Ready for Fun!

Earlier this week, I took Claire to the splash pad. She's ready to go!

She went straight for the swings, (no surprise here!), but we did make it to the water later.

 

Tonight we were planning a family outing to the splash pad with a picnic dinner, but the rain kept us from our plans. Instead, Jordan and Claire played in the rain, and I had a little bit of me time! That's an excellent plan B in my opinion! :-)

Our 4th of July

America! I love America! I'm thankful for the freedoms we have, and I'm thankful for those who have given so much so that I can enjoy living in this great country each day. Thank you!

We had a nice, relaxing day on July 4th. We just hung out at home. Claire and I did some crafts. We all sang some patriotic songs to celebrate. We marched around the house waving flags and singing "You're a Grand Old Flag." We had kabobs and burgers for dinner. I made an American flag out of fruit kabobs! We had a nice day.

Thankfully, Jordan did have the 4th off, but that night he had to drive back to Mississippi so he could work in McComb the next day. So he missed out on the evening festivities. But I'm glad Claire and I still went!

We listened to a community band concert on the steps of the Capital Building. Here, the band is still warming up.

During some of the concert, Claire played with a little boy who was next to us. I occasionally convinced her to sit with me to listen to a song or two. She also was her silly, crazy self as she spun around, ran down the steps, or even lied down on the steps!

I wasn't sure if I was going to try to go see the fireworks. I thought I'd have to go back to the car, drive somewhere else to get closer to the fireworks, find another parking space, walk somewhere else, and hopefully find a place where we could see the fireworks. But right before the last song of the concert, the conductor announced that you can see them great from the steps of the Capital Building! So we just stayed right there! Claire enjoyed the fireworks just fine, but she was much more interested in the sweet teenage girl behind us who thought Claire was so cute and funny. Oh well! She knows that fireworks go "BOOM! BOOM!" And at least she's seen some now! And I'm glad that we watched the fireworks. - I do enjoy celebrating our nation's independence that way!

God Bless America!

My Girl and Me

I love this girl more than words can say!

Lessons: All About Me

Last week we had some abbreviated classes with Claire about her body. Tracing her body and having her color different body parts different colors was a big hit to her!

She was so proud to show Dad later when he got home!

Another day she got to bounce balloons on different body parts. 

And finally, she went on a little treasure hunt by using her eyes (to see through the TP roll) to find things I'd left around the kitchen for her. 

Laura's Visit!

Laura came to visit us last week! We went on some fun outings -- to the indoor park, to the children's room at a local museum, to the farmer's market, and to the mall play area and food court. (We had some other things planned, but we didn't feel like being outside in the HEAT!) We also made some chocolate chip banana bread with Claire's help. YUM!

She snagged the spatula at one point. - She knows what's going on!

We also decided to make menu planning boards - one for each of us. At first, I thought it would be pretty easy; after all, the post I saw about it on Pinterest made it look quite simple. - Boy, was I wrong! We worked on it all week long, and we finally finished on Thursday. We kept saying how glad we were that we actually started on Monday because we hadn't realized that it would take us so long to finish! We also agreed that neither of us would have done this project on our own. - So I'm so glad we could encourage each other to get started on this project and to keep going when we wanted to throw in the towel! {My crafting history is simply that I don't make many crafts, and I generally don't love the way they come out if I do make them. But thankfully, I really do love how this one turned out!}

So here are our final products.

The clothespins are for each day of the week. The bottom box has meals to choose from in it, and the top box has the meals I've made recently in it. On the back of each meal card is a list of ingredients so I can easily make a grocery list after planning our menu. And the different colors of cards indicate different kinds of meals - like Mexican, home cooking, Italian, sandwiches, etc. I think they turned out great!

I've hung it up, and we've started using it! I love it! 

And here we have Aunt Laura and Claire! We are all so glad that Laura could come and visit us!