Adventures in Babysitting

Not sure if I mentioned it or not, but school has been cancelled for the month of April for Brooke. The teacher has a very valid, accountable and understandable reason (family emergency) but it still makes this a fun time for all of us. Toting around both kids in my morning errands or having to find busywork for Brooke to do to keep from getting bored or having to find alternative plans/locales for Brooke while I take Brenna to Kindermusik, etc etc...well, its all been challenging and tiring to say the least.

Also, I have a friend who is pregnant with her 3rd baby and she is in the very early stages of pregnancy...you know, the most horrible stage of pregnancy - morning sickness. Or, all day sickness. Anyway, she's got it pretty bad right now, so while school is out (both her kids are supposed to be in school now too!), I have been babysitting her kids to keep them out of her hair some mornings when I can. It works out since they are about to abandon us to Montana this summer! Because the older two girls can get a lot of playtime in before they have to part ways. If it weren't for the two little ones keeping me on my toes, I'd have it pretty easy actually! They all play pretty well together.

But nonetheless, we've been having fun (I think?...guess you have to ask them) together finding new and different things to keep them going.

Since its all girls, there is a lot of dancing involved usually...

And what kid doesn't like to play outside???

I try to keep them stimulated without use of electronics, but every once in a while a mom needs a breather. And after all, the two little ones are only infatuated with the TV for ....oh...about 10 minutes before they like to move on to bigger and better things. :)

We have snack time...

And maybe this could count as craft time? Coloring on the table? :P

And since the older two are in the same Kindermusik class, they got to practice their glockenspiels together today.
And then today, after a hard downpour of rain yesterday and Brad pressure washing the entire back deck, it was too wet to even open the door to go outside. So I got a little bit more coolness factor rating when I gave them all pedicures. :) Yea, they should love me right? I don't know about that....

Anyway, so needless to say, even though school is out (for now and hopefully not for too much longer), we have been staying mighty busy. Or I have anyway! And there are other times when I feel bad that Brooke is not getting any 'education' lately. So I went out and bought her a workbook to do some pages on here and there. I got her a kindergarten one thinking that she could start about halfway through and work to the end. Ugh. She blasts through the pages in like 2 minutes flat. I KNEW I should've gotten 1st grade material. But I really wanted it to be stuff she could do on her own that I wouldn't need to 'teach' her so much. That's definitely true of this stuff! But something's better than nothing right? At least it's practice? Or maybe its just busy work. Hmm...

We have a little bit of other exciting news in our house that's going on.... With Brooke's birthday money, one of the things she wanted to buy was a butterfly habitat where you send in for caterpillars and they mail them back to you. So we've been "growing" butterflies. This is a really really cool fun thing to do with kids! 2 thumbs up! I am not sure who enjoys it more...me or Brooke...but its neat to come in each day and see how the larvae have changed into caterpillars and then built chrysalids before coming into a butterfly. This is the kit we bought from Target I believe for less than $20. And we are about to move the caterpillars into their butterfly habitat since they have eaten, grown, and made their little cocoons (technical name would be chrysalids). Its really a neat process!

Here's a pic of them right as they were crawling to the top, but just before they started to make their cocoons. I'll try to remember to take pics at different stages from here on out.

And I'll end with a picture of our sweet cat, Bo. Because he never gets included in much. :) Thanks for reading and more coming soon!