Caden is Nine Months old!

Time sure flies when you are not pregnant. It's amazing how much faster the second nine months go.
He is cruising all over the place and he is far too busy for napping. Never fear, my very own copy of Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child is out for delivery right now and should arrive any minute now. In the meantime, we will go for a long stroller ride. It's a good thing he is so dang cute!

Planting peas

We got the peas planted this week. Caden was very helpful. :) He thinks garden dirt is delicious!

Fairy Garden

We built a fairy garden this weekend. So Fun!


Here is a decent article on how to build a fairy garden. We added horticultural charcoal to the bottom of the saucer to keep the soil sweet. I don't think this article talks about that.

Here's a link to fairy accessories. We bought ours at a local greenhouse. It wouldn't be hard to build some fairy accessories, if one had time and skills. Maybe next time. :)

Here is another view of the garden.

Happy Spring!

Colin took this picture in our front yard this morning.

New Skills

We have been learning like crazy at our house this week. Here are a few of the very important skills that have been acquired:

Thursday - Robyn learned to walk on the stilts. (She also attempted to put her hair in pigtails all by herself - We'll keep working on that skill.)


Friday - Robyn builds a snowman all by herself! (Three inches of snow fell this morning.)


Saturday - Randy and the kids learn to build an Astro Dome.
(Robyn made another attempt at pigtails)

(I attempted to cut Randy's hair prior to the Astro Dome project, I am not ready to list it as one of my skills yet. My hair cutting abilities are close to Robyn's pig tail skills. We will keep working on them. The goose egg on his head was not from my haircut, it's from Grace's help with the Astro Dome bars. He didn't even cry, he's very brave.)






Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the Christmas present!

Sunday - Randy and I learn to ride the neighbors' Ripstick - Go Us!

milestones

This Boy is 8 months old today!



This is a Mommy's favorite sight! Kids happily doing the dishes. LOVE IT!

Happy President's Day!

We have enjoyed a fabulous President's day weekend.
The kids and I started off the festivities with a free hot dog from the Dodge dealer and a visit to Cabela's. It was kind of an impromptu field trip as all we were planning when we left the house was to get the van washed.

We checked out the animals and tested a few tents. Fun Stuff.

When we got home, Uncle Jeremy called and asked if our house was the place to be. I said, "Of course!" He asked if he could bring a pretty girl over for dinner and a movie. I said, "Sure, how much time are you going to give me?" He said, "30 minutes."
We tidied up the house, made carmel popcorn, fixed up some pork chops and rice, and had a party. Jeremy and Shannon were treated to a fiddle concert, dinner, and a movie. I do best with last minute parties - they don't give me time to chicken out and cancel.

Saturday, we decided it was spring so we had a "Welcome Spring Party." The girls and I pruned 8 of the trees. Then the boys built a fire in the fire pit and we roasted hot dogs. It was a little chilly, but fun nonetheless.




Sunday, after church we made cookies and Robyn and I went for a walk to deliver them to some of the neighbors. It was a beautiful day for a walk.

Monday, Randy had the day off!! We all went to gymnastics and the kids loved that Dad got to watch them be tricky. After gymnastics, I dejunked my bathroom drawer - Happy Days! Randy made sure Caden didn't choke to death or fall off the stairs or.....
After lunch, I was going to finish pruning the rest of the fruit trees, but Randy had a better idea. He took us to the park. We hiked all around the hills and then played at the playground. What a beautiful day!




You don't think Caden will be scarred for life from having to wear girl snowpants, do you?

We rounded off the evening by all practicing our gymnastics skills in the living room. There is nothing like cartwheels, donkey kicks, and head stands to settle everyone down for sleep. :) I tell you, I have one talented husband. This chick digs a guy with skills. Too bad I didn't get pictures of that.

This family's nature deficit disorder has once again been successfully treated and I love the resulting pink cheeks on what used to be my paleface son.

Pan Sauce!

I have arrived! I can finally make pan sauce without out stressing out. Hooray for me and hooray for Alton Brown and Pioneer Woman and hooray for Jill who inspires me.

