Culture Night: England

After a long break, we finally had another culture night back in May.  This time Marsha chose England.  It was a fun one.  For dinner we had bangers and mash (sausages and mashed potatoes with an onion gravy), mince pies, and butterbeer (just for fun, at the kids' request).  We were all a little nervous about the mince pies.  The recipe was pretty crazy sounding (beef, apples, pineapple juice, pickle juice, molasses--to name a few of the ingredients) but they were actually a hit.  It was weird how you couldn't taste the beef much.  Sadly, no one could finish a glass of the butterbeer.  It was way too rich.  

Here's the table:

 After dinner we had our presentations.  These last few times, we've helped the kids make powerpoint presentations and hooked it up to the TV.  That has worked really well.  This time Elizabeth talked about English authors, Joe talked about religions, Natalie talked about monarchs, Marsha talked about landmarks, and I helped Nate talk about the food.  I also made the kids look at my book from my trip to London with Katie.  

 Here's the only picture I have:

Next up: Brazil!

School Year Wrap-Up

We finished up another great school year.  It had some bumps but the girls both seemed to adjust really well to another new school.  Elizabeth had some issues with some of her friends but I'm wondering if that is just typical of girls that age.  I think she would have liked to have made a closer friend during the year, though.  She had a wonderful veteran teacher who was strict but very kind and she loved her.  She had some struggles with the timed math facts tests this year.  But, after all the worry, she ended up right where she needed to be for 4th grade.  I had a hard time encouraging her, though, since I lived for those tests when I was kid.  Her reading level shot up this year and she has a real talent for reading and comprehension.  The homework load was a bit heavy at times and I'm a little worried about how next year will go.  Some friends of mine in this area have started homeschooling their older kids because the homework just gets to be way too much and doesn't leave much family time.  We'll see how it goes.  The school definitely has a competitive environment.

Natalie was in a combined class of 1st and 2nd graders this year.  It went really well.  She also had a wonderful veteran teacher.  He was the first male teacher our kids have had and we loved him.  He admitted openly that he didn't love arts and crafts and wouldn't be doing much of that, but he did have a really talent for pushing his students to achieve.  It was amazing to see the math that Natalie was doing by the end of the year.  She will be ready for 3rd grade.  She had some homework struggles during the year, too, but not too bad.  She needs to learn to be a bit more organized.  It will come, I'm sure.  She made some good friends who were 3rd graders actually, and a couple of friends in her own class.

Open House:

Natalie with her report on Siberian tigers

I loved this that was hanging in Elizabeth's classroom:

Field Day

Elizabeth getting ready to do the three-legged race with her friend Kara:

They didn't do as well as they did in practice so she was disappointed but they did pretty well for falling a couple of times.

Natalie was on her class's tug-of-war team and they had an exciting first match:

(One nice thing about our school is that it's pretty easy to pick my blond kids out of a crowd :)

It looked like they were going to lose but they held on and won a really long match.

That's her teacher in the dark blue shirt talking to them.  He works as a referee so he refereed the events and it was fun to watch him.  He was constantly encouraging all the kids and helping them finish strong. I'm so thankful for great teachers like him!

Violin Concert:

She made a little progress in violin this year.  It's hard to learn much for a few minutes once a week with a whole class of kids.  We need to decide if we're going to pursue that any more outside of school so she can keep learning.

School Play:

Two of the 3rd grade classes put on a musical called "U.S. Geography".  Elizabeth had a good amount of lines and she did a great job.  We still have the songs running through our heads all the time.  I think Nate knows them all by heart. :)

I enjoyed volunteering for a program called Project Cornerstone at their school this year.  You go in a read a book to the kids and then do a related activity.  It's mainly to encourage empathy, kindness and conflict resolution skills.  It was a good way to volunteer since it was just once a month for an hour or so and I could bring the boys if I had to.  I had another mom helping me in Elizabeth's class but I was on my own in Natalie's.   I'm really glad I did it.

Natalie and Eli with a new school mural:

Now we're in the thick of summer and couldn't be happier about that! :)

Preschool

I haven't had a chance to say much about the preschool co-op that we did for Nate this past year.  We loved it and are so glad we participated.  This was a really easy group of kids. We had 6 kids for most of the year and then dropped to 5.  My friend said that she thought it worked so well because we didn't have any oldest children in the group :).  She could be right.  They really hardly ever fought or got too crazy.  It got a little trickier when Elijah would no longer nap during preschool and I had to manage him and the kids but it really wasn't bad.  Maybe it's because I'm a lot more laid back than I used to be and I recognize that even if they just spend the whole time playing, that's still some good socialization time right there. :)

Anyway, we did it twice a week for two hours each time.  We had a lot of fun.  Here are some of the highlights:

They loved going on a walk to collect leaves and make these leaf turkeys for Thanksgiving:

Snack time!

