Bliss is...

going to check on your two youngest because it's too quiet. When you get there you find this. The seven year old reading a stack of books to the five year old.

Our boys

Every once in awhile, the amazing happens and the boys actually stop moving and find something stationary to do.

It's a beautiful thing.

A very beautiful thing.

Tools for learning

I love manipulatives. They are great for busy fingers and put into practice what we are learning.

Sometimes the olders still like to get their hands in there. (Don't mind the pile of empty Christmas decoration boxes in the back there. I'm busy, ok? ;-))

But sometimes, learning tools come in unconventional packages. Take the large ball pictured below, for instance.

Sitting on balls like this takes balance. What that can mean for learning is that it will engage the mind on a kinetic level. The benefit of that is that it can help a kinetic learner stay focused while they work as well as help a child who's brain has been developing faster than her emotions have been. I'm not naming names, just sayin'.

There is a company called Heads Up Now that carries some great learning aids for kids who have ADD, learning difficulties, sensory or fidgeting issues and the list goes on and on. They are not paying me to talk about them, I just really like what they have to offer. They offer balls similar to the one in the picture above, also.

Random acts of living

We started the weekend on Friday by getting some food in the freezer. Lil helped me by chopping onions. The goggles are her chopping tip for all of those who have issues with tearing up. It works!

We made 150 meatballs in all. Enough for Friday evening's meal and 3 more meals in the freezer.

We freeze them on cookie sheets first and then I package them with our foodsaver.


Now they are ready to go back into the freezer.

Friday evening, Bub and Steve made cinnamon rolls for our Saturday adventure that we had planned. I wish I had taken pictures of the finished product. They were beautiful.

We got up Saturday morning, popped the cinnamon rolls into the oven and got bundled up to head to Nana's first. Steve also made up a thermos of coffee and various travel mugs of hot cocoa.

Here is an example of how cold it was. Leaves were preserved in sheets of ice.

Our purpose for the trip was to take the 30 or so bags of leaves that we had collected at our house and put them in the garden at Nana's house.

Even Elijah got in on the work. He says he is a working man now.

We pulled up our tomato plants that were there and then spread the leaves over the ground.

Aunt K came along and built a fire inside the garden so we could warm up. It was really cold! Then after the younger three changed clothes we left for the rest of the adventure. Off to get our Christmas tree!

There is a nice lot, every year, in a neighboring town that has all of their trees for $7. It supports a mens program. The trees are seconds but we always manage to find a nice one.

We all look forward to going every year. Turns are taken pulling out trees to look at and sometimes laughing is had at what we find. One tree was so skinny on top and wide at the bottom that it looked like it needed a belt.

Lij loved helping Steve get the tree into the stand and helped carry it in.

Pardon this last picture. It's not easy getting a great picture of a lit tree. We spent part of the evening decorating and ended it with another reading from Jotham's Journey. That book is getting good!

Advent

I have been planning to do something for Advent each year but haven't found anything that I felt like would fit. This year we found it. (Thanks, Hilary!)

The book is Jotham's Journey and we are completely hooked. We should have started with it a few days ago but didn't get it purchased until Monday. It's a fantastic story that you read each night starting the first night of Advent. The story follows a young boy and at the end of each reading it shares about the people of Israel and their relationship to God. Not so different from Jotham's story and told in a way that kids and adults alike can relate.

This is our make-shift advent candle arrangement. I am using deep red in place of the violet candles as that is what we have on hand. Advent calls for violet candles on the 1st, 2nd and 4th weeks, with pink on the third and white on Christmas. I think the arrangement works for this year.

We lit the first candle.

I then printed out December calendars for the kids to color and decorate while I read the first three days to catch up. I have found that my kids have a longer attention span if they are doing something quiet while I read. It works even better for physical boys.

We were all disappointed that the reading was over so soon. Last night the cliffhanger was so intense! Steve and I had a hard time putting the book away to wait for tonight!

Birds of a feather

Can you tell what my kids are looking at?

How about now?

It's a bird's nest. We have lots of birds around here which has been kind of cool since we are working through our Apologia Science Zoology book about winged creatures.

We watched a little bird this summer make this nest, lay eggs in it and then watched the eggs hatch. We took it down this week after the bird moved on to greener pastures.

The kids drew the nest on their papers and made a list items that the nest was made out of. After that they wrote a paragraph about the reading we had done about how birds waterproof themselves.

I tried to get one picture from above the nest. Can you see the cherry pits in the middle? That was our favorite part. Our neighbor has a cherry tree so we are assuming that the pits came from there. All in all we found sticks and twigs, moss, plant material from our garden, cherry pits, string and last but not least...

...this little ladybug. We watched him for awhile too. I love being able to bring life into the class/dining room.

Tradition

With a flash, Thanksgiving is over. The tradition carried on, however. Each year all five kids have a hand in making the desserts with daddy for the big day. The night before Thanksgiving is looked forward to almost as much as Christmas Eve, if not more so.

There is the mixing of the pumpkin pie filling as well as the crusts.



Can you see that little brain taking in all of the info? Someday the responsibility of this task will be passed on to him.

This girl really loves helping with the pies. Can you tell?

It really is a family affair. The kitchen is a mess when they are all done and it's totally worth it.

It was then time to make the cheesecake while the pies baked.

As well as time to make the raspberry glaze to go on top. Do you see the cornbread cooling back there in the cast iron skillet? That was for the stuffing the next day and let me tell you, it was so good.

Here, our oldest girl is shaking fresh cream for butter to go on the rolls.

Steve really spoils me. One of those pies was a sugar free pumpkin and there is nothing like it. He topped it with sugar free whipped cream. Oh my, absolute heaven. Thanks, hon!