We actually had not gotten much snow this winter until recently, definitely different from last winter, so we decided to take advantage of our time to go out and go sledding over by the kids' school. They have a pretty good sledding hill that isn't too steep to walk up, but it flattens out nicely at the bottom to help them slow to a stop. I took Samantha and Aedan after lunch on Sunday while Owen and our little baby napped. It was fun to spend time with just the big kids, to get out and enjoy the outdoors together, and also to use the wooden sled that my dad brought out for us. The snow wasn't as fluffy as it had been earlier in the week, but this was our first chance to get out and sled. The wooden sled with the metal runners definitely did the best going down the hill, and Samantha and I both took our turns with it, whereas Aedan preferred going down on the spinning saucer disc. He did a pretty good job of controlling himself on it, and had a nice, fast ride down the hill. The black sled we have is probably the worst one because it doesn't go straight, and I think there's too much friction on the ground so it doesn't go very fast. The long green one we had was cracked in the middle from the kids going over a rock in our backyard while sledding, so I definitely am going to have to go out and get new sleds that work better before the next time we go sledding. Here are some videos of our time sledding. I told Ben to let me know if Owen woke up early from his nap, or ended up not actually sleeping, and we could come get him, but he slept the whole time we were gone, and it was good for him to get a long nap in that afternoon.
Our little baby is getting stronger and better at sitting up on her own, so I took a couple pictures of her that evening. She was sitting up in between my legs so that I could help support her and prevent her from tipping over backwards, but she enjoyed the new perspective and playing with this little cube toy. I took a video that I can't post because of her face being noticeable, but it's fun seeing her learn and grow, getting stronger each day.
Sunday evening, right around dinnertime, I got a call from a local number, so I didn't know who it was, but figured it was just a placement call or something. However, it was actually a friend of our last foster baby's mom, who basically wanted me to take her little boy, and told me her whole story. She did not like the foster mom that he was with, and she said she heard so many good things about us from our last foster baby's mom, that she figured she would call me and see if I could help her. I didn't really know how to respond, especially since we already have a foster baby, but I told her I would contact the case worker on Monday morning, and we could go from there. There really was no possible way that we would take her baby boy, but I wanted to at least follow through.
A lot of my free time this week was spent making our family picture calendar. I go through all the pictures I have saved by each month on my computer, and make separate folders of all the ones I think are cute. Then, once I have done that, I have been Ben go through the pictures with me to help me decide. Lately, to streamline the decision making process, I have chosen a six picture format for the calendar, and we try to do an individual picture of each kid, as well as a combination of other pictures of the kids together, or the kids with Ben or me. Doing that makes it easier to decide, but it is still quite the long process to go through a year's worth of pictures. However, I am always pleased with the end result. I love having family pictures hanging up on our wall. Plus, when I am done with the calendar, I take the binding off of it, take the pages apart, and put them in plastic sheet protectors in a binder, so in a way I am making a family photo album as I go. It's definitely worth it to me.
Monday morning I told Ben that I felt like an old person because my body was sore from sledding yesterday. I crashed a couple of times and could definitely feel the bruises. As we were getting ready for school that morning, I also discovered that Aedan had four unopened fruit snacks in his backpack, and while I was changing his sheets that morning, I found eight or nine cough drop wrappers under his pillow. I change their sheets every Monday, so these would have all been from the last week. Apparently he has been sneaking them out of the bag in the bathroom cabinet and having them sometime during the night, whether it's before bed or in the morning, so that is something we had to have a conversation with him about. This boy has becoming very sneaky with things lately! Cough drops aren't even that good!
I felt very tired that Monday, and it was hard being back from our vacation. I was feeling unmotivated to do normal taking care of daily life type things. It was hard being back in the busyness of life again. I even wore my new Disney sweatshirt that day because I was thinking back to our trip and how much fun we had, wishing I was back there. Disney was wonderful. It was probably the best vacation we have ever gone on. We went to a different park each day and were pretty much at the parks from when they opened until when they closed. Owen was old enough to be able to handle it (for the most part), and he was able to go on a large majority of the rides since he's tall enough now. We got a house close to Disney with a pool and hot tub, so Ben and I were able to sit in it and relax every night. It was a perfect break from life. We got to go on pretty much all the rides we wanted to do. I was really able to relax and forget about everything that is stressful about normal, everyday life at home, and going on rides and having fun like that gives me a boost of energy and makes me feel happy. My feet were tired from walking so much, but I didn't seem to feel as exhausted as I do at the end of a day when we're home. We came back to snow from the temperature in the 70s in Florida. It was even snowing that Monday morning, and the kids had a two hour delay. I was definitely missing the warmth and the sun. I know you can't be on vacation forever, but it was definitely a reality check coming back home.
Here is a picture of Samantha playing Marbles with kids in her class at school. Her teacher commented that they were actually really enjoying trying out this classic game that was referenced in their immigration reading story. I love seeing little glimpses into their day at school through pictures that they post on ClassDojo. Mrs. Welby is such a creative teacher and comes up with fun ways to get the kids up out of their seats, doing activities and group work, and extending lessons through hands-on learning experiences.
Here is some work that Samantha brought home from school that day. She got a 96% on her Chapter 7 Science Test and a 103% on her Chapter 5 Social Studies Test.
Aedan did some spelling practice by using the words to correctly fill in the blank in sentences and also writing words and marking the r-controlled vowel in each word. He got a 94% on his weekly reading test on the story Anansi.
