Deeanne’s Blog

Isaac’s 7th Birthday

Thu, 4 Mar 2010 20:44:37 -0500

It’s hard to believe that my firstborn son is 7 years old now! Isaac turned 7 on February 9th. We started the birthday celebrations with our family gathering over breakfast to watch Isaac open his cards and a few presents. Isaac was quite pleased with all the birthday money he received. =)

We hosted a birthday party on the following Saturday (February 13th). Two of his friends were not able to come, so we invited them to come over during the week. I tried to plan it so they came over on the same day, but we couldn’t make it work between everyone’s schedules. So Isaac had a friend over on Tuesday (his birthday), then again on Thursday, and lastly a party on Saturday! Talk about a birthday WEEK! =)

We were planning to have a “sports” party for Isaac, but we still had at least a foot and a half of snow on the ground, so the party turned into a “Play in the Snow” party in our backyard, followed by Wii games and a pizza lunch!

Esther was invited to a birthday party for a friend from church during the same time, so that was perfect for her to have a fun “escape” while the boys were being boys!

100th Day of Homeschool!

Fri, 5 Feb 2010 19:49:29 -0500

Today we logged our 100th day of homeschool! The kids knew we were nearing the 100 day mark, but I kept it a surprise and drew a big sign on the dry-erase board for them to wake up to. We had fun doing some different things to make the day special. The kids started out the day by counting 10 groups of 10 Fruit Loops for breakfast - that kept them busy for a while! Even Seth insisted on “counting” out his Fruit Loops! We normally have oatmeal, so this was indeed a special occasion. We did 100 exercises (10 reps of 10 different things), read about the 99 sheep + one lost (and then found) sheep, named 100 Bible characters (while eating a special snack), among other “normal” things that we do for school. =)

Jason’s Mom gave us the globe in the picture as a Christmas gift - I saved it for the first day back to school after the holidays, and it was a big hit. We are all enjoying it. =)

Just this afternoon I went to the library to return books and pick up some items on hold, including some short fiction chapter books in the series “Secrets of Droon” that Isaac and Esther are reading like crazy lately. After the library, we went to Walmart for some groceries, picked up pizza and came back home. Esther finished one of the chapter books before we even got home (she read while she sat in the cart at Walmart, and while we were in the car)! No wonder I have so much trouble keeping enough library books on the shelf!

Seth recently started drawing stick figures, and attempting to draw other things too, like animals. It’s so fun to watch his determination as he carefully works on something. He has been coloring “in the lines” for quite some time, so it seemed like the next natural skill. He just loves to draw on the dry-erase board side of the easel. Another favorite activity of his is to play with coins while I finish reading lessons with Isaac and Esther. He plays in his room for 50 minutes while I work with Isaac and Esther, but when his timer goes off he knows he can come out and join us. He does puzzles, plays with and sorts the coins, and frequently requests to play with Isaac and Esther’s “tiny Lego’s.” He is really growing up - exciting, but also sad that my little guy is getting so big!

In honor of our 100th day of school, we came up with 100 Bible characters. Mom helped a little, but they remembered a lot on their own! Even Seth shouted, “JOSEPH!”

Seth’s first stick figure!

Now he draws them all the time! The stick figures have multiplied!
My little bookworms!
Coloring and doing a Word Find with cousins.

Seth, sorting money.
Esther, practicing piano.

Our New Niece is Here!

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:20:09 -0500

Ben and Elizabeth welcomed their new daughter, Margaret Christine, into their family this morning at 8:05am! We have all been eagerly awaiting for her arrival, especially since she is their 6th child, and the FIRST girl! Now each of us married siblings has one daughter. My parents now have 12 grandchildren, 9 boys and 3 girls.

I went to the hospital tonight to meet “Margee” and visit Ben and Elizabeth. It was very special to be the first one to meet Margee, and I’m so grateful our families have each other to share momentous occasions like this since the rest of our family live far away. We will be sure to share lots of pictures for all of you who can’t be here in person yet!

