Snow play

Eric's favorite snow activity has always been having snowball fights.  So yesterday morning, he and I went outside to have a fight.

Be afraid.  Be very afraid.  

The start of his snowball stash.  

My stash.

He decided Pie in the Face would be his snowball of choice.  

RUN!!!!!

My one snow

I love having one good snow a year.  One snow.  Powdery, fun to play in, beautiful.  We got snow yesterday, and it was wonderful!  They were the biggest flakes I had ever seen.

I saw it starting in the afternoon while we were doing school.  We immediately ran downstairs and went outside.  

Eric immediately began catching snowflakes on his tongue.  These were easy to catch.  So huge!

Eric said my hair looked just like Elsa's, so he took a picture to show me.  

About three hours later, here was our winter wonderland.  Sigh.  I love it!!!!

FISH!!!!

So, after weeks of research, we finally got some fish for the tank Eric got last month.  Getting fish is much more involved than getting a dog was.  So many things to consider - temperature of tank, ph levels, who can go with whom, who needs a mate and who doesn't, food, etc.  We now own 6 fish.  Hoping and praying it stays at 6.  New tank syndrome kills a lot of fish, but we did everything we could to prevent that.  We have two Neon Tetras, two Black Tetras, one Silver Molly, and one Black Cory.

In the video above, Molly is the Silver Molly.  Dusk is the Black Cory.  The Tetras have not been named yet.  We haven't gotten to know them well enough to give them names.

This is the only picture I have of all 6 together.  They move a lot.  The Black Tetras are on the bottom left.  Dusk is in the center.  The Neon Tetras are next to Molly on the right.  

Captain D

We don't usually swim on Fridays.  His swim is offered 6 days a week.  That is a little much for us.  So, Friday is a day we had chosen to miss.  Two weeks ago, we decided to go on a Friday.  They have a fish award that they give out on Friday to the swimmer that week based on practicing hard, attendance, improvement, performance, etc.  You keep it for one week and then bring it back.  We didn't know this fish, Captain D, existed.  Eric was very excited to get the award that week.  They put the award on hold for a couple of weeks as it is state competition time, so we currently still have the fish in our possession.  He will bring it back next week to move on to a new home.  

I love my goofy little fish boy!

Library

It didn't take long for the librarian here to learn our names.  We go in once or twice a week, and she just immediately checks the hold shelf when she sees us coming.  We often request books from other libraries within the system.  We went in this afternoon and got our weekly haul of books.  He reads about this much plus 2-5 of his own books each week.  I try to read ahead of him on books to find good series for him.  It's tough.  He's a fast little reader.  He doesn't get in the car without a book.  He even brushes his teeth while reading a book.  I was the same way when I was little.  I read as much as possible.

Two of the above books I am hoping to read quickly before he does.  Wish me luck!

I'm not nearly as fast a reader as I used to be. 

This picture book caught his eye, so he wanted to sit and read it before we left.  

Lego at the library

The library here offers a once a month Lego build time.  They dump legos on the table, then there is a free for all to build whatever you want.  This was our first time to go.  Eric build a futuristic military plane.  You then label it and put it on display for the next month.  Then they take it apart for the next build time.

Here is his description: 

Happy Valentine's Day!

First of all, have you notice I have been a blogging machine lately?  I mean, really....

We miss our special Papa Murphy's heart shaped pizza.  We have no Papa Murphy's.  It's a cruel, cruel world here in the ATL.  But Chick-fil-a has a heart shaped biscuit.  All is good again.

And then I had to make Eric's favorite food for lunch.  

Potato soup.  With plenty of bacon. 

So creative!

We had a Valentine party today.  I told Eric a few days ago that he needed to make a bag or box for it.  He decided to make a Lego box.  Out of Legos.

Seriously.  How cool is that?  He is so super creative, this fella that I love!  (his name is also spelled out in Legos on the front of the box, but it is kind of hard to see.  The E is black, r is red, i is brown, and c is green)  The kids loved his box.  What kid doesn't love legos?  

The party was held at a Bounce House.  The kids had loads of fun.  

Here was my contribution to the snack table (or what's left of them).  

DaVinci's Donuts

We had a fun field trip today to DaVinci's Donuts.  They have some crazy good flavors.  I was surprised how much I loved the maple bacon.  I should have just bought a box of those.  SO GOOD!
It's a small business that is about a year old.  The owner met with the group and discussed how she started the business.  Then she showed us how she made the donuts.

And she kindly gave us each one to try.  Most of the kids chose their own icing and toppings.

Here is Eric's creation.  Chocolate icing with chocolate chips and M&Ms.  Not for me, but he loved it.  He is all about making things his own way, so this was right up his alley.  

The donuts were all cake donuts, and the recipe was yummy.  Definitely someplace I would like to go again.   I need some more of the maple bacon already.  Sigh.  

Dog beds

When we moved here, we wanted to keep the dogs off the furniture.  So we bought them each beds.  We bought Gizmo a smaller bed, because he is a pipsqueak.  Well, Gizmo loves cuddling with Widget.  Widget has learned that if he gets in the bigger bed, Gizmo will join him.  But if he chooses the smaller one, he gets to be alone.  There are many times that Widget will just opt to get in the little bed to be by himself.  It makes us giggle.

Valentine Service Project

One thing we have missed since being here is serving.  We had a homeschool group in AR that did a service project once a month.  Then we did some through church.  Then we did a few on our own.  We are finally getting plugged in to groups to serve with.  Last week Eric made 15 Valentine cards.  Then we delivered them to a nursing home with a group of other homeschoolers.  Unlike our group in AR, we really didn't know these children.  But, it was fun to serve together.

Doggies

This is what the doggies like to do while we work.  They have a hard life!

Science results

There is a lot of pressure to being the sole source of your child's education.  There is no backup in the form of parents or teachers.  Just you.  I was pretty nervous about E being graded.  His science class is 5th-8th grade, so he is very young in that class.  How would he do?  

Cave poster

First quiz

He ROCKED it!  Whew!  I think I kind of like this grading thing...

Science projects

At Eric's new one day a week school, his science class is pretty intense.  They have daily homework, occasional tests, and projects.  Last week we did an experiment with steel wool to see what causes rust.  This week they had to do a poster on a cave.  There is a part of me that likes it.  He is experiencing real homework and projects.  And there is a part of me that doesn't.  He is experiencing real homework and projects.  But, here is my cutie pie with his poster.