Baby G on it's way!

**Update....the baby arrived safe and sound this evening!**

Let's all send out a prayer today, I got a call this morning from Becky G, and she is in the hospital as I type this with a new baby on the way today! I hope it is o.k. to post this, I figured she would appreciate the prayers from all her friends today!

That was then.....this is now

These 1 videos are of Noah when he was born, and on his 7th birthday. I love this first one with his high pitched cry....it always makes me laugh. This was the first moment I held him....the first moment I realized he was MINE. Wow, what a feeling! (and excuse all the talking in the background in the first one. As I was recording, it, Leah wouldn't quit talking to me! The previous shot was of me pregnant, and she thought my maternity shirt was a Sea World shirt, and she kept asking over and over again how I got a Sea World shirt!)

Baby Rachel

I have been trying and trying to load videos on here, and I finally got this to work.....I think. I just recorded this with my little camera off the big tv that was playing my video camera...make sense?? So it isn't the best quality. I will show you more if I can get them to load.

This is Rachel, about 3 or 4 months old I think. Sorry to show her spitting up, but this is something that we dealt with with all 3 of our kids. They had HORRIBLE reflux, all 3 of them, until they were 10 months old. They ate like horses, their weight and growth was always good, but they spit up like crazy. All the time. We kept thinking surely the next baby wouldn't have it...surely we could have one baby that we didn't have to be on guard with a burb rag at all times. I had about 5 of the 10 pack of cloth diapers, and bibs out the wazoo. We had a bib for every holiday...b/c that is all you ever saw, not the outfits. Oh, it was so bad. Once they were crawling, they just crawled around spitting up all over the carpet. Yep, we replaced our carpet after Rachel. We owned a steam cleaner at the time, and that was a regular thing for us. By the time Rachel came along, Noah and Leah knew how to follow her around with a spit rag cleaning the floor behind her. So this video is a small taste of it. To this day, when I hold a baby, I am on guard for them to puke on me. We tried everything, and nothing worked to stop it. Clay and I both had it bad as babies, so I guess they got double whammies of it. I remember a friend came over and was holding Noah, and I kept warning her she better get that rag, he was going to spew, and sure enough he got her ALL OVER her shoe. I told ya!

What is your child's reading level?

I came across a book that assesses your child's reading level at www.timberdoodle.com that was $15. I am really curious at where Noah is, so I was thinking about ordering it. Then I started googling it. I found this link http://homeschooling.gomilpitas.com/articles/060899.htm . It tells you a way to determine your child's level. It also tells you how to look on the back of the book, and a lot of them will tell you the level it is for.

This is what is said...... One quick way is to look at the reading level designation of their favorite books. Usually placed near the list price on the back cover of children's books you'll see something like this: RL 3.2. This would indicate that the book was written with the reading vocabulary of a typical child in the second month of the third grade. I'd average the "RL's" of their favorite books, as homeschooled kids tend to read all over the map. This system, however, tends to stop at about the end of the 6th grade level.

I went and got one of Leah's Junie B. Jones books, and sure enough, it had RL 2.3. So that means it is for a child in it's 3rd month, of 2nd grade. Cool, huh?

Birthday post

My post of Noah's b-day's is below the vacation bible school post. I had started the b-day post on my laptop when the battery died and didn't get to finish, and then went and did the other post on my other computer, so, it has placed the b-day post below that....so go check it out!

VBS

I just wanted to invite anyone who would like to come to VBS at Monticello Church of Christ this week. It starts tomorrow, through Thursday. I think the time is 6:00-8:30 . (if I am wrong, mom, or Tracy, you can comment to correct me) The Draper kiddos will be there, and I will be too a couple nights. Love to see ya there!

**Thanks for the comments....the time is going to be 7:00- 8:45, and Tracie, sorry I spelled your name wrong, it was really late when I posted that!

