Time Well Spent!

One of my most favorite things to do and/or be a witness to as a parent is reading with Emma-Caroline and Sophie. It is a time that draws them close, builds relationship, fosters imagination, and instills love for reading. The experts will tell you and encourage you to read with your child for at least 20 minutes every day. As a teacher of 12 years of children in kindergarten through second grade, I will tell you that the reading experts are absolutely RIGHT! You have no idea the pre-literacy skills that are being built and enforced when you read to your child, pointing out the illustrations as they correspond with the text read aloud. They see you tracking from left to right, they see you wondering about what will come next, they make their own predictions about the story, they learn to love reading even before they become readers themselves. How many times have you heard your own child pick up a book and repeat it almost verbatim from what you read, or pick up a book that is not familiar to them, but be able to tell the story from picture clues? Those actions are pre-literacy skills and are the building blocks to becoming a great reader!!! I use to have people ask me if I was teaching Emma-Caroline to read at home before she went to kindergarten. My answer always was, "We read books together every day." No, I never sat down and said to her, "This is the word cat, dog, etc." She got it from our continual reading. When she left kindergarten, she was reading on a 3rd grade level! And now in first grade, she is reading and comprehending anything she picks up and reads. But the most important thing to me that Emma-Caroline has as a reader is her LOVE of reading. Every child will develop their skill in reading at a different rate. Again I will say, the most important thing a child can achieve in pre-literacy and early literacy stages is not skill, but a love for reading. Skill in reading will come with practice, but love for reading in young children is something that is fostered and nurtured through connection with others and the books that are being read. So read, read, read with your children!!! It is time well spent!

Jump Rope For Heart Event

Last week we announced that Emma-Caroline was participating in her school's Jump Rope for Heart Event. Emma-Caroline set a goal, created a page on the Jump Rope for Heart web site, wrote thank you notes to all who contributed and (thanks to you all) surpassed her goal! On Thursday, Sophie and I headed over to Bearden Elementary on one of the coldest days thus far of 2012. We followed the first grade and other classes out to the gym all ready to jump for a worthy cause. I soon realized as the music began to rock the house that I had left home without my camera's SD card!  Thanks to Ms. Ellison, I soon had her SD card and was back over at the gym to snap photos like mad. Poor Ms. Ellison, I apologize that you had to go through the 10,000 photos I took of the Jump Rope for Heart. Unfortunately, or maybe not, that is how I roll when taking photos. Thank you though very much for putting those photos up on your school website! I snagged a few of the photos that I took on Ms. Ellison's SD card to place here on "The Avery House" blog. We all had a wonderful time, participants and spectators alike, raising money for The American Heart Association!

Emma-Caroline and Nikol getting ready to jump. Emma-Caroline had chosen her "Peace, Love, Bearden shirt to wear for the Jump Rope for Heart event because she thought it showed everything she was about on that day. I agree completely!

 Emma-Caroline and Andie gearing up to jump!

 The first grade girls competing for who could jump the longest.

Ms. Ellison's first grade class cheering from the sidelines!

Jump Rope for Heart!

Emma-Caroline is participating in the Jump Rope for Heart fundraiser at her school. She is super excited and wants to raise as much money as possible to help in this worthy cause. You can check out more info about her efforts here.  Emma-Caroline says thank you for helping her raise money for The American Heart Association.

Winter-Project 52/2

Last evening, into early this morning a wicked storm blew in with howling winds and a bit of snow. I'll admit, I was a bit unnerved by the wind gusts swirling outside my windows as I lay snuggled under my covers. This morning, we awoke to a bit of ice and snow enough to delay school by one hour. Our neck of the woods did not see anymore snow accumulation, but our world does look quite wintry. The large silver maples which were the tree of choice in our mid-century neighborhood all have a gnarly "Old Man Winter" look to them. I snapped a few frames of our front yard Silver Maple and played it up in editing. I think the below shot just shouts "Winter!" Hope everyone is staying toasty warm inside their homes! Happy Winter y'all!

Striking Up a Great Friendship!

On Sunday, we headed out to the bowling alley again with some great friends of ours, the Hatchers, who have two AWESOME little boys, Sam and Charlie.  

  The ages of the Hatcher boys and Avery girls are stair stepped with Sophie and Charlie being the closest in age with a difference of 5 months.

 The kids are the best of friends and always have a great time together!

 I love the photo above and the look on Charlie's face. Aren't they cute?

 Mary and I have often said that Sophie and Charlie could be twins with how similar they look. What do y'all think?

 The kiddos had a "ball" so to speak and the adults enjoyed catching up. I got to snap a few frames between my turn at bowling.

 Now that I have a new computer, I also have few more editing techniques in Picasa. I still need to load my Photoshop and Florabella to this computer, but these little Picasa tools are pretty fun too. My ISO was upped so these photos are a bit grainy and really not the best.

  Maybe Mary will have some that are a little clearer since she was using her portrait lens.

