Prairie Days

We drove up to Five Mile Prairie this morning for their 10th annual Prairie Days. Since we've been reading Little House on the Prairie, the kids have asked me on several occasions, "What's a prairie?" It was much easier for them to relate to the previous book, Little House in the Big Woods, since we have 8 very tall pine trees in our backyard!

We had a great morning at Prairie Days. Some of the activities included tours of this old schoolhouse (very fun for me!)...

games...



tumbling...

prizes...

cupcakes (won at the cakewalk)...

(this is serious business here!)...

a hot dog, soda and chips picnic...


(they all chose Cheetos)...


and live music.

And these berries will be perfect in our Sunday morning muffins!

Guess Who!

Can you guess who these rascals are?

Friday Fun...Continued

We decided to camp one last time before summer's end--in the backyard.


Phil and the kids put the tent up while I was inside the house and on the phone with my sister. Now that's my kind of camp out!


Phil led the camp sing-along.


I roasted mini marshmallows on toothpicks over candlelight.

Then the kids were off to bed with a chapter read from Little House on the Prairie.

Friday Fun

The boys talked me into making Bob the Builder's Dirt Cookies this afternoon.

Surprisingly enough, they were actually very yummy!

We had all of our friends over this morning for school. Our theme today was leaves.

One of the moms came prepared with great crafts! The kids painted leaves on sheets of paper. Once the paint dried, we cut out the leaves and made mobiles, attaching them to sticks with twine.

Here's the finished product.

Then they made these great fall window decorations by placing fall-colored bits of paper and dried leaves between two pieces of contact paper.

Another mom came prepared to read these great books. Next week's theme is pancakes...yum!

Preparing for Morning

Phil was able to locate 2 more stools, so the kids will be able to eat breakfast at our new kitchen counter in the morning.

They've been looking forward to eating here. This has definitely become a favorite spot in our kitchen!

Comfort Food

The girls helped me make a pie this afternoon with the peaches we picked this morning. These peaches are to die for!

All 4 kids enjoy helping me make pies, but only Gracie will eat them.

But no pie until you're finished with your chicken and dumplings. Anyone want to come over for some chicken and dumpling soup and a slice of peach pie?

Waning Days of Summer

I decided to start school with Jared when Phil goes back to school on Sept. 22. This has given us a few more days to enjoy the summer as a family. This morning we drove out to a couple of orchards to pick peaches and apples. I had plenty of good help! Caleb was such a big boy to hold the box for us.

One of the orchards had a little store and a great playground. It was a nice place to stop and enjoy lattes, brownies, lemon bars and apples...mmm!

I'm not sure if I mentioned this, but we had a yard sale on Saturday. One of the things Phil and I wanted the kids to do was go through their toys and get rid of the things they no longer play with. You can imagine how that went over. To sweeten the deal, we mentioned that Chuck E. Cheese would be a great place to go with the money we make from selling their old toys. BINGO! We had a few boxes filled in no time.

Phil and I are getting pretty good at this Chuck E. Cheese business, by the way! We printed out a coupon for a large one-topping pizza, four drinks and 35 tokens for only $19.99. On their website he also found an "I Brushed My Teeth for 2 Weeks" incentive chart, worth 10 tokens if brought in completed. Four kids + sparkly, white teeth = 40 tokens! We've also learned which games pay out the most tickets and we encourage the kids to play those games.

Time to spend our tickets and go home for naps!

Family Picture

It's nearly impossible to get everyone to cooperate for a family picture these days (actually, I'm not sure if we've ever been very successful). Our friend, Steve, took this picture the other night at the arboretum. I love how happy Caleb looks! Lily's trying to sneak away, and Jared's tickling Gracie. I love these kids!

Finch Arboretum

We met some friends tonight at Finch Arboretum for a picnic dinner. The kids loved climbing trees,


playing in the creek,


exploring with their daddy,

and rolling down the hills.

Co-op Update

We made these apples and plotted them, by color, on a graph.

We also made these apple bushel puppets. We talked about the letter "A" today. When you open his mouth, he says the short vowel "A" sound...Aaaaaaaaaaa.


Well, Friday morning has come and gone. We had our first preschool/kindergarten co-op here this morning and it went extremely well. I wanted to mention it here, because I know that several of you had offered to pray for us. We had 18 kids and 6 moms here! I had my camera out on my easel ready to take pictures, but the morning got away from me. I wasn't able to get many pictures of the kids.

Here's a little info about what we're going to do: We'll start off with circle time, which will include songs, a story and a Phonics lesson. Then we'll divide the kids into groups by age and they'll go to different stations to work on activities. Every week we'll have a different theme (this week's theme was apples), and all of the activities will correlate with that theme.

I planned the activities for today so the other moms could get a feel for what we'll be doing. Next week we'll talk about leaves, and 2 moms volunteered to come prepared with activities for when we break up into groups. What a blessing for me! We had a wonderful picnic lunch together and then the kids played until it was time for them to leave. It was a perfect day!

Ta-Da!

Remember this old thing? We found it downstairs in our basement right after we moved in.

Phil did such a great job restoring it! He found this vintage red Formica table with metal trim on Craigslist and used it for the counter top. I love how it turned out!

Isn't this old linoleum great?

It's just perfect for our kitchen, and ideal for our family. Good job, Phil!

Before and After

Before

After!

Before

After!

One of the things Phil did in the kitchen was remove the fluorescent lighting. He installed track lighting and instantly it gave the room a warmer feeling.