Zoo Gallery

Elinor (Ellie) the ???? Can you guess?

Last week the focus in school has been animals. Along with the trip to the zoo (see previous post) they studied animals in the classroom. One of the projects in the class was to pick an animal, collect boxes and tubes (toilet paper, paper towel, etc) and make a replica of that animal. This is "Elinor" (or Ellie for sort) the...can you guess what it is??? It's a cheetah! Katherine really enjoyed making this and learning about cheetahs. She also had to write a fact sheet with a few facts about cheetahs. All of the kids in the class made animals (some others were a bee, flamingo, elephant, butterfly) and the other kids in the school came to visit their "zoo gallery". It was really neat. They also have in their classroom eggs (hatching into chicks), caterpillers (which have made cocoons and are turning into butterflies every day), ants, and ladybugs. Katherine is REALLY enjoying this unit on animals and learning about all of God's creation!

Springtime and the Zoo!

I think spring has FINALLY sprung for good now - can I do my clothes switch? It seems everytime I think about it when we have a 70+ degree day, the next day is in the 40s, but I think that might finally be past us. John planted some flowers in boxes for our new deck (I'll try to get some pictures posted) and they look beautiful!!! Katherine's school class took a field trip to the zoo on Wed this week and we decided to tag along. It was a BEAUTIFUL day and we got there right when the zoo opened, so things were quiet (although that also meant that some of the animals weren't out yet, either) and we enjoyed the morning. Here's her class at their meeting place... And here's daddy and the younger kids sitting on some kind of insect outside the insectarium - the same thing that the kids are sitting on in the above picture. Christopher on daddy's shoulders (he much prefered this to the stroller)

Various other zoo pictures... Elizabeth's favorite was the giraffe, so I'm glad we got to see them. Katherine wanted to see the cheetahs, but they were still sleeping when we saw them. We did see them in the distance across a field and that seemed to be enough. Thanks goodness.

Earthquake!!!

I was awakened this morning about 4:35 to my bed and the house shaking!!! At first, for a second, I thought it was wind, as it's been very windy here the last few days, but once I got my wits about me, I realized very quickly that it was an earthquake. The next think I heard after waking John up was "I'm shaking" from the girls' room. It had woken them up and Katherine was a little scared. They got out of bed and joined me in a group hug in their doorway. After the shaking stopped, they promptly went back to bed. After watching some news, I tried, but dont think I slept much more. Definitely a rude awakening and lots of trying to explain to Katherine this morning what an earthquake was. I'm afraid that I didn't do a good job, but told her to ask her teacher - that's what they are for, right???

Sad Times

It's been a while since I've blogged. It's been crazy here. Many of you know that John's mom was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer right after Thanksgiving 2006 - 16 months ago. She beat the odds that they gave her, but she finally lost her battle with the dreaded disease and died last week. The last week has been a whirlwind of emotions and stress, but we've made it to the other side and are now trying to resume "normal" activities following the funeral on Monday, April 7. We know that "normal" will be different now with her gone, but are doing our best to adjust and explain it to the kids. While we knew it was coming, the end was VERY FAST, which blindsided us a bit, but really was an answer to prayer. She went from her "normal self", albeit on pain medication and growing weaker every day, to gone in 9 days. A blessing for all those involved that she didn't suffer and and we and John's dad did not grow as weary being the caregivers. The hospice workers that we had for the last 5 days were fabulous and she died at home. She was 82 and lived a full life. We'll miss you, Hazel Mae, Grandma Bauer, and Mom.