Letter I

We did another Halloween craft last week. I helped the boys make spiders by tracing their hands. I cut them out and Sawyer glued on eyes. They are hanging on their bedroom doors, but I don't have a picture. My battery was out, but I am charging it and will post a pic soon.
We talked about the letter I last week. I didn't have many good I ideas, plus we were busy with Halloween festivities. I did help him make an ice cream cone on Thursday. I cut out the pieces and he glued them together. He was supposed to glue on a pom pom for the cherry, but he wanted lots of cherries on his ice cream.

He also decorated a card for his Lulu's birthday.
This week was supposed to be the letter J. This week really hasn't been that busy, but last week and weekend were so busy that I didn't plan much and I am tired and not feeling well, so we just haven't done anything. Maybe we will start tomorrow or just wait until next week. I haven't decided yet. There is no way I could home school. I am not organized enough.

H and Halloween Crafts

Last week we talked about the letter H. Our theme was Halloween. First he covered the letter H and a treat bag with Halloween stickers. I also let him color and decorate a mini pumpkin.

That same day he painted a pumpkin orange. When it dried I glued on the stem. On Wednesday the boys made ghost prints with their feet. I painted their little feet and helped them make prints. When they dried we glued on googly eyes and drew a mouth.
Saturday Sawyer helped me make and decorate chocolate cupcakes for the church trunk or treat. He helped me pour in the ingredients and mix the batter. I let him decorate two cupcakes, one for him and one for me. I decorated the rest for the cake walk.
I had more planned for the week, but we were all sick at least one day last week. It was not fun! We will talk about the letter I this week, and continue to do a few halloween crafts.

Go Go Go

This week we learned about the letter G. Our theme was go. We talked about different forms of transportation all week. We really started on Wednesday and finished up today. Wednesday we talked about things that go on land like cars, trucks, tractors. We read his big truck book. In the morning he helped me glue together a car craft. It was hard, even for me, so I did most of the work while he colored a G picture and I let him glue the wheels on.
That afternoon he painted with cars. He loved that and did not want to stop.

Yesterday we talked about things that go on water. I did an activity with him to teach about things that sink and float. I had a tub of water and different objects. First I showed him how some sink and some float. Then I had him guess if it would sink or float. His guess was always float, no matter what it was. He was running around the house getting all kinds of things to throw in the water. Jax helped too. I found some stickers that I had in the cabinet with cars, airplanes, boats, etc. and let him stick them on his road he painted the day before. I drew a picture of water and sky and told him to separate the stickers by things that go on land, sky, and water. He didn't really get this at first, but he starting catching on towards the end.

This morning I helped him glue together a sailboat. This lesson taught about wholes and halves. He folded all of the pieces in half and then we glued it together to make a boat. He also colored pages to make this book.

E and F

Well, we haven't completely stopped our lessons, but things have been a little crazy around here. We have been so busy with our normal stuff, plus Jon and Kelsey were here for 2 weeks and we had Jaxon's birthday. We ended up spending 2 weeks on E and 2 weeks on F. I really didn't have much planned with E and we just didn't have time to do much. One day he made a toilet paper Elmo, but Jax tore it up before I had a chance to take a picture. We talked about exercise and did stretches one day. I also let him color a picture of capital and lower case e and glue eyes on it.

With F I had too much planned and we didn't get too it all. We did a farm theme. One activity I did with Sawyer was I let him put cotton balls on numbered sheep cards. I had him use tweezers and tongs to practice fine motor skills. He had fun with this.


One day I put on a cheezy little puppet show with a cow puppet named "Gladys". She taught the boys about all of the yummy dairy products that comes from cows. Then they got to try different foods. Even Jaxon liked this activity. After this Sawyer made a dairy basket by gluing pictures of dairy products on a basket.
The next day he made a pig puppet.


Jax's birthday party came in the middle of all this and was farm themed. Then yesterday we took the boys to Green Meadows petting farm. They were able to pet and feed all kinds of animals, milk a cow, have a hayride, and pick a pumpkin from the pumpkin patch. It was a good way to end our farm theme.

We are so busy most mornings that I am really just fitting things in where I can. I have been more intentional about his learning which was my goal, but I am definitely not as organized as I would like to be.

D for Dinosaurs

The letter of the week was D and the theme was dinosaurs. Once again, we had a very busy week. I have a feeling this will be the norm. Monday we talked about D and read a book called, "Dinosaurs Big and Small." We did a color activity that I had planned for the previous week, but didn't get to do. I put shaving cream in ziplock bags and let Sawyer put food coloring in the bags and smush it all around to make red, blue, and purple shaving cream. I was going to let him finger paint with it, but he wasn't too interested in doing that. He just wanted to smush it in the bags and that was fine with me.
Tuesday I had Sawyer color a color by letter picture of a dinosaur. It had Ds on it and I told him to color all of the D's green. He liked naming the different letters and coloring the pic although he didn't keep it in the lines.
Wed. we read a book about dinosaur bones and put a dinosaur puzzle together. He painted a plate and I cut it in the shape of a dinosaur. I found the pattern here.


Sawyer chose to make the flying dinosaur and paint it purple. I know it looks a little bit like a bird.
I don't even remember what if anything we did on Thursday. I kept his friend, Bobby again and he wasn't feeling very good, so I just tried to keep all of the boys happy. Then Jaxon started running a fever that evening.
Yesterday we went to the doctor and I told Sawyer that d is for doctor. I asked him what other words started with d. He remembered daddy starts with d and then he said "Dax starts with D." He has a hard time with his J sound, so he pronounces it with a d. I guess he was right that dax starts with d, but I had to tell him that his brothers name is Jax, not dax. I helped him make a dorothy dinosaur with a toilet paper tube. I found this activity here.

Cows

Friday, we went on a little field trip. Aunt Jessica asked us if we wanted to go to the stockyards. It was a perfect end to our C week. We saw cowboys, a cattle drive, and got to sit on a cow named Big Jake.

C is for Crazy

The letter of the week is C. Crazy is not really our theme, but we have been so busy this week that we haven't had much time for our lessons. We have been talking about colors this week. Tuesday we reviewed the letter c and then read a book called "Cat's Colors". Sawyer was at his friends house all morning, so we did this when I picked him up. When he woke up I had a little activity and snack idea that I got from Shandra's blog. I had him sort fruit loops and then the plan was for him to string them and eat them. He sorted them all by himself really well, but the yarn was to thick to string them. He didn't want to eat them, so I just threw them away. It was the first time I had ever bought sugary cereal. He usually eats plain cheerios, so he didn't care for the fruit loops. I guess that is a good thing.


Wednesday I had a friend over in the morning. When she left we read a book about a rainbow and talked about the colors in a rainbow. I let him paint a rainbow. He made quite a mess! Usually I try to do the crafts when Jax is sleeping, but he was awake this time. He was on the floor pulling things out of the cabinet and I thought he was fine, until I saw that he was sucking on the red paint jar. He was testing to make sure it really was non toxic.


Today Sawyer's friend, Bobby came over. They are just a few days apart in age. His mom and I switch off keeping each other's kids and today was my day to watch Bobby. They played together most of the morning. I read them a book about colors while they ate a colorful snack of strawberries, blueberries, and green grapes. Then I let them glue colored shapes to a clown.

I am not really sure what we will do tomorrow. I had an idea involving shaving cream and food coloring that I wanted to try. We will just have to see how the day goes.