mohawk

Reef desperately needed a haircut.  It was getting to a weird shaggy stage.  When I asked him if he wanted a hair cut, he said, "I want it cut with no hair on the sides and spiky on top."

This is what we ended up with. 

He LOVES it!  I'm not a huge fan of having to fix it (is it sad that I spend more time on his hair than mine?), but he insists on having it done each morning and gets upset if I forget, especially if we're going out.

I love that his personality can show in this way and am glad we let him go for it.  Lachlan kind of wants one too...

Super Hero search

Some days I manage to make school really fun.  Last week was one of those days.  Reef has been learning the digraphs sh, th, ch and wh.  I saw a super hero word search on pinterest that I knew he would love.  I made several super hero sheets with words on them and hid them around the house.  He loved searching for them and writing the word in the correct column.

Bathtime with brothers

is so much fun!

My view from here...

is so good!

This is what I can see from my new window in the kitchen:  4 kids enjoying a book with their daddy!  Plus some laundry...

k5 learning review coming up!

K5 Learning has an online reading and math program for kindergarten to grade 5 students.  I've been given a 6 week free trial to test and write a review of their program.  If you are a blogger, you may want to check out their  open invitation to write an online learning review of their program.

Poppy 7 months

7 months already?! Where has the time gone!  Poppy is changing by the day, and sometimes I wish time would stand still.  It seems like we just brought her home yesterday.

The last month has brought a little more routine to her schedule.  Right before our cruise, we broke down and made her "cry it out" to go to sleep.  It wasn't as bad as I feared but it is still hard to hear her cry.  The first night she cried for about 20 minutes, and the longest we've had her cry is 45.  I would call the crying it out a success since it has made getting her down for bedtime or naps much easier.  She is pretty good about soothing herself back to sleep too.  I think the crying it out played a critical role in the great sleeper she was while we gone, too.

After our cruise, we decided it was time to say goodbye to Miracle Blanket.  This was a dreaded decision since Poppy has never slept with her arms unswaddled.  I had no idea how she would do with her arms free to flap about.  But, we were frequently finding her rolled over in her swaddle or with it around her neck.  She actually did 100 times better than we anticipated and is now in a sleep sack for sleeping.

The last month has brought a little more predictability to her routine.  On an ideal day (like yesterday), she will take a 1.5-2 hour nap in the morning and a 2-2.5 hour nap in the afternoon.  Most days don't look exactly like that, and she will get a second morning nap or a late afternoon nap; today she had both!  I am looking forward to hitting the "ideal" more days than not.

We are still not sleeping through the night.  She usually wakes for a feeding sometime after 3:30.  If it's before then, I try to get her to self-soothe back to sleep.  Lachlan and Jonas were still eating once a night at this age too, so I'm not worried about it.  More sleep for Mommy would be nice, though.

Poppy is still nursing every 3ish hours.  She is also eating baby food 3 times a day.  Her least favorite food so far is peas.  She also loves that she can feed herself the Mum Mum crackers.

In the last month, she started sitting up on her own really well.  I still try to put a pillow behind her but falls these days are rare and are usually forward instead of backward.  She can roll from her back to her belly but has to really want something to do it.  We are still working on rolling back the other way.  I hope mastering that skill will lead to better sleep.

Oh, I almost forgot, she cut her first tooth in December, while we were on the cruise.  Ms. Theresa and Katelin say it didn't seem to bother her much.  I can see tooth #2 through the gums, and this one seems to be causing quite a bit of trouble.  I have had one fussy girl on my hands the last few days!  She likes to use this new tooth to bite mommy; I am not a fan.

Poppy does love attention.  She is definitely starting to cry whenever she realizes she is alone in a room.  She thrives on attention from her brothers and was in heaven yesterday when she found herself surrounded by all 3!  She also loves when Daddy comes home!

