T t Turtle

We've been working on Tt Turtle for the last two weeks with the words to remember: "I don't quit, I persevere."  Here is the story of our days in pictures...

Nora made a turtle with pattern blocks using this template.  This week we focused a lot on puzzles and orienting shapes in certain ways.  This has been a difficult task for Nora but she is really improving and enjoying her work.

Picture Box Activity from My Father's World.  Every week she cuts out the pictures starting with the letter we are working on.  After 6 weeks she has built up a little box of pictures so she mixes them up into a pile and sorts each picture according to the starting sound.   Easy Peasy.

MFW worksheet - put the X over the pictures that don't start with the letter T.  Also easy for her at this point.  I remember the first time we did one of these and she had no clue how to draw an X.  It was surprisingly difficult.  Now look at those beautiful X's!

Her physical therapist still comes every Tuesday and Thursday.  Claire and Lucy join in.

Grocery Shopping.  She was mad at the turkey here because it was too cold and didn't cooperate as a pillow.

We went to the park later than usual and saw tons of deer - at least 40 scattered throughout the park!  This is just one shot of many.  They were everywhere.  

Add caption

We finally set up our thanksgiving decorations with ideas from here and here.  We finally had our piano moved upstairs. It's so great to be able to sing together and hear Mark play.  Plus, now I have a sort of mantle!  I've always wanted one.

She can curl up anywhere as long as she has her blanket

Playing with waterbeads

Bubble bath

Matching Game: Lucy was supposed to rolled the die (from a Scategories game which has all capitals) and Claire would identify the letter and find the textured capital letter.  Then Nora's job was to find the lowercase. 

It took waaaaay longer than I thought and some of the players left early.  After this photo was taken they started to use the couch as a springboard to jump on to the coffee table and knock all the letters off.  I freaked out.   But all in all I think it was fun for Nora and slightly educational.

 

Melissa and Doug Cube Puzzle - Turtle

At the playground with our neighbors

Building letters with foam shapes (templates found here)

We watched "Turtle: An Incredible Journey" and we read some books on Sea Turtles during the week.  I set up a sensory box area using this idea and these figures.  

Playing with the busy bag that Rachel made.  She loved these playdough mats!

Tangram puzzles

Turtle Tangram

Color by number

Claire and Nora's Sea Turtles

Connect the dots turtle found here

Lucy eating markers

She learned to get herself water from the filter this week.  I am amazed at how capable they are.  I had a migraine earlier in the week and I put on a video and tried to snooze on the couch for an hour.  I heard Nora ask Lucy if she needed a diaper change.  Nora changed her.  Then I heard Lucy ask for water.  Right away, Nora went to get her water.  Lucy promptly spilled it.  Nora got a towel and mopped it up.  Thank you, sweetie.  You are amazing.

She played a game where she had to reach in the bag and feel the textured letter to guess what it was

And that's the end of our Tt is for turtle unit.  Happy thanksgiving!

Busy Bags

Last week was the week of the busy bags.  My friend Jess and I organized a busy bag swap and it was a great success!  Busy bags are activities designed to fit into a Ziploc bag that will keep little hands and minds busy when mommy needs to do something else.  There are soooo many great ideas floating around on the internet.

Since I decided to participate in both the toddler swap and the preschool swap and I decided to make an extra preschool set for my neighbor, I chose three different activities.  I had to make about 13 of each activity to swap.  Of course I picked some of the most time consuming bags that are out there - felt snowflake building, dry erase I-spy game and a button snake.

My whole week was spent in cutting and then laminating and cutting again.  I was up to my elbows in felt.   I did a rough count - over 700 tiny pieces of felt were meticulously cut and over 2,000 paper squares!  It's times like those that I stop and think - what am I DOING with my life?!?!

