Chloe's affinity for letters

Chloe has been learning her letter sounds at a phenomenal rate! I let her watch the Leapfrog Letter Factory dvd every other day (we are continually renewing it from the library so we always have it). I usually get tired of a dvd after viewing it a few times but Letter Factory is surprisingly cute and un-annoying.

Now that she knows most of her letter sounds we've been applying the sounds to words. It's amazing to me how quickly she's been able to associate the letter sound with the beginning word sound. She even jokes with her newfound knowledge. She'll say to me, "Buh buh buh . . . tree!" and then giggle. What a character.

What's incredible to me is seeing how quickly she's soaking up these new concepts. Her letter loving brain is a thirsty sponge! Letters, words, writing, drawing, and books are definitely her fortitude. (That said I realize we need to work on other skills so she doesn't become a total bookworm. She doesn't throw balls very far and closes her eyes when we play catch. Hope she doesn't take after me in athletics!)

She takes after her mommy in the letter arena. According to my mom I was reading at age 3. I have a particularly strong memory from when I was learning to read. I remember my mom had written the word this repeatedly on a page. I stared at the word this and said it over and over again until I knew it by sight. No phonics for me; I did everything by memorizing.

Maybe that's why I like the Letter Factory dvd so much . . . I'm learning phonics right along with Chloe! Fascinating stuff. Though I'm afraid it's going to get more complicated than just simple consonant sounds soon.

I captured Chloe singing her letter songs on the piano yesterday. Too cute! (Forgive the ragamuffin hairdo.)

What do your kiddos excel at?





Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Teething, laughing, rolling

Can my baby really be doing all these things already?!?

In the blink of an eye my little Clive is no longer a newborn. He'll be four months old in just a few more days.

It's ironic that though I've been wanting Clive to get older so he would be more interactive now I'm sad to see it happening so quickly. Am the only one who feels like this baby stage goes by too fast?!?

Sigh. Watch my feeble attempt to capture Clive's laugh in the video below. (Those hiccup sounding things are his laugh.)



Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Children's Book Poll

Lately I've been frustrated at the library. I gravitate towards my favorite authors and to character books that I know Chloe will like (i.e. Curious George). I don't want to be so limiting to Chloe in our book tastes but I do want to be cautious. A few times I've picked up a book hastily and taken it home without realizing it contained questionable language (can you believe some children's books actually have bad language?!? c'mon!), a dumb plot, or drawings that weren't appealing.

I tend to like old authors and illustrators. One of my faves is Harold and the Purple Crayon. We've read almost all the Don Freeman, Beatrix Potter, H.A. Rey, and Dr. Seuss books from our local library. (Other favorite authors include Sandra Boynton and Karen Katz. I'm sure there are more but it's too late in the evening for my brain to function at full capacity. And even full capacity ain't much these days.)

We've also discovered the fun of wordless books like the Carl series by Alexandra Day or the Polo books by Regis Faller. I especially like wordless books because then I can make up slightly new stories each time to follow the pictures and point out different details. It keeps reading fresher for me. (We dig the Ella books and also the Coco books. Don't you love how little kids attach to characters?)

So now I need your help. What are your favorite books for toddlers? Do you particularly like certain authors or illustrators?

Belated Happy Earth Day!

All day yesterday I tried to finish a post on Earth Day to no avail. Small children, blogger errors, and a blissful early bedtime prevented me yesterday. So today I wish a belated happy earth day to you all!

Check out the helpful links below to see how you can make your daily life more green and be a better steward of the resources God has blessed you with. For those of you who have visited foreign countries, I'm sure you're acutely aware of the incredible wealth of our nation. We have so many resources at our fingertips that we can easily take them for granted and waste them. The earth is the Lord's (Psalm 24). He created it for us to use and to enjoy and to care for (Genesis 1:26).

Enough of my soapbox. :) Enjoy the links below! I learned quite a bit (especially from the computer article).

Easy ways to go green with your computer
50 ways to help the planet
The Green Christian blog

And I couldn't resist posting this cute ditty courtesy of the discovery channel. Warning: Tune is incredibly catchy.

Celebrate Earth Day with reusable bags

Most of my earth-conscious habits were initiated by my mom. She always recycled and kept reusable cloth bags in her car for shopping. Thanks, mommy!

Using cloth shopping bags is one of my favorite earth-friendly practices (definitely rates higher than cleaning out poopy cloth diapers). It's incredibly easy to keep our cloth bags in the trunk of the car and to pull them out for grocery trips. I'm not so good about always remembering to bring cloth bags into retail stores though. Still working on that.

