Downward dog baby

You really only need to watch the first 30 seconds of this video...silly thing wouldn't let me upload the edited version. Yes, it's cold and the baby really should be wearing pants and socks, but we found that he practices crawling a lot more without them.
Not that he needs a lot of practice, because he's EVERYWHERE. This afternoon I placed him in my room with a toy, right in front of the bathroom door while I was blow drying my hair. All of the sudden I heard a big thud. When a peaked out at him, he had flopped himself on his belly, weaseled his way to the wall, yanked on a cord and pulled my alarm clock off the end table. I'm so not used to this. Alison would have sat there quietly and played with the toy for an hour. Eliot says forget this silly toy, I want danger!

Snowed in!

We got about 14 inches of snow on Sunday. Church was canceled and the town pretty much shut down for the next 2 days.

We took advantage of our snowed in days and did a whole lot of nothing. I loved it! We stayed in our jammies, took naps, read books, drank tea and played some games.Ben took Alison outside for awhile. She could barely walk through the snow, but they made snow angels, a snowman and she even got daddy to play house.

Eli and I stayed nice and toasty inside. He did not like being left out of the fun, but we had fun getting hot cocoa ready for Ben and Alison.

Christmas 2010

Christmas Eve
We celebrated Christmas Eve different than most, but I suppose we always will. As the kids get older our traditions will change, but for now I'm enjoying what we have. We had the Boomer's over for Christmas Eve dinner on Wednesday so we could all relax and enjoy our time together and not have to worry about rushing off to church. Christmas Eve day Ben made cheesesticks and dessert pizza for lunch and then we opened our Christmas PJ's.

I was surprised how great the kids did during the "family friendly" Christmas Eve service. I know they see Ben play music all the time, but I was just waiting for Eli to shout "Dadda!" or Alison to run up to him on stage. They acted like it was no big deal Daddy was up on stage and were more interested in the bulletin than anything else. It was a sweet time for me. Alison leaned over to me and whispered, "Mommy, they're reading the same story that's in our Advent book!". Praise the Lord something's been sinking in this season!


My favorite memory of this Christmas was seeing Alison sprint out of her room at 7:30 (the kids actually slept in!) to see her stocking. We all snuggled in our bed to open stockings.

Ben made tea pastries and Alison took her time putting every single item of her stocking away, in it's exact place.
With a fire lit, tea pastries in the oven and hot coffee in hand, we let the kids open their presents. Eliot was excited to play with the wrapping paper and we enjoyed time playing with each new toy. My favorite gift was a box of nutty bars. I know, it's funny. But Ben and I both have fond memories of nutty bars when we were kids and it was fun to reminisce and share some stories with the kids. They were even our "fancy" treat for our princess tea party.

After naps, we went to the Williams' for dinner. I'm so thankful for their friendship and the kids had a blast playing together.

We had a great Christmas and I hope next year, and every year after that is just as good.

Merry Christmas!

This Speaks For Itself

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

A house full of LOVE

I love my family!

Snow Day

A random blizzard hit yesterday...well, for Virginia it was a blizzard. We woke up to a few flurries and by the afternoon we had about 4 inches on the ground. We only played outside for a couple of minutes, but Alison LOVED it and immediately started throwing snowballs.

We enjoyed a quite day at home and made gingerbread cookies.
I love snow days, especially when I get to stay in my nice warm home with my family.

A Simply Shear Sunday

We were loading up the car yesterday to go to church, when I noticed Alison was carrying a tiara. I asked her why she needed to bring her tiara to church.
"Just in case I need to be a princess, Mommy."

Eliot learned a little more than about Jesus in Sunday school. He came home with a whole new vocabulary and hasn't stopped jabbering for 2 days.

8 Months!

We've had a great family day, celebrating Eliot's 8 months of life. We watched Alison in her ballet class (aka: watch Alison stand in one spot with a glazed look on her face while all the other kids do the routine) and then we went to the Christmas Parade. Eliot's second tooth came through this morning. He seems to handle teething much better than "sister bear" (as Alison likes to be called) ever did. He's been a little clingy/cranky, but nothing unbearable.

Eliot was SO happy to get his first "famous daddy's" cheese stick tonight.

Just some random things

Eliot is on the verge of crawling. He gets up on all fours and just rocks back and forth. He scootches backwards and now he just needs to figure out how to go forward.
We're hoping he waits until after Christmas to really get on the move, or our presents and tree are going to be in trouble.

Alison has been asking to wear dresses every day this week. Yesterday she wore a cute little bracelet and carried her pink purse with her the entire day...even during school.

We're thinking singing might be in Eli's future....and this is what happens when you make Alison watch Veggie Tales for school.

