I love it!

Arianna is really making progress in her reading.  I came downstairs during their resting time today and Arianna was reading Sam and the Firefly to Grant.  Makes me happy!

Really??!!!!

The one day we plan on going somewhere special and it's got to start snowing!!  Please don't stick and pleeeeease let me go!!!!!!

The Long Winter

We just finished The Long Winter, the sixth of the nine books in The Little House on the Praire series.  Oh, how I cried and cried while reading this to the children!  How thankful I am for all that I have.  Here is the song that they all sang at the close of the book.  Wonderful words to live by for us all!

Cute bat

Arianna and Grant made this bat yesterday after we studied bats a little during science.  Isn't it adorable?!  Grant cut it out all by himself.

Midday entertainment

Oh the things that entertain children!  They spent quite a bit of time asking Siri questions on the iPhone.  At one point Emma told her she loved her and Siri said, "oh stop!"  Pretty funny.  Grant got the biggest kick out of Siri calling him Heidi.  He said to her, "I'm not Heidi!  I'm her boy!"  Then they all sat on the couch looking through the history book that just came in the mail.  The highlights were the Vikings (Jack and Annie talked about them! Magic Tree House Books) and Shakespeare.  They took the history book over to the book shelf and compared the picture with the picture on my Shakespeare book.  Wanna know something cool?  I took Shakespeare from William Shakespeare.  No joke.  My Shakespeare teacher at BYU was William Shakespeare.

Here they are:

Looking at the history book.

Kate kept busy playing with the chick and the dragon.  I love this girl!!!!

Some days I really love homeschooling!

Super Kate!! The Adventures of a Mover

Boy, is she ever a mover!!  On a regular basis I scratch my head and think to myself what DID my other children do for so long if they didn't crawl and strand and cruise and explore like Kate does?!  Emma crawled at about 9 months, Arianna was 8 1/2 months.  Grant- 10 months old, folks.  Well, Kate was up and at 'em at 6 months old.  Crawling non-stop.  I regularly have nightmares about her falling down a flight of stairs; The kind of dreams that I catapult out of bed, over Kenneth to catch my little baby who is going headlong down the stairs.  It's pretty humorous, except that it's not really at all.  I probably need to start stairs lessons pretty soon, so she can learn to navigate them.

Kate is such a good baby.  She will be 8 months old on Thursday.  She really makes us laugh.  We have lots of nicknames for her.  We call her:  Katydid, Diddy, Diddy-bitty, and Arianna's latest "Ooowee". (I like Oldies music and Arianna heard me singing Frankie Ford's, "Oowee, Oowee Baby!  Oowee, Oowee Baby!  Won't you let me take you on a sea cruise!" ) The kids still adore her and love to play with her.  They still ask if they can hold her when I am finishing nursing her and I have to remind them that Kate doesn't want to be held anymore.  She wants to move and play!

So, without further ado, her are the pictures of this adorable little lady:

Super Kate!  Arianna put her cape on Kate.  Grandma Pilz made it for her.

Emma decided Kate was her dog and needed to tie her up while she worked on her Piano Theory.

Poor little thing wants to move!

Here Emma goes again with her 'puppy'.  At least they know not to put collars around necks.  

Anyone seen the applesauce?  I know it's in here somewhere!

Did you need me?  No thanks, I don't need a new diaper, I'd rather look out the window.

Silly mom, why would I need a diaper?!

Kate likes the Magna Tiles just as much as the rest of them!

She is such a joy!  I love this baby so much.  If only she would sleep longer than 5:30 am!!!!

Aaainnr

During school time today, I saw Arianna writing her 'name' on the white board and I said, "Arianna, that's not how you write your name"!  To which she responded, "I'm writing it in alphabetical order".  She never ceases to amaze me.