If you're out and about tomorrow, be sure to stop in at your local Wal-Mart. In celebration of Earth Day, Wal-Mart is giving away 1 million free reusable shopping bags!

Or if you're the crafty sewing type, check out this tutorial for making a cloth bag that rolls up and then snaps handily. I love that idea! A compact rolled-up bag would be super duper easy to throw into your purse or diaper bag.

I won't even begin to address the plastic bag environmental issues (especially since a baby is crying for my attention at the moment) . Read more here and here.

Overalls fetish

When I want my kids to look extra cute, I often dress them in denim overalls. Why? Something about overalls is so genuinely kid-looking and wholesome. Besides that they're sturdy for playing in, they're hard to get dirty, they match any shirt, and they're downright adorable in my opinion.

Enjoy the pictures below of the cutest kids in the world (do you like Chloe's homemade crown?).

I'm also a sucker for little girls in dresses (nothing ruffle-y or lacy though) and I'm also really digging collared button down shirts for boys.

What favorite apparel do you don on your offspring?

Birthday photo shoot

These photos depict my attempt at wishing my sister a happy happy 29th birthday today! She lives in the far away land of New Zealand and we'll not get to see her lovely 29 year old face on the day of her illustrious birth. Feliz Cumpleaños, hermanita!

Clive told me what he was thinking during the photo shoot. Here are his captions . . .

(upper left) Can that flash be any brighter, mom?
(upper middle) Here's a cute smile for ya!
(upper right) Hmm, I wonder if I can grab this funny white thing.
(lower left) Mom, haven't you ever taken a photography class?!? You're generally supposed to get the entire face in the shot.
(lower middle) Tasty stuff this.
(lower right) I'm tired of this, mom. Let's call it a day.

Free donut today only!

Thanks to the money saving mom blog for alerting me to this free donut offer.

In honor of tax day, Dunkin' Donuts is giving away one free donut with every cup of coffee purchased.

Dunkin' Donuts serves such smooth delicious coffee; it's become my new errand-running treat. (A healthy improvement from my past car-driving snack - a $1 double cheeseburger from McD's.) I love coffee but I don't enjoy a strong cup of fashionable Starbucks or Arabica coffee. It's just too bitter and eye-popping for my liking. I'll take a cup of Dunkin' or Panera coffee over Starbucks every time. What's your favorite source for a cuppa joe?

Hope you have a nearby Dunkin' so you can savor a free donut today!

Watcha readin?

Now that my Clive is getting older and sleeping longer (Praise Jesus!) I'm finding snippets of time to do some leisure reading.

My two all-time favorite authors (forgive me if I've blogged about this before) are C.S. Lewis and Charles Dickens. So when I get the rare opportunity to read I almost always choose a book by one of these incredibly rich authors.

My tired brain is not quite ready to pick up The Four Loves (a book I'm ansy to read someday soon) or The Weight of Glory so I chose a lighter Lewis read. I love the Narnia series and with the upcoming Disney blockbuster movie coming out this summer, I chose to re-read Prince Caspian.

It's such an easy read that it's going fast. I might devour the rest of the Narnia series after I finish the Prince Caspian adventure! I've forgotten what a captivating storyteller C.S. Lewis is. And the character of God in the picture of Aslan is truly beautiful. As I read I often find tears coming to my eyes as I clearly see God's forgiveness, sovereignty, and challenge to faith.

What are you reading these days?

It's that time of year again . . .

. . . GOLF season!

My husband has converted me into becoming a golf-watching fan. Before marrying Matt, I thought professional golf was snooze-ville. Before birthing children (sorry, birthing is kind of a yucky word) we even attended a few pga events. INCLUDING the U.S. Open when it was held at Whistling Straits in Kohler, Wisconsin. That was amazing! Seeing Tiger Woods play in person was unforgettable.

This weekend is the first major tournament of the season - The Masters. We're big Tiger fans in our household but I also like to cheer for young underdogs. What I especially like about watching the young European players is that they've got daring and hip golf fashion sense. Yes, I said fashion sense. :) They wear white pants, bright spring colored polos, big belts, and sweater vests. I love Tiger but his black and red nike stuff gets a tad boring to look at.

My all time favorite guy to root for is Sergio Garcia. He seems like such a nice guy (I can tell from his genuine smile) and he's never won a Masters tournament. Unfortunately he's not in great standing this year, earning a +4 for the first two days of golf.

Are you a golf person? If so, who are you cheering for this weekend?

Starting my own free box

My gramma always had (and still has) a free box in her closet. It's simply a box of things she's gotten for free from Walgreens' mail-in rebates. When we were in college, my sis and I loved rummaging through gramma's free box and snatching up new deodorants and toothpaste tubes.