Ben and Elizabeth are doing well. Their boys will be meeting Margee in the morning. Can’t wait to see a picture of Margee surrounded by her 5 brothers! =) There are a few more pictures in our photo gallery.

December Treasures

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 22:57:50 -0500

Well, I’d say I’m a bit overdue for a blog post! I better get one in before all the festivities and celebrations next week!

We have had a variety of really fun and special events already this December. Preparations for Christmas are in full swing. We got our tree up at the beginning of the week after Thanksgiving (which is late for me, usually it goes up on Black Friday!). The kids all have strings of Christmas lights in their rooms. Christmas lights were always a big deal in my family growing up, so I was delighted that my children enjoy them so much too. We will be traveling to Massachusetts on Wednesday, Dec 23rd, to spend Christmas with Jason’s family. We are looking forward to it!

In early December, the kids and I went to a live showing of Schoolhouse Rock in the State Theatre (it was free!). Schoolhouse Rock is a series of animated musical educational videos. It was very well done and the kids really enjoyed it! A bunch of our homeschooling friends were also there, and we enjoyed going to McDonald’s afterwards.

Here are the kids with their friends Lydia and Tate Geiger.

We have been making our fair share of Christmas goodies here. Esther helped me make peanut blossoms, and we made some little miniature ones to have a tea party together.

We used chocolate chips instead of Hershey kisses for the chocolate. Perfect! Esther thought it was the greatest. When I was little, I remember when my mom used to let us make our own little loaf of bread in a mini loaf pan! Now I get to do it with my little girl! I love Esther’s smile in this picture. You surely can see the delight on her face.

We had a fun Christmas party with our homeschool co-op group. I forgot to bring my camera! But I did snag a couple pictures at our DiscipleMakers headquarters staff office party! Note the difference between the picture of the girls and the picture of the boys...

The girls happily huddled together to pose for the picture...
The boys didn’t notice I was taking a picture! They were focused on their pizza!

And last but not least, we have been learning a little bit about Tchaikovsky recently, so I took Isaac and Esther to see the Nutcracker Ballet, put on by a local dance company. It was lovely and the kids enjoyed it. The picture at the top is of the 3 of us getting ready to go to the show.

Waiting for the show to start...
Esther studying the program.

Esther read 100 books!

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:36:04 -0400

Esther filled up her “reading chart” well over a month ago. For each 20 books she read, she got some kind of reward (a little prize, her choice of dinner, etc.). My mom did something similar when I was young - and I remember really liking it! She is reading amazingly well - way to go Esther! I used this “rewards chart” idea to help motivate her in the beginning (Isaac too), but she has really taken off. For the 100 mark, she got to invite a friend over for (most of) the day and choose a special dessert. So Esther invited her friend Ema Scott. Ema is just 10 months younger than Esther, though Esther looks a lot older since she is so tall for her age! We had a lot of fun making cupcakes, decorating cupcakes, eating cupcakes, playing outside, doing a craft, playing with Legos, etc. and reading together. The boys had a good time too!

Esther and Ema pouring over an American Girl Doll magazine.

Decorating cupcakes!

More decorating fun!

Finger painting leaves for a fall tree craft.

Snow Day on October 15th!

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:55:02 -0400

The kids were thrilled that it snowed a bit today. I got out the winter gear and suited everyone up for playing in the wet snow. Definitely a high light of the day... until water soaked through gloves and I had cold, wet children to get warm and dry. =)

Apple Orchard Field Trip

Sun, 4 Oct 2009 20:41:54 -0400

We had the pleasure of going to the apple orchard last week! It was a very windy day, so we brought along our winter gear, and I am very glad we did! We went with a group of other homeschoolers. We went on a hayride along one side of the orchard and learned all about apple trees, how they are planted, how apples are picked and stored, etc. The kids also got to walk through the big walk-in cooler (big enough for a forklift to get inside)... boy did it smell good in there! Then we saw how the apples were washed and sorted by weight. All this for a very reasonable fee, especially since we took home 6 lbs of apples and a half gallon of apple cider! We all brought a picnic lunch, hoping to eat under the apple trees, but opted to eat inside because of the wind. A grand time was had by all!

