a stack of books

With the completion of a semester of class comes the cleaning out of the locker....this is what will soon be on Philip's bookcase at home.



Emma was given this t-shirt on Sunday and this was the third time she's worn it. It was perfect for this photo op!

Precious sleep

Another one down

Well, it's officially summer at our house! Philip turned in his last paper and final project today. We will begin our summer vacation as soon as he arrives home...whenever that is. It is really hard to believe that we have been here almost two years. My how time goes by. When we arrived here in June, 2006, Peter was the age Emma is now and Emma is the age Ryan is now. I can't get my head around it. I don't remember them being so young.
I think this is one of my first digital pictures of the kids. It is from September of 2006. This was one of our first "pre-school" lessons.





Now, Peter is in kindergarten, reading, writing sentences, solving all the world's problem, reciting the Gospel message, making his own PB&J sandwiches and tons more.
Emma is desperately trying to do everything Peter does, sings, creates her own stories, rides a bike with training wheels, draws, occupies Ryan during "school time", is a fairly good helper in the kitchen, dresses herself, makes her bed....

I can't begin to imagine what the next two years will hold. My babies are growing up and I haven't even mentioned Ryan!

Recycled wheels

For Christmas, Emma's got a great new bike from her grandparents. She was so excited to be like her brother and get to ride it! When we got home and tried it out, it was a bit too big for her to maneuver. I was hoping that she would grow into it over the winter and be able to get on and off it with out help and ride it. She definitely grew over the winter but not quite enough for the bike. The other day, I was looking at her bike and Peter's and realized that Peter's was smaller than hers. I sat Emma down, and talked to her about the possibility of switching bikes until she grew into hers. She was all for it and said, "mommy isn't that sharing!". I then talked to Peter about the plan and he was all for it as well. I made sure he understood that this was for a season.

Emma is as happy as a clam! She is able to get on and off Peter's bike by herself, she can ride up and down the drive way and is off like lightning.

Soap box derby

Another classic and unique event that fits right in with the culture of Roxboro! The first annual Soap box derby was held this morning. The weather was beautiful and with Poppop here what better way to spend the morning.
We had a great time and the kids enjoyed the candy that was thrown to the crowd.

This is our buddy Alan and his car that he made with a class mate and coach at high school! When we left they were in second.

A proud mommy

Last night, the HEAR group had a demonstration night for all those interested. I signed Peter up to recite Psalm 23. He has been learning that in Spring. I had visions of a grand science board but well that just didn't happen. Last week in the matter of basically one day, Peter also memorized Psalm 24. He stood tall and still and loudly recited in front of about 30 people both Psalm 23 and 24. I was so proud. After taking in the size of the crowd for a few seconds he began his recitation and didn't hardly pause until he was through. I was glad he didn't get confused because I'm not sure if I could have helped him!!



He is very proud of his certificate and has his sights on next year's event. He wants to do a science project and get a trophy!

New breakfast

One of my on going goals is to expand our breakfast menu to more than cereal and oatmeal. For some reason, Peter has begun to be a little picky. He is craving more variety in his breakfast and lunch options. I am not sure why this is happening so I'm trying to do what I can. I've been wanting to try this recipe for some time but keep forgetting. So when Peter awoke and asked what's for breakfast I suggested this. Some call it fried egg toast, eggs in a nest, bulls eye toast...the list goes on but it's basically an egg cooked in the center of a slice of bread.

Emma wasn't too crazy about the yoke but she ate around it. Peter and I both ate all of ours. Ryan ate some but he's hasn't really eaten anything this week so I won't count that try! I think it would be really good with waffles but I don't buy the frozen waffles. I think next time I'll try cutting out the bread with cookie cutters. That would make it even more exciting!

This definitely made "the list". I recently tried a refrigerated bran muffin mix that is excellent. I'm planning on posting that recipe soon. It's one of my new favorites!

attachments

Friends often ask me who is Ryan the most like: Peter or Emma.
When Peter was 2 years old, he was attached to his thumb and blue blankie. I don't think we had to travel everywhere with his blankie but he definitely needed it when he slept. When Emma was 2, I don't really remember her being attached to anything. She has never been dependent on her blankie, didn't have a paci or suck her thumb. She does have a few stuffed animals that rotate through in importance.

Ryan is beginning to really develop some attachments. Currently he's attached to my purse. I realize that some would be concerned with their son being attached to a purse. I might be concerned but you can usually find a monster truck or a matchbox car in his hand or in my purse! I guess his brother and sister are both rubbing off on him.

