"The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds
for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards"
~Anatole France~

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

A Princess and her kitty

Oh how this girl loves her kitty!

 Hershey has just started roaming around a little bit and she loves to play in Morgan's room!
 They really like to color together
 Hershey climbs up on the table and plays with the markers
 She spends lots of time being lugged around like a babydoll
 and doesn't seem to mind at all
 Morgan has reanamed her Annaleise.  She's been watching a lot of Barbie Princess and the Pauper and Annaleise is the name of the princess in that movie
 She thinks it would be a great name for Hershey
 Daddy isn't convinced yet
 The kitty doesn't seem to care either way
She's just having fun playing with her princess!

Hershey

My husband forgets a lot of things.  But he hasn't forgotten a conversation that we had many, many years ago.  Seems that a long time ago when we were having a discussion about adding a new puppy to our crew, we (and I say that very loosely) made the decision that the next time we got a puppy, we would get a kitten at the same time.  That way they could grow up together.  Avery's been asking for a kitten for a long time and now Morgan has jumped on the kitten bandwagon.  Well, I didn't think a thing of it when we decided to add Chloe.  He, however did.  He spent many a night searching the internet for the perfect kitten.  Late one night we were laying in bed and he hands me the iPad and says "what do you think about this?"  "Umm, it's cute, I guess"  was my reply.  Not another word was mentioned...until a couple of nights later.  Late Monday night, he shows me the picture again.  Seems this BOY kitten had stolen my husbands heart and there was no going back.  
Tuesday morning, I take the kids on a "field trip" to the animal shelter. I didn't tell them where we were going until we pulled into Walmart and go in to buy the necessities for a kitten.  Kind of ironic that I'm the one going to pick up this kitten and I'm not even the one who likes cats.  Unfortunately, the shelter is only open from 10-5 and Mike couldn't get away from work.  Obviously, the kids were beyond ecstatic.  We had just told them about Chloe a couple of days before that, so this was over the top for them.  Two new pets within a weeks time!  When we got to the shelter, we were directed to the "kitten house."  Me, three kids, and about 40 kittens were in a small shed, and remember that I don't like cats!  I couldn't find the one that matched the numbers of the cat Mike had found online.  Back inside we go.  The worker goes back out to the shed with us and directs us to the back side where there are even more kittens outside.  I've already been pounced on at this point and not really feeling the love for these kittens.  And then I spotted the cutest, shyest, littlest, gray tabby.  I looked at the tiny collar around it's neck and low and behold, the numbers matched!  After some paperwork, we were on our way home with a boy tabby named Hershey.  

 Our first night went great.  Hershey slept through the night in his room, pottied where he was supposed to potty, and seemed like a perfect fit for our family.  I made an appointment for the next day at the Vet.  Hershey got a clean bill of health.  Considering he had come from the shelter, the fact that all he had was a mild case of fleas was a miracle.  I was expecting worms, and who knows what else.  The vet handed Hershey back to me and said "this kitten looks great.  The only thing is, Hershey is a girl."  The words out of Graysen's mouth were, "Oh great!  Now me and Dad are really outnumbered!"  Avery's were, "Mom, what's Daddy gonna say?  I don't think we should call and tell him this over the phone.  I don't think he can handle that.  Mom, we have to tell him this kind of news in person."  Well, long story short, the boy/girl news wasn't a deal breaker.  We all had fallen in love with this sweet kitty and there was no way she was going back!  The only thing left to accomplish was introducing her to Sadie!

 

We waited a week and have gradually been introducing them.  I wouldn't say they love each other, but they tolerate being in the same room with each other.  Hershey spends a lot of time upstairs, while Sadie stays downstairs.  

  
   Little does Sadie know, her world is gonna get rocked even more when Chloe comes home this weekend!

Chloe

We're all very excited to be adding this sweet little face to our family
Looks like we may be able to have her this coming weekend.  It's been a very long wait and I've answered many times the question of how many more days until Chloe comes home.  Morgan is the one who's been keeping track of days.  Only she didn't have enough fingers for the number of days, so she's been counting weeks instead.  

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Thursday, May 12, 2011

Easter 2011

We spent Easter at home this year.  We started out the day with early church and Sunday school and then came home to a fabulous pork tenderloin that had been cooking all morning while we were gone!  
The Easter bunny didn't disappoint.  Movies and games and a little bit of candy thrown in!
A quick photo shoot on the front porch before clothes were destroyed by lunch and an egg hunt
The Easter bunny took all of our empty eggs and filled them up for us to make our egg hunt more fun


Morgan had her own area and a little help from Mimi 



While the kids had their egg hunt, Mike and my dad worked on putting in sections of privacy fence around our patio.  What a difference a little bit of fencing makes.  We now have a peaceful, private area to sit outside and enjoy the birds chirping and the flowers that are starting to bloom.  

Family Night at Chick-Fil-A

It was fairy princess/superhero night at our local Chick-fil-a this week.  While I personally go for the free kids meals, my kids go for the playground, the coloring pages, and the face paint.  

 Thank you Chick-fil-a for providing me with 90 minutes of free entertainment for my kids!

Monday, April 25, 2011

Time

Having my kids home with me all day is great.  But, I've found that in order to have any time to myself at all, I need to get up before they do.  Some of my favorite mornings are the dark, rainy ones.  Seems a cup of coffee always tastes better when you're drinking it in the quiet moments before the little ones get up!  I am by no means a morning person.  As a matter of fact, I would much prefer to stay up late.  But, the pull of having a few quiet moments in the morning has outweighed my desire to sleep in!  Today, is one of those mornings.  It's 9:15 and all my little people are still sleeping. 
 ~It's amazing what I've accomplished already~

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Valentine's Day 2011

I have a sweet girl.  While she has a couple of love languages, the most powerful of them is gift giving.  Last year, our first year of homeschooling, she was really disappointed that I didn't make a huge deal out of Valentine's day.  Sure, she got Valentines from grandparents, and from her daddy and I.  But, apparently that wasn't good enough.  So this year I went all out.  We studied a little about the history of the day, painted some themed pictures, and made our own Valentine's bags.  
 Oh how each of my kids love to do art work!  Give them some paints and they are satisfied for hours.  That makes this mama very happy to have such creative little people!


 Everyone had their own bag and each of us made a special Valentine for the others.  I wrote each of them letters telling them how much they were loved and what traits they had that made them so special.  I found Graysen's letter tucked into his nightstand a couple of weeks later.  Avery has hers in her desk.  I hope they treasure these letters and read them over and over again as they get older.  
 Daddy came home from work a little early and had flowers for all his girls and a special Valentine balloon for Graysen.  I think the smiles on my kids faces are proof that I redeemed myself this year!


Jumping In

I've been out of touch for awhile.  I was once the faithful author of the blog Notes From the Craddocks.  But, two years ago I started homeschooling my kids and all my spare time went out the window.  My computer time was used to find new curriculum or exciting things online to go with our current studies.  My free time was taken over by science experiments in my kitchen, math with jelly beans, classifying sentences with my oldest and reading to my youngest.   I tried several times to get back in the swing of blog posting, but after many failed attempts, I gave up.  I just couldn't get the dark cloud from Notes from the Craddocks to lift.  I really want to document all the fun things we're doing as a family, all the things we're learning from our life experiences and the neat places we're going.  So, I'm starting fresh, jumping back on board and telling stories from our 
Little Green Schoolhouse!