Prayers Needed

My dear friend lost her son this weekend to a tragic accident. Please keep this family in your prayers. It hurts me so much to think of all the pain she must feel. God can heal all things with time. She is so strong in her faith and I know He will be there with her every step of the way.

Bloggy Winner

During the Ultimate Blog Party, I hopped around visiting all kinds of blogs. It was pretty cool "meeting" lots of new people. Along the way I stopped over to Kystals blog at Our Happy Family. Surprise! Surprise! I won these really cute handmade cards. They are so nice and it has inspired me to make my own! It reminds me a lot of scrapbooking. This would be a nice project to work on with the kids without being too overwhelming. Thanks Kystal! I'm actually going to use one tonight for a fellow co-worker.

Will Spring Stay?

I've been off from work for spring break and it has been so cold and windy. I was looking forward to working in my flower beds. They are so pitiful. I live in an area with lots of pine trees and we just can't get much to grow. I've tried so many different plants and they all end up dying. The plants that have survived are the ones that were already here when we moved in. One being the azaleas. They are so beautiful. The problem is the blooms don't last and will die too. I also have forsythia, gardenias, roses, jasmine, and hostas. I have the farthest thing from a green thumb and it is so sad because I really do enjoy trying to be a gardener. My neighbor down the road is a wonderful gardener. She'll ride by on her bike and stop to give me tips and offer up what she calls "God's Gifts"......any of her plants that have reproduced. She must see how much help I need! I've killed most of those gifts. I just don't have much of a green thumb, as much as I try.

My husband made me a small garden bed a couple years back and I have had success with growing tomatoes so this year I plan to plant some more. All winter I've been throwing veggie scraps and such to help fertilize the soil. We also threw our pumpkin out there in the fall just to see what would happen. I went out a couple of weeks ago and turned the soil under getting ready for planting this week. Yesterday I happened to notice over 30 pumpkins plants!!! I'm going to have to thin them out but we've decided to see if we produce any pumpkins. I guess my hubby will have to build me another bed to plant those tomatoes.

Here is one side of the bed. It is uneven because my dog decided to use it as her digging grounds. I'm going to have to put something up around the bed because she'll dig up the poor plants!

The pumpkin seed is still on the leaf.

Special Exposure Wednesday/Wordless Wednesday

EI Visit Today

Today Mattie's Early Intervention coordinator came to review her goals and write new ones. Mattie met all her goals that we had set six months ago and we came up with some new goals for her to work on.

One goal is to have Mattie cruising/walking. Mattie has no problem pulling up on furniture and she will reach with all her might to get to an item. She just won't cruise down the couch or coffee table. If you place it just out of reach, she will plop down and crawl to the object and then pull up again.

We also set a goal to practice using her pincer grasp. She mostly scoops with the palm of her hand when eating. She also suggested letting her hold her spoon more even if she isn't really feeding herself. She has shown more interest with wanting to use her pincers so I think that will be an easy one.

The other goals were to encourage her to initiate playtime and sounds to objects. Mattie really doesn't show much interest in playtime. I'm not sure if others have experienced this, but she will just sit alone very content. If you bring her a toy she will play with it, but she really doesn't go to her toys and pull things out. She will crawl all over the place, but not to play with toys. She really likes things that make noise so if she sees paper or her wooden circles on the floor, she will get those things. They have to be out in the open though. We've also taken those little plastic containers and put rice/noodles in them. She loves to shake them. No need for expensive toys!

So far we've not had any therapist coming to the house on a regular basis. We are keeping a close eye on Mattie's development, but she really seems to be fine with just the things we are doing with her. Her coordinator said she will talk with the therapist and they may come out for a visit. Then we can decide from there what we want to do.

Happy Easter!

Hoping everyone is having a nice Easter! The girls woke up this morning and went through their baskets. Mattie happened to find the first egg of the morning that the Easter Bunny hid last night. The older girls finished finding the rest of the eggs. While searching for Easter eggs, they also came across another treat. I've posted a picture below. Then it was hard boiled eggs for breakfast. We then got ready for church and went to lunch with friends. No big plans for dinner since it is just us. We'll probably do something simple and mess free. The thought of a big dinner and a big mess was not in my plans for today!

Mattie finds the first egg!

Yes....that says Happy Valentine's Day. The girls were searching for Easter eggs and found these chocolate bars. I had bought them for them in Feb. and totally forgot about them! So today was two holidays in one!

Hatching Chicks

One of our class projects this year was hatching chicks. Thanks to the 4-H program for getting us the eggs and incubators. It is actually pretty easy and the kids love it. Once we get our eggs and incubator, we just keep water in the channels for moisture and turn the eggs three times a day. During the process, we can candle the eggs. This is when you take a flashlight and shine on the eggs. You can see blood vessels and even the embryo moving around. It takes 21 days from the time you get the eggs from the hen. This year we had 13 eggs. We had 10 eggs hatch. Unfortunately, life is full of uncertainty and not all the baby chicks are born healthy. We did have one chick pass away and another with an issue with it's leg. This is just an added lesson that our children learn about life. Many times the strong and healthy chicks will even pick on the small and weak. I find that quite ironic since some people in this world do the exact same thing to others.

One of my students put the little chick to sleep.

Happy Birthday Caroline!

What a busy week! Caroline's birthday was on Tuesday. She turned 8 years old. We celebrated her birthday twice. Her first party was with our group of friends. We went to Pizza Inn and reserved the party space upstairs. That was the perfect setting for all those families. I'm sure we had about 40 people and boy was it loud. I kind of feel sorry for all the customers below us. On her actual birthday, we took her to one of her favorite restaurants. So on the way back I ask her about her favorite gifts. So here are her top favorite gifts.

#1....her new backpack with her initial.

#2 Books! Yes....I think I have a child that loves to read!!

#3 scooter.....What a great buy! We got it for $20....marked down from $50!

#4 Money and Gift Cards