Waiting for Apple Blossoms

Pearl has been studying Africa lately, and last night she sculpted a salt-dough map of the continent. Tonight she painted it to show the different vegetation zones.  I benefit from so many ideas on the internet, like this one!

 

Sapphire is looking forward to her play date tomorrow with Miss D, an adult friend from church. I have found this relationship to be a real blessing for me.  While I fail to keep Sapphire still in her seat at church, sitting with her pew buddies, she seems able to make it through the whole service without a problem.  It is also nice for a middle child to get such special attention, I think. Here she is at her friend's house earlier this week. They made a fairy garden with live plants, which now graces our kitchen table.

When she got in the car with Miss D. on Sunday for a brief lunch visit, she looked at me dramatically and assured me that "I'll still love you mommy."

Over the weekend they enjoyed a nice meal and one last Easter egg hunt with the grandparents.  Not an egg was left behind!

Sapphire enjoyed tracing her letters and numbers in a cornmeal tray today. She is just figuring out how to hold her pencil, so this is less frustrating.  She's never liked to color with crayons, so it is neat (if a little painful) to see her practicing these new skills.

This weekend my husband will be traveling, and I plan to go to the annual homeschooling curriculum fair. I love picking up bargain workbooks and other idea books, mostly gently used things that other families in the area are ready to pass along. I really can't manage this with three little ones, so they will have a babysitter to entertain Saturday morning while I go book shopping. 

flowering tree at the church

Not a Still Life

We have been outdoors a good bit lately, and here you can see how  my daffodils have been multiplying.  They make a really pretty show in the front bed now.

Yesterday we had our co-op.  One of Pearl's classes is art, and here is a creation from last time we met. 

Because the art teacher was out with a sick child, I taught that class yesterday. We worked on the idea of landscape, still life, and portrait.  Those eight little girls whipped through paper like crazy.  It was all we could do to keep their water refreshed and paper in front of them.

Here is the still life.  She might look longingly at those apples, because she won't bit them.  I've noticed that she has been gnawing her food from the side, and it turns out she is trying to  keep her last front tooth from popping out.  We've already had tears when she noticed the wiggle. 

Last night, while their daddy made a rushed visit to the hospital (to see someone else, not for himself), the girls and I had an impromptu picnic.  We ordered Chinese food for them and sushi for me, and found a very grassy spot beside the creek at York College. We had to experiment with the limited dishes we had available in the car, so here is Ruby eating lo mein from a cup. I think it works better than a plate! While we ate we watched the willow trees wave.  

 "Can I go in the creek?"

After staring longingly at the creek, the girls came along for a celebratory Sweet Frog treat.  Pearl had read her first five chapter books, and this was the reward.  The line at Sweet Frog was amazing. I think I was at the end of a 40 person line, but it moved quickly.  The poppers are the girls' favorite topping. Pearl insisted I take her photo as she popped one. 



Also, we recently watched "The Wizard of Oz" with the two big girls. Note: the talking trees are *not* as scary as I remember them.  Jasper did say that the look on Sapphire's face when the tree slapped Dorothy was one of shock.  The witch is terrifying, but if you watch it all huddled together on a couch, you can get through it.  Pearl says she thought it would be scarier than it was.

April Flowers

I think we can put our hats and heavy coats in the attic now, but here's a last look at a cute gift from Grammy.

We had the chance to celebrate Easter all over again with some friends and their grandchildren. The girls enjoyed taking part in a huge egg hunt. 

We've tried to maximize the warm weather that hit this week. Pearl created a reading nook on the front porch to catch the morning sun, and Sapphire presented herself in her swim suit and demanded pool time. I explained that the baby pool would be staying in the barn for another month at least.

Here we are at the top of the hill above our house. We like to go there and eat ice cream, but I need to stock up on that.  We just took some jellybeans and enjoyed the beautiful light.

Pearl has also developed her own code recently, which Grammy cracked right away.

We are studying Asia now, which is just about the easiest continent to cover. My husband and I have plenty of stories of our travels there, and Pearl's favorite animal is the tiger.  As part of a culinary exploration, Pearl tried bravely tried sushi when she and I had a day out together last week.  The chewy nori was not a hit with her, sadly.  She didn't seem to notice the raw salmon.

Easter 2013

Ruby had a chance to celebrate her first Easter with us. The girls and I drove to Somerset County on Thursday.  This is the view we had during one snowy walk--it is the barn across the field from my grandmother's house.

There were no kittens in the barn when we arrived, but by the next day newborn kittens mewed in the corner.  Instead of begging to spend hours coddling kittens in the barn, Pearl understood that one does not handle such tiny things.  Ruby once again enjoyed viewing the cows but jumped when she found a barn cat three feet away from her.

On Friday we dyed eggs. Sapphire sped through her allotted eight eggs, popping them into and out of the dye cups like an assembly line before asking for more.  Pearl labored over hers lovingly, and Ruby just about got the hang of it, though she still doesn't have her color words down.

On Saturday the other visiting aunts and uncles rolled in, and we got to see some cousins.  The meal was perfect, and Pearl enjoyed some serious Dutch Blitz afterward.

The editor of my Christmas book wants me to acquiesce that while Christmas seems like the high point of the year, Easter is the liturgical pinnacle.  It seems ironic, when Christmas receives so much more build up and attention. 

I spent time last week explaining Easter to Sapphire, and she finally got the gist of it. Otherwise I don't feel like we did a very good job preparing for Holy Week this year, but Easter Sunday helped.  We worshiped with my Church of God Grandmother. The message was about the stone, and how the women who worried about how to move it aside found it all taken care of when they arrived.






Afterward we had a relaxing leftovers meal and lazy afternoon with family. Uncle Alexandrite worked hard to make up to Ruby, and by the end of the weekend she was falling asleep in this great-uncle's lap.


This is the one holiday I consistently celebrate without my husband.  It seems logical, since his duties keep him busy all weekend (four services in four days), and he is fairly wiped out afterward. But being so far west meant we missed seeing some of our other family over Easter; we pray that the joy and victory of Easter would be with you all throughout the year.

There is promise in Christmas, but there is fulfillment in Easter. 

Getting back into our school routine after Pearl's trip to Boston hasn't been easy (read tears), but we are progressing. Today we had a great time at CHAMP, our co-op, and here Pearl is working with her classmates on filling in continent facts they collected. 

She has baulked at reading her chapter books, but today I told her she could read next to me while I napped (CHAMP takes it out of me!), and that's all she needed to plow through half an American Girl book.  She's so social that reading alone is a misery!