Yesterday I finally found info on the internet for Rosie why the moon looks orange and really big in the horizon sometimes. The answer to the latter was awesome! It turns out that the big moon is an optical illusion. Some people call it "the moon illusion" because the moon in the horizon is actually the same size as the moon we see when it's right above us. Scientists still don't know for sure if the illusion is in our brains, but they know for sure it's not something from the environment.
Today the kids kept busy playing with play-doh, making chocolate dipped bananas and strawberries, reading library books, baking cookies, digging in the dirt in the yard, jumping on the trampoline, playing doll house (the girls) and doing target practice with plastic air guns and little rubber bullets (Nicky), caring for their virtual pets on line and our real pets (2 gold fish), shooting hoops on Nicky's mini basket ball hoop, and now Isabella is in the pool "swimming" with a dress on because she felt like it though it's too cold for her to truly swim so she is just getting her legs wet. Rosie has been upstairs watching "Ponyo" for what I'm sure is the 10th time since we got the movie last night. Oh wait, I just saw Bella jump in the pool with her whole body, but she quickly jumped out. And she's going back in and out over and over again. Nutty girl =)!
Eva sat in the potty again all by herself, but nothing else happened. I don't think she connects yet going pee-pee and poo-poo with sitting in the potty though she knows that she must sit on it with a bare bum. She's only 14 months old so it's a good start.
As for me I've been reading and reading and reading. I have a couple of books I need to finish and I just got my free "SALT" magazine issue and I must say so far I've enjoyed it. It encourages Christian families in our walk with the Lord and our convictions including quiver full, homeschooling, courting and such. I would like a subscription but I need to ask Nick if we have the funds for one.
Isabella just changed into her swimsuit and is swimming! That water must be about 60 degrees fahrenheit! But she is having fun and the other kids are trying to join her. Rosie got in, but it took her a long time to dip herself all the way in and Nicky tried to get in but he just could not stand the cold water so he is in the patio standing there naked (after taking off his swimming trunks) watching his sisters in the pool. Poor Eva is looking longingly from behind the screen door in the kitchen and probably wishing she was big enough to join her older sisters.

We're finally home and thanking God for a fun trip and that Nick made many new business contacts. I pray the Lord continues to bless the business and giving Nick wisdom.
On Tuesday the kids and I went on another walk on the strip. W didn't walk as far as we did on Monday, but we did have a good stroll. I took the kids to the Cesar's Palace Hotel where there is a mall and they also have replicas of Roman statues. I had a chance to discuss with them some Roman history and myth behind the statues as well as some of the artist and their techniques. We also admired the beautiful clothes from the ultra famous designers that were in the stores' windows. Many of those pieces are pure art! I've always enjoyed fashion for the sheer beauty of it.
There we also saw a show on a big fountain, with life size animatronic characters and fire and water shooting up and loud music. It was very cool but Nicky got scared and he cried the whole time. We had a front row view so I took Nicky to the back while the girls watched the rest of the show in front. Afterwards we tried to find a place to have lunch but everywhere the food was outrageously expensive. Ice cream was $10 a scoop, a Chinese fast food meal was $17, a hot dog was $8! It was so ridiculous. So we walked back to the hotel and on the way we found an AM/PM gas station and we got hot dogs and goodies from there. Thankfully that satisfied the kids because they were very disappointed when we couldn't find a cheap place to eat on the strip.
I also got several comments on how many kids I have from strangers on the street. A couple of comments were more like "you have your hands full, but one was down right rude. It's so sad how people are so selfish that they don't see the amazing blessings and miracles that children who are made in God's own image are. One lady asked me "How many kids do you have?" and she gave me this look of disgust. I told hr boldly "I have 4 and they're ALL blessing!" She said nothing after that, I doubt that she expected me to let her know so bluntly that my children are blessings to me. We chilled out at the hotel the rest of the day.
Yesterday we took a quick trip to L.A. because Nick needed some merchandise for a customer and then drove home. When we drove through the desert we saw an awesome big red moon and we talked about it and how the moon affects the tide. I promised the kids that today I would look up the reason why the moon looks so red and big sometimes. I was so proud of how well the kids did with all the driving. Rosie had a bit of trouble with her reflux but eventually she flt better. Isabella did so well and so did baby Eva and Nicky!
The Lord is good!

Today is our second day in Vegas. It's Nick's birthday but he has been at the trade show since the morning. Before he went though he had to go buy Rosie a pair of flip flops since hers broke yesterday (I think when I tried them on at the market I must have stretched them out, oops!). After he did that he went off to the trade show and we went off to our excursion.
I looked on the Internet to see how far the strip was from our hotel the Tuscany, which by the way is very nice. I would rate it amongst our top 5 places we've ever stayed. It's a suite with a kitchenette and a king bed plus a sofa bed. The room smells like a new house and the property looks like an Italian villa. So pretty!
Anyways, the yahoo.com map said that the strip was less than a mile walk from here so the kiddos and I dared to walk down E. Flamingo Blvd. toward the strip. The area might seem shady but in reality there were many people walking along with us including several people dressed in business attire. When we were almost at the strip Rosie saw the MGM Hotel at what seemed to be a short distance. We decided to walk to to it since there is a free lion habitat exhibit. Well, I figured the walk would not be that easy but I decided to keep my opinion to myself because I wanted the kids to experience walking down a city street. At first Rosie was nervous, but the rest of the kids were excited at all the things they saw as we walked along. Soon Rosie relaxed and she began to enjoy herself too. We stopped at various places along the way and back including a big fountain at the Bally's, walked across one of the many bridges along the strip, the M&M store, the Coke store where we took a picture with a 7 foot polar bear (a guy in a costume), went up and down various escalators and people movers, saw the monorail and they all wished we could ride it, saw the faux Eiffel Tower and Champs-Elysées and I discussed with them about where the real ones are and many other things. They also loved seeing the 2 story buses and people watching all the people here from all over the world of course.
Finally we saw the lion habitat at the MGM and the kids had fun watching those huge animals doing the "cat" things they do (mostly napping, lol). Unfortunately there were also many ads for filth on truck billboards and along the street and that bothered Rosie and me. It was the first time I noticed so much of that. Perhaps because it's the first time I walk so far in Vegas with children (no lectures please!).
At the end of our hike we ended up, not surprisingly, exhausted and sore! But over all it was a very fun time and I'm glad we did it. When we got home I made sandwiches for the kids and now we are just relaxing and waiting for my love Nick to come home. I assume we will celebrate his birthday somehow when he gets here.

