Merry Christmas 2013!

Merry Christmas from our family to you!!

Parker's Christmas Party at PlayGroup

On the last day of PlayGroup for 2013, Parker's class had a Christmas party. There were Christmas-themed crafts around the room and at the end of class we had a potluck lunch. It was a lot of fun! I am happy to report that Parker has really opened up in class. He talks to one of the teachers now, Ms. Michele, and even held her hand! He no longer hesitates or asks for Mom to help him when it's his turn to get a colored fish from the middle of the room (during a song we sing in Circle Time) and he participates during songs by doing all the movements (turn around, jump, clap, etc)! It's so fun to see him participate.

Before class, Ms. Michele took pictures of kids and their parent(s) in this sleigh outside the barn. I love how sweet Parker has his hand on my leg here :)

Parker decorated a gingerbread man using glue, stickers and fabric pieces:

We made an ornament:

At the end of class, Ms. Michele made a round table area for all the kids to eat.

It was a great morning!

Getting Ready for Christmas

We are all getting excited about Christmas around here! The weekend after Thanksgiving, we decorated our tree and hung up our lights outside. We have also decorated a gingerbread house and made cookies!

Decorating the Gingerbread House

Almost done

Look what we made!

Parker helps Mommy make cookies. He was in charge of turning the mixer on and off.

Being silly!

Our tree with the nutcracker

Elfie is here again this year!

Seth's mini tree

Isabelle's mini tree

Seth set up our snowman display

This clock plays a Christmas song every hour. The kids "shake their booties" with the music!

Parker also made some decorations at PlayGroup:

Letters Back from Santa

We received letters back from Santa! Seems he thinks all the kids have been good this year.

Jacquemin Farms

This post is a little late... it's about our Halloween pumpkins.

This year we ventured to a new pumpkin patch, Jacquemin Farms. It is located in Dublin, about a half an hour from our house. They had inflatables for kids to play in and a hay maze that Parker particularly liked. They also had an assortment of pumpkins to choose from or a hay ride to go to a field and pick your own. We actually did neither due to the line to buy pumpkins, but instead went to Strader's to pick out our pumpkins.

Parker had a ton of fun in this hay maze

Searching for pumpkins

Seth wanted a big pumpkin

 Seth, Isabelle, Shane and Parker rode these racing bikes. They tell me they were difficult to pedal.

Here are the 4 pumpkins the kids picked out. Parker got the extra little one and we ended up keeping it inside.

The boys

Santa Letters 2013

Time to mail our letters to Santa! There is a special mail box in Grove City to drop letters off for Santa. Seth and Isabelle wrote letters and I helped Parker with his letter.

Seth's letter (2 pages):

Parker's letter:



Isabelle's letter:

We had pretty warm weather on the night we sent our letters. Doesn't Parker look so excited?

Thanksgiving 2013

We had a nice Thanksgiving with Diane, Clyde and Lance this year at their house. Seth made a couple of pieces of artwork to prepare for Thanksgiving:

From school, Seth is thankful for "My Family, School, God, My House, Weekends, Life"

Seth made this at home, tracing his hand to make a turkey. We laughed because his beak seems to be on top of his head!

Seth also had an assignment at school to plan a Thanksgiving meal. He had to make an invitation, a guest list and plan the meal using a budget of $150. Then he had to display everything he did on a poster. I helped him a lot with this project and it was a lot of fun. Isabelle wanted to make a poster for this project too. The following picture is Isabelle's poster. Seth's had to be turned in at school.

PlayGroup Update

Parker has really been having a good time at PlayGroup. He is certainly the most timid one in the group, but he is beginning to participate in the group activities more, such as Circle Time where they sing songs and listen to a book. Today, for the first time, he did the motions and movements for the songs we sang! He also interacted with one of the instructors for the first time - Parker rolled pumpkins down a slide to the instructor then went with her to pick them up and do it again!

Rolling pumpkins down the slide

A favorite activity - the train table

Hammering golf tees into Styrofoam - brilliant!

School Pictures 2013-2014

School pictures are in!

Isabelle is picture-perfect for 5th grade. I french-braid her hair and wet it every night so that it is wavy for the day:

And... Seth's 2nd grade photo:

A re-take is in order! Though Seth likes this picture, I just can't accept that I paid $25 for it! So his re-take will be in a couple of weeks.