Neighborhood Egg Hunt

WE WANT OUR NEIGHBORHOOD TO KNOW JESUS! Yes, we really do!  We go for walks – not only for exercise – but to meet them and get to know them!  It has worked, and we are really building relationships with them.  (When they see that I am pregnant, THAT is a HUGE conversation starter since they didn’t see me all winter really and I look a little different!)  Actually I had a great conservation with a neighbor across the street – Rachel – and she ended up bringing some homemade Korean food over last night!  It was SO YUMMY!!  There ARE other perks to getting to know your neighbors!

One of the ways that we are working to get to know the neighbors is by having an annual Egg Hunt around Easter Time. Today was our Second Annual Egg Hunt!  We had a sign out for about a week and went around from house to house with invitations.  By the time the kids showed up this morning we had about 250 filled eggs for them to find – thanks to our Life Group who gave us some candy!!  The weather wasn’t too nice – cold and damp – but we had about 18 kids come.  We were pleased with that.  We had them hunt for the eggs and then we gave them a coloring paper and invited them to our Good Friday Event – Journey to the Cross.  It was nice to have good conversations with the parents and be reminded of names.  We are praying that the connections from today will continue to develop so they will be ready to hear about our Jesus. 

Danny – with a mouth full of Jelly Beans as he was hiding the eggs 

Go, Hannah!

Speedy Grace

 

Neighborhood kids on the hunt!

After the hunt, they gave us back the eggs so we can use them next year, but they kept their own candy!

Camryn and Parker – friends from Life Group

Josiah was asleep for most of it, but he woke up in time to snuggle with me outside and say hi to the neighbors!

Overall it was a great event… the families have asked if we are having it again next year!  Can’t wait!

It’s official!

Yup.. it is official!  We are DEFINITELY going to homeschool Grace in the fall.  I think it was an inevitable decision, but we have made it and are excited!  When thinking about the awesome space that we have, I was telling Danny that I really wanted more shelves to take books, craft supplies and school things from around the house and put them in the School Room.  We have several spaces for some wiring shelves that we already had (from a yard sale last summer), and I just wanted him to install them for me.  After talking it over, Danny suggested that we rearrange the basement and get more room in the School Room and then look for some shelving.  That would be a more permanent solution but more costly.  So… we rearranged everything and got some small shelves from a friend last weekend (along with a desk that you saw pics of last week).

Later on Sunday, I saw the PERFECT shelves on Craigslist!  I hadn’t really thought that we would do this project until this summer, but they were perfect and were the perfect price – FREE!!! Without consulting my man, I emailed the person about them.  There were 2 shelving units that looked like 4 shelves.  Combined they were 8 feet of shelving but most importantly…. THEY WERE FREE (I mentioned that, right?)!!!!!  I just had to have them.  I checked my email 100s of times on Sunday afternoon and evening hoping to hear back but knowing that I wouldn’t hear until Monday.  I PRAYED AND PRAYED!  I knew they would be perfect and Danny confirmed that!.

So… I heard from them on Monday morning and after asking a few questions, we were able to confirm a time to get them – Thursday.  I was jumping up and down and PRAISING THE LORD WHO CAME THROUGH AGAIN IN A HUGE, GIGANTIC WAY!!!!! Danny would get help from a friend at church with a pick up to bring them here!  Since then I have been organizing and rearranging.  This is NOT the final placement of everything… but it is a GREAT start!  I am thrilled and I LOVE seeing this new school room.  It is amazing… now to make the teaching/learning amazing!  It does help to have a nice new space!  We only have a little over a month of school left – I would like to finish before baby comes – so we will enjoy this room as it is now, and then I may change things over the summer –                                                   if I am able to with the FOUR kiddos! 

The view when you come down the stairs into the basement level

The view looking back toward the stairs

LOVE is here

Two happy girls… happy to be in school and happy to have each other!  LOVE is here!!

 

P.S.  This BINGO game was for Hannah.  She is doing such a great job learning to identify her letters.  She knows about 75% of them, and this game has really helped.  I think we will be playing more of this as well as Alphabet Soup in the next weeks.

100th Day of School

I know that most teachers and children have already celebrated the 100th day of school, but that was NOT the case at Lightner Academy.  We only do school four days a week (since Danny is home on Fridays or when MOPS is on Tuesday morning), and we have only been keeping track of those days when we are IN the classroom doing school.  So… when you figure in the awesome field trips that we have had this year, we should have had our celebration weeks ago when the rest in the US classrooms did. 

