First Day of Spring Celebrations

Almost summer???  Then I suppose I should post about our "First day of spring" celebration!

With a new baby born just days before the first day of spring, I still had high hopes for a special day.  We picked up library books to start up my latest homeschooling plan.  Our first unit would be spring... original, no?

Since I brought our little Belle home on the actual first day of spring, I decided to bump our "celebration" to Friday.  Daddy would be off work still and grandparents were still here.  Perfect!

My kids had their first ever egg hunt.  We don't do anything "egg" related for Easter, but both My Beloved and I grew up with "Easter Egg Hunts" every year.  And baskets.  And bunnies.

So when we determined early on that we wanted Easter to be all about Jesus, I knew that, one day, I would have to institute a special "first day of spring egg hunt". 
We started pretty simple.  I picked up a couple bags of plastic eggs in advance and filled them the night before.  Each kid got a paper "lunch" bag that I folded down to make a nice sized "basket" for collecting their eggs.  Just before the hunt began, I grabbed my bag of eggs and went out back to hide them.  I knew just how many we had (33 I think) so each kid was allowed 11 eggs (though I think I increased the older ones and decreased Little Man's for time sake).  I put some up high, some down low, some in easy places, some in hard (I thought). 


After everyone was done, we headed back for the front door where they found this shared "Spring Basket" waiting on the front steps for them.

I simply used a basket we already use somewhere else and added the fabric and some blue "grass" someone gave us last year because they weren't going to use it. We were going to make cookies, but when friends brought us a bunch of cute "spring" cookies they had decorated, I just put a few of those in there (we're talking simplifying with a newborn here people!)

I had also asked my mom to find and send us some "Simply Fruit" fruit roll ups because I haven't found them in our stores.  That was a fun treat for the kids (and me!)  And the punch balls were from some other little gift a while back that we'd never used and forgotten about, so I put those in there.  (Sadly, I'm not sure we've done them yet.)

The kids thought it was all great!


Inside the eggs???  Not chocolate bunnies and jelly beans.

Nope... "Bunny" crackers (health food version of fishy crackers), almonds,

raisins, and cute little gummy "moose heads".

(I was fussing about wanting the gummy bunnies, but they were more expensive.  I was reminded by My Beloved that baby moose are born in the spring too.  I guess I was still stuck on the "Easter" part of the whole thing.  Glad to be reminded!) 


It was a great day!!!  What memories we made!  And they got to eat the contents of their eggs for lunch! :)

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments, Making Memories

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 9:00 AM 0 Comments

Long {enough} Hair... finally!

For along time now I've been waiting... and waiting... and waiting for Sweet Pea's hair to grow.  It seemed for a long time that it just wasn't.

Ok, so it's curly.  I'm sure that doesn't help.  It just never looks as long as it may be.

And it's very thin... and there isn't much of it.

None of these things help with being able to do much with the hair.

Oh, I've been able to do "pig tails" up on the sides for a long while now.  And pulling half up into one at the back.  And most recently I've tried braiding just the front over to the side to get the hair out of her face.

But this morning...

 
And it worked!  Isn't it so cute.  Look at that little skinny braid in the back.  I'm telling you... not much hair!

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 10:00 AM 1 Comments

Read Alouds above "grade level"

For a long while now we've been reading chapter books... This past winter/spring we read through the Little House books for the first time.  Now, we're reading them again.  He's almost 5.  He's catching much more this time, and Sweet Pea is enjoying listening to them more this time around. 

Just this past week I'm seeing true evidence of what reading "above grade level" can do for our children...

Monday, we were at work with Daddy.  After going further down the hall to look around without me Tornado informed us that he "journeyed further on without us" to look around.  I could only smile.

Last night, while I was learning how to use my new sewing machine (so cool by the way), Daddy took the kids to Home Depot to shop for a few things (Snow shovels was not one of them, but evidently the entire town was there for those too!)  When they picked me up later, Tornado told me the woes of the "car-carts" being wet in the parking lot, but that there was one "under shelter", so it was dry.

"Under shelter?"  I never talk like that.  That came straight out of those books!

We're reading these books again, because I didn't really have a good chapter book to read when we finished the last one.  And I hate not having one going. 


What "above grade level" chapter books do you read with your kids?  Have you noticed any words and phrases coming out of those little mouths because of it?

Labels: Homeschooling 2011-2012, Little Moments

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 9:05 AM 2 Comments

Reminder from a four year old

I had spoken harshly again. Yelled even. And for what? Nothing really. Nothing worth anger.

I hugged him. Said I was sorry.

"I love you buddy. Mommy's not very nice sometimes, is she?" I said, knowing I'd failed again, hurting at how I'd just spoken to my sweet boy.

His response was steady, "It's because of sin."

There was no question in his voice... he just knew. He was telling me.

And it is. It is a direct result of my sin. My attitude. My selfishness. My impatience.

I've been working my way through reading this post again. Though none of the flies on my walls would know it. I ache at what my impatience means:

"And it strikes me, an epiphany over the fry of bubbling pancakes, “Love is only patient if it’s first grateful for what is.”

