Thankful Thursday

1. Paul received another invitation for a phone interview yesterday (to take place on January 10th). It's for a three year physical chemistry position in Indiana. So far four of the first sixteen applications have resulted in an interview of some sort, and some of those schools haven't started reviewing the applications yet.

2. We had fun roller skating as a family on Tuesday morning.

3. It's really nice having Paul at home a lot more than usual!

4. I love our reading and spelling curriculum. Nadia loved an activity a couple of weeks ago where she would pick a couple of slips of paper that had different food items on them (ex. liver, coffee, jam, cheese, ham, etc.) and then she was to put them in various places on a paper and read the sentences. She thinks the activity is hysterical because she creates all different kinds of cakes, muffins, sandwiches, and shakes. Ian loves one where there are words written on the back of some paper bones, and if he reads the word correctly he gets to put the "bone" in the mouth (hole) of a paper monster. He loves to feed that monster! I also love that Nadia is now trying to read everything (such as her Bible verses in her AWANA handbook).

5. I'm not a fan of cold weather, but the kids have been enjoying the snow. By far Nadia has spent the most time it in of the five members of our family, and she's now old enough to get herself into all her snow gear, which is greatly appreciated by me. I am also thankful that Paul has been willing to go out with the kids a few times to play in the snow with them, as it means I can stay in where it's warm.

6. The Steelers won on Sunday night! The ironic thing is that we beat one of the teams with the best records. Why couldn't we play like that more often this season? Oh well. It's just football.

7. I placed an order through Kohl's website a few weeks ago, and one of the two things I bought took a lot longer than expected to arrive. It didn't bother me because it still arrived before Christmas, but I got an email a couple of days ago for $25 off a purchase of any size (in store or online) because the item didn't arrive on time. How nice!

8. Nadia and I really enjoyed the musical Narnia on Sunday. I'm going to have to read the rest of the books in the Chronicles of Narnia series to her in 2014!

9. Paul and the kids (especially Nadia) enjoyed the Pirate School show at Bucknell on Saturday.

10. I am glad that our cookies have been turning out nicely! In the past week we've made cut-out sugar cookies, M&M cookies, cut-out gingerbread cookies, and chocolate chip Hershey kiss cookies. We're eating some and giving many away as gifts.

11. The kids have really been enjoying the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books. We're flying through them!

12. We're all still healthy! PTL!

13. Paul and Nadia went bowling last Wednesday afternoon, and that's where they are again today. This afternoon is the last bowling session for this co-op so they've also made it their Christmas party with pizza and such.

14. Oliver's afternoon naps have been pretty consistently 60 minutes long, but his morning nap had gotten short again lately (30-45 minutes). Yesterday it was 60 minutes long, and today it was 90 minutes long. WOOHOO!