Reflecting on 2012 - Preparing for 2013

Yikes, the year is almost over... excited to see what the new year will bring for our family!  This post will catch you up, from Thanksgiving until Christmas, we've been busy!

 

Our super smiley girl!

Amelia is "being like daddy" with her Starbucks cup full of whipped cream - she assured us that it was real coffee though!

So proud of Amelia, I told her the order of letters, but she wrote them all by herself!

Let me introduce you to the new system in our house!  This has seriously eliminated all arguments about clothes.  I was so sick of the girls wearing the same Tinkerbell shirt and jeans so I was picking out there outfits, we would all end up in tears because they didn't like what I picked.  So now, every Saturday I fill up the shelves with 6 outfits (their church dresses hang) and every morning they get their clothes out, and get dressed without complaint!  Why didn't I do this sooner!?

A new favorite "treat" for the kids is having grapefruit for breakfast... 

Abram and Soph both got their first hair cuts thanks to auntie Cara!

Celia actually learning to enjoy her car seat!

 Amelia enjoying her first year of ballet class

Learning to play together when mommy is busy with Celia.. today they were having a picnic!

A new family favorite (we try to do it once a month) - make your own pizza night!

 

Abram's newest favorite passtime - coloring - he didn't color the bird though, I think big sister did that!

CHRISTMAS 2012!

The girls and their gingerbread house!

The girls decorating the tree!

All decorated!

We played some minute to win it games this year during our family party... everybody had lots of fun!

         Tim, trying to get a cookie from him forehead to his mouth!

All the kiddos gettin' grammy!

Grammy organized a live nativity reenactment for our viewing pleasure!  Amelia was the sheep and Soph was a wise man!

all the cousins (minus Abram and Celia) doing their play!

We all went in together and got mom a replacement Advent wreath since her original one broke... a special tradition in our family!

This year Sophia was old enough to help papa light one of the coveted 5 candles!

Daddy helping Abram open his Christmas jammies!

Sophia opening her new cabbage patch doll Kiya!

Amelia opening her new cabbage patch baby Birdie!

Christmas morning, opening stockings!

Abram got a set of Weebles for Christmas, they are the favorite toy this year!

All 3 of the kiddos playing with the Weeble tree, hopefully learning to share!  

Amelia playing with her Christmas present - magnetic dolls!

Sophia got a giant box of princess dresses for dress up for Christmas!

Our little bug turned 3 months already, I'm packing up the newborn/0-3 month clothes and getting out the 6 month stuff.  She is such a happy baby, sleeping great, taking good naps during the day, LOVING her new jumper and to watch her brother and sisters chase each other around the house!  So thankful for our 4th littlest blessing!

 Tim and I also celebrated 6 years of marriage this month!  What a blessed 6 years it's been, a new house, 4 beautiful babies and many other countless blessings for our family!

 

This is how I plan to spend a good part of my afternoon tomorrow ... hot cup of coffee and my planning journal...gotta see how far "behind" we are! We'll be starting school up again in one week after daddy goes back to work!  Time to get crackin'!

 

Coming January 1, 2013 I'll be posting our new school schedule and will be getting back to three posts a week so stay tuned!

Mondays: Mommy's Musings

Tuesdays/Wednesdays: Teaching Toddlers

Fridays: Our Week of Family Photos!

 

Hope you all had a blessed Christmas and have a wonderful New Year!

"Where" we homeschool!

We're linking up again with the "Not Back to School" blog hop.  This week is all about homeschool spaces!

 

 Our school "nook"!  This room doubles as our toy room so I can keep the "non-schooling" littles in sight while we do our work!

  

 This door is to the left of our school table and is referred to as the "school closet"

(it's secretly my favorite part of our house - because I get to keep it so organized!)

Inside the School Closet:

 We are currently using the workbox system, my oldest likes to be independent so this is one way that she can do that but still do the things that she needs to get done.  It's working for us thus far, as long as I remember to refill the boxes before she starts school the next morning! :)

 

Directly above Amelia's workboxes are more shelves.  The bottom shelf is current curriculum, plus file folders of current worksheets/lap-book materials etc.  The second shelf is mostly literature that we'll get to over the next several years, along with reference books, dictionaries etc.

 

To the left of those shelves are all our supplies!  I'm kind of an organizational freak (my label maker has been working overtime lately), so we have boxes for pretty much everything, stickers, felt, paint, manipulatives, beads, random craft supplies etc!  

 Directly across from Amelia's work boxes are more workboxes! :)  The girls know they are NOT to get into these drawers without permission.  The top left drawer is MY box!  It has things that the girls can't use, stapler, hole punch, grown-up scissors, etc.  The other large drawers are filled with Amelia's workbooks for school, construction paper, computer paper, scrap paper etc.  The drawers on the right side house things for the kids.  The top drawer has crayons/markers, then glue and scissors, dry erase supplies, etc.  The purple box in the middle is Sophia's drawer - she's not old enough to be doing school but wants to be involved so every day I put a special game or coloring book of some sort in there for her to do while we are working.  The bottom half of the drawers are full of file folders, notebook paper, etc.

On top of the large workboxes is our giant roll of paper, and above it (pictured in the picture above) are three hanging baskets, those hold our writing utensils, dry erase markers, pens, and pencils.

In need of more ideas for how to organize your school spaces?  Click on the button below!

Project Reveal!

After finishing the basement last summer and moving the master bedroom down there, we left the upstairs room (for the girls to share) very boring.

ENTER GRANDMA!

I didn't know what I wanted to do for the girls' room, just that I didn't want it to be pink, and I wanted it to be something they could grow into.  I never would've been able to do all this without my mom's help, she was at our house every day last week getting things put together and finished up (so that I could cross them off my list).  So without further ado, I give you the new and improved BIG GIRL ROOM!

First things first:  matching beds.  And notice the bed-sheet over the window, we've lived here three years and didn't even have curtains *hangs head in shame*

Next up: PAINT!

Before the room was a "basic blah beige" color.  Now it's a cheery buttery yellow (the girls say it looks like pineapple but it is NOT that yellow-ish)

Grandma rolled while I edged.  The girls had to watch so they were on their beds in the middle of the room most of the time!

*notice the post-it notes on Amelia's head board - if you saw my post about my project last week, the travel coloring case you'll understand, she has to save EVERY drawing!

Much better!  The girls even have matching dressers, Amelia's has pink handles and Sophia's has teal handles!

The details:  This was the most fun part of putting the room together!


Mom found these really fun pom-pom flowers on pinterest so we made a few to hang from the ceiling (did I mention they were SUPER easy)!

Finished project, just waiting to be hung!

We had this shelf, it use to be white and we didn't really have a place for it, so I painted it blue (similar in color to the turquoise pom-pom in the picture above but you can't really tell in this picture)!

Grandma making curtains (and talking on the phone at the same time - in case any of you were wondering where I get my innate need to multi-task!) !

The BEDDING!  I love, love, love this set.  So cute and girlie but not baby-ish!

And yes we kept the guard rail up to set a "boundary" of sorts for the girls, at least until they are use to sleeping together!  And no, there isn't room to move their beds apart.

The finished product!

The girls use the blue shelf (their mailbox they call it) for their special books.

They each have a crate for their many many many loved animals/blankets!

In case you were wondering what those fancy pom pom flowers were for!  

So glad this project is done!  I love how it turned out and the girls love their new BIG GIRL ROOM!