Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Yeah for Birthdays!

My birthday was awesome! Thanks to everyone who called, FBed, and gave gifts!! Nate and the kids gave me a movie, a bracelet, and a new coat. A friend brought over tea and cupcakes (!!), another gave me Sara Groves' new cd, and my parents came a few days later and brought gifts as well!
Nate and I went out on Friday night to see a movie and eat at the Meeting Place. Yum!
The second cupcake was much prettier when I got it; I had already eaten most of the chocolate chips off before I thought to take a picture. : )

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Updates and Silly Pics

Naomi took a few pics of Jacob and "Baby" yesterday.
At this very moment, Bethany is standing on a chair tapping on the family room window and yelling "Omi! Jajuh!" and "Di Dis! Eh ah oo?" Yes, she's getting a lot more verbal lately. She's especially talkative in the morning when she uses her 20 words to convey countless stories about her night. She also asks immediately for any family member who isn't gathered around her in the morning. Bethany is definitely happiest when she knows where everyone is. Tuesday morning Nate left early, and when Bethany got up she asked "Where is Daddy?" (Eh ih Daddy?) probably 50 times. Every time I said "Daddy is already at work." That would get her through a few minutes until she noticed Daddy wasn't around. Then she'd ask again!
Jacob is loving life in community. He is crazy about his friends Bjorn, Graham, and Bailey. He loves his new friend Gardner who comes to nursery at Bible Study, and usually meets a new friend every time we go to the Y. Jacob is still writing lots of letters and recently has been working on how to spell his friend Bjorn's name. A couple of days ago I realized he had started spelling his own name "BJACOB" !
Naomi is really enjoying school, though whether or not she would admit that depends on the current activity. She loves having her friends come over for castle school, she loves it when I trust her enough to leave her alone to finish her work, and she loves the more creative games or artwork that we do together. The math facts and the correcting handwriting--not so much. Today's journal entry for school was, "Today is Wednesday, November 18th, 2009 and I will be going to cwior." She loves to write about princesses and places to go in her journal.
Olivia is excited about turning 32 tomorrow and looking forward to a date on Friday night. : ) She is very busy with the housework, the cooking, the taking care of kiddos, the teaching of school, and the writing of two blogs. She still makes time for reading though, and is currently re-reading The Sword in the Stone as part of the "Re-reading all my favorites" craze. Her favorite times of day are quiet time in the morning, dinner time with the family, and bedtime at night!
Nate is having an extraordinarily busy week with practicing and playing for a gig at Covenant. He'll finish that up late on Thursday night. He's also extra busy with work lately and would probably benefit from those 40-hour days he's asked for occasionally. (Olivia, for one, is very thankful that she gets to rest every 15!) He's excited about a few days of celebrating thankfulness in St. Louis next week.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Well Labeled

Fish Family Night

Head over to Of Such is the Kingdom to check other things we did on Wednesday night!
Bethany's fish

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Making Hats

When Ma made hats (chapter 12 in Little House in the Big Woods) the Castle School girls made hats too!
Thanks to my Aunt Kim for the idea of how to make them!
They turned out just beautiful!

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Ballet Classes

Class One
Arabesque (air-ah-besk)
Plie (plee-ay) in first with arms in fifth position
Class Two
Arabesque (air-ah-besk)
Plie (plee-ay) in first with arms in fifth position

Daddy and Bethany

Oster Art Show

"My New Crayon Box Rainbow" by Naomi
"Bethany Go to Sleep" artwork by Jacob; lettering by Naomi and Jacob
also known as "The Incline that Grandad Took Us On"
"The Flower Garden" by Naomi
"The Garden With Seeds" by Naomi
"Leaf" by Bethany
"Joseph and His Brothers" by Jacob
One of Jacob's teachers said that he spent much longer on this than the rest of the class. When he finished he said to her, "Look at my sunset!"
"A Parachute Jump" by Bethany
"Eyebrows" by Jacob
"Oihoi" by Jacob
)Original from which "Eyebrows" was taken.)
"Fall" by Jacob

Beautiful Bethany

So happy!
And not so happy!

Jacob and Bjorn Steal the Camera

"How do I know it was Jacob and Bjorn?", you might ask. Well, they took a few incriminating pictures! Here's Bjorn taking a pic of himself in the side of the trash can. (Fasten your seat belts for a wild ride through my house!)
And then he hands the camera off to Jacob.
Jacob likes to take pics of Bjorn making silly faces.
4-year old view
Refrigerator art
the sister
more refrigerator art
the tub (of course! Who doesn't take pictures of the bath tub?)
a closet door
a kitchen cabinet
a dishwasher vent
more silly faces
some piano music
and one more silly face!