Pizza

One of T's favorite books right now is "The Little Red Hen Makes A Pizza." We did a few activities this week that revolved around pizza.

We made a letter pizza. I found this idea on No Time For Flashcards. I punched out 26 red pepperonis and wrote a letter on each piece. I also cut some green peppers and cheese. I had saved a round piece of cardboard from a frozen pizza we had a few weeks ago, and so we made our pizza on that. Tristan identified the letters when he put them on and sprinkled the other toppings around too.

We also made a real pizza. I pulled one of our dining room chairs into the kitchen, and it was perfect because he could just sit on it and was at the right height. He helped me paint the tomato sauce on (He kept licking it off the spoon), then he helped me pour on the cheese and then the pepperoni.

We have gotten a little lax with our letter of the week stuff (although I do believe he recognizes all of the capital letters). We haven't really been doing too many crafts, and I want to get back to doing at least one craft per week. T isn't really crazy about crafts, so I've learned to just do a little bit at a time on a certain project. He does participate for a couple of minutes and then he's ready to move on, which is fine. I'm going to try to start photographing some of our preschool stuff that we are doing.

T knows the ABC song now and sings the whole thing, although he always leaves out the letter R. He loves to count and will often count the things he sees. His vocabulary is through the roof now, and he is really starting to use sentences. He recently said an actual, complete sentence, even using an article. His first full sentence was "Maggie doodoo's are gross." Haha!!

T also has very nice manners and uses them often. He sayd "Excuse me" if he bumps into you or is in the way (he says "Sorry" for the same scenario). It's so cute because he'll say "Excuse Me Mommy" "Sorry Dada", etc. He says Bless you if you sneeze (although I am trying to get him to say God Bless you), and he says "Tanks" if you give him something. He also says "No Tanks" if he doesn't want something. One day Maggie was follwing him closely because she wanted his cookie, and he kept saying "NO Tanks Maggie.' Sometimes in the bathtub when I am washing his hair he'll say (or yell) "No Tanks." He's so funny!! He also says "please." After we pray he always says "Amen." Amen was actually one of the first words he ever said.

I've found lots of sites with excellent preschool ideas and printables, so I have been trying to print stuff and organize it. Some of the stuff is too old for him right now, so I made files and stuck the older things in there. I'd rather know that I have it rather than try to go back to it later and have it not be there (this has happened a couple times already). I am constantly finding great ideas on the internet and really want to start doing more of these activities!!

July 4-11

(Pictures: T in the intertube by himself for the first time, T hanging on the equipment at the park, and Maggie taking a dip. YOu can click on the pictures to enlarge them-click on the second one to get a good look at T's face).

This year, we just stayed home for the 4th of July. It had been raining for four days leading up to the 4th, so all of our plans had gotten ruined. We did go swimming in our pool on the 4th, and it was freezing since the sun hadn't been out in days, but it was still nice to get in. We just watched fireworks that night in our driveway, which was actually kind of fun. Last year we watched them on the beach, and hopefully we can do that again next year.

On Monday, we just stayed home. I think I am going to stay consistent in not really planning anything for Mondays so that we can work on our preschool stuff, swim, play outside, etc.

On Tuesday, we went to the library. We played outside at their playground and then went inside and got some really good books. T loves going to the library and always asks to go!

On Wednesday, my moms group had our ladies Bible Study at the house here. We decided to study the book called Sacred Marriage. This book concentrates on building your relationship with God, and allowing the struggles that come up in marriage to conform you to be more like Christ. We are going to study one chapter at a time for each meeting (we meet every other Wed). One of the moms stayed afterward with her son, and the four us swam in the pool.

On Thursday, we stayed home and went swimming twice. As you can tell, T loves the pool-and so do I!

On Friday, we met some of our friends at the park and played for a while. Later after T's nap, my sister in law brought over her three kids to go swimming. T loves his cousins and asks for them alot!



On Saturday, I went to a prayer rally in the morning while Daddy and T ran some errands. We just worked around the house and of course, went swimming:)

Today (Sunday): We went to church and will probably just stick around the house. And yes, we will probably so swimming!!

Hope everyone has a good week!!

We have been busy the last couple of weeks, although I haven't taken many pics because our camera died and our charger is missing. We are going to look in one more place for it tonight, and if I can't find it, I am going to have to buy a new one. I can't stand missing out on all these pictures because of something being lost!!

T and I have been staying home alot more than we ever did at our other house, and we go swimming just about every day, although the past four days it has been really rainy.

We went back to a new gymnastics place for him to try again, and he really liked it. His favorite thing was hopping all the way down the tumble track ( a very long trampoline). Like last time, he really enjoyed jumping down with the older girls, and would wait for them to jump down with him. I would love for him to take lessons there when he is older, if he wants to!

I started a ladies Bible study at my house, and we had our first meeting two Wednesdays ago. We will meet every other Wed at 12 to pray and we will be studying marriage. There are four of us at this time.

Last Tuesday was a big night for me. For the past two yeas, I have been planning on starting a pro-life ministry in our community. Everything all came together, and we had our first meeting last Tuesday evening at our church. I am so blessed to have the endorsement of Calvary Chapel, and they are advertising it for me in several ways (in the bulletin, in the minstry directory, and on the website. There were ten of us at the meeting, and everyone was very excited to be there. I got some great feedback, and we are planning on having our next meeting at the end of July. The purpose of the group is to come together to pray, become better educated on the issues, and discuss various projects that we might like to take on.

