School Starting Up Again

Annabelle and Jonah were busy today! They planned, prepared and presented a magic show for our family. Our favorite magic trick was turning Jonah into a cat! They also wrote in their journals and made dinner - RS casserole and homemade rolls. WOW! What wonderful kids!

School started this week. Ezra was home to help us get ready for the first day of school! Annabelle is in 5th grade with Mrs Farnsworth (She has Porter for math and language arts). She is in a class with 5th and 6th graders combined. She did not get many friends in her class this year. But she has a good attitude and is looking forward to getting to know more people. Jonah's teacher Mr Feldman has a very large mustache and long hair. Jonah has several of his good friends with him in class. They played some fun games as a class, so he is enjoying school so far. Grace thinks her teacher Mrs Morgan is very pretty and very nice. That keeps her happy, even though her best friends are not in class with her. So far they all seem happy.

We went on a walk in the woods Saturday night. Finn had a stick in his hands the whole time. Often he carried 3 sticks at once. One was so big he had to drag it. The nature trail we were following ran near the lake edge. It was beautiful! We are very much enjoying the slightly cooler weather after a scorching summer. It only took a few days of cool and rain to turn the world green again.

Olivia was excited to start back up in preschool. She cleaned her room right away in the morning so she'd be ready to go, because I told her she has to have it clean before I'll take her to preschool. She wanted to wear the pink and green big skirt Grandma Susan made for her. Shen she came home she told me all about snack time. They get to pour their own milk this year! Many of her old friends are back again this year, and she made new friends!

Summer Research Reports 2012

August 2012

Just a look at some of the research projects we worked on this summer. 

Well, starting with Spring Break way back in March. We studied ponds. Annabelle did ponds in general, and what happens in pond life during the winter. Jonah learned about muskrats, since we have seen a muskrat at our pond. Grace learned about butterflies. Olivia learned about crickets, since I couldn't convince her to pick something more closely related to ponds. 

These are our pond pictures. I let the kids pick out which coloring page pictures from the computer that they wanted to print, color, cut out.

This is Jonah's, he wanted his realistic: (I didn't scan these until they had been handing on the wall for several months, so they are very faded. The water used to be blue)

This is Olivia's:

This is Grace's:

This is a selection of Jonah's report:

One week we learned about things in the ocean. Annabelle picked sea horses. Grace picked sea stars. Olivia picked jellyfish. Jonah picked sunken ships.

One week we learned about birds. Annabelle - ostrich. Jonah - sparrow. 

Grace - swan. Olivia - robin.

This is Jonah's art, he used how to draw instructions for various birds:

And Grace's picture she drew herself:

 One week we learned about states. Annabelle studied Oregon. Jonah did California. 

Grace did Utah. Olivia did Kansas.

Here are some pages from Olivia's mini state book. The light pink crayon she used to copy the words didn't show up:

One week we did dinosaurs. The first picture is Olivia's, the second is Grace's.

One week we learned about sports/olympics. One week we studied some natural disasters like hurricane, tornado, volcano, earthquake. No pictures those weeks. But we did build a volcano in the garden and used baking powder and vinegar for the lava. We also did an experiment with jello jigglers to demonstrate earthquakes!
Research Reports were a little more challenging this summer. I think we are loosing steam, especially with all the other responsibilities we have. But when we just set aside a few minutes early in the week, usually we can have at least partial success. We'll keep at it!

Dad's FHE Talent

For Family Home Evening, it was Ezra's turn to share a talent. His talent was that he can carry all 5 kids all at once. I didn't get the camera in time to catch it. Here Annabelle and Jonah are falling off his back.

Ezra is in the ICU (intensive care unit) this month. He does a 24 hour shift every 4 days. That 24 hour shift is hard on the body!

Lizz and David asked us to record our kids singing "Call Me Maybe" so they can put it with their kids and others to make a music video for Emmeline's birthday. So we turned the CD on and sang while washing the car and van. The kids liked that.

Check out some video's on facebook! Go to Heidi Slaugh Hallam's page, look for Aug 18, 2012 for the "Call Me Maybe", Sept 6 for "Little Piggies", Sept 16 for dancing girls in costume.

August 10, 2012: We've had a few ants here and there this past week trying to get to the cat food. This morning we discovered a full colony line of ants going in and out. So I researched some ways to get rid of ants. I got the kids involved to help clean the area, then mix vinegar and water to wash the area 3 times a day. We also made a mixture of borax and jelly, and placed it near their ant home but in the opposite direction to intice the ants that way. If they take it, it should kill them. 

Anyway, going through all this this morning, Jonah kept saying, "No, don't put so much there! We don't want to kill ALL of the ants! I LIKE that ant colony!"
Apparently he's been developing a friendship with the ants, you know, leaving bits of chips and cookies and watching them eat... teasing them by blocking their path or putting things down the ant hole... Poor kid pretty much ran off crying at our lack of sympathy and our injustice.

Susan's comment: Oh poor Jonah always had such a tender heart. Remember the time when he was three and I called tell him how I watched a fox catch a rabbit. ( thinking he would find it so fascinating) and he started to cry and said " well that wasn't very nice! Did you make the fox spit it out? Did you take the rabbit back to it's mother?"

Sunday, Aug 12, 2012: The kids played for a very long time. They pretended they were caught in a hurricane and took out foil packs of cheerios and coconut cups with water to make the experience realistic. It was raining lightly at that point. They also pretended they were all birds; sparrows. The mom and dad sparrow (Annabelle and Jonah) taught the 3 baby birds how to fly. We had read a book yesterday on how birds fly. They face the wind, get a running start, flap hard, etc. I love watching the kids play so creatively together.

Fishing One Afternoon, Aug 7, 2012

We picked up subway sandwiches for us, worms for the fish, then drove to the pond on Cherry St.

Annabelle's 10th Birthday Party, Aug 4, 2012

Annabelle had a beach party for her 10th birthday party. We drove the girls to Kent Park Beach. Grandpa Slaugh was here to help drive and watch our little ones. We had pizza and watermelon and pink lemonade in coconut cups.

 We've had hot, hot weather all summer. This particular day a storm came through during the day and cooled us off. So our evening at the beach was a bit cool, but the water was still warm.

Annabelle had a fabulous birthday weekend! Friday was her actual birthday. She didn't have to do any chores. She baked in her easy bake oven with friend Emily. She made pudding and jello, too. Grandpa Slaugh came! She opened presents. We went out to eat at Bandana's BBQ. Grandpa Slaugh put the kids to bed while Heidi and Ezra went out to the movies to celebrate their 11th anniversary. Saturday started with the youth triathlon. Then the party in the evening. Super fun!

"Just Tri" Youth Triathlon

Aug 4, 2012

Annabelle and Jonah signed up to do a youth triathlon at the North Liberty Rec Center.

Orange swim caps were ages 12-14. Blue caps swim caps were ages 9-11. Yellow swim caps were ages 6-8.

So excited to start! Let's get this thing going!

They started in heats of about 10, lined up along the pool. Annabelle had to swim a full lap, 50 meters.

This is the transition area, getting ready to bike.

Annabelle biked 2 miles.

Final leg: run 1 mile.

Phew, done! And well done!

Jonah started about 20 minutes after Annabelle. His group got to dive in and swim 25 meters. 

Jonah had quick transitions. Here he is on the bike: 1 mile

And now the run: 1/4 mile. Jonah sure sprinted in at the end!

Great job triathletes! Annabelle and Jonah were exhausted at the end. They worked hard and earned their finisher's medal. Yeah!

And here are some other pictures I took before, during and after while we waited. Grandpa Slaugh was here to help play with the little ones during the event.