Our birthday weekend

I have some more on my other camera, but here are some from our weekend. I had some videos I wanted to show you, but I am having trouble getting them to load. Today was Noah's birthday, but we had his special day on Friday. He first picked going to Jump Zone, but then Clay offered him the money we would have spend going there to go have the cash to go shopping at ToysRus, so that is what he chose. So, After eating at the Purple Cow, we went shopping at Toys R Us, Target, and K-mart in search of Star Wars stuff. And, we found the best stuff at K-mart. Apparently all the stores had removed all their star wars stuff from the shelves in preparation for a big Clone Wars toy release this weekend. K-mart apparently didn't get the memo b/c that is where we finally found what he wanted.

We spent today watching old home videos of when the kids were little. They were so much fun to watch! Just to hear their voices, and how they talked, so sweet! It was a fun thing to do today.

Noah's friend Sam from next door came over Friday morning to play. I think that was really more fun to him that actually going anywhere. That boy loves his friends.

At Purple Cow

I told them it was his b-day so they added whipped cream, sprinkles, and a candle! He was so excited!

Everytime we go to Target, Leah wants her picture on this big red ball sculpture outside Target. I finally had my camera, silly girl.
They did all this posing on their own...I know people walking in thought we were crazy! haha...I actually really like this big circle for pictures....if the nice door wasn't in the background.


And this is not the best picture, but I got these adorable outfits from e-bay for about $15 each, retail, $65. They are custom made, and so cute! And then, I got inspired the other night, and I made them both hairbows and flip flops to match. They were looking cute, and I was excited. LOL

He's 7, on the 27th

I can't believe it has already been 7 years since we welcomed our first child, our baby boy, Noah Dylan Draper into this world. What a joy he has been. Happy Birthday Son!

Killer Whale Lapbook

http://lapbooklessons.ning.com/page/page/show?id=1999465%3APage%3A28177

I am linking this for my reference mainly, so I can find this again when I am ready to gather everything for this lapbook. I don't have this site linked on my sidebar yet, but www.lapbooklessons.ning.com is another free site to get lapbooks from.

Scorpion

This is what Noah found in our bedroom floor tonight. It is a good thing we were all up at 12:45 am with all the lights shining bright! EEEK! He started freaking out....momma it is a SCORPION.....and yep, it was. I think now we have convinced him not to ever sleep in our bedroom floor again. LOL

ABC's

This is some of the work that Rachel has been doing. She knows her ABC's, but she didn't know all the lowercase letters, or the sounds of the letters. I got all this from the Homeschool Share website under ABC's lapbook. This has been great. We just concentrate on a different letter everyday, and then the next day I review all the letter sounds, and this has been a great way for her to learn all her letter sounds. Once we finish through the alphabet, then we will start with our Hooked on Phonics. I have each letter on cardstock, and then I will put the whole book together for her when we are done.

While she is working on her letters, the other 2 are working on these pages to go along with the same alphabet letter. This has been great practice for their spelling, and also their writing.
Noah likes to write small. I may regret this if I ever put them in school, but I remember hating having to write my words just perfect between those lines. His hadnwriting has improved so much since last year, just by letting him do it on his own. We spent a lot of time on reading and math last year, and now that we we are doing well with that, this year we are going to concentrate on writing stories and improving spelling and handwriting.This is something we are going to really work on this year. On this page he is suppose to make up a story to finish the sentence. This just blows his brain right now, but I want to document where he is so that I can see how he improves over time.

Patience.....

Leah has a lot of it. I have been noticing lately that Rachel is so attached to Leah. She literally follows her EVERYWHERE. She wants Leah by her side at all times, constantly playing with her. Leah is very patient with her most of the time. When Rachel calls her, she comes running. When we go to the pool though, she will complain to me that Rachel won't quit following her. I will hear all day long..."LEEEAAAHHHH!!" anytime Leah leaves the room, or tries to do her own thing.

