Snow Ice Cream

Due to MASSIVE amounts of snow, and one single memory of my own childhood where my mom made snow ice cream and it just rocked my world, I decided I MUST do the same for my girls. Our snow days tend to have two traditions, playing in the snow with snow ball (or dust) fights and a welcome back to the inside with warm hot chocolate and marshmellows! This was a welcomed addition by all in the family.

1 Cup of White Sugar
2 Cups of Milk
2 Tablespoons of Vanilla
and about a gallon of snow, or in our case, a large halloween candy bowl full!

I do things a tad differently, I heat up my milk, sugar and vanilla while the kids are getting dressed, once the sugar is mixed well, I leave the milk on the stove top with NO HEAT to cool while we play outside. When we come in, the mixture is cooled and ready to be mixed into the snow! If you skip this step, you can end up with clumps of sugar in your snow.

Preschool Corner-"I'm an AUTHOR"

I don't know how many times I have heard my sweet 3 1/2 year old running around the house proudly stating that she is "an author". Yep, that's right folks, she is beyond excited to be an author...although she has only written two of her 26 pages! I'm not going to rain on this parade...we'll keep talking about her being a "real author"!

For each page we review what her books title is (ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ), what a title tells us, and then we move on to that day's letter. We then "brainstorm" words that begin with that letter, and talk about that letter's sight word. From that we pick out our favorite words and "pre-write" sentences. Once we find the sentence we like, we "publish" it to the page and then she illustrates it. The point of this is to help her start to become comfortable with the process of writing; Brainstorming, Pre-writing, Editing/Publishing, Illustrating! Currently, I'm doing all of the writing, but she's coming up with the sentences and words using phonics.

Our Aa Board looked something like this:
Aa                                    at
airplane                  apple
ant                         alligator
Anna                      attack

This is what she ended up producing!

 

Kaelyn attempted to write a little a next to her "capital A"

The circle with lines on either side and circles underneath is the Plane and it's Landing gear, and the little "person" is her ant! 

Since we've had crazy amounts of snow, we've been doing lots of fun snow things like building a snowman, making Snow Ice Cream (for the recipe click here), and baking goodies for our neighbors. Like these sweet little cupcakes that Kaelyn helped bake,decorate, and deliver while Anna was with her Daddy for some 1:1 time!

Monday (Dance), Tuesday (MOPS) and Friday(Playdate) were our "socialization" days. I say this as a semi-joke, since some people have been mentioning Kaelyn's need to socialize so that she can "function" in a public school, but in the interest of showing just HOW much interaction the girls have with other people and instructors who aren't mommy....they get plenty! Not to mention, Thursday and Friday are Library Class days...we just didn't make it because of the snow!

Most of this week was "snow days", so instead of giving them the whole week off, and in part to save my own sanity....we only did fun "educational" things! 

Anna had a breakthrough moment and has twice correctly identified the color PINK!!! She said it out of the blue in the grocery store on Monday pointing to a pink cup! I actually danced in the store! Then she said it again at home referring to her sister's Pink Blanket....and again today referring to a PINK triangle toy! When I asked her to point to the Pink one....she did!! Needless to say, I have been reinforcing PINK and having Anna make PINK pages for her book!  So for today's lesson and in honor of Valentine's Day, we made PINK Kool Aid Playdough! The kids LOVED it! If you want the recipe go HERE!

 

To make things more educational for Kaelyn, I had her use her tiny cookie cutters to cut out "girly" shapes, then use a skewer to poke holes through them. They will dry overnight and become beads to be made into a pretty Valentine's Day necklace!

 

Go here to see what other lovely homeschooling ladies are up to at Preschool Corner!

He NEEDS to Go

I know this will seem a some-what-wacky-and-bizzare post to most of my five readers...but so be it. My darling husband is a pilot in the USAF and as nutty as it may sound...he LOVES his job. There are aspects that I'm sure are not his favorite, but he loves serving his country, helping others and doing his part. Which is part of the reason that he NEEDS to go. He's been unable to deploy due to a minor medical issue that the AF is slow to waive, but what many people don't understand, is that why this might seem like a blessing (and it is because this is the only reason our third child is well on it's way), my husband would be happier deploying. Because it's what makes him happy, I'm praying each day and night for that waiver to come through, for him to be able to plan his mission, hop on a jet and fly off to where ever and do whatever it is that he does.

The more selfish reason for me basically praying that my husband leaves NOW and not later, is that I REALLY want him at our baby's birth...and if he doesn't leave SOON (by March)...it's not likely that he will be there. If it comes to having to deliver my child alone, I will happily (not at first I'm sure, but give me a week or two to get used to the idea) do it so that my husband can serve... I just want to know...I need to know...NOW. I need to wrap my brain around whichever outcome, be it delivering with my husband at my side, or by myself while my husband serves thousands of miles away and dreams of meeting our sweet little one.

So the point of this post, other than a therapeutic relief, is to ask all five of my readers, if they would, to pray that my husband leaves....tomorrow, please!

Meal Planning Monday

How can I forget? It's Monday already, which means it's time for Meal Planning Monday at I'm an Organizing Junkie.

Today- Leftovers from superbowl (hotdogs, frozen veggies, and dip)
Tuesday- Fully loaded baked potatos with Chili...who knows, maybe I'll do twice baked. These are also leftovers from Super bowl
Wednesday-BBQ Chicken with Grilled Squash from last week


Thursday-Sandra's Round Two recipe BBQ Chicken Salad
Friday-Gyoza and Edname from my Freezer
Saturday- Corn Chowder from two weeks ago from my freezer
Sunday-Vegetable Minestrone from my freezer with grilled cheese

We are expecting EVEN more snow to top off our standing 12-18inches....as in an additional 12-18 in! So, the soups may move to Wednesday...who knows!
I'm also planning on joining in on the 28 Day organizing challenge...all this snow is making me itchy to do some minor repairs I've been planning since we moved in! I have the space picked out and I know the problems...now to figure out the solutions!