Fun with friends

We had a great time having dinner with some friends on Sunday!

Then we had a slumber party at another friend's house who also lives in Durham. However, she wasn't home so it was more like we crashed her house. It was so great to wake up Monday morning and be in the big city. We were 5 minutes from Southpointe Mall in Durham. We bypassed Southpointe and headed to another mega mall on the Raleigh/Durham border. I needed to get my Oreck serviced so we went shopping at Brier Creek.

It was fun to be in the big city and I'm glad to be back home.

Thursday night fun

Check out Philip's blog for a post about our adventure....

It's times like these that I really feel like a city girl and wonder, "how in the world did I end up in Roxboro?".

A friday at home

We had planned on meeting some friends at McDonald's this afternoon for lunch and some play time. I was really excited about going as this is a new group of ladies that I've been hanging out with. They are women from the home school group that have kids our age. However, Ryan went to be with a fever and woke up with a fever so I figured we should stay here.
I have been experiencing a little bit of "mommy guilt" the past few weeks. I think it might be spring fever. I haven't been as dutiful to our scheduled "school activities" as I would like to be. It's not that we've had tons of stuff going on to take us away from the house. It seems that I just end up letting the kids outside for some morning sun and we spend all morning out side instead of 15 minutes.
So today, I was determined. I failed. But I compromised with myself. I've been wanting to get back to an activity where Peter takes a picture from the newspaper and he writes about it. I found a strawberry picture so I dragged the kids inside and we spent about 20 minutes writing. Emma and Ryan joined us at the table but they were doing something with stickers!
Here's Peter's finished product.


The picture's not that great but he wrote: The boy went to the fruit store. He bought strawberries. He loves strawberries.
Peter's writing is in pencil and I wrote in a colored pencil the letters he didn't know- those are the ones that are hard to see!

Since we couldn't go to McDonald's, I treated kids to a Capri Sun and a picnic lunch in the yard.

Ryan's trying to figure out the sunglasses thing!

toe nails

I realized today I needed to paint my toe nails. I think it might actually start being warm here. I brought my polish outside to where the kids were playing. Every one immediately had to inspect what I was doing. I painted Emma's toenails for the first time. Ryan promptly took off his socks and shoes and put his feet in my lap. He kept saying, "toes, toes, toes". How do you explain to a 2 yr old little boy that toe nail polish is just for girls. Peter finally distracted him and he forgot about it!

Farm Days

NCSU sponsors an annual open house for young kids at one of their farm locations on Lake Wheeler road. The flyer sounded fun and I thought it would be something we could do with my grandfather. We picked up grandpa on Thursday morning and headed to the farm. I had no idea what to expect and soon found out that I probably should have found out a little more information before I brought my 88 yr. old grandpa with me. First thing we should have done was bring his handicap parking tag.

After a bit of a walk to the farm, we started the self- guided tour inside. We saw white turkeys, chicks, mamma and baby horse, cows, sheep and goats. The weather was beautiful. The place was absolutely packed. I'm not sure that my grandpa had seen that many children in one place in a very long time. It was a bit overwhelming for me a few times.

It's not something I would ordinarily drive an hour and half to attend but it was so great to be able to do this with my grandpa!

Make a slideshow - it's easy!

News Flash

You may want to sit down for this one....

Peter's earthworm family took a turn for the worse. All but one worm died. After the first two- three days of dutifully checking on his friends, he got a little distracted. I told him yesterday that we needed to check on them. After removing the lid, the whole thing was covered in white fungus/mold! Apparently, the worms didn't care for that too much.

It seems to me that his container wasn't properly ventilated and perhaps there was a bit too much water added!

Peter took the discovery and news of his loss like a man.

He's on to capturing ladybugs.

Unbelievable

We have a good friend who would say all the time "unbelievable" and I thought of him several times today...I called our ped. office this morning (9am) to speak to a nurse b/c Emma went to bed with a low fever, woke up with a low fever and complained of a stomach ache yesterday. Those were two of the symptoms I was supposed to report as they are often related to "tick borne illnesses". So I carried my cordless around with me all day until 2:45 when the nurse kindly returned my call. The Dr. wants to see Emma!
Fortunately, Philip was on his way home so I said I would come in around 4pm.

The Dr. discovers that she has an ear infection. Unbelievable- what are the chances of that! Emma told me one time on Sunday that her ear hurt but that was it. I am thankful that it wasn't anything more serious.