Letter J

We kicked off the Advent season with 'J' is for Jesus. We talked a lot about Jesus' birth and used a sticker board to help narrate the story, although somehow baby Jesus ended up with a pet lizard. It's important to us that our kids know the truth and have the focus of Christ...which brings me to my beef with Santa. Alison had a Christmas party this week at her art class. The teachers had her make a popsicle tree and told her to put it in her house so Santa knew to come give her presents. This is one of my ultimate pet peeves. Why do people think they have the right to convince my daughter to believe in lies! She came home asking when Santa was coming to our house to give her everything she's ever wanted. So, sorry to all you parents out there-but I told my daughter the truth, that Santa is just pretend and we give gifts to each other to celebrate Jesus' birth and the ultimate gift that God gave us through his son-forgiveness of our sins and eternal life. A few days later, Alison had another art class in which they were writing letters to Santa. She felt very convicted that her teachers needed to know the truth about Santa. I wasn't there for the class, but she told me later that her teachers talked about Santa again and she very bluntly told them that Santa doesn't come to our house.
Besides killing Christmas for all the other kids at the Y, we...

jumped in some leaves,

played jump rope and learned how to do jumping jacks. We sang jingle bells and made some jewelry. We also learned about jungle animals and jaguars. We worked on telling time, lacing, tracing and letter recognition.

I had "WOW!" moment this week. I started a prep for Kindergarten workbook with Alison this week. I've hesitated for awhile because I felt like the concepts were a little too advanced for her, but I finally decided just to jump in and give it a try. First page, with no prompting, she got it 100%. She was able to look at a picture and circle the correct letter the word started with. For example, she could look at a picture of a rainbow and find an "Rr" and circle it. WOW. I didn't have say anything or point to anything...no instruction, she just got it. Is she Ben's daughter or what?!

Shows: Veggie Tales: Josh and the big wall, Veggie Tales: Jonah, Gigi: Dreaming of a pink Christmas, JoJo's circus

Books: Cusious George takes a job, Jaguars, Let's Go, Jill and Joe!, Johnny Appleseed, The Day Jimmy's Boa Ate the wash, My "j" book, Jungle Animals, The story of Christmas

Biblestories: Jesus' birth: Luke 1-2, Jonah: Jonah 1-4, Joshua: Joshua 6

And for a little fun, we spiked Eli's hair

Thanksgiving 2010

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good.
His love endures forever.
Give thanks to the God of gods.
His love endures forever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
His love endures forever.
Psalm 136:1-3

The Lord certainly is good and has given us so much to be thankful for. I'm thankful for a God who cares for me, provides for me and forgives me. I'm thankful for a Savior who is my strength and my all. I'm thankful for the wonderful family He has given us and for the unconditional love they continually pour out on us.

Elizabeth, Kent, Jordan and Sophie joined us for Thanksgiving this year. It was so much fun having a house full of family. I'm thankful that Nana and Granddaddy are early risers and spent some time with Alison each morning when she rose with the sun.

I'm also thankful a little pampering and relaxation. Elizabeth graciously treated the girls to pedicures to get prepped for all of our Thanksgiving festivities. It was Alison's first time in a salon and she had a blast just sitting in the massaging chairs with us. The technician very sweetly did Alison's toes at the end, even throwing on some sparkles for her.

Thanksgiving day began with tea pastries and we watched the parade. Alison helped Aunt Sophie make some cookies while the Ben, Kent and Jordan played chess.

It was a beautiful day, so Alison and I headed outside to play in the leaves and "carve" our pumpkin.

We roasted the pumpkin seeds, made lots of yummy food, took some naps, played some games and got ready for the feast. Oh, and in the middle of all that, the neighbor's turkey fryer went up in flames in their back yard and we had help them out. Thankfully everyone was safe and there was no damage.

I'm so thankful for my princess. I'm thankful for her sweet spirit, endless hugs and kisses and passion for chocolate. We were getting ready for dinner and she asked if we could wear sparkly shirts and bracelets for the occasion. I love having a little girl to get dressed up with.

Alison asked to help decorate the table. She insisted the forks be placed backwards and was excited to have her very own special tea cup.

I'm thankful for my precious monkey. He's turned into quite the little ham and I'll take all the chubby smiles I can get. And I'm thankful for his first tooth that FINALLY came through yesterday.

Dinner was amazing and the food just keeps getting better each year. Our menu was: smoked turkey and ham, sweet potato casserole, Nonny's mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, stuffing, cranberries, creamed onions and pumpkin pie. Pecan pie and zwiebach were also on the menu, but we ran out of time to make them.

Friday we decorated for Christmas and exchanged some gifts. Alison has this cute fascination with decorating. She even asked to forgo the annual pizza cook-off so she could continue decorating the tree. I finished all the decorating yesterday and she keeps politely asking if she can move things to where she thinks they would look better.

She was so excited to help daddy put the angel on top of the tree and is counting down the minutes until we start reading the advent book.

