Perfect Little Popsicles

The girls have really loved popsicles this summer, but I don't love all of the sugar and artificial colors in the store bought popsicles.  So, I was excited to find ring pop popsicle molds on Amazon!

The girls LOVE these popsicles, and I love them, too, since I make them with orange juice to make them a healthy treat!

These small popsicles are the perfect size for our girls, and they love to have them as after breakfast and lunch treats!

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Making Pizza

Since one of O(6)'s leveled readers is titled Making Pizza (Reading A to Z), we decided to make pizza!

It was deeeelicious!



Since it was pizza night, I decided that it should be movie night as well!  We watched The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe since we finished reading the book about a week ago.  The girls loved the movie, but I was cringing at some of the scary and violent parts.  I tried to cover their eyes during some of the battle scenes, but they were not interested in that at all.  E(2) said "I like the sary (scary) parts!"  O(6) was really scared until she saw Aslan, and then she said she wasn't scared anymore.

We are looking forward to reading the rest of the books in the Narnia series...I was not surprised by how much O loved this book, but I was surprised by how much 2 year old E enjoyed it!

Fun on a Rainy Day!

It rained ALL day one day last week, and we all wanted to be outside so badly.  I let the girls run around in the rain (it wasn't thundering or lightening) a little bit, but that didn't last long.  So, we headed to the (empty) garage to ride scooters and the plasma car.  We ALL love the plasma car!

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"It's a Hard Knock Life"

Ever since O(6) dance to the song "It's a Hard Knock Life" for her dance recital, the girls have LOVED playing Annie and singing while they cleaned.  I gave them a quick lesson on scrubbing cabinet doors, and they got to work...singing the whole time.  Love it!

So Proud of Our Sweet Girl!

O(6) received 3 dollars and a note that she could spend the money on candy (during our vacation) in one of her birthday balloons.  I was surprised and proud when she immediately handed one dollar to her sister and one dollar to her cousin and said "There's enough for us each to have one!"

I'm also proud that she chose to receive donations during her bday party instead of gifts (she still receives gifts from her family and plenty of them!).  Last year she received donations for our local children's home, and this year she decided that she would like to receive donations for our local animal shelter.  We'll deliver the items next week.  We are so proud of our kind and generous girl!

Outside Movie Night!!!!!!!!!

For years (about 4), I've wanted to show a movie onto a big screen in our front yard for an outside movie night, and we finally did it a few weeks ago!  We had about 20 people join us for our first outside movie night, and it was a huge success!  The kids sprawled on sleeping bags and ate lots of popcorn and candy.

We watched Dolphin Tale which was interesting for everyone from kids to adults.  However, it was a little long, so most of the kiddos were swinging or climbing on the jungle gym during the last 20 minutes of the movie.  We handed out glow stick bracelets to all the kids, and they had fun running around while they glowed.  It was a fun night, and I'm hoping to do it again soon!

Bubble Room

Since we have such a small house, we decided to add on a bubble room (just kidding, of course!).  The idea for a bubble room came from here.





A friend gave us a HUGE sheet of plastic, and I folded it in half and used duct tape to seal 2 sides.  I left the 3rd side open for the fan.  The fan blew the bubble up nicely, but I would have liked to have 2 fans.  It was fun to play in the bubble, but it was pretty hot, so we didn't stay in there too long.



I have to admit that I was a little unsettled by the idea of essentially creating a plastic bag for my children to play in since I've seen warnings on to keep kids from playing with plastic bags my whole life.  However, they were never unsupervised and were never in any danger of suffocation (I promise, Daddy!...my dad was very concerned about this!)

How We Wrap...

There are several things that I don't enjoy doing, and I'm not good at them...cooking, baking, and wrapping presents (I'm sure there are LOTS more, but these are the things that come up frequently).  So, when it's time to wrap presents, I make it REALLY easy on myself!





I wrap the presents in white paper from the girls' easel, and they decorate it using paint, markers, crayons, or stickers.  The girls are always SO proud, and their wrapping paper is definitely original!

As Dirty As They Wanna Be!

After the sun finally came out today, I asked the girls if they wanted to go to our wooded lot to play in the clay pile.  They said "YESSSSSSSSSSSSS!"  I told them to put on old clothes, so that they could get as dirty as possible.   Their eyes lit up!

They had SO much fun and got SO dirty!






They went swimming in the lake to wash off, and they were thrilled to swim in their clothes.  Fun times!

Problem Solving...

I try to let my girls figure things out for themselves rather than jumping in to "fix things" too quickly.  So, last weekend when my niece threw a hula hoop in the air and it got caught in a tree, we watched for a while before helping them out.

If you look closely at this picture, you can see the hula hoop fairly high in the tree.  The girls are staring at it and having a lively discussion about how to get it out.



At one point, they decided to put O(5) on my niece's shoulders (she's 8), and then put E(2) on O's shoulders.  It didn't work.