So I am putting Ryan and Emma in the tub and low and behold what do I spot on Emma's shoulder- a TICK- Unbelievable. The part that really makes me mad is this. The Dr. did a check of her whole body to make sure there weren't any rashes at 4:30. We went to church to swing on the swing set for about 40 minutes. We walked only through the grass in the yard (not tall field grass), she was wearing pants and a long sleeve shirt and somehow managed to land another tick. Unbelievable. This time I got the head although one of his grabber legs remains. I'm getting better though.

Peter arrives home from church past his bed time but I am determined to give him a bath. Low and behold, what do I find on his shoulder? A smaller than flea sized TICK. This is ridiculous! However, this time I get the entire nasty creature.

I am about to become a insect repellent stock holder.

2 yr check up

Ryan had his 2 yr check up this morning with his Dr. It was just Ryan, Emma and myself as Peter got to go to Duke with his dad for a meeting. When our nurse called his name, Ryan hesitantly walked towards the door. When we got to through the lobby and into the nurses station, he started back peddling. I tried to put him on the scales and he started saying, "No" loudly with a look of fear in his eyes. Emma got on the scale to show Ryan that it was OK. She weighs 37lbs, by the way. Meanwhile, Ryan really starts crying and running to towards the exit.
I capture him and we decide to put him on the baby scale sitting up and called it quits when the machine blinked at 33 lbs. The nurse kept saying, "Oh- he remembers me from last visit...shots". We were able to get him to lay down long enough to measure his height: 36 inches.

The actual visit with the Dr. wasn't nearly as bad! So maybe it was the memory of the "shot lady" that freaked him out.

I asked the Dr. to look at Emma's tick bite because the head is still there. She worked on trying to get it out for a good 10 minutes. She was able to remove part of it but there is still some there. She said the body would take care of the rest just like it would a splinter. We just need to keep it clean.

I'm thinking that I need to keep Ryan away from the Dr. office as much as possible until we can build some more pleasant memories!

blogging family

Philip has started his own blog after becoming addicted through mine!
His, of course, has a bit different content. It's a great read.

Check it out
http://wikiworship.blogspot.com/

Make sure you leave a comment when you browse.

Silliness

That is all I have to say....



OK- maybe not all. In order to be faithful to my womanhood, I have to say that not only were they on sale and I had a coupon. I believe my totally price savings was around 70%.

Shoes

Enough about the ticks, please do not abjudicate us of what we really want. We do not want to hear about your gnostic sense of fire ants versus ticks in the battle of control over our fears. We don't want to pleasantly peruse through the prevailing cultural wars that seem so prevalent in your context. What we want --- all of your fans --- is to see the shoes. We have been hanging on to your every word --- checking your blog every day --- in hopes that you would give us at least a glimpse. And what have you done? Talked about ticks, donuts, kites, worms, ants ..... Let us all rise up with one voice --- speaking the same language --- building again the great tower of Babel --- to say to DeAnne: "give us shoes, give us shoes, give us shoes." That is what we want. Please, please, please.

Sincerely,
your biggest fan.

Ticks

I had no idea that the ticks were already hatching from their awful eggs. I buttoned Emma's night gown and found one of those dreadful creatures attached to her neck. I really really don't like ticks. I got my tweezers and attempted to remove the awful insect. I was unable to get the head. After calling in Philip and many unsuccessful attempts, we left it. Emma was quite a trooper. It had to hurt. All I can find on-line about heads left in is to call your doctor. So I'll put a call in tomorrow and see what they say. I can't believe the ticks are out already. I suppose I'll need to begin the bug spray regiment!

Did I mention that I really really don't like ticks. I can't decide which are worse: ticks or fire ants. I'm thinking ticks because you can at least get a spray for your yard for the ants.

New friends

Peter has finally gotten his wish; he has some pets. Bootsie and Sukey have joined our family. He has adopted a family of 5 earthworms. We've had lots of rain here so the earthworms have been easy to find. Ironically, my nephew in WV has also adopted 2 earthworms so my sis sent me some links to earthworm info. I got her email the same day that Peter decided to adopt his new pets. Needless to say, worms have been the subject of our science time today. Peter is certainly becoming very "responsible" with these new pets because I will not touch them!

I think this is the third time today that he's taken the worms out for a little "fresh air". Peter is very protective of the worms by making sure a bird doesn't swoop in and steal one.

