November update

I've never had so many comments before. I wrote the title meaning to come back to it but being a single mom right now seems to be sucking all my time. So here is the long over due update for November....

Jacob...
He is still loving ballroom more than scouts or anything else. I'm so glad that he seems to have found the thing that makes him happy and he enjoys. I hope he'll enjoy it for many more years to come. He also got his first report card from the 4th grade. Four A's and a B plus. He also paid his tithing for the first time. He was very proud and loved giving his envelope to the bishop. He also has now saved enough money to buy a Nintendo 3DS. I am very proud of him.

Amara...
Amara was invited to participate in a before school club called SharkNets. There they teach kids how to have good sportsmanship, how to use their time wisely, how to do their homework, and to do speed cup stacking. She has loved every minute of it, she didn't even mind getting up at 8 am every morning and staying at school until 3:30. In November she continued on her perfect spelling record. She loves school and plays school with her friends. She is really looking forward to her 8th birthday (even if she won't be getting baptized until April). She bought this outfit with her allowance so she would look super cute for her Christmas concert at school and her birthday.

Ethan...
Is loving all the tutoring he is getting outside of school. He has learned so much from his private tutoring with Corianne. His sounds, letters, and speech has improved better and faster than I ever could have hoped for. He also loves the reading tutoring at the library. I think it's all starting to make sense to him and that he is learning it for a reason. He actually asks everyday after school if it is a tutoring day. I think Tuesday is now his least favorite day of the week. No one had as much fun on vacation as Ethan. He played his little heart out with his older cousins and had a really great time talking with Great-Great Grandma Lillian.

Keira...
Has the best preschool teacher ever with the cutest ideas. She made this turkey hat and wore it for 2 days until we left for vacation (then it fell apart). She now knows all her sounds through i. She is so cute when she does the actions. Keira is also turning into quite the student. Everyday after school while I'm working with the older kids on their homework she gets out her Hello Kitty (because eveything is Hello Kitty) coloring book and says she is doing her homework. She goes page by page and makes sure she colors everything on the page.

Soren...
Soren gets bigger eveyday and does something new everyday too. I'm not going to get into too much detail since I plan on doing a 6 month update on him too. We bought him this walker since our last one was destroyed by the older kids. He totally loves the colors, sounds and toys it has. He has yet to get it to "walk" but then I'm not really ready to have him all over the place yet. Not that that keeps him still. He has discovered and mastered the fine art of the "army crawl". He could give some serious lessons to Marines. I love that he is such a happy baby.

Jake and Jill...
Jake didn't have to travel for work the entire month of November. We were very happy to have him around so much but he did leave on Dec 2 and we haven't seen him since and don't plan to for a while. His work has been going really well and he seems really happy with what he has been working on. He just got his pilot's physical, so I guess he's working on planes. Jill has been busy doing nothing but laundry and cleaning house. It's not easy getting ready for a 9 day trip and then having to wash the laundry of a 9 day trip. I'm having real issues getting it all folded and up the stairs. My holiday diet seems to be working. So far I have lost 8 pounds so that I could feel like I could eat whatever I wanted for the holidays (if I want pie, I want to eat pie and not feel guilty or gross) and then really start losing wieght for the new year. I only gained back 3 pounds (good pie) at Thanksgiving and I have already lost 2 of those pounds. I'm very pleased.