Blake's Birthday

The big 3!

He really loved his new drum set.

A birthday is not complete with visiting Chucky Cheese.

All the kids. Not sure what is going on with Parker in this pic.

Happy Birthday Blake. I love his eyes in this picture, it reminds me of...


when he was this big :(

Fall picture time

I love fall pictures! Today was just the most perfect fall day. I could not pass up the chance to go Eureka Lake and snap some cute picture of the kids.

Here are some of my favorite of Blake:

Here is my favorite of Hannah Bear:



My favorite of Parker:

My favorite of Payton:

Soccer

It is Parker's turn to joining in the "after school" activities. He choose to try soccer this fall and gymnastics. Gymnastics is technically during school as it is a home school class. He seems to like it. Soccer however is on Saturdays and Mondays. He LOVES it. During his last game he told me he loves to sweat. Yep he is a boy! I can not believe how much I enjoy watching him play. He is not the most talented kid on the team, but boy does he try hard. He is the go to kid on the team. The coach knows that Parker is always ready to play and can continue to play for long stretches. The first game Parker scored three goals and at the last game Seven goals.

First day of school

Payton 3rd grader
my little fashion star

Hannah

2nd grade

What makes me happy?

I have been seeing lots of blogs posting on what they are thankful for or what makes them happy. As a mom of four little ones it is easy to get lost in the day to day stuff. I can easily complain about what went wrong, who was not behaving like I want them to, what I did not accomplish, etc. Every once in a while I will say... this is why I do what I do. I need to make this a more regular habit. So I will be posting what makes me happy here in the blog for me to reflect on later in those more heated days. I am hoping that by Christmas time I have 100 happy "things" listed.

1. Seeing any of my children curl up to a good book. I love that they are becoming "readers".
2. Blakey walking on his toes doing his happy dance.
3. Parker being such a lover. He always want to cuddle and hug and kiss. He will still sit on my lap for long periods of time.
4. Parker and Blake asking to be rocked at night.
5. Hannah's toothless smile. It reminds me how little she still is!

Miss Chicagoland

Payton is doing awesome this year in baton. She has improved SO much. She is enjoying the benefits...winning. We may have created a monster. This weekend she competed in Regionals. She got some 3rd places. But got a 2ND in instate solo, 1st in Midwest Regional Basic Strut, and...

1st Novice Midwest Regional Solo
Miss Chicagoland

She was just a little excited and so was I.

That was fast...Blue Belt

Little Miss Hannah has been quite busy with her Tae Kwon Do. She has made it all the way to a blue belt. We are so proud of all her hard work.

Payton my little Ballerina

Payton started taking ballet again this winter. She was not sure if she wanted to do ballet as she found it boring at the old studio. But she loves the new academy and has found a new love for the dance. Her recital was at the end of May. I was not crazy about the costume but she was happy.

Life with a two year old

It all starts with a scowl...
then you get the arms crossed and a good yelling at

Maybe even some fist shaking

Then he turns so he can not even look at you anymore.

He has had it.

Just about one minute later you get this.

That sweet little smile and all is right in the world.

So this is a typical two year old fit. I use to get so upset when my other kids would have a fit. Now I just find them so darn funny. Here is Blake...

Homeschooling

So I am trying to pull my stuff together for the up coming year. The girls will be in 3rd and 2nd grade (wow how did that happen). Parker is four years old and I am hoping to start kindergarten after Christmas. For now the curriculum is mostly bought. There are still a couple things I am still wanting to buy.
History this year we will be using Tapestry of Grace. We are studying the middle ages, it should be really fun. I am hoping to do lots of fun activities and projects. Art will be included in history this year. We will be studying some of the famous artist and creating our own works.
English, Spelling and Reading the girls will be using Bob Jones. Nothing exciting but it will get the job done.
Math the girls will be doing different curriculum. Hannah will be doing Math u See. Payton will be using Teaching Textbooks 5. I am still trying to decide what to supplement this with... maybe Singapore.
Science is not something that comes easy to me. We will be doing experiments from ASK chemistry set. We will also be doing a nature study. I bought A Nature Walk with Aunt Bessie by Sandi Queen at the convention. I still need to buy a good field guide to go with this. I really like how easy this looks to do. Read a story... do a lesson.
Parker will be doing Sonlight P4/5. We have already started loosely. I really enjoy the books (when I remember to read them). I am going buy the new PAL program from IEW for teaching him to read and write. I just need to click buy ... harder than it sounds.
For our religious studies we have the Faith and Life series. I will also be reading the loads of other Catholic books we have. I am thinking too that with history this year we will be able to study lots of saints.

Mrs. Rainbow

Finally, Payton has won a title for baton. She has worked so hard and has come really far this year. At the Wood Dale competition she was really on it. She won a first place in Beginner modeling, second place in Beginner Mrs. Rainbow Modeling and the over all title of...

Novice Mrs. Rainbow

She was so excited I thought she was going to start jumping up and down with joy.

Look at that smile.

After this picture my camera battery died. Booo.

Let the naming begin

Blake has been calling me mama for ...well forever it seems like. The same with Steve. So with in the past two weeks he decided to start calling his best friend Ethan.... YELLOW. We have no idea why he calls him Yellow, but it is so cute. He sticks his head out the door and screams for him every morning. He just loves his Yellow. Today I was asking him a question of "who did it". He ratted out his brother! He said "Parker" for the first time. Parker was so excited he did not even care that he was tattled on. The girls are both disappointed that he has not said their name :)

Goodbye Butterflies

For science this year we decided to study butterflies. What better way than by getting the butterfly garden. The kids really enjoyed them. We keep them for a week before we decided to let them be free. Hannah was very sad about the whole thing as they were her "favorite pets".

So pretty

There were five Painted Lady Butterflies in all.

Parker watching them try and escape

Blake watching them fly away

Payton's First Communion

Yesterday was Payton's big day. She was so excited and has been talking about it for weeks. We went all out for her, complete with a professional up-do for her hair. She could not be any more beautiful. She loved it all. The small party afterwards was just icing on the cake. But by far her favorite part of Saturday was that her "fairy" godparents made it. It meant so much to her for them to be there on her big special day.

The "Fairy" Godparent (aka Eric and Jaynie)

Payton looking as beautiful as ever.
The complete look.

Random pictures of Hannah

Thinking of Hannah. How fun it has been watching her grow. All the memories keep flooding back with each picture.

Crawling baby


One year

Two years

Three years

Four years

Hannah's 7th Birthday

I am little late posting about Hannah's birthday. I have been slacking on my blog. But here she is seven years old now. I remember just yesterday she was born and was so tiny and was the sweetest baby EVER. She is still super sweet but is not so tiny anymore. She is growing up to be a beautiful young lady. I wish they would all just slow down. So for her birthday it was all about her. First up was breakfast:

Hannah's breakfast of champions- choc. chip pancakes and bacon

The birthday girl

Then birthday gifts: chixos & an mp3 player
Next up was a mad rush to Chucky Cheese, Build -a-bear and MacDonalds.

We finished up with birthday cake and dinner at Firehouse Pizza.

How sweet is she?

Baton

This year Payton is still loving twirling her baton. She has been to three competitions so far. She has one coming up in May. Depending on how she does she may go to Regionals in June. She has gotten lots of second places and we are just waiting on her to get her first First place in her new age division. She wants it so bad. She needs three first places wins to move up so she can start doing a Show Twirl. I hoping this is her year.