Pictures from the Pumpkin Patch ~ 2009
32 Weeks
After Mass and Benediction this morning, we finally took our children to the pumpkin patch so that they could pick out their pumpkins to carve.
While we were there, I couldn’t help but think about the last time we brought our children to this particular pumpkin patch, almost one year ago to the day. I was 8 weeks pregnant at the time, and we excitedly shared the news with some of our friends. Little did I know that just one month later, I would miscarry our little one, and be told by the doctor that he had stopped growing between 7-8 weeks. Looking at the pictures from that day, and remembering that I was 8 weeks along, still brings tears to my eyes.
What tremendous sorrow and heartache losing a child causes…
A Handmade Treasure
I was so excited when they arrived in my mailbox this week from Aimee!! She had them made, by her Grandmother, for our little one and I absolutely LOVE them!! Thank you so much Aimee!!
*Aimee will actually be welcoming a new little one any day now! (Her due date is November 8th.) Perhaps you could join me in saying a quick prayer for her. Thank you!
Highlights from “I” Week
I always feel like I am not getting very much done until I sit down and try to record what we did each week… Then, if I remind myself (or somebody else reminds me!) that my husband was gone all last week as well, that I had 9 girls here for a Little Flowers meeting, that I am nearly 32 weeks pregnant, and *trying* to keep up with Religion, Math & Phonics (most days), I don’t feel quite so bad that we didn’t get to “everything!” 😉 Anyhow, here are a few of the things that the girls did do last week with the Alphabet Path.
letter I’s, and practiced making and writing the letter I using Handwriting Without Tears Hands-On Materials and Kimberlee’s Grey Block Paper.
book and listening to the 
!)
We read various picture books from our collection and the library.
The girls also completed some of the worksheets from I is for Insects, though we just added the pages to their binders, and did not make the actual lapbook.
and the Museum ABC Nesting Blocks
, in fact, at the beginning of the week I was even able to find a couple of the images and printed them out, but it just didn’t happen… Oh well! (Here they are, if you’d like a copy: Study of Tulips and Bees with Honeycomb)
copywork from An Alphabet of Catholic Saints,
and one more coloring page from Fenestrae Fidei.
The children also colored a picture of St. Isaac Jogues, which I traced from one of our coloring books after they were shocked that I couldn’t find one online. (His feast day fell during our “I” week, so they insisted!) I think they have been a little spoiled by everything that is available online! Seeing me trace the picture for them, piqued their interest though and they wanted to try too. (The top right picture was traced by Rascal. It looks like I didn’t take a picture of the one Twinkle Toes traced. Hum… I wonder where it disappeared to!)
We also listened to Ondesonk: St. Isaac Jogues by Reginum Martyrum Productions.
I is for Icicles
I’ve been trying to tie in a few of our Christmas Crafts now, in case the baby arrives early. My children love making ornaments for their Godparents and Grandparents, and since one of the ones we choose to make this year were Wooden Bead Icicles, I thought “I” week would be a perfect time. They were quite easy and turned out very cute!
Sparkling Ice
Spider Crackers
I know… Spiders are NOT insects, but I had everything to make these, and I was trying to keep the treats fairly healthy with all the sickness going on around our valley. However, it was a perfect opportunity to discuss the differences between Spiders and Insects! 😉
Ants on a Log
And, yes, I did let them each have a scoop of ice cream on a cone. I needed something to bribe them to eat that celery!
State-by-State Scrapbook :: Connecticut
the capital of our state.
Inside the gold-leafed dome
is where we legislate.”
, making the pages, and completing a number of worksheets from the Study Guide, they were very excited to learn that Nathan Hale is a Connecticut State Hero. Apparently they already had learned all about Nathan Hale from Liberty’s Kids
. I love how much they learn and remember from that show!
…
A Costume for St. Maximilian Kolbe
My oldest decided he would like to be St. Maximilian Kolbe for our All Saints’ Party this year. At first I thought, “Oh, this will be so easy! I’ll just find a prisoner costume, add his number, and find some glasses.” He had other ideas… He wanted to look just like this picture, which Charlotte had used as inspiration for her coloring page:
Not as easy as I thought it would be… Especially since I’ve only used my sewing machine once, and this time I didn’t have a wonderful seamstress walking me through each step!
Anyhow, for the robe, I ended up purchasing a few yards of inexpensive grey fabric. I folded it in half and sewed a (extremely crooked) seam up each side and over to create the sleeves. I then just cut out a circle for his head, which, despite being careful, I still cut too big… Oh well! I then took the little remaining fabric and made a little collar to cover up that mistake… 😉
For the shirt I used a white collared dress shirt, some blue painters tape for the stripes, and a couple small pieces of felt for his prisoner number. The blue tape is easily removable, and I just pinned the felt on, so the shirt can return to its current status as one of the boys Mass shirts!
The glasses, although not perfectly round, were from the Dollar Store (they didn’t say they were prescription, but to be safe I still plan to pop the lenses out), the belt was from one of the girls costumes from last year, and Captain pulled out his Black Rosary. I still need to replicate the books and perhaps buy some grey hair color.