Alison made Nana a special gift and wrapped it herself. I'm so thankful for grandparents who get excited about pink pieces of paper covered in pompoms.

I'm thankful that kids think the smallest things are the best toys ever. Elizabeth and Kent gave Eliot stackable cups-he's played with them for days on end.
I'm thankful for our simple life; full of drool, giggles and love.

I'm a movie style!

Letter I

This is the assortment of activities we did this week for letter I...the incredibly cute little boy is just a bonus for the picture. We made an igloo, made and 'I' island, watercolored, worked on tracing letters, numbers and shapes, punched holes in a letter I (to work on fine motor skills) and made a mouse to go with the book If you give a mouse a cookie.

We read the book Inch by Inch and learned about measuring and inchworms.

We spent some time working on opposites and started an "I'm thankful for..." chart. The things she added to her chart this week were: ice skating, art and daddy.
We learned about the color indigo and worked on counting to 30 by putting cheerios in a jar.
Eliot's favorite part of school this week was singing the itsy bitsy spider.

Books: My "i" book, I Took a Walk, I Love My Abuela!, What will I do if I can't tie my shoe?, Inch by Inch, If you give a Moose a Muffin, If you give a mouse a cookie, Is a Camel a Mammal?.

Bible Story: Isaac: Genesis 18, 21, 24 & 25, Israelites: Exodus 1 & 2, 14-17

Movie: Barbie, Island Princess

7 Months

This is a classic moment in Eliot's life right now: pants covered in drool, a shirt covered in lunch, playing with Alison's dollhouse car. He doesn't have any teeth yet, but is eating all finger foods. He's sleeping a solid 8 to 11 hours straight and taking 3 naps a day. Crawling isn't looking too far away-we just need to find some motivation to get him moving! I absolutely love this stage! I love how he wraps his arms around my neck, grabs onto the back of my hair and give me a great big slobber kiss when I pick him up. I just can't get enough of his little giggle and his chubby smile.

Letter H

Ontop of our "normal" school stuff this week, we had a birthday party for Mr. Horse, sang him 'Happy Birthday' and drank hot cocoa. We read 'Caps for Sale' and talked about how cap and hat are the same thing. Then we saw how many different hats we could balance on Alison's head like the peddler in the book:In the book, monkeys mimic the peddler's actions, so we played 'monkey see, monkey do' and hopped around like hippos, patted our head and wiggled our hips.


Somehow this outfit equals cowgirl to Alison and she rode around on her horse for awhile. She practiced saying, "howdy partner" and "yee haw!".

wearing a heart shirt

Then we sang 'if you're happy and you know it shout hurray' and 'head, shoulders, knees and toes'. We started to learn how to read a clock and talked about the hour hand.

We finished our week by stamping some heart shapes on a big H poster and cut out hand prints to make a fall wreath.

Our books this week were: Harriet's Halloween Candy, Honey Helps, Happy Hiding Hippos, My "h" book and I want a hat like that.
Bible story: Hannah, 1 Samuel 1 and 2
Show: The cat and the hat
Game: hide and seek

Eli had his first play date yesterday. We went to the William's for the afternoon-Stacie and I worked on biblestudy, Alison and Samantha had a tea party, and Eliot and Isaac rolled around the living room.

I mentioned that I thought Eli would be feeding himself within a week...it was only a couple of days. He does remarkably well for being 6 months old and toothless. However, it's slightly more challenging because he does not want to be spoon fed at all. And if he sees someone eating, he wants to eat too. But don't even try to give him baby food, he wants what you are eating.

Halloween and some stats

Sunday's are long days for us and by the time trick-or-treating rolled around we were all exhausted. We went trick-or-treating downtown (foregoing several invitations to tour neighborhoods), got a few suckers for Alison and then went on a family date for dinner.  Eli had his 6 month check-up yesterday and is now 16 lbs 11 oz and 27 inches long. He's actually dropped a little on the growth chart and is now more in the 40th percentile.

Don't turn around

Not even for a second.
I've had many chances to learn this lesson in the last 3 1/2 years of being a mother, but Eli is going to make sure I really get it down pat. The other morning we were all sitting at the table eating breakfast, Eli was in his bumbo on the table and he reached down, grabbed Alison's spoon full of cheerios and flung them all around the kitchen. I should have learned then-don't leave a bowl close to Eli. But I didn't. Lunch today was a typical lunch hour. I was trying to feed Eli while fixing Alison lunch and get a few bites of something myself. I turned around to get something for Alison and looked back to find Eli feeding himself some squash. He's at the stage where if he sees you eating something, he has to have it. Forget baby food, he wants the real thing. But he still has a very sensitive tummy, so I'm having a hard time coming up with "real", soft things for him to eat. He loves the little baby puffs and gets excited when he hears the container of them shake. I say give it a week and he'll be feeding himself.

