No, I haven't abandoned blogging

The short version is we've been busy, I'm still having rib pain so it doesn't feel the greatest to sit at the computer, and there are a lot of adjustments going on around here (namely Hubby becoming a work-from-home guy). This week though, Hubby is halfway across the country in training and I have 3 sick kids with high fevers. It's not been a fun week (and I'm only saying this on TUESDAY!)...nor am I looking forward to the next few days.

Rose turned 5 a couple weeks ago and if she were going to public school, I'd need to be registering her for kindergarten soon. But I'm not. ;) She has been working hard on spelling - and it's all been totally her own idea. She's learning to read at the same time so it's interesting to see her phonetic spelling everywhere. [As an aside, isn't it an oxymoron that the word phonetic isn't pronounced phonetically?] Here is some of her recent work and art (I'll try to translate for you). If you want a clearer image, click on each picture and it'll blow up bigger for you.

That's "hamster" at the top, "gerbil" and "kangaroo" on bottom (with an unnamed ghost in between, I'm told).


Her drawing skills are really taking off and I'm sure my mother's inner artist is beaming with pride. There's a peacock, fish, bat, kangaroo, butterfly, a few snakes/worms, turtle, and my favorite - the jellyfish at the bottom.


This one says, "animals that (dat) you can draw (dro) on different paper".

I just know you teachers are groaning, "Ohhh pleeeeease do not let her make her S's backwards!!" But don't worry - it will correct itself as she gets older. She used to spell her whole name backwards, then just a few letters and now she writes the letters backwards because she "likes to be silly". Hubby called tonight and as she hung up, she said, "I love you too....I mean, I L O V E O U...no, Y O U T O."

What have we done right to have such early readers? I can't say for sure but my best guess isn't that I have geniuses...I don't. But we have fostered a love of reading in this house. I started reading Charlotte's Web out loud to Matthew when he was an infant. It soothed my fussy baby and I enjoyed escaping into a fantasy land for a while too. Reading has always been a ritual part of bedtime. Hubby and I soon got tired of the toddler books and often read books that we assumed were 'over their heads'. But it was amazing to see how much they actually caught. I think it almost became a science experiment to us, to see how much of the 'older' stuff they would catch and we soon found ourselves reading chapter books to our old 3 and young 4yr olds. Things like Magic Tree House and Magic School Bus and Little House series, Chronicles of Narnia and classics from our childhood like Charlotte's Web and Runaway Ralph and The Boxcar Children. Did that have anything to do with it? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Maybe they would have been early readers even if we hadn't read so much to them. Or maybe if we hadn't read above their reading levels. Maybe we picked the right stories to motivate them to want to learn to read. I guess I'll never know but I'm glad they are well-read even at 5 and 7 years old.

Matthew and I have been working on organizing his room. He outgrew his Buzz Lightyear themed room a couple years ago but his bedspread remains. It doesn't quite match the Transformers curtains but there's certainly no mistaking that a boy lives in there. :) His room has been long overdue for a change and some good organization. He and I went shopping last weekend to look at storage containers and ideas that would work in his room. We turned furniture around and sorted through his toys. We started to put the new organizational tools to good use.

And that's where it stopped. Rose got really sick on Saturday and then Matthew started it on Sunday. High fevers, cough, sore throat and body aches. We've had a good winter for illness (probably because with my back/rib injury, we haven't been anywhere to gather germs) so it was time. I just wish it had been a quick 24 hour bug instead of the week long (or better) flu that's going around. And I wish it had happened while Hubby was home to help me out with them. But life isn't fair, is it? ;)

And since I'm by myself this week with them, I'd better get my rest too. I'll post pictures of Matthew's room when we're done with it. Good night!