It is also really long and the bottom still should be hemmed (somehow)… But that might actually prove to be a good thing since, right after I finished making it, I checked my email to find that our All Saints’ Party needed to be cancelled this year, due to so many families in our group coming down with the flu. We will still have a celebration at home, of course, but I’ve also decided to incorporate a Saints’ Party later in the year, with our Home School Group, after flu season in the spring, so he has plenty of room to grow. I just might need to buy a new white Mass shirt, in the meantime!
So, what do you think?? Despite the many imperfections, Captain was thrilled!! In fact, he told me that it is “the BEST costume EVER!!” And that makes it just perfect, right?!
Little Flowers Girls’ Club ~ Generosity
Last Thursday I hosted our 4th Little Flowers Girls’ Club meeting for this year. I was so glad that most of the girls were healthy once again and we had 9 in attendance, unlike our last meeting with just 4 girls. Nevertheless, it was a rather laid back meeting. I’m not sure if that was due to the fact that we have settled into a nice routine, or the fact that (since my husband had been out of town all week, and I had not seen any adults in days!) I was desperately needing some adult conversation/interaction. It was probably a bit of both… Whatever the reason, I enjoyed the afternoon just as much as the girls! Now if I could JUST figure out what the other moms are up to, and kept whispering about, when I would leave the room… I guess I am just going to have to wait and see… and work on the virtue of patience! 😉
We began our meeting with our opening prayers and then reviewed the virtue of Courage from our last meeting. The girls shared some of the activities that they were able to complete from their checklists in the Wreath 2 Member’s Guide and choose prizes accordingly from the prize box (which is stocked with various Coloring and Father Lovasik Books, Stickers, Stamps, Notebooks, Candy, Bubbles, and more!).
I included the memory verse for Generosity, an icon image of St. Katharine Drexel, The Corporal Works of Mercy, multiple daisy images, Martha Stewart dimensional daisy stickers, a quote from the bible, and the prayer to St. Katharine Drexel from the Little Flowers Virtues CD.
(If you would like to download the document I created for this notebook page, you can do so here. Also, you can find links to all of my notebook page documents in this post.)
*I’ve updated this post as well as my downloadable document with the correct spelling of St. Katharine’s name. It seems to be spelled incorrectly just about everywhere, including on the coloring pages and in the Little Flowers Materials. Thank you, Kathy, for the correction.
Here is a picture of the sample pages I had prepared for the meeting. (Yep, this past summer, I accidentally made this page twice. Oops! It seemed extremely familiar as I was working on it. lol!)
Saint Therese, the Little Flower, pray for us!
Small Successes :: October 22, 2009
I held our 4th Little Flowers Meeting this afternoon! We’ll just be having one more meeting, in two weeks, before we take a 3 month winter/baby break. I’ll try and share some pictures from today’s meeting soon.
Even though Hubby has been gone all week, and has only been able to call home for a few minutes on Tuesday, I am still alive!! It has been a busy week, but I’ve managed to keep up with the laundry, the dishes, bathing children, and have even baked Apple Puff Pancakes for breakfast twice! Thank you to all of you who have been praying for me this week. I am sure it has made all the difference!
Pro-Life Pumpkins
I was so excited when I saw this awesome pumpkin carving earlier today, sort of like our Saint-O-Lanterns, from American Life League:
There are many opportunities to be a voice for the voiceless, and most of those opportunities require us to go to a public place. But, on the eve of All Saints Day, the public comes to us!
So, make a pro-life jack-o-lantern and send your photos to us. Be sure to include your name, age and address in the e-mail, and we’ll post the best ones on our home page!
It doesn’t have to be anything fancy. It could be as intricate as the design here or as simple as the word “Pro-Life.” Whatever your skill level, be creative and tell the world about the personhood of preborn babies!
You can even download the template here!
Apple Puff Pancakes
Early this morning, before my children woke up, I was catching up on a few posts in my Google Reader and ran across Kimberly’s Apple-y Goodness. Oh, it looked too yummy! I quickly clippedthe recipe, realized I had everything I needed to make it (yay!), printed it out, and headed to the kitchen to get started.
It was very easy to make and was SO SO SO delicious!! In fact, my children kept asking if I could make it again Saturday morning so that their Daddy can have some. I think we will!
The recipe was originally from The Farm Chicks Cookbook. (Oh, and I doubled the recipe, using two pie pans, for our family.)
Apple Puff Pancake
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter (1/2 stick)
- 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 apple, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
- 5 large eggs
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/2 cup all purpose flour
- Dash of salt
- Maple syrup or confectioner’s sugar for serving
Heat the oven to 425 F. Place the butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon in a 9-inch pie pan.
Heat in the oven until the butter is melted and bubbly – 5 minutes. Remove from the oven, stir well and mix in the apple slices. Return to the oven and bake for 2 minutes.
Meanwhile, combine the eggs, milk, flour and salt in a blender or food processor and process until frothy – 1 minute.
Pour over the apple mixture. Bake until the cake is puffed and the center is set – 18 to 20 minutes.
Serve warm with maple syrup or sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar.
Enjoy!
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