Happy Saint Patricks Day!

We have had some good Saint Patrick's day fun around here. Jared has been talking about leprechauns all month so I decided we would have one visit us last night.  A trail of gold coins was left that led to a morning treat and there were some rainbows found at the breakfast table.  Some pictures and furniture got turned upside down and food was dyed green.  It's so fun.  I love it.  We did lots of simple learning times with rainbows, gold coins and shamrocks.

I really love his face here. Mark was working on subtracting with him. 

Pretty much sums up how I feel about math but I will never say that to Jared or Lydia.  

Jared loved finding our furniture like this. 

 Lydia sat right down at the table and ate her "gold pieces" (Reeses PB Cups) and rainbow. 

 Green shamrock pancakes. And a green smoothie, I did feed them one healthy thing. 

We met up with our friends the Farnsworth's at a park and made a cute little rainbow snack. It was easy and fun. Such beautiful spring weather.

I was quite pleased that I managed to get the shamrock Jigglers out in one piece. And that Jared and Lydia ate their chicken salad croissants really well.  Sometimes they do and sometimes they don't.  A little motivation about dessert didn't hurt...

Leprechaun floats and shamrock jigglers. 

Lucky Leprechaun Parfaits.  Brownies, chocolate pudding, mint chocolate cookie, more brownie pieces, white chocolate pudding, and cool whip with green sprinkles.  It was a little much for me but festive.  Lydia only at half of hers it was pretty filling.

We are so lucky to be together. 

 I am happy to report that Lydia can identify 95% of the letters in the alphabet now and can correctly count to 1 - 10.  This counting bit has been so hard of her.  It was one of her "goals" for the year.  We will work on identifying the numbers now. She is also doing really well saying the sounds each letter makes too.  I love seeing her and Jared learn.  Jared and I have been reading a short first step reader book each day after I put Lydia down and his reading is really improving.  It's fun.

4354 Dickerson Road

4354 Dickerson Road

This will be our new address as of April 30th!  We bought a house and are really excited about it. There were many times we doubted if we would be able to buy a house we liked in an area we wanted to be in here.  It's a fairly expensive place to live. (We got a great price for this house for where and what it is) We had contacted a realtor though some neighbors here and began looking at houses with him (Mark Polk) in early February.  Our lease will be up on June 17th so we felt that gave us a good window.  We checked out some houses he found then Mark found this house online 3 days after it was listed. We went to go see it and put an offer on it 3 days later. It is a great space for us in an excellent location with a great school.

Quick stats if you don't want to look at it.
5 bedrooms
3 bathrooms
2392 square feet
on 2 acres
great walk out finished basement (perfect for an in home preschool which I plan on starting)
Hardwood floors
Huge double deck

It was built in 1981 and has been well maintained.  It is a rancher with a walk out basement (exactly what we wanted) a huge deck and our own little woods. It does have small bathrooms but there are 3 of them so we are not too worried. I will miss a nice walk in closet but we have his and her closets in the master so it will work fine. Those things are more a worry for reselling one day far away not us living in it. We are planning on repainting the interior, redoing the kitchen and re-carpteing the basement.  We will most likely replace the shower/bath stalls as well.  This will all be done in May before we have to move in (at least thats the plan).  Mark and I have been choosing paint colors and debating about dark wood cabinets or painted cabinets.  We think we have decided to go new dark wood ones.  The front yard has a built in fire pit, a chicken coop (in case as we want chickens...which we may do) a built in, cemented basketball hoop (not one of those stand alone ones that always falls down in wind I never liked those) and so many trees for tire swings.  That was one of my must haves.  It is a great place for us.  It is on a gravel road which we don't love but its only like 5 houses down.  It's in the county not the city so part of the road is paved then we will have to drive about 1 minute on a gravel road. We feel really blessed to have gotten this house.  After the inspection we had about 6 things on our list we wanted the sellers to fix and they agreed to them all!  Such a pleasant surprise.  I worry a little about things falling apart since its older (not because it looks like they are about to) so we are going to go ahead and get a warranty each year and have some peace of mind.  Jared and Lydia are really excited to go live there. It is about 1 mile away from Chris Greene Lake which will be so nice.  There are nice hiking trails, a sandy beach area and we hope to get kayaks one day. I never thought we would find a place like this.  There are things I will miss.  It has houses nearby but doesn't feel as much like a neighborhood (the whole gravel road thing).  Part of me wanted to live in this community called Forest Lakes that has the tennis courts, swimming pools and paved walking trails and tons of kids but the other part of me didn't. If we lived there we would have a monthly HOA fee which we got so tired of in Colorado. I think this is a better fit for us.  This house also puts us on the North side to town which is farther from Mark's school (it will now be about an18 minute drive) but closer to DC.  It is only 20 minutes but those 20 minutes will feel really nice after being in the car for 2 hours. It is the area I really wanted to be in.

