Nine Years Ago

July 27, 2001 my life changed forever. In a really, really great way. I gave birth to my sweet baby girl after a very long wait (26 hours). I wasn't in labor for all of that time but from beginning to end, 26 hours. I had my sweet baby girl at home with a midwife named Charlie and her two assistants.  My husband and sister were there as well.  I've come to realize that this was way too many people watching the pot boil and would have had a faster labor if I had limited the people in attendance, because as we all know, a watched pot never boils. And in this case a watched mama in labor has a longer labor.

Anyway, that first night I remember thinking OMGOSH, now what?!  What do I do with this... baby. I just can't believe that this baby is now nine years old, dancing 'round my living room to Michael Jackson songs in her pink and black bathing suit bugging me to go swimming. Lots of things have happened since she was born, as we have all grown and changed (and moved!). But I have had time to reflect on that learning experience and remember my baby girl coming into this world.

Here is a photo from about 2 weeks after she was born.  I scanned this print, as it was taken with one of our film cameras.  I just love her cute little face.  Look at how tiny she was!

The Many Faces of Queen Elizabeth I

History homeschool co-op this week: Queen Elizabeth I, England

Aybelle and Mr. Av and I get together every Tuesday with two other families to do history.  We trade off teaching each week and who's house its going to be at.  We are working our way through the book A Story of the World Vol 2, and focusing on the medieval time period in (mostly) Europe, although the book does touch on other parts of the world (briefly).  I am not a huge fan of this author, but its good for a brief introduction to these topics and the kids LOVE, I mean LOVE seeing their friends every Tuesday, because seeing their friends on Wednesday, Thursday, and some Mondays, and even the weekends, just isn't enough!!

Queen Elizabeth I of England loved to have her portrait painted and she was always bedecked in fabulous dresses and jewels.  Check out this picture of her!  

For history this week Randi talked about Queen Elizabeth I, who was the (second) daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn and described what she did for England.  After the intro to her, our girls dressed up as her!  We offered the boys (Mr. Av and his BFF Kel B) to be privateers, but they were having none of the dressing up stuff.  They played and would periodically check in to see what their big sisters were doing, but didn't want to participate in the powdering of the faces, the choosing of the jewels or the dresses. ha!  

The girls got dressed up into some fancy Renaissance dresses, choose jewelry from my friend Jennifer and Randi's glamorous collections,  then we did their hair in these fancy poofs, and put powder on their faces.  Even after the powder and blush and lipstick, my olive skinned girl looked like she was the Queen of Spain, not the Queen of England!  But gorgeous and beautiful they all were, and they had the best time, despite the 104 degree weather.  Yes, I am not joking, it was over 100 degrees here on Tuesday.  I was dying!

Below is a slideshow from the portrait session that we did which includes all of the girls. They all had a ball, and were really into the photoshoot.  I co-opted Jen's dSLR camera (because I had dead batteries for BOTH of mine) and shot some of these using her Canon dSLR. {O.M.G. GASP!  I'm a NIKON gal}.  

Dress-up!