February brings the rain,
Thaws the frozen lake again.
The weather has been just wonderful, unlike most of our family and friends in the North, so we have had a lot of outdoor time. Nature walks every weekend as a family, trips to the beach, and hours and hours on the front lawn and at the park across the street. I will miss Florida for the winter months!
The month started with a visit from my parents. They flew in on February 1st and stayed until the 5th. While they were here, we went to a Mardi Gras Parade, we went to the Wildlife Sanctuary, we went to the Jet Museum on base, we visited my sister in Pascagoula, and we celebrated my Dad's birthday.
The day they left was Fat Tuesday. We did not do much for this day, but we did celebrate Groundhogs Day and Candlemas ( a little late) by making candles and reading books about Groundhogs. I hope to do more with this in years to come.
Then the next day was Ash Wednesday, although we did not make it to Mass for Ashes because we were all sick, but we did start talking about Lent. I brought out my new purple place mats (I am trying to incorporate the liturgical colors into our daily lives) and all the Easter books.
Then came the week of Valentines Day. Early in the week, we had two fun play dates with friends:
1. We went to the Jet Museum with my friend Tanya and her son Christopher
2. My friend Christy visited from Gulfport, MS with her three kids Chloe, Luke, and Audrey.
We celebrated Valentines Day as a family on Wednesday, February 13, because on Thursday the 14th, the kids and I jumped in the car and took a 6 hour trip to Jacksonville. I was very proud of myself for doing this trip alone with the kids, especially considering both kids were sick! The purpose of our trip was a doctors appointment for Tigger (more later), but we were hoping to see some old friends and neighbors as well. Unfortunately the kids were just too sick and on Saturday February 16 we got in the car and drove home with no visits. (Although in hindsight, this was probably for the best...but more about that later...)
The next day, Sunday, was the Kids Marathon that we trained for. Too sick to participate, I let the kids put on their Marathon shirts and we drove downtown to watch the adult runners run the real marathon. Another disappointment, but oh well. 2 months ago, my kids did not even know what a marathon was and now it is part of the daily vocabulary. Just today I found Piglet on the porch with her stuffed animals dressing them "for their marathon practice."
Then, the next Monday was Presidents Day. Still all sick, but happy because dad did not have to work we read several books about the presidents and watched the Animaniacs President video on You tube (very funny and catchy if you have not seen it- the kids just love it!).
I checked out a few library books on George Washington and even rented a little video. One of the books we all really enjoyed that was age appropriate for a 4 and 5 year old was George Washington's Teeth. On the actual night of George's birthday we had some friends over for dinner. After eating a shrimp stir fry, I served cherry juice pops and cherry pie for dessert. I had George's picture displayed and we almost sang "Happy Birthday" to George until Owl stopped us because he said that was just too weird. At the end of the night Tigger said, "That sure was a fun party, too bad George couldn't make it." So I am thinking Cheryl's Timeline might be a good idea to start putting events and people in perspective.
On the 19th I turned 31. I took the day off from schooling (not that I hadn't already taken most of the month off...) and had a fun day with the kids. We went out for coffee and bagels in the morning, then we went to the beach, then we had a picnic lunch at the park. It was a beautiful day and we spent the whole day outside. For dinner we went to Macaroni Grill. Owl gave me a bunch of new running gear, including a new athletic watch, a hat, sunglasses, running socks, and new shoes.
The next weekend we drove to Mobile as a family to see the Human Body exhibit at the Exploreum. This defiantly made an impression on the kids and I. We also went bowling which proved to be a fun family activity.
During the last week of February we had another play date with my friend Tanya and her son Christopher. We met at the Gulfarium and then went to a Destin Playground.
On the 27th Owl turned 34. I gave him wooden wings to hang on the wall (someday to hang in a bar...). Technically he has not received his "wings", he will officially receive them on Mar. 28 at his graduation. So I told him this was really an early graduation present. His real birthday present from the kids and I was the 2008 March Madness video game and 2 Yankee Candles. We went to Olive Garden for dinner and then had a small carrot cake at home for dessert.
Owl's birthday was an exciting day in our home because the first butterfly in our butterfly garden hatched out of his cocoon. The whole month of February we enjoyed watching the caterpillars make their cocoons and then turn into butterflies!
On the last day of the month, Leap Day, I took the kids to the base movie theater (where kids get in free and adults only pay $3) to see the new Veggie Tales movie.
For Art Appreciation, we finished our Mary Cassatt study. I will have to post pictures soon. A wonderful book we read during this study was Suzette and the Puppy. It was especially nice to study Mary Cassatt after studying Degas earlier this year because we discovered Degas and Cassatt were friends. The kids really liked this fact.
We continued with our Alphabet Study for both kids and I also started doing a bit more of our RightStart math. Somehow I am only on lesson 13 and it is February. Not good, we need to start doing math more consistently.
As always, we enjoyed lots of picture books from some of our favorite authors:
More books written and illustrated by Don Freeman (and there are still several books of his that we have not checked out of the library yet!):
Will's Quill (This one was especially good because it introduced the kids to Shakespeare!)
By Rosemary Wells:
Max's Chocolate Chicken (Getting ready for Easter...)
By William Steig (and we will continue reading his many other books, probably after Easter...)
By Erza Keats:
Kitten for a day (this was more of a baby/toddler book but my kids thought it was so funny they could not get enough of it!)
And after reading Goodnight Moon last month, we checked out a few more by Margaret Wise Brown:
Also these random books:
Night City and The Big Bad Wolf and Me (The kids loved this. I thought it was very clever and different...)
And yes, we still listen to books in the car, especially this month with our 6 hour trip! This month we heard Bears Bicycle, Madeline's Rescue, Runaway Bunny (this soundtrack also had a delightful song about the runaway bunny that we all loved and memorized!), The Wump World, Ferdinand, Mrs. Rumphius
