Week from You-Know-Where

On Sunday I was in the family room at church with another lady who had two children. She mentioned how her daughter had been sick over Thanksgiving, but nobody else in their family. I should of grabbed Jonah right then and ran.

Every single one of us had a stomach bug this week. All.Five.Kids. Yes, five kids with a stomach bug is as bad as it sounds. There was a very low ratio of actually making it to the toilet. Lots of cleaning, lots of laundry. It hit the youngest the hardest, as Jeremiah, Isaac and I all had it very mild and poor Sadie, Jonah and Sammy had it the worst. Sadie worries me the most because she is so small and small babies can dehydrate so fast. She is not sick anymore, but her diaper was dry this morning and that's not good. I'm feeding her as often as I can, but I'm going to pick up some pedialyte to make sure she gets those fluids back.

Two goods things are 1. It's a short virus (12-24 hours), 2. The boys all napped...a lot.

Advent Wreath

TulipGirl's posts last December inspired me to make an Advent wreath to celebrate the Advent season. I'm looking forward to planning our own little Sunday "services" where we can read from the Bible and sing some Christmas songs.

Thanksgiving

ahem...ahem...and now for my 4th Annual Thanksgiving Day Poem:

Thank you God for fifty.
Fifty little fingers going tappity tap
grasping and pointing, learning to snap.
Fifty little toes that never stop wiggling,
sometimes they're piggies and we can't stop giggling.

Thank you God for ten.
Ten little hands to hold in mine.
Ten little arms for hugs so divine.
Ten little feet that rarely slow down.
Ten little eyes, 4 blue and 6 brown.

Thank you God for five.
Five little souls to cherish and reach.
Five little minds to nourish and teach.
Five little hearts to point towards Your light.
Five little smiles that bring such delight.

Thank you God for one.
One wonderful husband, I couldn't be without.
Who works hard for his family, and knows what love is about.
One precious family, knit together in Your love.
Such a gift and a blessing comes from nowhere else but above.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Bullets

• I haven't did -sorry- DONE bullets in a long time. I'm not even sure I have enough interesting thoughts to pull off bullets. I'm sorry if these are extremely dull.
  
• There was no Art post on Friday because the boys did some cut out Thanksgiving crafts from some A Beka Art books we were given last year. These Art books are pretty lame, filled with pictures to cut out and tape or glue onto to something. I guess if your looking for super easy crafts where you need very minimal supplies, these are for you. Also, these are older books, maybe their newer ones are better.
• I've been watching season one of Heroes thru Netflix. Very good.
• I have a stack of books to read that I got from Paperbackswap. I banned myself from any new library books for awhile. So, of course, I get an email telling me the book (The Parting by Beverly Lewis) I had on hold is available. Meanwhile, I'm half way thru my current library book that I wasn't supposed to check out but couldn't pass up (Critical by Robin Cook). The ban doesn't include craft or cook books.
  
• School is going very well. We are farther than I expected to be at this point, and putting Elijah and Sammy together was a great decision.
  
• I haven't did any Christmas shopping yet. Zero, zilch, zip. That's okay, I LOVE Christmas shopping so I feel no pressure.
• I'll end this because I'm even boring myself. There is one thing a mom of five never has to suffer...boredom.
  

6 Months

Sadie is six months today. Just think, a year ago we just assumed we had another boy on the way. Nope, it was a girl and she has now been here for six months already!

Wishlist

All around me I hear people complain about Christmas in the stores before Thanksgiving. I, however, have been listening to Christmas music for a week already. I started while I made Sadie's Christmas dress, and I can't stop. Nothing gets you in the Christmas spirit like sewing red velour and listening to Christmas tunes. On a side note: why does "velour" keep showing up as misspelled? I even looked it up on dictionary.com! It's right!

I asked last year, and I'm going to ask again this year. What's on the top of your wish list? Even if you have zero chance of getting it. I know Christmas isn't about getting, but it's fun hearing what other's like.

I like this.

And how's this for a little Christmas preview?

Paper Beads

Now this is a fun -and easy- project! You simply cut out colorful pieces of paper from magazines, wrap them around the end of a paintbrush, glue the end, then string the beads! The book suggests adding buttons or metal washers to the necklace also. It's fun to find colors or patterns in the magazine that you want your bead to look like. The boys love the cutting and gluing, of course, but I think girls would really enjoy this for the making jewelry aspect also.

Presidential Ponderings

I've noticed a few people are undecided as to who to support for the presidency. In case you haven't noticed my sidebar, I'm wholly behind Ron Paul. What I really hate is how the media feels like they have to narrow it down to two candidates right away, and then shove them down your throat until you forget there are others. Ron Paul won two Fox News debates. He has recently broke a record for the most money raised in one day. Yet, instead of talking about him and giving him some airtime and name recognition they just insist it's a fluke. Just mention his name to Sean Hannity and watch him go crazy!

Anyway...I just wanted to share this little quiz. Just answer 11 questions on key issues (skip any one you are unsure about) and it will tell you what candidate best matches you.

Select a Candidate Quiz

Civility

A while back I was reading a book about George Washington to the boys. It mentioned the 110 Rules of Civility that he was familiar with. This piqued my curiosity so I made a mental note to look them up when I had a chance. I was expecting to find some profound rules, rules that only the elite of the elite followed. Instead, I found things like:

7th Put not off your Cloths in the presence of Others, nor go out your Chamber half Drest.

13th Kill no Vermin as Fleas, lice ticks &c in the Sight of Others, if you See any filth or thick Spittle put your foot Dexteriously upon it if it be upon the Cloths of your Companions, Put it off privately, and if it be upon your own Cloths return Thanks to him who puts it off.

Not quite what I was expecting. You can see all 110 here.

Yup, I'm One of Those Moms...Part 2

Matching mother/daughter clothes. I finished a skirt the other night and thought "hmmmm...there is just enough here for a baby dress." The dress was the smallest size in the pattern, but is still pretty big on her. It was really hard to get a good picture that showed the skirt and the dress. I kept trying until we had a situation that necessitated the dress being removed and washed. "Code Brown" as Jeremiah would say, although it's more like "Code mustard" during these exclusive breastfeeding months.

She doesn't look too happy about this...

Straw Painting

This weeks art project was very uncomplicated. You just pour a little tempra paint on paper, and blow it around with a straw to make patterns. We used red, blue and yellow so the boys could learn about primary colors and how all the other colors can be made with these. The pictures look kind of funny to me, like they're sucking up something nasty.





We were really blessed this week when one of Jeremiah's co-workers gave us these! The boys, of course, love them. Isaac is a little big for them, but he still has some fun.