Sam was back into recreating other paintings this week. This one was called "Farewell" by Sandra Peters. He started off following the painting real well. After a little bit though things changed because his little brother wanted to help, so we will say she is the inspiration for this. I thought that the boys worked so wonderful on it together. Below is a picture of how it turned out. I think that it is amazing. Enjoy!!
We have been working on new ways to do spelling lessons with Sam. The poor kid hates doing anything involving writing. So I have been trying to come with new and fun ways for him to do the lessons. The top picture was of him doing the spelling in shaving cream, he hated it. So the next day I gave him corn meal to write in and he is flying through the lessons. He finds the corn meal to be much neater.
A Family Outing---
My husband took a few days off from work, so we decided to take a trip down to the Miami Children's Museum. I have included a few of the many pictures that we took there today. The boys had so much fun. The first picture is of the sundial that was outside the museum. I thought that this was a really cool mosaic.
This is a picture of the boys standing at the information stand of the sundial. They are holding up the flat travel friends so that they can see to.
Here is Sammy with the flat travelers at the giant mouth in the dentist office. 
Gabe would not let me brush his teeth with the giant toothbrush, sometimes he can be no fun LOL. He did have some fun brushing the big teeth though. 
We went into the Miami Heat Safety room. Gabe was getting a helping hand from Daddy sliding down the pole like a fireman.
Sammy had his turn with some help from Daddy to. Alot of fun
My two little motorcycle policeman. So Cute.
I am going to try to add some more pictures tomorrow. Hopefully I can figure out how to set up a Flickr account, because as I mentioned earlier I took alot of pictures. So check back soon and check out more of our little adventure.
The Son Of ManRene' Magritte
1964
Son Of ManSam Gottfredsen
2007
Sam even took the time to read them a story last night before bed. 
Today the were well rested so Sam had some fun during craft time with them. Very silly kid.
This first one is of Sammy. He has been behaving so well latley and doing a really good job on his school work that we decided to give him a reward. He had been asking for this coloring book for a while now so we finally got it for him. I mean how can you say no to an eduacational activity. The rule for it is that he has to finish the school work each day before he can color in it. He is so excited when he finishes now.
This one of Gabe he was helping Daddy with hanging up the Laundry. Daddy was so nice and patient to, what a good daddy. 
Gabe is very much into the "I am a big boy and can help you phase." so as you see we get a lot of good help from him. He was helping Daddy make some Meatballs for the Volcano Meatball Subs that we were having for supper that night. We got the recipe from Kraft. Here is the recipe if any one wants it. He had a lot of fun making it.
I just thought that this was really cute. We keep our DVDS up high for 2 reasons, one it keeps the kids from playing when ever they want and 2 we have no other place to put them. This makes for a problem though when Gabe wants to pick out his own video. We end up having to give him a little boost.
His big brother even took a little break from his lessons to join in on the lesson.
The picture above is a gift from my grandmother for Sam. While she was out for a walk one day she saw this piece of birch bark on the ground and thought that it would be something good for a lesson for him. He was to look up some of the different uses of the bark. He thought that this was great, because we live in the city and he does not see this tree much. Here is a list of some of the uses that he found- pot holders, napkin rings, coasters, charcoal, canoes, pulp, toothpick holders, paper, boxes, and furniture. Below is picture of a basket made out of birch bark that he found and thought was very beautiful. The name of it is Dona Look Basket.
Ok the boys have been building like crazy with the fort supplies. The top picture is of one that the created themselves. It is a barn with a swimming pool attached. I love the look on Sammy's face, he is pretending to swim in the pool. The bottom one is one that they followed the directions on and built a ship. They did such a great job on these. I am so proud of my little guys. They did add something to the boat that was not supposed to be there originally. The purple sheet in the middle is a trampoline. Unfortunetly for stuffed animals only, no mommys allowed :(.. LOL
This is a picture of my new best friend for schooling. I know you are all saying she is so crazy, That is just a timer. Well your right I am crazy but this has changed our lives around here. Well Let me start from the begining. During our school year last year Sammy had a really hard time completing his work. He would start after he finished his breakfast and go straight through till bed time, with breaks for meals. He just would not focus to get it done on time. Well our school year started out really well this year that we thought that was all behind us. We were wrong. Hey it happens. This past week was really rough on trying to get him to accomplish things. So not wanting to fall into last years pattern again, His dad and I started thinking. We went and wrote out the order he was supposed to do his work in. This was because he would do all of the things that looked fun to him first. Then he would fight doing the rest. So on the list we mixed it up and added things that were fun at certian times. Then we also choose a time limit for each activity and wrote that down. We would set the timer for him at the begining of each section and it helped him focus. He knew exactley what was expected of him. And boy did it work. He became so eager to get things done he was beating the timer. he cut his work from almost 12 hours down to 3 to 4 hours. He has improved his focus so much with it. That is the story of why this timer is my new best friend.
Rocket Ship. They flew to planet states and brought home a large state (wyoming). It was very cute the even put on a little story to go with it. Later they even decided to open their own ....
Gravel Company. As you see the started outside moving lots of gravel around and having a good time.
When it was time to come back inside they wanted the fun to keep going so they layed out the mat and expanded the company size. I really love seeing their imagination at work. It is so much fun.
Here is a couple shots of Gabe playing in his room. He decided that he needed some shelfs and the ladder up to Sammy' s bed was going to be it. 
So the monkey boy was asked how Sammy should get up to his bed. He decided to show him. I stopped him before he got any further than this. I really think that he would have tried flipping over and up into his bed if I let him. Crazy kid. LOL!!!
We also went to the library. Even though Gabe loves going to the Library he much prefers to play outside while we are there. Here he was using the tree supports as a ramp for his cars.
His brother was a little different though. He loves getting all of the books. Look at that smile on his face. Daddy was pretty happy to. LOL!!!!!
Here is a close up of when I pushed for him to finish up with this lesson. Are they born with the drama gene or something. I mean where has he learned this from. I had the last laugh tho. I told him that if he was to tired to do his school work he needed to go down for a nap. He did not like that. LOL
So that was a look into some of the more "tiring" times of our day. How does everyone else deal with these days?
