Zoo, Ribs, Artistic expression

 Swimming, Sunshine, Good Weather. 

We even took in the zoo on Saturday. IT was packed. Everybody must be ready for spring and ready to get out. We had to park next to the bison. Ains loved the llama. We took in the otters and raccoons too. What's nice about the zoo during this time of the year is the leaves haven't come in so it's very easy to find the animals for the most part. Everything was going pretty well until Grady decided to throw his 516th whiney fit. So he and I waited in the car until Matt and the girls had finished enjoying the zoo. E was so excited to tell me about the camel who was eating the wall of his pen! 

Matt smoked some ribs this past weekend too. With all the butchering that was done this winter, he had more time to practice and play. He cut the ribs out of one of the beef and seasoned and smoked it. The kids thought it was fun to chew on the big bones. 

E's been really working on reading and learning words and letters. We were driving to school one day this morning and all of a sudden she yells, LOOK!!! I didn't know what she was specifically talking about and she told me that the billboard said love. I was a bit skeptical and asked her to spell it for me - and didn't waste a second to belt out L-O-V-E. She's been watching for letters and sounding them out but she's on the springboard of taking off. She's so interested in her studies - they've done plants and seeds, continents, and Spanish. She's got some of the sign language down too for the letters she's learning. My favorite is her artwork. She produces buckets of it and prefers to cut and glue in her mediums but I like the crayon and marker pieces.

Her journal are my favorite and I get excited whenever I see them in her take home pile. Ains, especially since she got her caddy for her birthday, is excited to color too. I've always been impressed with the kids on how they hold their colors. We know at school Ains is working on cutting and I've been hesitant to give her a scissors. We've been really lucky with cut hair and whatnot and I feel that if any of my children are going to make poor decisions with a scissors it's going to be the last child.