My First Giveaway: $20 cash!

I have been wanting to host a giveaway for awhile now it seems.  I have been so blessed in winning other bloggy giveaways that I wanted to host my own.  What is up for grabs??  $20!  This giveaway is pretty easy.  All I ask is that you follow my blog via google friend (see my sidebar).  Leave a comment that you follow on this post and that is pretty much it!  Sorry, I cannot ship internationally.  This giveaway will close at midnight on February 14th!  The winner will have 48 hours to respond or another winner will be picked.  Good luck :)

Painting Party Success

We celebrated A's 7th birthday over the weekend (even though she is not officially 7 till the 22nd).  She wanted a painting party and we had so much fun letting everyone paint.

 A posing for me!

 

The set up - what fun!

 

Some of the artists...

Concentrating...

 

Smile :)

 

More artists... 

 

Even more artists...we had a lot of talent! 

Even D got in on the fun.

 

And of course, David's amazing cake!!

 

 Happy Birthday A!!

I Lost A Few Pounds Last Night

Or at least it feels like it, in hair that is!  Yes, I donated my hair to the Locks of Love program again.  Yeah, my 5th time in my 9.5 years of marriage.

 

 B and I right before I cut my hair

(if you look closely you will see C!)

The first time I took the plunge was on my honeymoon in England!!  So, I donated 15 inches and a few more were cut off to make my style so I am ~ 16-17 inches shorter and my head feels much lighter.  So my grand total of donated hair to date is (13+14+16+15+15) a whopping 73 inches!!

 D and I right afterwards!

Book Review #1: God Gave Us So Much

I am so excited to do my first book review for the blogging for books program!!!  Woohoo, I received a free copy of God Gave Us So Much: A Limited-edition three-book treasury by Lisa Tawn Bergren and the art was by Laura J. Bryant.

The three stories within this book are God Gave Us The World, God Gave Us Love, and God Gave Us Heaven.

Each of these are written as a conversation with the child polar bear, Little Cub.  I really like that Bergren includes scripture into the text; she is clearly building on a strong Biblical foundation.  The conversational format is sometimes choppy, especially in God Gave Us Heaven where the question-and-answer dialog doesn't always have a natural continuity.  In several places in these stories, the response, or answer is so conclusive that my kids thought the story was over.
 
In God Gave Us the World, Little Cub is interacting with her mama.  It is basically one conversation discussing  topics like God's creativity and taking care of the world.  Little cub learns about the different bears in the world and that she is unique and special.  It is doctrinally sound.  I love that it has scripture embedded into it - God made the world and everything in it!

In God Gave Us Love, Little Cub is interacting with her grandpa.  This story discusses the different ways we can love one another: the love between mamas and papas, friends, family, and others.  We may not always want to show love to others but God always gives us love to show.  It is great illustration for kids in being nice.

In God Gave Us Heaven, Little Cub is interacting with her papa.  It is set up as question and answer format and dicusses the possibilities of heaven.
 
I think the artwork is great and these books are engaging to children!  I would recommend this book!!

What is a Hypothesis Anyway?

We had a fun little science experiment yesterday.  B got some grow bug capsules for Christmas.  So, I decided that we should hypothesize and guess what each one was going to turn into.  After explaining what a hypothesis was (note: this is not the first time we have talked about it but it has been awhile) I asked the kids, "What is a hypothesis?"  All three were convinced it was some sort of bug!  After the second and third explanations they got it!

 The present.  They loved watching these turn into insects.

 

The set up.

 

 B helping it along.  These capsules were pretty fast as it only took them a few minutes to reveal what was inside.  I think the trick is to have pretty warm/hot water.

C enjoying guessing!

The girls getting ready.

 Some of the results.

 C's first round.

More results.