Here are a few cute pictures from the last month:

Christmas morning

 Sitting on the couch with Mommy.  I put all those pillows around so she wouldn't fall.

 Chomping on a Mum Mum.  This might have been her first try.

 A Christmas photo shoot.

 Hello, crazy hair!  Jonas's hair used to do the same thing!

Can't wait to see what the next month brings!  I'm hoping it's more predictable sleep patterns!

12 for '12

We're 5 days into 2012.  Is that too late to make some resolutions?  I don't think so...
1. Read through the whole Bible.  I tried this in 2010 and made it 10 months but never finished. 
2. Make a budget and stick to it.  We are so bad about just buying what we want, when we want it.  I think it will be good to have to wait for some things.  And it will be good for us to be more mindful of where our money is going.
3.  Organize all the pictures from 2010 and 2011.  And keep up with the ones from this year.  This also includes hanging more pictures on the walls.  Currently there are no framed pictures of Lachlan or Poppy.
4. Declutter and organize the whole house.
5. Serve more, especially with the kids.
6. Meal plan more efficiently.  I feel like this will help with resolution #2.  So many times, we get to a day that I have nothing to cook and we end up eating out.  I like cooking and trying new stuff, though, so this one could be fun.  Plus I pinned a really cute meal planning board on pinterest.
7. Spend quality time with each child by him/herself.  This is especially important for Lachlan and Jonas.
8. Love more.  Criticize less. Both verbally and mentally.  I am very quick to think negative things about people, and not so quick to point out the positive.  Must change this...
9.  Get in shape.
10. Eat healthier.  Aren't these on everyone's resolution list?
11. Have a deeper prayer life.  This one's a repeat from 2010, but I don't think you can ever get deep enough in your relationship with God.  And, I know I'm not deep enough...
12.  Waste less time.

Homeschool fall wrap up

I didn't post about homeschooling nearly as much as I thought I would last semester and took even less pictures!  I do want to do a fall wrap up post, though, so here it is! Reef and I had a long talk a few weeks ago about what he likes about school and what he doesn't.  His favorites are Spanish with Ms. Theresa (no surprise here!) and math, so I don't need to work much on those.
He likes reading and has come so far since we first started.  His confidence is way up and he attempts to read almost everything that comes home from the library!  I still don't have a set "curriculum" for this, but it's going ok.  After a 2 week trial of readingeggs.com, an online phonics program, we decided to buy it; bonus: there was a groupon!  Reef really enjoys his reading lessons on the computer; he's actually more advanced than the lesson that he's on but it's a great review and he can do it independently.  In addition to that, we've been working through several series  early readers.  We really like the Piggie and Gerald series by Mo Willems and the Greenlight Readers series.  After this week, I think Reef will graduate to the Level 2 books.  Pinterest has also been an invlauable tool for teaching reading.
For math, we are using Saxon Math 1st grade.  I don't LOVE it but will stick with it since he doesn't mind it. 
Reef says he is enjoying our Expedition Earth studies.  We made it through the Asia unit in the fall, studying China, Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Israel, and India.  We typically spend 2 weeks per country, so this curriculum may last us 2 years.  At his request, we are skipping to Australia and New Zealand at the start of our new semester. :)
I thought our Grapevine Studies Bible curriculum was going great....until I talked to Reef about it.  He actually said it's a little boring.  So, we decided that we will stretch the lessons out over more days and try to include more crafts and games with each story. 
At church, Reef's class was learning to recite the books of the Bible.  I decided to make it part of our school day, and he has earned his 2 trolls (one for each testament) in class and gets to participate in a special Club 66 presentation at church in January.
We are continuing with our weekly memory verses.
For the spring, I am hoping to add more writing, a little bit of spelling, and more art projects.  I also hope to enroll him in gymnastics.
All in all, we are definitely still loving our decision to homeschool.  It is overwhelming at times, and I am learning that I am going to have to say no to some things.  I'm sure this will especially be true next year as we add more subjects.