I'm so proud my little man's sitting skills...I just can't get enough. I was taking some pictures of him the other day when Ben commented that he remembers a picture of himself in a similar outfit as a baby. So we pulled it up to compare.

Ben at about 6 to 7 months

I'm not sure Eli really looks like either one of us, but we do know that he is one super cute kid.

Alison has loved dressing up as Minnie Mouse this year.

She was invited to a ballet class and all of the kids dressed up

She acted exactly like I expected her to, the same way she does in all new, unfamiliar situations. She turns into this super shy kid and when asked to participate she gets a big frown on her face. She even shed some tears as they pranced across the room. This was only her second experience with dance, so I just kept reminding her that it was fun and she could just watch the other girls learn ballet. Ironically, when we got home, she kept saying, "I had the most fun EVER at Maddie's ballet class!" I may never understand this kid, but I'm thankful she wasn't traumatized.

Last night we went to the Y's fall festival.

There's not much to say about the event. It was past the kids' bedtime and not exciting in the least bit, but I think Ben's super cute in the this picture, so I had to post it.

Memory verses

Galloping goats!

Did you know galloping goats are super funny? Eli sure thinks they are.
We started 'G' week for school and Alison was pretending to be a galloping goat eating grain, gummy bears, gumballs and drinking green tea.
This is the first time he's laughed out loud at something other than being tickled. Notice his sitting skills? Within a week he learned to sit all by himself. I wonder if he'll catch on to crawling just as fast.

A week at school

It's letter F week at Shear Preschool and I thought I'd give you a glimpse of what school looks like for us. I'm hoping to blog weekly about school so I can keep track of what we've done, what she's learned and maybe get some ideas/feedback. Also, when it comes time for little Eli to learn all this stuff I'll already have it set.

We started off the week with family fun day and ate french fries at Five Guys. We also went to see the fish at Bass Pro, which Alison was not excited about (her fear for animals is growing by the day).

Our "normal" school day looks like this: breakfast, school time, Y, play alone time, lunch, reading time, nap, school time, play outside or computer time, show, dinner, family time, bath, bed. Monday's and Friday's she has story time, Tuesday's and Thursday's she has art class and Saturday's we're taking a mommy/daughter ballet class. In the morning school session we talk about what day it is and sing our 'days of the week' song.
Then we go over our memory verses, sight words and states. Occasionally I'll throw in some math at this point, but really Alison's just interested in the chocolate candy we use so I don't do it every day. She's got 1+1=2 and 2+1=3 down and can count to 20.
Then we spend some time working on writing. She practices tracing the letter and then does an activity of letter recognition.

The salt box is tactile tool I use to work on learning to write. I've actually found it's really helped her drawing skills in general.
Then we usually work out of our curriculum 'Before Five in a Row' which reads one book a week and works through activities that go with the book. I also add books that go with our theme for our reading time.

In the afternoon we read a bible story, do some workbook pages, color and play some games.

Along with the curriculum, we have a letter of the week. Alison knows all of the letters, can recognize them and knows their sounds. We're working on writing them and spelling simple words.

This week:
We worked on our cutting and pasting skills while making a poster for our new verse: Psalm 1:6 "For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish."
(Alison insists on writing her name on everything she does, except she hasn't quite got the concept that the letters need to go in order. She knows her name is spelled A.L.I.S.O.N, but the letters will be written all over the page instead of in a line in one spot.)

She water colored and upper and lower case 'F',

made fruit faces,

and finger painted.

We read Hattie and the Fox and The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night (which happens to be a song that daddy sang for us) and made a 'F' fox craft, while learning how to spell fox.

Eli wore his fox shirt and Alison wore a flower shirt.

We read How Many Fish, worked on counting and made a 'F' fish craft.We read The Flag We Love, learned the Pledge of Allegiance and had fun waving flags in the air (Alison thought they were fun to cheer with and made up many flag chants)

The flag activity is actually a great example of why I love the homeschooling concept. While planning F week, I thought she would love an emphasis on flowers and had several flower themed things planned. However, while at the library she discovered the flag bag and asked to get it. I was surprised at her interest but I was able to adjust my plans and encourage her love for learning about this topic. We talked about flags everyday and just had flower shaped sandwiches one day.

We also read a book about seasons and met some friends at a pumpkin patch to enjoy a fall day.

Our other F books were Franklin and his Friend, Fancy Nancy and the Fabulous Fashion Boutique, My Five Book, The Reason for a Flower, The Farmer in the Dell and Fat Cat on a Mat. The "shows" designated for this week were 'High Five', 'Sesame Street's Firefly Fun', 'Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue' and 'Dora's Fairytale Adventure'. Our bible story was Jesus feeding the five thousand.