Ok, My Turn

This isn't a very good picture, but I'm playing by the rules. Halloween 2007. Pumpkin carving in the back building (Pictures back there always turn out funky...still trying to figure this out.) Lydia said she wanted to carve "God," so Brian did his best. I think he did a smiling face and she was happy.



















In other news, a have a small sucess story that has greatly encouraged me today. For the past few weeks, Sam has grumbled every time we take out "math." (Although I love the program and he is doing fantastic.) We have had a challenging week, so we took yesterday off and played in the snow all morning. Today I knew we should get back at it, but I was feeling a bit discouraged and reluctant as well. We set the timer for 10 minutes (our agreed upon time to work on math, which to me feels like a drop in the bucket and to Sam feels like he has to fill up a bucket with a dropper) and began practicing adding "9." For the first few problems, he was still struggling to put the pieces together and relying a lot on the manipulatives and counting. Then, something I said, I don't even rememeber what, just struck him and I literally SAW the lightbulb illuminate his brain. His eyes brightened, he sat up straight, looked and me and confidently told me that "9 plus 6 is fifteen" and then went on to quickly and correctly answer any other "plus 9" problem I gave him!!! I love helping my kids learn. This feels so good!!! Lord, help me remember this next time I get discouraged.

Random Photo

Maybe you saw on my blog, but someone tagged me to post a particular photo and share what it was from. I thought this might be fun to do with you all.

Let's each go to the pictures directory. Find the 20th folder and post the first picture in it. Just for fun. I'll start.


Blueberries. Oh warmth of summer. This is Elinore from 2007. Probably about 20 months old. I remember this day. It started to drizzle while we were picking and I asked her if she wanted to go home, but she wanted to keep picking. So we picked in the rain (which didn't last long). Our clothes got all damp, her hair got all curly, and she didn't have any blueberries in her bucket by the time we left because she had eaten them all! I can't believe how fast she has grown.