School

I say often that I have a suppressed kindergarten teacher inside of me dying to get out. I loved loved loved teaching kindergarten for 5 years, and I really do miss it. But I can't imagine going back to work and not staying home with my kiddos right now. So when my buddy Elizabeth said she was going to do a letter a week with Braden, Gavin and I of course said we wanted to join her!

I sure have loved all the students I've had over the years, but I think this little guy might be my favorite! :)

Since Gavin is not even 2, I didn't want to do a ton of things that would be over his head, so I came up with a fun schedule to give us structure that I think is age-appropriate for him. My schedule looks like this (and is subject to change on a weekly basis!)...

Scripture Sunday

Music Monday

Tasty Treat Tuesday

Working Wednesday

Thinking Thursday

Field Trip Friday

Cinema Saturday

And let me say that I am a teacher, therefore most of what I'm coming up with is completely copied! These are my favorite websites right now:

http://www.notimeforflashcards.com/

http://confessionsofahomeschooler.blogspot.com/

No way am I going to have time to share what I do each week, but I wanted to share "A Week" with you because we had so much fun!

Scripture Sunday

We just got this awesome book: My ABC Bible Verses to learn a verse a week.

A week's verse:

"A soft answer turns away wrath." Proverbs 15:1

Music Monday

Learn a Nursery Rhyme/Song every week to go along with the letter.

A Week: "The Ants Go Marching"

It's amazing what you can YouTube and find to teach these little guys!!

Tasty Treat Tuesday

We made homemade applesauce! Gavin loves helping in the kitchen (and eating what we make!!) so this might be his favorite day!

It was so easy and so yummy!

Working Wednesday

I want to do some sort of art project each week with the letter.

A is for Alligator!

The kitchen table is our work space for most of these activities--he loves it!

This boy loves to color! Twistables are my favorite (and were a requirement in my classroom) because they're always sharp and don't break!

Finished product:

Thinking Thursday

Math skill to go along with the letter.

We sorted different colored apples. Gavin is getting this sorting thing down!! He wanted to line them up after he sorted them. He's a bit particular about lining things up these days!

He was so proud of himself!

(And I do in fact put clothes on my son, we were just waiting on Henley to wake up for bathtime!)

Field Trip Friday

Fun adventure that starts with the letter.

This technically wasn't on A week because I got sick, but we had plans to go to the Zoo to see the Animals! We postponed it a week and Ryan was able to go with us!

Sweet Henley always along for the ride and happy as can be!

I think Gavin likes the Zoo more with his Dad there!

I think we need to go back for M week for these crazy monkeys. The Gibbons are probably my favorite at the whole Zoo, but they were CRAZY Saturday! A lady started talking to one of them and he kept talking--for literally 30 more minutes. We heard him as we walked all around the rest of the zoo still yelling:

Gavin loved the petting zoo! I guess it helps that we have an 80 lb Boxer, so he wasn't afraid of the animals at all!

And onto the main event...the Alligator!

Cinema Saturday

I love having family movie time, so I would love to find a family movie to go along with each letter. This week, it was Aladdin! I remembered so many songs from when I watched it when I was little that it was so fun to watch it again!

After we did a full week of A, we were at my friend Kim's house with an "A" magnet on her fridge and Gavin walked up and said, "A!"

HOLY COW!!! I freaked out. This is a horribly blurry video, but I had to document my little genius:

But don't be fooled, he now thinks EVERY letter is an A. It's pretty funny actually. We were outside this afternoon playing and he saw letters on his basketball goal and said, "A!!" No, buddy, "Little Tikes" does not have an A in it. But hey, he is recognizing letters which is progress! So maybe all letters will be A for a little while. :) But we're having so much fun and I'm having so much fun teaching again!

Firetruck

At not even 2-years-old, Gavin has gotten to do some pretty awesome things in his little life, but this one I think ranks up in the top 3. We got to ride on a firetruck today!!!

All thanks to Elizabeth and her friends in high places! :)

Back in college, Ryan used to live across from a fire department. And small world, Elizabeth lived next door! (Side note--that's actually how I met most of my good friends now because I would stay with them when I came up here to see Ryan when we were long distance in college. Ok, back to the main story...) Elizabeth knew some of the firemen that have now moved to a different fire station and they let us bring the boys to see the firetrucks today!

And what was this firetruck-obsessed-boy's reaction for most of the time!? Joy? Elation?

No! Crying and complaining!

I was shocked!! He was very clingy to me and very unlike himself.

I couldn't believe it!

Braden had a good time at least!

Ready to take an emergency call...

