Isabel's Ballet Recital

Escorting Isabel backstage for her dance recital brought me back to when I used to be the young ballerina backstage waiting. Now I take my daughter backstage. Nothing (not even the birth of my children) has ever made me feel more like a grown up. The girls danced to "All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth." Isabel was beautiful. The performance was at the old Las Vegas High School, now the Las Vegas Academy of Performing Arts. Afterward all Isabel could talk about was how much she liked performing on stage.

Following the recital, we were on our way to Del Taco, stopped at a stop light, when we hear Luke saying, "Hot Double You Nugs, Corn Dogs and Pizza." I didn't know what he was talking about until I looked over and saw this gas station sign:

Errands with four and Isabel "goes to home school."

Last night I babysat Ryan and his older sister Tori (5). I had them all make paper Christmas chains with twelve links for each day left until Christmas. Isabel LOVES count down paper chains. I overheard Isabel and Tori's conversation... Tori: I made a count down chain in school before.

Isabel: Well, I go to home school and we made a count down chain for Thanksgiving.

I just love it how Isabel "goes to home school."...funny.

This morning, Luke and Isabel took their Friday spelling test and completed their Math worksheets. I HAD to get the oil changed in the car and go to get white tights for Isabel's dance performance. Taking four kids to Jiffy Lube and Target??? You better BELIEVE I said a quick prayer before pulling out of the garage.

And it worked....sort of. Although the little Jiffy Lube lobby was filled with chaos because of my four (crayons all over, Apartment Finder catalogs Sylvia threw around, Ryan and Sylvia running in circles screaming) I was very patient and pretty creative in distracting them. Luke just read his book, Isabel colored her Twelve Days of Christmas pictures, Ryan was pretty crazy, but Sylvia was pretty crazy AND had a poopy diaper, so she wins the prize. Let's not even mention Target, it was more chaos with ANOTHER poopy diaper by Sylvia and no more clean ones in my bag for her, enough said. Looking on the bright side, I never lost my patience, yelled at them and then felt guilty later. That is what usually happens.

This afternoon I was planning on burning our Christmas candle and reading the Christmas stories to the kids while they color their Twelve days of Christmas and do more Christmas projects, but instead I have a last minute doctor's appointment that I have to drag the four to. Need to say another prayer and hope I have some patience left in me!

An Unexpected Lesson on Venn Diagrams

This morning we had to run Sylvia over to get a flu shot. I printed off the internet some Christmas worksheet packets that included crossword puzzles, mazes, word scrambles, etc. for Luke and Isabel. They worked on those while waiting for Sylvia and me at the doctor's. At home, I printed out coloring pages for the Twelve Days of Christmas that they have been coloring. I will have them sing the song while holding up their coloring pages for Daddy and Grandma and Grandpa. They then completed their Math worksheets, took a practice spelling test, and Luke wrote in his Take Five Journal. I had Luke also take a reading comprehension test on the internet and practice piano while Isabel read three of her books to me. Also, since one of Luke's questions on his reading comprehension had a Venn Diagram on it, we had a quick lesson on Venn Diagrams. I used some little plastic animals and drew two circles that overlap. One was "Eats Meat" and the other "Eats Plants." So they put the animals in the correct circle and in the overlapping area they put the omnivores.