ANYWAY…. we celebrated this special day with many fun learning activities:

1.  I decorated the school room with lots of 100s and put out several 100 day books to read.

2. We created a list of 100 things/people we are thankful for.

3.  We read several books on the 100th day or with the number 100 in them.

4. We finished this sentence: “If I had 100 dollars, I would buy…”  It was interesting to see what the girls would buy.  Grace did a great job writing her sentences; I am simply amazed by her reading and writing abilities!  :)

5.  We made a 100th day snack – we got 10 small snack items from the pantry, counted out 10 of each of them, added them to a bowl and mixed it up!  The girls thought this was GENUIS!  It wasn’t, but I will take it.  So…we had 10 Cherrios, 10 pretzels, 10 Fruit Snacks, 10 Chex pieces, 10 Coco Puffs, 10 Craisins, 10 shortbread rods, 10 Trix, 10 Almonds, and 10 some elses (I can’t remember what it was, and the girls are resting so I don’t want to go ask them!)  If you add up all of the pieces, that would be 100!

6. Then we made an art project using a 1 and 0 and 0.  We made butterflies! 

7.  The final thing that we did for the 100th day (sorry to disappoint you by not doing 100 things!) was for math time.  Grace filled in all of the missing numbers on a 100 chart – which hardly took her any time and she got ALL of the numbers in the correct spot and written perfectly.  There were NO backwards numbers!  What a girl!  Then I called out numbers to her.  She had to find that number and then color in the space of that number.  In the end it made a special message… the number 100!  She was thrilled! 

By the way, for the really observant reader of this blog, you may have noticed that our school room looks different!  Well, it is!  A friend from church was giving away some wire shelves this weekend, and I told her that I would LOVE them for our school room… STORAGE IS A MUST WHEN YOU HOMESCHOOL!!  So that was really cool.  In talking with her she said that she had this homeschooling desk thing that was in her home when they moved in that she would love to give us if we wanted it.  She was even willing to bring it on Sunday afternoon if that would be ok.  After talking with Danny, we had no idea what she was talking about, but we figured we could always Craigslist it if we hated it. 

So… she and her hubby came on Sunday at 3:30 and delivered this AWESOME desk unit.  It is 90 inches long and is basically a counter top with drawers under the middle section and two braces at the ends.  It is great!!  It is fabulous!  I am sorry to make my SIL Rachelle jealous!  :(  It is a great thing and it was FREE!!!  And then God has blessed again and we are getting 8 feet of bookshelves tomorrow for FREE as well!  I found them on CL from a lawyer who is downsizing the office.  When we have them in the school room with all of our books and stuff on them, I will take another picture! It may take a while to organize and rearrange the school room… so be patient, mom!

Sewing up a storm!

No, I have not been sewing…Nanna has been!  She enjoys making things for the kids – outfits for the girls, dresses their dolls, pillowcases, etc.  Here is the latest creations from Nanna..Pillowcases with Disney Princesses on them.  I don’t think Hannah is EVER going to take hers off. I am not sure she will even let me wash it tomorrow!  And yes, they are IN their pillowcases… it is hard to tell that from these pictures!!

Egg-O

I am always looking for fun ways to promote learning in our home – games to play, activities to do, places to go, craft projects to make, etc.  Many of the ideas that I am currently using in homeschooling, I used when I was teaching so have been relying on my memory or things that I have written down in folders.  Yesterday was no exception.  I pulled out my Easter/Spring folder over the weekend and decided to make a game with Grace to help with math equations.

It is called Egg-O.  All you need is an empty, clean egg carton, permanent marker, two coins/chips, and markers/stickers to decorate the carton.  I gave Grace and Hannah the responsibility to decorate the outside of the carton.  With several dozen stickers in hand, they plastered them all over the carton to create this lovely masterpiece:

 

Then I programmed the inside of the carton with numbers 0-10 and then repeated 5 to have one number in each of the wells.

I put two chips in the carton and then closed it tightly.  Grace shook the carton for five seconds and then opened it.  She noticed that the chips landed on 5 and 3. 

I had her make a number sentence or equation with them.  She wrote 5+3=8.  She put the chips back into the carton, closed it, and started again.  She made a whole page of equations.  It was fun to see her make these number combinations and she LOVED it! She did this over and over again and then had to show Danny when he got home! 

