What we've been up to...

We have been busy growing little brains this past month!  Braxton has a renewed interest in school and asks to do work.  He's been working hard learning shapes (circle, triangle, square), colors (red, blue, green, white), letters A-E, recognizing his name, learning mom's and dad's phone numbers and counting to 20.  He really enjoys participating in calendar time and sings along with our Days of the Week and Months of the Year songs.  It's fun to see him so eager to learn.

We finally finished decorating the alphabet.

Adeline is a reader!!  When I think back on all she has learned in the past 3 1/2 months, I'm truly amazed.  We have made it through all the short vowel sounds and blended them with consonants to make 28 word families that she can sound out - although most she knows by sight.  She has also learned 18 sight words that she can't sound out yet - things like mother, father, Jesus, help, here, are, for, good, come etc.  She has 12 readers from our curriculum that she can easily read and she is constantly finding words that she knows in books .  We've discovered she can read a lot of The Cat in the Hat.  I can't wait until she can read it alone to her siblings!  :)  Yesterday in church, she spent most of the hour flipping through the hymnal picking out words.  

Some sentences she wrote:

She has been working hard in math, too.  She has learned to tell time to the hour, to read and write numbers through 40, and the concept of place value with tens and ones.  I have to say that Unifix cubes are a priceless manipulative!

In art, we made turkey cookies for Thanksgiving.  I wish I would have taken a picture of them.  We used rice krispie bars to form the turkey body, then attached fudge striped cookies for the tail and base.  Candy corn and gum drops made the feathers and the beak was another piece of candy corn.  They were really cute!  We also disguised paper turkeys so they wouldn't be eaten on Thanksgiving!

Last week we learned the primary colors and painted hand pictures using primary colors for the hands and secondary colors for the background.  

It's not school-related, but we are also doing an Advent Activity Tree this year.  Each day the kids turn over an ornament on the tree to find a special activity for the day.  So far we have made paper snowflakes, watched The Polar Express, went to a special event at a local church where we decorated sugar cookies, listened to stories, made crafts and had a family picture taken, went to an amazing Christmas concert, and had root beer floats with supper.  Whew!  And it's only December 5!

 Snowflakes with a lovely snow background:

Craft 1 at the church:

 Craft 2:

Our Advent Activity Tree: 

This week we are making pinch pots with air-dry clay and tempera paint.  They are in the process of drying. 

    

Adeline is also learning about missionaries.  She sent an email to our church's missionary family today asking questions about what they do and where they are working.  She is excited to hear back from them!

And now Sadie is making her presence known, so I better wrap this up!  She, by the way, is learning lots, too!  She says daddy, mama, kitty, up, book, no, nuh-nuh (nurse), nigh-nigh (night night), cheese, buh-buh (bye bye), baby and maybe a few other words I can't remember right now.  She is part monkey climbing on EVERYTHING!  She adores her brother and sister, following them everywhere.  She loves animals, outside, books and Mommy - but prefers Daddy when she goes to sleep.  She is learning to use a fork, but it's not a very efficient way of eating yet.  Doesn't she just look like trouble?  :)