Week in Review #23: Wow, we take a lot of breaks :-p

The end of this week we are heading to Clarksville basically to drop the kids off with grandparents and then Ryan and I are running away to Gatlinburg (until Tuesday and then we are forced by law to reclaim the children). Should be a great time! Now to just get through the week!

Monday - Zoo day! Ryan is off Sunday-Tuesday so we try to make one of those days a zoo day. The first day of spring was yesterday, so today was pretty crowded. I'm sure it will only get worse as summer comes along.  Is it just me or are strollers getting bigger as time goes on?  We had a bit of frustration (actually a lot) with school work even though we got a lot done. Ugh.

Tuesday - School done by 9:30! Love it! At this point in the year, I am mostly focused on making sure math and reading get done and then Hannah has the floor as to what she wants to do.  Everything but math and reading is almost done for the year (woot!).  We've dived back into her science kit--learning how sun dials and paper airplanes work.  Also, as I was just typing this I hear Autumn scribbling vigorously in the living room and I leap out of my chair expecting the worse. It was just her magnadoodle. A near heart attack wasted. LOL

Wednesday - We had school at the kitchen table since Autumn was already there, contently gluing pom poms to paper.  How refreshing it was to have a change of venue. :) Autumn has just recently taken to coloring books.  She's kind of a violent colorer, as if she's trying to rub out the Care Bear's face.  Pretty funny to watch actually.  During quiet time, I peeked in at Hannah and she had taken it upon herself to get out her phonics readers.  She was reading one about an ape who bakes a cake and places it on a tray. :) Add in church and this day was definitely a winner! 

Thursday - A very uneventful, yet lovely day.  School, crafts, playing outside without getting attacked by wasps, visiting Ryan at work, kids falling asleep quickly after going to bed. I'll take it! Actually I take that back, after going to bed Hannah came into my room and asked me repeat what exactly it means to obey and tell the truth as opposed to lying. Another conversation we have had more than once.  My initial response is to say, "Hannah, you know what it means to obey" but I suppose if it's pounded into her head enough she will follow through when I tell her to do something (which she does most of the time). :)

Friday - We are leaving for Clarksville this afternoon! Ryan traded around shifts like crazy for this trip, so he's currently working the morning shift.  I'm home trying to get last minute packing done. The ideal thing to do would be to have the house all straightened up so we don't come home to horrible mess, but we'll see what happens.  In just this last week we started and finished lesson 12 in reading! I was so thrilled. A nice breaking off point. 

I am currently trying to figure out what exactly we need to accomplish each day if I want the school year to be done by the end of May.  Doing a reading lesson a week would just about cover it, but that's pushing it a little.  If reading crossed over into June it wouldn't be the end of the world.  Geography, handwriting, and early learner are just about finished so I'm not worried about that.  Math has 56 lessons left (out of 160).  So that would average out to be 6 lessons a week which would do just fine. There are 9 or 10 science experiments left to do (out of 25).  Lately Hannah has been asking to do science while I'm still staggering down the hallway after getting out of bed.  I'm sure we'll do just fine. :)

Your Kids are Always Listening

Numerous magazines have said in some form or another kids are much more intuitive than we give them credit for. They may look occupied, but they are still taking in most of what is going on around them.  We found this out several days ago when we were all in the car.  Hannah had one of her many bears with her, and she was pretending to talk to it.  She started saying something along the lines of "You've been very bad.  You're gonna have some hot sauce."  Ryan and I looked at each other, horrified.  Recently there had been a story on the national news about a woman on Dr. Phil who gave her child hot sauce and put him in a cold shower for misbehaving at school.  I could have been easily watching this on TV, while the kids were playing in the same room without even thinking about it.  We asked Hannah where she heard about the hot sauce, and she told us pretty much verbatim what they said on the news. Wow. She really was listening!   I don't like thinking about my kids having such images in their head.  I know I can't shelter them from the fact there are not such nice things in the world (I talked to Hannah the other day about what is going on in Japan), but I by no means want them to think that this behavior is acceptable.

Week in Review #22: Autumn is shaping up!

The pandas have come
to expect us.

 Monday -  School went just fine...just did some math and learned about the Asiatic black bear.  Autumn is definitely coming into her own on the learning curve. I hear her counting to herself, "1, 2, 3, 4, 9, 14! I did it!" LOL She's getting better with colors and shapes as well.  She also still loves packing up a ton of books and dragging them all over the house.



The grizzly feeding was both
adorable and hilarious!

Tuesday - We did reading (finished lesson 11!) and math first thing this morning.  After lunch we made a trip to the zoo and were there a good three hours. We made it in time for the panda and grizzly feedings.  It was cool seeing pandas sitting up, gnawing on bamboo. After we got home we all took a nap, which was simply glorious.  Today was one of those days I wish could happen at least once a week--nowhere important to be, a great time spent as a family.  Very lovely indeed.



Relieved to finally
find some more books
on snakes and sharks!

