and joyful about listening to young children sing. Luckily, I teach in a Christian-based program so we have a very God-oriented program planned. There is one song in particular that I think will have a very powerful impact. I am pumped!!

I wanted to write a little bit tonight about something that happened here at my house a week or so ago that got me thinking. I'm a little foggy on the exact details. (Hello! I would hardly be able to remember what I ate for breakfast if I didn't eat the exact same thing every day.........2 toaster waffles, a banana and orange juice in case you're interested!!) What I do remember is that I was standing at the kitchen counter either cooking something or getting ready to cook. My 3yo son had pushed a chair up to the counter and was standing next to me. He had a pencil or something like that in his hand and he started tapping the empty stainless steel coffee pot with it, essentially creating his own drum. ( He LOVES to drum on things.) I was, admittedly, tired by that point in the day and a little stressed. And I asked him to please stop banging on the coffee pot. I think I said it in kind of a frustrated way, not really mean or angry, just kind of exasperated. Anyway, he was unoffended by my request and (I think) stopped his drumming. But he did say to me, "But Mommy! It's music!" And I'm telling you, that little innocent comment stopped me cold in my tracks. I quickly replied, "Yes, it is music." And felt like a complete lunk-head for asking him not to do it. If I remember correctly, he went on with playing and (hopefully) was not emotionally scarred by the experience. But it really made me think. When do the joyful noises stop being joyful and start to just be annoying? What I mean is..........why is it that we, as adults, can't hear the music anymore? I am pretty sure that we all went through a childhood fascination with "making noise", similar to what my little one enjoys right now. So when did it stop being musical and start to grate on our nerves? I found these questions to be very sad, yet eye-opening to ponder. So my wish and prayer for tonight is that my ears remain open to the music for as long as they are able to hear. Let the joyful noises begin!!

Icy wonders and reflections

Things happen for a reason, you know. I believe that anyway. I wanted to share a little story about something that happened to me within the last hour. My three-year-old and I were leaving preschool to head home. It is really cold here in the midwest where I live and I was kind of impatient for him to get into the van because I (selfishly) didn't want to stand out in the wind waiting for him any longer. He was taking his time walking along the sidewalk towards our van. He wanted to step in the patches of snow and make footprints. As I was opening my mouth to urge him, once again, to "Hurry up!", I realized that this was one of those moments of wonder that I needed to stop and share with him. As soon as that thought entered my mind, I thought of Jesus and the suffering he endured on his way to the cross so that WE, so that I, could be comfortable and happy. I firmly believe that this thought was God-directed to remind me to stop, slow down and be willing to endure some temporary discomfort in order to allow others to have their joy and wonder. WOW! Seriously...........I was humbled in that moment.

Another thing happened when we arrived home. I pulled the van into our garage as usual. As I was pulling inside my son was trying to tell me about something he had seen but I couldn't understand what he meant. To be honest, I was distracted, already thinking about what I wanted to do when we got inside, etc. I got out of the van and pushed the button to close the door of the garage. Then I helped him get out. He immediately was looking for something. He realized it wasn't in the garage and he said, "Come on, Mommy. Let's go see. Come on." And because of my parking lot revelation, I followed him around to the front of our garage (instead of hurrying him into the warmth of our house) to see what he wanted to show me. There, hanging from the eaves of our garage roof, was a row of icicles, glistening in the noonday sun, as beautiful as anything you've ever seen. And again I stood there humbled and thankful. I am so glad to have the little people in my life, my sons, to show me the wonders of our world. I certainly would never have noticed those icicles on my own. But I do remember my childhood wonder at them. I remember where the longest ones hung at my childhood home. I remember trying to knock them down so I could lick them and feel their shiny cold wetness. And I remember bringing them inside, like my son did today, to hold onto that wonder just a little longer. Thank you, God, for slowing me down today and for the beauty of your creation.