Happy 4th Birthday, Millie

This beautiful girl is 4 now!  She came in like a hurricane at the end of March and keeps us on our toes.

When she's grown up, she wants to be a doctor, so for her birthday we put her a 'real tools' doctor kit together.  We've all been thoroughly checked out!

Natalee was in charge of charting - I couldn't love this more.

 Grandma stopped by with flowers from her and Papa and got a mini check up before she left.

 Puzzles from sister.

Our dear Ameliya - I hope 4 is as beautiful as you are.

Hooky

The forecast this week called for a week+ of drab, gray skies, rain, snow mix, and blahness.  That forecast, coupled with Mike working shifts where we haven't had good time with him since last Saturday (he got called in at 2 a.m. Sunday morning and ended up working a 12+hour day), had us all feeling a little grumpy and blue. 

So, this morning when the sun was shining and the wind was blowing less than 15 mph, I called hooky on school activities, loaded my kids up with winter coats, hats, and gloves and headed for a good park.  I posted in my mommy Bible study group that we were going, knowing it was last minute, and we were super blessed to have a couple of moms join us for awhile.  Everyone knows hooky is more fun with friends.

We didn't even eat breakfast, the kids were excited with a treat of breakfast sandwiches from McDonalds.

Okay, the big kids thought it was a treat - the little ones nibbled theirs.  Whatevs.

Truthfully, the wind was still kinda bitey.  But the sun was shining and we needed OUT of the house and the lonliness of daddy being gone, so we just pretended like it wasn't blowing.  So glad I had the opportunity to visit with a couple of mom friends and just connect.

Thank you, Lord, for the sunshine.

After the park we ran through the grocery store and then took our lunch to Grandma's work and snuck a few minutes with her.  Blessed day, indeed.

Art with Mia

Mia and I sat down and did some art this afternoon together.  We worked slowly and had a nice chat while we drew and used watercolor pencils and oil pastels. 

She tried to get me to add sticks to my ground like she did hers but I just couldn't.  LOL.  But I think she did a great job and gets props for creativity.  She drew as much as she wanted and asked me to draw things for her that she wanted in her picture but wasn't sure how to re-create and then she added the color.  This was a sweet time with my Mia while the others played Legos.  PS - watercolor pencils are super fun!

March 4th Bike Ride

We took an opportunity to get outside when the weather was decent-ish last week.  All 4 started out on bikes, but little Zayden lost his steam pretty quickly, leaving a toddler and a bike needing to be carried.  God bless his big sister - she circled back for him and carted him for the rest of our loop in her basket!

He got back on his bike for the last downhill coast into the driveway!

New Specs

New glasses for Natalee...

New glasses for Ameliya...

This wanna-be wanted to get glasses....

Mommy and Daddy got new glasses, too.  The boys go for their eye appointments in the fall!

Ameliya Can Write Her Name!!

This big girl is making great strides with her preschool education!

She practiced on a tracing sheet for several weeks - first with me showing her, then with me moving to verbal prompts.  Then she would practice and we turned her paper over so she could try writing it on her own.  And look how great she did!  We're so proud of you, Millie!

Homeschool Rally at the Capitol

The first Tuesday in March is the homeschool rally at the Capitol in Missouri.  This was our first year attending, and the deal was sweetened by the fact that we met friends of ours there that moved south last fall!

After getting through the construction and security, we did a guided tour of the capitol, sat in on a legislative session, and then met back in the rotundra for the rally.  It was absolutely inspirational to hear from the legislators that quite literally "have our backs" and from those who are successful homeschool graduates!

We got paired with a group of public school JH students for our tour and they were very respectful and well behaved.  Kudos to their teachers!

Not too impressed with his ride...but big crowds + lots of stairs (so no stroller)...it was best for all of us.

I baked cookies

for our legislators and when the kids took them into the Governor's office we were offered a private tour of his office.  Quite a beautiful historical room! The Page was very sweet and even offered to take our picture!

The Governor's office was the last stop on our scheduled tour so we let Zayden out of the Ergo...he was quite pleased to be on two feet again!

 Love this painting - my sister said it was creepy.  LOL

Mike took the older ones through some of the museum displays while Zayden and I sat in the rotundra and smuggled some animal crackers.

He supports Home Education.

The homeschool orchestra was lovely!

These legislators made time to come to the rally and wait for a turn to address us.  I am so thankful for their willingness to openly support our efforts and right to educate our children.
1. Representative Hannah Kelly
2. Representative Kurt Bahr
3. Representative Dan Stacy
4. Representative Sara Walsh
5. Representative Allen Andrews
6. Senator Ed Emery
7. Senator Andrew Koenig

After we left the Capitol, we ran the kids through for some chow and fed them in the car while we drove back to Columbia.  Our friends came back to COMO and we paid for entry into Bonkers, and let them have a blast for 3 hours while we caught up visiting (okay, Mike was a champ and did a lot of climbing).  I used a TON of homemade Thieves hand sanitizer because places like Bonkers kinda give me the heebie jeebies.  LOL

We were TIRED when we got home (did I mention the wind had blown quite literally like 30 mph allll day?) but it was SO worth our efforts to go.  Besides getting to meet our friends, we realized as parents how important it is to show our children their Capitol and to familiarize them with the people who have the power to make a difference in how things are down.  It's also important to show ourselves to our legislators and help them remember the faces they are voting for or against when they are making decisions.