Current Zelie-isms

 This girl...seriously.

 I believe she was born to be funny and entertain. Even when she was a baby, people would comment about how great her facial expressions were, and I don't think a thing has changed. My mom put together a one day theater camp and, besides appearing for a few minutes as a sheep in the Fatima play, this was Zelie's first experience with theater. The theme, obviously, was miming.

 The day before the camp, we were eating brunch at my parents house and Zelie kept asking G-ma (my mother) questions about the camp. To say she was excited is an understatement. When she finally understood what being a mime was she said, "That's going to be really hard because I love to speak!" Zelie is an expert speaker. Her brothers hardly have to do any talking because she is happy to oblige them. I think G-ma might have chosen miming for a reason.

Her other current Zelie-ism is, "You can't go wrong with chocolate, even if you tried!" Spoken like a true girl.

Finally, she discovered a notepad I had started to write ideas for Christmas gifts in. She's reading pretty well now, so she understood what I was doing and tried to sneak her own ideas into my notepad:

I could not get over #5! Jeff and I joke that she will need to go straight to the convent after leaving home because she is definitely a romantic and would happily marry any man she sees. Well, maybe not. She tells me she's marrying a prince, so maybe Jeff and I are safe from that problem.

The funny thing about this list, is that I casually brought it up to her and she acted like she didn't write it. She said, "Isn't that your handwriting?" and "I thought you wrote that." What a smart little girl.

Finally, I found this gem on my phone that the kids took this morning. Zelie, I love having you for a daughter!

Field Trip to the Zoo

Our Classical Conversations Homeschool community organized a field trip to the Henry Doorly Zoo last week. I never tire of seeing the incredible exhibits there! And my children were in awe of them too.

 Pygmy hippo!

One of the instructors, Mrs. Miller, put together a wonderful scavenger hunt that correlated with what we have been learning over this first semester. We had to search for animals from Africa, Asia and Egypt; find an invertebrate; list things that fell into one of the following kingdoms - animalia, plantae, and fungi; and wonder about how God created all these plants and animals.

The kids thought the eye of this blue fish was very funny because it looked like a human eye with the white on the outside and a blue iris and dark pupil, but he could move his eye every direction and he never blinked like we do, so he always looked very surprised!

 I love how stingrays look like they're flying. Toby just loved being this close to the animals. He would get so excited every time one swam by them.

Notice how Rocky is looking really close at his eye.

 I think the kids could have stayed here for hours. It was so soothing to watch all these creatures glide through the water and only be inches from your face. Zelie eventually asked for my phone so she could take a few pictures herself. She has quite the knack for it:

 This may be my favorite with the stingray "flying" past the big blue fish. And the shark photo-bombing in the background.

 Zelie was pretending to ride on the back of this butterfly.

 And Rocky almost looks like he could be the butterfly with those antennae coming out of his head!

 I am incredibly blessed to have my younger sister Lydia to help me out. She never seems to tire of helping with my kids and doing whatever I ask her to. She is so good with the kids that Toby immediately goes to her whenever we see her now. She is definitely his favorite after momma.

 Max cracked me up when I took this picture because he was laying on this turtle, belly down, pretending to ride it, and I asked if I could take a picture. He said yes, then stood up and tried to find just the right pose. I would say it's a winner.

 Rocky, sweet as ever!

 Eating chips! Luckily the hungry peacocks had been chased away by this point, or there's no way Toby would have a chip in his hand!

Max must get his modeling skills from Zelie. She asked if I would take this picture of her...I think the toe on the ground says it all.

 I think Max wanted to get in on the wrestling action with this momma lion and her cubs.

Baby Curls

Toby is the first of my children to get pretty much everything from me that I've been praying for. He has the reddest hair of them all, dimples, bright blue eyes, and curls. Oh how I wish Zelie had gotten these curls as a baby!

Needless to say, we had received one too many comments about "How pretty SHE is!" and we decided the curls needed to go. Toby was born with the most hair of my children and never really lost it, so he was the youngest baby to get a hair cut in our family, at the ripe ol' age of 11 months. We distracted him with Baby Einstein on our phone while I chopped away. And the end result...

I have to admit, he makes a handsome little boy.