Baby Christy and the Rest

Newborn

1 Months

3 Months

4 Months

5 Months

6 Months

8 Months

9 Months

10 Months

11 Months

12 Months

Darn it! I think since I thought of this as a journaling experience I've stopped caring! How horrible!

So Christy turned one, Lorien started 1st grade and Vanessa is still a monster, I mean a sweat angel!
I've started watching two kids, 4 yr old boy and 2 yr old girl. it's been quite interesting having five kids. Our day starts by my alarm going off at 7am. Sooooo early! Then I set things up so our dog, Sebastian doesn't bark. The kids lightly knock on the door and I let them in as quiet as possible. I want my girls to stay asleep as long as possible. Then the little girl gets dressed, their mom says bye and then they start to play while I get the dishes done. The girls slowly wake up between 7:15-7:30. I know it's not that much longer, but I'm sure it helps! When I'm done with dishes I start making pancakes, sometimes I have to grind wheat so the kids go play in the bedroom.
Large bowl: 1 1/3 cup whole wheat, 1 1/5 tsp baking powder, 1/4 tsp salt. Medium bowl: 1 C water, 1 egg yolk, 1 TBS honey, 1 tsp vanilla, 1 TBS oil. 2 C measuring cup: 1 egg white whipped to just between soft and hard peaks. Mix dry, mix wet. Whisk egg whites (set aside) then whisk wet into dry, then fold egg whites into mixture. In the meantime heat skillet to 4.5 for electric little less than medium for gas. Has to be hot for the first pancakes to not be ruined. Make sure to cook them long enough and NO BUTTER OR OIL!
It's a fun recipe. I like whisking the eggs up. I feel like it's a sufficient work out:) Anyway, then I call them to eat. They all sit down and wait for everyone to have food on their plates, we pray and then they dig in. Then Lorien has to stay and do schoolwork. Science: she has a book she works from, she's on reptiles right now. Just covered Giant Turtles. 1000LBS!!!! Crazy. LA: Reading books on her own, level 3 in the level readers you get from the library, and one page of handwriting. SS: We've been doing this world tour book her step-grandma gave her. She LOVED IT! Just devoured it. It had 36 or so pages and she finished it in less than a month. Now we're on history of the world where we just talked about the level of the people throughout time. Math: We worked on money today, tens and ones and how easy it is to count them. She has the Spectrum curriculum book and likes the pictures that go with the problems she has to do. On Thursdays she goes to her school (Pathways Charter School). She has Gardening at 9am, Fairy Tales Study at 10:30 (yeah, I know!), and Art at 12:30. She gets to eat lunch there too. She loves it! I think. She's very worried about what the other kids think of her. She's afraid they'll all laugh at her. They did once when her backpack accidentally fell off the table. But I have a feeling they were laughing at the backpack and not her. Oh well. Oh, back to my day. . .
Vanessa and August always want to do schoolwork, so I printed up some stuff from FirstSchool.com or whatever it is. They do a letter a day so far, and we just did G. We talk about things that start with the letter, they have to trace it and color an object that starts with the letter. They also have a shape they work on and a color of the day. So far it's working well. I don't know if Vanessa is learning anything, but they are definitely having fun.
After School work they can go play, or we have an outing. The other day we went to Western Farms, Tuesdays we go to play group, but Lorien was not having a good day today, so we didn't. I would like to start going to the Library on Fridays. I'd also like to make Monday our park days. There are a lot of field trips going on soon. The Petrified Forest, Pumpkin Patch, Harvest Festival and Monterey Bay Aquarium. There's also a design day I'd like Lorien to be a part of. We missed it today because of her attitude. She was distraught, so hopefully she'll remember next time! After playtime/outing then they all sit down at the table for lunch. Then the two kids I watch change into shorts, go potty, get their blanky's and go to bed. YEAH! Then I have three hours to do whatever! Like sweep, work outside of projects, dishes, or blogging. Lorien sometimes falls asleep too:) On Monday, Tuesday, every other Wednesday and on Fridays I have piano students. The kids never wake up to the noise, which is good. Their mommy comes to pick them up at 4:45-5pm. They wake up around 4:15-4:30pm. Then I get to making dinner and we clean up, get ready for bed, watch a movie or read a book and go to bed.
Except me! I've been staying up to re-watch all the Harry Potters. I just finished the 5th one. I remember HATING IT! I guess it pays to not read the books for a LONG time and then watch the movies. I want to read the books over again too. But that would mean I couldn't watch the movies for another 4 years or so while I forgot what happened.
Jimmy stays "up" with me. We normally read scriptures and pray before I start my movies, and then he falls asleep next to me while I be crazy watching movies late into the night. He's been tearing down the patio covering that was in our backyard. Oh yeah, one reason I haven't been on here is we got a house last year. We've had it for a couple days over a year. So his project was to re-roof, and in the process was forced to agree to take down the porch covering. It's a HUGE job. It has lots of problems since the people before us or before them put it in and didn't do it "right". We also discovered termites. No there anymore, but damaged wood. There are also bumblebees living in the wood and yellow jackets that love the wood too. The bees like to come to our back door and sneak in. Jimmy is almost done getting the wood ripped out of the concrete. Then he will need to put Fascia board around the perimeter of the house and get the gutters up before it rains. Jimmy's great, but I lack confidence in the "before the rain" statement. And his father wants to get a French drain in as well! I hope it can be done. It's gonna rain in a couple weeks. Oh well. Jimmy just recently got to go on a business trip. It was to learn how to train new fork lift drivers. Oh, and he asked for July 3rd to the 18th off next year, so we can see Leda!
Well, I think that's it. Christy just turned 1. I can't remember if I mentioned that. I could read it all again, but I'm not going to:)