Thursday, February 15, 2007

A Day for Tea

We had our Valentine's Day Tea Luncheon yesterday, it was so much fun. We had food everywhere and chocolate, yum! The girls started out reading their stories, they did such a wonderful job and they each had their own perspective. It was a great experience and I hope we can continue to do this. We ate and ate and ate and the little one's played so hard my 3 yr old fell asleep on the couch and my 19 mo took 2 naps! Of course what would a tea party be without someone throwing up, LOL! My 19 mo old had a very stinky diaper which made my friends 3 yr old quite ill, she threw up and my sensitive little Seth began to gag. Luckily, he was able to hold himself together. It was a brief moment and all was well again once the diaper was changed and removed from the premises. We spent all day visiting and the kids played and worked on Valentine's and just had a fun time in all. We are leaving tomorrow so this was their big opportunity to spend unstructured time together before we say good-bye (temporarily).

On to Valentine's with Daddy. He was so generous and thoughtful this year. I have been hinting for a while that I wanted an MP3 player to take w/ me to workout but I never thought he would actually get me one but he did. It isn't working right (he was so disappointed) but no big deal, I'll just go exchange it for one that does. I had asked for a few chocolate covered strawberries which I got (YUM) and a bonus of a few Godiva chocolate squares. We have this ongoing joke that if it's not Godiva, I don't want it for Valentine's Day. I'm kidding, of course, but he was so proud of himself for getting me Godiva b/c he doesn't know where there is a Godiva store around here and he just does not order things. Not to mention the very sweet card he gave me. He was such a sweety. He brought the kids all sorts of yummy candy and we had a great time. We had followed some inspiration from Lindafay to make Valentine's very family oriented. The kids made Valentine heart shaped envelopes last weekend and we left out all the craft stuff on the craft table so they could make Valentine's for their siblings any time the urge hit. Apparently the urge hit quite a bit because they had tons of Valentine's from each other and a few from their friends yesterday at the tea party who got in on the fun. Before dinner I filled their hearts with candy, a treat, and a love note to each of them from Mommy. My 7 yr old wrote love notes to all of her siblings all on her own. My heart just melted, they were so sweet to each other. They even made baskets for Daddy and Mommy and filled them with Valentine's and candy that my 9 yr old bought with her own money. They were so sweet and thoughtful. We are going to make this a tradition, it was such a wonderful experience. It was a wonderful day from start to finish, filled with love and affection for friends and family. God has truly blessed us in abundance and I hope we were able to convey that to our children yesterday, how truly fortunate we are to have each other.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Our plans this week...

We are planning to move back to our house in GA over this weekend & next so we will be packing most of the week. But the kids are being so good about being uprooted once again (even if it is familiar territory this time) that I wanted to do something special for them this week to say good0bye to their friends (it is temporary, we will be back here but it will still be for a few months at least). So anyway, on to our plans. The girls have been working on a Story Starter from Karen Andreola's book, we have also shared the first story with their friends and they are also working on a story. We will have a Valentine's Day Tea Luncheon on Wednesday so they can read their stories and exchange Valentine's. In case you are wondering, my boys LOVE tea parties also. So here is our menu:

scones w/ fresh butter, lemon curd, and strawberry preserves
tea sandwiches (cream cheese & cucumber, tuna, cheese & tomato, and chicken salad)
crudite platter w/ ranch & blue cheese dip
fruit salad
potato and leek soup
tea cookies (the variety pack from Pepperidge Farms)
Edom Chaos (not sure if I spelled that correctly, this is my favorite dessert at the tea room in Chatt, TN. It is fresh whipped cream, meringue cookies, and strawberries all mixed together, YUM!)
Brownies
And I think my 7 yo chef will be making either cookies or a cake, she hasn't decided yet.

And of course it will be served with piping hot Earl Grey tea w/ cream & sugar.
We are also making a Minty Fruit Iced Tea w/ the cutest heart shaped ice cubes b/c a few do not care for tea.

It sounds yummy (I'm pregnant, it's all about the food to me these days) but it is all so easy & quick to make. Except the scones which I am going to try to make today. I wish the tea room in Chattanooga was closer so I could just go buy some buy no such luck & they are too good to skip so I will make them.

Anyway, the food is not really the focal point, I was just trying to make it authentic. I really hope all of the children enjoy each others company while they share their stories. I am anxious to hear what each girl has written, how they each will have a different spin on how the story plays out.

