The other stuff we did this weekend ...

We read a lot of books this weekend! I had checked out an interesting children's story book from our church library. I returned the book this morning, so I can't recall the title! What was neat about it was that these three kiddos wanted to read it TO me. It was illustrated really simply, and it was in kind of an easy-read format, dealing with seven parables that Jesus taught to his friends. I was encouraged by how well the children were reading. We went through each parable and had a wonderful time discussing each of them!

We watched a more recent version of "Lassie" for our bedtime movie. The kids and I really loved the story. There was a lot of relationship stuff going on and family conflict that had a happy ending! These pictures just show the kids reading other books while I was getting ready for bed before we turned on our movie.

Matthew has a very active imagination.
Here he is reading to his favorite
stuffed animals ... so sweet.

 It seems hard to believe, but all three children sleep in sleeping bags on the floor in the main room here. I sleep with them, but on the couch. They like me to be with them and I enjoy it too. After our movie is over, we turn on our favorite Michael Card CD and listen as he sings lullabies. I rub each child's back and face for TWO songs each, and then I get to upload my pictures from the day and edit them while the children finally go to sleep (which is nearly midnight each Friday night!).

It was COLD and somewhat snowy Saturday morning and I was wondering if we would be able to do our afternoon adventure ... I was so hoping to take the kiddos to another NEW place to hike.

We almost chickened out because of the cold, but finally we decided to take a BRIEF adventure over to Seidman Park (Ada). I had heard that it was beautiful and a great place to hike. We were not disappointed. 

I need to figure out what this creek is called ... isn't it beautiful? 

This was just a brief exposure to this great park. It was TOO cold to stay out very long. The wind was very blustery too! 

I love to watch how the children interact with nature ... especially streams ... they get as close as possible and just HAVE to make contact with that water! I totally "get" that! 

We will surely make many return visits to this beautiful place. We hardly even began to hike here. But we have a nice map for the future, and hopefully the next time we come it won't be so windy! 

This is Kaity-girl. I got to see her for a little while once I dropped the other children back home. Isn't she a sweetie? She is going to be tall, like her sister. She doesn't know me very well, but I can tell that she is going to warm up just fine and that we will have a lot of fun together.