Our First "First" of the New Year!

I know this year will be full of "first" which will be exciting but also sad without Dad to witness them. When we first arrived in Pensacola at Nana's we tried to get Anna to try riding her bike without training wheels. She did it for a bit, but then wanted them back on. After her cousins arrived and could all ride their bikes without training wheels, we thought that would motivate her to try again, but it didn't. In true Anna style, she waited until no one was "harassing" her about it and then just decided to get on a bike and ride it, no help, no falls - she just did it. She is such an independent little girl and I love that about her, even when it is frustrating. Oh, and she got to tell Dad about her new skill when he called a short time later.

Here is a photo of the big girl on two wheels!

2 feet before Halloween!

Since moving back to Colorado a few years ago, we have grown accustomed to an October snowfall, but we just weren't ready for this year's October snow STORM! It started snowing here around 9:00 Tuesday night and did not stop until 9:00 Thursday night. Looks like its going to be a snowy year!

Thanks John Biretto for keeping the driveway shoveled and Mr. Bull for taking the kiddos sledding!

Reward

A close friend shared with me an idea she has for promoting kindness and obedience in the home. We now have a "reward jar". The kids can get a "rock" for being kind to one another, obeying the first time, doing chores without being reminded and a few other things. Basically, it is Mom's discretion, I give a rock when I see them doing something worthy of a little praise. When the jar is filled, the kids get to pick a fun family activity. After the first filling, the kids chose to go to Arts on Fire, a local paint your own pottery place, and paint something for their rooms. On this trip, we also brought along Anna's best friends, Anna and Stevi. Everyone had a FUN time and now we have a couple of little pieces to remind them of what they accomplished. Hopefully, these will help spur them on to more good deeds - we shall see!

Almost There!

That's right, I am almost current with our pictures and posts! I hope you are enjoying catching up on our fall adventures!

Pumpkin Patch

As Halloween approaches we usually find ourselves visiting one of the MANY pumpkin patches around. This year, we were lucky to be able to attend one while Dad was in town. We had to squeeze our trip in before Eric's soccer, but we were able to pick out a couple of pumpkins and enjoy a couple of activities before heading off for lunch and Eric's soccer practice.

How Big is the Sun?

As most of you know, we are homeschooling Anna and Eric this year. We have a wonderful Bible-based Kindergarten curriculum, My Father's World that is filled with Bible instruction, phonics, fun science and literature. Our first two letter units were S and M, so we studied the Sun and Moon. One of our daily activites involved making a sun, earth and moon to scale and then placing them outside so the kids could get an idea just how big the sun is and how far away it is from the earth. We met our friends The Sages for a picnic lunch in a field near there home and then marked off the distance. The kids had a great time having lunch and playing, but I am afraid the experiment was a little too much to comprehend despite Carissa's and my best efforts! Anyway, here is a pic of the kids with the sun Carissa cut out for us!

Thanks Dr. Lisa!

Each year, our wonderful dentist Dr. Lisa, hosts a family day at Heritage Square. The big kids enjoyed the swings, a couple of little roller coasters and many other fun activities. It was sad to go without Dad, he usually rides everything with the kids, but we were happy Nana was in town to go along and help out!







Daniel had a good time "playing" golf, although he didn't really like the idea of hitting the ball into the hole so he just picked it up and dropped it in. It was pretty darn cute!




Our last activities were the paddle boats with Nana and the carousel. Here are our last few pics. As usual, it was a fun day, we just wish Dad could have been there with us!






We can't wait for next year!