Letter E is for Elephant

Our letter of this week is Letter E, and I scoured the internet looking for other great mommy-blogs who have made letter E packs and activities for their kids. I just love 1+1+1=1, don't you?
But I couldn't find what I needed, or it all related to Easter, which is fine, but why do I always have to have my child study these letters when it's nowhere near Easter-time?
So I made my own.

Elephant


Elephant 2
My son has to know how to write the letter 'e' because it's in his name. At the end, and granted he only knows the first 2 letters of his long name (it's 11 letters long), but we are getting there.

Our other object we are studying is 'eggs' for this week. I love the ideas that Mom to 2 Posh Little Divas has over on her blog to do with Easter eggs. Who says I can't pull them out to use them as a learning tool? Great ideas!

We played a game with the letters, matching them and finding the big letter and the small letter. Some of the eggs were the same colors and made it easy, but a few of them were mixed, which made it hard for him to figure out. I also made him find the letters on the ABC Chart. We took turns, but I was still able to help him learn the letters by helping me find mine on the chart. I put the eggs in an empty Tide Pods container and kept it with all of our homeschooling supplies and games. We'll play this game again!

Here's a photo of my son at a wedding we went to this weekend! He's so handsome!

Happy 10 year anniversary!

May 12, 2012:

Here's what we did-

• previous night dropped son off at Grandma's house (the farm)
• got up early on a Saturday
• rode our bikes to the Ottumwa Park (avoiding traffic)
• walked The Race for the Cure 5K race in a little over an hour
• hubby was proud of me, because I was able to keep his pace. 
• rode our bikes back home
• went out for lunch at Appanoose Rapids in downtown Ottumwa- yum! 

 Hubby's lunch. Yes, that is a burger sandwiched between 2 grilled cheese sandwiches!

 I had their Pork Tenderloin, no I didn't eat it all! :)

Beautiful example of what could be and should be in downtown!

• Went to scrapbooking store Craft & Hobby Connection for a project I was doing- that's complete now, more on that another time. Yes, hubby went in with me- you know he really loves me if he went in there! 
• Went to our first movie in a long time! Before 6pm, so we still didn't pay $8/ person. Yup, you guessed it- The Avengers. 

•  Ended the day with a hot dog cookout and s'mores at the farm and also, we picked up our son (here he is being silly). 

• Here's our 4 year old son (our only child) playing 'Captain Jack Sparrow' and Papa John and Grandma Shirley by the fire! 

Hard to believe 10 years has gone by since that cold, windy day at the campground where we got married! 

Time flies when you are having fun, though! 

Wedding Shower

My brother in law is getting married on Feburary 4, 2012- yikes! So while the happy couple took some vacation/ school break time off my mother-in-law and I decided to throw his fiancé a bridal shower last Friday. 

The theme was "Bed Bath & Bridal Shower" My husband, the great designer of our family did a paradox of the Bed, Bath & Beyond logo.   The idea behind this was that the couple doesn't have a full or queen size mattress set, so if people didn't want to give a traditional gift they could bring money to contribute to a mattress fund. It was a great idea, and it worked out great- one gift came with crumpled up cash ($1 dollar bills) in a puzzle box! The bride was very excited about that 700 piece puzzle!

 The banner I made- it looks great!  The font is MTF Chubb and I found it over at MissTina.com for free!

 I downloaded this free print from eighteen25 and ordered the canvas from The Canvas People. The print looks red on screen, but when it came it looked more orange-red, but that's okay because both the bride and I love orange! This was my gift to them.

 My mother-in-law made a little bed underneath the gift table and the red blanket is a reversible comforter for when they do get their bed. The bears were from the church nursery! 

 Cupcakes

 The punch had to be the right color- Dark red, so I mixed Cranberry Apple with 7up and bingo!

 This was well thought out Ice Cream Sandwich "Mattress" Cake my husband made- man, he's talented! We like watching Cake Boss, so he pulled a 'Buddy'. Ice cream sandwiches followed by Cool whip topping, followed by more ice cream sandwiches and  let that harden over night. Then rolled out the fondant and covered it all, shaped it, and even used a little tool I picked up at Wal-Mart to make it look like there's a quilt on the bed, a little bit of white frosting beading and frosting ruffles at the bottom. He took the time to make pillows out of fondant as well. The headboard is graham crackers covered in fondant and black lettering for the bride and grooms first names. It had to be done in several steps otherwise the cake would have melted, but it turned out great and was a big hit at the party- despite it being December 29th in Iowa! 

