The boys and I have decided that we are going to keep track of all the books we read together and see how long it takes us to reach 1,000 books. A fellow speech pathologist whom I work with has been keeping track of every book she has read to her baby since he was born. Yes, we SLPs are very anal and like to track everything. I wish I had kept track all these years, because I would be so proud of the number of books we have read. Now, I am not exactly sure how to track the 2,000 times we read Clap Your Hands, Goodnight Moon, and The Big Red Barn. Does each read-through count as 1, or should I count each book separately? :) Okay, focus on the big picture. Starting now, we will log each book we read one time, regardless of how many times we read it.
I need to jump up on my soap box and vent about something for a little bit while I am on the topic of early literacy. I was in a preschool last week evaluating a little kiddo who stutters, and asked the child to recite the nursery rhyme Jack and Jill. Many times, people who stutter are very fluent if they are reciting something that is familiar to them, like a nursery rhyme or the Pledge of Allegiance. Anyway, this child looked at me like I was crazy. She didn't know Jack and Jill. So I asked several other kids to say Jack and Jill, Humpty Dumpty, etc.. I don't think a single child in the room could recite an entire nursery rhyme. How sad is that!! Why aren't parents doing nursery rhymes with their children anymore? And if they aren't teaching them nursery rhymes are they even reading stories to them? Nursery rhymes were the first form of literature that I exposed my children to. I bet Callum could sing Rub A Dub Dub and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star right now. He recognizes nursery rhymes, that I am sure of. Nursery rhymes have always been something I have done with the boys. Of course, my Mom is big on nursery rhymes and taught them to us at a very young age. I have a cassette tape of me when I was 2 years old reciting many, many nursery rhymes...and also singing the theme to Love Boat and The Brady Bunch, but that isn't the point. ha ha Back to the topic: nursery rhymes are very important to early literacy. They teach rhyming words, the sing-song prosody of language, vocabulary, etc.. Not to mention that they are just fun to say. Now I am not a perfect Mom by any means. We don't read books every single night. Things come up, we are late getting to bed, or I am just too tired sometimes....but we read several nights a week. And we DO recite nursery rhymes in this house! Parents--bring back the nursery rhymes!! I am stepping down from my soap box.
Monday, January 28, 2013
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
The One About January Chaos
Well I guess I could title every blog post I write something about chaos. Our home is so chaotic. I keep telling myself that someday I am going to miss all the yelling, fighting, fart/poop talk, etc.. Someday..... For now, I just try to get through each day. When all three kids finally fall asleep (which some nights isn't till 11:00), I breathe a sigh of relief that I survived another day. :) I am half-joking. In the midst of the chaos, there are a lot of laughs.
I haven't written a post since right after Christmas. Wow, I am behind. Not that much has happened since then, but I still try to post at least once a week. I guess I'll just do a catch-up post.
Last summer in the span of a few days, I had three very close friends all tell me they were having babies. This month, the babies arrived. Welcome to the world Creed Leeland, Liesl Katherine, and Kinley Joy! We are excited to have new playmates! Although Asher was disappointed that only one was a baby boy, I was excited to have two girls. :) I got to go shopping for pink, which is always fun for me.
Work has been crazy (don't I always say that?). I think all the birth-age 5 kids were just waiting for me to get back from maternity before they were referred. I have had a lot of little ones lately, which has been fun. It's no secret that I prefer working with the jr. high and high school kids, but it's been fun to have a few birth-2 home visits. Luckily, so far I haven't had any awful homes like I have in the past. And I LOVE my 3-day work week.
Gavin celebrated his 100th day of school. With no absences! The class had a big party, and every child had to bring 100 snack items. Little items, like Gavin had to bring 100 pieces of Life cereal. They mixed everyone's foods together to make a trail/snack mix for the kids. Here are both boys posing in Gavin's 100th day projects:
Gavin's homework the other night was to write the numbers 1-100. It took him forever, since he works at a snail's pace to make everything perfect, but I was proud that he could do it. That's a big accomplishment. He is reading more and more words each week, which is fun to see. He is doing really well in school. I can't believe we will be sitting at kindergarten graduation in just a few months.
During the past few weeks, influenza B has hit Ewing really hard. Gavin has 13 kids in his class, and last week there were 8 out with the flu. Many of them missed several days, if not the entire week of school. The school was being very cautious and they were sending kids home with even the smallest symptoms. Every day we would send Gavin, and just wait for a phone call. But somehow, our family was spared. Knock on wood!
Callum started on rice cereal this month. He is starting to get the hang of it now, but doesn't seem very into it.