(photography by Colin - He wanted me to have a picture of it for my blog)

Why I blog about Homeschooling

This week I was asked by someone that I dearly love but don't get to see often why I talk about homeschooling so much. Well, Please, Consider the Following:
1: The title of this blog. It is House of Learning - where I blog about learning. Yes, this is primarily a homeschool blog.
2: We don't "DO" school. I can't only think about homeschooling between the hours of 8:00 - 3:30. We learn 24/7.
3: It's my blog and I'll say what I want to.

As far as general conversation goes, I don't talk about homeschooling much.
Here is a Nifty Experiment you can do at home, at church, at the store..... Pay attention to how often school comes up. Notice how many times conversation turns to preschool, school, teachers, school buses, schedules related to school or school breaks, problems related to school, homework, grades (both k-12 or A-F)... Notice how often your children are asked questions such as "What grade are you in?" Notice how many times you think of something school related yourself.
Judging from how many times school comes up, it must be considered polite conversation to talk about school.
Unless, of course, you don't do school.

Miracle Cure

My nature deficit disorder has been treated sufficiently today - we went to the zoo.

The kids and I were sitting at the breakfast table talking about how wonderful it was to have a blank calendar square today (it's been a busy week) and I glanced at the thermometer on the patio that said 40 degrees. I said, "is it Thursday?" and Colin said, "Yes." So I said, "Lets go to the zoo." (Thursday is half price day. Wahoo!) I called Randy so he could talk me out of it and he checked the weather and said it was going to rain. So I said, "You're right we should stay home and fold laundry." Then I got off the phone and all the kids put their boots on and said, "Let's go to the zoo."

We knew that the weather man had said 60% chance of rain, but, because we watched Bill Nye on Tuesday on the way to fiddle lessons and learned about probability, we knew that meant we had a 40% chance that it wouldn't rain. We decided to take our chances. We stuffed my coat pockets with string cheese and granola bars and left. We called Randy on the cell in the car to tell him we were going to the zoo. He said, "I thought you would."

We took a chance and we won - NO RAIN! It was absolutely beautiful! Of course, I forgot the camera so I can't share with everyone. You are all invited up to go to the zoo with us anytime that you get tired of your snow. We do have about 6 inches of snow but at 42 degrees it is melting fast.

The best part of the zoo today was the babies. There was a 6 month old snow leopard that wanted to play with Colin. He was so funny. We called him Leroy. :) He would hid behind his rocks and the come charging out and crash into the glass where Colin was standing. Then he would lick the glass and rub his head against it like he wanted us to pet him. Then Colin would run to the other end of the glass and the leopard would chase him. They ran back and forth, back and forth.. Finally the little (I use that term very loosely) leopard got worn out and he flopped on to his back for a rest. After a little rest, he was back at it. It was so fun. The guy that takes care of the cats for the zoo came over the first time (we went back to visit the leopard five times) we were looking at him. He played with the little leopard through the glass a minute and then watched him play with Colin while he talked to me. The cat guy told me that he was just a baby only six months old and seemed to really like our zoo. Then he taught me about the cats. It was very interesting. He said that snow leopards have really long tails so they could balance as they are leaping through the air. The Amur leopard's tail is much shorter and skinnier. And Snow Leopard have bigger paws and they walk on more of their paws so they don't sink into the snow. Our zoo got the baby because our male got old and died. Our zoo is part of the species survival plan and takes endangered animals and tries to create more babies to help the species survive. We have a 15 year old female snow leopard but she probably won't last more than another 3 years (average life span of a snow leopard in captivity is 16- 18 years) and when she dies we will get another young female to perpetuate the species with little Leroy.

The other baby is a 9 month old gibbon. Oh my goodness, she was SO cute! She played and played swinging from branch to branch and then dropping into the net. If it hadn't been so hot in the gibbon house we would have stayed for hours.

We got to watch the zoo keeper feed the penguins too. That was cool. But not as cool as the babies.

Anyway, we had a lovely time. We stayed for three and a half hours. By the time we left, we were soaked through from tromping in the snow and we have pink cheeks from the sunshine. A little vitamin D was just what the doctor ordered!