{This Moment}

{This Moment} - A Soule Mama Friday ritual. A single photo- no words- capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you are inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments section for all to find and see. We hope your weekend is full of sweet moments!

Almost There

Working on her collage to complete her Clover petal. 

Only two more petals to go before she has her complete set!

Wordless Wednesday

The Wonderful Word Cube

Thanks to my friend over at the Momgineer I have now discovered a new website called Teachers Pay Teachers.  It's a treasure trove of activities and things to do. Some of which are free to download and some which you pay for. Grace recently has been saying that now that she knows all her letters and their sounds that she'd really like to be able to read some words. And while, yes, back in the day I was a classroom teacher who did in fact help kids learn to read, I knew that I needed to take a different approach with her when it came to this skill. While we are a family who loves books and while we have surrounded the girls with the printed word and have read to them from the moment they were born, I have noticed that Grace is the type of little who needs a wee bit of instruction. I don't want to create "school at home" by any means but I also don't want her to struggle through this very important skill. So, in pondering how to lay the right foundation for her I took to the internet (as all modern mamas do) and decided to explore Teachers Pay Teachers. I discovered some wonderful materials there that I knew she'd adore (like the word cube and accompanying game pictured below).

This is the third word cube Grace has made.  She absolutely loves creating them!

Once the cube is made you can either play by yourself or you can play with friends.  This particular sheet is for an individual player.  And we changed it up so that you are coloring in the squares instead of tracing the words.  Coloring is way more how we roll (pardon the pun) anyway!

Watching her learn to read is just amazing.  To go from not reading one minute to reading the next has been a true joy to witness.  And to know that we get to be there partnering with her every step of the way just makes it that much sweeter.  

No Jacket Required

Today it reached just about 60 degrees!  The sky was a gorgeous shade of blue, the clouds were perfectly puffy, and the sun was happily shining down.  It was simply amazing!  A glorious day such as this surely calls for an adventure to be had.  And, as luck would have it, plans had already been made to meet up with my friend Julie at the Natick Community Organic Farm.  Our timing couldn't have been any better!

Someone get these girls a farm, please!

What started out as a simple errand of dropping off some yarn to my friend Julie turned into a completely lovely adventure.  Our time spent at the farm today was just what we all needed. Soaking in loads of Vitamin D and connecting with nature truly feeds our souls.  Watching the girls run with wild abandon and connect with their friends and the animals made me feel (once again) that they really should be farm kids.  They would do well with lots of land to explore, animals to take care of and gardens to tend.  Thankfully we have the last two covered!  Thank you Mother Nature for this gift of this day!  We girls truly appreciated it!

{This Moment} What The Tooth Fairy Left

{This Moment} - A Soule Mama Friday ritual. A single photo- no words- capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you are inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments section for all to find and see. We hope your weekend is full of magic!

A Magical First

Yesterday at 2:30am Grace appeared at our bedside to tell us that the very wiggly tooth she'd had finally fell out.

As you can imagine, there was much excitement in our house. This tooth had been wiggly for quite some time and this past week it seemed to get looser and looser each day. We chatted with my mom that same night and she apparently went to bed thinking that this little tooth would fall out during the night. Smart Gramma.  

The tooth fairy box that we'd bought and tucked away many moons ago for her was brought out yesterday. There was much rejoicing over this sweet little box. "Oh, Mama, the fairy looks like me!"  and "I remember seeing this box at the toy store and wishing it could be mine!"  

All day long we waited for night to come so that the tooth fairy would arrive. Finally, it was time to head to bed. We went upstairs and she lovingly placed her box on one of her pillows.  

"Oh mama, I am so excited! I cannot wait to see what the tooth fairy leaves for me. Do you think my tooth fairy is a boy or a girl? I wonder if she will leave me a note and tell me her name? I think I will put my tooth in the box under this pillow over here and I will sleep on the other pillow over there so she doesn't have any trouble getting to the tooth and her wings don't get squished. I can't wait to show you what she left me in the morning!"  

It took her until about 11:30pm to actually get to sleep. In the words of my friend Emily: "better than Santa if you believe in fairies." Such a wise soul that Emily. We've never had any trouble with the girls falling asleep on Christmas Eve so this was a first for us. Needless to say, I was very grateful for the wisdom of Emily, who, too, has a house full of girls who adore fairies.  

The first time she came down very upset at the idea of the tooth fairy taking her tooth. "Do you think she'd let me keep this one mama?"  

Finally, she was ready for bed. I tucked her in for the fourth time and she sweetly drifted off to dreamland.  

Around 4:00am Grace crawled into bed with us."Mama, the tooth fairy came and left me a necklace!" The both of us promptly drifted back to sleep. She and I slept until 8:00am when Emma could not take the waiting any more and woke both of us up with "Grace, you are covered in sparkles!" Grace then showed Em what the tooth fairy had left for her and both girls skipped down to their room to see how much fairy dust was on Grace bed.  "Mama, there's lots!"  That's when it was discovered that yes, the tooth fairy did indeed leave a note!

If you look closely you may be able to see some of the fairy dust that currently covers her.  

It was truly magical!  And thankfully we'll get to experience it all again soon as she has a second very wiggly tooth in there. I'm actually surprised that both of her bottom teeth did not come out at the same time!