 For those who didn't want punch or wanted to warm up after eating their cake there was hot chocolate available.

 

 When my mother-in-law got married a few years ago I created this 'Love' design from 1 Corinthians 13, so we were able to use this for decoration.

The sign-in table with a basket for cards, a photo of the couple, a candle in a mason jar, some roses, a Mr. & Mrs. sign, and something to write advice/ recipes on. 

 The gift table with a few gifts on it, the photos of the couple when they were younger, the "tub" container we used for decoration was also a gift for the couple. I even took an old velvet heart that my hubby gave me once full of chocolates was now used as decoration. 

 I had these old shower curtains in my basement and hung them up so as people came into the fellowship hall they could feel like they were walking into a shower. 

Two unsuspecting guys who were volunteered by the best mans mother to participate in the festivity.... of you guessed it- toilet paper dress making. I'll spare you the photos, because truthfully I might have a very mad hubby on my hands, and a not happy brother-in-law! But the bride voted and actually chose my husband as having the best designed dress. 

The bride got tons of laughs from having the boys dress up! I think she had fun- it was a great way to wrap up 2011. While it wasn't New Year's Eve, it was the best bridal party I'd been to in a while! 

Thankful

I'm so thankful for my little batman. He's such a joy to us, even on days when I want to put him back where he came from. Hey, what can I say, he's 3 1/2 years old, he's not perfect!

I love that he has such an enthusiasm for life, even when mommy struggles with what God wants me to do- stay home and home-school the little man! Our little boy makes us laugh, yell, cry, and love more. He's starting to ask questions about family- who's related to who. "My grandma is your mom?" Yes. He's finally getting it, but I think I'm going to put together a family tree with photos of people, because some of them he remembers (Keegan and Aidan) and some of them he forgets (Uncle Mike and Aunt Vicky); then there's the ones he's never met that live far away.
Over his left shoulder you can see a Give Thanks Free Printable I found here. I had some frames I picked up from Wal-Mart a while ago that weren't being used, so I grabbed a frame and framed it. I haven't had time to make this cute little banner that I wanted to make before Thanksgiving.

 I found the banner here. So maybe I'll make it for next year.

I'm thankful for my warm house and food that we have to eat, so many people even in this country are going this holiday season without a warm place to sleep, food to eat in their kitchen or even a good paying job. The gap closes between the rich and the poor some days I really feel like I'm on the poor end, but thankful because I'm not really- I can still afford to pay my bills on time, feed and clothe my child. Plus we have a lot of luxuries I take for granted like XBOX Live, Netflix, Internet, computers, and two vehicles that still work even though they are both over 10 years old.

My latest project is taking all of my old t-shirts and making them into a blanket or a quilt, I haven't decided yet because just the word quilt scares me- I've never done a quilt before, so I don't really know what the difference is between an actual quilt and just a blanket.

In other news, the one family member that we thought would be single forever, my husbands brother, Jim, has found a girl named Suzi and they are getting married in February! It's so exciting to be part of wedding planning I forgot how much fun I had planning my own wedding (10 years ago in May)- it's awesome to see their wedding coming together so quickly and God opening doors for them during this whole process. We are already blessed by having Suzi a part of our lives and we welcome her into our family.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

"So did you have a _______ time?"

I asked my husband that very same question on our way back from our weekend getaway today. I said it just like that.

Good. Couldn't classify it as a good time.
Boring. Nope. Not that either.
Horrible. Nope.

There really doesn't seem to be a word for the weekend mini-retreat that my hubby and I just got back from. We went to Honey Creek Resort for a Geocaching event. We knew about it ahead of time, and we knew that we'd get a great rate for the weekend- I scrimped and I saved my money in a jar because if I put it in an envelope that's in my purse I will spend it. This past Thursday was our wedding anniversary, on May 12, 2002 I married my husband. Nine years later we are at Honey Creek Resort enjoying, or rather trying to enjoy our time.

The weather: was cold, and rainy, and windy, and drizzling/ misting. Yuck!

Hubby thought of a great idea to bring our bikes along. So we could get more Caches around the area. We didn't count on the weather being icky. We found a few caches on our bikes, and then we looked at each other and said: "Why are we doing this? This isn't fun! Let's go back and warm up!"

