Our First Field Day Experience

Savannah's school had Field Day this past Friday.  There were something like 12 or 15 events which the kids rotated through.  They competed against another kindergarten class.  Most of the time they got beaten, but they were all so busy having fun, they didn't seem to mind.

 Savannah said this was the funnest event because the girls competed against the boys and the girls won.  As you can see, she is pulling with all her might with her best friend in front of her.

 This is the first time that Savannah ever tried popping a balloon by sitting on it.  She had a hard time but finally was able to get it.  Most of the kiddos needed the assistance of their teacher sticking something sharp in the balloon to pop it.

 They got to play and do whatever they wanted with hula hoops.  Savannah decided to use it as a jump rope. 

 And her favorite event was flag tag.  They played three rounds and the girls won.  As a result, one of the girls' fathers said he would buy the whole class pizza for lunch.  Savannah was pretty happy about that.

And lastly, at the end of the day they had an "end of the year" class party.  As you can see, Savannah had fun, but she was pretty worn out by this point. 

Savannah the Sweetheart

In April, Savannah was excited to learn that her school was going to sell T-shirts for Field Day. We disappointed her, however, by explaining that we couldn't afford to buy one for her. Near the end of the month, Savannah announced that she had counted the money in her piggy bank and found she had enough to buy her own T-shirt ($12.00). When she told Katie that she was planning on buying a shirt with the money, Katie reminded her that she had previously said she was going to spend that money on a present for her sister Leila on her fifth birthday. Katie told Savannah that it was her money and, therefore, her decision to make.

Savannah agonized over the decision. But in the end, as she later explained to me, she wanted to buy a present for Leila just a "teensy tiny bit more" than she wanted to buy a Field Day T-shirt for herself.

The day of Leila's birthday, I took Savannah to Toys R Us so she could buy her sister a present. As soon as we walked in the doors, she shouted, "Oh!" and darted off to a display of toys. By the time I made it to that display, she had scampered over to another. She zigged and zagged around the store in search of the perfect present. When she finally stopped, I told her I had an idea for Leila that she might want to consider. I told her what it was, and she responded, "Dad, I'm the one buying her present! You're just the driver!" Then she grabbed the front of my shirt, twisted her fistful of fabric into a knot, and yanked me to another location. Pulling me around by my shirt, she continued her quest. She eventually settled on two items: a jumbo-sized Jake and the Neverland Pirates coloring pad and some sort of Doc McStuffins toy.

As we waited in line to pay, Savannah started worrying. "Do I have enough money, dad?" she asked. I told her that the sales tax might push the purchase over $12. She asked, "Can you pay for that part if it does?" I assured her that I could. The cashier was very kind to Savannah and patiently counted out the mountain of coins she dumped on the counter. The total came to $11.89, a fact that greatly pleased Savannah.

Savannah and I went home and together wrapped the presents. Savannah decided that, since she had 11 cents left over, that she would include the cold hard cash with the gift instead of returning it to her piggy bank.

She was so excited for Leila to open her presents. Katie and I worried that Leila would not react to the gift in the way Savannah hoped, so we explained that Leila probably would not understand the significance of Savannah's sacrifice and the tough choice she had to make. I worried when Leila tore open the wrapping paper, shrugged, and moved on to the next wrapped present that Savannah would be hurt, but she took it all in stride.

In the days since, Leila has spent a lot of time with the coloring pad. She has really enjoyed it. To our surprise, the Doc McStuffins toy has languished in obscurity.

As for me, I genuinely enjoyed the shopping experience with Savannah -- even though I was *only* the "driver." It was delightful to see her enthusiasm and excitement as she painstakingly picked out the perfect gift for her little sister and paid for it all by herself.

Savannah is such a good big sister. Such a sweetheart!

In which Leila offers to pay for our daddy-daughter date

A few days ago, I picked up Leila from preschool and had 45 minutes before I needed to pick Savannah up from her school. Thinking it would not be worth it to drive back home, only to hop back in the car and get Savannah, I came up with an idea to fill the time. I asked Leila if she wanted to go on a daddy-daughter date with me. She squealed with delight and said, "Yes!!" I then called Katie to tell her of our plans. During our conversation, she cautioned me about spending too much money on the date and told me to keep it cheap.

I relayed this message to Leila as we were trying to settle on a destination. Leila immediately said, "Dad, you can borrow money from me for our date. We can just drive home and get my piggy bank and then go on our date. I explained that time would not allow us the extra trip home and politely declined her offer to pay. In response, she said, "But dad, I have a lot of money. I mean, TONS of money."

I said, "Oh yeah? How much you got?"

She said, "I have two dollar bills!"

I agreed that that was a large sum of money, but told her I could afford to pay for our frozen yogurt at Yogurtland.

She said, "Dad, you need to earn more money." Then, after a pause, she offered me a means of supplementing my income. She said, "I got an idea, you could tickle my back and I will give you some pennies. Then you will have more money."


Pennies, huh? You mean you're not willing to pay me the big bucks to tickle your back?

First time....Gingerbread Houses

 OK, so this year I decided it would be fun to make gingerbread houses.  I have never really done that before in my life so it would be a fun new experience for all of us.  So the first few pictures are of the girls decorating the houses.  By the end of the task Colette figured out how to use a frosting bag.

 Leila used more frosting than her two sisters combined did.  Hers took the longest to dry because there were just gobs and gobs of frosting on her house...and her hair....and her shirt...and the table...you get the idea.

