Faith August - 4.75 Years

Sleep - Same as normal.  I've been trying to give her more stuff to keep her mind engaged during her rest time and she seems to be enjoying it.

Eating - Remains a great eater although not as adventurous as Rebekah, she does love food and sometimes surprises but she always asks for more fish but never for more kale :)

Skills - Faith's favorite Christmas present was her new bike.  She never tires of telling people that she has a new bike without training wheels.  That balance bike that she rode for a year was totally worth it.  Within a half hour she was riding her new 16" bike without any help.  After an hour she was starting and stopping all by herself. 
Her awesome phonogram skills continue and she has completed another book of cutting a pasting the pictures in after reading the words.  Her handwriting is improving.  Incidentally, something I've learned about her is that learning the strokes for her made much more sense when she saw what letter that stroke was going to turn into. She needs to see what it is she is doing, that her time as a purpose! 
She is doing great at ballet and loves going to the classes.  We have moved to another studio and now she gets to do tap dancing and is super excited about that. 
Her coloring has started to be more deliberately within the lines and she is enjoying it more.
She continues learning her Russian and does well at it.  I need to start speaking with her more during the day so she can really learn it!
Faith did a great job singing in the Children's Choir Christmas musical; she was an angel (literally!).

Play -  Faith loves to dance around the room, either to the music we play during worship time, or to the stuff she is just singing to herself.  In addition to the bike (which she wants to write all the time) the girls were also given a set of magna tiles and that has been without a doubt the best toy they've ever gotten.  Frank plays with it just as much as the girls!  Faith enjoys making a magna-tiles house for Rebekah's Calico Critters Kanga family.  She also continues to love her baby doll but loves Grace more and continues to play Mama with her.  It is so sweet the way she talks to her sister (except when she is coming to knock her magna-tiles tower down).  She just loves Grace. 

Rebekah Joy - 3.25 Years

Specs - 31lbs, 37 inches

Sleeping - About 3 days before she was due for this 3 1/4 milestone, she began to drop her nap.  I've been giving her about a half hour to fall asleep on her own and then books if she doesn't.  I imagine it will be several months before it is dropped completely. 

Eating - Rebekah is a champion eater.  Always asking for more broccoli and so sweet in thanking me for meals, I just love it. 

Skills - "I can do it my ownself" is the most frequent phrase out of Rebekah these days.  She loves to try, she wants to learn new skills and only wants to be treated like a baby when she is playing baby and mama with Faith (although she does revert to this baby whiny talk once in a while).  It has been her job to sort and match the socks on laundry day but pretty soon she is going to move up to doing pants and I think she is ready for it.  She has started to be more deliberate about coloring in the lines on a page, although sometimes it is just a tornado of color on a page but she loves to color.  She can hop with both feet together.  "Mama look at this" is another oft spoken phrase from Rebekah.  She wants me to watch how fast she can run, how long she can stand, or at the silly face she is making.   For school time, Rebekah is learning her letters, loves to cut, match, transfer, and pour.  She is also learning her phonograms by overhearing them from Faith and plays the games in our LOE curriculum really well!  Faith's balance bike was handed down to Rebekah at Christmas this year and within about a half hour she was totally rocking that bike!

Play - Her little imagination is really coming to life in playtime.  She has always enjoyed "going on a drive" usually to "Chick-Fil-A" but she is enjoying playing choir teacher and Ms. Layne (their ICE teacher).  She loves to dance around and sing, it is so sweet.  I am sure plenty of this comes from her ballet class which she loves (although I suspect her favorite part is getting her Tiana sticker afterwards; Tiana is her favorite because she wears green).  During our Mama time she generally asks for stickers or for me to read to her.  She LOVES acting out our Bible stories; she enjoys craft but acting out the stories is her favorite part. 

Random - At her 3 year old appointment, the doctor heard an innocent heart murmur and that was verified by the cardiologist.  Rebekah did awesome at the dentist and has beautiful teeth :) 

Grace AnneMarie - 14 Months

Is it possible that I have the cutest baby on the planet?  I am sure lots of parents think that but I actually do have her!

Specs - 22lbs, 31 inches

Sleeping - No changes, still 12 hours at night and 2 naps a day, no real signs yet of dropping that first nap. 

Eating - Grace has learned to say "milk".  She is doing better about eating the food on her tray without whining for something else she sees on the table.  Not perfect but getting there.  We dropped the nighttime bottle when she turned 14 months and I still warm her milk a little bit in the sippy but she is happy with it cold also.

Skills -  Grace shakes her head "yes" whenever she hears inflection in your voice.  By the end of the month she also learned to shake "no" and is now confusing them, shaking "no" when she really means "yes" and you can tell from the look in her eyes!
She has learned to crawl up and get down safely from the couch.  She also figured out she can go down the slides at the park on her tummy with great success.  Awesome walker!

