Monday, December 18 through Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Brrrrrr...it has not gotten above 50 today and that is COLD for this California girl! But did you really come here to hear me whine about our comparatively moderate weather? I thought not. I hate when I go so many days without blogging. I totally forget what we did. And that is exactly why I do blog... so I don't forget all the wonderful things that we've done.

Let's see... Monday we went to this Imagination Station thing with S5. It basically just a big room with a bunch of toys, dress-up clothes, and art supplies. It's a fun place and the kid really love it. I just can't help feeling ripped off, you know? There's a store in the front too that sells all the stuff - like the place play is just the back half of the store - so I always wonder why I have to pay to come play with their sample toys. I guess it wouldn't irk me so much except that they charge for everyone... adults, babies, everyone. So, yes, I had to pay $3 to bring my INFANT into the play place so that I could carry him around. He was playing with a tambourine for a little while, but he was just too young for most of the stuff, including the toddler area. It just screams of greed to me. But since we had 5 kids altogether, we got a special playgroup price and it only cost $13 for our whole family, instead of $18, but it still feels like a rip-off.

Sunday, while DH and I were frantically trying to get our Christmas cards and family DVD finished (yes, I know we procrastinate!) the poor, neglected children were left in front of the tv watching movies pretty much all day. Bad idea. They were total maniacs when Grammie came over for dinner that night. Anyway, that has resulted in a "no movie" rule during the day now. Monday, I just had to keep them occupied until 12:30 when we were leaving to go meet S5, but Tuesday that meant allllllll day. I didn't realize how much I had been giving in to "just one short movie" until I was saying "No" to it all day. When they asked to watch tv, I just told them that we could read books or do school instead. Cameron chose a book and Cassia chose school!

We read a Max & Ruby book - not exactly great literature, but it kept them interested. Then Cassia and went to go do her schoolwork. I feel guilty because she is so close to finishing EB1A but I keep avoiding it, lol. The next lesson is one with measuring volume with cups of water. I remember when Cameron did that one. It was SO much fun.... but it was a mess and a big ordeal. I just don't feel like a mess and an ordeal right now, lol. So we started her next ETC primer. She learned the letter "p."

After that I told Cameron that it was his turn. He still wasn't really into it, but he played video games with DH over the weekend without doing any work for it, so he was in a schoolwork deficit. He did two exercises in math: the last one on picture graphs and then we started on the "numbers up to 40" chapter. The biggest problem he had was in how to circle groups of 10! He would count the items in such a squiggly way that it was almost impossible to circle them correctly. After lots of erasing, he finally got it, I think. Next we did one phonics lesson. It was long /o/ words like so, pro, yo-yo (he liked that one). He dissolved into the sillies about a quarter of the way into it so it took about ten times longer than it should have. Every single word was turned into some silly made up thing ("whiz" was read "whipping cheese" etc) but we eventually got through it.

Since he was in a school work deficit, we had to do double school. We had already done double math and double phonics was NOT looking feasible so I pulled out the science. The activity book (which I had previously thought was too classroom-y and not activity-y enough) provided a wonderful activity for a drizzly day. It was a leaf hunt where the teacher provided 4 leaves and the students compare and contrast them and then go in search of the plants from which they came. Cameron just loved that. I wonder if you can turn reading into a scavenger hunt too, lol. One day last week, Wednesday I'm thinking, we did another fun activity from there which I think I forgot to blog about. We sectioned off the front and back yards into 5 different area and then studied the diversity in each area. I was surprised at the results. The kids were surprised that the green fuzzy stuff growing on the bricks was really a plant, lol.

Today, Wednesday, we didn't do anything but park day. Man it was cold out there, but the kids needed some good running around time. The rest of the day the silly monkeys have just been playing Star Wars with the LEGO characters and singing Christmas songs. Their current favorites are "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" and "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus." Cassia thinks it's absolutely hilarious that Mommy would kiss Santa, lol.

And that's the biweekly update from BermLand. Satisfied Maria??