On coming home, and festivities

Well.... in this house, we FINALLY have our daddy back!

After being gone a record breaking 672 days in a row {nope.  I refuse to acknowledge the hyperbole there, because that's exactly how long it feels like he's been gone}, we finally are again a two parent household.

Whew.  Just in time for me to have maintained my sanity, but it was a narrow miss. Once upon a time, back when I had one new baby and was shockingly naive, I thought having him gone for three weeks was a big deal.  Hah.  Those were the days.

At any rate, Casey has arrived to at least as much fanfare from this crowd as Santa earns. The kids and I were all thrilled to have him home at last.

We didn't host Thanksgiving this year, so we were all in the mood to get the Christmas decorations up and running while Casey was still in town.  Which meant that they were up a week before Thanksgiving this year - not our tradition, by the way.  But, the kids and I enjoyed the warmth and joy they created throughout the house as we toughed out those last difficult two weeks without Daddy.

We even let the kids decorate the tree this year for the first time ever.  So, if you've been to our house, you might have noticed that there are huge sections of tree where three or five ornaments are clustered together while other areas remain entirely bare.  It's topped with a giant paper star made and decorated by Leah. I know, I could have re-decorated it while the kids were sleeping, but it brought them so much pride and joy to squeal and decide where to delicately (and sometimes not so delicately) place each ornament, I couldn't bring myself to change a thing.  They neither see nor care about the "flaws," so why would I?

Casey arrived home just in time for the Parade of Lights, which really shouts "Open Season!" on the holidays as far as I'm concerned.  We enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Maggianos before rushing out to watch the parade.  Unlike in past years, the weather was actually really lovely.  It was cold, but that perfect kind of cold where it's both festive and completely bearable.

The kids enjoyed hot cocoa, and Casey and I had coffee as we watched the parade.  

And I was again reminded, as I always am at this time of year, how very blessed we are.  And, guys?  I absolutely adore having a tiny baby to snuggle.

Ugh, seriously.  Be still my heart.  Little Livvy did a great job.  She hung in there and didn't fall asleep until the very end, but she didn't cry or fuss either.  She was wonderful!

It's strange, because for the first time I'm very aware of the finite number of Christmases I'll ever have snuggling tiny ones.  I definitely did not feel that way in that photo up there. {sidenote: look at me all glowy!  First baby in her 9 month old glory.}

I wasn't remotely aware of it in 2012 either, though, to be fair, I wasn't really capable of being aware of much outside of our very immediate needs, as I was still in the process of recovering from Logan's birth three months later.  Yowza.

It was so much fun.  At the risk of bragging a little, we have really, really nice kids.  I am so impressed with how kind they are, and how much awe they are capable of in situations like this.  Their excitement was palpable, and they wanted to give everybody a high five.  They clapped and cheered all the different floats, bands and balloons, and were absolutely ecstatic at seeing Santa.  There was a weird gap in the parade where they last several floats including Santa were like 15 minutes behind the rest of the parade.  The kids didn't complain or whine, they just patiently waited for the Man in Red to arrive.  It was so sweet.

And, when they got home, they couldn't wait to sleep by the Christmas tree.

Although things didn't go perfectly the entire time, and there was some bickering and they were definitely up past their usual bed time, it was so sweet to watch and listen to these two that night.  They were mumbling I love yous and holding hands (until poking each other became more fun).  

It absolutely warmed my heart.

It's funny how, as parents, our mistakes flood our vision and stand out more clearly than anything else.  I am constantly aware of how much I do wrong and areas I can improve.  Moments like this make it clear that, while I'm far from being perfect, I must be getting something right amid all the mess.  Those sweet ones up there are pretty great little humans!

Homeschool update: November

I had to take time to document just a few of the things we've done so far this year on our homeschool journey:

History

Learned and memorized American history sentences starting with "In 1492, Columbus made the first of four trips to the Caribbean on three Spanish ships named the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria" all the way to "In 1820 Henry Clay worked out the Missouri Compromise allowing Missouri to enter the Union as a slave state and Maine as a free state."  We've read a number of fiction and non-fiction stories to support our weekly learning, and are currently working our way through An American Girl: Meet Addy (1864).