I had to include this picture because it just made me laugh and is very stereotypical of Aedan. It looks like he did a really nice job coloring and gluing on the parts of the ocean food chain, but this is not something he finds important, so he just shoved it in his folder, and it got all wrinkled up and the glue made it stick together in this form. He is such a funny kid.
Aedan also had a spelling test that he got an 84% on, his Chapter 3 Science Test that he got a 92% on, more spelling word practice, and another spelling test that he got 100% on. He must have had a lot of papers building up in his desk to bring home because he had a lot of papers and tests.
Aedan also brought home the results from his winter DIBELS testing. He got 93 out of an expected 68 on Nonsense Word Fluency (Correct Letter Sounds), 30 out of an expected 20 on Nonsense Word Fluency (Words Read Correctly), 75 out of an expected 36 on Word Reading Fluency, 146 out of an expected 78 on Oral Reading Fluency (Words Read Correctly), 100% out of an expected 96% on Oral Reading Fluency (Accuracy), 21.5 out of an expected 9 on MAZE, and 433 out of an expected 389 for his Composite Score. I was excited to see how much better he was in the nonsense word categories because he used to struggle more with that. He is such a good reader, and this test just shows what we already know.
Here is more work from Aedan with practice filling in words to complete sentences that have an -or combination, as well as marking the r-controlled vowel. He got a 90% on a Math Mid-Chapter Checkpoint on which he wrote that his name was Nothing. This kid is so silly, sometimes I wonder what his teacher thinks of him and these silly things that he does, writes, and draws on his papers.
Here's some more work from Samantha: her acrostic poem on Anne Hutchinson that she worked on while we were gone in Florida, the daily math review she completed in Florida, a Math Mid-Chapter Checkpoint, as well as her sample weather forecast for the live weather reports they had been working when studying about the weather in Science.
Here is a a picture of Aedan working with another boy in his class at school. They were practicing making words with syllables. I loved seeing this picture of my little boy hard at work.
Samantha's teacher sends home graded work in a packet and asks for parents to sign the cover sheet and send them back. It's good to see all the grades in one place and to know that her teacher is keeping track of whether parents are aware of the grades coming home, even though it's a decent amount of work for her to do this. Samantha got 40/40 on her New England Brochure and 100% on the "Shutting Out the Sky" reading test.
Friday's visit was cancelled on Friday morning because our little baby's mom said she was sick with a cold and sore throat, and she didn't want to take the chance of getting our little baby sick. We also planned on having a sibling visit on Monday afternoon, since it was the last Monday of the month, but we didn't feel comfortable with doing that either, unless we knew for sure that her mom was healthy. I didn't mind too much having the visit cancelled because it freed up my morning more to do what I wanted, I just had Owen and our little baby with me, and I was able to keep her on more of a normal schedule with eating and napping.
Samantha got to do her weather report live in front of the class on Friday. She was really nervous about it, but she picked a nice "professional-looking" outfit and even put her hair up into a bun and wore hoop earrings that she got from a friend. I wish I could have seen the weather report because they used a puppet and everything! They were very creative and funny in how they wrote their script.
We recently started the tradition of family pizza and movie night on Friday nights because we never just sit down and hang out like that. We decided to rotate through each person being able to have their turn choosing a movie. I also needed to clean the house that weekend since we were hosting small group at our house on Sunday, so that would take up the majority of my time over the weekend. I took down and put away our Christmas decorations last weekend, but not our outside lights though because it was still too cold and snowy to do that yet. I was ready for Christmas to be put away and to move on.
Also, after getting the kids to bed, Ben and I sat down to talk about and come up with a responsibilities chart for the kids. We want them and need them to be doing more around the house to help us, especially as they are getting older. As I get back into working more and eventually full-time, I'm not going to be able to easily do all the things I would usually do when I stayed home full-time, like washing and putting away laundry, cleaning the entire house on my own, doing outdoor jobs and gardening, and just generally keeping up with the household. Ben and I were getting tired of always reminding them and asking them to do things, so I hoped that having it written down in a chart where they could cross things off would help them. They have daily jobs like getting ready, putting dirty clothes away, and cleaning up toys. However, they will have a rotating task each day like helping to clean up dinner, wiping off the table and counter, and playing with Izzy, feeding her, and cleaning up her poop outside, once it gets nice enough to do that. We also will have a special cleaning job every Saturday, so the kids will help clean the upstairs and basement bathrooms, taking turns with cleaning the sinks and mirrors, cleaning and wiping down the toilet, and cleaning the shower. Then, every week they will switch from cleaning and dusting their rooms and cleaning and dusting the basement. Ben and I also gave ourselves jobs that we would rotate back and forth: cleaning the main floor bathroom and kitchen. I gave myself the other jobs to do throughout the week like vacuuming the rugs, dusting and cleaning the living room and front playroom, dusting and cleaning our bedroom, and helping to clean the floors in the rooms after the kids clean them. Cleaning has been an overwhelming task for me, and there is no way I can clean the whole house in one day anymore, so I'm hoping this cleaning/chore chart will help us keep up with the house and have it more in a state of being picked up and clean, so that way if we ever want to have people over to our house, or when we host small group, we don't have to do a lot to get the house ready. I'm hoping that this will teach the kids to be more responsible and helpful around the house, especially the boys. Samantha generally does a good job of noticing ways she can help us, but she also likes lists she can cross off. Then, at the end of the week, the kids can earn extra screen time on their Kindles/LeapPad. Cleaning up toys has been a big problem lately, and I just felt like we had to try something to keep them responsible, on track, and motivated, so we will see how this works for them!
(Blog about January 23-29 2022)
