Thankful Thursday

1. Last Thursday we participated (for the first time) in our town's annual "pink out." For about 3 hours various local businesses give away a variety of treats in honor of breast cancer awareness. I didn't realize that included hot foods. We had already eaten lunch. If we are living in this town next October, we can have lunch for free downtown as they were giving away soup, pulled pork sandwiches, hot dogs, etc. in addition to a myriad of baked goods, teaberry ice cream cones, peanuts, chips, etc. One dentist was giving away apples and toothbrushes. We passed on the apples for some odd reason.

2. Lately Oliver has been saying (very frequently) "Ian, you are the best brother in the whole world." What a sweetheart! I hope and pray my three kids love each other dearly their whole lives.

3. They cancelled the soccer games on Saturday. I was thankful because I didn't really want to sit in the rain in 50 degree weather to watch their games. I'm also grateful that the weather forecast is much better for this Saturday as my parents are planning to come up to see the games.

4. I wasn't able to run on Saturday like I usually do because it rained almost the entire day. As I stopped to think about it, this was the first time since I started running a few months ago that I got rained out. I am grateful! I don't usually run on Sundays, but I ran on Sunday afternoon because it was SO pretty out (60's and sunny). I set a new personal record in that I ran for 5.5 miles without stopping. My legs were very aware afterward that I had gone farther than usual, lol! As of last Friday I was down a total of 15 pounds.

5. On Saturday I listed more things on FB yardsale pages, and if everyone actually buys the things they said they would buy, we will be getting another $209. We paid off the minivan last month one year early (even though it had 0% interest), and now my goal is to pay off the loans from my retirement accounts that we used (in part) to buy this house. My goal is that in a few months the only debt we will have is the mortgage. We're trying to build the equity in the house in preparation for moving in 2016.

6. Yesterday we went to the Children's Museum to participate in one of their "homeschool hangout" events. It was our first time, but it won't be our last! Yesterday's theme for the science crafts and experiments was germs.

7. Ian has really been into doing puzzles lately. Oliver also does a couple several days a week during our schoolwork time, although sometimes he has a tea party instead (see pics in yesterday's post).

8. Nadia has really picked up the pace lately with reading several chapter books a week. Her favorites right now are the Cul De Sac Kids books, Boxcar Children books, and American Girl books (she's reading the Addy books now and says she'll read the Samantha series next).

9. The weather has been really pretty the last few days which has made me runs more enjoyable and also meant more time at playgrounds.

10. I am feeling much better. Last Wednesday choir rehearsal was very painful due to my sore throat. Unfortunately Oliver now has my cold. So far the other three have escaped the bug.

11. Although I haven't been using it as much lately, I am still VERY thankful for my camera and lenses. If I had to pick my five most favorite personal possessions (meaning things not people), the contents of my camera bag would absolutely be in that list, and of course there are three reasons why I love taking pictures and their names are Nadia, Ian, and Oliver. :)

Wordless Wednesday

3rd Birthday

Yesterday we celebrated Nadia'a third spiritual birthday! I got her a new Bible as her gift. She requested donuts for breakfast, a ham and cheese hot pocket and a yogurt for lunch, and grilled hot dogs, shells and cheese, and an apple pie for dinner. I made the pie using apples from our tree on Friday when I made our beef empanadas for dinner (we studied Panama last week) because both recipes required the use of a pie crust. Nadia was so full she didn't have any pie yesterday, but she enjoyed a piece today. I tried a different recipe, and I think it's delicious! I hope she will grow in her walk with the Lord every year of her life. I am very grateful we will be able to spend eternity together. I had said we would make a pinata for her spiritual birthday in connection with our study of Latin America, but we didn't get around to it. I lost motivation in part because the kids broke a pinata at Bella's birthday party last Sunday.

I took a few videos recently and uploaded them today. One is of Ian reading. He was doing such a good job that I videoed him reading the last page of a story about wombats. It was the first

time he had read that story. I  think he is doing well considering he's in Kindergarten. Then I took a video of him singing this afternoon because he sings many hours a day around the house. He doesn't have all the lyrics correct. It cracks me up sometimes to realize what kids think we are singing (ex. the line that is supposed to be "lives in us" he says "this is love"). Then Nadia wanted me to take a video of her singing because I took one of Ian singing. I love hearing my kids sing! I also think the video quality is better when I use the video recorder rather my iPhone. Lesson learned! (these were taken with the phone) I also took pics of the kids in their Sunday outfits today. I was planning to skip Oliver because of the boo boos on his face (he injured his nose on Monday and his forehead on Thursday), but I couldn't resist as I thought he looked so cute in his vest and tie. The boys haven't been this dressed up in a few months because I just have them wear colored polo shirts to church in the summer.