Birthday Boys

Sat, 5 Sep 2009 21:44:42 -0400

Happy birthday to Jason and David! David turned 13 on August 23rd, and Jason turned 32 on September 2nd. David is spending a few days with us while Suzanne visits a friend in Wellsboro. We enjoyed a joint birthday celebration the evening Suzanne was here... pizza for dinner and blueberry pie and ice cream for dessert! I tried to make a cut-out of a balloon on the pie, but blueberry goop overflowed and it looked like a big mess! Oh well!

We are enjoying the holiday weekend. Jason and David did some Wii game shopping with some of their birthday money on Friday morning. On Friday afternoon we went to the new Park Forest pool - a big hit with the kids! There are 2 slides, and one of them is tame enough for Isaac and Esther to go down. Friday night we enjoyed “dinner and a movie.”

Today (Saturday), has been a full day. Jason, David and Isaac went to Isaac’s football scrimmages. Isaac also had his team picture today, so they had to be at the field at 10am! The second scrimmage ended at 1:25pm. A long time in the sun, but they all survived! Esther, Seth and I went to a birthday pool party of some friends, and we had a great time. Needless to say, everybody crashed this afternoon (well, I didn’t, but I would have liked to)!

Summer Days

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 21:32:13 -0400

Today has been such a productive day that I am taking a “break” to blog (fun for me!). I feel as though God made the clock tick slower today. I had a long list of things to do, and I was unexpectedly able to get through almost all of it. I give the glory to the Lord for providing the time I need as a wife, mom and homeschool teacher. =)

Here are some of my favorite pictures from various outings recently. We went to Spring Creek park with 2 other families a couple weeks ago. I did not plan for the kids to swim (ran out of time and energy to pack all the swim gear), but since all the other kids were already playing in the water, we let our kids go in with their regular clothes. Boy was I grateful for the “emergency” bag of clothes that I keep in the car at all times! We had a really fun time. We had some nice fellowship as adults while all the kids went exploring and playing in the creek.

Jason took this picture of Isaac when he took the kids to a park last Saturday morning. He commented on the rusty monkey bars - the kind of bars we were used to as kids! I love this picture of Isaac though - it captures his coordination and focus. And his signature tongue sticking out slightly to the side.

Esther just learned this trick today. She ran into the kitchen to tell me that she was close to being able to hang by her knees, and that she would keep practicing. Esther does not usually show a lot of emotion, but occasionally she gets REALLY excited about something, and then she talks a mile a minute and has a smile a mile wide. She ran inside again soon after and told me she could do it, “Come see, Mom, come see!!!” So here is the proof that Esther can hang upside-down, all by herself!

Here she is excitedly telling me about her accomplishment.

July Guests

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 22:54:04 -0400

We got to visit with some special friends on July 28th. Shamus and Karen lived in State College for a couple years while Shamus was a grad student at Penn State. They moved to South Carolina 2 years ago, and this was the first time we had seen them since they moved! They have an adorable baby boy, Jay, born in Dec 2008. We had a great time having them over for dinner, catching up, and of course, the boys had some Mario Kart fun on the Wii! We’re thankful for great friends like the Cronins!

We had the privilege of meeting and hosting another couple at the end of July. Tim and Patricia Young, with LightSys, came to serve DiscipleMakers for a few days by helping with computer systems. Tim is known for being an amazing story-teller, and we thoroughly enjoyed having them stay with us for a couple nights. Tim told some stories to the kids, and they were so sad to have to go bed and miss more story-telling! One of his stories was about a pirate’s cove (I missed it because I was making dinner), and they got inspired to make a pirate’s cove and treasure maps. Too cute!

