American Girl Club

Sophia and I are so excited!  We have found 6 other little girls (or should I say young ladies?) that LOVE American Girl Dolls are are excited to form an American Girl Doll Club to study American history over the next 2 years.  We can't wait for the first meeting!

Here is what the club is supposed to look like:

We plan to study the AG dolls and their period in history in chronological order:

Kaya  1764
Felicity  1774
Josephina  1824
Kristin 1854
Addy 1864
Samantha 1904
Rebecca 1914
Kit 1934
Molly   1944
Julie  1974

We encourage each girl to read at least the first book in each series prior to the first meeting for each doll, but obviously aren’t going to force them to read the books if they don’t want to.  Each girl is asked to bring any AG doll (or other 18 inch doll) with them each meeting.

Basic outline for each meeting:

Meeting #1:  Craft for the AG doll, history and game

Meeting #2: Food from the time period, history and game

Meeting #3:  Field trip

Meeting #4:  Craft from the time period and scrapbook pages.  If time permits we will go back and “replay” favorite games

The thought on the scrapbook pages are that the girls can use pictures for the fieldtrip or any other items they like to decorate the pages.  We thought that it would be fun for them to have AG catalogs to cut up, so if you have any, tuck them away to bring with you!

The first two months we will focus on Kaya (host family F):

Meeting #1 :  Outfit and moccasins for the dolls

Meeting #2 :Cooking (we were thinking bison)

Meeting #3 :  Sunwatch Indian Village http://www.sunwatch.org/  this should be free if you are a member of the Cincinnati Museum Center

Meeting #4 : dreamcatchers and scrapbooking

Followed by Felicity (host family R):

Meeting #1 : hat for dolls and paper marbling

Meeting #2 :  spiced nuts and lemon tarts

Meeting #3 : 1776 re-enactors visit

Meeting #4 : hoops and sticks craft, journals with marbled paper (from meeting #1) and scrapbooking

We have left December open for the girls to have some kind of Christmas gathering!

After the new year will be study Josephina (host family M)

Meeting #1 : rebozos for dolls

Meeting #2 : cookies and hot chocolate

Meeting #3:  possible tour of the cathedral downtown as Catholicism had a huge influence in Josephina’s life.  The cathedral was build in the 1840s, so not too far out of Josephina’s timeline http://www.stpeterinchainscathedral.org/

Meeting #4: journal or other craft and scrapbooking

We will study Kristin in March and April and Addy in May and June, take July off and then start back in August with the remaining 5 girls following the same 2 month schedule!

We also decided that we will have “dues” for the group so that we can use the money to purchase craft supplies.  As of right now the host family for each month will provide the food, we might figure food costs in too in the future, especially if some families prefer not to host a “doll”, we will just figure it out as we go.  Dues for the first 4 months will be $8.  We ask that everyone pay this at the first meeting. Families will be encouraged to host a “doll” but is not a requirement as we know some families are better at organizing this or have fewer things on their plates and some of us are just control freaks!

We are open to any suggestions!  We want the girls to enjoy themselves, make new friends and learn a little history at the same time!

Here are a few links : 

The American Girls and American History   http://eclectichomeschool.org/articles/article.asp?articleid=61
 http://www.krazykuehnerdays.com/2011/06/american-girl-club-first-meeting-for.html 

Also, for the boys (younger or older brothers), I will bring legos to play with (or if one of the moms would like to host a lego club for the boys at the same time, feel free to jump in!) or there is an area for playing on during the meetings.  I figure that they will join us for fieldtrips if they are interested or that you can make other arrangements for them those days!

Happy 17th Bithday Emily!

Today we celebrated the LAST of the summer birthdays!  3 birthdays within 3 weeks is nothing compared to the 4 birthdays in 11 days we celebrate in the spring, but it does make for a dizzying celebration!

It is hard to believe that Emily, who was supposed to be our "last" baby is only 1 year shy of being an adult!

We didn't know what to expect as far as labor when we arrived in the labor and delivery unit of the hospital on July 11, 1994.  Brett had been a fairly long and complicated delivery, Hannah had been very short (50 minutes start to finish).  At a routine visit to my OB that morning, he decided that he wanted to induce labor that afternoon, as the baby seemed big and I was miserable.  The heat was oppressive, my legs were swollen so badly that I couldn't even tell that I had ankles and my toes were so swollen they ached!  We began the induction at 1 PM, I was already nicely dilated (between 3 and 4 cm) so they started an IV, added pitocin and broke my water, once we were settled and the room cleared out, it was close to 2 PM.  The contractions were strong and steady by not unbearable, I even manage to fall asleep for about an hour.  Then things CHANGE....I feel unbearable pressure and ring for the nurse.  NO ONE ANSWERS.  I ring again.  And again.  And again.   By this point I have flipped around backwards on the bed and am squatting and clinging to the headboard to deal with the pain.   I scream at Jay to go find SOMEONE, find ANYONE because the baby is coming!  He grabs the first person he finds in the hallway, later we laugh that it was lucky it wasn't the janitor, but I think at that point I wouldn't have cared if it was the janitor.  The young resident he was pulled into the room seems a bit frazzled, but comes over and checks and confirms that there is the top of a head presenting itself.  He has me flip back around in the bed and asks Jay to go and get a nurse from the nurse's station.  They return just in time to see the head emerge.  OK, next push, we should have a baby.  NO....push again....NO.....push again....NO...THIS BABY IS STUCK....the nurse literal jumps on the bed, her butt in my face and she pushes on my stomach as hard as she can to pop the baby through the pelvic bone....you could literally HEAR the pop, Emily breaks her collarbone as she clears the bone. 3:55 PM Emily enters the world!  Apgars are 5 and 9, due to the stress of her delivery.  Weighing in at 9lbs 13 oz, measuring 20 inches, she looked like a little butterball turkey!  An absolutely BEAUTIFUL butterball turkey!  Maybe I just think TURKEY because they didn't feed me lunch before they started the induction!

Happy Wedding Day, Mary Jane!

The girls and I traveled to South Bend, Indiana to attend my neice's wedding.  Here is a picture of my beautiful daughters just after the wedding and before the reception!  First picture, from left to right:  Emily, Tori, Hannah and Sophia.

COW-stomer Appreciation Day

Every year on the Friday before Emily's birthday, Chick-Fil-a, offers any customer that shows up dressed like a cow a free meal (chicken, fries/side, and a drink) so we ALWAYS dress up and join in on the fun!  Even the herbivore amongst us joined in for the fun and Tori ate her first french fry!

Every year once we get home, the stained t-shirts get washed and then folded up and put on the shelf in the basement for the following year!  We usually add a little something new each year, this year it was horns to some of the boys headbands!