Play - If Grace sees a book, she wants you to read it.  She is constantly crawling into mine or Frank's lap with a book in her hand.  It is so endearing and impossible to resist because we want her to love to read!  She continues to love her little Hide and Squeek Eggs and Dolls.  Doll, Dog, and DaDa are the only words she really says consistently but she says them with such passion.  Her sisters got a set of Magna Tiles for Christmas and Grace has enjoyed being "Baby Godzilla" to come knock down towers!  She can be such a terror to them but then so loving to her doll :)

Faith's First Book

Faith created and read her first book this week.  We are using the Logic of English Foundations A curriculum and I love it.  I have never taught anyone to read so the step by step is very helpful for me :)  Faith has learned about 2 dozen phonograms so far, knowing all their sounds and how to write the lowercase form.  For the book, I printed out sheets of paper with a 3 letter word on them.  She had to read the word, pick the corresponding picture and glue that picture to the page to make the illustration.  She did awesome and was so proud when I told her she had to sit in the middle during reading time today because she was the reader! 

Grace AnneMarie - 13 Months

Wow, I am really late with this!  In my defense, this has been a stressful month for us!  First we found out that Frank got command of a comm squadron (great) in Korea (okay) as an unaccompanied tour for a year (not cool!).  Then after a month of getting used to that idea, he was accepted to SAASS and was universally advised to take the SAASS and put in for command later.  So, now he is staying here in Alabama for another year :)  Hooray!!  Now, onto Grace...I am trying to write this for how things were on December 2nd (even though it is about 20 days later)

Sleeping - Doing great, no changes

Eating  - Still loves bread.  Using a sippy cup exclusively and doing really well with it.  She still gets milk at snack time and a bottle before bed but I am sure these both will change by next month. 

Play - Doing great at solo play.  There is no very little or no crying at all.  She still loves dolls and loves to give hugs, especially to Mama.   She enjoys hearing the modulation of her voice when we bounce her or tap on her chest; she thinks she is pretty funny :)  She really enjoys these link toys that my sister got her for her birthday from B.  Her favorite book is Sense & Sensibility

Skills - One Wednesday night about the middle of the month she took a few steps at church.  Then a few days later she took even more and by the end of the month she was done crawling.  What a big walker and she is so proud of herself!!  She is a sorting fool and she loves putting things away.  Using her hands to move her lower lip and then blowing out to make noise.  I don't know the name of this action but it sure is cutie.  She has also learned to shake her head "yes".  Both the other girls learned the action for "no" long before "yes".  So, does that mean she is going to be my super positive and optimistic daughter?  Grace has also learned the sign for "please". 

Homemade Yogurt

The next installment of Continuing Homemaker Education is homemade yogurt. 

I'd often thought about, and even pinned a few recipes for making yogurt in my crock pot but I never did anything with it.  Frank sits next to a Jordanian exchange officer at ACSC and we've made an attempt to get to know him and his family.  We went over there to drop off some Danielle bread and while we were there the sweet wife of this officer gave me some of her homemade yogurt to try.  It was awesome!  She invited me over to learn how to make it and I was floored at how easy it was and how great it tasted!  The girls and I have made it several times, most recently for our Y week, and have had great success each time.  I don't think I'll ever buy yogurt again!

Heat whole milk to a boil, whisking continuously so it doesn't burn to the bottom of the pan. 

Once boiling, remove from heat and allow to cool until just warmer than you would drink. 

 

Remove a little of the warm milk into a cup and add in 1-4 TBSP of the yogurt starter (or Greek yogurt from the store) and stir together. 

 

Add the yogurt/milk mixture back into the warm milk and stir. 

Pour milk into a plastic container and put on lid.

 

 Wrap container in a large heavy comforter (I use our down comforter) and let sit for 5 hours. 

 

After 5 hours check and if yogurt is still liquidy, replace lid and re-wrap for another 2-3 hours.  Every time I have made mine I have let it sit for about 7 hours. 

Place yogurt in fridge overnight before eating.  For sweeter yogurt, use less of the starter, for more sour yogurt, use more starter.  If you are using yogurt from the store as your starter, use the full 4 TBSP.

Cotton Pickin'

A sweet lady at our church invited several of us out to watch the cotton harvesting at her farm in Pike's Road this week.  We headed out there on Veteran's Day and had a great time.  It was so interesting to watch and then she allowed all the kids to pick their own cotton by hand.  The farm was harvesting the cotton about a month later than normal because of the cool summer that Alabama had this year!  It was plenty hot out for us while picking cotton and it certainly made me think about what a wonderful inventions the automatic pickers and cotton gin are!