Thankful Tuesday

1. Friday and Saturday our town held its annual community yard sale event in which about 200 yard sales took place within 2 miles of our house. I didn't spend as much time shopping at them as I usually do, but I did find most of the things on my list (snow boots for Nadia for $1, Nike sneakers for Nadia for $2, jeans for Ian for 50 cents, etc.). There was only one thing on my list I didn't find (brown pants for Nadia). The kids also bought a few things with their money. Ian bought a light saber for 10 cents, Nadia bought a doll for $2, and they bought some stuffed animals and a puppet for 50 cents each. Part of me cringes at the thought of *more* stuffed animals, but I will say they have spent hours playing with the new ones over the past few days (Baymax, grouchy ladybug, chipmunk, etc.). I spent less money over those two days than I have collected selling used clothing and shoes lately.

2. Paul's parents came up on Saturday for the soccer games and then spent a few hours at our house playing with the kids, which was a special treat!

3. Paul took the kids to Bella's 8th birthday party on Sunday afternoon after church while I was watching the Steelers at home. They were very excited to attend her birthday party at a playground. Oliver was the only one brave enough to try most of the Chinese food that was served. Bella's mother grew up in China, and her extended family still lives in China. They all enjoyed the cake and the candy from the pinata.

4. I love the song the choir sang on Sunday morning. "Never Once." I only wish a cellist had been available to play the accompaniment as written. They used a synthesizer to play that part. Our choir director has told us we are singing ALL songs from memory this year. We are not going to be using music on Sundays. The choir has grown a little, which is also nice (about 85 people in the choir). I didn't mention it last week, but the youth pastor preached two Sundays ago, and he did an excellent job. The senior pastor and his wife were on vacation in Ireland.

5. Last night we went out to dinner at Bonanza. We hadn't gone there in years, and then we went in April for my birthday and the kids discovered (again) that they love eating there. It's always nice to get a night off from cooking, and we hadn't eaten out or bought pizza to go for a few weeks. On Mondays the kids get a free drink and their buffet is $1.99 each. Oliver's favorites last night were macaroni and cheese, baked beans, garlic bread, pizza, ice cream, and chocolate chip cookies. Ian's favorites were chicken wings, a pasta casserole, ice cream, oreo cake, and chocolate chip cookies. Nadia kept going back for more jello, and she ate a wide variety of other foods as well. The kids enjoyed the fact that I didn't require them to eat a fruit or veggie (like I do at home) although Ian did eat some green beans and Nadia had some grapes, and they also were tickled that I let them have as many desserts as they wanted. Nadia ate quite a few different desserts - rice krispie treat, cookies, blueberry muffin, etc. I think Friendly's and Bonanza are their two favorite sit down restaurants.

6. It rained almost all day today, which meant that Nadia's soccer practice was cancelled. I usually take the boys to gymnastics on Tuesday nights, but Paul took them tonight. Nadia and I enjoyed having a couple of hours at home together. I painted her fingernails and toenails, we played a game of Scrabble, etc.

7. Although we still have moments when Ian takes a LONG time to eat something (such as his banana at lunch or potato soup at dinner), in general I have to say he is doing a much better job at eating food in a reasonable time frame. PTL!

8. Although Oliver still has moments of displaying a wicked temper, he also has come a LONG way with his behavior in general. This is a huge relief for me! He also has been doing better with taking his naps lately. If he has missed a nap it has been because the schedule didn't allow it rather than because I put him to bed and he didn't go to sleep. I'm thankful!

9. We didn't need to go to the ER or urgent care yesterday! Yesterday morning Oliver tripped and when he fell the bridge of his nose landed on the metal strip on the one step in between the kitchen and family room. There was blood EVERYWHERE. At first I didn't even know where the wound was because his entire face, a lot of his hair, arms, hands, etc were covered in blood. I picked him up and then also had a lot of blood on my arms, hands, shirt, etc. When I discovered the source of the blood flow I put a towel on it, and then I ran across the street (without stopping to put any shoes on) to see if the neighbor was home because he's an ER nurse who works 3pm to 3am, and this was about 11:00am. He wasn't home, but by the time I walked back home the bleeding had subsided to a trickle. I gave Oliver a bath and changed his clothes and my clothes and cleaned the blood up from the carpet. I put a bandaid on the wound and noticed an hour later that the bleeding hadn't totally stopped. I called the pediatrician's office a couple of times, and eventually they suggested I should bring Oliver in. I was able to bring him in after dropping Nadia off at gymnastics (how convenient!). The doctor said he could put in a stitch, but Oliver would "hate him." So he cleaned it up and then used a steri-strip on the wound. I was grateful we could go to the pediatrician because the two times Ian had a split chin it cost us $100 in co-pays each time, and the pediatrician's office is a $20 co-pay. Ian still has scars on his chin even though they used glue on the wounds. I am hoping Oliver won't have a scar, although the strip has already partially come off. Nadia has escaped having this type of wound thus far.

