7 Quick Takes - Back to School Photos

The other day I was having one of those mornings.  What kind of mother am I?  We're two weeks into the school year and  I haven't even taken any back to school photos of the children?!?  So, we dropped everything and headed outside to snap some pictures.

Let me set the scene for you.  It was an absolutely, perfectly beautiful morning. I thought that the apple trees would make a nice backdrop for the photos.  However....there were hornets swarming in our little orchard.  And I don't mean like one or two friendly little pollen seeking fellows.  Nope!  There were dozens of angry hornets.  But, that was my chosen location.  I had my mind set on it, so I told the kids to suck it up.  After all, there aren't any bee allergies in our family, so there's nothing to worry about, right? This, I found, was not exactly reassuring or consoling to the children.  I should also add that in order to get a nice, bright, colorful picture, they each had to look directly into the sun....ooops!  Perhaps I should have waited until the sun was at a little different angle.  But, being a mom of seven kiddos, I knew that if we didn't do this now it may never get done.

So, with that back-story in mind....here are the 2013 Back to School Kraft Family Photos! (there should really be a drum roll or something, don't you think?!)

(1) Peter ~ Pre-pre-school

This little turkey keeps us laughing all day long.  He doesn't really do any "official" school work, but is underfoot every step of the way.  I'm sure he's gleaning some valuable lessons throughout the day.

(2) Esther ~ Pre-school

She's our accessory gal.  Notice the wristlets, bracelet, headband and all the other stuff in her hair that you can't see.  She carries at least one backpack with her everywhere she goes and really likes her "stuff".  Primarily, we're working on self control issues with this little angel and learning to play nice with her baby brother.

Look, Ma!  I totally photo-bombed Esther's picture!

(3) Eleanor ~ Kindergarten

This cutie-patootie started reading over the summer!  Not really from anything that I've done, just that she wants to keep up with her big siblings.  She is a very motivated learner and truly enjoys having her own official school work to complete!

(4) Lillian ~ 3rd Grade

She is our nonfiction girl.  The amount of knowledge in this young mind astounds me on a daily basis! She is a bookworm who enjoys re-reading her favorite biographies and various nonfiction pieces to make sure that she didn't miss anything the first time.

(5) Joseph ~ 4th Grade

Origami....Legos.....Origami.....Legos....I'm pretty sure these two topics occupy most of his waking hours.  He has a great mind for math and solves most of his problems mentally before I do.  He enjoys playing chess and even beat his dad once...don't tell anyone about that though, okay? (heee, heee)

(6) Haley ~ 7th Grade

Haley is my go-to gal.  She has a huge heart and loves to help anyone in need.  She says that she wants to be a teacher when she grows up and I think that she'd do a wonderful job.  She's working on learning guitar and is beginning to play some beautiful music.  If I can't find her anywhere else, she's usually hiding in her bed with a book.

(7) Madeline ~ 8th Grade

Madeline is also an avid reader. She began crocheting a few years back with some books that she checked out from the library.  She has become quite accomplished and will be selling items in my etsy shop soon (more to come on that later!). She's still enjoying ballet and is just about ready to dance with the advanced classes.  The whole dancing on one's toes looks so painful, yet beautiful at the same time.

That's the Kraft clan....from pre-pre-school through grade 8.  We tried a couple different group photos and none of them really turned out great.  So, I'll just leave you with this very real one!

I hope that your school year is off to a great start.  Ours is off to a start at least...the great is still in the works!

Join Jen over at Conversion Diary for more Quick Takes.

God Bless!

Heather :-)

Prayer to Ask for the Grace of Properly Educating My Children

I did not write this, nor do I know the source.  But it is one of those prayers that I keep in my bible and pray regularly.  I hope that these words are able to help you as you start your day and focus on what our goal as parents truly should be.

Prayer to Ask for the Grace of Properly Educating My Children 

Dear God, my children belong to you more than they belong to me.  I must remember that You have entrusted them to me as a precious trust for which I am responsible and must one day account for.  I have received, by the grace of holy matrimony, the necessary help to bring them up properly; but I pray that You shall put in my heart the right dispositions to remain faithful to those graces.  Do guide me, o Lord, in this awesome task of giving my children a real christian education.


My unique goal, o Lord, is to bring my children to a truly virtuous life.  To You, I trust their spiritual call which is not mine to decide.  Mine is the task of helping them to discover their vocation and to follow it for Your highest glory and their salvation.  To this intention, I offer You all my prayers and good deeds; do help me to spend my efforts in acquiring those virtues I need most.  Help me, Lord, to correct my failings of character and mood.  Please, help me to be persevering in patience, without weakness in kindness, gentle in firmness, with great self-denial, so that I will not give in to discouragement in the trials to come. 