T had a big accomplishment this past Saturday night at church...he went into the toddler classroom for the first time. WE started out in the family room, and about half way through he was getting antsy, so I walked him down to the room. I expected that I would go in with him and help get him acquainted while he clung to me. Nope!! He went right in and just started playing and talking to the other kids. I had planned on staying in the room for at least five minutes, but after about two, I could tell he was fine, so I took the plunge and signed him in. He saw me leaving and I expected that he would start to cry, and he never did. I stood outside the room for about five minutes , waiting......and nothing. One of the helpers came out at that time, and I asked her how he was doing, and she said "He's doing great, he's still playing with the trucks." I left and went back to the Family room and expected to get paged to come get him, and I never did. When I went to pick him up after church had ended, he was just in there playing with the toy kitchen. The teacher said he did "Awesome" and never even cried. In fact, the only time he did cry was when we picked him up because he didn't want to leave. Ha!

Books we have been reading

Sorry I haven't had much time to come on and update. I really want to keep this up to date, so I am going to try a new approach and see if it works.

Here is a list of some of the books we have been reading lately:

The Little Red Hen Makes A Pizza: this is T's favorite book right now. It's about a hen who needs to keep going to the store because she doesn't have all of the items needed to make a pizza. She keeps asking her friends the duck, the dog, and the cat for help, but they won't help her. At the end of the book, she gives them some pizza, and they help her do the dishes. T loves the part where the big pizza is all finished and likes to name off all the different toppings, especially all the bacon slices. He calls the tomatoes "monanoes."

The Color Box: He loves this book too. It's about a monkey who steps inside a box and goes through different holes. Each hole contains a different colored room. Every time I am finished reading a book, T says "one more time."

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom: This is such a cute book and T loves it. It's about all the alphabet letters racing to the top of the coconut tree. When they all get to the top, the tree breaks and they all fall off. They all go up the tree again, but they have various amusing injuries..(T's favorite page goes..."look who's coming it's black eyed-pea, q,r,s, and loose-tooth t. I always point out that the letter t's tooth is just dangling there, and he thinks that is hilarious!

Oh Boy, it's Bounce: This is a cute book with great illustrations. Bounce is a goofy little spider, and the book just talks about his goofy outings. This was his favorite book to read for a while but now he's getting tired of it, although he did ask for it last night.

Don't Wake Up Mama: A funny book about 5 little monkeys who are baking a surprise birthday cake for their mom while she sleeps. They burn the cake and the firetruck has to come. T calls it the fire-monkey book.

Slowly, Slowly, Slowly said the Sloth: A nice book about a sloth who likes to take his time. At the end, one of the jungle animals asks him why he is so lazy, and the sloth replies he is not lazy, he just likes to do things slowly, slowly, slowly.

Circles and Squares Everywhere: Nice book about circles and squares.

The Number 1: Good counting book featuring one of each object pictured.

Touch and Feel 1,2,3: Another good counting book

Dinosnores: A book about dinosores sleeping that T is not really into

The Little Boys Bible: He loves the story of Adam and Eve eating the apple!

Daddy turned 30

Daddy's birthday was this past Monday, and he turned the big 3-0. I had a family party for him at the house on Sunday, and we were excited to host our first real gathering ever! Our last house was just too small to entertain people in!!

All of our local neices and our nephew came over, and the kids and the dads spent the majority of the day in the pool. We also had a cookout, and after a few hours of pool time, we celebrated with cake and ice cream.

I thank God every day for bringing my husband into my life. He is so gentle and kind. He works very hard to provide for us, and always puts his family first. I am so proud to be his wife and I look forward to celebrating many more birthdays with him!!

Ocala Trip

For Memorial Day weekend, we went up to Ocala and stayed for two nights. Daddy's brother owns a property up there, and he let us stay in their large trailer for the weekend. Daddy's brother, his wife, and their daughter met us up there and stayed at their property, which happens to be just one mile from where we stayed. Daddy's mom rode up with us as well, as she had never been there before. We took Maggie too. The trip was a little bittersweet for me because we took both dogs up there last year and they loved it. Daddy and I had talked about taking them back again over the next year, and we just never got around to it. It made me sad because I know how much fun Thomas would have had...man I miss him!! Anyway...

On Saturday night, we went over to Tim's brother's place for dinner. They eat seafood every year for Memorial weekend, so they had steamers (either raw clams or raw oysters..I can't remember), and they fried up some fish. I wouldn't go near the raw food, and Daddy ate one, but T gobbled up four of them. They were so gross looking, and he just scarfed them down without a care in the world. I tried to get a picture but he was done before I could locate my camera.

On Sunday, we went to a place called Silver Springs. It is kind of an amusement park, but a much smaller scale. We rode on a glass bottom boat, which allowed us to see what the springs look like from the inside. We did a jungle safari in a jeep and saw some animals. We watched a bird show. T went on his first amusement park ride without us-boats that go in a circle. He went on with his cousin and loved it! Then he saw the Merry-go-round and was running over to it shouting "Hooray." He rode on a horse with Daddy behind him. They also had a nice jungle gym for little ones to play in, and he liked that too. We were there for about half the day, then went to eat at a BBQ place.

Once we got back, T and Daddy rode on the quads and the tractor. Daddy's family came back over to hang out and we had a BBQ that night at the place where we were staying.

We had a fun Memorial weekend and are so thankful to all the men and women who died for us and for our freedom!