It was so much fun to watch them and to hear their ideas and watch them work.  Eventually, their Grandpa helped them out.  Fun times!

Our Graduate

We are so proud of our sweet O(5) who graduated from Montessori Preschool 2 weeks ago!  She made a commencement speech in front of more than 100 people, and she did an amazing job!  We are hoping to start 1st grade homeschool soon, but we have been very busy with dance lessons, swimming lessons, baby showers, and now Vacation Bible School so far this summer.  Fun times!

Pure Joy

An impromptu ballet recital on the deck...does it get any better than this?  I don't think so :)

Thank You to Everyone Who Voted!

Emma won a bike!!!  We are SO excited for Emma and her family!  What a blessing this will be for this sweet girl!

Only 1 and Half Hours Left!

When you go to the Friendship Circle of Michigan FB page, click "like" then "Vote" and then look for this picture!  Check the vote box by Emma's picture. There's not much time left, and she is close to winning a bike!  Thank you!

Vote for Emma!!!

Please click on this fb page (Friendship Circle of Michigan) and vote for Emma!  She is a very special little girl who would love an adaptive bike for her 3rd birthday!!!  All you have to do is "like" the page, and then click on "vote".  Then find Emma's picture, and check the vote box under Emma's picture and her mom's name (Cassie).  You will be helping make a super sweet little girl and her parents very happy!  Here's is the write-up that is beside her picture...

Emma has CP and works so hard everyday. She always finds a way to laugh through the tears when her body aches or doesn't cooperate. An adaptive trike would give her some much needed freedom to move and to be the social little girl she is!


THank you!!!

Capes and Masks

I've been thinking about making capes and masks for my girls for years, and I thought I'd finally make them this year for Easter.  Then I found out that WM sells cape and masks sets for only 5 dollars!

I immediately lost all motivation to make the capes and hurried to WM to get this great deal. E(2) was excited to receive a cape and mask for herself and her sister for her half birthday :) Since they don't know anything about super heroes, they pretended to be the Phantom from Phantom of the Opera...Love it! By the way, WM stands for Walmart! I thought everyone used that abbreviation, but I've gotten many, many emails asking...sorry about that!

Elliott and the Girls

Since Elliott will be having brain surgery soon, he'll have to cut his hair.  In the 15 years that I've known him, I have never seen him with short hair, so I can't even imagine it.  However, he's wanted to cut his hair for a while, and he thinks that brain surgery is the perfect motivation to go ahead and do it!

So, I wanted to take some pics of the long haired daddy with his baby girls before his big haircut.  E(2) was not very happy (which was a good distraction for me...I was so busy trying to make her smile that I forgot to be sad...not sad that Elliott is cutting his hair just sad that a brain tumor is the cause of it), so I'm hoping we'll have time to do another photo shoot this weekend.







I'm hoping to get back into the habit of writing posts to this blog again soon.  While my thoughts are full of Elliott, brain tumors, surgery, etc, we are still doing fun things that I want to share and don't want to forget.  This blog is the best way to do both.  While I have no intention to getting back into the routine of  writing daily posts, I am hoping to write at least 2 or 3 posts a week (that are not related to surgery, brain tumors, etc.).  Thank you again for all of the wonderfully supportive comments and emails!

Happy Half Birthday, Sweet E(2)!

In the midst of all of the drama of Elliott's brain tumor and my fall down the stairs, we are still doing all of the normal and fun things we've always done.  E(2) recently celebrated her half birthday!  She was so excited and proud, and she loved it when we sang "Happy Half Birthday" to her.

Elliott bought a tiny cake for her and put candles in it, and we hung our birthday banner and wore birthday hats.    She kept pointing to the cake and saying "that's my happy half birthday!"  We had a lot of fun.  Sweet O(5) wrapped up one of her miniature American Girl dolls (Josephina) and a quarter for E for her half birthday.  She was SO proud and excited to give E this special gift, and I was touched by her kindness and generosity.



In addition to the cake, we ate half ice-cream sandwiches and started talking in half sentences.  O thought the half sentences were hilarious and then frustrating...it was all pretty funny to Elliott and I.  We have found that we are laughing and enjoying lots of crazy little things (like being silly and talking in half sentences).  This keeps us laughing instead of crying and is good for the kids...we don't want this to be a traumatic or stressful time for them.

A Smart Globe or an Intelliglobe? Opinions PLEASE!

My dad is going to buy the girls a globe for Christmas, and I need to decide whether he should get them a Smart Globe or an Intelliglobe.  I've never seen either of these in real life (there's no where around here that sells them), so I will be buying it from Amazon.  I'd love to hear your opinions on these globes, so I can make this decision soon!  Thanks!

Thanks for Reading!

I just noticed that this blog has 1500 followers through blogger! Then, I checked the google subscribers, and it's at almost 3,500. Wow! Thanks for reading Chasing Cheerios!