Happy Valentine's Day!

My wonderful husband personally delivered these wonderful gifts to me at work for Valentine's Day!

 The roses are absolutely perfect!

 When I asked the kids what we should do for Valentine's Day, their vote was for ice cream sundaes . . . so that's exactly what we did!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Is it really February???

There haven't been too many times that I can remember taking the kids to the park in February - but this has been a unique winter!

This park trip was exciting for all of us - because Noah was big enough to do more than just sit in a baby swing or nap in the stroller!  Jaden had fun introducing him to all the cool "little kid" places to climb (while keeping him away from the cool "big kid" climbing spots) . . .

 They enjoyed going down the slide together.

 . . . and Jaden showed Noah how to hang upside down - so he'd know what to do when he gets bigger!

 We thoroughly enjoyed our dose of Vitamin D straight from the sun!

 Noah loved having so much space to explore . . . but he kept the rest of us on our toes!

 One of Lael and Jaden's favorite things to do at this particular park is to climb to the top of the climbing rock and relax in the sun!

 What is it about slides that compel children to try to climb UP the slide?  No one even had to show Noah that climbing up the slide was a possibility, but that was what he wanted to do!

 Jaden wishes we had trees he could climb in our backyard so he wouldn't have to wait for park trips to get his tree-climbing fix in!

 Of course, Noah still wanted to ride on the swing for a little while - and there's always someone willing to push him!

What a fun time we had!

I hope it doesn't mean we'll be snowed in . . . in April!

New Year's Eve

We had a wonderful worship service - so special to bring in the New Year with brothers and sisters in the Lord!  Afterwards there was a time of fellowship in the auditorium.  Last year, we left before the New Year due to sleepy kids - but surprisingly, this year they made it til midnight!

We had fun getting dressed up . . .

My precious big kids

 Ready to make some noise!

 Noah couldn't quite comprehend what all the noise and fuss was about!

 The auditorium was beautifully decorated . . . Jaden was fascinated with this one!

 My sweetheart and me

Happy New Year!

Ice sculptures (Part 2)

I know you've probably been waiting so long to find out what happened with our ice sculptures . . . so here they are -- the long-awaited pictures!

These are the "building blocks" - all the colored ice that Jaden and I made!

And here are some of our creations . . .

This was the tallest stack we were able to construct (and manage to take a picture of before it toppled over)

And these are Popper's Performing Penguins on their way to their next performance destination by train!

A couple of things we learned from this activity:

• It's hard to stack ice blocks if they haven't frozen flat -- and most of ours didn't freeze flat
• Next time we do this, we need more square and rectangle-shaped blocks for greater ease of building
• Another "next time" lesson -- color the water in larger quantities, not by putting food coloring into the individual containers -- the ice ended up being too darkly colored and ended up staining our hands
• Gingerbread ice people break very easily -- this was devastating to Jaden when both of his ice people lost a limb rather early in the play time
• Mittens or gloves are the proper attire for this particular activity!

While it was a fun activity, it's not one we'll do every day . . . but it definitely added some "color" to our day!

Ice sculptures (Part 1)

So Jaden and I had the night together at home while Daddy was at class and Lael was at ballet. What to do? Well, make colored ice cubes, of course! ;-) Thanks to Candace, another homeschooling mom, for this fun idea!

We filled all sorts of small containers with water and then used food coloring to tint the water. (And it was a fun way to review primary and secondary colors at the same time!)

When we were done, we took all the molds out to the back porch so they could freeze overnight. Then tomorrow we will actually use these colored ice cubes to build sculptures. We even made some "people" to go along with whatever we create.
We definitely needed something fun -- it's been too long of a stretch of really cold weather - but not much snow to enjoy. I decided that if this winter means ice all the time, we needed to find a way to enjoy it.

Please stay tuned to see what amazing creations Lael and Jaden come up with! I can hardly wait!

God is so amazing!

I was doing some research on snowflakes as part of our winter unit for school and I came across some amazing photos of snowflakes. I was just reminded how amazingly creative our God is! Here are some of my favorites:

Our God truly is an awesome God . . . all you have to do is look at His creation to be reminded of that! BTW: Here's the link if you want to see more: Snowflake Photos

SNOW . . . well, sort of!

We got snow on Saturday! Yay! The problem? It was supposed to be 3 to 6 inches of snow, but it turned out to be about 1 and 1/2. Oh, well . . . when God gives you snow, go out and play in it! And that's exactly what Lael and Jaden did with Daddy!

It looks like they're out there playing at midnight, but it was about 5:30. We held out as long as possible hoping that "the big snow" would come after all. By 5:00, we knew we'd have some disappointed kiddos if they didn't get out there. Besides, you don't need that much snow to have a snowball fight with Daddy! ;)The kids had fun . . . Daddy was just plain cold! (He's such a wonderful daddy, don't you think?!)

Watch out though! We will get a big snow this winter! How do I know? Because I've got two children who have been praying for snow since probably July of last year! So we're ready for it here . . . are you?

Snowy day fun!

Finally, we got enough snow to play in! Our princess has been praying all winter for snow to fall where we live, but every time it did, it was quickly followed by rain that washed the snow away.

But Saturday afternoon we had some snowy fun, including:

making snow angels,

preparing for (and then actually having) a snowball fight

and building this magnificent snowman!

Disclaimer: Before you are completely impressed with the size of snowman we were able to build with only 4 inches of snow, you should know that the arms are actually cinnamon sticks, the eyes are pennies, and the smile was cleverly crafted from a red twisty tie!

These pictures will give a more accurate representation:

As you can see, we had lots of fun!

Fun family times

We spent last Saturday with my husband's family to celebrate his father's 60th birthday. While there, we went to the Chambersburg Ice Festival to see the many ice sculptures they had there. Our kiddos loved it . . . here are a couple of pictures (thanks to Uncle Brock for the photography):

Prince Jaden and Princess Lael on their royal (chilly) throne!

Lael as an Inuit girl

Happy Birthday, Papa!