School Work, Soccer Games, Roba Family Farms, and Potty Training Owen

Samantha: 112 Months, Week 1

Aedan: 79 Months, Week 3

Owen: 36 Months, Week 1

As I was going through papers over the weekend before a new week of school started up again, I found some papers from Aedan. Here's a great one of ninjas from Ninjago, as well as it looks like guys falling down the stairs? The things he draws are so creative, and he can tell you the whole story behind what he drew.

Here is some of the work he is doing with letter review, easy stuff for him.

And here's some of his work with basic addition.

Here's more of his letter review packet that they were working on in class. The packet was in alphabetical order, but they uploaded in a mixed up order.

During nap time for Owen and our little peanut on Sunday afternoon, Samantha decided to get out her embroidery work. (I caught her off guard when I took her picture.) It's great to see how she enjoys and picks up on these handicraft skills. I never learned how to do this stuff when I was a little girl, but I think I would have liked it as well. She is able to stay very focused and follows the pattern very well. It will look beautiful when she is done.

Aedan decided he wanted to use the directions in the back of his book "Hi, Jack!" from the library to learn how to draw the characters, like Rex the dog. He is so good at following step-by-step directions like this, and he is actually really good at drawing. I'm impressed at how well he does at making these cartoon characters. He never has really enjoyed coloring just for the sake of coloring, but he enjoys drawing and creating his own characters and scenes. Here's my cute little 6-year-old boy with his missing front teeth, hard at work doing something he loves.

It was a really nice, sunny day, so after nap time was over, we decided to load up the kids' bikes and soccer balls and head over to the playground at Lake Noxen Elementary School for some time to play outside together. Aedan hadn't really had many chances to continue to practice his bike riding skills after learning how on the grass hill at Frances Slocum, so I wanted him to have a chance to ride again, and the sidewalks at Lake Noxen are perfect for that. Here is a video of Aedan riding his bike. He was doing such a fantastic job! He was going around so far, turning, and braking all by himself. We didn't even have to help him get started. He did it all by himself and was having such a fun time. We were very proud of him, too!

Monday morning was back to school for everyone while I stayed home with Owen and our little peanut. I had to call about getting her medical insurance lined up so I could get her prescription paid for, and I also contacted a friend about watching her while we go to Great Wolf Lodge in November. Ben gets emails with good deals, and we ended up getting a loft room, as well as admission to the water park of course, for the same price we would pay for a regular hotel room when we travel. It was a steal of a deal, and we couldn't pass it up. We are going to surprise the kids again like we did last year. It's such a fun place to go, and they will like it even more this year.

As I was doing things around the house that morning, I kept looking outside and noticing how good of a job Ben did over the weekend on cutting the grass and using the weed whacker to make the yard look so nice. It's quite the undertaking mowing our steep yard with a push mower, and we have a lot of property, so it takes him most of an afternoon to get it done, but I am always so appreciative when he does it, and it looks so nice.

Here is a picture Samantha's teacher, Mrs. Gannon, posted on ClassDojo that day. The caption said, "Making our cells." They are working on a cell project for Science where they had to gather materials to construct a cell and label the parts correctly. Samantha spent a lot of time making her plan and gathering her materials over the weekend so she could begin constructing it at school on Monday. Here she is hard at work, with her friend Cadence sitting next to her.

Other than that, Owen was being a little uncooperative that morning, but I was able to put our little peanut in her crib for her nap that morning because we are trying to get her used to that now that we have her sleeping in her own room at night. Here she is asleep in her bed at nap time.

Here is a card that Owen got for his birthday from Great Grandma Donna and Don. She also sent some money for us to use to buy him something for a present.

Aedan had a soccer game at 5:30 that evening, so Ben and Aedan ate dinner early and quickly so they could head out to the game. Samantha, Owen, our little peanut, and me left once we were done eating and got ourselves ready. Here's Aedan playing hard on his soccer team, with Samantha cheering him along.

And here's our little peanut, hanging out on my lap while we watched the game. She was pretty happy and content.

Here's a great video of Aedan kicking the ball hard and assisting his team. He was definitely in the right place at the right time.

On Tuesday morning I had a WIC appointment for our little peanut. I didn't know how long it would be or what I would have to do, and as I drove there I realized that I didn't have the card. Ben had it, so he had to leave campus and meet me there to give it to me. Luckily, he didn't have classes because it was a Tuesday, but I felt bad having to take time out of his day for that. It was also just a quick loading of the card for the formula benefits that we receive since she is in foster care, so I didn't even need to have the little peanut with me. Plus, I was late because Owen was totally uncooperative in getting ready to go, and she was fussy because she was tired, so it was a bit of a hectic and crazy morning. Since the appointment was so quick, I decided I could stop at Target to let Owen pick out something with the birthday money from my grandma. I let him wander around the toy aisles for awhile and suggested a few things that I thought he might like and actually play with. Finally, he settled on a boat bath toy with lots of things inside the boat like little cups, a captain, and even some fish and a fishing pole. We need some new, decent bath toys, so I thought this was perfect and would be played with by both Owen and Aedan. I also picked up our little peanut's prescription on the way home for the medicine for her acid reflux to see if that helps her be more settled and happy sleeping flat on her back, so we will see how that goes!