So needless to say, we did not do any official schooling last week.....again.  Blech.  BUT Nora did get some math in since she helped me to count out all 99 I-spy cards 13 times in a row.  She is now an expert counter. And I did get to watch the entire 12 part video series that R.C. Sproul Jr. did on "Suffering and the Sovereignty of God"...twice!  That helped a great deal in my quest for answers to the things I posted last week.  So, there were some bright spots in all that effort.  And now I have 25 different activities for the girls and a set to give to my neighbor.

My toddler loot (thank for the pictures, Terri!)

The preschool bags

This is one way they amuse themselves when I am neglecting them in order to craft

A visit with Mommom and Poppop

We spent Wednesday at Katie's magical house.  Claire reads a book to S'more the Cat.

On Friday we went to the Bucks County Children's Museum with our neighbors

The Castle Fort.  Notice Claire trying to climb the walls...

Nora at the thrift store.  We found a doll that she liked.  She's "nursing" it here.  Very discreet.

The kids liked the fort so much at the museum so I made one for the bunk bed with some velcro and an old sheet.

Answers

Right here. Thank you, R.C.

N n Nest

"Still Life With Bird's Nests" by Van Gogh

This week we studied N n Nest and the words to remember were: "God takes good care of us".   Kindergarten is really making me dig deep.  Since we are choosing to indoctrinate our kids in our homeschool, we should probably make sure we believe the things we're teaching. But I find myself really struggling with those words to remember.

God takes good care of us...

Does he?  I haven't been feelin' it these last couple weeks.  Actually, I've been pretty angry.  I know I'm supposed to trust you, God, but  really, how am I supposed to do that when September 18th happened?

Most of the time I sidestep the doubts by giving myself Christian pep talks about that day five years ago and all those that have followed - "God has a plan", "Look at all the blessings that have come out of it", He's going to use this" - blah, blah, blah.  Lately I've found all that "God speak" totally irritating.  The pep talks just don't cut it when I'm completely worn down with suffering.  When I ache with a dearest friend over the crushing blow of infidelity.  When mental illness strikes again in the life of a neighbor and robs her family of everything.

Really?  You're taking good care of us?

When I put my life in your hands, God, and trust you with it all, how do you answer?  You take away my mind and make me a monster?! Make me nearly kill the baby I begged you for!  Why when I called for help on that day did no one answer?   And the months and months of deep, dark loneliness and not being able to see her... And the terrible shame... I am haunted by my vivid memory of every detail of that day and how I was so powerless to stop it.  You, All Powerful Creator, didn't stop it.  It all still hurts.  How am I'm supposed to trust?

Sometimes the scars of that day are all I can see - how Nora and I are both permanently and horribly marked.

Sometimes I'm a spiritual toddler.  I've thrown quite a few temper tantrums when I've been by myself this week.

.....

But relief is coming.  At the end of this week I don't have any answers to my questions.  I can't easily and joyfully proclaim that God is good, though I am choosing to believe it - or I am being enabled to believe it. The pain is still very much on my mind and I've cried every day thinking about it.  But every day there have also been glimmers of truth available to me to hold on to and rebuild.

…That which tears open our souls, those holes that splatter our sight, may actually become the thin, open places to see through the mess of this place to the heart-aching beauty beyond. To Him. To the God whom we endlessly crave.”  -A.V.
  

Here are the pictures from our week...

grouping similar things together

matching pictures of animals with their homes

sleeping bears math game (thanks BJ and Rachel!)

handwriting stations

Our Halloween Day picnic at the park was a lot of fun.  Claire dozed off on Nora's shoulder during the trip home.

Halloween dinner - "hot dogs in a costume" were a big hit.  I love that they had little hats that come on and off.

She's just so capable.  That's a steak knife, folks.

Making the Cat's hat

Thing 1 decided she just had to be a princess riding a horse after spotting him at a thrift store.  I had to step in at the last minute as Thing 1 since the Cat wanted a complete entourage.

She's trying so hard to hold that ridiculous hat up.  Maybe next year we'll stick to 100% store bought costumes!