I'm trying to be frugal in every area of life and I've always kept the free box idea in the back of my brain as something to do when I had more free time. Ha! When will that ever happen? When Jenny Muth sent me a link to money saving mom, I caught the coupon/rebate fire!

The author of the money saving mom blog does all the leg work. She finds the sales and links you to the appropriate online coupons which make most purchases free or just a few cents. She covers big chain drug stores like Walgreens, CVS, and Wal-Mart. She also gives tips and how-to instructions for newbies like me.

I can't tell you how THRILLING it is to get something new for free! I'm totally hooked. Check out the loot I got in the picture above. I spent a grand total of $1.47 for all of those products. And I have a $2 mail-in rebate for the toothpaste so really I earned 53 cents in the transactions.

There seem to be two disadvantages in the process. 1) Traveling to different stores to garner the deals. This week we already had a planned family trip to Wal-Mart and then during my grocery shopping run I hit two other stores to get the pictured freebies. If I'm going to keep this up I'll have to be extremely organized with my coupons and shopping excursions. 2) Do we really need this stuff? I'll need to be selective in what I acquire.

Do any of you partake in these free offers? If so, what tips do you have for me?

Too early for phonics?

I'm poised to dive into teaching Chloe phonics and I'm kind of nervous.

Chloe can identify all her uppercase letters (and most lowercase), her numbers and she's even picked up writing a few letters on her own. I think it's time to move ahead so we can keep challenging her.

She's always been super interested in books and reading so this might be the right time to start. I want to be careful though to keep things fun and light so we can maintain her enthusiasm and love for learning.

I'm nervous for a few reasons. 1) I didn't learn to read through phonics! I simply memorized words and then built up my sight word vocabulary. I figured out phonics much later on in life. 2) I don't yet have a phonics curriculum or strategy. So far we've used the Leap Frog dvd Letter Factory which has been terrific! The animated characters travel to different rooms which contain each letter of the alphabet. Each letter then makes its sound and does something visually to depict the sound. For example, the A letters get scared by a monster and they scream, "AAH!" in their fright. The other cool thing about the dvd is that it uses the same song throughout that we sing now all the time. Chloe catches on like wildfire when music is involved! 3) Phonics seems like the first big learning concept in life. I'm nervous I'll teach something incorrectly or not using the best method. Yikes!

Now I need to tap into my blogger resources . . . At which age did you teach your children phonics? Is it true that girls generally start learning phonics earlier than boys do? What curriculum would you recommend? (I've heard good things about Phonics Pathways).

Blogging baby bounty!

Recently several blogger buddies birthed new babies. Congratulations to all of you! I'm praying for your speedy recovery and that God grants you special grace for these first tiring weeks!

Check out the pix of these new cuties using the links below:

Jonas Mark Conley

Malachi Elias Johnson

Megan Nicole Miller

Ezekiel Simeon Tolosa

Fighting the weight fight again

I'm back on the diet and exercise wagon as I seriously strive to lose my Clive-pregnancy weight. Sigh.

Since my free time is limited these days and since Clive isn't on a regular daily schedule yet (we're still working on that!) my exercising habits have been hit or miss. Now that the weather's finally warming up a little I hope to do some walking in the coming weeks. I also have some post-natal exercise dvds on my bookshelf that I've done occasionally. AND I have a membership to a nearby gym. So, I have lots of ready and available opportunities to get fit!

What I've been focusing on this week is a healthier and more controlled diet. I've joined sparkpeople again and I'm using their tracking tools to measure my daily food intake. Slowly I'm making changes to bring my daily calorie level down. I'm also drinking lots of water and coffee (an appetite suppressant). The coffee isn't a part of sparkpeople's plan but I see it as my one indulgence. :)

What do you do to maintain a healthy weight?

3 months old already!

I'm in shock that our little Clive has already hit the 3 month mark! Yesterday he officially became 3 months old. A friend from church once told me, "The days are long but the years go by quickly". That's so true!

Clive is an active, strong and social baby. He freely gives away his smiles (such a wonderful difference between him and Chloe!) and is just discovering his own hands. He intensely tries to touch and to reach objects that are near him. His neck and head are almost completely stable and steady (I'm sure that's due to his tummy-sleeping). Clive loves to be carried around upright by mommy so he can catch all the action going on in our house. He especially likes looking at his baby einstein blocks and the swinging pendulum of our clock. Clive also enjoys watching his very active sister, Chloe. Of course she pretty much ignores him right now since he's not too exciting.