On Tuesday afternoon as I was putting Owen down for his nap, he decided he wanted to read a book to me instead. He had the book "Daddy All Day Long," and he likes this book because the little pig's name is Owen. I thought it was amazing how much of the book he had memorized, so I took a little video of him reading it to me. His mind is like a little sponge, so much like his sister, who could also memorize books like this, after only having them read to him a handful times. I love his cute little voice, and how he always asks for reassurance for each number because he's never quite sure if he's saying the right number or not.

That afternoon, right after school, Samantha had her first orthodontist consultation appointment. The last time she was at the dentist, they recommended we see an orthodontist, particularly in reference to the overcrowding she has on the bottom of her mouth. They took a look and made lots of notes and measurements. The doctor said it looks like she will have to have some teeth extracted on top, like maybe her first molars to make room for the eye teeth that are trying to come in but don't have any room to fit. The bottom teeth will need to be spread out slightly and straightened. However, he said we will just wait and see how her teeth grow in over the next few months, and we scheduled an appointment for six months out, knowing that some kind of treatment will probably need to be started at that point. Fun, fun! The joy of braces are in our future!

It was Samantha's turn for her soccer game at 5:30 on Tuesday night. We decided to go all together. Here's a video of Samantha running down the field with her team. She kicked it away from a blue team player to another player on her pink team. Just seeing her run back and forth across the field is a great thing to see because in the past she hasn't really enjoyed running all that much. I love seeing her learn to be part of a team as well.

Here is some evidence of Aedan's creative with drawing and making characters. He made these at school during their freetime. You can see two ninja turtles on the left, and I'm not sure what the big guy is. These were in his folder, and they made me smile when I saw them.

Wednesday morning is our grocery shopping time, and I went to Aldi again because it's just so much cheaper. I only spent about $139 on most of our groceries for the week, with just a few leftover things to get at Walmart. Saving money is definitely a good thing right now.

Samantha is doing a great job in her 5th grade math class, even though she always starts off the year feeling nervous, and wondering if the class of students will accept her and understand why she comes to the class for math. Here is her first Mid-Chapter Checkpoint Test that she did an excellent job on. She was upset with herself for getting two points taken off because she's a bit of a perfectionist, but I think she only got it wrong because she misread the number in the problem. We are so proud of the hard work she puts into learning and how she has such strong internal motivation to do well.

Here's the weekly math review that they do each day in class. I love that they are constantly reviewing past math topics so they don't forget. I would have loved to have something like this in my class when I was teaching.

Here's a multiplication number puzzle.

And here are 5 Minute Language Review worksheets from the packet they do daily to also help review and remember various language skills as well as her Wonder packet for the novel unit they are doing.

Here is some work from Aedan. He comes home with various coloring pages like these that are only partially colored in. Coloring has never been one of his favorite activities, which is okay.

As they go through the school year, he will come home with newsletters like this that correspond to the story they are reading in their Reading Book at school. It has their spelling words listed at the top as well as what they will be focusing on in Reading/Language Arts that week.

And here's some of Aedan's math pages with practicing with addition using pictures, cubes, and number sentences.

Here are the last pages of his alphabet review packet, as well as some practice with writing his letters.

At school they do DIBELS testing to assess the students' reading skills, and this was Aedan's report for the Fall testing. As you can see he got 74 with a goal of 42 in Letter Naming Fluency, 9 with a goal of 31 in Phonemic Segmentation Fluency, 60 with a goal of 30 in Nonsense Word Fluency (Correct Letter Sounds), 9 with a goal of 5 in Nonsense Word Fluency (Words Read Correctly), 32 with a goal of 12 in Word Reading Fluency, 80 with a goal of 10 in Oral Reading Fluency (Words Read Correctly), with 92% Oral Reading Fluency with a goal of 67%. His total score was 384 with a goal of 330, and he was on track to becoming a strong reader. I was proud of how well he did, but I did ask about his only lower score of 9 with a goal of 31 in Phonemic Segmentation Fluency. His teacher explained more about it to me over the phone later in the week, and she mentioned that that skill was a timed skill where they had to break words down into letter sounds, and he just didn't do it quite fast enough. I am confident that he knows how to do it, but I have seen at home that he can be very slow and resistant to sounding out words in this manner, which is probably why he got a lower score in that area. Regardless, he did an excellent job on this test, and his interest and ability to read had greatly increased over the summer, so I'm excited to watch him learn how to read even more as he begins first grade.