Wednesday - We went to the library this morning.  Sometimes instead of story time they will have a speaker talk to all the kids about different things.  One week they had a speaker on seat belt safety  and how tall kids should be before no longer needing a booster seat, etc.  This week the speaker talked about the food pyramid and how we all need different colors of fruits and vegetables in our diet. I guess Hannah just heard about the colors because she was excited to tell me that mustard and ketchup were yellow and red.  Not much nutrition there. :-p


She was excited to come
across some board books
she had never seen before

Thursday - Ryan was awesome before I even woke up this morning! I had a hard time sleeping last night, so he took the kids on some errands while I slept in. I woke up at 8:30! That's like sleeping until noon to me! On top of that, the girls stayed with Ryan at work this evening while I went to the gym. Husband of the year! :-D For school we pretty much just did the basics--reading, math, and handwriting.



Showing off her counting skills
for her daddy



Friday - The kids got out in the beautiful weather, Hannah got a new booster seat, Autumn knows what a hexagon is, and we did more school work than I expected.  Hannah read "Go Dog Go" to me and Autumn, although I'm sure she has some of it memorized since I've read it to her so many times. ;) She might have learned some sight words in the process.  This evening the girls also had a "pretend birthday party" for me in their room (my real birthday is in 4 months).  We all had "party hats" which were just random hats (winter caps, Hannah's Mickey ears). They gave me "presents" which were "wrapped" in plastic shopping bags. Very sweet of her to do all this planning. :) We also danced around the room singing silly songs. I wore them out pretty good since they both were asleep within a half hour of going to bed. Woot!

Yay for productive weeks!

Rules for the Zoo

1. Don't get all frustrated because your 38-seat tandem stroller has a hard time getting through an already crowded women's restroom. We're all in there for the same purpose and that's not to convenience you.

2. Even wannabe professional photographers should know how to read. There's a reason they say no flash photography in the nocturnal animals' habitat.

3.  Make plans to drive out of your way if you are planning to eat out (we enjoy eating at Cici's Pizza during our outings which is a bit out of the way but worth it to us).  Don't plan to eat in at the zoo. Not saying the food is bad, but you know you can spend so much less at a place where you actually know whether or not the food is good.

4. Tennis shoes are your friend--no flip flops or shoes with chunky soles (like what I wore today). You do a lot of walking. Kind of like a duh thing. :-p

5.  Wear your kids out something fierce! Wagons and strollers are awesome but get them to walk some of the time. You're almost guaranteed an afternoon nap.

More to come I'm sure...

I think I'm having too much fun with this

1-Corn Chex
1-Lucky Charms
1-Cinnamon Toast Crunch
1-family size Suave shampoo
1-family size Suave conditioner
1-Dawn dish detergent w/ Olay
1-Glad Force Flex trash bags
2-Chex mix
3-Idahoan instant potatoes
1-International Delight coffee creamer
1-Tuna Helper
1-Kraft singles

Retail: $45.37 +tax
Paid: $14.77 +tax

After doing some math, it's as though I paid $1.14 for each item. Not too shabby. :)

Spring Break (for real this time)

The girls with their new friends:
"Green Violet" and "Janie Singing Bear"

Here is a simple laundry list of all the happenings this week (keeping in mind that most of this we do during a normal week ;-D):

Build-A-Bear Workshop, lots of outside play, sticker crafts, glitter paint, riding bikes, drawing sharks and whales, building with jumbo legos, reading an unlimited amount of stories, library storytime, Wednesday night church, an impromptu mini unit on snakes (Hannah's idea), Easter bunny craft, lots of toddler radio on Pandora, the girls having the treat of watching Veggie Tales DVDs in my room so I can get housework done :-D, trip to the zoo, finding out how soap and water make bubbles, making a fort in the living room with a sheet, kitchen chair, and an enormous cardboard box, Hannah asking me how to say various words in Spanish (I knew "Dad" and "Mom", but she wanted to know how to say "grape juice" and "Kracker Bear".  I've heard about a very kid-friendly Spanish curriculum, so it's something I may look into).

I always forget how pleasant a break from school really is. Here's to a new week!

Entrance tunnel to the fort

Welcome to the lair!

I will leave you with a few items I picked up yesterday with coupons.  Ryan is getting tired of me getting him deodorant, but at least he'll never stink!

Gillette body wash
Gillette deodorant
Gain 80ct dryer sheets

Retail: 11.21 plus tax
Paid: 4.24 plus tax

Today's Couponing

I went to Kroger today with some coupons I wanted to combine with sales.  The trip was a great success!

1 box of Lucky Charms
1 box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch
1 tub 72ct Pampers wipes
1 20ct Pampers Cruisers diapers
1 bag of Kroger brand crinkle fries
2 tubes of Pillsbury crescent rolls
1 bottle of Pantene shampoo
2 bags of Green Giant Valley Fresh steamers
1 Marie Callender family size lasagna
1 Gillette ProGlide razor

Retail Value: $49.45 plus tax
Paid: $16.28 plus tax

Yaaaaaaay!!