May all my sufferings contribute to the spiritual good of my children, and may they love You above all things; this request I address to Your Divine Heart, imploring You to hear my prayer.  Amen.

~ B. Michaels ~

Madeline working on her grammar.

Haley creating a Word-a-day card.

Joseph building with Lincoln Logs in his free time.

Lillian finding a fable to retell and illustrate.

Eleanor exclaims, "Essie is NOT in the box with the stuffed animals!"

Esther LOVES to dress up and be "pretty".  Every time I come downstairs, one of her big sisters has her in a new outfit.

Our School Day and Read Across America

We had a relaxed school day today.  We did our math, religion and memory work and then found comfy places around the house to relax and read.  Madeline saw in a magazine that today is Read Across America Day, so we decided to spend a little extra time with a good book.  I also started an extra read-aloud with the big girls that I didn't think we'd have time to fit in.  We got the first 3 chapters read and the girls really like it! (Becky Landers: Frontier Warrior)

 Haley and Joseph turned the swimming pool on its side for their comfy place to read and relax.  Haley is reading the Junior Classic version of Little Women (a little intimidated by the "real" book!).  Joseph is working his way through the Boxcar Children series.  He's on book 6 and is totally enjoying them.

 

Madeline curled up on an over sized chair with her book - Little Women.  We're reading it together as our first book in our Mommy/Daughter Book Club - she's so excited to be reading such a "grown up" book and have me read it with her.  It's so much fun!

So, what am I reading?  Of course, I am slowly reading through Little Women along with Madeline.  This is the first time I have read the book (embarrassing to admit, but true!) and I am thoroughly enjoying it. I am happy that Madeline chose this book for us to read together.

I am also reading Beloved and Blessed by Kimberly Hahn as part of a bible/book study which I am a part of.  It is the third book in the series and so far is my favorite.  She is a very knowledgeable woman who I have a good deal of respect for...it's so valuable to read, reflect, and then discuss with the other ladies in my group.

Thirdly, I am reading The Story of a Soul.  I am really connecting with St. Therese and am so moved by the profound impact that her mother and father's love had on her development.  It is really challenging me to love my children more deeply and to make sure that they feel that unconditional love that I have in my heart for each one of them.

Eleanor and Lillian are beginning to play together much better...not so much yelling and fighting.  Lillian kind of rigged this game of Candyland, but Eleanor was none the wiser, so it all turned out good!

 

There were a lot of other details that filled out our day, but I won't bore you with those.  Hope that you all had a great day!

God Bless!

Heather :-)

Coughing, and Sneezing and Wheezing...oh my! (and other misc happenings)

Yep, we've got the cough/cold respiratory stuff at our house...again.  This time of year is tough and germs seem to spread at record speed.  Right now, the two oldest have it and are on nebulizer treatments, antibiotics and some nasty cough syrup at bedtime.  I have a humidifier going in their room and it feels like a tropical jungle in there!  We're praying that it is short lived and doesn't get passed through the entire house.

We reduced the price of the house....again.  But this is the last time we're able to do that as we're at our bottom number.  It's been almost a week since we reduced and haven't had any showings.  I was expecting it to be busy with showings this week.  Goes to show what I know about the realty game, huh?  :-)  Please pray that some family will come see our home that is able to make a full price offer.  It is a big house and we know that it is too many square feet for the average buyer, so it will take just the right person.  It's been on the market for a long time (about 10 months) and we're really ready to move past this phase of our life.

School has been going well.  We've been doing Math at night so that the kids can get a little extra sleep in the morning.  That has been working out great.  It makes me so thankful for the blessing of home schooling.  The older girls would have missed all week of school and been terribly behind.  Instead, we work at a slower pace and take naps in the afternoon.

We got outside today for a walk around the block.  The fresh air and exercise felt great, but the wind was really blowing.  It's supposed to cool off again tomorrow, so we probably won't have the scooters and strollers out again for a while. :-(  The big kids have been watching the little kids for a half hour each day this week so that I can walk on the treadmill.  They are such a help!  Even that little bit of exercise helps to clear my mind and improve my outlook.

You didn't really want to see me on it, did you?

I've been spending all my spare time sewing to get ready for the National Hearts at Home Conference in Normal, Illinois.  We've got less than three weeks to go and have made great progress, but there's always more to do.  The children are looking forward to having some "vacation days" with the grandparents while mom and dad are gone.

Normal, IL  March 11-12, 2011

Hearts at Home National Conference

Esther is almost weaned and is nursing just in the early morning when she wakes up.  I have such mixed feelings about it, but figure it's for the best.  We are going to be gone for 4 days and it seems silly to pump while we're gone to keep my supply up.  She's 16 months old already and is such a ray of sunshine to the house.  She keeps smiles on all of our faces and is really in to puckering up to get kissed...adorable!