Here's another coloring page from Aedan that was all crumpled up in his folder.

And here are all the Ninja Turtles that Aedan drew, colored, and cut out at school. They look so good! Each one even has their own unique weapon. He keeps them in his folder and gets them out to play with during their free time or snack breaks at school. It made me smile to see that he was basically creating his own paper doll Ninja Turtles.

And here is more practice with addition to 10 for Aedan as well as a Mid-Chapter Checkpoint for him.

That afternoon once they finished their homework and before dinner, Samantha and Aedan went outside to play for awhile. They also decided to release their toads. They had kept them in the terrarium in our garage for a couple weeks, but they didn't want them to die in captivity, so they decided by their own free will to take them back out into the backyard, placing them right outside the toad hole in the ground where they discovered them in the first place. Samantha wanted to make sure they had plenty of time to make a warm place to live for the winter, and they hoped to find lots more toads come next Spring. Samantha's toad was funny because it made that loud chirping noise.

With Halloween coming up in the next month, even though who knows what that will look like with Covid, I was trying to keep my eyes open for people selling costumes that I could purchase used rather than new. I found a lady selling Chase and Heatwave costumes, and well as two Ninja Turtle costumes. She also had two boys that often liked to dress up in coordinating costumes, so I thought Aedan and Owen would love these and could also use them to play dress-up around the house. Here are Aedan as Chase and Owen as Heatwave, but I think Aedan was jealous of Owen's Heatwave costume.

Here they are wearing their Ninja Turtle costumes. The reason Aedan is giving me a grumpy look like this is because he tried to stuff his shell with something and it wasn't working, so he was mad that he had a flat shell, and he didn't want to wear his costume anymore. We will figure something out for his turtle shell, but he was still grumpy with me which then made Owen want to be difficult for me as well. They are still cute in their turtle costumes!

Wednesday night was bath night, and the boys were excited to get Owen's new boat that we bought with Great Grandma's birthday money at Target on Tuesday. They had fun using the fishing pole to fish and playing with the boat in the bathtub.

Sometimes life goes on at such a busy pace that time slips away from me. However, a memory that popped up on Facebook on Thursday reminded me that today was the due date of the baby that we lost to miscarriage in 2013. So I decided to wear the necklace I got after losing this baby, with a small set of footprints on a heart and the birthstone for September. I would say there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about this baby I lost, but there are certain times when the pain is more real. For example, when well meaning people talk about how nicely spaced out our kids are, not realizing that this baby I miscarried would have come between Samantha and Aedan, and also that we dealt with almost two years of infertility before I was pregnant with Owen. Or, when someone asks how many kids you have, and you never really know what to say because I have three children on earth and one in heaven. However, whenever I think about the extreme pain and sadness of the weeks surrounding my miscarriage, I always remember the picture that God gave me of the same image of our little baby from the ultrasound, but instead our little baby was cradled gently in the palm of God's hand. And that is still where I picture our little baby is today, seven years later.

Here's more work Aedan brought home that day with work on the short a sound in his spelling words as well as some very nice handwriting practice. We worked pretty hard on his handwriting and letter formation over the summer, so I hope he can keep up these good skills at school as well.

When it got to Thursday night, I felt like the week had gone by quickly with school and soccer games for the kids, as well as appointments and visits for our little peanut. There is a chance that she could leave our home sooner than we thought. Her dad got his paternity confirmed a few weeks ago and has now started supervised visits with her. His mom has also been there for the visits. We had a home visit with our caseworker and our little peanut's caseworker, and we were told that the grandma was interested in taking our little peanut, so she is going through the approval process. The caseworker planned to do a home visit with the grandma in the next week or so, and then we should know more. However, it sounds like our little peanut could be moved to her grandma's house sometime in the next few weeks, so we will see what happens.

Here is our little peanut hanging out in Owen's bed while we were getting our kids ready for bed and starting the bedtime process. She is such a cute little girl, and you can tell she is filling out more and getting some chunky rolls on her legs. The kids like having her around in their rooms at bedtime.

Here is a picture Aedan's teacher took of the class on Friday, which was Crazy Sock Day, but I forgot about it, so our kids didn't wear any crazy socks that day. Oh well! I can't keep up with everything these days.

Friday was going to be a fun day for Owen and me. Our little peanut's normal visit was cancelled, which meant I had more free time in my schedule. I lined up my friend Amy to watch our little peanut so I could take Owen to Roba Family Farm, just the two of us, with the gift certificates we got for Owen's birthday. Also, Ben and I were planning on starting official potty training with Owen on Saturday, so I took Owen on a longer day trip that was farther away because I knew that I wouldn't feel comfortable doing a trip like that with him for awhile until I would know he can handle it with potty training. By the time we got ready, got out of the house, drove to drop of our little peanut, and drove to Roba, it was after 11:30, but that was okay because we didn't have anything that we had to leave for so we could spend the whole afternoon there. I don't even remember the last time the last time I got to spend time with just Owen like this.