10. I probably sound like a broken record, but I placed another great order through Shutterfly today. I got the kids some birthday and Christmas gifts (ex. a 252 piece puzzle, 2 placemats, and a Frozen notebook) as well as ten folded 5x7 birthday and thank you cards for $5.49 total with free shipping.

Thankful Thursday

1. On Friday morning when I weighed myself I was greeted with a number that showed I had lost two more pounds. This put a BIG smile on my face. It put my total weight loss at 14 pounds, which means I have 6 pounds to go. I'm still hoping to reach that goal by the end of October. I haven't been dieting much, but I have been jogging about 16 miles a week (4 miles a day on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday mornings).

2. We had a fabulous day on Friday with my parents at the Maryland Science Center and Port Discovery Children's Museum. I was thankful that we didn't hit much traffic at all either direction and that we had a safe, fun trip. I'm also thankful that Port Discovery wasn't nearly as crowded as it was the one other time we went there years ago.

3. Oliver had an accident on Monday evening. Ironically, his clothes were dry, and I told him to go to the bathroom, and he emerged handing me soaked pants and underwear and wearing wet socks. Lovely. I'm not particularly thankful for that, and I'm not exactly sure what went wrong, BUT it was the
first accident in a few weeks, and I am thankful for that because around the middle of August he had a big regression. I actually hadn't been thinking about "potty training" at all for a few weeks, which was a happy thing as he's been wearing underwear for a full year now. He definitely has taken a LOT longer than the other two, but in time it will be a thing of the past.

4. I placed two orders with Shutterfly on Monday night. The first order contained 2 photo books, two 8x10 prints, 4 small magnets, and a Star Wars placemat I made Ian to save as a birthday present for him, and for all that I paid not one penny. WOOHOO! I could have gotten 3 photo books for free, but I opted to order the third one separately and pay $8.47 for it so I could have lay flat pages in that one. I am really getting the hang of maximizing the use of coupon codes on Shutterfly!

5. My kids love each other. This picture of Ian and Oliver holding hands wasn't posed. Ian volunteered to carry Oliver's chair, and I quickly snapped this photo when I saw they were holding hands as we were walking off the field after Nadia's soccer game on Saturday. I love when my kids hold hands. It just melts my heart!

6. The big rope has been missing at the playground closest to our home for a couple of months. The kids were so excited to see it was back on Tuesday, and Ian put a big smile on my face by walking across it without ANY problems for the first time ever. He actually enjoyed it and did it multiple times whereas in the past he would refuse to try it even once. He has really been getting braver lately!

7. We went on our 5th field trip of the school year yesterday. We went to R. B. Winter State Park for a program about Fall, since yesterday was the first day of Autumn. Today we went on our 6th field trip to tour a 911 center.  We had a tour around the center to learn how they do their jobs, the kids got to dial 911 on a phone and answer questions (ex. what is your address, what is your phone number, what is the emergency), and they got to put out a fire with a fire extinguisher in the parking lot. Ian's "emergency" was that a bank robber was coming in our house. LOL! My goal is to average about one field trip per week over the course of the school year, and this is our sixth field trip in five weeks so we are off to a good start at achieving that goal of mine. Some weeks we haven't taken any trips, and other weeks we have gone on two or three trips.

8. I received a check in the mail for $50 yesterday for playing the flute last week. I wasn't expecting anything so it was a pleasant surprise. Since I received paychecks for more than 20 years, it is still an adjustment for me to not have an income so that $50 means more to me than it would have when I had a job.

9. We did Facetime with the Towfighis in Turkey on Monday, which was a treat. Nadia played a song on the piano, Jenna played a song on the piano, we talked about recipes we had tried lately as we study different countries, kids recited Bible verses they had been learning this week, etc. We are really enjoying having more regular communication with their cousins. I am so glad Yvonne had this idea to try to connect once a week! Last week they were studying Mexico, and Bruchko right now, and we finished it on Sunday. We really loved that book, by the way.

so were we. It's fun to have some similarities in our curriculum. They are reading

10. The past few weeks we have tried a few new recipes. The kids liked the Guatemalan fruit smoothies, Mexican hot chocolate, churritos, tres leche cake, tacos, and taquitos. Nadia and Ian were not fans of the flan, moros y cristianos (Cuban black beans and rice), or the chilaquiles (which I thought Nadia would love since she adores scrambled eggs). The kids will eat the coconut kisses (for Puerto Rico), but I also don't think they'll ever ask me to make them again. I am grateful that the kids have liked some of the new recipes. I think their most favorite was the churritos, and their cousins favorite new recipe so far was churros. I am not a big fan of cake. I'll usually pick a  brownie, cookie, or pie over a cake, but I have to say the three milk cake was very tasty!

