Monday, November 19, 2007

Reece is very enthusiastic about his school work this year. Everything seems to be his "favorite" subject. He always asks to do more Math, Phonics, Language Development cards and Growing up with Amber Lamb character stories. Here you seem him doing a math lesson of shape/color attributes.
The picture, above, is Reece doing his letter blends for phonics. The next couple of pages start him on three letter words. Our last child to read! Very exciting!
This is Reece's Saxon Kindergarten Math's meeting/calendar book. He practices ABAB/ABB patterns, orally tells us what day it was yesterday, today and tomorrow. Then he shares all the days of the week and the current month and year. In the picture he writes a number, in the arrows, to show how many days we have done Math this year.
The last picture shows how all the kids like to join Reece and remember their Preschool Language Development cards and the Growing Up with Amber Lamb character story. Today's card was about camels and their unique features. We all found it interesting that camels have three eyelids including one that they are able to see through and keep the desert sand out of their eyes. The world is opening up to Reece and he is ready for it!
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King Louis XIV

In our History lessons we learned that Louis XIV became King of France at the age of 4 years and 8 months. Lindsey just burst out laughing at the thought of a King at Reece's age. She just laughed and laughed that Reece could be King of a country. Reece, on the other hand, thought that would be "pretty cool". Just look at his smile!

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The Wachtels visit to North Carolina - UPDATED!

What a fun time we had, a couple of weekends ago, when Eric, Amy, Ben and Olivia came for a visit. We enjoyed hanging out at Shelly Lake, spending a day at the Marbles Museum and even competing in tennis on the Wii.














Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Halloween 2007

This was Austin in 2003 as an almost five year old.

Now Reece is wearing this outfit as a four year old.


He and his siblings had a great time tonight. It was great to get out in our neighborhood and see our neighbors!

The kids made out pretty well too. Mommy and Daddy can't wait for bed time so we can pillage.

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Friday, October 26, 2007

Kid Cameras

Did anyone know that there are digital cameras for 4 year olds? I didn't know that but Aunt Nar knew and couldn't resist treating all the kids to their own digital camera for Austin's birthday! This picture is for you Aunt Nar!
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Austin's Birthday

Austin really wanted to go to the North Carolina Zoo for his birthday so that is where we took him with his good friend, Caleb. The kids had a wonderful time and it was the perfect "birthday gift" for






Fair

North Carolina State Fair Pictures




You gotta love fair "food"!
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Marbles Museum

Raleigh opened up a new museum called "Marbles". The opening day was crazy, but the kids sure had fun. They had an art center, a music room, "be on t.v.", children all around the world, water play, and an entire floor of hands on fun for little kids like Reece. We'll definitely be back for more fun!



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Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Chemical Reactions

In Chemistry, recently, we did experiments with lemon juice, vinegar, milk, baking soda, and water. We had fun discovering that vinegar and lemon juice are similar kinds of molecules and that milk and baking soda are not similar. Also, even though lemon juice and vinegar are not identical, they behave in similar ways because they are similar kinds of molecules. As you can imagine, History and Science are some of our favorite subjects around here.

Sumo Wrestling

In history lessons, recently, we learned that sumo wrestling allowed Japanese warriors to fight without blades or bloodshed. So, of course, we had to try out our own 'sumo wrestling'.
We made a "dohyo" ring with colored paper representing the pillars in the North, South, East and West. Lindsey wore her hair in the "mage" sumo hair style. Austin and Lindsey marched into the circle, squatted and clapped once (called a chirichozu ritual). Then they did the "shiko" ritual of exaggerated foot stamping. After that they drank water to purify themselves and tossed a handful of salt into the ring. They did a "glare-off" and then lunged at each other (called a shikiri). The kids had a memorable history lesson and we parents were glad that we only saw one neighbor on this Saturday morning.

Sunday, September 30, 2007

Lazy 5 Ranch

A couple of weekends ago the family went to the Lazy 5 Ranch in Mooresville, NC. It is a drive thru safari with over 750 animals from 6 continents. You can take your car, but we chose to take the horse drawn wagon thru the 3.5 mile safari. It was worth riding in the wagon, plus it saves your car from getting animal slobber all over it. The kid's favorite animals were the giraffe and the zebras. We also enjoyed a picnic lunch and playing at their playground.

Lindsey feeding the giraffe.


Petting the zebras that came up to our wagon to be fed.




Getting the parrot to say "hello".


Sunday, September 09, 2007

Day at the Beach

Last month we made an attempt to go to the beach. It didn't work out very well. We could hardly find a place to park, and once we did find a place, the skies opened up and it rained on us almost the whole time. With big bolts of lightning. Needless to say, we did very little swimming that day in August.

Friday, however, was a whole different story. First, having the day off on a weekday is great. The kids basically do school four days a week, with some extra things here and there for Austin on a fifth day, other kids were in school, other parents were at work, and as a result, there was PLENTY of parking available for us at our favorite Wrightsville Beach location.



No clouds, warm day, in the mid-upper 80s, and we got to experience a usual relaxing day in the sand. We were greeted on this day with some extra seaweed that had been pushed ashore, probably be a storm several miles out, but as the tide came in, the weeds went out. We all had a great time.
Austin, while speaking to his Grandma on the phone on the way to the beach said "Some kids go to school on Fridays, but we go to the beach."





Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Durham Bulls

Austin and I finally went to a Bulls game--the second to last game of the season and I recorded the final out. This time, on a camera that records video AND sound!


Monday, September 03, 2007

Flipping in the Pool

The kids have really enjoyed swimming in our neighborhood pool this summer, and by now they've become very comfortable, even adventurous...