So sweet.

The last few days, Elijah has been quite serious about some things.  Yesterday he told me that he doesn't want to die because he never wants to leave me.  Today he told me that if a mean man ever breaks into our house, he will do everything he can to be mean to him and save us. When I went over our safety plan of locking himself in a room with Isaac to call 911,  he insisted that he would make sure I was safe first, and then try to fight the intruder.  Oh, my dear sweet boy.  I think I drilled it into him that he is to stick to our safety plan and call 911, that it is the very best way that he could ever help Mommy, but I had to fight back tears.  My sweet, sensitive little boy wants to be my hero.

As I was helping him to brush his teeth tonight, I was telling him that he would have his new molars forever, so he needed to take care of them.  I told him someday when he was grown, he wouldn't need someone to double check his teeth, that he would take care of them all by himself.  He said that was okay, but that he would always want to brush his teeth with Isaac.  I hid a smile.

As I was helping him into his pajamas, he asked me to tell him about when he grows up.  I told him how some day he will be a great big boy, that can cook and help dad do bigger projects than he does now, that he can mow the lawn for me and help me take out the trash.  He told me that he likes helping me, and I told him that he is for sure the best helper I have ever known.  I told him that some day he will be big enough to drive, and he would even own his own car.  He said he didn't need his own car, because Daddy was going to let him drive the van and he would just keep that as his own car.  I smiled imagining him driving the same van that he rides in the back of now, in a harnessed carseat with a Thomas train in the cup holder.  I told him that someday he will be big enough to have a job where he earns his own money.  He told me that he still plans on getting a job when he is 6 (LOL).  I told him that someday he will be a great big grown man, and move into a great big house that he pays for with his own money.  He got the saddest look on his face and told me he is NEVER moving out of this house, and offered to pay the cable bill (God, I love that kid, he knows how to prioritize lol).  When I told him someday he would marry a nice lady and have his own kids, he said that he only wanted to marry me, and that if he had kids he would play Thomas Trains with them all the time.  I kissed his forehead, because he is the sweetest 5 year old boy I know.

I snuggled my guy as he relaxed and made his way to dreamland.  I got teary-eyed thinking about the fact that yes, some day he will grow up and be a great big grown man, one that has his own job, and a woman in his life that is not his mommy.  He will drive a car, no matter how worried I am while he is out, and he will sleep under a different roof than me, and fall asleep thinking about all the stresses and pleasures of his life, while I think about him, hoping he is happy and safe, and remembering when I was the one who tucked him in at night.  I sighed as I held my little 5 year old boy, trying not to blubber like an idiot on this poor, dozing child.  I whispered to him that someday he would indeed grow up, and some day he would be a wonderful man, with a wonderful life.  And the little boy, that I thought was sleeping, rolled towards me and whispered sleepily "I'm just gonna be me forever".  And you know, as long as he holds true to that, I think I will be able to handle him growing up.  With many tears.

He has an answer for everything...

a conversation between Elijah and I...

Elijah: Mom, I'm hungry
Me: Would you like a banana, or some of this marinated mozarella with crackers?
Elijah:  What's the cheese?
Me: Mozarella with sun dried tomatoes, peppers, and olive oil.
Elijah:  YUCK!
*30 seconds of silence*
Elijah: Okay, I'll taste the cheese.
*I give him a piece on a cracker*
Elijah: YUCK! 
Me: Say "no thank you", please
Elijah: NO THANK YOU!  YUCK!
Me: So do you want a banana?
Elijah: I like the cheese.
Me: Do you want the cheese with some crackers?
Elijah: No... how about some spinach dip?
Me: Okay.

*2 minutes pass*

Elijah: Mom, I'm thirsty.  What can I have?
Me: I'll get you some water.
Elijah:  What about milk?  Can I have milk?  (he doesn't like milk)
Me: Do you want milk?
Elijah: No, you know I don't like milk.  I want water.
Me: Okay.  (getting him water)
Elijah: ICE WATER
Me: There is no ice.  This water is cold.
Elijah: Not cold enough.  Can you make some ice?
Me: No, there is no room in the freezer for me to make ice right now.
Elijah: Can't you make some room?
Me: No honey, there is too much food in the freezer.
Elijah: So take some food out.
Me: No, because then it will go bad.
Elijah: Well, can you get an ice chest and go to the store and put ice in it and keep the food good that way?  Then there will be room to make some ice.
Me:  *dies of exhaustion*

Gobble Gobble

Happy Turkey Day, everybody! (that's all umm 3 of my readers ;) It's only 10:30am, turkey is a'roastin' over at moms, and I thought I'd go ahead and toss up some pictures of our hand turkeys that we made last week.