Having dinner with the Cronins.

Other side of the table...

Wii Time!
Happy Family!

Trip to Wisconsin!

Wed, 15 Jul 2009 20:36:18 -0400

Esther and I flew to Wisconsin early last Thursday morning, and I mean EARLY! We woke up at 4:45 to be at the airport in good time for our 6:30am flight. Our friend Anne Bounds was gracious enough to give us a ride to the airport so that Jason didn’t have to wake up the boys to take us. Thank you, Anne! We visited my parents and little sisters, including Heidi’s family! We met our new nephew (cousin), Gavin, Heidi’s third child. What a cutie! We spent about 5 days and just soaked in all the family time, fun outings, good food and fellowship.

Some highlights:
Riding the express tram and moving sidewalks at the Detroit airport
Esther picked cherries with Papa
Ethiopian food on Thursday night
Pizza dinner on Friday night
Giving baby Gavin lots of attention
Watching girl cousins Esther and Elyse play together
Esther and Elyse’s outing with Nana (portraits, shopping, ice cream!)
Visiting Old World Wisconsin (outdoor museum of rural late 19th century)
Sleepover for Esther and Elyse (and their moms!) at Heidi’s house
Esther: scrapbooking with Nana
Watching old home videos of Kinza and Colette as toddlers
Playing Risk
Lots of talking!

Home Improvement

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 20:56:49 -0400

This picture (above) is from the spring of 2006. Jason is giving Isaac and Esther a lesson in how the toilet works. Our bathroom has undergone a few minor improvements over the past 3 years that have helped to transform it for the better! The first thing we did was hire an expert to remove the shower doors on the bathtub. We discovered pretty quickly that it is really hard to bathe toddlers when you have sliding doors and their tracks in the way! The next project was painting. Though the bathroom had a lovely dark green linoleum floor and a pretty new sink and vanity, the color of the walls detracted from all of that.. a bright green that totally clashed with the dark green floor! We had to do one coat of primer and 2 coats of pale green to cover the bright green. Yikes! The dark green blinds provided privacy but also blocked out all the natural light, so after experimenting a bit with some different options, we ended up with putting a frosted film coating on the window. It turned out pretty well! Now I’m just looking for a simple valance to finish the window area. And lastly, Jason undertook the project of replacing the ugly, too-big-for-the-space light fixture above the vanity. I wish I had a picture of the old one so you could get the full effect, but I couldn’t find any. Check out these before and after pictures!

Seth is Growing Up

Tue, 26 May 2009 22:03:22 -0400

The past week has been a big week for Seth! I started potty training him last weekend, and after a couple days of wondering if and when it was going to stick, he had a breakthrough on the third day and has been nearly accident-free since then! The other big change is that Seth is no longer in a crib. Jason took the crib apart yesterday and we set up a little toddler bed for him. His bedroom is pretty small, so it will be nice for him to have more floor space for playing even though he doesn’t have much wiggle room in bed (compared to putting a twin bed in the room). I have been busy sorting through baby things that don’t need to be kept in his room anymore, as well as putting away toys that he has grown out of. Jason’s Mom is letting us use some of her furniture (that would otherwise be in storage right now), so we moved a bigger and much-needed dresser into his room to replace a little dinky one that was about half the size! The wall-hanging above the dresser is a framed cross-stitching that my mom had in our house when I was a child. She passed it on to me recently, so it was fun to find a perfect place for it.

