The Kids

This outfit has become very familiar this year.

Fun in the 10 inches!

Dragon Masks


Sue at the Chicago Science and Industry Museum

Val and Nora have the beat.

Spiderpig, spiderpig, does whatever a spider pig does.

The reason the blog is neglected...

I recently started working at Mad Science and Waldkindergaten Inc. Mad Science is a fun job, easy and pays well enough. I am really excited about Waldkindergarten Inc. It is an outdoor (all outdoor) preschool program started by my friend Amy Farmer. We meet in Arcadia, IN on the Goss Family Farm. They are organic farmers and also friends and it is great that they share there healthy land with us. They have a big garden and raise sheep and chickens. Our Waldkindergarten is modeled after the movement in Germany and other parts of Europe that is slowly springing up in our country. It's all about connecting, with nature, all of the senses, each other and individually. The boys hike, engage in pretend play (which is so fun to watch), picnic, have journal/circle time, explore natural phenomena, help take care of farm animals, and do extreme sports such as huge log pile climbing and icy creek bank sliding. As the group of boys gets older, (they are almost all five or half way to six), we are able to read books together and plan outdoor based projects (shelter building and gardening for example). The boys have grown so much in the last couple years, and it is evident that Forest Boys(the boys group name) has had a great influence on them(a lamb was born last night and Drew said "it's all starting again mom!" remembering the lamb we witnessed being born last spring). Amy is now leading group of younger kids(girls and boys) and it is really neat to get that 3 year old age group out there because they are still so in awe of it all. Nora has been once and I will enroll her is spring. This winter has been brutal! Our blog (and website)is linked on this blog under check me out:).

Indiana State Museum

A couple of weeks ago Drew, Nora, Lily and I attended the Indiana State Museum. We actually had a lot of fun after we ran into the building nearly escaping frostbite and waited in an hour line to ride on a tiny train. (The kids didn't seem disappointed in the train at all so I hid mine- I think)

Preschool

I don't think I have posted yet about Drew's school. He goes to Meridian Hills coop and loves it. It was a rough start, he didn't want me to leave him. It was also an incredibly hard decision, never would I have imagined something like preschool would have been so hard before the kids came along. Nevertheless, we made the right decision because now he is so confident at school and has lots of friends. In fact, he is pretty popular(this is what im told!), and is very into the school parts of the day (circle, music). This is a play based preschool, so while it is low on academics(which lines up with my education philosophy for this age), it is so great for social interaction. His teacher, Mrs. Shipley is wonderful and that makes all the difference. They have gone to plays, raspberry picking, the fire station and more. They play out side for at lease 30 min everyday and always have new things on the science table and sensory table. She allows the boys to wrestle, ride scooters down the hall and play balloon volleyball. They also do creative crafts (not the cookie cutter variety) and she does not push my non crafting son to do art if he doesn't want to...he did make a great gingerbread house! I also love that it is a coop because there are always parents and siblings there and it makes for a real community.

Nora and I went to school last wed for a cookie exchange with the parents but she ended up staying all day in the classrooms while I drank coffee and chatted down the hall. She was so on task that she wasn't a problem at all and when I would come in the room, she wanted me to leave. This may have hurt my feelings if I hadn't already dealt with clingy mcclinger (drew). But now it is refreshing. Once again, they prove how different they are!!


Nora and the big girls at snack.

Drew and his boys

Nora playing "Doggie, Doggie where's your Bone"(flawlessly i might add)

Making pizza (with a meticulous touch)

Front and center for story time

Go Colts

Val has been going to Colts games with Pop and the other family colts fans since we have lived in Indy. A couple of weeks ago, Drew got to take his place. Drew is a bonafide sports fan (must be genetic) and was ecstatic at the opportunity to go...


Ryan, Uncle Dave, Grandpa and Drew

Grandpa and Drew

Uncle Bob and Drew with his serious football face.

Wolf Park

About an hour north of Indy there is a wolf rescue center called "Wolf Park". The have wolf howl night and a couple of weekends ago Drew, Val and I attended. It was more fun than I expected. It is hard to tell from the picture but the wolves live on acres of property and have something like 25 total. The handlers actually go in the fence with them and put on quite a talk. We got to howl as an audience, wait a few seconds and hear wolves from acres away howling back. My favorite part was when the extremely knowledgeable wolf handler stated, "now thats a coyote from somewhere else, not ours" just so impressed with her ability to differentiate the canine vocals. We went for Drew's sake because he is fascinated by animals, especially the predators but I would recommend it to anyone. We are going back in May for the wolf-bison demonstration (they have bison too!)- As an animal lover and vegetarian, it is sometimes hard to be accepting of Drew's fascination with the predator-prey relationship but as he puts it, "mommy, they have to feed their young somehow!" As a science lover, I am impressed with his level at which he understands interdependency in different habitats...


Drew mid howl

this pic of the wolf makes it look zooish but it wasn't at all

Nora is Three!

We celebrated Nora's third birthday with a pink tea party(the pink was her idea of course). It was great! Hard to believe my baby is three. She is so conflicted right now, she wants to be a baby one moment and a big girl the next....I can only imagine what 13 will be like! I hope she lets me baby her for a little while longer-

Nora's pink cupcakes baked by my personal cupcake baker (Joanne)

We played "Pin the Teabag on the Teapot" The kids loved it...


Even baby was pretty in pink.

Beatrice and Autumn

Willow and Lily