To prevent fighting, I set up a rule that each child gets to help alone to make a cake for another one's b-day. Rachel helped me with Leah's cake. She stayed up late one night when everyone was in bed, and had my full attention. Noah's b-day is Sunday, but we decided to celebrate it early, and we were making him a cake yesterday. I know I told Rachel 10 times to get out of the way, get out of the kitchen, leave us alone, this is Leah's turn. I kept reminding her that she got to do it by herself, and this was the rule, it was Leah's turn to help with Noah's cake. She would not let up. And I don't think she was trying to get my attention, she was trying to get Leah's! She wanted to be right in the middle of what she was doing so bad!

Today, Noah was playing with one of his new video games, and I heard him hollaring for Leah to come be the 2nd player. I helped him out for awhile, and then Leah came along, so I let her take over. As I walked out of the room, I saw Rachel sitting on her bed just bellowing for Leah to come in there to play stuffed animals with her. Then she went looking for her, and finally dragged her away from Noah's attention so she could get it back. I am watching all this, knowing I would be going crazy with someone sticking to me like that, and Leah is so laid back she just said, "well, I better go play with Rachel, she is calling for me." Tonight, Leah was in my lap, and 2 seconds, here comes Rachel. This time, I could tell Leah was getting tired, so I said, sorry, Leah needs a break from you! She gave me a look, stuck her thumb in her mouth, and stormed off. Leah smiled, and I asked her if she needed a break from her, and she said yes. Bless her heart, she is being pulled in both directions by both of them....it is nice to be that loved, huh??

Are any of your kids clingy to another??

Children's Museum of Memphis

*Warning....you are about to be bombarded with pictures!* If you want a FUN quick trip for the kids, Memphis is the place to go. Between the Awesome Memphis zoo, and their super cool Children's Museum, you can't go wrong. (you just might want to wait until it cools off to go to the zoo!) We had wanted to go back to the zoo b/c we loved it so much last time, but decided it was just too hot! Memphis was just a bit out of the way for us coming home from Blytheville, so we planned to go through there on Sunday so we could go to the Children's Museum of Memphis. I had been hearing that it was really cool, and it was included with our family pass that we have through the museum in Little Rock. We got 4 family members in for free, so we only had to pay $9 for us to get in. It was so cool! Very interactive for the kids. (as long as you don't get grossed out by the kids trying on costumes that you know a million other kids have had on previously....I just couldn't think about it) They had a blast. Clay and I did just watching them! I took all these with my little mommy cam, man I love that thing.

This is a replica of the Mississippi River that they could float boats down, dams you could move around and change how your boats flowed....neat.
They had a heart replica, and then this was a human body with all the parts. Noah put that together so quick..while I was looking at the parts trying to figure out what they were. I asked him how he knew all that, and he said, well it is just like a puzzle.....DUH MOM!There were several other medical things.....and scrubs and doctor jackets for the kids to wear

This was Picassa's work station where they could draw self portraits.

Notice the above picture...how Noah is doing his teeth...then notice his drawing....he was trying to draw his teeth just the way they are all uneven.....cracked me up!



There was a stage, and all these dress up costumes, and they had music playing for the kids to sing and dance to.

She wanted to make sure I got her tail in this photo.....nice pose huh??
This was something to climb in. One boy got scared and couldn't come down. And the holes are so small, his dad couldn't get up there to get him. Finally the smallest person that works at the museum had to crawl up and get the poor kid.
They got to be dentists
Fireman with a real firetruck to climb on
Look at how his stripes glowed in this picture!

Policeman and a real police motorcyle and car
This was in a Curious George exhibit
There was a bank, where the kids had to go "write a check" to get cash to go shopping at.....
KROGER! This was so cool!

Leah hit the Seafood section heavy. She went way over her budget of $16.00

Then they got to check out at the cash register, and then it even printed them out a receipt

This was inside the Fed Ex plane. Can you imagine trying to learn how to operate all that??