So as with every holiday, I was all set to drive myself nuts with some festive cut-out cookies. Oh, how I hate them, but oh, how cute they are... well I was saved by the bright bulbs over at Nick Jr. television. They showed a bit between shows about making hand turkey cut-out cookies. Easy, cute, and lots of involvement from the kids! I hauled my stuff over to mom's to make a mess of HER kitchen and dining room :)

No pictures of making the dough, but believe me, there was a lot of taste testing going on! After trying literally dozens of cookie recipes, I have settled on a cream cheese cut-out that holds it's shape very well. So, cream cheese, butter, eggs, vanilla, sugar, flour - MMM!

So we paaaat it, rolllllll it...



(Did you see me rip off a little piece from the front there and eat it? No... no. Neither did I. Ahem... moving on.)


Have your super-enthusiastic kids trace their hands with a toothpick...

 

I added some little beaks on the turkeys, and roasted them! Bwahaha!


This is Bella. She really wishes this was one of my clumsy days, where I drop everything on the floor while I'm cooking :P Sorry Bella. Come back in 30 minutes when the dining room floor has been covered in sprinkles, and there is frosting wiped on the chairs.


Time to decorate! I told my boys to have at it with the sprinkles, and they took their job very seriously!


See? These kids don't mess around.


They were lots of fun to make, and the boys definitely enjoyed them. We made some pine cone turkeys yesterday, but I didn't have my camera handy. Still, I'll post some pictures of the finished product later on. Hope you all have a great Thanksgiving!

Gobble Gobble!

5 already

Elijah turned 5 on October 4. It amazes me how quickly time seems to pass after having children. I never have a day that feels as long as a day that I spent at school as a kid, or at work as an adult. Time never creeps anymore, it just seems to be rushing us along.

There is something about the age of 5. Kids that are 3 and 4 always want to be 5, and it's a birthday that's often celebrated big, like a 1st or 16th. For me, Elijah being 5 is bittersweet. I love that he can have a real conversation now. He can tell me what's wrong when he's sick or hurting. He tells jokes, and is wildly independent. He is sensitive, creative, adorable. I love all of these things about him being a great big 5 year old now, but I already miss him being a drooling little crawler and a chunky cheeked toddler - he's huge on my lap now. If these last 5 years went this fast, he will be 10 before I know it. On his birthday he asked me when he will be 7, and 8, and 12, and 13... "Way too soon" I told him. He'll be all grown up before I know it!

We had a little family party for him, complete with a Thomas cake that Grammy made. She made him the same cake last year, and he was planning on another for his 5th birthday since about the day after his 4th birthday ;) He got lots of great gifts, including some pirate Legos, Imaginext toys, and a pet rat from Jon and I that he named Toby.

I can't even let myself think about the fact that the next birthday we will celebrate will be Isaac's 4th. These guys are growing so fast!

The Homeschool Thing

So the question of the month is definitely "how is the homeschool thing going?" My honest answer is that 'The Homeschool Thing' is going great! We actually call The Homeschool Thing "CAVA" (Cah-VUH), which stands for California Virtual Academy. CAVA is a WASC accredited online charter school - we have an on-call teacher that we can meet with at any time (4x a year is required), and Elijah will be included in state standardized testing.

We are homeschooling because we feel that our children can get a better education at home. If they excel in one subject, they will not be stuck at the same pace as the rest of a classroom full of kids, and they are behind in something, they will get the help they need and never be overlooked and advanced before they are ready. In a brick and mortar school classroom, there is 1 teacher to about 30 kids. For every lesson, there will be kids that get it, and gets that don't. Even if 1/3 of the class isn't getting it, the teacher only has so much time that she can spend on the lesson before she has to move on, leaving those kids still not getting it. This will never happen to my children. Already I am seeing how Elijah is able to advance more quickly than if he was in an actual classroom. We are in the 4th week and Elijah is several lessons ahead in math and phonics, because he already knew a lot going into kindergarten. In a classroom, he would still be doing a lot of review, much of which he will loudly tell you he finds boring because he already knows it - he is ready to LEARN!

