Christmas! Christmas! Christmas!

It was mayhem, madness, and paper flying everywhere!
The kids are all now playing with their new toys all over the house and are as happy as can be, except when Katharine tries to play with Joseph's toys and Joseph tries to play with Katharine's toys.

Merry Christmas everyone! Here are some pictures....

The Snowman

Isn't it a great snowman? Us kids made it ourselves! We did this today. We made the snowman because it was a lot of fun. It was Daddy's idea to make a snowman. We used carrots for the eyes, mouth, and nose. For the arms, we used Christmas tree branches from the Christmas tree that were cut off so we could fit it in the stand. Daddy helped us by shoveling snow for us. Joseph got snow for Grace, too with his small green shovel. After we built the snowman, we had a great big snowball fight. Mommy even came out to play! And, Katharine came out to play in the snow too! After we played in the snow, we had hot cocoa and cookies. After we ate and drank, we played with playdoh.

Love,

The whole family

Us kids & a snowman

This is a very cool piture of Joseph.
He is sitting still!

Rocking around the Christmas Tree!

We got our tree today and even got it decorated. Only 2 strands of lights (sorry Mom!). The kids put on all of the decorations. Katharine got the "hang" of it very quickly -- now to keep her from undoing it all!

Pictures, pictures, and more pictures:

Grace's Birthday

It was so great! I'll let the pictures tell it...

Preparations for Grace's birthday

Preparations are underway! Grace's birthday is tomorrow! Hooray!

Grace is :
eating Cinnamon Crumb Muffins for breakfast and opening her presents!

joining the Children's choir rehearsal at church. She'll be singing in the mass on Christmas Eve!

attending mass, then we'll be going out to lunch, to the library, and other errands in town.

For dinner Grace requested fried shrimp and corn on the cob.

And her birthday cake is Chocolate-Peanut Butter!

I'll post pictures next week of the festivities :o)

Thanksgiving and Christmas

We had a lovely Thanksgiving at home. John had 4 days off!! And even a little sprinkling of snow the next morning.

And now it's on to Advent and Christmas. We've put our Advent wreath out, but we decided not to put out our china Nativity set (Katharine!). So Grace and I made pictures of the Nativity and taped it onto the wall. Creativity!!

Our 2008 Christmas greetings are being written and mailed this week. Our letter goes like this:
2008 was a year of memories for the Densons. Our favorite memories are John's re-deployment from Iraq in April,

and our trip to Disney World in May!!

Since then we've been busy and quiet. John is very close to finishing his Master's degree in Business. (Could Dr. Denson be next? We'll see :o) We'll be staying at Fort Riley for another 1-2 years. It's very likely that John will deploy again, but we don't know where or when.

Grace is turning 7 this weekend. She loves home schooling! And she'll be receiving her First Communion next April.

Joseph is 4 and loves trucks, trains, and tractors. He'll be starting home school kindergarten next fall. (Already?!)

Katharine is 21 months, growing fast and into everything. I am managing home school lessons and our household, along with whatever the Army throws our way.

Love and wishes for a beautiful Christmas and a joyous New Year!

Cyndi, John, Grace, Joseph, and Katharine Denson

Grace's Artwork and Katharine

The first artwork is called "The Swan in the Sunset".  I painted it with a stamping paint brush.  The paint is washable tempura on poster board.  I used some very pretty colors.  I put a swan stamp on the paper to make it look like a swan.  Katharine did not help me in any way.

The next picture is my Daddy being very, very funny.  Can't you see that Daddy is pretending to be a moose?  Isn't he very, very silly? He does rea

lly look like a moose to me.

This next picture is the "Starry Night" by Joseph.  Doesn't it look by the real "Starry Night" by Vincent Van Gogh?  Didn't Joseph use very good lines?  I think he did a very good job.

Fall and Winter

The weather has turned from fall to winter. We have had a week of low temps in the 20s and 30s, day highs have been 40s and 50s. Our noses are sniffling and it takes half an hour to get everyone into coats, mittens, hats, and shoes. But somehow the kids still manage to have fun....


I'm working through my Christmas shopping list. I look forward to the year when I can do "Black Friday" shopping, but not yet. Thankfully, I bought all of the kids presents when we were at Walt Disney World in May. And now, it's all about internet shopping! I love eBay and Amazon!! But if you're reading this post -- send me your wishlist!!!

Cyndi :o)

Halloween

Halloween was so much fun!

Grace is Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty)
Joseph - Tow Mater from the Cars movie
It even has rearview mirrors and a tow hook!



Katharine - the not-too-fierce dragon with purple polka dots!

September is off to quite a start

September is usually such a nice month -- nice birthstone (sapphire), the last of the nice warm weather, back to school, and just, nice. But things are not so nice here at Fort Riley right now. On Friday we were told that John has to leave on Sunday for a month of lock-down training for sergeants at Fort Campbell, with 3 duffels and 1 ruck sack full of gear, as well as his fancy Class A's too. Grumble, grumble, grumble. This really messes up my jury duty and also finishing the half-done crown in my teeth. Grumble, grumble, grumble. And the weather has cooled down to 60-65 degree days and low 50 degree nights. I can't believe that we have already hit cool weather, what is winter going to bring; where is the global warming? I am wearing a sweater already for crying out loud. Grumble, grumble, grumble.

But, in happier news, I have discovered eBay again! I've been buying Christmas outfits, heavy winter parkas, Halloween costumes, and winter dresses. Grace didn't like the auction format, but is ecstatic to be Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) for Halloween. Katharine is going to be a flower (must be her daddy's doing?), and Joseph is going to be Tow Mater again (Cars movie).

