Spring Science, and other goings-on

The weather is getting warmer again, and with that comes something that moms and little boys have two completely different opinions of- bugs are coming out of hibernation!

My boys love bugs.  Caterpillars and ladybugs especially, but no creature that wriggles, flies, or hops is too small to escape their detection.  They even managed to find some of those teeny tiny blood-red bugs about a week ago when we were picking Kailey up from school and tried to convince me to let them take them home.  Umm, no.  There are very specific bug rules.  Such as "All bugs that come in the house must be in and stay in glass jars with lids" and "Caterpillars will not be put on your food to share your meal" and "If Mama finds a bug where it shouldn't be, it will be put back outside, or killed".  Better add "Bugs will not be brought in the car or put in your pocket" now, too."

But hey.  As much as I don't like creepy crawlies, I don't want the boys to become afraid of them or get grossed out by them like I am.  It's sort of irrational, really.  I used to play with roly polies all the time when I was a kid, catch lightning bugs, let ladybugs crawl on my arms.  What happened?  Why do I have to force myself not to have a negative reaction to them now?  I want to avoid that happening to them, if at all possible.  So far, so good.  Brennan catches crickets, Colin puts four caterpillars of various types in a jar to watch them turn into butterflies (though they usually turn into moths).

There have been a few times I thought bugs were just completely beautiful and awe-inspiring, though.  When we lived in Monterey, I was walking the boys one day, and saw a group of moths fluttering around some flowers, with the sunlight filtering through the trees and lighting up the dust and the moths.  It looked so ethereal!  It was such a beautiful and magical sight!  The second unforgettable bug experience was when we went back to Texas a couple years ago.  I was sitting outside, and my attention was caught by a bunch of winged bugs of some kind coming out of the wood that made a raised bed around a tree.  They just kept coming out and coming out, there had to be hundreds of them, and the realization that bugs actually do hibernate in the winter, and I was seeing them wake up from their hibernation, really struck me and confirmed in me that bugs are beautiful- or at least they can be sometimes!

So, the boys are having fun with bugs.  And I'm encouraging it.  We read a book that had a little section about bugs in it today.  It also had a section about humpback whales, and I'm planning on drawing a life-size humpback whale in the cul-de-sac when it gets a little warmer.  They've been interested in whales for several years now, starting with a book Grammy and Grampy gave them about a humpback named Humphrey who swam up the San Fransisco River.  Great story, based on something that really happened!

I've started reading the Jesus Storybook Bible to the kids.  I like how all the stories point to Jesus, and why Jesus had to come to Earth, and what Jesus had to do.  There are a lot of parallels in Old Testament stories to Jesus that I'd never noticed or paid much attention to before, and I love that it's opening my eyes to all of these.  We read a handful of little science books on various subjects, and a few "fun" books just because.  I love storytime!  It's one of my favorite parts of the day, and really one of my best chances to teach and disciple my children.  It may be kind of untraditional to use bedtime stories as homeschool time, but I think it's a lot more natural, and it works for us.

They've also been doing a lot of computer games lately.  I replaced the screen on my previous laptop, and gave that to them to use as a family computer, and they used the last of their Christmas money to get a subscription to Starfall.  It's been one of the best things I think I've ever done for them!  They're always on PBS Kids, and come out to tell me about this or that they learned, and "Mommy, did you know...", and "2 and 6 make 8!"  It's so amazing seeing them learn!  Starfall has been a huge help in teaching them, because all of the games are designed to teach the basics of what they'd be learning in school, but it's all in a game format.  They're picking up on reading remarkably quickly for me never having "taught" them.  Starfall and PBS Kids both have everything verbalized so you don't have to know how to read, and it's been teaching them how to.  When you hear the word "back" every time you put your cursor on the arrow that says "B-A-C-K", you'll eventually realize that those letters spell the word, and then you'll be able to read "back" any time you see it!  I'm so happy they're learning so much, and in the ways that each of them learns best.

Other schooly things I've done lately: we have a few spots in and near the kitchen that I like putting worksheets and printouts and other fun things on.  We've done a couple maps, and those are hits, and the ASL alphabet was so popular I had to make another one to replace the first copy.  I'm trying to get the kids more involved with cooking and other household tasks.  Sometimes it works well, sometimes it doesn't, but I think we're better off than we were a month ago.  We've been discussing songs in the van, various things that are mentioned in them.  Prohibition, immigration, Ellis Island, Scandinavia, some myths and legends.  It's amazing how many teachable moments there are when you look for them.  We're learning about raising chickens.  The ducks were less than successful, and had to go.  The chickens are coming along, though.  This week we're gonna have to build the coop to get them out of the living room.

Nikolai has put together a few sentences, which is exciting.  Other than that, I haven't seen too much else developmentally for him.  It's probably more me not noticing than milestones not being there-this is the crazy house, after all! 

I think more than anything else this last few weeks, I've noticed how much I'm learning, and I'm trying to pass on at least a portion of what I learn to the kids.  It's been really cool, some of the conversations we've had.

That ends tonight's monologue.  I've gone on long enough :)

-Amanda -_-*

Sick Days

Who knows if it's the changing weather, exposure to germs from outside of the house, or what, but none of us are feeling the best today. I'm thinking it's going to be a day for movies, playing outside (if/when they're up to it), and maybe throwing a chicken in the crockpot. After I take out last night's chili that no one ate. I guess no one was feeling that well last night, either, because normally it would have been GONE!