I'm not a teacher, and luckily I don't need to be. Right now I am with Elijah during his school time, because he needs me there to help guide him and help him stay focused. As he gets older, Elijah will logon to his online school schedule, and receive his daily instructions online. Some of them will be self-led online lessons, some offline, and some will be done in an online classroom where he can communicate via computer headset and keyboard. I will be here to help him figure things out, and he also has his teacher who is on-call 40 hours a week.

"But what about socialization?" I think this is the top question posed to homeschooling families. So let me ask the brick and mortar school families this: Pick one - Did you send your kids to school for a) an education, or b) so they could socialize?

First of all, I would like to point out that public schools do not provide much of an environment for socialization anymore. Kids are rushed through lunch, and given minimal free time. In fact, many schools have cut out regular recess all together. So I guess the kids are socializing during class? We spend our learning time learning. Socialization happens plenty during play dates, story times, sports, church, enrichment programs and field trips (yes, real field trips, with other kids! Like our dairy farm tour :). I have yet to come across a homeschooler that was not super-dedicated to their child, and I don't think for a second that any of these people, that have put hours of research and planning into homeschooling, are ignoring or dismissing the fact that their kid needs to be interacting with other kids. I especially don't think these people are missing the fact when it is every non-homeschooler's #1 concern.

I have not had a lot of experience with homeschooled families, but did meet several on our recent trip to Organic Pastures. The kids were aged 1-9, and introduced themselves to one another, played together, and even exchanged numbers. When you looked around, you just saw a group of normal, happy little kids. As another CAVA mom on our field trip joked to me, "I am the one that needs socialization!" :)

Ribbit.

My mom sent me the link to these cupcakes, and I just had to try them. There's actually a lot of cute ideas on that site that I will be trying, but the frog cupcakes were just too cute to put off. When I shared the idea amongst my friends, one of them suggested I make them as part of a lesson on the life cycle of a frog. I know, my friends are smart, right? Me, not so much. To share my pictures of this frog cupcake project is to show you that I was not paying very good attention to the recipe. I think I just got a little too excited and winged it while I was at the store. I didn't buy mini M&Ms! There, I said it! And on top of it, I was only able to find enough green M&Ms to do 2 cupcakes... out of all the bags of candy I bought. GRR! I will make them again, and do it right. The boys were thrilled :)

Organic Pastures

Today we went on a field trip to Organic Pastures dairy farm in the sticks of Fresno. Organic Pastures is a family owned and operated farm that produces and sells raw milk and raw milk products. Our tour guide was Kaleigh, whose shirt stated "Mom in Training" - Kaleigh's dad, the CEO, informed us at the beginning of our tour that his daughter was expecting their first grandchild, a boy, and was due in January (I thought that was cute lol). The kids on the field trip ranged in age from 1 to 9 years old. The tour guide kept the facts simple and most of the tour was spent just checking out the cows in the main pasture.

We learned that they have several different types of cows at Organic Pastures - Not just Jersey, Holstein and French Normandys, but lots of cows that are a combination of those 3. The Combo-Cows produce the best milk, which gets to be up to 75% cream.

We walked around the labor and delivery pasture and were greeted by an assortment of Happy Cows (if you live in California, you've seen the commercials!). They were very friendly and allowed the kids to pet them.

While in the L&D pasture, we met a cow named Boo. Boo is a PETA sponsored cow that was going to be slaughtered because she only had 3 teats. So PETA adopted Boo, and she now lives in the main pen at Organic Pastures. National Geographic took interest in this cow, and when they came out to photograph her, they discovered she has 4 teats. PETA comes and hangs out with Boo, brushes her and walks around with her. She has no tags and has a large bell around her neck to help PETA to identify her.

As you can see here, Boo is also a friendly cow :)

After we left the Mama's and Papa's (there was a few bulls in there, too) we hopped in our cars and cruised across the property to where they keep the calves. The calves are kept in solitary pens from 3 days to 2 weeks old, it helps to keep them safe from coyotes. They are then shuffled around different pens, depending on their age, and eventually land themselves in the L&D pasture that they were born in :) We loved the calves! They were a little nervous due to all of the action, but a couple of them were curious enough to be pet, and even nursed on our fingers.













We finished up our tour by tasting some raw milk, and chocolate colostrum, both of which were pretty good. I really can't afford to spend $8 for a gallon of milk, but if I could I would probably switch to raw milk. The benefits sounds pretty awesome.