Advent!

Wow we have had a very crazy year it seems, and this blog has suffered because of it. I really don't want to get into the details here. I do want to say though that God has really been teaching me some hard things this year and I hope that I am actually learning them. I'm hoping 2013 will be a bit calmer and I can get to blogging a bit more. Today I just wanted to share some of the things we were able to do for Advent this year. Since I am posting the entire month all at once I think I will go ahead and put up a slideshow. Once again we used our wooden Advent calendar and had daily activities planned. I tried to take pictures of all of them but I did miss a few things. It seemed this December our kids really got to learn about and practice giving. The pictures aren't in any particular order and include all sort of things i.e. baking, frosting, light parades, Advent wreath time, live Nativity, making bracelets for Wally, St. Nicholas Day, my birthday, etc.Some of the things that I forgot to take pictures of were an Angel Tree lunch that we helped at, Drive Through light display, Getting warm things to donate to a local place that helps the homeless, etc.

A Couple of Birthdays!

We have two birthdays close together in the fall. Sweetpea turned 7 on October 31st, and Buddy turned 3 on November 9th. Here are some pictures from the festivities:

Sweetpea had a horse/rainbow party!

The kids made tie-dye bandannas.
 
Straw creations!
 
She broke it on the second hit!

Buddy! He had a Cookie Monster party!
 

Fun Fridays!

We have been trying to get together with my sister, sister in-law, and cousin on Fridays for some nature walks and science learning. The kids are enjoying that very much and I'm enjoying our new schedule of 4 full school days and 1 lighter day. Here are some pictures from a few Fridays:

Learning about Butterflies and flowers!

Human Digestion day! The kids made stomachs and learned how we digest.
Bird watching and nature journaling!
We also made popcorn strings for the birds.
   
Pumpkin Patch field trip with local homeschoolers!  

There were two other Fridays in here but I must have forgot my camera.

Camping September 2012

We had a vacation the second week of August and went camping for a few days. It was really nice to go the second week of school because nothing was crowded and the weather was still fairly nice!

It was really nice because we were able to reserve a cabin. The nights were cold so it was really nice.

Boys love fire!

The kids had so much fun find little trails around our camp site!
 
 Keeping Warm!
 
 We discovered some beautiful trails at the South Slough!
 
West Coast Game Park!
 
The Beach and Sunset!
 
 Park Fun!
 
Aside from Buddy feeling a bit under the weather this was the pleasantest most laid back vacation ever!