Falling Madly and Deeply

I'm probably not like most Moms, meaning that at the moment I first hold my children, I don't find myself spiraling headfirst into love. That's not to say that I don't love my child, it's just not that crazy journey where you loose all sense of rhyme or reason (although Rhyme and Reason disappear due to sleep deprivation, but that's a whole different post). I do love my kids, as soon as I know they are in my womb, I would do anything for them...anything. I don't find myself falling crazy in love with my girls until they start to show who they are, and the more I get to know them, and what makes them tick, the more I find myself helplessly lost to that love.

Anna is the kind of child who would make you swear off having more. She's bright, mischievous and require near constant supervision...with that said, she's a charmer and you can't help but LOVE her! Here lately, I've watched this spunky girl develop a massive heart. She's showing such an amazing capacity for love and kindness at her wee 18 months, and I can't help but fall even deeper in love with her.

Here is what she's been up too,
We were upstairs recently after I had showered and Kaelyn asked for a snack (very politely), I told her No since I was naked and NOT about to tramps through my home for the sack of a snack. Next thing I know, Anna slips downstairs and I hear her moving around chairs and opening cabinets, as I'm about to go downstairs to see what she's up to (because she's almost ALWAYS up to something) she walks in my room holding a box of Cheerios and hands it to her sister and says "ere oo go".

At ChicFila the other day, we were sitting next to our good friend and her son Link (5 mos) who was trying out a high chair next to Anna. Anna broke up her LAST nugget into bite sized pieces and put them in front of Link. She wanted to share, and not only share, but make sure they were the right size! People, Anna is a CHUNK and doesn't like to share food, but here she was sharing with Link.

If she sees her sister getting bullied, she takes care of her (I know this sounds backwards, but Kaelyn is such a non-aggressive person and Anna is her protector when she can, and vice versa). If Kaelyn starts to cry, Anna runs to her, hugs her, and if that doesn't work, will sit beside her and either wait it out or have a sympathy cry.

Anna is slowly developing a heart that surpasses her mischievous streak...and I can't help but love her even more.

Preschool Corner

I'm not going to lie, I'm really irked with myself for how poorly we are doing with our homeschooling. It's not for lack of planning, it's simply a lack of time. Between Doctors, Dance and Dentist's I don't see how we can manage to get ANYTHING done! So, I'm completely frustrated with the whole thing, and I'm sure this is normal, but since we are expecting a New Addition in August I've decided it's time I went and purchased a "real curriculum" in hopes of cutting out some of the planning time and using that for work time. I would love for you guys to give me your opinions of Saxon Math K if you have used it or know of friends who have used it.

So, we had a great Groundhogs Day activities planned, but since I fell down the stairs, that was junked instead for doctors appointments. I hope to use some of the poems (Robert Louis Stevenson's My Shadow) for a Shadow unit.

Instead, I  have decided to take a break from our Phonics program, Math activities and Science, and focus on what the Kindergarten Class up the road uses for their "literature" curriculum. It's the Mary Caulkin's Writing Seminar...which basically believes that every child, no matter abilities can "write" or tell a story.

Kaelyn and I spent the day discussing Books, and what makes a book. Today, we discussed the "Cover" of a book, what you find there (pictures and letters...these are her answers). I explained that the Letters make up words which create a Title. Her vocab words for this week are Title, Cover, Author, and Pre-writting. These are all terms that she will be introduced to in her Kindergarten class (should we choose to send her). She is going to be making an alphabet book using Dr. Seuss' ABC Book and My First Alphabet  Book as models. She brainstormed the title today, and it's all 26 letters "because that's what my story is about". We will be working on rough drafts of the title page and "publishing" it as well. I hope to have her use a sight word that starts with that pages letter....and start working the sight words with her prior to introducing the books. It's a backwards approach but the other way wasn't working.

Anna, my sweet 1 year old, sat through the WHOLE lesson on books and what makes them up (I'll be making a book for them to keep and use as a reference showing what makes a book, along with vocab words). She will be making (with lots of help from me and her sister because Kaelyn asked to help) a Colors book. Kaelyn "helped" choose the title Rainbow Book, so that it can be all about colors. I hope to have Anna work on one color the ENTIRE week while we work on a single letter each day.

I'll post pictures as soon as I have them, but I'm going to be perfectly honest....this is all what I did today. So if you'd like to see what other, more organized preschooling mama's are up to....go here!

The Dangers of being a Stay at Home Mom

Laugh, go ahead and laugh...but I'm completely serious...this is a DANGEROUS job and I'm not just talking about sleep deprivation, poor diet, insanity...I'm talking about the really tangible dangers...like the minefield that is the toy room, or the completely innocent looking things like a child's Scarf on your Staircase that will sneak up and trip you....and as your pregnant self goes flying down the last five steps, you'll sprain your finger so bad that you almost ruin date night and a paid babysitter with a trip to the ER. Instead, out of a desire to have said date night and not blow the $10/hr highschooler with hours in the ER, you suck it up and wait until the next afternoon. End up having to have x-rays EVEN THOUGH YOU ARE PREGNANT because the doctors are 90% sure it's broken. Luckily, it's not, but joy for you that you get to sport a really AWESOME splint for the next two weeks...

I'm telling you, we stay at home parents should get hazard duty pay. Last week it was the infamous Stomach Bug of 2010 and this week it's a hurt finger...I need a vacation