I am seriously lamenting the fact that we have no working digital camera at this time.  Because I would love to show you a funny picture right now.

We just got new hardwood floors.  It's a long story, but to make it short.....home depot put in wood laminate last year for us and completely botched the install.  So they gave us a settlement of sorts and were set to reinstall whatever we wanted.  We decided we weren't so thrilled with the laminate anyway and put in real wood. The whole ordeal turned out to be a big blessing in disguise!

SO, dear Betty was leaving nice claw marks every time she'd get riled up.  Even with trimmed nails.  So I did some surfing, figuring that somewhere someone had solved this problem.  Sure enough....I found these:  www.softpaws.net    I spent about 30 minutes applying them to Betty this afternoon.  And now she has gorgeous PURPLE claws.  And she makes a squeaky tapping sound as she walks across the floors instead of the clickety clack.  I'm thrilled, but it does look SO funny and I wish I could show you.  She definitely looks like a doggy diva now. 

Oh, let's see what else is going on.  We had visitors a couple weekends ago.....my Aunt Beth and Uncle Barry.  We had a lovely time going out to dinner and bowling with the kids.  Anna beat everyone except Uncle Barry.  (including me and Matt)  Leah had a blast.  Of course it took roughly 5 minute for her ball to get down the lane.  One time it didn't even make it!  Very cute....it was her first time.  The boys skied, the girls decorated Valentine cookies and played with American Girl dolls.  It was so nice to see them!

School is going OK.  David made it through his first tests.  It was somewhat frustrating for me, but really not so bad.  He did quite well in grammar, composition and lit.  Not so well in Science and History.  But it wasn't because he hadn't learned it.  It was mostly because he got confused and turned around in multiple choice/matching sections of tests.  You know they basically do everything they can to trick kids.  It was OK....it was really his first time taking a tradtitional test.  However, in Science this time, we are going to do an "alternative assessment" where he has to give a presentation on the things covered in the chapter.  He's doing a powerpoint presentation on the classification of organisms (Kingdom,Phylum,Class, Order, etc.)  and also a poster presentation of an ecosystem with its food web.....and a discussion about the interactions therein.  I think this type of 'performance' will really motivate him and allow him to learn the way he does best....hands on and creative.  We also switched his Math back to MathUSee, a much more manipulative based learning.  I am very thankful that the charter school allows us to customize his learning like this and desires to make him as successful as possible.  He is now learning multiplication happily to my great relief.

We are also hoping to get funding through our insurance to put D through the Davis reorientation therapy for dyslexia.  But, we won't know anymore until we speak with his pediatrician on March 17th. 

I know I've been saving funny quotes and stories up, but right at this moment....they all escape me!  I hope A. Beth will e-mail me a couple of the pics she took while she was here, so I can post them. 

 

purple claws . . . now THAT would be a picture worth posting!! We've never taken the kiddos bowling; that might be a fun family activity to try in the future. Or maybe we'll just get a WII sometime and try it that way!