We're going to be out of town with Nick for a trade show in Las Vegas.

Today was a busy one. I had to wake up the girls at the crack of dawn to make it to their docs appointment on time for a physical and a referral for a pediatric dentist. So Nick stayed home with Nicky and Eva while the three of us went to the doctor's office. Everything was OK with the girls. Bella is perfect. She's 4 feet tall but I didn't get her weight. She was nervous so they had to take her blood pressure twice since the first time it was abnormally high. Rosie, though she's perfect too, still has reflux so we will return next week to get that checked out more thoroughly. Oh, and she's 5ft tall now!
After the doctor's appointments we went home and while the girls and I ate a late breakfast Nicky watched his new favorite movie "The Right Stuff". Of course being only 3 years old he completely ignored all the drama but has become obsessed with rockets and astronauts. So much so that yesterday when he saw the movie for the first time he made me take him on a quick book run to the library to pick up as many books on space rockets as we could find for him. So today we spent a few minutes looking through his library books and he asked me dozens of questions on what was happening to the astronauts in the rockets in the movie and then he adamantly told me that one of the astronauts on the movie was him. Later Bella, Nicky, Eva and I went for for a walk to the park. We played there for a while and I even got a chance to talk to my sister Beatty when she called me on the cell phone. It's nice hearing from her even if we don't get to talk much anymore. Afterwards we came home and waited for Nick to get home from running errands and we went to take Rosie to get her hair cut and to have dinner.
Right now I feel drained but blessed to have had such a full day with my loves! I look forward to later having nightly devotions with the kids and a good night sleep!
Thank you Lord Jesus for all you give us and for all you provide.

Some of the toughest lessons for me to teach my children are how to forgive those who hurt them. Not because it's tough for them to forgive, on the contrary they usually tell me to not say anything to anyone when someone is mean to them. They worry about those people's feelings and sometimes they are also are afraid that those people will be angry at them. The real tough part is dealing with my own feelings of anger when I know someone did my children wrong. Today I was talking to them about a couple of situations when certain people didn't respect their belongings and because of it one of my children's toys were damaged and other toys were lost. I asked my child, the one who's things were damaged, if *** wanted me to say something to the individuals who were responsible. But my angel said no, *** didn't want one of those people to get in trouble or have that person get angry.
That is not the first time people have been disrespectful to my children. In fact I've witnessed how some people are out right rude to my babies. I think there are only a few sins as abominable than hurting a child on pourpuse, even emotionally. I remember years ago certain visitors to my home would ignore my kids when my baies tried talking to them or when my kids brought them a book to read to them or asked them to play. Once someone even read a book as fast as she could to my child, so ridiculously fast that I couldn't even understand what they were reading, to rush and to get my child away from her as fast as possible. I don't know how those adults could be so hateful to innocent children, even with me right there?! Others have yelled at my kids for things they didn't do and my poor babies, being so meek, tell me that even though their feelings got hurt that they don't want me to say anything. Inside my blood boils, my heart breaks and tears swell up in my eyes, however the Holy Spirit keeps me from going after those people and just slapping them. I usually manage to muster up the calm voice to tell my children that I am proud that they can forgive those who hurt them. Then I tell them we must pray for our enemies. It's sad to say enemies because 99% of the time those people have been family. After a situation like that it takes me about a day of prayer to give me the strength to forgive. Then I realise how amazing my children are! When I was their age if someone hurt me I took delight in seeing them suffer and punished. But my kids think about the other person's feelings and well being before their own!
I have no doubt that my babies have the Lord in their hearts. Even though I should be the example to them of how a godly person should react to being hurt emotionally or being disrespected, the truth is that they are the ones who inspire me to become more like Christ and I consider them my heroes!
Lord help me to have "faith like a child". Give my husband and me the wisdom to show them how to gave a Christ like attitude towards our enemies and that my precious and amazing children don't lose that meakness and love they have even to those who don't show them that same love.

It's another day of recovery for our clan. This "bug" trully hit us hard. Eva has been the only one who seems to have avoided it. But we're still praising the Lord that everyone does feel better today than yesterday!

I'm almost done reading one of the 2 books I'm tackling now. Honestly I skimmed through most of it because I had read it a few years ago when I first began considering to unschool (the book is The Unschooling Handbook by Mary Griffith) and now I was surprised to see how it was sort of like old news to me. The book gives parents ideas and encouragement from the author's and other unschoolers' lives to new and potential unschooled families. Yet, as I read through it this second time I noticed that we already do live a very free and unschooled life! I could relate to the stories of the unschoolers in the book. I felt special (hee-hee) to find that our family fits in the ranks of other well seasoned unschooling families. The chapter that I am reading all the way though is the final one on grown up unschoolers. It's mostly for the sake of encouragement for me. I know that I shouldn't seek for the approval of others, except from the Lord. But in a world where my beliefs are unconventional and where many of the people around me find it hard to understand what we are trying to accomplish for our children , it is nice to read about other families who have gone through this same path we are on right now and that they came out all the better for it.