We had beautiful weather that day, with lots of bright sun, which didn't make it feel too much like fall, but it was nice and warm. We started off by watching this little animal singing show where you can push buttons to make them sing and tell jokes. He found this very interesting, so we stood here for awhile and watched the show.

I bought a cup of food for the animals so Owen could feed them, and he enjoyed holding out his hand for the goats to lick the food out of his palm.

I let Owen decide what we did since this day was for him, so we played in the playground area for awhile where he pretended to drive all the different vehicles and had me ride in the back while he drove.

After that we went on the cattle train ride, and Owen really enjoyed playing with his cow's tail while we waited for the ride to start, and then he turned his steering wheel for most of the ride. He had a lot of fun!

After that he decided he wanted to jump on the giant air pillow. I didn't get a great video of him jumping, but he was definitely enjoying himself. Although, I think part of him thought it was weird not having Samantha and Aedan there with him. He is so used to having automatic playmates when they are around.

We did several other things there that I didn't take pictures of, like watching the dog show and the pig show, as well as going down the mountain slide and getting apple cider donuts as a treat before we left. We had a wonderful time together, and I loved spending this time one-on-one with him. With the pandemic and Samantha and Aedan doing school at home in the Spring, and then getting our little peanut at the beginning of July, we don't get this chance to be together very often, and I was so grateful for it. He loved going to the farm together, and I loved watching him have fun. His favorite thing was definitely the slide. We went down the tall one, sitting side-by-side, over and over again. As soon as we got to the bottom, he would jump up and down and say he wanted to go on it again. I love this little boy of mine and his exuberant energy and excitement for life.

Before we left the farm a little after 3:30, I took a picture of him sitting in the pumpkin patch. His faces are a little silly or awkward in the pictures by himself, but some of the pictures of him and me together are some of my favorites.

I liked these pictures so much that I couldn't choose just one. He is smiling so cutely and looking into the camera so nicely in these pictures. I love his cute sun-kissed red cheeks, his bright blue eyes, and his adorable dimples. This little boy has certainly stolen my heart.

After the farm I went back to pick up our little peanut, went to Wilkes-Barre to pick up and drop off a meal for a friend who was going through a hard time, and then met Ben, Samantha, and Aedan at a Moe's for dinner. Owen did a great job sitting in the car for a long time, but he was definitely tired of running around by the time we got to the restaurant.

That night Ben posted this about Samantha: "Samantha is writing a book based on a family that eats dragon fruit and then turns into dragons. One of the ancillary characters is rich. She told me he was rich because he has a big library in his house. My daughter, the daughter of two people who like to read, thinks a clear sign of wealth is having a dedicated library room." Yep, that pretty much sums up who Samantha is. Writing and Reading are two of her most favorite activities right now.

Saturday, September 26th was the big day. Potty training day for Owen! We figured there's no better time than the present, and it's not like life was going to slow down anytime soon. Other than soccer games, that Ben and I were going to trade off going to, we dedicated the weekend to staying home to do a modified three day potty training like we did with Samantha, which basically meant switching totally over to underwear other than still using pull-ups at nap time and bed time. (We were lucky with Aedan and he basically potty trained himself at Disney World, but that's a story for another day.)

Owen was so excited to take his diaper off and put on big boy underwear like what Aedan wears. Throughout the morning he had one slight accident, and he wasn't doing a great job of telling us when he had to go potty, but he was tired from not napping and having a big day at the farm with me on Friday. I hoped it would go better after he took a good nap that afternoon. Potty training is not one of my favorite things to do, especially because the three day potty training method basically requires you to watch your child like a hawk to look for signs of them needing to go to the bathroom or when they begin to have an accident so you can take them to the potty right away. Also, you are supposed to constantly ask, "Is your underwear dry? Let me know when you need to go potty," as a way to help them learn what it feels like before they have to go and be able to tell you in enough time to get to the potty. Nevertheless, that day was going okay, and the end result of being diaper free was a huge incentive to keep working at with Owen.

Ben took Aedan to his soccer game first on Saturday morning while I stayed home, and then I took Samantha to her soccer game that started right after lunch. However, it was rainy and cold, but I did okay sitting under my umbrella. I just felt bad for all the girls getting soaking wet on the field. Here are some videos of Samantha playing defense for her team that afternoon. Luckily, the rain stopped about halfway through the game, so that was a relief.

And here's some more work of Aedan's that I found in his folder over the weekend, practicing words with "ck" endings and writing complete, correct sentences. Isn't his handwriting very nice? He's doing a great job.

(Blog about September 20-26, 2020)