Baby L's Blessing

Last weekend we had baby L's blessing. Grandpop came and took these awesome pictures for us.  He also toured a couple of houses with us on Saturday.  

Family Schooling Summary

I am the assistant teacher in the Spanish Culture Class at co-op school. This week the main teacher was away on vacation, so I volunteered Daddy to teach the kids about Honduras.  Thay made clay versions of Mayan sculptures.

I made corn tortillas, beans, and rice -- which is what Daddy ate almost every day when he was a missionary in Honduras.

Daddy showed the kids pictures and artifacts from Honduras. Then they played a game with wooden tops in the parking lot. I asked A what her favorite part of the class was. She liked the game with tops the best.

Daddy really enjoyed M's Lego class:

M made a Japanese pellet drum in his preschool music class at co-op school.

We also had a field trip to one of our local nature centers for Joy School this week. We visiting one of the exploration play rooms and saw a variety of reptiles and amphibians.

This nature center is great because it has a series of indoor caves for the kids to explore. One of them even has underground windows into a small pond.

It is the same one that has the wigwam and tree canoe.

Brother M climbing a tree for the first time.

We also celebrated Daddy's birthday this week. The kiddos got a little carried away with the candles.  We had 37 or so on this rhubarb pie. 

Another illustration of why 4 kids in one small bedroom might be too many.  Still looking for the right new house though.

Garden Progress

I pruned all the fruit trees in March and they look a lot healthier. The plum trees are all blooming now. I counted at least 5 different types of pollinators buzzing around this one. Hoping for lots of fruit this year.

A bunch of lettuce varieties self seeded themselves again.  They look like flowers coming up through the leaf mulch.

Our neighbor was tired of having blueberry bushes, but not getting much fruit. He dug them all up and put them by the side of the road. We saved them. Another neighbor took 5 bushes over to his house, we took 5, and we gave about 5-7 more to my brother's family. They might not all survive the transition, but I hate to see a homeless fruit bush.

I think the honeyberry bushes liked the cold winter.  They are all leafed out and covered with blossoms already.  

And my faithful giant rhubarb is shooting up again. It seems to me as though all the plants are growing twice as fast as usual since winter took so long to let go this year.

Family Schooling Summary

This week was Easter break for most of the school districts around here. Co-op school and dance class were cancelled. We did have Joy School though. The kids are working on pages for their "All About Me" books. 

Big sister A did her usual workbooks and history studies.  She is listening to Ramona the Brave in her tape player at night and The Wizard of Oz on cd in the car.  Both are great stories for her age.

Baby L started drooling this week. I am sure that we won't see any teeth for a couple months yet. It's just a shocking reminder that she is already 3 months old!  She is also becoming more chatty -- making lots of cute noises at the dinner table with us, as though she wants to be part of the conversation. Baby L is making her transition from the co-sleeper into her crib now. I have been laying her in her bedbox in the crib so that she can get used to her new sleeping cues before we take the bedbox away. 

And finally - this is what all the rooms are starting to look like. Piles of boxes!  We keep telling the kiddos that we are "pretending to move".  That means that we are getting ready to sell our house, but we won't be putting it on the market unless we find "the one" we want to buy. Our realtor came over last week and walked through our house with us--advising us on what to do to get it ready.  We are going to get a storage pod delivered and take most of our stuff out of the house so that it looks bigger, do lots of touch-up painting, and finally get the exterior painted. 

 We are in a good situation because we know that our house will sell quickly. But the type of house and the amount of land that we are looking for is unusual around here.  I think that their is only about a 50/50 chance that we will actually move.  We are having fun looking at houses and I am excited for both possibilities. I love our current house and it will be great to check some things off my list of house projects or "moving to the farm" and having more space would also be wonderful. 

Family Schooling Summary

 This week at SHARP Co-op School we had Easter activities. They divided us into small groups and the kids rotated through various stations.  Our group went to the egg hunt first.

 Then we played games that kids would have played in Jesus' time. They had a craft/lesson about food and culture in Jesus' time. They tasted olives, honeycomb, cheese, and grapes. Then they made a mezuzah scroll with scriptures in it to put by their bedroom door.  They played an easter egg game where each egg contained something symbolic of an event in Jesus' life.

 After all the activities we had a picnic on the floor.

We took a field trip to the feed store to get more food for our hens and see this years baby chicks. They were so hard to resist -- especially the ducklings.  "Maybe when we get our farm" - is a phrase that we often say to each other.  I asked them when the turkey poults will be available -- not until May or early June. That would be a fun project for our farm too.

Aunt H was in the hospital this week for a kidney infection and because they found some kidney stones.  The kiddos were happy to have the cousins over to play and the big kids had a sleepover upstairs.

Easter egg dyeing with daddy.  He does the best color combinations.

 Showing off their loot. We took it easy on the candy again this year. They had plenty of candy from their two Easter egg hunts.

We did the usual math and reading workbooks this week. We are still talking about WWII for history and Big sister A and I started reading this book out loud to each other.

 The bean and potato science projects are also still in progress.

Sew special: A new couch cover for 5 dollars

At least a year ago, I snagged a very nice white ikea loveseat cover from the "As-Is" bin.  It was 1 dollar! I grabbed some cushion covers and other denim bits from the bin as well that were of the same color.  Each one was a dollar!
Here is the couch that that cover set was supposed to be for:

My old cover was made from a double layer of white sheets. Brother M is in a cutting phase and recently made a small hole, which quickly became gigantic as they played with it.  The day before the Easter Egg hunt party I decided that completing this project was a priority and stayed up very late almost finishing it. (The back/side hem is still not done).
In some ways starting with a cover that did not fit was harder than starting from scratch. The rounded back of this couch is always challenging to slip cover. This is my 3rd time making a cover for it. I think it is the best yet in terms of the pleats.

I made these little tucks around the arm curves both because their was excess fabric and because that was what I was hoping to test out on this third iteration. The piecing in the center of the couch, I would rather not have done, but it was the only way to fill in gaps in the other model to make it work for this couch. and my fill ins were seat covers... so I made do as best I could.

I also finished off another doll project for my neighbor's doll business this week.  She had an antique dress that was falling apart. My neighbor brought me this nice quality satin and tulle to work with and I replicated her wardrobe, including the parasol! That was the most fun part of the whole thing.