BIRTHDAY GIRL

My little Savannah is 9 today!!  She has brought such joy to our lives.... It all started on September 29, 2002 at 2:30am!!  A little precious baby girl entered the world 8 months after our glorious Lord formed her in her mommy's belly (that's me!)!!  She was only 4 lbs 11 oz!!  So tiny but yet so full of our Lord's Grace!!  It is now 9 years later and how she has grown!!  I am so blessed to be able to spend the entire day with her today!  I am so glad to have my kids home with me full time now!! What peace our family feels, following God's call to homeschool.....just the other night, Jeremy (my cute hubby) said before he fell asleep....."Have you noticed how happy our family is now that we are homeschooling again?!?"  He is right!!  What a beautiful gift it has been for us (following the path God is calling you to will do that)!  Thank you Jesus, for our Little Savannah!  She is the light of our lives!!

 Savannah got a bike for her birthday!! She was so excited....we found the perfect one!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAVANNAH!!!  WE LOVE YOU!!!!!

PROUD LITTLE BOYSCOUT

My sweet baby Nicholas is a boyscout "Tiger Cub" to be exact!  He had his first meeting this afternoon and he was beaming with excitement!! What a special day for Nicholas and his Daddy an "Eagle Scout"

 He could not WAIT to get into his scout uniform!! He looks like a little man!

 Daddy fixing Nick's signature "Spike" for the meeting

 All ready to go....look how messy my closet is!!!

Off to the Den Meeting!  I love my boys with all of my heart!!

MY MADISON BEAR

Here is Madison's favorite "Surprise Face"  I just love it!

ANGELA'S 40TH BIRTHDAY LUNCH

Today was my friend, Angela's 40th birthday.  We took her out for a girly lunch at PF Changs.  We had so much fun!! Girlfriends are so great!  We just visit and laugh!

Here we are with Angela's new baby Charlotte in the middle!  She is such a little button!

(Me, Angela, Elizabeth "Lizzy", Marquette holding Charlotte, Carey, and Therese)

These girls are GREAT!  They are fun and so inspiring to me.  I am so thankful that they are in my life.

MADISON'S PRAYER GROUP

Some dear girlfriends of mine and our daughters have been getting together for about 6 years!  We have had an organized prayer group for our little girls that over the years has consisted of prayer time, saint studies, service projects, sewing and crafts.  It has been called numerous names from year to year (Little Flowers, Pearls Club, etc..) They have grown up together.  They are a sweet virtuous group of little girls that get so much joy out of honoring and serving our Lord!  They inspire one another as we moms inspire each other as well.  It is truly a special group.

(From left: Evan, Clare, Gracie, Madison, Isabel, and Oliva)
They have really grown up!  Just yesterday, they were 5 years old...now 11!  Jesus brings such special people into our lives.  They accompany us on our journey home towards our Lord.  There are just certain people that you know, our Lord has sent to guide us on our way.  They are good for us and good for our souls.  Thank you, Jesus for the people that you put into my life that truly feeds my soul.

(From left: Evan, Gracie, Madison, Olivia and I think that is the right side of Isabel)
LOOK AT THIS PICTURE!! They were only 5 years old. This was one of our prayer group meetings WAY BACK THEN!  Wow, how times goes by!

(Isabel, Olivia, Claire, Evan, Gracie, Madison, Anna Grace)
We ended the year with a Tea Party (that is our old house!)  The girls each got a straw hat at the beginning of the year and each month at our meetings, they were get a flower that went along with the virtue/saint that they were learning about.  They would add a new flower to their hat each time and this was the end result of the hats.  The girls were just little darlings!!

Here are the girls in their "Little Flowers" sashes and hats during the tea party.
I miss those days!  All of my kids were so little and safe!

After all of this time, only 2 girls are not with our group anymore....Anna Grace (next to Madison in the front) moved to Tennessee this past summer and Hannah (next to Anna Grace) had to drop out a few years back because of ballet class.  Out of our original 8 girls, 6 of us are still meeting.  Wow have we seen each other through a lot of life changes over the years!!  What wonderful friends we all are!

Thank you Jesus, for those special memories and also for the memories made with each new day and time in our lives

NICK'S BIG FISH TROPHY/FISHING VEST

My little Nicholas had his first boyscout event this weekend.  They hosted a dad and son fishing day at a local lake.  Unfortunately our daddy was out of town so thank our great Lord for great friends.....our friend, Felix took Nicholas along with him and his son, Joey.  They all fished and had awards for different things at the end.  Nicholas won the trophy for BIGGEST FISH CAUGHT!!  He was so proud!! I wish that daddy could have seen his little fisherman!  Nicholas even got to bring home a cool fish trophy! What a wonderful day it was.

Good Job, Nick!! We are so happy for you!

Oompa heard about Nicholas' big trophy and sent him a special gift!!

 Hi very own FISHING VEST....Thank you Oompa!!!

 He heard that something was coming for him in the mail and checked EVERYDAY with such anticipation!!

Now he has one that matches Daddy's!!  I cannot wait to see my two special guys making memories on the dock!!

NICHOLAS' FIRST SLEEPOVER

Our rule is that sleepovers start in 3rd grade...if even then!!!  Nicholas was going on a Boy Scout fishing trip with his great friend, Joey and the boys were leaving before day break.  So we decided that spending the night together made sense.....just this one time.  He is such a big boy!  He was so excited to try it out.

Here are the boys before Nicholas left for the night (Yikes!!)  The funny thing is, Madison did her first sleepover at the same house with Joey's big sister, Isabella.  What great friends we have!  Our kids are growing up together!

SAVANNAH WITH HER BROWNIE TROOP

Savannah on her first day back to Brownies after summer break! What a sweet group of little girls

Of course we forgot Savannah's brownie uniform!! It didn't phase her at all though..She had a blast!! She is the one in the light blue t-shirt on the right. 

LIGHT AND SHADOWS AND THE NILE DELTA

We did 2 projects today in school...

We are doing a really great science curriculum Charlotte Mason style that's units follow the 7 days of creation.  We cover all of the areas of science while focusing on where they stemmed from....our Lord.  We naturally started out with "Let There Be Light" and so today we did a short activity on the sun and shadows.

 We traced our shadows in the morning and then came back hours later to see what had happened

 Nick asked if I had paid someone to move our chalk drawings while we were inside doing other school subjects

 They were amazed.  It was neat to get to have them really see the change instead of just telling them about it and having them look at a picture.  They loved being able to SEE the movement of the earth by looking at the sun

THEN IT WAS ONTO ANCIENT EGYPT FOR HISTORY

 We are learning about the Nile River and how they used it to water their crops and the legend behind why the river floods every year.  We even studied the red king and the white king.  They love it.

 We made our own Nile Rivers with the "River Delta" section.  They look a lot like lobsters

 Here is Madison forming her Nile River Delta

 Here is Savannah covering the bottom of her river with rocks

 After we set in the rocks, we put flower seeds in the dirt to see how the river would make the soil fruitful

 Flooding our Niles

It is really fun to work with the kids!  We have such a great time together

TIME WITH OUR FRIENDS

I just love spending time with our friends!! They are truly a gift from our Lord.  When we get together with our friends the Mira's....laughter just fills the whole house!!

Thank you, God for these times...they grow up so fast!