Summer Week 5 - Freedom & Bravery

One of my favorite things about teaching was the that I always learned so much more about what I was teaching in preparing my lessons, explaining the content in various ways, and answering questions.  I've found the same thing to be true this summer!  I mean, I had NO idea how clouds were formed and what caused the sound of lightning until Sophia and learned about it last week!

This week, which teaching and learning with the girls, I discovered a completely new appreciation for the 4th of July.

I started the week by asking them about their favorite parts of the 4th.  Naturally, they both said fireworks.  When I asked them if they knew why we set off fireworks, they were pretty clueless of course.  As we drove home from swim school on Monday, I told them the story of Independence Day with a fairytale tone.  "Once a upon a time, in a kingdom far away..."  After that 15 minute long drive and many questions about the king, about freedom and what it means to have your freedoms taken away, and about the whether or not people today still have their freedoms taken, I felt a sense of patriotism and pride that I hadn't felt before.  This holiday is truly remarkable.

A few weeks ago, Sophia was running the track.  She totally loves to run and she's pretty fast.  She can run a mile in less than 9 minutes!  After that run, she told us that while she was running, there were times she wanted to give up but she kept telling herself "Keep on going, no matter what."  I was so proud to hear her say those words.  In a world where most people think that when the going gets tough, it's time to quit, it's refreshing to hear that some people still have the innate desire to persevere, work hard, and never give up.  Since that day, we've referenced those words so many times.  For example, while we were in Albuquerque last month, we saw a few homeless men on a corner asking for donations.  She asked us what they were doing.  After we explained it to her, she asked us why they didn't have any money or a home.  Of course there are countless reasons why someone ends up in that position but we told her that sometimes people make mistakes or have some bad luck and life doesn't go their way.  We also told her that everyone encounters bad things from time to time and if/when those things happen to her, she has to remember her own words "Keep on going, no matter what."  This week when we got to the part of the story where the people in the colonies had to be brave and fight for their freedom, I explained to her that they knew how important their decision to fight was.  They knew that by being brave and strong, they could change their lives and lives of their future generations forever.  They knew that they had to keep on going, no matter what.

We also spent a lot of time talking about some of the meanings of Freedom.  Between Sophia and I, we use the term "bossy" a LOT.  I'm bossy and so is she! So used that lightened version of what it sometimes means to loose your freedom - that someone else is bossing you around for your whole life, making decisions for you, telling you what you can and cannot do, and making choices and decisions for you.  I wanted to let her know that even though that story happened a long time ago, there are still people all around the world that are fighting for their freedom and for the freedom of other people. She seemed a little concerned about that part and asked me if we still have to fight for our freedom.  I told her that there will always be people that want to "rule the world" as we talked about in the story, and that it's so important that she is brave and stands up for what she believes is right.

We continued our talk about all of this throughout the week but we also did some fun with 4th of July traditions.  We used these 4th of July themed printables to practice our addition and subtraction skills.  Color by number math is awesome!  Although, we decided that we didn't really like the colors they chose for some of the sections so we did a little improve there ;)  For Ellie, there was a version that just had the numbers, no math.  I explained it to her and we went section by section letting her determine what color that part should be.  She got them all, the understood what she was supposed to do, then decided to color the whole thing red. Aye, Ellie.  We're going to keep working on that one.  Mostly because she's so super stubborn and thinks the rules don't apply to her.  Yep, total threenager.

 We found some more activities on Teachers Pay Teachers.  There are are a bunch of free downloads for every holiday.

 This one stumped us in a few spots!  Something you wear that starts with an "A".  We couldn't think of anything until Ken got home and said "ascot". Ok sure that works.  

 Sophia LOVES wordsearches!  

Thursday we started working on our big projects.  We decided to create a book about the 4th of July story.  I told her that we would start out with the illustrations and we'll go back and add the words in later.  So we broke up the story into 9 sections and she drew/colored a picture to represent each section.

Those glasses? Yeah, those were her 3D glasses from Finding Dory.  She wanted to keep them and I really don't know if the lenses were bad for her eyes so we popped them out and she's been having fun with her "glasses" ever since.

We did a few crafts too!

 I gave Ellie the paper and a flag and asked her to recreate it.  She did an awesome job!  Let me tell you, there is like half a glue stick on each piece of paper! Ha!

For Fun Friday, I knew I had a bunch of work to get done in the next few days and I REALLY wanted to be able to take of the weekend so I sucked it up and got everything done in the morning.  Phone calls, deliveries, post office, finishing up a party box for my BFF's daughter's 4th birthday party, etc.

Once I was done, we all went to a late lunch.  Ken has a 5 day weekend and we are super excited to have Daddy home with us!  We went to lunch at Outback then came home to wrap up our activities.