When I am not patient? My failure to love is first a failure to be grateful for who people are right now." (from Ann)

So instead, let me be grateful. Grateful for curious fingers... for endless questions... for silliness.

Let me love the way He does... patiently.

Let my love be patient.

Labels: As it happens..., Life Lessons for Mommy, Little Moments

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 2:52 PM 1 Comments

8 Months... is all well???

This past Wednesday my baby turned 8 months old. I can hardly believe it!

Truly.

And this meant, as it always does, that it was time to bring out the scale. I pulled it out, stripped him down, and hoped and prayed that he'd gained some weight... that, at the very least, he'd remained within the same percentage on the growth chart this month.

I know that not every baby does... that the scale doesn't know everything.

Still I check.

I can't help it. I have to.

3 ounces.

In one month.

Three. Ounces.


While we were at My Beloved's office Wednesday afternoon, we poked our heads in to say "hi" to the doctor on staff and asked if he had a minute. Moments later I was sitting in one of the chairs telling the story. He asked a couple questions, measured him and sent me home to email all the numbers over when I had them.

Next evening, we had plans to have him and his wife over for dinner and games. They came, we ate, kids got put down... game time. Little Man was up and eating while we set up the game, but before we got started, he brought out our file. He'd done some looking around and number crunching and was worried about his weight gain... or lack of, I should say. He wondered about developmental milestones. Was Little Man meeting them according to schedule? If he was... he won't be so worried at all.

I worked through the list he gave me, marking it up. Trying to decided whether he does some of those things or not. Finally we tucked it away for "keeping an eye out for them" the next few days.

We still played the game, but I don't remember much else the rest of the night other than watching for those developmental milestones and looking (and re-looking) over that list, trying to remember what he does and doesn't do.

Suffice it to say I was worrying. And my heart was heavy. The weight mounted and really didn't go away the next day either. And I know... I just know that the enemy used this (as well as some other little things) to mount an attack on my heart.

And I let him. I didn't fight back. I sunk. Deeper and deeper. I won't use the term "depressed" because I believe it to be over used and abused in our society, but I was certainly downcast. Defeated. Lonely. Hopeless.

And my tools... thanksgiving, worship, praise, prayer, Scripture... they lay unused. It was a long couple days... a long weekend.

Praise God for being ever by my side, even when I pay no attention. Praise God for grace!


Where do I stand today? So much better. My spirit is up... clinging to grace. To God. My lack of motivation has been put aside... by grace.

Still I don't know the whole story on Little Man. It may be a little while before we do. Time to watch and see. We've stepped up solids and are paying more attention to those milestones (not that I wasn't before).

What a fun thing to see Little man pull up to standing for the first time yesterday... and then again today. He can't sit more than a minute or so (and can't get to a sitting position without us) before crashing backward uncontrollably, but he pulled himself up to standing... before crashing backward uncontrollably.

Perhaps I should be spotting him instead of taking pictures the next time. :)


Linking to...

Labels: As it happens..., Depression, Little Moments, Raising Children

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 2:42 PM 3 Comments

What's On the Table Tuesday

Well... I did it. I finished the cute little doll quilt! I got in some practice with my free motion foot. That's not to say that I'm not still fighting with my machine. Another project got worked on this week too, but I gave it up because it was going so poorly! But this little thing is done. And Sweet Pea loves is!
Sometimes it's a doll quilt... and sometimes it gets folded in half and used for a burp cloth. She copies Mommy. Once receiving blankets are too small (or rather, babies are too big) and spit up gets out of hand, I fold a receiving blanket and toss it over my shoulder instead of those useless little clothes they have the nerve to market for spit up!

I digress.


I also got this cute thing done last week. I was afraid of it but it was sooo simple! I looked around at how others made theirs, then I kinda came up with my own thing. I loved the velcro idea I found here, though, and incorporated it... just a little different. I tested it too and it pops right open with any tug, yet is strong enough to support the doll and wears well. Sigh... now I don't have to worry about any of my babies getting it caught around their necks!

I did some cutting tonight... but you'll have to wait till next week for that!


How about you??? Do you have anything on the table??? (I say on the table because that's where I do my sewing... on our kitchen table. Your "table" could be in your craft room, in your lap, or anywhere else.) Are you working on any little projects? I'd love to know about it... and if you have posted on it, leave me a link so I can check out!

Labels: Little Moments, With These Hands

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 9:23 PM 1 Comments

Slingin'

This little project came together so fast last night... and she is loving it so much today that I couldn't wait to share it!!! Sweet Pea slinging her baby! Had I known how easy and fast it would be, I'da done it long ago!

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments, With These Hands

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 12:03 PM 0 Comments

On the Table Tuesday: Birthday Edition!

Welcome to this birthday edition of On the Table Tuesday (it's still Tuesday... it still counts!) First of all... I should get this one thing off my chest. Not only did I not finish everything I had hoped... I didn't finish any of it!

None.

Now, on to what I did get done! I themed this 3 year old birthday with "pink". That's all. My pink girl needed to have a pink birthday. Grandma sent a pink dress, so we opened it first thing in the morning so she could wear a new pink birthday dress (who cares that it was supposed to be for warmer weather... we improvised!)

