A Day in the Life

The first video is of Nadia reading one of the stories in the first book of All About Reading (Level 1). She has read almost all the stories in that reader one time. This morning I let her pick any one story so I could take a video of her reading it. She's come a long way with her reading skills in the past few weeks. The next time I take a video of her reading I'm going to take one of her reading a story for the very first time. I tried to do that yesterday, but Ian was making a lot of noise in the background. She's also doing really well with spelling. If you give her a three letter CVC word, she can spell it! Today we started to delve into four letter words because we were working on "qu." The video below is one I took of Oliver yesterday showing his skills of clapping and also walking while pushing the lion around the room.

Today I thought I'd write about what a typical day is like for us these days. The first person up in the morning is either Ian or Oliver. This morning they both woke up around 6:20. Ian went straight to the bathroom, and I brought Oliver in to our bed. The four of us usually snuggle in bed for about 20 minutes until we all head downstairs for breakfast. Sometimes Nadia sleeps until 7:30. After we've all had breakfast and gotten dressed, sometimes Nadia and I start on her schoolwork right away and other days she and Ian play for a little while first. We start her schoolwork by 8:45 at the latest, and at 9:00 I put Oliver down for his morning nap, which lasts 30 minutes long 99% of the time. This morning I had Ian pick a 24 piece jigsaw puzzle to do while I was working on reading and spelling with Nadia, and then after he finished the puzzle I let him use the Writing Wizard app on the iPad (letter formation) while I did math and drawing with Nadia. We do handwriting almost every day, but we didn't get to that subject this morning. We do spelling and reading in the dining room (large whiteboard on the table) and the other subjects at the kitchen table.

Next all four of us gathered near the CD player in the family room. Nadia and Ian each picked one CD of songs, and we sang all the songs on both CDs. Ian marched around the room during "Joshua fought the battle of Jericho." Rhythm sticks were used during several songs. Normally we would have read some picture books next, but Ian had an 11:00 hair appointment this morning. During lunch I read some more of the Voyages of Dr. Doolittle. While Ian was finishing his lunch, I helped Nadia with practicing the piano. I need to take a video of her playing one of her songs! Around 1pm we head upstairs to brush teeth, take Ian to the bathroom if he hasn't gone recently, and change Oliver's diaper. Nadia has her quiet time, and Ian and Oliver take a nap, which usually lasts between 45-60 minutes. Sometimes I am busy cleaning or cooking at that time, and other times I am blogging, reading, or doing my devotions. I have been reading through the Bible on the iPad. I'm following a chronological plan that will take me one year to complete.

In the afternoon we usually walk to the playground. Our first top is Miss Cheri's house. She babysits her great granddaughter (who is 11 months old), and sometimes they join us at the playground. At some point in the afternoon or evening we spend some time reading non-fiction library books. The last couple of weeks we've been reading books about the sun and moon. Our next theme will be leaves. What time we have dinner depends on what we're up to that evening. On Monday night we had dinner around 4:15pm because we leave at 5:00 for gymnastics.

Last night we weren't going anywhere so we had dinner around 5:00pm. Except for Wednesday nights go to bed later due to AWANA, around 7:45 we head upstairs to brush teeth, put on pajamas, take Ian to the bathroom, read a Bible story, pray, and give each other hugs and kisses. Our typical morning schedule won't be followed on Tuesdays, Thursdays, or Fridays for the next 6-7 weeks because I'll be going to ladies Bible study on Gideon on Tuesday mornings starting next week, and we'll have co-ops on Thursdays and Fridays. Ian will also be taking three classes on Thursday mornings. They'll be together in one of the classes (Kindermusic), and the other two periods they will be in different classes. At this co-op I was assigned to help with the Kindermusic class, help in the nursery during one period, and then I'll have one free period. I think I'm going to like this co-op better than the Friday one, but time will tell. I actually prefer the days we are at home all morning. I still haven't mastered the art of getting all my chores done. It's easier on the days when Paul is home in the evening. Yesterday I took everything out of the toy box. Evidently I hadn't done that in almost a year, as I found the Dunkin Donuts gift card we lost last fall at the bottom. It had about $25 left on it, which put a smile on my face! In the very near future I'll need to add one more task back into my weekly routine, and that would be applying for jobs for Paul. The first applications are due the end of this month. I've enjoyed a two month break from doing that. Here's to hoping it doesn't take 88 applications this time around. I usually go to bed between 10:00 and 10:30 each night.