I am also super excited about the school Jared will be attending. It is one of my top three choices.  He will attend Baker Butler Elementary. It 's really nice to know where he will be next year.  I went in a took a tour of the school a few weeks ago and am really happy about it.  I had to wait in the office for awhile while the principal talked with a student and as I sat there I noticed how straight the lines the kids walked in were and counted how many students were in each class.  (its the teacher degree in me) None of the classes had more than 18 kids.  I loved walking around the school.  It was bright and happy and organized. The principal was very helpful and seemed well liked/respected.  The schools out here were a big motivator for us getting out here.  So many states have so many budget problems.  Here Jared will have music and art at least once a week and PE 4 times a week. They have lunch recess and an afternoon recess which makes me happy.  Kids have to sit still for so much of school!  All the Kindergartens are full day which I am bummed about but it is what it is. I think Jared will love being there.

We are excited to move in and start feeling really settled here.

Elmer Spencer

Last Saturday we got a call from Mark's Mom telling us that Mark's Dad (Elmer) was in the hospital.  He had fallen at his facility and been taken in.  He didn't seem to have any serious issues but was not responding well.  He was put on Hospice on Sunday and passed away Tuesday morning (March 10, 2015) around 11:00.  His health had been failing the past year.  Each time he went into the hospital the past year (he came down with pneumonia a few times) he came back with a little less.  I believe he was tired and ready to go, to be whole and be reunited with his family.

Mark flew out Friday night to attend the funeral Saturday (March 14).  All of Mark's sibling were able to be there and celebrate Elmer.  We are so happy that he is in Heaven now and can be whole again.  I am glad that Jared and Lydia could meet him and spend some time with Elmer. I don't feel like I really ever knew Elmer because of he and Mark's accident back in 1995 with the Ultralight. I do know that he loved his family and the Lord deeply. Here are some photos from the funeral.

Susan (Spencer) Clayton, Sue Spencer, Kristi (Spencer) Clayton, David Spencer, Steve Spencer, Laurie (Spencer) Riley, Mark Spencer, Shannon (Spencer) Heslop, Cathryn (Spencer) Jacobson.

 Hand prints of his 8 children, 32 grandkids, and 6 great grandkids. 

Keys found! Spring arriving?

We got a nice snowstorm 2 Thursday's ago.  Mark's school district called a snow day as it was supposed to start snowing about 2 hours before dismissal. (Which it did and continued for quite a few hours so I think it was a good call) We got about 5.5 inches of snow and it was so pretty. I love falling snow.  We went out to play in it while it was still falling and had a lot of fun.  Sadly Mark had his car keys in his pocket and they fell out while he was running around.  This wouldn't have been as big a deal if he had an extra set of keys to his car but we don't.  Just 3 weeks ago I had mentioned how we needed to get a second set maybe we really will now. We were sitting down to dinner and heard the snow plow come through. The snow gets pushed into 2 large piles near our house so we had no idea which pile the keys were plowed into. We knew we wouldn't find them anytime soon but Jared and Lydia willingly went out and dug in the piles a little each day.  Fortunately for us, this happened now and not in the beginning of February.  It rained a good amount and did not snow the last week so that helped the piles melt faster.  On Wednesday (just short of one week later) Jared, Lydia and I came home from running errands and they went to go do their daily check and they found the keys! We were so happy.

