Farm Animal Days!

When I found out when the NC State Farm Animal Days were scheduled for this year, I planned for that to be our field trip for our learning unit on farm animals. All the materials for this week were based on the book "Ask Mr. Bear," which I had never heard of before, but Joshua loved it! We did reading, handwriting, math, rhyming words, sorting, matching, and other activities, all using different farm animals...so by Friday, Joshua was really excited to go see all the animals in person. David took a half-day so he could come with us, so it was a whole family field trip and we had such a good time! And honestly, without David there, I would probably have not gotten a single picture taken, so big thanks to him for toting the camera around!

The kids loved the big cows...and Joshua

enjoyed climbing up high to see!

I'm sure I was saying something extremely

fascinating (please insert sarcasm here!)

LOVE this picture of Leah!

Watching the kids see new things

and seeing their faces light up makes

everything so fun :)

I think we were looking at the dairy calves here

Joshua was counting the sheep...the little lambs

were SO adorable!

See! Adorable :)

Leah liked petting the baby goat.

I love how David gets a great shot

of my gray hair in this picture...

but I will say, I saw a lady about 20 years

older than me at the library recently

and she had long curly hair like mine but

it was all gray and she looked GORGEOUS!

So, if that is what my future holds, so be it :)

Those big, beautiful brown eyes melt my heart.

Now this shot needs some explaining,

since you can clearly see that Joshua is

wearing an NC State shirt. It was a hand-me-down

from one of David's coworkers Ashley (who is

AWESOME and has given us so many

great clothes for Joshua as her son has

outgrown them!) and Joshua chose to wear

it today since we were going to an NC State

event...but please notice the hat he chose

to wear with it. The boy has his allegiances

in the right places, so don't you worry about that!

He LOVED the chocolate ice cream...so much so

that he ate his cup AND his daddy's cup, so David

just shared with Leah :)

She didn't want to sit in her stroller, but we

couldn't just have her running around while we

ate our ice cream, so David figured out a

compromise :) And as you can tell, she seemed

perfectly content...silly girl!

My little pigtailed finger-sucking sassy girl

(who, by the way, tried to pick up multiple

baby chicks by their heads...she's a bit

rough and tumble, so Mommy had to come

to the chicks' rescue and save them from

this heavy-handed yet adorable toddler)

Best Family Portrait EVER!

Joshua drew a picture of our family today...he drew everyone and labeled all of us by himself.

Cutest family portrait ever...

by the cutest artist ever, too!

Bulls and Horses in the same week!

Last week, when we heard that Wool E. Bull, the mascot for the Durham Bulls baseball team, would be at our local Moe's restaurant on the same night that kids eat free, we knew we had to go! The kids loved meeting him and playing a few games that he brought. Plus, who doesn't like dinner at Moe's?

Leah decided that Wool E. Bull's baseball

card was a good after-dinner snack :)

My friend Jenny has a horse that she rides

locally and since our learning unit this week

was about cowboys, she invited us to come

meet Lucky! She even brought a cowboy

hat for Joshua to wear :)

The kids loved looking around the horse farm

and they both wanted their picture taken on

this big Ford tractor--isn't she the cutest

pigtailed tractor driver ever?!

"Forget posing for a picture, Mommy--

let's take this thing for a spin!"

Joshua didn't want to give me a real smile,

so this was the best I could get. We're so glad

Jenny could help us bring our learning unit

to life last week--it was so great to see so

many of the things we've been reading

and learning about!

Pigtails and Policemen

Leah's hair is getting pretty long these days and I have been enjoying putting her hair in pigtails, since it is the only thing I can do with her hair that she can't pull out (she's not a fan of headbands or barrettes). I think they are adorable and go along well with her sassy attitude :)

It was either hand her the cell phone to distract her,

or she was getting down from that chair and

running away! Isn't it sad that this is the best

shot I could get of her pigtails?!

And since I was snapping pics of Leah,

Joshua wanted to smile for one of his own.

I absolutely LOVE that smile!

***

Now that Joshua has gotten pretty good with his writing and reading, I decided to make it more interesting for him (and me!) by using these weekly learning units I found online. I absolutely love the talented people who create things and share them online for others to use for free! Each unit is on a different topic and covers writing, reading, math, patterns, puzzles, and other activities, as well as a suggestion of books to check out from the library that cover the same subject. For our first week, Joshua chose the unit on police officers. He's loving the books and printable activities! We are fortunate to have a few Garner police officers that attend church with us, and I asked one of them if he'd be willing to let us meet up with him one day while he was working so Joshua could see him in uniform and get a tour of the police car.

Officer Kevan Anderson and Joshua posing in front

of the police car...Kevan was SO patient and sweet

with Joshua! We got to see a lot of the things we

have been learning about: uniform, badge, handcuffs,

flashlight, two-way radio, flashing lights, siren, and

police cruiser.

Joshua can be really shy with new people and

new things, and Kevan was great with him. He gave

Joshua a cool pencil and a sticker badge, and Joshua

gave him a thank you card he had made the day

before and some cookies I made as a thank you.

What a fun way to start our new learning time!

Time with Grandma

We love when Grandma comes to visit! She spent the weekend with us and I snapped this picture after church on Sunday. Leah is wearing a precious dress that my Aunt Sydney gave her for Christmas (we put a long-sleeved onesie underneath since it was chilly today, and the dress has a matching overcoat that is gorgeous!) and Joshua is sporting a new church outfit Grandma brought up this weekend, along with a badge they made in Sunbeams today. Side note: how much do I love that when I asked Joshua what they learned in Primary today, he said, "Heavenly Faver and Jesus love me SO much!" :)

Of the 20 or so pictures I took, Leah either had her eyes closed or her fingers in her mouth for all of them...this was the best of the bunch! As a baby, she'd suck on her fingers all the time for comfort. She rarely does it now, but I think she's cute either way :) Three of my favorite people in the whole wide world, all in one picture!

Leah-bug on the move

And lest you worry about Leah feeling left out during Joshua's school time...

She loves having free reign of all the toys, with no worries about Joshua taking them from her or pushing her over! It might be her favorite time of the day :)

Are you seeing this crazy hair she's got?! It is flipping further and further out from her head the longer it grows...I'm waiting to see when it will curl up like mine did.

Could you not just eat that sassy little thing up? She's constantly on the move and starting to talk up a storm. Her current favorite words are Da-da, ball, go, uh-oh, potty (she hears us talking about it with Joshua all the time), hey (she drags the word out like I do: "heeeeey"), ow! (wonder why she ends up saying that 20 times a day?) and bu-bye. We love our spunky little gal :)

School days

One of my goals for this new year was to do a set "school time" with Joshua each day. He absolutely LOVES to learn and we've been doing all kinds of activities regularly related to that, but I never had a set time each day for us to sit down and spend time on writing letters, reading, etc. Now we do...can you tell that Joshua is enjoying it? :)

This picture is from a couple of weeks ago. We focus on a new letter each day, as well as repeating all the ones we've covered so far. He's getting really good with his writing and he has so much fun doing it--it makes me so happy to see him enjoy learning so much! I love all the online resources available for him to do activities on the computer, as well as worksheets that I can print out and laminate for multiple uses. We're also using some online reading activities and the BOB Books, and I am absolutely amazed at how quickly he is learning. These little ones have so much potential and aptitude--he constantly surprises me. He loves to read words on signs or at the store or even on my shirt, and to see his face light up with pride at a job well done is just priceless.

I can only hope and pray (and encourage!) that he

will continue to love learning throughout his life!