And this here is her pink cake. However for people who don't use standard food coloring (and as a woman who can't talk her husband into the importance of the really expensive natural food colorings), we improvise in this area too. That cake is a v.e.r.y. sweet strawberry cake. I just kept adding pureed strawberry to the frosting until it was pink enough (and the right consistency for spreading as I used all my homemade powdered sugar).

And all that pink frosting is on top of a white cake turned brown when I added strawberry to it too. So much for pink cake. I subbed the strawberry for some of the buttermilk, so the cake didn't puff up as much as it normally would have. But it was still good (ok... so I told my diabetic land lord he couldn't have any after My Beloved offered some last night [small fridge problem brought him out after hours to check on us]... I just couldn't let him eat any in good conscience.)


I said I didn't finish any of the projects I had intended... I didn't say I didn't try. It's just that we ran into some technical difficulties. More on that later. For now I'll point out the design difficulty.

What do I mean?

Can you read that??? My Beloved pointed out several times that he couldn't. I knew it wasn't going to work great. But by that time I was so far in that I was committed and decided to just do it anyway. She's 3, after all. She's going to love it anyway!

I was planning to quilt them all like this one.

Or perhaps like this one (can you see the quilting on the letter?)

This is one of the places the technical difficulties came into play. I've been fighting with my machine this week and it wasn't going well. You should see the back of these things. Matted and terrible. I'm *sorry* I didn't get a shot of that for you. Oh, wait... maybe I'm not. At any rate. Only the first few letters look like these. There is a little tiny bit on the rest of "happy"...

But really most of them look like this. Plain. And hard to read.


And I was planning to cute them up with rick rack and other fun embellishments. But since I intend to toss or disassemble them once they are down... I just didn't have it in me. Let's not even mention that I flat out ran out of time because of all the machine issues!

And once I did get my embroidery floss threaded through and hung, they weren't staying close to the wall, but turning sideways instead. So I stuck a {pink} straight pin in the wall to hold one.

Worked like a charm!


Like I said... it's not like I didn't work.

This is the doll quilt I worked on all last Tuesday and Wednesday night. I even had it almost half quilted. I had told my husband minutes before that I would probably get it done before we went to bed.

Famous last words.

Then I turned it over and saw that I'd caught a bad wrinkle in the backing and it was not savable! I hate to admit that I actually spent 1.5+ hours with my seam ripper tearing out all the quilting. And I'm not that good at free motion yet... some of the stitches were beyond tiny! I couldn't see straight for a while after I stopped looking so closely at those little stitches!


So it waits for me to figure out my machine problems. But it's pieced. Nine patch is the pattern. But instead of 3 inch squares... each block is 3 inches. Insane, I know! It's finished (pre-quilting) size is 12"x15". And I just can't wait to get it to her... she's going to love it. She got a baby for her birthday and has been mommying it so well already!


How about you??? Do you have anything on the table??? (I say on the table because that's where I do my sewing... on our kitchen table. Your "table" could be in your craft room, in your lap, or anywhere else.) Are you working on any little projects? I'd love to know about it... and if you have posted on it, leave me a link so I can check out!

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments, With These Hands

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 7:54 PM 1 Comments

No Winter

A lunch discussion about the melting snow and "it's not winter anymore" and mommy saying "Spring is thinking about coming"...

Sweet Pea (almost 3) yelling out the window: No Winter, put some snow down.

Tornado (4): Don't say that to winter!

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 7:48 AM 0 Comments

Snow-play

Labels: As it happens..., Little Moments

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 12:22 PM 1 Comments

Fresh worries and the Creator

The end of five months came and with it the same worries fresh.

Digital numbers on display. A baby on the scale. He's growing!

But is it *enough*?

Is it ever enough?

Three babies born to us, and never do they gain quite the way I hope... never are all doubts quenched. All questions quieted.

Then come the gentle words, again... the baby, look at the baby. Not the charts.

Not the charts. But how can I ignore? How can I but compare? What else do I know?

The baby. A mother of three, still I flounder. I stare long, mind empty. I don't know. I expect some sort of understanding. It doesn't come.

I say I don't compare. Each child is different. But I do. Not to my oldest. Not to my girl. But to hundreds of thousands of others.


Look at the baby. This baby. My baby.

How can he be behind in pounds and ounces, yet perfect in every other way?

How can he be behind in pounds and ounces, yet ahead in diapers and laundry? (So far ahead!)

Look at the baby! This baby. Not his baby or her baby or all of those babies... My baby.

Look at the smiles, the laughs, the eyes. Hear the laughs, the cries, the squeals. Wipe the spit-up, change the diapers, wash the laundry.

My baby.

I look to the Creator of the baby, not the maker of the charts. With that, He calms all my questions. Soothes all my fears.

And He'll be there to do it again tomorrow, and next week, and next month... until finally I trust. Until finally I remember.

Labels: Breastfeeding, Gratitude, Little Moments, Raising Children

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 3:02 PM 1 Comments

Flashback Christmas

Christmas 2006...
Christmas 2007...

Labels: Little Moments, Making Memories, Raising Children

posted by ~Babychaser~ @ 3:18 PM 1 Comments