Happy Birthday Christie!

Happy Birthday Christie! We are so glad to have such a great sister-in-law and Aunt!!!

Have a great day!!

March is Reading Month

Ok, I have been neglecting the blog as of late, I have been too busy on the computer trying to finish yearbooks for Quinn and Averys schools. But I am in the home stretch with that now so I thought I better post.

The festivities for March is Reading Month at the schools are in full swing. Grammy commented on how she was a mystery reader for Averys class last week, and the porridge was a big hit. This week it was the Camp-Out at Quinn and Ellas school. I had the priveledge of taking the two first graders, and it was a little crazy, but fun to sit with our sleeping bags and flashlights and hear some stories. Tomorrow Avery gets her turn with Camping out and gets to wear her jammies to school.

We also made a trip to the library this week, and because it is "reading month" and Quinn is old enough, he got to sign up for his first library card. It was quite the big deal for him, filling out the application, and signing his name to his card. He was very excited, and Avery was a little upset that she didn't get one. Next year it will be her turn.

Today we had a visit from some of Scotts friends, and they brought their baby kitten with them. Apparently the mom cat is not able to care for this kitten, so they have taken over baby duty. The kids were very excited (especially Kaleigh) to get to hold it and bottle feed it. But thank goodness, the cat went home with them!

Hopefully the next time I post, yearbooks will be completely edited and finished, and I'll be moving on to the next project.

Tiger Cub and Puppy Cake

Tonight was the Cub Scout Blue and Gold Banquet, and Cake Bake. We spent most of the day today baking and preparing food for the evening. Quinn wanted a dalmation puppy cake (big surprise), so thankfully I had most of the ingredients on hand and we made a pretty good go of it. He worked hard placing chocolate chips in just the right places, and after getting some fondant from my friend Marcy the finishing touches were in place.

The banquet was nice, and Quinn officially earned his Tiger Cub badge after a ceremony where he had to cross the bridge made up of wood planks with the character qualities that all boy scouts strive to have on them. The evening was nice, the girls even got all gussied up with curled hair and dresses. Grammy and Grampy attended too, hopefully they weren't too bored.
After the festivities, Quinn and Scott headed off to the hockey game, while the girls and I had to make a quick errand run. Tomorrow is Chili cook off and visiting.

Crayon Recycling

Today's project, in between parent teacher conferences, was to clean out the crayon bin (exciting I know, really the kids had dumped them all over the floor, so we had to pick them up anyway). After removing all of the broken ones, and the girls and I spending about half an hour peeling off the paper, we sorted them into colors and put them in the cupcake pan. We then heated them up and made new circle crayons. I had seen this in some magazine somewhere a long time ago, and I finally got the energy to try it. It worked pretty well I have to say, and is much better than the stash of bits that they were before. The kids are very excited to get to try them out tomorrow.

Beach Day and Boy does time Fly

Today was Beach Day for Kaleigh at the preschool. She could not wait, and has been talking about this event for a week. The kids had fun in class, and as Kaleigh said, "we didn't have to do any work." They played beach volleyball, went swimming, played in the sand, sang karaoke, and went to the snack tiki bar. This is her class, and Ms. Bonnie and Kaleigh taking a nap on their way to "Hawaii" on the "airplane"

Tonight we had Opa over for dinner, as Jane is in Florida. He has quite the social calendar this week, and is making his rounds all over town. It was nice to visit with him, and the kids had fun playing Lego's and trying to get him to build them a ship. I took some of these pictures, and remembered that a few years back I had taken a similar picture of Opa and Quinn, time sure does fly. This was April of 2006...

And today...

Great Day

We made a trip yesterday to Opa's house to visit and the kids got to spend some time outside doing a few chores. They were very excited about feeding the sheep, and had their own little cheer for them, "who wants corn!?, who wants corn!?"

When they had thrown the cobs over the fence it was time to unload the rest of the corn from the back of the pug into barrels. After doing that and giving the cats some milk from Jane, they got to go on a PUG ride around the farm, looking for rabbits in the fence line (And taking the garbage out on the way, but Scott did that...don't worry Dad :) ).

After the ride, Quinn and Scott got to feed the sheep their second course...some hay. Quinn got to do the honors this time, he had his good farming boots on for the job. After the work was done, it was back in the freshly cleaned house (thanks to Aunt Marys hard work) where the kids, Opa and Scott got a yummy snack of graham crackers and frosting. Quinn does not want me to forget to mention the cool prizes that they got from Aunt Mary either. He is sitting here with me helping me type this out, and he thinks that was one of the highlights of the day. Quinn got a dog statue made by Aunt Mary (I think it was Queenie), Avery got a pretty candy dish, and Kaleigh got a cool elephant.

Today after church we got to visit with GG and Grammy and Grampy, we had fun there too. GG played a game of Chinese checkers with Quinn (and the girls, but they didn't last to the end). It was a very nice weekend, and those are just some of the highlights.

Quinn wants me to make sure I sign this,

from the McClelland Family.