Speaking of snack time, I pulled out these placemats way back from Natalie's preschool for veggie faces again.  They loved it, too!

I loved the games they would come up with during play time.
They often involved lightsaber wars:

Here are some pictures I stole from my friends during their preschool days:

That N is hanging proudly in his room, now. :)

Some more highlights:
-When I taught about magnets we learned how a compass works and then used the compass on my phone to follow the clues on a treasure map I made.  I wasn't sure it would work but they were enthralled and followed every step until we made it to a Hershey's bar treasure.  That was a big hit.
-I found a simple activity on Pinterest around Valentine's day where you write each upper and lowercase letter on a half of a paper heart, draw a simple picture of something that starts with that letter on the back, and then cut it in half.  Then you lay them out and the kids match the upper and lowercases.  Then they turn it around to see what the picture is.  They loved that game so we played it a few times.  It was such a simple idea that I thought was great.
-We ended the year with a fun pool party at our house.  I didn't get any pictures but the kids had a great time.

Now, on to deciding about next year.  Nate is a September birthday so he won't start kindergarten yet.  He can go to transitional kindergarten which is nice because it's free but I am hoping for something that is a little less than the full kindergarten time.  I really want him to have more time at home with Eli and I before he's off to school every day.  We'll see what we decide.

Nate has learned a lot this year.  His reading is getting better and better, despite his frequent protests to sound out things at times.  The only time he really wants to practice is in the car when we pick up the girls.  He will work on some sight words then.  Entire books still intimidate him, though.  He still loves to read with me and especially loves Elephant & Piggie books and any Star Wars book he can find at the library (I can't even tell you the number of times I've fallen asleep trying to slog through one of those).

He is great at math and can count to 100 (and beyond).  He loves to learn and especially loves animals like his sisters before him.  The PBS show Wild Kratts is a big favorite, along with Sesame Street.  One of my favorite things is to hear him giggling while watching Super Grover on TV.  That guy always makes me laugh, too. :)

I sure love my Nate and feel so lucky that I get to be his mom.

Berry-Picking Fun

Back before school was out, the boys and I took a trip down to Gizdich Ranch to pick some strawberries.  I missed out on making strawberry freezer jam last year and I was determined not to do it again.

We met some friends there and had a great time.

These guys were great helpers, although they certainly did eat their fair share. :)

Nate with his friend Tyler:

Of course we had to get some strawberry-rhubarb pie and play for awhile:

Elijah was doing a pretty good job giving the bigger boys pushes on this toy:

Now we need to find a time to go back with all of the kids!

Camping Fun

We went back to our favorite camping spot over Memorial Day weekend, although we had some experiences that made us doubt if it's still our favorite spot.  More on that in a minute.

Eli had a lot of fun exploring around.  It was tricky for him navigating the rough terrain as a fairly new walker but I think he had fun.

He especially enjoyed the s'mores:

We had a blast on the huge tire swings again:

Elizabeth was quite disappointed when our family hike didn't last too long.  I was holding Eli in the carrier and Joe was holding Nate since he's not much of a hiker yet.  We did learn that his shoes were too tight so that didn't help.  Anyway, Elizabeth loves hiking and wanted to go much farther.  So, she and Joe set off on a hike.  They ended up walking all the way down the mountain to a ropes course in the lower part of the camp.  They had some adventures that I don't think I would have approved of if I had been there but thankfully they survived and started hiking the mile and half back up the mountain.  Soon Elizabeth noticed pain in her side and they realized it was a tick.  Joe had gotten one at camp but he was able to pull it out.  This one wouldn't come.  So, poor Lizzy had to hike all the way back up with a tick in her.  She was quite distraught but they made it quickly since she wanted it out.  Joe was able to get it out with a match (also quite traumatic) and then she was OK.  Still, the whole experiences was pretty awful.  We also found out after we got home that some friends had been there in a different part of the camp that weekend and their kids had gotten ticks, too.  So, this is what makes us hesitant to go back...

Anyway, here are the pictures Joe took from the first part of their adventure:

 
 
 
 

We camped for 3 nights this time--our longest so far.  I think we might gradually become actual campers some day! :)