A glimpse into what it is like to live in our home just this moment.
Intentional Outdoor Hours: 2+ hours (of 1000)
So cold and snowy! But the kids are doing great. Gemma had a sled-riding birthday party she attended where they pulled the snow tubes around behind the snowmobile (most fun ever!) and Violet had a playdate with a friend that they were able to go sledding. Grey taught Rusty how to shovel the snow off the porch and sidewalks and Rust was so proud to be big like Grey.
Reading and finishing Legendborn by Tracy Deonn and also finishing The Companion by Katie Alender. Both books were borrows from my thoughtful students who share their favorite recent reads with me. I borrowed Legendborn from my student Lily and really loved the creative, meaningful twist on the King Arthur/Knights of the Round Table stories. So good and interesting and leaves you hardly waiting for the next book. The Companion was a borrow my student Cali and was spooky and had me trying to guess the whole time what was going on. I had a lot of guesses (they were all wrong) and the book was sufficiently creepy enough to keep me up half the night just to finish it and find out the truth. It was one of those books that the main character has some blackouts (like Woman in the Window or Girl on a Train) which always makes ME feel like I'm also having blackouts - LOL.
Excited about getting our first green chicken egg! We have one Easter Egg layer and she finally started laying this week! This great news as that means the other girls we got at the same time should start laying too. We've been down to very low egg production the past few weeks from a combination of winter daylight hours (lowers production), some older hens slowing down, and our newest girls not ready yet for laying. But we are so excited not only about green eggs (and ham, hah) but also to have more regular eggs now - we've been using them sparingly to make sure we can get through the weeks!
Giving elbow bumps to Gemma and Violet for being so good at handwashing and drinking out of their own cups this winter season. We have been doing so well with no regular sicknesses this winter (thanks in part to virtual school for MP2 and also all the sanitizing thanks to Covid), but all three boys took a beating this week with runny noses, sore throats, and general tiredness (very much sinus infection signs). Brandon and I got hit with it too, but Vi and Gem were good - so I figured they must be doing better at the handwashing/germ precautions than the rest of us -good job girls!
Smiling about how sweet Rusty is with my baby bump. He is truly the kid who is most excited and thoughtful when it comes to the prospect of a little sis. He never fails to wish her good morning and good night and regularly asks how his baby sister is doing in my belly. He is just the sweetest sweetheart sometimes, especially when it comes to his role as a big brother.
Prepping for Valentines day at school. The little gifts I got for the kids (from Oriental Trading) arrived this week and the kids got to work writing out their valentines and packing them all up. I was lucky to find free printables in the theme of each of the kids' toy gifts on the internet (win!) so I just printed them on colored paper card stock and we went with it. Rust had squishy sharks, Violet had stretchable glitter horses, Gemmi had squishy cats, and Grey had mini skateboards.
Swooning over Peter Kavinsky and Laura Jean Covey. The third TATBILB movie was released this week and don't you know this little baby girl nugget woke me up with insomnia at 3:07a on release night. So - I stayed up and just watched it. hah! The girls watched it on Friday evening (fast fwding through the two parts that are a little sexy) and they loved it. I literally reminded Gem about it coming out and she immediately started squealing and doing chores so she could watch it immediately.
Cracking up about guinea pigs on leashes.
Amazed at Red and his ball handling skills. I know I said this before, but this kid! I swear he is starting to actually dribble. At 10 months. I'm in awe of his freakish-ness.
Enjoying a mostly quiet night at home on Saturday when the big boys got to have a sleepover with Chum and Abba. (thank you!) What a huge difference in noise level it makes to be down a kid or two - especially when the kid or two are Grey and Rust!
Winter sporting with one game and on practice for each Grey and Gem. Gem is really starting to understand basketball now and so fun to see her get aggressive and make adjustments so that she can do her best. She's starting to see passes now and she's been getting a lot of steals (and bruised knees/hands) and tons of rebounds. Grey is still doing great and his passing has been stellar - we love his inside looks to his buddies and they are all trusting each other better on the court - just like they do on the football and baseball fields now. And B had a CT football league meeting this week for next year where we spilled the news that I will not be coaching cheer this year because too many baby-babies (hah).
Teaching with 2hr delay schedules mixing up my classes and one called off day (because Red was home sick). Spanish 1 started watching Ferdinand the movie to finish out their bullfighting unit (so cute and even the big kids love watching it). Spanish 2 finished the Which Way Home Documentary and read chapters 1 and 2 of their novel Esperanza. Spanish 3 learned about the imperfect past tense in Spanish and turned in their Cereal Box Preterit-o's projects (they are so cute!) I found a very cool Imperfect vs. Preterito Maze worksheet on Teachers Pay Teachers that was a big hit with the kids and really helpful in figuring out how to choose which tense based off of context. Spanish 4 finished up their La Dentista Choice board projects.
Making all kinds of yummy snacks for Superbowl Sunday (mozzarella sticks, soft pretzel bites, jalapeno popper dip) plus B ordered wings from Tulunes because he and Grey would not have survived without wings for the game (lol). Later in the week, we made copycat Zuppa Tuscana with homemade breadsticks, crockpot chicken over biscuits (homemade biscuits!), crockpot Hawaiian meatballs over rice, frozen pizza and buffalo chicken dip. B made a really yummy General Tso's sauce to put over popcorn chicken and rice to celebrate Lunar New Year (year of the ox!), and on Saturday night for dinner, since it was just B, Gem, and me - we had Valentines dinner with crispy shrimp and Brussel sprouts because none of the three of us know when enough shrimp or Brussel sprouts are enough.
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