Mason has been learning so much at preschool and I'm always surprised by what he knows when we do an activity like this at home. He knows almost all of his letter names and sounds now and you can see how proud he is by that smile!
A typical Saturday afternoon: chores and piano practice.
Kiki loves getting into the box whenever we play a game or do a puzzle, even if it's too small for her. Cats are so funny and weird and sometimes infuriating!
Temple grounds visit one Sunday afternoon. Temples always have the best kept gardens and we were so happy to see and smell some of the first flowers of the year there.
Hooray for spring-like weather! Spring and fall are definitely the longest seasons in Oregon. We typically have spring weather from January to June.
Mason was super excited to make Valentine's cards for his preschool class this year. He chose this space idea from pinterest and signed his own name on the back of all 15 cards.
His preschool hosted a Valentine's Tea party for parents during the class before Valentine's Day. The kids sang a couple of cute songs and served us cookies and juice. Mason was especially proud of the place mat and candle holder he made. It was all very cute.
We got super lucky and Valentine's Day itself fell on a Friday without school this year! So, we decided to go on a family date to OMSI and then out to a "fancy" lunch at Olive Garden. We watched a show called Impossible Science with Jason Latimer. It was a super fun and impressive show about wondering and questioning in science and we all enjoyed it. Lunch was yummy of course and the boys thought it was so fun to eat someplace so fancy. Haha! No one was super hungry at dinner so we had homemade granola and smoothies instead of our traditional fondue this year.
We made heart-shaped sugar cookies to secretly deliver the day after Valentine's Day. I tried a new frosting recipe this year and it was amazing! I will never make my old recipe again.
Spencer had to re-purpose something for his FACS final project. He decided to turn some old pillow cases into bean bags since we needed some new ones for our corn hole game. I got him started and showed him how to do each step, but he did almost all of the work himself. And it wasn't too tortuous! ;)
"Mom, I made a car!"
Alan and I decided that it would be good for all four of us to set goals like the new Children's and Youth Program at Church has all of the kids doing. I printed and laminated a goal sheet for each of us and we spent a family home evening coming up with our goals.
Mason LOVED having doctor day at preschool! He got to take a stuffed animal to "treat" at school and came home with a very cute diy doctor kit. We feel so blessed for the wonderful experience he has had at the Southwest Church of Christ Preschool this year.
On days that I need to shop for groceries while Mason's at preschool, I usually finish early and spend some time studying the scriptures in my car. I love having a few minutes of quiet during the middle of the day. This particular day was so sunny and warm that it was extra wonderful.
And, Spencer's 6th basketball season is in the books. Alan coached his team again, this year as the co-coach since his job took him away from several of the Saturday games. Alan and Dave have coached together the last three years and have become good friends. They make a great team because Dave is loud and super energetic while Alan is calm, and level-headed. Spencer has become a good defender and actually improved his offence a lot this year too. I believe he scored at least twice in every game except for one. There was only one game that wasn't a good experience because the other team played very aggressively. The score was very close the entire game and it got really intense. One parent from the opposing team even had to be removed from the game for yelling at the refs. Poor Spencer got fouled with .5 seconds to go when we were down by one point! So much pressure! He missed both shots and we lost. Alan wasn't at that game, but Dave and another assistant coach did a wonderful job at building Spencer and the whole team back up. It could have been a devastating loss, but the coaches turned it around by focusing on how hard the boys played and what they did right. Not all coaches are like that so I feel so blessed that Spencer has always had good coaches.
This season turned out to be Spencer's best and most successful one yet. They ended with 8 wins and 4 loses. Much more importantly though, Spencer learned so many physical and life-skills. Since I didn't play sports as a kid, I haven't always appreciated the benefits of team sports. Spencer has learned how to work hard, how to deal with disappointment, how to work as a team, how to encourage less-experienced players, how to be a good sport, and I'm sure many other important life lessons. I don't always love the busy schedule Spencer has because of his sports, but I'm so grateful for the opportunity he has to learn these skills while playing a game now. Hopefully, he will be ready to apply them to real life problems when they arise later because of it.