This is Bootsie. He/she is the biggest.


I think this is Sukey. The others haven't been officially named. For now they are there are the "twins" and the baby.

kites

Although it didn't make the favorite's list, flying kites was a fun thing we did. When Philip was growing up his family would vacation at Myrtle Beach in the summer for a week. They really got into kite flying. I've heard that they would enter tournaments and knew how to fly stunt kites. Poppa brought up some kites and we hit the field beside us shortly after their arrival. The wind wasn't that cooperative but we had fun trying!

Highlights

We had a fun weekend with a visit from Gram and Poppa(Philip's parents). I asked Peter what his favorite two things were from their visit tonight at dinner. Without much thought he said, " 1. Lili (Gram and Poppa's dog that also comes) and 2. Going with Poppa to Walmart to buy donuts".
Emma's response was similar: 1. Lili 2. Going with Poppa to the grocery store to buy cookies (a separate trip from the donuts).

We always try to make our times with grandparents fun and special. The kids have discovered that the specialness often times comes in the form of foods that we don't serve on an ordinary basis in our home. When grandparents come special foods come too; along with special trips to the grocery store "without a list"!

My two favorite parts were: 1. Extra hands = extra help! 2. My new shoes!!

We had a fun weekend despite the rainy and gloom.

Published work

Philip has an aunt and uncle that recently retired from the mission field. They are currently living in Waxhaw, NC, continuing their work with Wycliff and loving being grandparents. They spent their years overseas working on Bible translation. I have yet to get my head around all that they did but I know it was a lot. Upon returning to the States, Aunt Jan, began some work of her own. She has written and gotten published the book The B-I-B-L-E, Volume 1. I have yet to receive my copy. From what she told me about it, she has done a paraphrase of the Psalms and 1 John. It is a paraphrase written in language that early elementary children should be able to read themselves. What a novel concept! There are certainly tons and tons and tons of children's Bibles but I haven't ever seen one that was written in language that children can read on their own.

I'll definitely give you more of a book plug once I get my copy but I thought I would at least pass along the link and share our excitement with you!
Congrats Aunt Jan!

Science in the closet

We haven't done a whole lot of organized science this year. Our science time has mostly been through reading library books, nature walks, museum trips and experiential learning. When we were at the library Peter spotted a book called, Explore Spring! 25 Great Ways to Learn About Spring.
It's great. We spent about 1.5 hours yesterday making our own Science Journal. It was quite a labor some project and I'm not sure if it was worth the effort but it's done now.

Today we read about seasons and what causes them and then we headed to my closet, turned off the light and got out the flashlights. We changed the angle in which we held the light to represent the sun's light as the earth tilts. Kinda hard to explain and for that matter I'm not sure if they got it either. However, after the activity was over, I left the closet but the kids remained. Peter began his own "science lecture" and was informing Emma and Ryan all about everything he knew (or could invent) about space. It was fun to listen in.

raisin!

We had bananas with peanut butter and raisins for snack this morning. The kids were at the table and I was doing something in the kitchen. Ryan all of a sudden got upset, pointed to his nose and said raisin. Sure enough there was a raisin in his nose. Yikes. I could see it and feel it with my finger. I promptly got on line to see if I could figure out what to do as this was my first foreign object in the nose! No good advice so I went and got my tweezers. I was too nervous to use them so I called the pediatrician's office. While I was on hold I decided I know she's going to recommend this so I might as well try. I laid Ryan down, who was by the way completely calm and breathing and acting normal, and removed the raisin. When the nurse came on, I explained that I gained enough confidence to give the tweezers a try and I was successful. She laughed and said, "one of the joys of having boys".

Grandparents!

I am so thankful that my grandparents decided to move to Cary, NC about 2 years ago. The kids and I headed down there for a little visit this morning. Our visits are usually short because, well- three kids can be a bit overwhelming for anybody. The kids have grown accustomed to what it means to visit grandma and grandpa's house: candy, cartoons, a singing frog, Emma gets milk from a special cup, bananas, muffins left over from breakfast, raisins in little plastic containers, and well practically anything they want!

We had a nice visit again this morning. Peter was even able to get a story out of them about the "olden days"!

Duke Gardens

We took some time on Friday to explore the famous Duke Gardens. They are certainly beautiful. Here are a few of the shots Philip took that afternoon.


We were excited to get this picture of Ryan. He has been a little "uncooperative" lately when a camera appears!