Long Hiatus, Best Excuse Ever!

Baby S.

After a long uncomfortable pregnancy which zapped me of much of my creative energy here she is in all of her angelic loveliness. I'm so excited to feel human again and embark on a new Montessori journey with our sweet baby girl and to resume the one we've so cherished with our 4 yr old.

I've been taking Karen Tyler's Montessori Teacher Training course for 3-6 yr olds over the past many months. The albums are great; invaluable tools full of activities for each of 12 subjects. After taking the birth to 3 yr course through North American Montessori Centre (which gave me the confidence to guide our oldest daughter's development using Montessori philosophies) I was looking for an affordable alternative in increasing my knowledge. I do recommend the NAMC courses, but if you're on a tight budget or don't care about paying for glossy, picture-filled albums then Karen's albums which have all the information without the unnecessary flash are for you! Her course is available through amontessorimarketplace.com

My current project is putting together the pink language scheme for A. We tried the Gettman/Dwyer method as it seemed to be straight forward and much less labour intensive in activity set-up. Unfortunately A. seems to need all of the visual aids that the pink-blue-green system employs so I have my work cut out for me! For a great discussion and comparison of the pink-blue-green scheme vs the Gettman/Dwyer method for learning to write and read check out What Did We Do All Day's research and thoughts.

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Well, off to work on all things pink scheme... until next time, happy Montessori-ing!

About A Girl's Gnome Home Giveaway!

I whole-heartedly urge you to visit my awesome friend's blog About a Girl to see the wonderful little Gnome Homes she made to participate in a Giveaway and the larger version she was inspired to created for her own Gnome Home Giveaway! The little needle felted homes are so darling and I'd absolutely love to win the one she's parting with! Thanks!!!

Oh Camera Where are You?

I'm really bummed about our camera just walking away! I haven't been the most prolific blogger of late and when I went to get the camera to record A. making her own soup from scratch it was nowhere to be found. It's been 5 days now since then and still no camera. AArrrrrghhh! I must remedy the situation soon! Please camera, come back to us! We love to use you to capture all of our wonderful life moments together. and... we're sorry for using some not so great language to tell you when we were not happy that you take blurry pictures 10x in a row and that you only work on the action setting. We love you and need you! OK, so if there really is a camera fairy then maybe my heartfelt plea will be heard. Silly? Probably, but if it works......

ButterBlossoms, Flowerflies, and Cherry Friends!

A-Girl loves a good play on words and rhyming so I’ve titled this post just for her!

Two weeks ago was all about having a great spring birthday party with friends. If you read our last post you may have realized that yes, she has had TWO birthday parties this year! We live a 9 hour drive away from A.’s Mama and Papa and they wanted to celebrate her birthday with her so we met in the geographical middle at Grandma and Grandpa’s house for a family birthday. Turning Four and becoming ever more social A. expressed a heartfelt interest in having her first birthday party with good friends so once home we had one of those too. It was fun for me to plan and execute as I could exercise my creative passions and give her a party to remember. The only down-sides to the day were when A. with tears in her eyes came to me and said "Mommy I don't want to be four, I don't ever want to grow up!" Awww my sweetie pie. I think I replied that I didn't want to grow up either but if I hadn't then I would never have had a sweet Baby Aayla to love soooooo much. She liked that but I'm not sure that it made a difference to having to grow up.

The day before the party we made some window stars together to serve as decorations. I think they made the room magical and now I'm wishing for some other colors of paper such as bright fuschia and purples to brighten up the place!

We also dyed some eggs for the egg hunt. A said they needed a nest so we improvised with a basket and some dried grass from the lawn! We especially liked the marbleized eggs. How-to courtesy of Martha Stewart.

Some healthy snacks including: fruit bouquet, raw and vegan "cheeze-its" crackers and veggies with hummus.

Birthday girl ready for some egg hunting!

Watermelon Contemplation...

The tunnel to Pinata time! Kids had to line up and go through the tunnel to have their turn at the pinata. That way they wouldn't get too close to that swinging stick!

Aayla would NOT commit violence against the pinata. My sweet peaceful girl!

Lovely Flowers and Butterflies! The kids did these with bingo dabbers and as you probably have seen a million times before... then they sprayed them to spread the colors. They sat on the hearth to dry and then the pipe cleaner feelers and stems finished them off.

Each child made a beautiful little Cherry Blossom Tree in a vase to take home. (they each picked out a bird on the tray to mark the place of their own tree so they would make sure to take their own masterpiece home) Great problem solving! We finished off the day with a raw vegan raspberry cheezecake. (sorry all of the photos were blurry!) If you're always looking for super healthy guilt-free food (especially deserts) like me I highly recommend raw food chef (dessert chef extraordinaire) Heathy Pace's blog SweetlyRaw. Every year A-girl has a raw birthday cake that is sooooo good and Heathy's raw caesar salad dressing is a weekly occurrence around here. YUM!

In-Home Hatching: Baby Robins!

A little 4 year old somebody in our house just LOOOOVES birds. Well, we all do around here but I mean she LOOOOVES them! She has two of those great Audubon singing plush birds (Male Robin and Eastern Bluebird) She also received a needle felted female bluebird from Santa (with a little help from mom) for leaving him such healthy treats to fortify him on his epic Christmas Eve journey. She left him blueberries and almond milk! She just loves to play "Birdies", finding new types of nests for them and now since those little fuzzy Easter chicks appeared in stores, the birds can be Mommies and Daddies. I was inspired to give her some robin babies as the Plush Robin has been father to baby chicks for quite some time. He seems perfectly paternal in his adoption of chickens but well....

First Hatchling

And Then There Were Two...

So Ugly They're Cute!

Feed Me, Feed Me!

Now to make a Female Robin. Over at our house it's not a question of which came first, the chick or the egg, its- which came first, the babies or the mommy. Babies came first due to lack of time in making a mommy bird. A. doesn't mind, the daddy Robin is a great Daddy just like her own!