Alright, I'm over my grumbling now. Time to start preparing for fall! I'd better go clean out the closets and dressers for all the clothes I've bought on eBay and hum along to some Christmas carols, maybe with a cup of hot chocolate. :o)

A little calmer now?

I was hoping things were going to calm down a bit now, but I cracked a tooth today and have an emergency dentist appointment tomorrow. I'm taking John's iPod with me so I can have some music to help me, 'cause I think it's gonna hurt. And that's before they hand over the bill :o)

Anyway, I got the pictures uploaded of the kids playing and of Grace and John doing their Art class together. I sent most of them out to you guys via e-mail, but here they are again.

Aren't they so cute in matching outfits?
Next is Joseph, doing what boys do....playing in the dirt

The Artists--

Crazy two weeks

It's been a crazy two weeks:
- Grace had a dentist appointment (no cavities, but she needs a little procedure to fix her front teeth, probably in late October)
- I had to go to a meeting for her virtual school that requested no children present (I got her laptop,and John got two other guys to cover his job for a few hours so he could watch the kids)
- Joseph cut his lip very badly one night (probably needed 1-2 stitches, but it took a while to calm him down for us to get a good look at it, anyway, it's healed up nicely now and I even got all the blood out of the white shirt I was wearing after only two washes)
- one Holy Day of Obligation (aka kids behaving badly at church much to my complete embarrassment),
- I was appointed the Treasurer for our Army FRG and attended a meeting yesterday for that (fortunately it was after hours so John watched the kids again - Thank you Burger King Playland!)
- I have been ordered to report for Jury Duty (I can't be excused because I was excused twice while John was deployed, the clerk ordered us to have John's chain of command be notified and excuse him from duty, at first we didn't think that they would, and I was really worried about ending up in jail on a contempt of court charge but yesterday his new and very nice commander said yes so John can watch the kids again)
- John was going to go to school for a month (yes, again with the school thing) but yesterday his commander said it's a no-go thanks to jury-duty.
- five trips to the library (books, DVDs, and a required reading book that came in)
- lots of school work for Joseph and Grace !!
- registered both Grace and Joseph for CCD classes in Manhattan. Grace should be taking First Communion sometime next spring!!!!


Wow! No wonder I feel so crazy!! But I have pictures on the camera to upload so I'll have a better post tonight or tomorrow!

Don't forget to send me your favorite "History of Grace" stories, pictures or mementos at our home e-mail address.

Rainy Day and cute kids

It was a wonderfully rainy day and John took the kids out to do some puddle jumping.


School is going great! We're cranking through 2nd grade Math and Language Arts, and 1st grade History, Science, and Art. Grace learned to use a balance scale today - the comparison between the marble and the huge styrofoam ball was fun to watch.

And here are some more fun pictures of the kids -- Joseph, Grace, and don't forget Katharine and Daddy

First Day of School

Our first day of school was just like everyone's first day: a bit chaotic, stressful, tinged with the hope of fun and the responsibility of learning so much in a short period.

Joseph really enjoyed his lessons on letters and colors and especially cutting straight lines. All day long he begged to do more.

Grace and I are figuring out how to manage between the computer and the kitchen table downstairs. I think the laptop computer that the school is going to provide us next week will really help, along with a wireless router. Grace had Math, Language Arts, and Science yesterday. She got a kick out of different ways to measure using "feet" and paper clips and was relieved to know that scientists finally got smart enough to develop the metric system (she calls it the m-electrical system.) She did great writing out all of the numbers from 1-20, except for thirteen, which really should be threeteen for simplicity she said. And we discovered she plays xylophone with her toes nicely! :o)

John's orchid website

Just wanted to tell you all about John's website --

http://www.geocities.com/cattleyasource/

It's all about cattleya orchids and he's put a lot of work into it over the past two years. It has lots of beautiful prints and graphics of the different cattleya species orchids and tons of information that he's compiled from many sources.

And he's putting together a reprint of an 1800s orchid book "Orchids of Mexico and Guatamala." It's from a Victorian-era expedition to discover new and rare orchids. It's pretty much for the most dedicated of Cattleya enthusiasts, but it's neat to watch John working on it. He has to edit all of the pictures and text for the digital age and work through the nomenclature changes since the 1800s.

Hot! Hot! Hot!

It's a lazy Saturday afternoon, but it's 104 degrees so not very comfortable. No change in the weather until Wednesday, that's a HOT, HOT, HOT forecast!

We spent this afternoon at Wally World (aka Wal-Mart), shopping for school supplies.
It was chaos!!! Up-down-around-fight the buggy through the aisles looking for notebooks, paper clips, and crayons. John and Joseph went to the toy department to escape while the girls fought our way through. And in the end, we were victorious!! School supplies are here, and we start on Monday. Hurrah!

PS - Happy Birthday Nida!!

Welcome to our blog

Hi everybody! Well I'm jumping into blogging too! (Thanks Tom and Nida for going first!)
I hope to write a bit every few days, the kids are such good material!

Grace received her homeschool books for this year yesterday and we've spent two days looking at all of the stuff sent. K12 curriculum looks awesome. I'll be posting pictures of some of the projects we finish. Joseph is going to do Pre-K workbooks on letters, numbers, colors, shapes, and cutting and pasting. Katharine is going to get into everything she can!

See what I mean! She's wearing Grace's shoe!

Grace and Joseph playing

John finishing a 10 mile race!