Coloring skills in progress...

Geography:

We've memorized the states and capitals from Augusta, Maine to Santa Fe, New Mexico.  Leah loves pointing out states and capitals, and to my sheer amazement, even our little Logan knows his share.

Math
We've been working on skip counting, and have memorized all the multiples from 2-14.  For the record, skip counting means that she's counting by 2's, by 3's, by 4's... to 14's all the way up to multiples of 12 for each number.  Yep.  This might be my favorite part of the program, because even though she doesn't realize it, she's just mastered pretty much every multiplication table she'll ever need to know.  Through this process, Leah has also figured out the rest of her numbers and can currently count and recognize numbers upwards of 100.

Science
We're learning about the human body, including the different types of muscle, tissue, the axial skeleton and all the various systems (digestive, excretory, circulatory, etc).

In school, she's had art lessons, done science experiments, completed weekly presentations on everything from Columbus's journey to the Caribbean, to simple show and tell, to researching and presenting info on her favorite state.  They are currently building a life-size model of the human body and all its organs and learning about music by playing the tin whistle.

At home, besides working on our weekly memory work, we also work on reading, sight words and spelling, 

 put on dances and plays, 

(a very serious business, I might add)

use all sorts of methods to practice addition, colors, shapes and fine motor skills, 

enjoy lots of different art projects and crafts, 

play with different kinds of disgusting, delightfully goopy substances,

and enjoy precious moments when the whole family is together.

More often than not, we do it all without the use of a comb through our hair and while wearing interesting outfits or jammies - because that's just plain more fun.

Even Olivia Joy gets in on the action!

....Alright, so maybe she's got a few years.

I can't even begin to describe my own awe and gratitude for the amazing little learner our girl is.  It's all about background knowledge, this program.  No, she doesn't magically understand it when we talk about the secession of the Southern States, nor do I expect her to incorporate such language into her daily vocabulary.  But, she is hearing that advanced vocabulary every day, training her brain to work in ways that will benefit her for a lifetime and learning concepts that will give her a framework to - when she's ready - synthesize and build on her knowledge in a way that I find so awesome and exciting... though, admittedly I'm a super big Nerdy McDork on the academic, brain-development front.

Although we've had our fair share of figuring things out and adjusting as we go along, I feel so very, very grateful for this opportunity for our family to be together, and to share in the joyful and challenging process of learning and growing.  It is amazing to be able to watch those precious little ones every day!

Celebrating Halloween 2014

We were so lucky that, despite his busy schedule, Casey was home for Halloween day.  Granted, he flew in the afternoon before and flew out early the morning after, but the kids and I were so happy to have him home to celebrate one of our favorite days of the year.

We started the day with a little party for the kids we go to school with, and it was a pretty good turn out!

There were games, crafts and food, and tons of fun and creative costumes.

I also put together a little scavenger hunt for the kids.

As part of the scavenger hunt, I gave the kids a list of items to find under the heading, "I MUSTACHE you to find..."  Well, our whole family got in on that action.

And our little mouse did wonderfully.  She was quiet, cute and calm the entire time.

After lunch and a much-needed nap, we did a little pumpkin carving.

It was the first time we've ever let the kids in on this action, and I think it's fair to say that they LOVED feeling the goopy, squishy pumpkin guts!

The decor this year required a few last minute touches.

We enjoyed our traditional Halloween dinner, and before long, it was time to set out.

Our kids absolutely adore Halloween, which is so much fun.  That spooky white ghost guy in our front yard?  They shook his hand, named him Fred and loved on him all month long.  Every day after dinner, they begged me to take a walk to see the Halloween lights in our neighborhood and we watched Toy Story of Terror,Curious George's Halloween and It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown more times than I can possibly count.  While trick-or-treating, Logan had to stop each and every time to inspect the candy he was given, and was so cute and brave about walking from house to house.  They are at such a joyful, excitable and just plain fun age; I am grateful I get to experience these wonderful moments with them.  

Another awesome year down, and above all else, I am just so happy we were all together.