 Savannah has this thing with lines.  She colors in lines (meaning thin, long rectangles) when using crayons, and she decorated her house the same way as you can see by the above picture.  I loved though how their different personalities came out in how they decorated their houses and what they were thinking.

 This one is Savannah's  The pretzel squares are windows and the large marshmallows are chimneys for Santa to use when he visits.  That is a big deal in our house this year as we are living in an apartment without any chimneys and the girls are worried that Santa won't be able to get in to leave their gifts.

 The photos above and below are of Leila's house.  It was her idea to use pretzels as windows.  When she was decorating her last side she realized that she hadn't done any windows yet and decided to make up for it on that last side.

 And Lastly we have Colette's.  She chose candies for decorating based on what she likes to eat because she knew sometime soon she was going to be able to eat some.  She kept asking when she would be able to eat her house.  It was so cute.

I loved this activity with the girls.  They are so creative and had so much fun!!  Definitely a tradition we are going to have to continue in years to come!

Kindness.....

Ok, so I was going to post about this awhile ago, but obviously I didn't.  One afternoon there was a knock on the door.  By the time I got to the door, the knocker was gone, but a bag was on the porch with the above note.  The bag contained several shirts (both long sleeve and short sleeve), two dresses, and two skirts.  For those of you who don't know, Savannah started kindergarten this year and, here in Dallas, TX the schools require uniforms.  Not knowing exactly how much clothing to get, and not having a lot of money. I was brought to tears by this wonderful surprise. 

Then I noticed the second half of this sweet note.   Leila and Colette were told that they would get something later.  They were so excited about not being left out of the excitement that found our home that afternoon.

A couple weeks later, 4 more bags appeared on our porch.  These contained new matching skirts for the girls, along with a shirt, socks, a hair barette, and a new movie for each kid. And this time, there was a very touching gift for me.  Savannah also got some uniform pants for school.  My emotions overcame me and I weeped.  My girls were wondering what was wrong with their mom.  I have no idea why someone chose to do this for my family, but it was truly an answer to prayer -- and much more!  Thank you so much to whoever did this.  I wish there was something I could do for your family in return.  Please know my heart is full of gratitude and love for you!

The girls wore their new matching skirts to church the next Sunday. Savannah's primary teacher asked her if I had sewn the skirts, and Savannah excitedly told her that someone had left them in a bag on our porch.  My girls absolutely loved being thought of and enjoy all their new treasures throughout each week!

F is for Fairy Tale

So several weeks ago the girls and I did a fairy tale theme for preschool.  It was so much fun.  In the following three photos you can see the Three Little Pigs' houses, Cinderella's glass slipper (which was a shoe cut out, painted blue, and sprinkled with glitter and sprinkles), and two pictures which shows the difference between a frog and a toad (just in case you wanted to give one a kiss). 

 

As you can see in the first photo below, Savannah drew her own houses and then applied the straw and sticks.  The red one is the brick house and was painted with a rectangle sponge.  She was going to fill in the whole paper but remembered that the wolf goes down the chimney, so she added one in the

top right corner of the page.

 Leila's artwork is pictured below. Leila drew her house of straw similar to Savannah's and applied straw, but then decided to draw her stick house like I drew Colette's houses.  She also used toothpicks to put in a window.  The brick house is the red one.  The outer layer is the bricks, and the pink middle is the inside of the house.  The small gap in the bricks at the bottom is the door, and if you look closely, you can tell that she remembered the chimmey at the last minute.

 I drew all three of Colette's houses but, as you can see below, she had her own style when it came to placing the sticks on the middle home.  It's amazing how different three kids can make the same project.

 In the next picture on the right-hand side, you can see Colette's frog and toad better.  We glued oatmeal and rice on one and painted it browns and grays to make it look like a toad. The frog was a shiny paint of any color since frogs vary in color.  We based this project on The Princess and the Frog story.  The other artwork is painting with apples, which we did after we read Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. 

 The photo below is Leila's Apple Art.

 Below is Savannah's Art.  She is very much into her artwork having some kind of order.

We also read The little Red Hen and made home-made brownies afterwards.  We made princess hats, a dragon mask, and then a castle out of card board boxes, which the girls painted. Then we acted out Sleeping Beauty.  Savannah was Sleeping Beauty, Colette was the wicked fairy Maleficent, and Leila was Prince Phillip.  We had all the important characters at any rate.  Below, the girls are sporting their princess hats.

 We also made miniature apple pies when we read Snow White.  Leila is showing hers off in the photo below.  We also played games like finding Cinderella's lost slipper, or picking which shoe would make a good glass slipper.  We had races and ran away when the wicked fairy tried to get us.  It was so much fun and so much fun to watch the girls express their different ways of looking at life.  It was also fun to hear what they took away from each story, after all a fairy tale is supposed to teach us something. 

Pioneer Day Celebration

So we celebrate the arrival of the pioneers into SLC on the 24th of July.  So this morning we learned about our own pioneer ancestors.  Then we played with water balloons.  We learned that Dad can throw it the farthest and highest, but the girls have the most fun passing it around to each other. Below are some action shots.  Last week for FHE we also played pioneer games and walked through ice water in the bathtub to experience some of the things that the pioneers did.

 Then we made covered wagons out of strawberry newtons, marshmallows, toothpicks, and gummy lifesavers.  The girls really got a charge out of it and wanted to make several.  Below is what they are supposed to look like.

 This is how our (very independent) 2 year old made them.

 Here are the girls with all the finished product.  We had so many of them we put them into a wagon circle.  It was a fun activity and a yummy treat to end the morning.