Delia Wanted to Type Her Name:

delllllia

Now uppercase:
DELIA

Now purple:
delia

(Thank you for indulging us! :)

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 Feeling run-down?  Exhausted and discouraged in your daily endeavors?  Then I suggest my family's Queen for the Day remedy!  Simply have a birthday in my house and you will enjoy this Royal Treatment:

-Being roused from bed with a serenade

-Breakfast with your girlfriends

-A parade of sweet email and Facebook messages

-Phone conversations with loved ones

-Thoughtful gifts that are all your favorite things (gift cards to your favorite stores, clothes, accessories, books, home decor)

-A fun restaurant dinner

-Candles in your dessert Tiramisu

 -Lots and lots of hugs and kisses!

Thanks to everyone who gave me The Royal Treatment for my birthday.  Thanks especially to Dave, Ella and Delia whose spoils, love and very presence in my life is the best gift!

I Saw a Tree

 I saw a tree by the Riverside

one day as I walked along. 

Straight as an arrow and pointing to the sky, growing tall and strong.

"How do you grow so tall and strong?" I said to the Riverside Tree.

 
This is the song that my tree friend sang to me:

"I've got roots growing down to the water.

I've got leaves growing up to the sunshine.

And the fruit that I bear is a sign of the life in me.

I am shade from the hot summer sundown.

I am nest for the birds of the heavens.

I'm becoming what the Maker of trees has blessed me to be-- a strong young tree!"

-- Tree Song by Ken Medema

Puzzled

Last week on Labor Day we bought a box of puzzles.  An 8 pack, to be exact, with puzzles ranging in size from 150 pieces to 500.  While I've had a large puzzle spread across my dining room table every day this week and we've all taken our turn chipping away at it, this was mostly Dave and Ella's project.  It's been sweet to watch how Ella revels in spending hours searching for pieces and persevering side by side with her Daddy.

Just seven days later and all the puzzles are done-- 2,200 pieces collectively!  The two medium sized ones (300 pieces) were done almost entirely by Ella this weekend.

Writing about our puzzle enthusiasm makes me feel a bit like an old retired couple.  Hopefully I won't be reporting next week that we've bought and RV and taken up bird watching!

Friday, Friend Day

This Friday, I set up our day so it was full of friends for everyone.  Delia and I spent the morning at Jetta's.  With the twins, Delia climbed the pasture fences and ran through the sprinkler in her undies, while Jetta and I got a good 3 hours to talk and munch on zucchini bread. 

Because Delia and I do try to keep busy with fun activities and little outings, Ella tends to feel a little left out when she gets home.  Her time to be home is short and, honestly, the adjustment to full days of school has been harder than we expected.  To give Ella a special treat, yesterday I also picked her and Chloe up from school and brought them to the tea shop we found this summer.  What a fun tea party we girls had!  Ella and Chloe giggled and chatted over their china cups of hot chocolate and then spent half the time trying on and modeling all the different dress up clothes. 

Hooray for good friends!  This quality time with our friends was the highlight of the week for me, Ella and Delia.

Another Peach Post

What do you get when you spend a whole day opening, pitting and slicing peaches?  Yes, a pantry full of canned peaches for the winter, but also some pretty sore muscles!  Apparently twisting open and digging pits out of peaches work muscles in your shoulders you didn't even know existed and I am feelin' it today!

 

But it's worth it to see our 50 jars all lined up, having completed the final step of cooking in the canner.  It's also worth it to spend the day with Anna Jean, who's been doing canned peaches all her life and who continues to teach me, still a novice to canning. 

Some other things that are fun about canning with Anna Jean on the dairy are:
-Finding ways to include Delia in the process (a lot of the work is knife work, so she was the bucket filler and peach mover).
-Walking over to the pen of mama cows to see if any babies have been born whenever we get backed up or need a break.
-Hearing the cows moo while we eat lunch.
-Driving the golf cart out the pasture to feed the cows our buckets of peels and scraps.
-Watching Delia stay entertained for hours by Buddy, the pony-sized St. Bernard.
-Concluding a hot day and rewarding our hard work with a good long swim in the pool.

Work and Play

Make a pretty good Saturday.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane

In the past we've enjoyed attending the sunrise launch of hot air balloons at a local festival.  However, this school year, getting our already tired family there before 6:00 am to see those balloons take the sky just seemed like mission impossible.  By going to the festival three hours later we were able to see all new stuff this year!  

The coolest thing we saw was the skydiving show!  We watched the 12 skydivers from when they were just dots in the sky, 12,000 feet up, to their whirling touch-down right in front of us.  

When each of the divers on the team landed, they hung out a bit to chat with the spectators.  Ella really wanted to talk to one and tell them "how great they did!"  Dave the skydiver, who's taken 2,300 leaps, was super nice and interesting to talk to.  Delia informed him that she will "NEVER EVER jump out of an airplane."  Mommy is okay with that. :)

We've always been too exhausted to stroll around the festival after the hot air balloons take off.  Today it was fun to explore the booths, see the kite fliers and watch a really neat wild animal expert give a show with live animals.  And we didn't miss the balloons completely, a few stuck around to give rides.  The girls were totally taken with this panda bear balloon! 

Inspiration

Usually Ella's imagination is inspired by a box.  With her sketchpad and markers, I had to smile when I saw her finding creative inspiration from inside a box!

Recipe for a Day with Delia

Ella's full day of school and bus ride have her getting home around 4:00.  And Delia no longer naps in the afternoon.  This means, when she's not at preschool, I have 8 hours of pure Delia time every day.  Lack of structure and planned activity makes me a grumpy clock-watcher and makes Delia struggle with earning her behavior chart stickers, so our time together is all about keeping busy and engaged!  Here are some of the ways we pass the hours together-- a recipe for how to fill a whole day with a 4 year old, if you will!

1 hour of crafts.  This school year I have a goal of improving Delia's attention span and fine motor skills. We raided the clearance section of Michael's and stocked up on craft kits and materials.  She makes sticker mosaics, strings cereal necklaces and assembles Biggie Bead bugs and animals every day.

1 hour of play time at the park.  Delia's a girl who needs to just move.  If we can't make it to the park, I make sure we at least get outside to play or ride bikes every day.

1-2 hours of story time and snuggles.  Delia shows and feels love through affection and enjoys nothing more than curling up to cuddle.  Though she does much better sleeping at night without a nap, she obviously still benefits from some down time.  We have about 1 hour of movie time every day too.

1 hour of supplemental preschool activities.  Another goal for the school year is to improve Delia's letter awareness, cutting skills and name writing.  I know she does all this at preschool, but I try to have an activity every day that gives her additional practice.  So far, writing her name and letters in shaving cream has been the most fun (probably 'cause it's the messiest!).

1-2 hours of chores or getting something off the housework to-do list.  On some days, running errands falls into this time slot.  Not super engaging, but it needs to get done and I have Delia help me as best she can.

1 hour of free play.  Even without Big Sis around, I still think it's important that Delia know how to independently entertain herself.  I encourage her to go in her room and take out some toys.  This lets me get ready in the morning or have a break myself.   Her favorite toy, lately, has been the dollhouse.  She'll easily spend an hour playing here.

Add in 1 hour for eating meals and there you have it!  Every detail you always wanted to know about how we pass time! :) It's been such a blessing to be able to stay home with my kids, but I feel like this time is slipping by so fast, even when the days go slow.  Some day I'll look back and wonder, "What did I DO for all those years at home?"  As tedious and small as it sounds, this is the new routine and Delia and I are enjoying it!