Let's Go Exploring!

This last Saturday our family was itching to do something different, somewhere new. So, we went exploring and followed some general directions from friends and found this lovely little picnic spot. We drove up, up, up the side of Kilimanjaro and then down, down, down and found a ravine with lots of large rocks and a COLD mountain stream.

Anna was in her element as a budding explorer, whereas Sarah was a bit less enthusiastic.

The Papa of the family doing his own boulder jumping - and letting me take the camera for a moment. :)

Ben was enjoying every aspect of this experience!

His favorite activity was picking up rock after rock and throwing them into the water. It never got old, and he was a machine... rock, after rock, after rock, after rock... without ever looking up.

Anna fearlessly jumped from boulder to boulder and could have summitted Kilimanjaro this way if we had let her. Her mantra as she was doing this was, "I can FLY! I can FLY! I can FLY! I can... FLOP!" from a favorite book of hers.

Thankfully, she never did flop.

Benjamin beating the ground with his new found "stick weapon".

This was his second favorite activity of the day.

Taking a break for some chakula (food).

What a place.

Take My Breath Away...

A hot Moshi day,

A sweaty 18 month old boy,

An ice cold sprinkler...

taking his breath away.

She Just Keeps Growing Up!

A last picture of Annalise with all of her upper baby teeth intact...

The loose tooth trick that is unique to six year olds everywhere...

Annalise one step further to adultsville...

Fun In The Sun

This is our fun in the sun family day during October break. The school pool was being painted over the holiday, so we decided to visit the pool at a local hotel. What a fun day!

Can't really tell you what Anna is signing in the above picture. Recently, whenever we take her picture she has been making different odd symbols with her hands, like she's a gangster. I don't really think she means "peace" or anything like that... maybe she means "be quiet", or maybe "bunny ears on an invisible bunny"?!?

I'll have to ask her later about this particular one... she's sleeping now.

Ben enjoyed the water, but the sun was so intense and bright that we kept his red shirt on to spare his skin, and the rest of us from blindness at the glare off his very white belly.

We are ready for the the 2012 Summer Olympics...

Sarah was taking a turn at using the baby sea turtle floatie.

Ben was using the "mommy floatie."

One of Anna's more graceful jumps off of Daddy's shoulders.

And please don't worry, the edge of the pool appears closer than it actually is...

Accolades for Annalise

At the end of the first term, Anna was able to give Jeff and I a tour around her classroom where we saw all of the projects she has been working on over the last eight weeks.

The class has been reading "Flat Stanley" as a read-aloud book, and this is her depiction of what Flat Stanley looks like:

Anna received an "Eddy Elephant" award this term as well. Anna's writing attempts have come a long way in the last several weeks. She has always enjoyed writing, but she has been especially focused on improving her skills this term.

"This is a picture from my computer in class. I made a picture. We were making rhymes about them. I forgot my rhyme. "

"This is a picture of my house and it has words on it that you can read them. "

"This is a house I made out of straws. It was for the three little pig stories. We were learning about houses. What kind of material it is made out of and what it has in it. "

"This is about when I was making a houseboat. But it isn't finished yet. But these are the plans and the idea of the house. You will see at the pictures what it will look like when I am done."

A few skills not pictured here that Anna has mastered in the last few weeks have been greetings, colors, and counting to 20 in French. She also participated in swimming club and gymnastics club. Her teacher is Miss Narelle from Australia, who used to be a gymnastics trainer.

Two Peas In A Pod

This is Sarah and her best friend Charlotte. Charlotte is French and British. She and Sarah have been best little friends since they were two. Now they are five. Charlotte is moving to the UK in December. We are capturing as many moments as we can of these two little girls doing what they do best.... being silly!!! :)

Happy Anniversary!!!!

This may seem odd to those of you that know that Jeff and I celebrate our wedding anniversary in May. But our children wanted to throw us a surprise celebration last Saturday. While we were sleeping and they were awake, they took it upon themselves to create multiple signs and arrows showing us the way to our anniversary breakfast.

Notice their recent style of dressing themselves... "Mom, did you know it is cool to wear a shirt under your dress?" No, I didn't know that.

And here is our breakfast feast of wooden pizza and cake with a wooden fruit salad. The table is neatly set and we ate this specially prepared food reminiscing over our eight and 1/3 years of marriage. Thanks Annalise and Sarah! We love you too!

Know When To Hold 'Em, Know When to Fold 'Em

One quiet morning, while the girls were in school, Ben and I were spending some precious time on the front porch. Between his one and two word phrases, and grunts, groans and pointing... we were able to figure out the activity that he was begging to play.

We found the dice he was pointing to, and then mimicked an activity I have done with the girls for fun. We roll the dice, and then add the dots on each die to get the sum. We usually have pencil and paper on hand to tally the results. So, Ben pointed to and acquired the dice, paper and crayons. We were set.

Ben's "way" is to manipulate the dice when they don't roll the way he likes...

...and to give a hearty cheer and clap when he gets just what he was hoping for!

We must not forget the writing of our new addition sentences.

And, of course, we only end the activity with a result we are proud of!

Update without pictures

How is that for a generic title?!? Sorry! I hope to post soon with more pictures and family happenings. For the moment I think it is necessary to update all of you since my last post. Things have been a little tricky... continued bouts of sickness and experimenting with various antibiotics. At the moment we are mostly cleared up. Anna and Sarah still have clinging coughs, and I am still recovering from my own bout of strep throat that caused my throat to almost swell closed, but we are definitely on the mend. Jeff and Ben have managed to escape it all! Well done, my hearty boys!
It is our October break so we have been able to enjoy being together alot more over this last week. Jeff played rugby at a tournament last Saturday, and lived to tell about it. :) While there I discovered lice, yet again, in Anna's hair and then in Ben's! My little 18 month old son had lice. Yikes. Everyone is cleared up once again... WHERE IS THIS COMING FROM!?!? So thankful that Sarah has not had it yet.... those beautiful long strands would be a nightmare to comb nits out of. On a positive note, lice loves clean hair and heads, so I guess we are just too clean. Hmmm.... :)