If you have never held or worn a fireman hat, they are HEAVY!

Gavin warmed up to Fireman Chip a little bit when he turned on the engine:

"Can we ride in it, Mom?"

Elizabeth and I never thought they would actually let us ride in the firetruck...but they did!!!

Two firemen stayed back to watch Kate and Henley (how cool is that!?) while we rode with the boys down the street and back. It was sooo fun! Gavin cried at first (ridiculous!) but then relaxed once we got going.

Braden got to honk the horn:

Fireman Chip gave us a tour of the station. It had a real pole! Blurry picture, but Braden is pushing the button that makes it open to slide down.

I would love to have a picture of Gavin sliding down the pole, but he wouldn't let go of me! I said, "Gavin, do you want to slide down the pole?" and he said, "No!"

Gavin is napping now and I'm sure is dreaming about his awesome morning at the Fire Station. I think he was just overwhelmed that his dreams had actually come true!!! :)

Thanks for letting us come with you guys, Elizabeth!

Misson Statement

On our date night this week, Ryan wanted us to come up with a Family Mission Statement. We're huge Dave Ramsey fans, and he encourages you to do this in your business or for personal growth, so Ryan wanted to do it as a family. We started making a list of things we wanted to work on with the kids, and I thought the easiest way for us to remember it was to use our last name to help us out! So here's what we came up with, and you can keep us accountable to doing these things as a family in how we interact with each other! I've also put it on the right side of the blog for a reminder, as well. -->

Honor God

Use Self Control

Give Respect

Have Fun

Encourage Each Other

Search for Ways to Serve

We're really excited about it and pray it can be a helpful teaching tool for Gavin and Henley!

Smiley Girl

Henley is such a smiley girl these days!

She crinkles her nose up sometimes which is so cute:

My sweet girl. I don't want her to get any teeth because I love her gummy smile so much!!

I love this video of Henley laughing!! Ryan's parents came up for the day with some friends, and Susan kept making her giggle like this!

Another recent thing she's been laughing at--her brother!

Aunt Amanda stayed with us when it snowed in case we all got snowed in, so we left her air mattress up for Gavin to play on for a few days. Henley thought it was the funniest thing! My favorite is at 56 seconds when we ask Gavin to go say "Hi" to Henley for like the 4th time and he sighs!

Dinnertime

Ever since we watched the dreaded Food, Inc., dinnertime has been very different at our house. Gavin has favorite foods now, and it doesn't include Goldfish or Hamburger Helper. What's his favorite food?

BROCCOLI!!! This was actually after dinner one night and he ASKED for more while sitting on the couch. It truly amazes me.

I guess it goes to show that if your kids don't have a choice, they'll eat healthy stuff and learn to love it! So thankful he is such a good eater, and I'm so thankful we saw this movie so we're putting healthy things into our little kiddos.

Gavin has turned into quite the chatterbox these days, whether he's saying real words or not. I think he was telling us he really enjoyed Liz's Chicken Tortilla Soup!

And we luckily don't have to do the airplane trick to get Gavin to eat (I guess that's why he weighed 25 pounds under a year old, huh?), but he has fun doing it to himself!

Dinnertime has not always been this fantastic around here! He was throwing food and refusing to finish for a while, so it's so nice to see progress as we work with our little man!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!!

First, let me share Gavin's reaction to the snow we had back in December.

Before we even got outside, he was NOT a fan of layering up...

Once we got outside, he was very curious about the white stuff...

Then he remembered all the clothes I put on him and he was NOT a fan...

And then after a whopping 4 minutes outside, we ended our fun snow day like this...

So, you can see why I was so amazed that he loved the snow at Christmas!

So we, along with the rest of the country, have had so much snow this week!

And PRAISE THE LORD, Gavin is now a fan!

Our pitiful attempt at a snowman:

Henley stayed inside most of the time because it's been sooo cold. I put her by the front door so she could watch us play during the day:

But when Dad and Aunt Amanda came home from work, we all went outside to play!

For some reason, the swing is more fun in the snow!

I love this picture--runny nose and all!

Dakota loves the snow, too!

One thing Gavin is not a fan of: making Snow Angels!

What's the perfect break from playing in the snow? Homemade Hot Chocolate!

And then it's back out for more!

He prefers gloves to mittens. He thinks it's so fun to put his fingers in, even if they get in the wrong finger slots!

My sweet boy.

Real conversation after 30 minutes outside at 5:00 pm in the freezing cold:

Me: "Gavin, do you want to go inside and get warm?"

Gavin: "NO!"

You won't hear any complaining about snow in this house anymore!