Friday, December 21, 2018

Welcome Baby Peter!

We are excited to announce a new arrival in the Compton household!


Little Peter joined the family the first week of November (narrowly missing the all-important Halloween, on which day the kids solemnly forbid me to give birth).




Back at home, this little guy quickly became a favorite. The kids adore him, even little Annie.


He loves his binky

and sleeping!

He is growing really fast and is super strong, for a six-week-old. He can already lift his head and chest, doing a little "baby push-up," during tummy time.


In other news...
 We celebrated Sadie's 9th birthday (another day on which I was forbidden to have the baby)
This girl is getting so big and grown-up. What happened to my little girl!?


 Halloween at our house is always fun...






 We also celebrated Matt's birthday --in sackcloth and ashes, since it was the big 4-0.



  Right now, we're gearing up for Christmas. We already had our Christmas party at church



including a nativity that all the kids got to participate in. Sadie got to be Mary, which she was very excited about.

Michael, Sadie and Ada each did great at their Christmas piano recitals. Michael, especially, worked really hard on his pieces this year and it definitely showed.

Random cute pics:

Jojo fell asleep on the couch for an impromptu nap (which Never happens!) clutching his beloved light-saber.



Michael got to visit a local police station with his Webolos den.






The girls had fun dressing Annie up as a princess one evening. They play so sweetly together!


Sunday, October 14, 2018

Back to Home School

We began our third year of homeschooling at the start of August (trying to get a head start before the baby comes and everything falls apart.)  Michael started 5th, Sadie is in 3rd, and Ada is in 2nd. The older kids each complete math, reading, journal writing, handwriting, world history, science, language arts, music, Spanish, and a memorization exercise each day. They also have piano/music lessons, and Sadie loves her art lesson with Nana each week.

Jojo started Kindergarten this year. He is doing great learning to read and he is already into first-grade math!

Annie does "school" each day, too, by doing her "worksheets" (aka scribbling on scratch sheets of paper) and joining Jojo and Mom for reading time.

We celebrated the end of our second week by taking Friday off and visiting a new park. Sylvan Beach is a county park with a man-made beach off of Houston Bay. Nice little beach, not too busy, and small enough the kids can't wander off too far. And it's only an hour drive instead of two hours. 



And there were hermit crabs galore!




We are once again involved with our local Deseret Homeschoolers Co-op and Tween Nights.
The opening tween/teen night had lots of minute to win-it games, including pantyhose bowling.

We hosted an Iron Chef competition at our house for another tween night in September.
Another fun tween night: hungry, hungry humans!
We just finished up session one of co-op where I taught a class called "Math-terpieces" all about the intersection of art and mathematics. This day was all about tessellations.
We also had a blast at the Family Hoedown and Chili Cookoff.




Also in September, we made a trip down to the Butterfly House at the Houston Museum of Natural Science. I just love this place!











Other updates:

Joseph had a great 5th birthday.  The rocket-moon-asteroid cake was a mild-success, but the best thing of all was getting his own collection of Legos!





Michael continues to enjoy Webelos Scouts, and after becoming one of his den leaders a few months ago, I'm learning to enjoy it too. This past week, we visited the local fire station. The boys got to spray the big hose and see how many push ups they could do with a uniform on.





Besides doing "worksheets," Annie is really into making "houses" right now. Any place can suddenly get proclaimed "my house" with the expectation that everyone else must stay out!




She also discovered the joy of painting, marking, and drawing on oneself, thanks to a little encouragement from her big sister. 


She has also made great strides in learning to undress herself.... We're stilling working on the getting dressed part.


This little guy is due in just a few weeks! The kids are getting so excited, and we have everything ready.  Can't wait to meet him!!!