Go Upward!

Lori has finally found her calling in life, cheerleading. After many failed attempts at getting her to dance, I hesitantly suggested cheerleading this winter. To my great surprise she gave me an adamant YES!

She is taking her new found love through an organization called Upward.She is currently cheering for basketball games,  and in the fall she will be cheering for soccer.

Our whole family knows her cheers by heart because she is constantly practicing them and teaching them to her sisters.

It is so fun to finally see her excited about participating in something. We are proud of you Lori!

Baked Oatmeal Recipe

This is one of my favorite dishes to make for a weekend breakfast. I double the recipe so we have plenty of leftovers to eat off of for a few days.

Recipe:

*1/2 cup butter                     *1/2 C Brwn Sugar

2 eggs (beaten)                     2 1/2 C oatmeal

1 T Baking Powder

1 Cup Milk

*I substitute applesauce for the butter.

* The original recipe calls for 1 cup of sugar.

Directions:

Cream butter (or applesauce) and sugar. Add 2 eggs and beat. Mix Oatmeal, baking powder, and salt together and add to creamed mixture alternately with cold milk. Pour into 8 X 8 pan (or 9 X 13 if doubling). Top with brown sugar and cinnamon. Bake at 375 degrees for 25-30 minutes.

We like to add nuts, craisins, and a little milk to ours when we eat it.

Hope you enjoy!

The Mitchell’s’ Christmas Adventures

Christmas came and went rather quickly around here, but we had a fun December preparing for it. Here are some of the highlights of our holiday season.

Decorating the Christmas tree, and it also appears to be crazy outfit day as well. It is our tradition to put the tree up Thanksgiving weekend.

We made Christmas stars out of cardboard, foil, and lots and lots of glitter. Did I mention they used LOTS of glitter?

We did a lapbook on the Gingerbread Baby by Jan Brett, and then of course had to make some gingerbread of our own.

Lori and Audrey’s choir put on a Christmas program for the families about week before Christmas. Audrey didn’t pick her nose once this year.

On Christmas Eve, we attempted to put together some gingerbread houses from a kit we bought at Wal-Mart. Unfortunately we didn’t read the directions first, so our houses looked like they’d been hit by tornados. The kids enjoyed licking frosting off their fingers though.

Last, but not least, came Christmas day and the girls finally got to open their presents. Here are Nat and Audrey sporting some new dresses from Grandma Mitchell.

Lori thought Grandma and Grandpa Mitchell had given her a can opener, but it was really her long hoped for camera. Tricked you!

And here is John with his favorite Christmas gift. Stuff tastes like turpentine!

Happy New Year!

 

 

Are You Ready for Winter?

Learning about how animals get ready for winter is an interesting topic, but it’s even better when you can pretend to be those animals. That’s what we and few of our friends did today at the Kuehn Conservation Center’s nature program.

First, a few of the kids got to dress up as animals that tough winter out, hibernate,and migrate. The naturalist helped the kids think about what teach type of animal does to survive winter.

Next, the kids got to pretend to be squirrels by making a nest under a tree and then grabbing a nut one at a time to bring back to their nest. Then they got to touch and see other animals native to Iowa and learn about how they survive winter.

Finally, after a hike in the woods to build more nests, they got to crack open some hickory nuts with rocks and eat them.

As an added bonus, there was an Indian tepee the kids could explore and play in.

What a fun way to relish in a gorgeous November day, learning about and exploring God’s creation.

Cell Craft

Today we began a unit on the human body for science. Our first topic was cells. We talked about what their purpose is and looked at pictures of them in a book called Cells by Michael George.

After reading about it, I had the girls make a model of a cell from a diagram I got from Crayola.com.

They drew a circle and then glued a button in the middle to represent the nucleus. Then they used gems and colored macaroni to represent the other cell parts.

Learning is more fun when you can use glue!

First Snow

We had our first snow last Wednesday. The girls were so excited that got themselves dressed in their gear and headed out to play. They spent about an hour running around and throwing snowballs at each other and the house. It would have been the perfect snow to make a snowman out of, but they didn’t get around to that.

We got a late start to school that day, but it was worth to see them enjoying the first snow.

Now it Makes Cents

 

Counting money has been a frustrating skill for Lori to learn. But, as usual, when I bring art into the mix, math isn’t so bad.

So we began by pulling out the grocery adds that usually go to the recycle bin. Then I gave her the task of finding items she could buy with $1. So she began perusing the merchandise and clipping out what she could afford.

Then she pasted them to her paper.

When the cutting and pasting was complete, I had her pick two items she would like to buy, add them together, and then count out the correct change. Then she checked her answer on the play cash register.

Audrey got to cut and paste too, but her only goal was to find numbers and then tell me what they were.

Lori’s comment after this activity: “This makes math more fun mom.”

Mission accomplished.