We went sledding again on Friday because of course school was cancelled and had a great time.  We don't have official snow pants for Jared so the poor kid gets pretty cod.  This time I took a tip from a friend and wrapped his first layer in plastic shopping bags then put another pair of pants on top of him. It worked great.  We had a fun time sledding.  The snow is pretty much all gone now. It has been in the mid 60's and daffodils and tulips are starting to push up their stems.  Some crocus's have started blooming and they are so happy.  It is nice to see some color coming!  Everybody keeps telling me how awesome spring is here.  I can't wait. I did see this funny saying the other day on Facebook and it is so true!

We are looking forward to a beautiful Spring. It's fun to see seasons in a new place for the first time.  I did not expect as much snow as we got and am glad we did get a good amount. I don't want it to stick around for months and months but one good snowy month is pretty great. I am so happy to live places with distinct seasons. We can't wait to be outside more and start exploring again.

that girl...

Jared had a hard time staying in his seat and eating lunch today. He just kept getting up and wandering around.  About half way through he went to the bathroom. I commented to Lydia who was doing a surprisingly good job eating, that maybe I should take Jared's lunch away since he wasn't eating it. She really liked that idea.  I said since he was using the bathroom I wouldn't this time but that I hoped he would settle down and eat. I then went upstairs to grab something. When I came back down (maybe 3 minutes later) I heard Jared say "Lydia ate my chicken nuggets!" I walked to the table  to check it out and there was Jared's plate and each of the 5 chicken nuggets on it had a bite taken out of it! It was so hard to not laugh with Lydia.  I thought it was so funny (and sneaky) that she didn't just eat one, no she took a bite out of each one then left it on his plate.  I asked her if she did it because I had mentioned taking it away and she smiled and just said she was helping me.  She is too much.

Lydia is definitely deep in the "Why" phase as well.  I remember reading an article that talked about one reason behind a child asking why altho time is because it is their attempt to be part of the conversation.  They may not have all the language or understating to contribute to the conversation but they do want to be a part of it thus all the "whys?".  It helps me be more patient answering all her whys. (I still turn the question back on her all the time "Why do YOU think do?" She certainly says some funny things. One common one is "Who do you want to be in that show/book?" After almost every book we read or show we watch she always asks each family member who they want to be from it.  Last night was family movie night and after she asked us who we wanted to be she looked at Mark and said " Can I be a princess Daddy?" Her little voice was just so sweet. She sure keeps us on our toes.

I have tried spending more time with Lydia and Jared each day and her behavior has improved.  We are not back to the pre 3rd birthday level but it has improved. I know its a phase and some days will be better than others but they seem to both really appreciate me making one on one time for each of them. I also read this article this morning that served as a good reminder.  The basic summary is found in this line from it " Praise what you want to raise". I really like the idea of praising behaviors you want to see in you kids.  It said to stop and think about when was the last time you praised your child's behavior instead of correcting it.  I can easily see how tiring it would be to "be good" when all you hear about it your negative behavior. I also really try to be specific in what they are doing when offering praise. Instead of just saying "good job!" I like to expand it. To focus more on what they did well and how they did it the work behind it. It feels much more real. I have also tried to make sure she has some room time or independent play.  I think our routine got too loose for awhile. I wasn't doing very much learning time with her and she wasn't having as much room time.  We just weren't following our normal schedule (I think I was trying to be more loose and let her and Jared just do what they wanted more and it turns out that really doesn't work very well for me or our kids since they are so used to structure) Jared is in preschool 2 days a week and I work M and F all day (and TWTH afternoon) so I was using our T and Th mornings while he was gone to run all our errands and I think it was pretty boring for her. It is just nicer to run errands with one kid instead of three. We will just keep working on a good balance. A lot of it just has to do with having a plan and sticking to it.