We've made a plan to get together again soon, and Emma-Caroline has even decided that she wants to have her 7th birthday party at the bowling alley in March. Score, or Strike! At least that buys me another year not having a sleepover party! Woo hoo! Back soon with maybe some snow photos for 2012. They are calling for freezing temps and snow tonight. Let's all keep our fingers crossed and wear our pajamas inside out!

Wishing for Snow!

I was listening to NPR today, (yes, I am not afraid to admit that I listen to NPR) and they had a segment on "All Things Considered" about a town in Alaska getting 18 FEET of snow and expecting 3 FEET MORE through the night! That is CRAZY snow accumulation!!! Here in East Tennessee, we would settle for 18 inches of snow and then 3 inches more to give us a nice snow day of playing outside and building a snowman or two.

  Instead of snow, we have had LOTS of really mild weather days in the 60's and a few rain showers here and there.

 On the plus side, Emma-Caroline and Sophie find it almost as much fun playing outside in the rain as they do the snow.

 Every day that it has rained this month, they have run to put on their rain boots and to grab their umbrellas for some fun splashing in the rain.

I love their excitement for the rain and just hope that it will be cold enough soon for some of that rain to turn into snow!

Out with the Old . . .Project 52/1

The phrase, "Out with the old, in with the new," never has really settled well with me. Sure, I know what it essentially means, rid yourself of past habits, things, etc. in order to have a fresh start, new perspective, and the ability to move ahead into a better state of affairs. My problem with the phrase is, how can you move forward into the new if you don't remember and have respect for the old? And if you completely throw out the old, how will you ever know where you have come from? As I tap away at the keys on the computer, I really don't want an answer to any of the above posed questions. I simply got to thinking about the phrase "Out with the old . . ." when I was outside recently admiring the sunlight glimmering on the spent hydrangea flowers in my garden. There in front of me was that phrase in a magnificent display in nature.

 Out with the old . . .

 In with the new.

  In looking at these images, you may understand my problem with the phrase. The old in it's own right is worth taking notice of. The old may have lived it's life whether it be an idea, habit, thing . . . but it is still valuable.

 The old, reminds us of who we were, the old pushes us forward to who we will become. Without the old, there could be no new.

 A better statement to me would be, "Remember the old, while you step into the new." The old will always be a part of the new no matter how much we want to be "out with the old and in with the new." The old is the catalyst of the new. Just as these hydrangea coexist with it's "old" spent flowers and "new" buds awaiting spring, so too do our old habits, ideas, etc. coexist and push forward our new selves awaiting to bud with new opportunities.

In 2011, I learned much about photography and my camera through my 365 Project. Admittedly, it was a project that was HUGE and a lot to keep up with. But I found it extremely valuable for many, many reasons. In the new year, what I have learned from 365 will carry on as I explore new things in photography. The old 365 Project will dawn into a new project. I respect the process I went through in the 365 Project and the lesson it taught me in patience in learning a new skill. As I continue to explore and improve my photography skills in 2012, I hope to complete a Project 52 just choosing and posting one photo per week of the 52 weeks of the year. I may keep up with it every week, or I may not. The important thing is to keep learning and to remember the old as I step into the new.

Hakuna Matata!

Perhaps the phrase "hakuna matata" from The Lion King should sum up our attitude for the new year. It would be nice to have "no worries for the rest of your days!" In reality, hakuna matata is not a bad philosophy to live by if you are prone to being a worry wart. I am mentioning this lovely little jewel of a phrase because it is fresh in my mind after having watched The Lion King with Howie and the girls on New Year's Eve.

 As I told you earlier, poor Emma-Caroline was sick on New Year's Eve, so a quiet family celebration at home on the couch in front of the fire was just what the doctor ordered.  I had forgotten how much I love The Lion King. When the movie first came out, I even had my first Tennessee "email" UNIX account handle name as nala@utk.edu (not real account). When Howie and I lived in Austin, Texas we had the honor of picking up James Earl Jones at the airport and riding in a limo back to the University of Texas where he was appearing for one of Howie's events when he worked at UT Austin. James Earl signed a poster for me with the phrase "Hakuna Matata!" since I told him how much I loved him as Mufasa in The Lion King.

Ohhhh, memories! But I digress. We had a nice quiet New Year's celebration and I found my New Year's resolution to boot! Hakuna Matata!

Bowling in the New Year!

Happy New Year 2012! We hope that everyone had a wonderful New Year's Eve celebration and that you all have a very blessed 2012. At the Avery House, we had a sick little Emma-Caroline, but we managed to celebrate still with some great family time activities (more on that to come). Before 2011 came to a close, and before Emma-Caroline became sick with fever and a stomach bug, the girls Howie and I headed out to the Bowling Alley for a little fun. Howie and I had not bowled in over10 years when we had lived in Phoenix! The girls had never been bowling, so it was a whole new adventure for them. I was pleasantly surprised that the bowling alley we went to was VERY nice and clean. That is always a plus in my book. It was also filled with families who were doing the exact same thing as us, getting the kids out of the house for a little fun. Sophie I think had the best time of all of us and squealed with each roll of the ball down the lane. It was a lot of fun and an outing we will do again in the very near future.