As much as I don't like being sick, I have to say there are some advantages to it. It's nice to have a lazy day every once in a while, and to be able to do some of those "sitting down" things that you don't have time for when you're feeling better- things like mending clothes, and making crafts for the craft fair, and reading extra stories to the kids. And yes, even watching movies you don't normally watch. We have a ton of nature documentaries and other nifty stuff on our Netflix queue, but usually the kids want to watch Backyardigans, or Busy Town, or Kipper, or things like that. They like the other stuff, but it isn't their first choice most of the time.

Last weekend, I brought the kids geocaching. This cache was farther away from the house, but still an easy find once we got there (and once I figured out how to work with the coordinates on the GPS!) I'm actually learning a lot about mapping, and coordinates, and am having my eyes opened a lot more to what's around me by looking for the geocaches. This last one we found, we ended up taking a little walk along the way, and the kids threw some rocks into the water, had fun running around, and Brennan found a bright green frog so small it could fit on my thumbnail. I don't even know how he saw the thing! But, they passed it back and forth several times, then Brennan tried making it swim in the water, before I finally made them let it go so they wouldn't kill it. It was so cute!

This week I also brought the kids to the Lynnwood Park Zoo. A lot of the reviews online said it was dirty, unkempt, not worth going to, etc. I thought it was a delightful little place! True, the cages did seem a bit small for some of the animals, and it wasn't the most stroller-friendly place I've ever been, but the kids had a great time, and the man who runs it even brought a few of the animals out for the boys to pet, and gave them some extra food to feed the goats. We'll definitely be going back there! It was so nice and outdoorsy, and a great place for the kids. Nick, towards the end, got out of the stroller and started walking with us. When he saw one of the monkeys, he stood completely still and stared at it, and watched it for several minutes, even after I called him and tried to get him to move on. He finally did, and then got entranced by a cockatiel or something like that the same way. That one, he had a bag of snacks in his hand, and was taking out handfuls and shoving them in his mouth without taking his eyes off the bird, pretty close to someone watching a movie and eating popcorn. It was so funny! You could just see him calculating, trying to figure out what this thing was, watching it's every movement.

Also this week, we went to the thrift store and found some new books. What were they? Arctic and Antarctic, Shoes Through History, something about different kinds of flowering plants, My Body Is Private (appropriate and inappropriate touching), The Eye, a school book that has a mix of fic and nonfic stories on various subjects, and Biscuit's First Thanksgiving, because we all like Biscuit so much!

We also got a chalkboard, and the kids have been using it to draw on, scribble on, spell on, and I'm sure we're still at the tip of the iceberg of what they'll end up doing with that thing. My family had one when I was growing up, and I used that thing a LOT!

Did I write about our spider in the window a while back? She's still there, and she has an egg sac. We've watched her make a new web most mornings when the blinds are up, and we've seen her catch a few insects. Yesterday a black praying mantis parked itself above her web, and they watched each other for a good part of the day. It's been so interesting to watch the spider! I'm glad we didn't kill it when it first showed up.

Also, the kids are really getting into Adventures in Odyssey. I'm going to have to start switching out the CDs in the car more often, because it's the only thing they want to listen to anymore!

Colin is collecting stuff outside. He found a something he calls a starfish, and it does look like one. I thought at first it was the base of a (very) small tree, but Matthew says it looks more like the bottom of a mushroom. In either case, we let it dry in the windowsill for a few days, since Colin found it in the ditch after it rained, and now he's got it in a box with a few other treasures from outside.

Last but not least, Nick may finally be starting to speak! He's said a few more words the last few days, and today already he's said "cup" and "off". Woohoo!

More adventures later!

-Amanda -_-*

Learning Lately

Colin has been working on numbers this week. I printed out a counting chart and stuck it on the refrigerator- 1 through 20. The first day, Colin found it, and tried counting, and could only get up to 16 very slowly. I helped him the rest of the way. Every time he passed the refrigerator after that, he would stop and count up to 20. It only took him a few days, and now he'll look at it once a day or so, and count. He's got it! Prior to this, we've counted to 100 a few times in the car, and he has a Curious George movie he watches every once in a while that I think counts to 30, but I've never made a point of teaching him to count, so that's pretty good!

Colin also found a toad yesterday, and noticed the camouflage on its sides and back, and pointed it out to me. I think he talked about it with Brennan, too, because Brennan found a snail today, and brought it inside to show me, and was telling me about its camouflage. We read a book today called How Animals Hide. I think it's a really old National Geographic book. I'm trying to read some of the books we haven't read in a while at bedtimes, because when they pick, they tend to pick the same ones over and over! So, I've been picking some, and they've been picking some.

(Colin also just told me that he learned we shouldn't murder- because it's bad!)

We've also watched some pretty cool videos on The Kid Should See This blog, about shapes, crayons being made, a violin being made (from sapling to finished product), a couple versions of Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, a video about this couple that collects plastic from a beach and makes art out of it, a couple videos with bikers doing crazy stunts, how to make puppets, and too many others to name. They've also watched a DVD of Magic School Bus about bugs. Nature theme lately, much?

I'm making a chart of the main constellations to put up somewhere. I want to learn those, and Colin is interested, too.

Brennan is learning the alphabet by sight, and we're trying to reinforce the potty habit, as well as cleaning up messes- that goes for all of them!

Nick is saying a few more words, but not really talking all that much. He's very good at getting his point across, though! And he's finally started pointing for things he wants.

We've also done a little studying about Rosh Hashannah. Colin likes hearing the shofar. Brennan, not so much! I'm going to try to make challah today, if I remember at a convenient time before it gets too late. Either that or honeycake. I don't think we'll be able to do both today, though if it turns out we can, great! I'm at my midday slump, though, so nothing is looking like it's going to get done right now (even though I know I'll feel more up to working later).

That's all for this week!