Home Schooling and Little House on the Prairie

So, I had this great idea to rent Little House on the Prairie, it was redone by Disney not too long ago. The kids and I watched it over two days and explored all the things their family went through and did. We studied geography while they traveled, we are making corn husk dolls with our home grown corn, and we learned about building a house and Indian beads and headdresses, and how to find syrup in a tree. I thought this was a great two days of learning and the kids really enjoyed it. About a week later Daniel and I were in the backyard and found our big beautiful Eucalyptus tree had huge hammer holes in it and a giant old nail driven right into the tree trunk! Daniel was extremely upset, the boys know they are NOT supposed to harm our trees! When questioned they happily explained they were looking for syrup! But they were very disappointed they had worked really hard to put that nail in and no syrup came out!

Three things, I then learned...

1. Never teach a boy something without expecting them to try it later by themselves!

2. Never think too highly of your ideas when it comes to teaching, somehow it comes back to bite you!

3. It actually was really well done on their part.LOL!

I think the tree will live...

Payson Rodeo

My Grandma and I at the Parade
Our Team

Autographs with a hunk!

Sponsor flag duties

Thank you everyone who came up there!

Darin, Jodi, Karsyn & Ryker, Jaime and Shane, GG and Grandad Croce and especially Daniel, Noah, Graham and Braxtyn - my biggest cheering section!

11 years married, May 24th

Daniel and celebrated our 11th wedding anniversary yesterday. It was probably the least amount of celebrating we've ever done. Our kids were gone at Aunt Aimee's and Uncle David's house and Daniel's and my plans were gone out the window. We were both sick. We did enjoy sitting around and watching TV and we did end up dragging ourselves out of the house to catch the new Indiana Jones movie (loved it!). The funny thing was, I actually forgot to even buy Daniel an anniversary card! This is soooo unlike me and usually its Daniel who gets in trouble for this one. So I was really in trouble. So to try and hide my mistake, I casually ask Daniel if he wanted to postpone anniversary card exchanges until we could actually go out for a nice dinner date. He looked at me and just started laughing.. he knew I forgot the card! We laughed a while and then he said, "thank you, that was the best anniversary gift ever!". I guess my clever gift to him was a "get out of jail free" card for the next time he forgot to remember!!

So to top off our anniversary weekend, Daniel is headed for the hospital to make sure he's ok. The Dr. said he shouldn't have stomach flu symptoms for 7 days so he had to come in to get an IV and checked out! So please be praying for his quick recovery!

Sickness everywhere!

Wow! it seams everyone has been hit by this terrible stomach flu. We thought we escaped it until this weekend when all three kids got at the same time, while Daniel had them alone, driving home from Payson. By the time I got home, they seemed fin until today and Graham got sick again and now Daniel has it too. I'm staying strong so far... Summer has hit and I thought this stuff was supposed to be gone!

Tanner we are praying for you buddy!!

Payson rodeo went great Arlo and I have achieved teamdom! We are working together well and finally adding to the team as partners. It was so fun traveling with my horse again, I absolutely love traveling with a trailer and my truck to compete; its a little bit of a natural high for me. Its different now, though, I can't wait to come home to my family. It has been the best of both worlds for me to be a part of this. I did feel a little guilty leaving three sick children for Daniel to care for:(. He did amazing though and never complained once!

Feel the love

I have been so blessed to have snug a bug kids! I just wanted to catalog this time in my kids lives because, I'm sure it will change at some point. Noah is my affectionate one, he is a giver when it comes to cuddles, he tells me repeatedly how much he loves me and wants to snuggle up next to me wherever he'll fit. Graham, needs me, he needs to be holding my hand or sitting on me and still wants me to carry him out of bed and have some cuddle time after sleeping. And Braxtyn, she's not a giver when it comes to cuddle time, she's more needy. She has it planned out as to where I should sit, what blankets we need and what were going to do while we cuddle. Its either, watch now, read now or just couch now. Once you have completed her demands she then sits quietly for quite some time. I wonder how much of these patterns will relate into their adolescents and adulthood. I'm just grateful right now to have some time to just sit and enjoy each one of them.