Peter's New Tricks

While Dadda was away, Peter has been busy. He grew a tooth, started to army crawl - which has now become up on all fours, full on crawling. Today he crawled from one end of our suite to the other. Our girls were so very proud. "Mom, look at him, look at him, he's over here now!!" 

As a result of Peter's crawling, the girls are now much better at picking their things up off the ground ... thank-you Peter for chewing on everything to teach them a lesson :)

Peter has also started to clap his hands. He started clapping the same day that Dadda came home. I was pretty thrilled when Dadda came home as well, so I do understand the enthusiasm.

Worship Music

The girls love doing worship at church. Here are a couple of their favorite songs:

Welcome Home Dadda!

The girls were super excited to pick Dadda up from the airport last Saturday. They even made special signs saying: "Welcome home Dad".

Eagerly awaiting Dadda's arrival. 

Dadda brought the girls some new Guatemala dresses!

Juliette loved showing our friends where Dadda was on our big map.

The girls like to play "hair dresser".

Matching skirts!

Ella has some new math books and manipulatives. They have been awesome - all the girls love to play and count with them.

Spencer and I have different visions for the doll house. While he was away we used it as ... a doll house. Upon his return it has been introduced as a parking garage and the perfect spot to attach our car tracks.

Karis prints very well - and is quite proud of herself. Since she can do "m"s and "a"s and since we are reading "Little House in the Big Woods", the girls coached her on how to write "Ma".

Juliette's printing is coming along also. She loves to hold her pencil in very awkward ways, but lately has had a major pencil grip breakthrough :)

Ella's work. For dictation, she writes down what I read to her. We then go back and try to find any spelling mistakes or other errors and discuss. It is very simple, but she loves it and so do I.

While Dadda Was Away...

My mom came to visit us this past week and help out while Spencer was in Guatemala. It was amazing having her here to help care for and love her grandkids. Grandma even stayed home with Karis and Peter while I took the big girls to swimming lessons. While Grandma was here she played many games of Old Maid with the kids, read stories, visited the aquarium and watched the Little Mermaid.

We saved the Little Mermaid for our last night together. The girls were looking forward to it all week. Grandma even brought them matching Ariel nighties. This was special for us because the Little Mermaid was my favorite movie when I was a little girl. It was so fun to watch our littles enjoy it. Ella has been humming "Part of Your World" around the house. Thankfully, Peter doesn't have an opinion on movies yet, so we got away with this choice!

We went to the aquarium on a beautiful sunny afternoon.

And Juliette wore this peach sweater every day since she got it. It is already set out on the floor to wear with her outfit tomorrow. This will be the 7th day in a row. For those of you who remember Juliette's love for her red sweater, the peach is the new red.

During quiet time Ella has enjoyed journaling with me. She came in the living room the first day of the week and said "Mom, can I journal with you. I'm studying Proverbs." And sure enough she had about 15 verses from Proverbs written down in her journal. She is such a funny kid.

And we were thrilled to meet baby Caedmon this week. Our dear friends Chris, Serenity, and Moriah welcomed baby Caedmon into their family on Monday. He is such a beautiful baby!

Spring Break

While we were out for a bike ride the other day, the girls caught a snail. Ella brought it home in her jacket pocket. We followed some wise advice from our dear friends about building a snail habitat. The girls named our snail "Fast".

Grandma is here visiting us this week. Hooray!!

The girls are thrilled to see her. And they have also been having fashion shows every day with the spring clothing that she blessed them with.

They love their new sandals.

And Ella is especially fond of her long skirt. She beamed when she took it out of the bag and said "this is just like Ms. Juliet's!!"

And this guy is looking pretty handsome as well :)

We had the first day of swimming lessons today. Our friend Ethan is taking lessons this week as well.

And this picture just makes my heart burst.

Ella is reading "Seeker" in the sunshine at the picnic table, with Charlotte the spider in the jar behind her, wearing rubber boots with her "Ms. Juliet skirt". I love homeschooling our littles.

Music School and Aquarium

Last Monday was parent observation day at music school. Ella was so excited to show Spencer and I what she has been learning. She loves playing the xylophone. We were impressed with how she can read notes. Her music teacher is amazing.

Ms. Rita also let Juliette try the xylophone.

And we visited the aquarium on Thursday. We had so much fun that we decided to become members :)

Last night Karis had trouble falling asleep, so I brought her into our bed. When I came into bed to join her she was all snuggled up with Peter Rabbit. So sweet!

In other news- Peter cut his first tooth! The only way I knew he was getting a tooth was by him sucking on my finger and feeling the tooth. This was not the case with our girls - they were much more dramatic about getting their first teeth. Peter is also the earliest Lafleur baby to get a tooth.

Peter is 6 Months!

Today our sweet baby boy turned 6 months old!

He loves to smile, go in the Jolly Jumper, army crawl (mostly in reverse), pivot to face any direction his sisters are moving, eat, pull hair, pinch, and put all things in his mouth

He also loves to suck on his lower lip (as seen above), and read stories.

Last weekend the girls went with Spencer to pack some clothes for the upcoming Guatemala trip.

Ella and Juliette started keeping their own gratitude journals. Ella loves writing in hers and already has over 250 things on her list. 

I love Juliette's list. We started these journals on the same day that Juju turned 4 and a half. So she wanted her #4 to be that she is 4 and a half.

The weather has been beautiful so we have had a few lunches outside on our picnic table.

The girls love to draw pictures in their art books as I read to them.

And the other day the girls did rest and read outside as well. They lined all of their books up on the picnic table bench.

Ella has been busy making Uncle a special birthday card.

And Juliette is trying to teach Peter his colors.

We got a couple of new outdoor toys to have in our yard. The girls are thrilled with their "ogobild".

Karis has mastered the letter "t". She spends a lot of her time writing "t"s in every color. She is also very good at the letter "o".