Santa Cruz

We were able to take the family to Santa Cruz this weekend! My kiddos are beach bums for sure! Adriano wanted to go out as deep as he could and Lily laid in the water to go swimming. The kids had a great time! They also enjoyed playing in the sand. We had a day filled with laughter and memories! We hope to do it again soon!




With daddy



Me with the kiddos


Playing in the sand!


Since I just realized that in none of the pictures above Adriano was looking at the Camera here is another:

One Last Playdate

As most of you know I am a special education teacher and therefore I am blessed to have summers off. This summer was filled with lots of play dates and near by adventures. The day before I returned to work we headed out to Debbie's (Adriano's Godmother). The kids and I had a great time! The kiddos rode the donkey and went for a swim while Debbie and I chatted!





Swimming:

Park

This summer the weather was very nice.We were able to enjoy serval trips to several parks in the area. Some nights when there was a nice breeze we would make our way to nerby parks. It was during these evening walks that Lily was able to practice riding her bike!




Central Park in Mountain House







Jacabson School





Clyde Park

Daddy Time

One of Daddy's favorite activites to do with the kids is to take them to Home Depot on the first Saturday of every moth and complete there activity! This is a great experience for both daddy and the kids. The kids are able to wear their aprons and earn a special pin once they complete the project. This months project as a pencil box!

Home school Math

I have a friend who uses saxon math and she loves it! So I picked up a copy at a home school conference that i went to with her this summer. I love this set of lessons because they are directed and simple. Some of the activites include.. graphing, counting, patterns etc.





Based on the concepts being taught I supplement with fun activities. Our most recent adventure was The M& M graph it was a hit! She sorted all the candies by color and counted them.. she had a harder time graphing so mommy helped.

Home school Part2

For part 2 I want to focus on reading. As of right now I am using Phonics and the concepts in the book Ordinary Parents Guide to teaching reading I supplement these lessons with Art activities.




Currently Lily loves puppets so we create a puppet for each letter of the alphabet(Alley the Alligator)using templates from DLTK. I also love the No Time for flashcard. She has great art activities for kids of various ages and also does a craft for each letter of the alphabet. In addition,I also love the following websites for inspiration:

1+1+1=1

Totally Tots

As mentioned in my previous posts I also use the literacy resources from Hubbard's Cupboard

To reinforce the concepts of Phonics and letter recgonation we will play games outdoors. One of Lily's favorite activites is to create Sidewalk paint and write her letters and then I usually shot a letter or sound and she steps on the letter.

As a review I use simple poems/ or ryhems such as these to have Lily cirlce the letter being focused on and as she does she practices the sound they make. I also complete a directed draw activity based on the poem.. In wich I draw and lily copies.



Ranibow Letters is also another fun activity. In this activity Lily takes a coloring page and traces it with different coloring crayons from her coloring box.

I also plan on implementing lap books from 1+1+1=1

Tot School Part 1

I have been so busy I have not had a chance to update the blog..I have had many adventures in educating my kiddos at home. It is such a joy and a pleasure to be able to share in their educational experiences. I am not a full time home school mom, but as I have previously worked in a kindergarten classroom I want to make sure that my kiddos are well prepared! I have recently had a few friends ask me what my return looks like so I have decided to describe it using pictures and website links to help all those interested.

I have a semi circle time routine. Most of the time the majority of this routine is done in the car on the way to summer because it involves a lot of signing which is great for the car!
So below is a picture of our circle area from home...





During circle time we review the calendar and weather graph. We sing the days of the week song... an online favorite can be found here or a CD with many of the morning circle songs can be purchased here. We also sing a days of the month song (here) and then I always throw in a kids favorite or religious song! We also recite our numbers to 20 and sing our ABC's using charts to guide us! Lily loves this activity especially if she gets to hold the pointer.

During this time or throughout the day we also use our easel and white board to practice shapes and letters. I will choose letters we are working on or review letters and ask her to place them in a particular shape (circles/Square) as she places them in the shape she is to say the name of the letter. Then she must put all the letters away and make their sound. She loves using her magnetic letters and the white board. Pictures below (Please excuse the crayon on the white board...our little guy did that earlier this week and I have not gotten to the store to get magical eraser:





Another thing that we love to do is right before bed is to read a story. I have recently started chapter book read alouds. We are currently reading Charollet's Web. We review concepts about print whenever we read a book... Title page, front cover, back cover,authour, illustrator, reading left to right etc. I also have had Lily anwer "WH" questions or summarize the chapters. In addition to being read to Lily practices reading books to Mommy. These books are from Hubbards cubboard and include a variety of sight words. From this we are also working on concepts about print as well as recgonizing sight words.





I will post more about our adventures tomorrow as for now it is time to go to bed!

An April Affairr

I participated in my first vendor fair this weeekend. I had a great time networking with other and getting my name and product out to people! Lily also performed with her dance studio, Starlight Studios. Here are a few pictures from everything!

It's raining, it's pouring!







Fun for the kids

25 days of praise

so I am participating in the 25 days of praise plan!Each week the challenge will be the same - to praise, encourage, inspire, admire, build up, thank and appreciate your husband. But each the challenge will be to show different ways to express your praise. Feel free to tweak it for what you think is best for your husband.


Week 1 starts TODAY! Look for ways to praise your husband verbally. Praise him in front of the kids, friends, family, co-workers, on facebook, tweet it - get praise out anyway you can! Try to mention something noteworthy he has done - in his role as provider, father, husband, lover, or friend.

I have a wonderful husband..today without me asking he did the dishes after dinner, helped Lily put away her toys and put Adriano to sleep so that I could get some rest! He is also working hard at making sure I have everything I need for my trip to Canada. (BTW as part of the challenge I also text him to say thanks, and gave him a kiss and a big thank you for all he did today). He rocks! Check back daily to see how I praised him!