I was hoping to put some pictures of the kids up, but can't figure out how to get them off the camera.  Oh well, some other time....I need to get sewing!  Hope that you're all having a blessed week!

God Bless!

Heather :-)

Home School Phy Ed

One thing that I really like about our house is the unfinished basement.  It allows the kids to do outdoor things indoors during the middle of a Minnesota winter.  They ride scooters, tricycles, jump rope, throw balls around, jump on an exercise trampoline, roller skate/roller blade and whatever else that they can think of to burn off energy.

Here are a few photos of what home school Phy Ed looks like at the Kraft house.  We turn on some tunes and get moooooovin'!

It kind of looks like chaos, but they're all moving 

and nobody got hurt - that's a success in my book!

 

Lillian just got her first real pair of roller skates and 

doesn't quite have the balance/glide thing figured 

out yet...so her sisters rigged up a cushion to help her out!

  Eleanor's favorite thing to do is shoot hoops - and she's pretty good at it too!

Haley jumping on the exercise trampoline and carefully 

keeping her toes out of the way of all the rolling wheels.

Madeline's getting fancy and doing cross-overs with the

jump rope...I never did master that move! :-(

You probably noticed that Esther was not in any of the pictures.  Since I fear for her safety amid all the commotion, I put her down for a nap before we began.

God Bless!

Heather :-)

Two Down - One to Go!

The whole Craft Show world is unusual.  It is such a short season, that we feel we really need to take advantage of good opportunities to sell our wares.  This has gotten progressively more difficult as our family has grown larger over the years.  Additionally, there is a massive crunch trying to get more of something made that sold well last year at any particular sale.  And of course, I've always got new ideas for things! 

This month has been a blur (is it really Thanksgiving next week?!?) and our family was starting to feel it.  Even though we've got one last craft show this weekend, I've decided to back off and just have a "normal" week with schooling and activities without mommy stressing about getting more blankets done.  I've been sewing after the kids go to bed, and that's it.  They are my priority - and I need to remember that. 

We had many small successes today.  School was done by noon.  The kids played in the snow - for 2 hours!  There were minimal melt-downs (from both me and the kids!).  We had a family meal before daddy has to travel again tomorrow (chicken noodle soup and fresh bread...yum!).   I had an online bible study with some fellow Catholic, home schooling moms tonight (refreshed my spirit for the rest of the week).  Today was a good day - praise God for that!

God Bless!

Heather :-)

Family Fun Day 2010

One of the greatest things about home schooling is the flexibility that it allows.  Todd has a couple of crazy weeks coming up at work, so we decided to take a family fun day today!  We brainstormed ideas last night and came up with going to some favorite parks.  We all packed into Big Blue and hit the road.  We said a family rosary on the way in honor of Mary's birthday, which I'll talk more about later. Our first stop was Staring Park in Eden Prairie.

Here's Haley cruising down the slide. 

They all had a great time...until, Lillian tripped on the way to the car and skinned up her knee.

After a lot of drama and a little TLC, she was fine.

Our next stop was "Chutes and Ladders" park in Bloomington.  We don't get here very often, but the children absolutely LOVE it!

Joseph climbing one of the huge cargo nets.

Madeline and Eleanor looking at themselves in the funny mirrors.

Esther watching me help Eleanor with her digging.

After park stop number 2, we were ready for some lunch.  We stopped at a mall, ate, and ran a few errands.  What?  Errands on family fun day?  You couldn't expect me to be at the mall and not check a few items off my list, could you?!  The kids spent almost an hour in Barnes and Noble - love that store.  Also, did you know that home educators qualify for their teacher discount card?  It's 20% off every purchase, all the time!  It doesn't take long for that to add up!

Our last park stop was close to home at Minnetonka Regional Park.

Lillian and Eleanor trying to figure out how to walk on this rolling thing without seriously hurting themselves!

When we returned home, we had a make-your-own supper.  You know, every man, woman, and child for themselves!  I do that once a week or so to make my life a little easier and the kids really like it.  Anyway, after the kitchen was cleaned up we had our birthday celebration for Mary.  I picked up some fresh flowers to put by her statue and we made some cupcakes with light blue frosting.  We all sang happy birthday to Mary and enjoyed a cup cake.  Madeline commented, "Isn't it nice that we got to have a fun day off on Mary's birthday!"  And in her adorable little two year old voice, Eleanor said, "Mary is the Mother of God." 

Here is Mary with her fresh flowers and birthday cup cakes.  Happy Birthday Mother Mary!

I got the idea for this from one of my favorite blogs called Catholic Icing - check it out!

Now the kids are all in bed and I've really got to get sewing.  The fall craft show season is upon us and I'm not ready....yikes!

God Bless!

Heather :-)