So… if you are looking for an activity for your kiddos, try these variations:

1.  Fill the wells with numbers and have your children tell you what the two numbers are.  For example, 3 is THREE and 5 is FIVE.

2.  Fill the wells with numbers and have your kids use the two digits to make a two digit number.  For example, 3 and 5 would be 35 or 53.

3.  Fill the wells with numbers and have your children add, subtract or multiply the numbers they land on. 3+5=8, 5-3=2, 3x5=15

4.  Fill in the wells with letters and have your children tell you the letter names, the sound that each makes, and/or a word that begins with that letter.

5.  Color in each of the wells with a circle of different color using a marker or a sticker.  Have your child put an Easter Egg in the well that matches that color.  For example, color the bottom of the well blue, orange, red, yellow, green, pink, white, black, brown, etc.  Have eggs that match those colors and the children will have to put the eggs in the right places.

 

The possibilities abound.  Do you have a cool activity to share using egg cartons?  Let me know… we eat a lot of eggs when they go on sale!   We are going to make Resurrection Eggs at MOPS next week.  If you don’t know what they are, stay tuned… I may have to share about that as well!

STOP moving and TALK

It is hard to get Josiah to stop moving so he will talk for the camera.  We tried last night... this is the jumpy video that we got.  It is really cute... but it might get you seasick from watching it!  He truly knows a lot words and it is fun to hear him talk!  He likes copying his sisters and us, but the only problem is the girls like to teach him words that we don't necessarily want to be in his list of first words...like BUTT and PANTIES!  Thanks, big sisters!

ENJOY!

I MUST update it IMMEDIATELY!

Every time the kids’ birthdays come around, I try to get a good photo shoot of them.  It was really fun getting the most recent pictures of the girls, but since Josiah’s birthday is in the fall, I couldn’t leave him out… ESPECIALLY since I have printed the girls’ pictures and they are hanging above our fireplace.  The picture that I have there of Josiah is one where he is in his Bumbo chair… yes, that was A LLLLOOONNNGGG time ago!  I MUST update it IMMEDIATELY!

So I grabbed my camera this morning – with hardly any battery left – and the black blanket with a few props and headed to my favorite photo shoot location – the girls’ room.  I laid everything out and then changed Josiah.  I wasn’t hopeful for a great shoot, but I was THRILLED when he cooperated with me!  I was only able to get 14 pictures due to the lack of battery (how did I let that happen?), but I like the results… updated pictures of my little man!  Yes, I will be printing one of them asap to hang with the awesome ones of the girls! Later this week you will have to come over and see the new display above our fireplace!  (Yes, it will need to be rearranged when our new buddy arrives!!!!  Danny and I are thinking that through.)

He started off a little slow…. he wasn’t sure that he wanted to smile for me!  But with the help of some props and the girls….we made progress!

But he quickly began to show some expression and personality (which he DOESN’T lack)…

My favorite… the one for the mantle:

And a goofy one… just like the girls had! 

First ride of the season

The weather is gorgeous… we all love being outside… we are in need of some exercise….we want to do something together.  So what do the Lightners do?  We go for a family bike ride… even though I am 31 weeks pregnant!!!  I took my bike for a little spin this morning – by myself – to make sure that I could actually peddle and would have good balance.  It was weird to have my legs hit my belly with each peddle!I seemed ok, though… so Danny was excited to get going (especially since we don’t know if we will get to much biking this summer with a new baby!).  He had everything ready when Siah woke up from his nap and away we went.  I did make Danny promise to be patient with me if I needed breaks and to NOT leave me far behind!  (He was great!)

Here are all the kids with their helmets.  We were glad that Josiah didn’t scream with his on… he just kept saying HAT, HAT, HAT! 

The girls fit snugly in the trailer…

Josiah is hydrating before the long trip….

He didn’t mind the bike seat… YEAH!  We weren’t so sure because he hadn’t ridden in there since last fall.  He was very content and VERY chatty.  When we went by different people, he would say hi.  He liked the horses and made the “Neigh” sound over and over and over.  He liked it when Danny was next to us so he could chat with the girls and Danny. 

When we made it back to the van, we got out lunch to eat as a family.  It was a really nice location by the water, and we were all hungry!

(Hey, Aunty KK, do you recognize the girls’ shirts? They LOVE them!)

Our van with the two bikes…

We hope that isn’t our only ride of this year….  we will have to see how the weather is and how I am feeling!