Samantha: 118 Months, Week 1
Aedan: 85 Months, Week 3
Owen: 42 Months, Week 1
Samantha continues to struggle with sleeping at night. In fact, I talked to my parents late Sunday night, and Samantha came downstairs after I was done talking to them. She also got up at least once more. That's the 4th time this week that she's been up past 11:30. It's definitely a struggle right now, and we were asking for prayer from family and friends. We were at a loss for what was causing it and how to help her.
Here is Owen being cute in bed before nap time on Monday. He is such a silly, fun little boy!
Here is the work the kids brought home from school that afternoon. Aedan was practicing adding -er and -est, problem solving through addition word problems, a 100% on his weekly reading test, a picture he did and a math coloring page, and a 100% on his weekly spelling test.
Samantha was working on singular and plural pronouns, consonant pairs ng, nk, ph, and wh, as well as a math test she got 96% on. I love seeing these little glimpses of what they are working on at school, as well as seeing how they are doing on everything.
The boys still enjoy taking baths together, and I enjoy just sitting there and watching them play with each other. Aedan and Owen have had a lot of fun together lately. Owen looks up to Aedan so much, and Aedan really enjoys always having someone to play with. I remember when I used to watch Samantha and Aedan play together in the bath, and now she's taking showers while the boys are enjoying playing with toys in bath together.
Tuesday, March 16th was grocery shopping morning. Owen and I drove out to Aldi in Tunkhannock and then stopped at Walmart for anything else we might need. Just one of those weekly traditions we do together, but something I enjoy doing with my little helper.
Here is some of the work the kids brought home from school that day. Samantha was working on spelling words with the consonant pairs: ng, nk, ph, wh. Owen colored a Dr. Seuss "Green Eggs and Ham" page from our take home story time craft bag from the library. Aedan was working on adding and subtracting with the hundred chart, learning about the compass rose, and practicing with matching sums. Samantha also came home with a 100% on her Science Test. Those are always so easy for her. Basically, if she knows the study guide, she will get all the questions right on the test.
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That Tuesday evening, Samantha had gymnastics lessons, and I took her to them. In the past I haven't been too impressed, but this teacher in the pink sweatshirt in these pictures is really good at helping her and teaching her new skills. Look at how far down she got in the splits on the balance beam! I was proud of Samantha for trying new things. Even though she had never really done gymnastics before, she wasn't letting that stop her.
Samantha really seems to enjoy working on the bars. She did a great job flipping herself around in a somersault form, and the coach helped her flip her legs up and around.
And here she is practicing her jumps on the bouncy pillow. It was a good lesson. Samantha worked hard and had some sore muscles afterwards. It's fun to watch her try something new and challenging.
We got the workbook "Braver, Stronger, Smarter: A Girl's Guide to Overcoming Worry and Anxiety" by Sissy Goff for Samantha in hopes that it might help her work through some of her worries and anxious thoughts that have been making it hard for her to sleep lately. We have been trying to give her extra time at night to just calm her mind down and get ready for bed, and we figured this might be a good thing that she could work on during that time. It's something she could do on her own, or something that we could talk about together. She looks so grown-up sitting here at the counter. It blows my mind sometimes how fast time passes. You don't realize how much your kids change until you see pictures over time and watch them grow up before your very eyes, noticing all the changes that you don't see on a day-to-day basis.
On Wednesday, March 17, I subbed today for a teacher I know, but her class was very chatty, and there was one boy who was pretty disrespectful. I had to threaten sending him to the principal if he didn't stop misbehaving. I just never know what power and authority I have over their behavior as a sub. Plus, it seems like teachers at this particular school give more independent, busy work, so the students can't be expected to sit quietly and work for an hour and a half on one math project. It's just an impossible expectation, so you are just asking for the kids to get noisy and start not doing their work. I would rather actually teach lessons and engage with the students. It was not the most enjoyable day, but I always say I can do anything for one day.
Ben stayed home and did his classes virtually, so he could be home with Owen while I subbed that day. He tried to get Owen playing while he taught his class, but he ended up coming in the room for a while, sitting on his lap, and staring at the screen quietly while he continued to teach. I bet the class thought that was pretty humorous!
Also, Ben got his first dose of the Covid shot on Wednesday, so we were anxious to see how his body would respond to it because we have heard a wide variety of reactions to it. Ben ended up having a fever and chills throughout the night and into the next day. He just stayed in bed a lot and had no energy. It wiped him out for quite a while.
Here is some of the work the kids brought home Wednesday. Samantha has a science review guide, lesson review pages, practice on singular and plural pronouns, creating line plots with fractions and the coordinate system, spelling practice with consonant pairs, a clover created with a coordinate system, and hot chocolate and fudge word problems. Aedan did a graph the rainbow candy sort, practice putting spelling words into sentences and a crossword, and practice with -er and -est endings. Plus there was a cute cartoon picture drawn on the back of one of Aedan's papers, an art project from Samantha with the letters "Love," and a leprechaun hat.
Even though the mom's Bible study group I was in hasn't been meeting since Covid started, we decided to try to get together again and hang out at the coffee shop. One of the moms volunteered to watch the kids back in the playroom, and even though it wasn't a large group, it was good to get together and talk for a little while anyways. I'm not sure how often this will happen, as everyone seems to be too busy to make it happen regularly. I do miss having this group of moms to get together with and do a Bible study, so hopefully I can find another group to get involved with some day.
The other thing I had to do that afternoon, after getting Owen down for his nap, was just to get ready for Ben's parents coming to visit that weekend. Also, Owen had his gymnastics lesson that afternoon, and it was my turn to take him. It was fun to watch him run around the obstacle course as well as jump on the bouncy pillow to practice his jumps. He was having a good time and listened well to his coach.
I forget when these pictures were taken, but I imagine they weren't from the middle or March which this post is written about. I think I found them on my phone and realized I never saved them or posted them. These were really the only updated pictures I got of our little peanut after she went back home with her mom. It was crazy to see her sitting up like this because we never even saw her roll over in the almost six months that she was with us. We think about this little girl all the time, and I try to keep in touch with her mom, but I often don't get any reply. We were hoping to have a continued relationship and stay in touch, but it doesn't look like that is going to be how things continue.
To round off a week of gymnastics for each kid, here is Aedan at his lesson on Saturday. He enjoys doing the obstacle course, but it's a little too slow-paced for him. They don't let the kids move around too much, considering it's a gymnastics/ninja warrior class. Aedan doesn't always listen, and he gets impatient waiting for all the other kids to have their turn, which is definitely something he needs to work on. However, he would much prefer going through the obstacle course over and over again, but that's not what they do during these ninja warrior classes. It's been a decent experience for him, but I'm not sure it's really his thing.
(Blog about March 14-20, 2021)
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