11. Paul came home in time to have dinner with us this evening before taking Nadia to soccer practice! It was a surprise and a very rare treat. I would say in a typical week all five of us eat four meals together - lunch and dinner on Saturdays and breakfast and dinner on Sundays (Paul eats lunch by himself on Sundays while we are at the second service at church). Paul eats breakfast with the kids the four mornings that I run, and he has dinner with Nadia on Monday nights after her gymnastics class. I used to be able to be back home from my run before they woke up, but I really can't leave much before 6:30 am these days unless I want to run in the dark. We got really spoiled for three months this summer in that he ate a minimum of 17 meals a week with us each week; that will likely never be the norm again. He received a VERY warm greeting by all three kids when he surprised us at dinner tonight. He leaves for work before the kids get up on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I knew we wouldn't see him for many meals during the year, and that was why I had us finish the Chronicles of Narnia series while he could be with us as I knew he really enjoyed those books.

Hello, Autumn!

Although it felt like summer was over when we started back to school, yesterday was technically the last day of summer, and the last few days the weather has gotten cooler so it actually feels like fall. This morning we had a field trip at R. B. Winter State Park. Today's program was titled "Countdown to Fall" and included talking about the signs of fall (migration, hibernation, storing up food, leaves changing colors and falling, length of day/night being almost equal, etc.), looking at samples of many different kinds of leaves, listening to the park ranger read a book by the same title as the program, going on a nature hike to complete a scavenger hut (listen to crickets, spot a hawk in the sky, pick up an acorn, etc.), and making a wreath with the items collected on the hike. Oliver really enjoyed brushing glue on to his wreath. There were also many different activities set up in the nature center, and the kids did some of those as well. I let them play on one of the playgrounds at the park before we headed back home.

I had packed our lunches so we could eat on the way home as we live about 40 minutes from this state park. Unfortunately Nadia threw up on the way home (car sickness), but the good news is that Nadia grabbed the trash can we keep in the van and everything went in there which made it MUCH easier for me to clean up once we got home. Whew. It was a little cool out when we left, but it was really nice out by the time we came home. It was a gorgeous day for a nature walk! Many times when we have a field trip I give the kids the day off in terms of their other school work, but today I decided to just let them each skip a subject or two. Nadia skipped handwriting, and Ian skipped science and spelling. Oliver fell asleep on the way home. When he woke up he was so fussy even after I gave him a snack that I put him back to bed. I cannot remember the last time he went to sleep twice during the day. Usually if he takes a nap in the van, that is it for the day, but today he fell back asleep in his bed after taking a nap in the van. He must have really been tired! It seems the theme of the day is scavenger hunts because they will be going on a treasure hunt outside the church during game time at AWANA tonight.

Textless Tuesday

Baltimore Harbor

Yesterday morning the kids and I left the house around 8:30 and arrived in the Inner Harbor three hours later. Aside from an about fifteen minute screaming temper tantrum on the part of Oliver around 10:30, we had a very smooth drive there. We made no stops and didn't hit any traffic. We spent four hours in the Maryland Science Center. We could have spent even longer, but we were also planning to visit Port Discovery (a children's museum). In addition to enjoying the hands-on exhibits in the science museum, we also saw a 3D IMAX movie on lemurs and attended a science demonstration on optical illusions. They didn't have the van de graaff generator out yesterday like they did last year, and this year if you got in as a homeschooler (VERY cheap) then the planetarium show wasn't included, which it was last year. Nadia's favorite part was the bed of nails. It was hard to get all three of them out of the Kid's room on the third floor.

After we left the science museum, the six of us (my parents met us there) walked around the harbor to Port Discovery. We had an early dinner at a Subway near the museum. Once a month they have a reduced admission ($2) from 4-8 pm. The last time we took advantage of it was several years ago (before Oliver). It is a large three story children's museum. Oliver's favorite parts were the water room (see how much fun he had washing the windows!) and the diner. Nadia's favorites were the castle and the diner. Ian really liked the Lego castle area. After we spent about two hours in the museum we left because we had to walk back to the parking garage and then drive three hours to get home. My phone told me that once we were in Baltimore we walked 6 miles, and since I jogged 4 miles yesterday morning, the phone said I had walked 10 miles total. Oliver fell asleep as soon as we were in the van. My dad and I carried him a little, but he was walking most of the time as well, and he also didn't get a nap. Ian fell asleep about 20 minutes into our drive so it was a very peaceful drive home. We arrived home at 10:00 pm. It was great to be able to spend the day in the harbor with my parents!