Hubby finding one of RedDarlings Geocaches.... but you don't need a GPS unit for this one! 

(They aren't EVER this big!) 

Here's a photo from a while back: Getting a geocache with my dad, photo taken from his iphone in Kentucky. I showed him how to do it and now he is a geocacher too!  The great thing about Geocaching is that they are everywhere- all over the world! My dad and I are excited to take our GPS units with us when we go on our family cruise next year and get some then!

Side note: It's funny that this weekend was cold and overcast cloudy. That's exactly how my wedding day was. Cold, and windy. My mother-in-law will never let me forget how cold my wedding day was! All because this girl thought she had to have an outdoor wedding in mid-May. Perfect, right? Not always in Iowa! On my wedding day I don't remember being cold- I had layers upon layers of gown on- and being nervous that the wedding would go off without a hitch probably prevented me from getting cold.

So we sat by the resorts fireplace for most of the late morning and afternoon. It helped that some friends loaned us their ipad2, it was kinda fun! Hubby played on the Wii that was there in the lobby for a little bit, and we did some people watching too.

We ate lunch at the Lakeshore Grille, which I must say was the BEST meal I've had out to eat for a very long time. I had to warm up, so I ordered a French Vanilla cappuccino- which was better than Starbucks that I can't get in my town anyway! I opted for the Tenderloin sandwich, while hubby had the special- a sliced ham with goat cheese sandwich on toasted rye bread. I had a few bites- and I loved it. The ham was amazing. I even saved room for their Cheesecake with Raspberry drizzle- super rich and one of the rare times I was allowed to order dessert!

We tossed around the idea of staying another night, but I don't think there were any empty rooms and we left the little man at home with the babysitter and figured out it wasn't financially worth it to stay another night. Unfortunately, we weren't impressed with the hotel side of the resort, some major Architectural flaws that we happened upon by accident just going where we thought we needed to go ended us up in the laundry rooms of the hotel. Whoops! Minor things such as HGTV being listed on the channel list, but when I turned to that channel it was QVC, and they didn't know anything about it at the front desk. Hubby took a while to figure out some electrical switches in our room- and the decor was nice, but not superb- plus the room had a bit of an echo when you talked. Sometimes it's just good to sleep in your own bed (says the lady who couldn't get to sleep until 2am!)




ps. I found 14 Geocaches this weekend, despite the weather! Most of which I found while Hubby escorted me around in the truck on our way home.

Weddings and Photography

So on September 5, 2009- this past weekend- my mother-in-law got married, again.

It's not every day that your mother-in-law gets married, and being that I have known her for 9 years, I have never known her to be married! She's been in and out of many relationships, but never engaged- until recently- and never married until this weekend.

She's not Shirley Howk anymore... she's Shirley Waite. I know it's weird, and it'll take some getting used to- but she and John have been seeing each other for almost 2 years! I guess when you know it's right- you just know! Don't they look happy? This photo was taken of them in the horse drawn carriage after a long ride from the farm to the reception at the church! So they are truly man and wife in this photo.

It's her story, but her husband, my husband's dad, died 10 years ago of a heart attack when he was just 50. It's been a rough road for her and her 3 kids, but they've all survived, and so will she- even happily ever after!

It was a beautiful day- as opposed to my wedding which was cold, cloudy and windy, or my sister-in-laws, which was pouring down rain! She said the only way that you can tell it's raining in her pictures from the wedding, which my husband took, is the ducks that are swimming in the puddles just feet from the picnic shelter!

My husband and I took the photos for my mother-in-laws wedding as well, I took the snapshots with our digital camera, and ran the video camera and the company that he's laid off from was nice enough to lend them their professional digital camera for the event! So out of those three options my mother-in-law will have gotten a pretty good mixture of photos of her second wedding!

The wedding was held at the family farm, where the two newlyweds will live when they return from their honeymoon. It was a good location with a corn field as a backdrop and people sitting on wooden benches made from concrete blocks and wooden boards.

Being out at the farm for a week prompts me to take advantage of the beautiful creation God has provided us. So I took some time to take some photos of what you might see if you were to visit the farm yourself sometime. We took a lot of flower photos... but I like this one. It just says to me, though there may be rough times we all have to go through- like death of a loved one, there will be new life at the end of all of that. John 10:10 tells us this "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." And so a new life is started- with a new marriage in this family!

See more photos I've taken here.