Soup and Arts Fest

Well, I knew it had been awhile since I posted, but I didn't realize it had been since January!

This past Saturday was the annual EMS Soup and Arts Fest.  This event is a highlight of every year.  The art teachers (K-12) display student work, area restaurants donate delicious soups, and students display their many other musical and artist talents.  This event raises money for the various arts programs that we have at school.  Attendees pay $10 to sample various soups, eat homemade bread, and enjoy decadent desserts prepared by the Family and Consumer Science classes.

From EMES, 2nd graders recite original poems (which Hannah did last year and Sophie will do next year), and the 3rd-5th grade choir sang a song.

The elementary art teacher also displays the students art work, and it's always so wonderful!  This year each student got to choose three pieces to share.  Here are the girls pieces:

Hannah: The Ballerina on Stage

Hannah: Fall Tree Silhouette

Sophie: Complimentary Colors (in UVA blue and orange, no less)

Sophie: Overlapping Shapes

Sophie: Scratched Lines

Hannah: Self Portrait

Ice Skating

Yesterday we were blessed with the opportunity to go ice skating at Massanutten.  A friend from church was having a birthday celebration and invited us to come skate.  I had not been ice skating in quite a long time, and this was the first time for the girls.  (Charles stayed home to finish painting the dining room.  Pictures of that to come later.)  We had a great time!  By the end of our time there, both girls were skating hesitantly on their own, rather than holding on to the wall or to me.  Neither one wanted to leave!

Snow Day and Popcorn Balls

This past Thursday I got up as usual and was in the midst of my morning workout when my phone beeped with a text message.  Knowing that there was a chance of flurries the night prior, I expected to find a message that school would be starting late.  Boy was I surprised to learn that school was cancelled!

At first I was bummed.  We didn't have that much snow (though it's been absolutely freezing), and I was really wanting to be at school.  My students are doing interesting things, and I've been energized by getting into other teachers' classrooms to observe.

But, since we were home, we made the most of it.  I baked two loaves of bread to freeze for the annual Soup and Arts Fest, and the girls and I made popcorn balls.  Blue popcorn balls, no less.

They do tend to stick in your teeth pretty badly but are quite yummy anyway.

We also experimented with our first ever online learning day.  This is something the school planned before Christmas, when we missed some days of school due to a hurricane.  The idea is that students have work to do at home on a day off, and therefore the day can count as a school day and not need to be made up.

So bright and early (once I was done with my workout), I got my assignments posted on Haiku for the students.  I was pleasantly surprised to learn that most of them did the work they were supposed to do.  Others will get it done this weekend to turn in to me on Monday.

The girls each had a "snow day" folder that had already been prepared by their teachers with assignments for them to do.  They had been itching to do this work and were so excited that they dove right into after eating their breakfast.  They dismissed themselves to their playroom to play school while doing their real school work.

All told, it was a successful day, though it certainly was hard to return to school for just one day before the weekend.  (Turns out it was only a half day since we were released early due to yet more snow.)

Cinnamon Twists and Shark Skin

We had a fairly typical weekend this weekend.  Lately I've been trying to get our weekly grocery shopping done on Friday afternoons after school, which frees up Saturday for other chores and tasks.  This weekend was a baking weekend, so I made three loaves of bread on Saturday, as well as doing laundry, cleaning bathrooms, checking my parents' mail, and going for an afternoon run.  It was windy Saturday, so the first half of my run was very difficult running into the wind.

Charles started painting the dining room in the color scheme that he and his coworkers worked out.  The trim is called shark skin.  While he was painting, Hannah was conducting her science fair experiment.  She tested which candy dissolves fastest in a cup of water.  She checked each cup every few minutes, as well as taking pictures and recording observations along the way.  She's quite the budding young scientist!

Hannah found a recipe for cinnamon bread sticks that she wanted to try.  We found a similar recipe for Sour Cream Twists in the Mennonite Country Cookbook, so we gave that a go today.  They turned out quite well, as you can see by the photograph above.  My neighbor group will enjoy some of these on Tuesday as well, since the recipe makes 36 twists... far more than we can eat!  I even froze eight of them that I didn't have enough icing for anyway.  I'm sure Hannah will enjoy spreading Nutella on them instead.  She does love her Nutella!

One final photograph, leftover from a couple of weeks ago, of a couple of very adorable shepherds:

My Birthday

Wednesday was my birthday, and it turned out to be a wonderful day.  It started with cards from my favorite two little girls:

Left is from Hannah, right is from Sophie

I wasn't at school for too long in the morning before Charles showed up with a dozen beautiful roses to color my desk.  My school day was busy, with not a moment to myself all day long.  Things began looking up, however, when the girls and I got home to find Charles already here.  He was planning to make dinner for me and came home early to take care of business.

It was in the upper 50s, so I treated myself to an afternoon run since Charles was home to stay with the girls for homework time.  After my invigorating run, we all enjoyed a meal of burritos, salad, grapes, and birthday cupcakes from Shank's Bakery.

Before dinner I was escorted to my seat by these pretty little things:

The sign on her shirt says "Wait here to be seated"

My birthday gift (other than the flowers and cupcake) was a nice, big, sturdy shelf to hold canned goods in the basement.  Charles lovingly put it together for me last weekend.

All in all, it was a great birthday.  Sophie is now looking forward to celebrating her half-birthday tomorrow.  She seems to think that this celebration should be as big a deal as a regular birthday.  I hope she's not too disappointed!

Sweet Moments in Pictures

Enjoying a moment together before church one Sunday

Shepherds tending their sheep

My Workout Buddy

Sophie is my workout buddy.  If we go out for a walk or head down to the park for some outdoor play, she'll often want to jog with me.  Sometimes she'll join me for a morning circuit workout inside as well.  Here are some photos of one of those mornings, as she was sharing her routine with Dad, who had the camera.  I'll let the photos speak for themselves!

Notice the workout clothes: shorts, undershirt, socks, tennis shoes, and hair pulled back ready for sweating.  That's my girl!