Mini Maestro in the Making

Click on the arrow right below the picture to hear Grace's first 'recital'.

Here's Grace's most current song in her piano book.

She is almost finished with her beginner piano book and ready to start level 1.

Fall Fun

I've tried for an hour and the computer has only loaded these four pictures.... I give up.  I'll try again tomorrow evening.

The 'kiddie' maze last Sunday.

We should have stuck with doing just this one.  It was obviously targeted to our skill level.

The maze we did next took about forty minutes to do a maze that was supposed to take fifteen to twenty minutes.

Thank God we  didn't do the hard maze.  They would have had to send in a search party at dark to rescue us!!

This was a display they had set up in the children's play area.

  The kids could  put a plastic duck in the rain gutter and  race to see who could get their duck to the other end first.

It was a huge hit with all four of our kids.

OK.

I'll try again tomorrow night.

On a different note, Grace now has two teeth loose, still none have come out.

No visits from the tooth fairy yet.

Grant is loving preschool even choosing to stay the extra hour and half on Tuesdays for Lunch Bunch.  Who would have guessed??

John and Emily just got invited to take the SAT or the ACT (their choice which one) this year as a seventh grader.  Anyone ever heard of this program through Duke University?  Is it a scam for money or is it legit?

The 'invitation' was based on their ITBS scores and originated through the counselor's office at school, so I'm guessing it's not a total hoax.  I've just never heard of it before.

Later!

Divine at Devine's

We had a great time playing at the local farmer's fall festival.

Recognize these faces?

or these?

The farmhouse on the property

I think I'm a bit envious.  I think it's a perfect farmhouse scene.

Takin' on the slide......

More tomorrow.....

I'm off to iron or sleep right now.

Probably iron.

Actually, probably not.

Goodnight!

Stuff

The kids have had a lot of fun playing with toys lately. 

Whenever I make a trip to the attic and haul down toys that have been out of circulation for a while, it rivals the excitement of even Christmas Day!

I could open a small version of Toys 'R' Us with everything stored up there.

I try every couple of months to bag up things that aren't being played with much and change them for bags of things in the attic that haven't seen the light of day for a while.

It works better than a trip to the real toy store.

And it keeps our bank account out of the red.

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Grace has been reading a lot lately.

She enjoys reading to Grant.

I love the trickle down effect of how older kids can do things for the younger kids.

Grant fully reaps the benefits of being the youngest of four kids.

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We've been to the farm this weekend.

We had a a super time and did some really fun things.

It's late and 5:30 comes early.

I'll download pictures tomorrow (hopefully).

Goodnight all.

Packages - Ponies - Camels

We get some mighty strange packages around here.....

The contents might not be exciting to the six and under crowd,

but MAN do they enjoy the boxes.

This particular box was everything from a space ship to a vet office to a pretend house to a robot costume before it finally got so beat up I threw it out.

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Fun with the horses

No, we don't let John and Emily do this as a general rule, but Sammy (the guy we bought them from) wanted to prove that the ponies are capable of bearing the weight of a larger child.

I think he proved his point.

Emily's feet were almost touching the ground.

It is a bonus for our kids that when we want to ride the horses right now we have to go to a petting zoo to see them.

They have fun with the other animals while we're there.

Their favorite is still the monkey, but on this particular day they had a little fun chasing pigs...

and catching them once in a while.

Emily and Paco having a little beauty session....

Grant on Brownie......

CLYDE....

Our new horse run-in waiting to be delivered to the farm...

Not much exciting here.

First grading period ends tomorrow. 

We'll see how the Zoo scholars are doing so far this year.

Grace is still wiggling away at her tooth.

Grant and I are going on (almost) daily bike rides through the neighborhood now.

Having just him home has provided me a nice chance to enjoy him as an only child this year.  It's been fun.

Well, it's been fun when he's not driving me crazy wanting me to play with him every second of every day, but we won't address that issue tonight!

Happy autumn!!

Train Trip Take Two

Taking some time to look around the train museum while waiting on our train departure time.

A nod to Steve and Operation Lifesaver......

They had a very informative display about this organization's work.

Waiting to board....

Mr. Conductor came around and punched our tickets.

We stopped at a little town in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE to turn the train around.

While some passengers went in the little convenience store nearby, we watched the train turn around and prepare for the return trip.

Getting ready to hook up to the passenger cars for the return trip....

I know I've posted some other pictures from this trip.  I just found these.  One of these days I'll redate this and move it with the others. 

For now, you'll just have to scratch your head at my lack of organization.