The 3rd, 4th, and 5th

It was nice to have a long weekend!

On Saturday, we went for a walk around the river. It was nice to be outside and even nicer that, for the entire weekend, the humidity was considerably lower!



We started the festivities a little early. Gracen made Grandma's Apple Pie. I remember very few family get togethers without this pie! The recipe calls for cinnamon red hots--an odd ingredient for apple pie. I wish I had thought to ask Grandma where this recipe came from.

I hadn't made this in a long time and had forgotten that this recipe card was written by Grandma. Gracen looked for a while at her handwriting.



After lunch on the 4th, we headed to American Village for the afternoon.



We saw the Liberty Bell and Liberty Hall, heard Thomas Jefferson speak, and saw lots of Colonists and Redcoats.



As we were watching the jugglers, they stopped for a moment and asked us to stand in a line. The three of us lined up and then we were being juggled around!



Gracen enjoyed the games. She did not like being on the team called the Redcoats!!

The 5th found us at home catching up on yard work and laundry! We did make time for some hot dogs and homemade chocolate peanut butter ice cream. All in a all, a very fun holiday weekend.

Easter 2009

Hope everyone had a great Easter! 

We always let Gracen open her Easter basket before Easter Sunday.  She was delighted this year to find Season 2 of I Love Lucy.  She has most of season 1 memorized!  She also had a bunny Webkinz and a chocolate bunny.

My 2 favorite people!

Sunday night, Jeff's mom, sister and brother-in-law came over--which means we got to see Audrey for a bit also!  She has grown a lot since we saw her last.  She gave us some smiles but they were a little quick for the camera!  

Room Redo

Gracen's room was the one room in the house that we didn't paint 4 years ago when we moved in. She liked the pink. She and I added the butterfly stamps .

Times change and little girls grow and decide that they don't like pink quite so much. Purple now reigns supreme. So, on Labor Day weekend, we labored! The walls had to be primed twice--and painted a lovely shade of Sugar Plum (twice).

The dots were a compromise. Gracen originally wanted stripes. We were more than a little leery of trying to paint straight stripes. So, we pulled out the other colors in her comforter, got some clear contact paper and Gracen painted dots. (Looking back, I probably would have put tissue paper between the pieces of contact for more color, but she really wanted to paint!) After everything was dry, the dots were strategically placed on the walls. It did bring some more color in the room. (Don't you love the Legolas poster on the wall?! She's been fascinated with him forever and she's only seen parts of the movies!)

The original closet doors were bi-folds that had a nasty habit of pinching fingers so we took those down and put up a fun shower fabric shower curtain instead.

The bedding that started it all!!

Thanks, Jeff, for working so hard to give her a great room! (He wasn't real sure about the paint color after the first coat. "It looks like Barney the dinosaur came in and exploded.")

The Third Part of the Fourth

Throughout the day there were "classes" on different topics. We went to one on animals (naturally!) and had the class to ourselves. The next one that we went to was on the science of fireworks. Gracen got to be a helper for this one. She was very excited!

In the class, they soaked cotton balls in alcohol and then rolled the cotton balls in different substances (most were some type of crushed metal) to see what color the flame would be. When we got home that evening, we had to have our own science class. So, in the backyard, we soaked some cotton balls and rolled them in different things and set them on fire! Gracen thought this was really neat.

She stood in front of the green screen and gave the weather report. There was a map and teleprompter off to the side so that she could read what to say and see the map. It recorded her giving the forecast and then we went to another area to watch her report on the small television!

I think one of her favorite things was the wind tunnel. The winds got up to about 78 mph with her in there.

After the McWane Center, we had lunch at Johnny Rockets (one of Gracen's favorite places). On Saturday, Jeff's parents and sister and brother-in-law came over for watermelon and a game or two of Rook. (They played; I kept score.)

We watched National Treasure 2 Saturday night--and ended our weekend celebration by making smores!

The Fourth of July, Part 2

The World of Water at the center was great also. I don't know if it was because it was a holiday or because we went in the morning, but we had some sections of the center pretty much to ourselves. We were able to take our time in the water section.

We all thought Papa would appreciate this picture of the big fish! Gracen was amazed. "It's even bigger than the one in Papa's cabinet!" (My dad caught a really big large mouth bass once and had it mounted. It really is a beautiful fish.)

We all thought the albino catfish was pretty neat!

These are just 2 pictures that turned out really good.

The Fourth of July, Part 1

For the Fourth of July, we took Gracen to the McWane Science Center. What a great time we all had! Here are just a few of the pictures.

Gracen began her time there by lying on the bed of nails. Jeff and I also tried this. I could have spent a lot more time on this--it felt really good on my back! But, we had to move on.

She always loves these pull yourself up by the rope things. She always gets off and checks her muscles!! She did the hard and the harder ones but the hardest one proved to be too much.

Gracen and Jeff enjoyed trying to fly the plane. Getting up was easy--keeping it level was a bit more difficult.

The harp with no strings made beautiful music!

Happy Valentine's Day!!

The Week's Review

We are finishing up Unit 2 of Tapestry of Grace, Year 2. This unit basically went from Renaissance to Reformation. It has been enjoyable and we have both learned a lot, but are ready for a new unit!

Over the past several weeks, we have been reading some of Shakespeare's plays in The Children's Shakespeare. I wasn't sure how Gracen would like these but most she really enjoyed. We discussed the fact that Shakespeare wrote different types of plays--comedy, tragedy and historical. She particular liked Romeo and Juliet (she now has a Webkinz named Romeo), Macbeth, and The Taming of the Shrew. One of her assignments was to keep a chart listing the plays in the correct category. I eventually turned this into a game of sorts and had her make predictions about whether the day's story would be a comedy or a tragedy. She also really enjoyed coloring the pictures in the Shakespeare coloring book.

