Preschool Activities Swap

I have had the Preschool Activities Bags books for a few years. I have made some of the bags for Miss K. This year at co-op I decided to organize a swap. We had 10 ladies sign up to do it.

I decided to make bean bag toss but filled the bags with rice as that was cheaper. I made 55 bean bags each with between 4 and 5 oz of rice.

Here they are ready for the swap this afternoon.

I will say that the Preschool Activity Bags book has all the instructions for how to do a swap. I didn't have the party to kick off the swap or even to end the swap. It seems live is too busy.

I am looking forward to the activities that we will get.

Happy Anniversary

Seven Years ago - we said "I do".

It is hard to believe it has been seven years that we have been married. Happy anniversary to the one I love.

I think normally I post a nice posed wedding picture of us but this year with the help of the scanner I have another picture to post.

That is probably the first picture that we have of the two of us together.

Since it has been seven years I decided to see how well you know us with seven questions.

1. Where did we meet?

a. Seattle, Washington

b. Hong Kong

c.Taipei, Taiwan

2. The first meal I cooked for Stuart included one of the following ingredients (we are not sure which meal I cooked but both contain one of the same ingredients.

a. broccoli

b. steak

c. chicken

3. Where did we go on our honeymoon?

a. Flordia

b. Jamacia

c. New England

4. Where did we get married?

a. The church I grew up in.

b. St. Thomas Church

c. Ephrata Cloisters

5. Which city did we not date in?

a. Chicago

b. Shanghai

c. Singapore

6. One of our dating projects included which of the following?

a. Putting together a scrapbook

b. hiking

c. DH making a shirt

7. Where did he propose?

a. Sears Tower

b. Taipei 101

c. Space Needle

Bonus question - when was the above picture taken -- year is fine.

Post your answers or guesses. I will come back later this week and give the answers. Maybe I will give a prize to the person that gets the most correct.

Happy Day - Master J

Two years ago today, after inches of documents, fees, waiting, and redoing all the paperwork and traveling we met Master J. We had arrived in the town where he lived after a overnight train ride. We were able to get permission to visit him. Then we went to the orphanage where he was at the time. He was called to the director's office.

He was quiet. I think that might have been the last time that I thought he was quiet. He says that he didn't know what was happening. We talked a bit with a translator and I do remember giving him a matchbox car.

Miss K has been in love with him from the beginning.

I know I have not written much on here about the fact that J was adopted. There is much more to the story and it involves more people and lots of pain. I will say that through all this I know God is sovereign and that he has a plan. Our plans were not his plans. God used us. What happened is not something that most people can understand.

Happy Day - J. We love you and pray that Ephesians 1:16-23 will be seen in your life.

I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him, 18 having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the working of his great might20 that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, 21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.

Birthday Gift

Miss K was invited to a birthday party for a little girl at school. I decided I would just make something. I decided on a bag of breakfast food. Don't worry it won't go bad before the party.

Three pancakes with syrup and of course a bit of butter and two fried eggs. Usually I had sew it but to save time I did it on the machine. I do like the hand sewn food better. I then made a little bag to put it in and use as the gift bag. I don't like buying wrapping paper.

Fall has arrived.

The weather outside doesn't feel much like fall but the leaves are falling. The other day the kids raked all the leaves that had fallen and were jumping in them. Miss K would jump to the pile and then run. I tried to get a picture of her in the pile and that just didn't happen.

Ahoy, Mateys

Today is talk like a pirate day. My husband and son were excited as they have been reading Treasure Island. I didn't really plan far enough in advance to have a good pirate breakfast then again I am not sure that enough time would have helped me have a good pirate breakfast. We had piratecakes aka pancakes.

Here is the happy pirate.

We did listen to Patch the Pirate this morning. We also have a pirate self photo.

So I guess now would be a good time to look ahead and plan what special activities happen in the next few weeks.

September 22 - First day of fall. Since I took the kids to Rita's on the first day of spring maybe I should take them on the last day of summer.

September 26 - Johnny Appleseed's birthday -- also our anniversary and the day we met J

1st full week in October is Get Organized week - I think the problem is they only give a week for that.

Wednesday of the 1st full week - Walk to School day - hmm we walk to school everyday

Week of October 9 Fire Prevention Week - that will be the week we fulfill the requirement to talk about fire safety

October 2 - National Peanuts Day as in the comic strip

October 10 - Stamp collecting month and also Double Ten

October 12 - Columbus Day

October 22 - Pretzel Day

October 28 - My birthday

The ideas for celebrations come from the book Every Day a Holiday by Silvana Clark except for my birthday which comes courtesy of my parents.

Legos at the Zoo

Currently the zoo has some Lego sculptures and we enjoy looking at the various animals.



There were a couple of Lego portraits where the kids could put their heads through. 



There were a number set up throughout the zoo and at various places you could get cards. Yesterday, the kids managed to collect all the cards but we did miss a few animals.



This even shows a bit of action. 

The largest sculpture was the polar bear and I don't have a picture of him. He was made with 95,000 bricks. The artist for these is Sean Kenney. His work is interesting and inspiring. I think we might need to get a few more Lego bricks.