He has been working on some teeth. None have popped through yet, but he is drooling up a storm and has had a low-grade fever several days. And we have had a couple of weeks of newborn sleeping patterns...getting up every 3-4 hours. That was rough on us after he had been doing so well and sometimes going all night without waking up. Hopefully when those teeth come in, he will go back to his normal sleeping. Like the other boys did, he loves lying on Daddy's big chest.
Oh, and as you can see in the background we decided to add some some blinds to our big windows in the living room. The morning sun was blinding, and made it difficult for Asher to watch his morning Jake and the NeverLand Pirates cartoon. ha ha
Asher has developed bipolar disorder. ha I kid...but he will remind me he is three years old by being completely unreasonable and throwing a fit and then turn around 5 seconds later and apologize with tears in his eyes. It's actually really cute, and knowing that sweetness is coming at the can make the tantrum behavior a little more tolerable. Just a little!
That's about it for the month. It seems like we have been so busy, but I can't really think of anything else to share. Here are some other pics of Callum from the month. I didn't get my camera out very often, as you can tell.
As you can tell from the pictures, he has Asher's spiky baby hair, but he has Gavin's blue eyes. A perfect mix of his big brothers. :) And thank the Lord that so far he has Gavin's sleeping patterns!! I have no idea where Asher gets all his energy with that little sleep.
I haven't written a post since right after Christmas. Wow, I am behind. Not that much has happened since then, but I still try to post at least once a week. I guess I'll just do a catch-up post.
Last summer in the span of a few days, I had three very close friends all tell me they were having babies. This month, the babies arrived. Welcome to the world Creed Leeland, Liesl Katherine, and Kinley Joy! We are excited to have new playmates! Although Asher was disappointed that only one was a baby boy, I was excited to have two girls. :) I got to go shopping for pink, which is always fun for me.
Work has been crazy (don't I always say that?). I think all the birth-age 5 kids were just waiting for me to get back from maternity before they were referred. I have had a lot of little ones lately, which has been fun. It's no secret that I prefer working with the jr. high and high school kids, but it's been fun to have a few birth-2 home visits. Luckily, so far I haven't had any awful homes like I have in the past. And I LOVE my 3-day work week.
Gavin celebrated his 100th day of school. With no absences! The class had a big party, and every child had to bring 100 snack items. Little items, like Gavin had to bring 100 pieces of Life cereal. They mixed everyone's foods together to make a trail/snack mix for the kids. Here are both boys posing in Gavin's 100th day projects:
Gavin's homework the other night was to write the numbers 1-100. It took him forever, since he works at a snail's pace to make everything perfect, but I was proud that he could do it. That's a big accomplishment. He is reading more and more words each week, which is fun to see. He is doing really well in school. I can't believe we will be sitting at kindergarten graduation in just a few months.
During the past few weeks, influenza B has hit Ewing really hard. Gavin has 13 kids in his class, and last week there were 8 out with the flu. Many of them missed several days, if not the entire week of school. The school was being very cautious and they were sending kids home with even the smallest symptoms. Every day we would send Gavin, and just wait for a phone call. But somehow, our family was spared. Knock on wood!
Callum started on rice cereal this month. He is starting to get the hang of it now, but doesn't seem very into it.
He has been working on some teeth. None have popped through yet, but he is drooling up a storm and has had a low-grade fever several days. And we have had a couple of weeks of newborn sleeping patterns...getting up every 3-4 hours. That was rough on us after he had been doing so well and sometimes going all night without waking up. Hopefully when those teeth come in, he will go back to his normal sleeping. Like the other boys did, he loves lying on Daddy's big chest.
Oh, and as you can see in the background we decided to add some some blinds to our big windows in the living room. The morning sun was blinding, and made it difficult for Asher to watch his morning Jake and the NeverLand Pirates cartoon. ha ha
Asher has developed bipolar disorder. ha I kid...but he will remind me he is three years old by being completely unreasonable and throwing a fit and then turn around 5 seconds later and apologize with tears in his eyes. It's actually really cute, and knowing that sweetness is coming at the can make the tantrum behavior a little more tolerable. Just a little!
That's about it for the month. It seems like we have been so busy, but I can't really think of anything else to share. Here are some other pics of Callum from the month. I didn't get my camera out very often, as you can tell.
As you can tell from the pictures, he has Asher's spiky baby hair, but he has Gavin's blue eyes. A perfect mix of his big brothers. :) And thank the Lord that so far he has Gavin's sleeping patterns!! I have no idea where Asher gets all his energy with that little sleep.
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