When I finished reading Hamlet, Gracen's reply was "boy, I sure am glad that's over." Needless to say, Hamlet did not make her favorites list!

In other school related things, she learned about Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent. I had written several verses on cards. Her job was to look them up and fill in the who, what, why, and how long described in each. I used this to teach her how long Lent lasts and the fact that throughout the Bible, 40 (days/nights or years) was used to discipline and teach. We also focused (and will continue to) on Lent not being about our giving up something to please God, but about what Christ gave up to pay the penalty for our sins.

We did look a little at yesterday's Chinese New Year. Gracen did some reading about this and we looked at some current news--apparently China is having a really big snow storm right now that has essentially shut down parts of the city. Travel is severely limited in some places. We also made paper lanterns and had Asian chicken last night for dinner!

Since Valentine's Day is coming up, we decorated the mantle. Gracen made the little house from a kit we found on sale at Michael's. She had a lot of fun with that. And again, at Seasonal Delights, there was a pattern for the banner. We decided to give that a shot too.

My plan for the weekend is to place some verses about loving one another on heart shaped paper and create a Valentine version of our thankful tree. Gracen really seems to enjoy these "seek and hunt" approaches to Bible study. I've been really convicted about getting her into the Bible more in-depth than we have been. I've also been looking for ways to put God's words and teachings into her heart and to also help her see ways of practically living out those teachings--especially in regard to other people. Providentially, God placed a very tender heart in her and many times her natural bent is to look for a way to help someone or to express love to someone. I just want to cement it all in there!!

And, as always, if you've got any ideas along those lines--please let me know!

P.S. I apologize for any misspellings in this--Blogger's spell check isn't working!

More Christmas!

We had our family gift opening on Friday night before Christmas. Gracen loved opening the really long package. She had no idea what could be in such a big box! A pogo stick! I would say that a picture of her on it is coming--but I doubt it! A bouncing, falling, giggling child does not a good picture make.

It's hard to say whether Gracen received a favorite gift, but this surely has to be in the running. She opened a box that had a scrapbook and a camera case and was so excited. She just knew there had to be a digital camera in her future.

She was right!!

Another great gift was a vet play set with a lab coat complete with her name. The set came with all manner of vet essentials--stethoscope, cotton balls, syringe, scales, and much more. She has really enjoyed this; and so far, has limited her vet practice to stuffed animals. (Molly and Lily breathe a collective sigh of relief.)

Christmas

On Christmas Day, we left for a trip to visit my family. We enjoyed a great Christmas lunch with Mom, Dad, Nanny, Granddaddy, Clay, Niki, and Jordyn.

Cousins especially glad to see each other!

One of the long standing traditions at the Anders Family Christmas is Granddaddy reading the Christmas story. I'm not sure exactly when this started, but it is a treasured tradition.

Gracen got Nicki, the American Girl Doll of the year from Nana and Poppy. She was (and still is) a very happy girl!

Happy New Year

The New Year usually brings out something in me that has to reorganize and change something.
For us, this started before we left for Christmas!
We have:
~taken down and stored Christmas decorations
~rearranged living room, playroom, hall closet
~cleaned out 3 bedroom closets
~donated 2 truckloads of stuff to Goodwill
~gotten new calendars and schedules ready to go
~converting LP albums to CDs (Jeff's project!)

It never ceases to amaze us when we clear out just how much junk we hung onto and haven't used or get no enjoyment out of anymore. Hopefully, we will be more diligent about using and passing on!

The changes also affected the blog too! I hope everything works right. It's still a work in progress.

Happy 2008!!

May everyone have a safe and very Merry Christmas!

Memorial Day

On Memorial Day, my thoughts very often turn to my Grandfather. He's truly one of my favorite people--always has been!

Granddaddy served in the Marines during World War II. He saw a lot of action all over the South Pacific. I don't remember Granddaddy telling "war stories" when I was young. I remember seeing the Japanese sword that he has for the first time and I was probably about 10. It was then that I became curious about that period in his life.

He was drafted into the military as a very young, newly married man. He was very far away from home for probably the first time in his life. His first son was born while he was away--in fact, my dad was about 18 months old the first time that Granddaddy saw him. I can't imagine the emotions that he must have felt and probably had to keep "shut off" most of the time.

I was much older when I began to realize how much death and destruction he saw. And, what he had to do in order to stay alive. Now knowing just some of what he saw and went through--both in the war and after he came home--I have even more respect and admiration for my Granddaddy.

In this age, when mention of war sends people running for their respective sides and voicing their opinions, it may be worth remembering that when all is said and done, there's not much "pretty" about war regardless of how noble the objective. There seems to be two distinct sides--one America is right and the other America is wrong. I'm not sure that the lines are that clear and I'm not going to debate the "rightness or wrongness" of the current war. There are certainly things that are worth fighting for; I'd even say there are some things that must be fought for. I just hope that we, as a nation and as individuals, don't forget that there are people on both sides going through the ugliness of war.

In God's sovereignty, Granddaddy came home from the war relatively unscathed. He had an injury from shrapnel. After he had been home for a while, he was hospitalized for a long time due to a brain tumor that could have been caused by breathing in gases from the bomb. His life has been an example to me and to others. I hope that today, especially, he knows how very much he is loved and admired.