Happy 14th Birthday Leo! (Siobhan)

Happy Birthday Leo!

We recently celebrated Leo's 14th birthday. We had a fun, but crazy day of celebration on Saturday, starting with our power going out the morning of our annual birthday brunch! Grandma Z. and Leo share a birthday, so we always cook them a special birthday breakfast. Thankfully, our power did come back on a couple hours later, and we were able to enjoy a relaxing brunch together. Here are the pictures I was able to snap amid all the craziness...

We started off the brunch with some delicious fresh fruit and smoothies.

I baked two types of scones: Pumpkin Spice and Vanilla Bean. Here are the links to the recipes:

Pumpkin Scones with a Pumpkin Spice Glaze

Petite Vanilla Bean Scones with a Vanilla Bean Glaze

We had Mom's amazing Cafe Eggs and Bacon. I also made gluten-free and regular Blueberry French Toast.

Adam, Steph, and Carter joined us on the evening of Leo's birthday for some delicious pulled pork sandwiches and s'mores. 

Leo's big birthday present was a bass, which he helped pay for. He has been a member of a band he and a few of his friends set up, so he is excited to use it when he plays with them.

Happy Birthday Leo and Grandma!

Labor Day Ocean Fun (Siobhan)

~Ocean Day~

I was going through our pictures and realized I'd never done a post for our Labor Day Ocean Day! Dad had the day off, so we took a day off of school and went for our last ocean day of the summer. Here are the pictures...

The water was freezing!

Filia, Tert, and Lux love looking for cool rocks on the beach.

Lux is not a big fan of swimming, but today he wanted to try wading in it,,,

He was determined!

He's in! 

And he's out...

Pumpkin Muffin Cups (Siobhan)

~Pumpkin Muffin Cups~

These pumpkin muffins are a go-to breakfast for us! They are so easy and delicious. We adapted this recipe from Green Lite Bites. Here is the recipe...

 

Ingredients

(Yields 15 Muffins)

• 1 15 oz can Pumpkin
• 1/2 cup Milk
• 2 Eggs
• 1 T Baking Powder
• 3 cups Old Fashioned or Quick Oats
• 1 T Pumpkin Pie Spice (or a combination of Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Ginger, and Allspice)
• 1/3 cup Brown Sugar
• Chocolate chips

Mix together all ingredients in a large bowl. 

Add to muffin pans. For a double recipe (pictured above) I usually get 18 regular muffins and 6 jumbo. 

Enjoy!

For a printable version of this recipe, click here.

School Crafts (Siobhan)

 

Crafts

Mom and the kids have done some fun craft projects lately for school. Here are some pictures...

I can't quite believe Filia is in Kindergarten. It seems like just yesterday she was doing her first year of preschool! 

Masks!

The next craft the kids did was fruit constellations. They are doing the Exploring Creation with Astronomy textbook by Apologia.

They started out by painting paper plates blue.

Mom cut up a bunch of different types of fruit and cheeses for them to use to represent the planets.

Connor Craziness

As a home school mom of 6, I'm always hopping between grade levels.  One minute I'm trying to remember the difference between mitosis and meiosis, and the next I'm teaching the alphabet to my 4 year old while keeping the toddler from eating too many crayons.  Today I was especially long-winded in my explanation of adverbs and how they can be used to modify adjectives.  I looked up to see Connor (age 7) staring at me with glazed eyes and a post-it note on his forehead with "WUT?"  written on it.  Maybe it's time to back up a little?  : /

The Tuscan Village Car Show (Aidan)

     Dad,  Connor,  Ethan and I went to the Tuscan Village Car Show. The traffic was bad and we were getting late for the car show. We had brought the camera, but it was raining so we couldn't bring that to the car show. We had to walk, but at least we got a good view of the passing Lamborghini Aventador. We walked into the parking lot, greeted by the revving of a Lamborghini Diablo. We walked around and we saw many cars these included: Lamborghini Gallardo, Lamborghini Diablo, Lamborghini Miura, Porches, Maserati, Mclaren, Ferrari 458 Italia, Ferrari 458 Spider, Ford Shelby, Corvette Stingray, and antique Ferraris and many other fascinating cars.  About 8 of the cars were owned by the same man. We even got to sit in one of the Lamborghinis. Near the end of the show the Lamborghini revved it's engine (and it has the loudest rev I have ever heard) and drove out. We went back to our car and drove home. This field trip was amazing!

My Son Pinocchio Jr. (Siobhan)

~Pinocchio~

One of my favorite things to do in the summer is work as a teen intern at Franklin Area Children's Theater. We have only two weeks to put together a Disney musical. This year we performed My Son Pinocchio (a junior Broadway musical.) It always amazes me to see how quickly the play comes together. The teen interns and kids are amazing, and we always have so much fun. 
This year my camera died right before the play (thankfully I had a warranty on it!) so I couldn't get pictures, but our director took some on her phone. 
 

Each of the teen interns were assigned a 'buddy' to look after. Mine was Olivia :)

My friend, Asia Grace, was able to do FACT this year and loved it!

Gepetta's Toyshop

 

 Toys!
 





The Blue Fairy

Fairies in Training




Pinocchio and Gepetta


Townsparents


Stromboli and His Marvelous Marionettes 

I've Got No Strings
 

Idyllia

 
Pleasure Island

  

This was my 5th year in FACT. Here are links to pictures of the different plays:

Honk

Seussical

Alice in Wonderland
Little Mermaid

~My Son Pinocchio~