These two are so in love.  They hardly leave each other's side.

Over the holiday weekend, we have a few more things to do for our theme.  We've got plans to play 4th of July Bingo (they even made prizes) and we're ready to go on the hunt with this 4th of July Scavenger Hunt

I don't know if it's just the time we live in where everything is recorded through photos and videos or if Sophia really just loves the camera, but she asked me if I could record her telling the story and using her book.  Of course I agreed and the next thing I know she's got her "glasses" on and she's ready to go!

We finished the day with ice cream sundaes on the porch while the rain fell on the yard.  Perfection.

We would like to say that we are eternally grateful for all of the men and women in the past, present, and future for having the bravery to fight for our freedom.  Thank you!

Summer 2013 With My Girls

Being a teacher in Hatch, combined with a maternity leave that started a month before school ended, my summer started April 16th and ended August 6th.  It was an interesting summer to say the least.  Let's state the obvious first.  I now have two children.

Last summer, I was able to do a TON of stuff with and for Soph.  From Cooking and Baking to loads of sensory play days to focusing on different topics each week for her learning.  I was determined (watch out world when I become determined to do something!) to not let little Ellie's entrance into our lives change this any more than it had to.  I was nervous for months about what it would be like to venture out into the world with both girls in tow.  And so I decided to grab the bull by the horns, or in this case, the carseat by the handle, diaper bag by the strap, and Soph by the hand and get out with the two of them as soon as I was feeling well enough to do so.

As it happened, I had just seen a playdate at Dion's group invite thing come across my Facebook newsfeed a week or so before Ellie was born.  Perfect.  Interesting for Soph, casual environment, surrounded by Mommies and Kiddos so no one would judge if things got out of control.  I grabbed the bjorn (thankfully Ellie is a little chunky monkey so she was perfect to walk around with - - Soph was too tiny to use that sucker until she was like 3 months!).  Anticipating it would take much longer to get to girls out of the house, I set my alarm that morning with almost 2 hours to get us all ready.  Indeed, that's pretty much how long it took.  Once we were at Dion's, I got Ellie into her pouch and we went inside.  They had little activity packets set out for each kid with a coloring book, crayons, etc. Once everyone was there, the Dion's guy came out to take the kids though the back of the house for a tour.  They got to see all stations, play with pizza dough, then help make a giant pepperoni pizza for everyone to share.  After that they had pizza and juice for all the kids that participated.  Soph totally loved it.  She wanted to make more and more pizzas.  Ellie, on the other hand, thought it was boring.  She just slept and slept.  :)  So, I did it.  I broke the ice and successfully got out of the house with both girls.

After our Dion's date, we wanted to do more fun things.  We went to the public library where they have toddler story time every Tuesday and Wednesday.  We went to the Las Cruces Museum of Natural History.  We went on many lunch dates.  We did a lot of shopping.

We also had a lot of fun at the house.  The highlight of our at-home days was the weekly installment of Movie Mondays.  We started this pretty much right away.  I made Soph some popcorn and let her pick out the movie.  The first week she chose Wreck-it Ralph.  The second week she chose Wreck-it Ralph. The third week she chose Wreck-it Ralph.  The fourth, fifth, sixth...oh you get the point.  She ONLY ever wanted to watch Wreck-it Ralph.  Good thing I love that movie too.  If she would have chosen Cinderella I might have but the kibosh on Movie Mondays.

We also created our new favorite breakfast.  Peanut Butter Tortillas.  Tortilla with peanut butter, honey, and cinnamon sugar rolled up and cut in half.  Delish.  We love them.

We baked cookies.  We painted. We made bracelets with beads. We did some math and spelling. We watched the series North America (which we call the Animal Show) and Naked and Afraid (which we call the Scary Animal Show).  We made presents for Daddy for father's day.  We played with Juju.  We exercised...well, I exercised and she jumped around like a crazy fool next to me.  She's nuts.

For the Fourth of July we went back to the park we typically go to.  This year we invited the Howells to come with us.  Sophia was as excited as ever to see Drue and Ellie let out some of her biggest giggles yet with Reece.

Later in the summer we went to ABQ and took Soph to a real natural history museum.  She's bonkers about dinosaurs that's for sure.

It's always a little sad to go back to work after the summer but this time was different.  I sooooo badly wish I could just stay home with them.  I do believe that if I have to work, teaching is the best job I can have.  But...I just don't want to leave them!  I want to be with my babies!

Here are some of the highlights of our time off together.

Dion's Playdate

 Bye Bye Uncle Bob!

 Oh Sophia.  What did you do.

First Movie Monday

 Bathing Beauty

Ice Cream Date!

Camping in the Backyard!