In case you haven't heard of this book, it's called Story Starters by Karen Andreola. The basic idea is to give the kids the beginning of a story with a picture and they take the story & their imagination and make it their own. The first draft is purely their story, their imagination, no critics, no spelling errors, no grammar, just get the story onto paper. The next draft cleans up the spelling, the grammar, the punctuation, and the flow of the story. The final draft is written in their best handwriting so from each story your child gleans creative writing , grammar, spelling, and handwriting practice. And they just think they are writing stories!

So while they help prepare our menu (math and home economics) and then read their stories aloud (public speaking) and have a tea party with their friends (etiquette and socialization) while listening to Mozart (composer study) they will be increasing their education. And they think they get the day off. Isn't homeschooling the best!

Tuesday, February 6, 2007

A written narration

My 9yo dd wrote a narration from Ernest Thompson Seton's Wild Animals I Have Known. This is from the chapter Lobo King of Currumpaw:

A wolf who,after losing his mate, no longer cared for life and was later on caught in a trap for punishment for robbing a cow everyday but he didn't care, his mate was gone and so should he. And he died for the want of freedom and for the loss of his mate.

(Big grin from Momma!)

The Joy of Morning Sickness

I have been so sick lately it has really made an impact on our family. My husband just rolls his eyes, he can't believe that this being the 6th time I've been through this I'm not used to it by now. It's kind-of like asking people why they still act ill after catching the flu for the 6th time. You might know what to expect but it doesn't make it any easier to go through. The luxury of being a man during a pregnancy, the only time I envy them. But he works a lot, no big deal, just a part of our life, and he doesn't have time to take my car in for repairs or do other things I know my dad does for my mom. But he knocked me off my feet this morning when he got up early to take my car to have the tires repaired, one was going flat & we needed the spare repaired. What a man! That was better than Godiva at Valentine's! The idea of waiting in a dingy car repair shop with 5 kids while wondering how long I'll last before I need to make a dash for the toilet did not seem appealing at all. I then went all on my own to get the oil changed & the fuel filters changed, this was of course done at Jiffy Lube so I did not have to get anyone out of the car.

But my story about morning sickness, a few mornings ago I took my 2 smallest into the shower with me because we were the first one's awake. I spent a LONG time in the shower and had not eaten a thing since the night before. Finally, as the water got cold, we meandered out of the shower, covered in towels, and were just about to leave the bathroom when an overwhelming sense of nausea took over. I had to think fast. We have a very hot & dangerous gas heater in the hallway, I couldn't just send them out b/c I was afraid of my 18 mo burning herself. I didn't have time to wake my dh so he could watch the babes so I just had to throw up with the poor little things as my audience. Midstream I caught a glimpse of my 3 yos face, it was as green as mine, and before I knew what was happening, his face was next to mine just throwing up everything he had. So much for my future doctor! Oh, I felt so bad for him. What a terrible mommy to make my own little guy sick. I make sure to eat before I shower now and he hasn't wanted to take a shower with me since then. Hmm...I wonder why!

Monday, February 5, 2007

How's this for a first blog...

OK, I haven't written a blog in forever but felt it was time. I was on homeschool blogger but they made some changes that made it hard to manuever my way around. I'm not computer savvy enough to enjoy the struggle. So if you know us already, this paragraph will be repeat info but if you don't here is our introduction. We are a homeschool family in the South. Currently S AL. We homeschool our 5 chicks using the Charlotte Mason method which incorporates nature study, great lit and living books as well as journaling, narration, and dictation.

Now for our news, first, we are moving back to Georgia. Kind-of sad, we LOVE where we live now b/c of the people we have met and the landscape but we have had a rough time w/ the rental house we are in & our house in Georgia has not sold yet. We LOVE our house in GA and will be glad to get back to a house that is truly a home to us. So we are a bit torn but feel that we are doing the right thing. This means spending the week without hubby as he continues to work in AL and come home to us on the weekends, that is tough but we feel it needs to be done in order to do & oversee some needed updates on our GA house in hopes of an easier sell in a few months.

Our next bit of news, we are expecting baby #6 at some point in September. The kids are so excited, I would be too if the morning (all-day) sickness was not about to do me in, LOL. It hasn't been this bad since baby #2 when I was sick for the first 6 months, hopefully, this will subside before then.

OK, the troops are getting restless so I should head back down and motivate them in their studies.

Samantha