Seth’s first night and first nap in his toddler bed went smoothly, so hopefully that will be the trend! I am very grateful that he has done so well with these 2 big transitions. I can’t believe that my baby is growing up. This is the first time we have put the crib and changing table in storage after 6 1/2 years of constant use!
Funny Quotes

- I had my Bible open at the table, where I typically read a chapter out loud to the kids. Seth asked, “Are you going to read the tractor?” I guess he thinks I’m reading a “tractor” instead of a “chapter!”
- While trying to get a bite on his fork, Seth asked, “Can you help me dig this?”
- After a couple days into potty training, Seth said, “I love pee pee and poop and toilet paper and wipes!” Isn’t it funny what they get excited about and how they express that excitement?!
- I talked with Seth about moving him into a toddler bed. The day we set it up, Seth asked, “Am I going to sleep in my tyler bed?” He has a cousin named Tyler. It does sound a lot alike! =)

This picture shows part of the closet and the wall facing the wall with the window. The door to the hallway is on the right, just out of view.

Esther reads to Seth to help keep the restlessness in check on one of the first days of potty training.

I thought it would be fun to post some old pictures of Seth’s bedroom. The walls were this bright lavendar when we moved in! Isaac and Esther used this room until we finished off the 3rd bedroom the summer Seth was born. Isaac and Esther are pictured here with cousins Tyler, Zach, and Judson.

And here is the nursery after stripping wall paper border, painting, ripping up carpet (and putting down an area rug), etc. And now it is a little boy’s room. =)

Funny Quotes

Sat, 25 Apr 2009 07:09:52 -0400

I haven’t blogged in while and decided to post some of the funny things that the kids have said recently. Read on for some good laughs! They are so cute. Naturally, the biggest list comes from Seth. 2 year olds say a lot of funny things. He’s working so hard, trying to learn the intricacies of the English language!

Seth

● We were praying at breakfast, and I started praying for forgiveness as if Seth had disobeyed, instead of thanking God for the food. He interrupted me saying, “That's not it, that's not it!”
● I read from Matthew 25 to the kids, the part about the sheep and goats being separated before the Lord on the judgement seat. Afterwards I said, “Do you want to be the sheep or the goats?” Isaac and Esther quickly answered “Sheep!” Seth busted out, “I want to be the goat!”
● While eating popsicles, Seth said, “It's pretty cold. Can you warm it up?”
● Jason was planning to read to the children and said, “Tonight is going to be Dr. Seuss night!” Seth answered in a worried voice, “I don't want to go to the doctor!”
● Isaac got Seth out of his crib after a nap. Esther asked, “Do you want to come downstairs with me?” Seth replied, “No thank you, but thank you for offering.” (I’ve been prompting the kids to respond graciously when they don’t want something; my 2 year old was the first to use this wording without being prompted!)
● Seth is very passionate and often says the words, “I love ....” The other day I was making PBJ's for lunch. Seth saw the PB container and said, “I love peanut butter!” Then he asked me what color the letters were on the PB container. I said, “White.” Seth said, “I love white!” Then he saw the jelly container and asked, “Is that grapes?” I said, “Yes.” Seth said, “I love grapes!”
● Seth mimics the things we say, but sometimes gets the words jumbled. For example, he said, “It's a nice really day!”

Esther

● “What is that in the world?”
● I was going to run an errand after dinner and asked Esther if she wanted to come with me. She said no. I told her that I was going to take one kid with me, and she said, “You should probably take Seth because he is the destructivest.”

Isaac
● Isaac inadvertently said “the Chronicle son” instead of the “prodigal son.”

Happy Birthday, Esther!

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 21:40:00 -0400

Esther turned 5 years old on March 15th! Grandma came to visit us that weekend, and we had a joint celebration for her and Esther. Grandma turns 60 years old on March 22nd! We had a fun family celebration with tacos for dinner (Esther’s choice), opening presents, and yummy cake and ice cream. We had another celebration tonight (Saturday, March 21st) at one of Esther’s favorite places: Meyer Dairy, the local dairy. Jason takes her there occasionally for a father/daughter date. This time the whole family was involved. =) We invited a couple of families that we have met over the past few months as we’ve been visiting churches in the area. Esther has enjoyed befriending some other girls her age (and older) and it was a really fun evening of ice cream, coloring pictures, opening presents, and fellowship!