Happy 3 month birthday, buddy! We're so glad you're a part of our family!

Question for moms of tummy sleepers

Clive is sleeping well on his tummy but I have a logistics problem. Because he almost always fusses a little bit before falling asleep, he drools and sweats on the sheet all the time. To prevent washing his sheets every single day I've been laying out a blanket on top of the sheet and tucking it in tightly so it won't bunch up or be a choking hazard.

Well, our Clive is proving to be an extremely active and strong little guy! Today he managed to grab the blanket he was laying on and pull it up. He then somehow maneuvered himself to turn 180 degrees! Of course all that activity woke him up and his nap didn't happen this morning.

What do you moms of tummy sleepers do to save your sheets from constant drool?

Easter visit in pictures

This Easter we traveled to western Michigan to celebrate and to visit with Matt's brother and family. We had a splendid time and the kiddos did a terrific job adjusting to their new surroundings. Traveling with two small children in our tiny VW Jetta wasn't always the most fun but it was most definitely worth it.

This was the first time Ben and tribe got to see our little Clive. And boy did they enjoy him! Zach is incredibly thankful there's another male in the cousin pool. :) And now Grace is convinced her mom should have another baby. What do you think, Diane?

A belated Happy Easter to you!

It wasn't until after Easter Sunday was over that I realized we didn't snap a family photo! Oh well. We were way too busy to make a photo shoot a priority on Sunday morning. I'll have to work some computer magic and make these two photos one somehow. Anyone know how to use photoshop?

This year we spent Easter weekend with my brother-in-law's family in western Michigan. We had a fantastic time visiting and showing off our smiley little baby boy. And Chloe was in toddler-heaven playing with her cousins all day long. Since Clive is still so little, we really didn't go many places. Chloe and her cousin Grace played together constantly and they were adorable to watch. They're both into pretend playing and came up with some doozies (including scooping up elephant poop, riding a train to Chicago, and playing on a sandy beach).

With the help of my niece, Ahna, we sponge curled the little girls' hair for Easter Sunday. No special duds for Easter this year though Clive wore his first sweater vest ever. I guess I was thrown off by Easter being so early . . . . Chloe still looked cute in her springy purple dress though it wasn't anything special. Maybe next year I'll be organized enough to make something coordinating for the kiddos.

A belated happy Easter to you and your family! How did you celebrate this year?

Lucky me!

I won something again! It pays to leave comments on these giveaway sites, I tell you. Probability says you're bound to actually win once in a while.

So, what did I win? The enviable book of Peeps crafts and recipes pictured at left! Chloe is going to be thrilled as she's recently discovered the marshmallowy goodness of brightly colored Peeps.

I know, a strange thing to win. I don't care, I'm excited anyways. Matt says I should apply my luck at winning online giveaways for something useful like a $500 gift card for gasoline. :) How practical of him. How could he not see the value in a full length publication devoted to recipes and crafts to make with marshmallow candy?!? C'mon, tell me who wouldn't coo over a Peeps painted bag? (I know one bunny-loving gramma who would!) And apparently the Washington Post sponsors a big Peeps diorama contest each year devoted to artfully displaying Peeps in creative ways. Let's show a little vision, Matt! :)

Personally I don't like Peeps - too sweet for me. My fave Easter treat is the traditional cadbury cream eggs. What candy treats do you savor at Easter time?

Bitten by the sewing bug

I've been bitten by the sewing bug! My recent sewing spree began innocently - out of necessity.

Chloe has recently been going through another nap rebellion stage. I think part of the reason is that her room was too bright as she had no curtains, only a shade and some cheap blinds. So, I got to work sewing her some new curtains. As material is unbelievably expensive these days, I found a good quality fabric shower curtain at a local thrift store. It didn't take long to sew up and it does an INCREDIBLE job blocking out the light. (Don't look too closely at the photo - there are an embarrassing amount of threads that need trimming.)

Project number 2 was along the same lines. Curtains for Clive's room (previously used as our study). I had a more difficult time finding fabric for his room and had to dish out $4 a yard for his curtains. Ouch. I hated having to pay that much money. But I really like how his curtains turned out. They block the light fairly well and the fabric is fun and colorful.

Project number 3 was the most enjoyable one and I'm so happy with the result! I made Chloe a lovely tiered spring skirt and a matching headband. It was an extremely easy project and would be a great way to use up fabric remnants. Here's the link to the tiered skirt instructions if any of you are interested.

It has been so soothing and therapeutic to sew these past weeks. Ah. Just me and my machine and oodles of quiet during naptime. What could be better?

What projects have you been crafting/sewing/baking/decorating lately?