Cultivating Childhood

It's going to be a cold week up here in the Pacific Northwest.  We may even get a bit of snow.  I definitely need to find more for us to keep busy with in the afternoons as I want to limit our screen time as much as possible, but going outside seems to be getting more and more difficult.  The high for Tuesday is only supposed to be 29 degrees.  That temperature is hard for this SoCal girl to wrap her mind around.  Yikes!  Noah is loving movement songs ("Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" anyone?) so we might be doing a bit more of that.   This week is also THANKSGIVING!  I love this holiday.  I'm hoping that we can do a lot of Thanksgiving activities and talk about Thankfulness.  We just got Madame Blueberry: A Lesson in Thankfulness from the library, and we have a number of Thanksgiving books to use. Here are our activities for this week.... Everyday - these unfortunately haven't been happening as much recently.  I think I'm going ...

I don't know how some bloggers do it.  They somehow are able to create amazing curriculums for their preschoolers AND get gorgeous pictures of their children doing said activities.  I find that I have to be extremely hands on with Noah in each of his activities.  I wonder if this is because he isn't yet three, and this is just the way kids at this stage are.  Or, is it that I'm having him do things that are slightly harder than he is ready for?  Or, maybe it's just that I have a toddler as well as a preschooler.  Or, maybe it's that I don't want to pull out the big camera (my beloved little point-and-shoot took a bath a couple of weeks ago).  Whatever the reason, you will find that I did not get many pictures this week. Despite the lack of pictures, Noah had a VERY productive week.  We got through most of our "boxes," and he has learned his letters by leaps and bounds this week.  This is largely owed to the DVD we checked out at the library: ...

This week we are going to move math up earlier in the week.  I like the sound of Math Monday, so Monday it is.  The alphabet theme has been easily worked into our week with the library kit so I don't think it will suffer from being moved back. This will also be Noah's last week of traditional preschool.  We will be taking him out for both financial reasons, and so that we can have more time together.  I know he will miss going, but I'm hoping to supplement with doing other fun community classes from time to time.  Our city has some wonderful music, art, and gym/sport lessons for preschool aged children. Everyday Listen to  The Four Seasons  or  Ring of Mystery  by Vivaldi Talk more about what we are hearing Read about Norman Rockwell and look through our big coffee table book of his pictures Devotions and Bible Verse Review Monday Seasonal Workbox - Read Fall Books Rotating (Math) - Leaf Counting Book from Totally Tots Instructions from...

Aren't time changes fun at this age?  Our sleep patterns have been pretty irregular this week.  Kids napping at 10ish some days, not napping other days.  Falling asleep for the night super early and then late.  Consequently moods have been affected for both boys and Mama.   Despite the disruption, we did have a pretty good week.  This was mostly because of all the help that Daddy gave in supporting Mama.  I'm hoping that life will get into more routine again next week. Monday was one of those perfectly imperfect preschool days.  Mama felt like there was learning happening and lots of fun was had by all but not in the way that was expected.  I think the best way to give you an idea of our adventures on Monday is to give a play-by-play of our first activity.  I hope all you mothers of preschoolers can appreciate the humor in this: Mama gives Noah and Zach the leaf outline. Noah is then given a bunch of torn colored pieces of paper to make ...

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This week looks a bit like last week as there are a lot of the same activities mentioned.  One thing worthy of mentioning is Veteran's Day is this week!  We will be learning about our military and patriotism as well as our basic fall theme. Everyday Listen to The Four Seasons  or Ring of Mystery  by Vivaldi Talk more about what we are hearing Read about Norman Rockwell and look through our big coffee table book of his pictures Devotions and Bible Verse Review Monday Seasonal Workbox - Leaf Mosaic  Craft Rotating (Alphabet) -  Upper and Lower Case Matching Puzzle  from  Homeschool Creations We are going to try this again since I actually have color ink!  This might be a bit advanced for him, but we'll see how it goes Extra Activity - Playdough Baby Box - Playdough Tuesday Seasonal - Read Fall Books Rotating - MOPs Day Extra Activity - Fall Weather Coloring Page Baby Box - Colored Blocks Wednesday Seasonal - Balloon Turkey Craft Rotating (...

You know those weeks where nothing seems to go as planned? Yes, this was one of those weeks.  We had good plans, but life had different ones! I should have known something was up when Monday didn't go as planned.  Mondays are usually our best day because Mama is excited to start the new week.  I was pretty excited about the Upper and Lower Case Matching Puzzle , but my color printer ink was out.  I attempted to print it in black and white, but only succeeded in getting a really sketchy picture for each card.  You couldn't even tell what they were.  I pretty much gave up on our alphabet activity for the day.  However, right before we were ready to go to bed, Noah enjoyed using my computer keyboard to hunt and peck for letters.  He thought it was hilarious to watch all the letters show up on my computer especially when he would hold one down for a long time.  This quickly deteriorated from a learning activity to a crazy time, but it was fun whi...