Update for the end of August

It's really hard to believe that August is already just about over! So far the year is just flying by! So much has changed in our family this year and I know there are only bigger things to come. I can't wait to see what God has in store for us! 


Seems like we've all been a lot more busy here the last few weeks and the next 2 are going to be busy ones too. Ian just started back to school so that takes up from late morning to mid afternoon two days a week. So far it's going fine but last week was his first week so we'll see how things go as the classes progress. 


M has been busy with school and speech appointments (he was tongue tied at birth and had to have surgery to have it corrected last year so he has some catching up to do). He has another appointment on the 31st and they should be done with all the evaluations at that point so they'll decide what they want to do or if he still needs therapy. That's one of the bad things about moving I guess... having to start over with things like that. The girls are the only ones who haven't had anything going on lately. 


I still have appointments once a month for now but I suspect with my history of delivering early the doctor will be wanting to see me every two weeks sometime soon. I have another appointment on Wednesday. My diabetes screening is scheduled then which I am not entirely looking forward to. I know I could opt out of it but with my family history I don't think that would be wise so I'll just have to suffer through it. Hopefully it won't have me feeling blah for the rest of the day. I am very excited that I will be 24 weeks tomorrow. It's such a relief to make it to a point where baby N stands a good chance of being okay should something awful happen. It's not something anyone wants to think about but it does cross my mind from time to time. 


M has done really well with school lately and he hasn't lost his excitement. I'm planning on getting him the Letter Factory DVD and a K math workbook (because he doesn't seem challenged enough) to go along with the curriculum. I know he'll probably need some extra help with the math but I think he'll be able to do most of it on his own with very little help for me so we'll try it and see how it goes. If for some reason he hates it then we'll put it away and try it sometime later. 

Week 2

So on this past Monday we finished our second week of school (we do school from Thursday-Monday) and overall everything went well. M didn't do as well with his memory verse as he did last week but this one was a lot more confusing than the other. The verse was quite a bit longer and rambled somewhat. Other than that it was much the same as last week. One of the books is difficult to read from because it doesn't hold their interest but I read it to them in the car on the way to see family and that seemed to work. It helps them pay attention when they can't go anywhere! Captive audience! We may try coloring or playing with blocks while I read that one and see if that helps.


 It's still hard to get J to pay attention to a lot of the stories but I'm trying not to make a big deal out of it since she's not even 3 yet. We'll be repeating the core again for L and N so I'm sure she'll hear all the stories at least once by the time it's all said and done. 


The rest of the week was business as usual for the most part. It's been nice that Ian's work schedule has gone back to normal and we can get back into our routine. Even though it was only for one week it somehow still turned everything into chaos. We've been slowly trying to get things organized and settled into the house (which we moved into at the end of March). In the next few weeks I plan to go through all the infant boys clothes that we have and see what we can reuse and ultimately what we will need to get before the baby comes.  I'd like to have most of that stuff situated before I get so big that it will be even more of a chore than it already is. We'll see how that works out.. as the saying goes.. the best laid plans... 

Our first week of school

I know I'm a little late posting but it has been a crazy week! We have finished up our first week with Sonlight and it's going great so far! M impressed me with everything he has picked up on already and his enthusiasm for learning. It's wonderful to hear him ask when we're going to do school every morning instead of dreading that time of day. I was floored by how quickly he picked up on his memory verse (Proverbs 4:20 NLT) this week! By the end he only needed a word or two as a prompt and he was able to recite the rest himself. It excites me that the Word is already beginning to dwell in his heart and that he's just soaking it all up like a sponge. The verse for this week is a little more complex but hopefully we'll be able to master it just as easily. 


The curriculum doesn't include Math or writing for Pre-K but I have found some excellent resources for free printable worksheets that cover things like colors, shapes, numbers/counting, same/different etc. We try to do at least one worksheet each day and so far he really seems to like them. I also bought a book (that you can use with dry erase markers) so we can begin to practice writing letters. I don't expect perfection, we'll just do them as he wants to and work on them for as long as it takes to master them. We worked on A this week and by the end he was doing a decent job, although a lot of them looked more like H's! I wasn't planning on practicing them today (dad was making lunch about that time so he didn't want the girls to eat without him!) but later on he mentioned that he wanted to practice his letters. It makes me so happy that he actually enjoys what he's doing and asks to do more work! Hopefully this attitude will stick around for a while as he gets older! 


Now on to Week 2!

Starting school in two weeks!

We finally got all our curriculum in the mail! Felt like it took forever! We had a blast opening everything and looking over all the books. Now they are all nestled on the shelf waiting till we start. After some discussion we decided to start on the 22nd of this month. That will give us plenty of time and ensure that we'll be able to take a nice break when the new baby comes. I know I'll need time to recover and we'll all need time to readjust and get some sort of schedule going. I think I'm more excited than the kids are! haha I know once we get started they're going to love it. I've reviewed the first weeks worth of lessons and it all looks to be really simple and well laid out which is going to be awesome for me since I won't have tons of time for lesson planning.

In other news, we should be finding out whether we will be having a boy or a girl on Tuesday (as long as baby lets us see!) and I can't wait. It'll be the first time I'm having a 4D ultrasound so it should be pretty exciting. I've been feeling a lot of movement lately and the other morning the baby had the hiccups which is super cute. Now I feel like I'm just twiddling my thumbs till Tuesday!

Waiting to buy the curriculum

We'll be buying the Sonlight P4/5 core sometime in the next couple of months and I am so excited! I absolutely LOVE books so the fact that the curriculum is entirely based on literature just tickles me pink! I'm just hoping the kids will love it too. I'm looking forward to going and getting supplies and starting to set things up for school. At some point we would like to have a dedicated room to do school in but for the time being it will be done around our kitchen table or curled up on the couch while we're reading. I pray God will bless our learning and help us to grow closer to Him as we go through school!