Hooked on Phonics works for Alex!

Alex is starting to read using Hooked on Phonics for kindergarten. In one day he was reading the words of that lesson. He is about to start the third lesson and already has read the two short stories that go with the lessons. After the next lesson Alex will read his first book! I have not been using the CD, just the workbook. We have used letter magnets and I just got two packs of letter foam tiles, (88 cents at Wal-Mart) to make it more interesting. Today we handed Alex the letters of the first lesson and told him what words to spell and he got them all right, until he started being silly.

Teaching Alex to read was one of my main concerns when we started homeschool, but using Hooked on Phonics has made it so easy. I do recommend Hooked on Phonics. It is available at our library and may be at yours if you want to try it. I bought the complete set kindergarten to second grade for $40 at Big Lots.

Marie-Anne

Children's museum with mom

Today is Alex’s b-day, but that’s not why we went to the Children’s Museum. We went so my mom could enjoy spending time with her grandson that she doesn’t get to see that often. This was Alex’s third time to go there, but mom’s first. Sabrina slept the whole time until right before we left. We took lots of pictures to go into his scrapbook and she videoed him playing.

Alex looks through his scrapbook over and over and relives the events and memories of the time spent with people. It’s a way of helping him stay close to family members who live far away.

After Frank got off work we went out to eat at Famous Dave’s (YUM!) and we had them sing happy b-day to Alex.

Marie-Anne

Small Changes for a healthier me

~ No eating after 9 pm

~ Drink water after 9 pm

~ When doing errands pack a water and fruit for me

~ Walk around the neighborhood a couple times a day

~ Wear ankle weights

~ Instead of going to McDonalds on shopping days pack a lunch and go to the park

~ Spend 10 minutes a day walking up and down the stairs

~ Snack on fruit rather than junk food (most of the time)

~ Cook and eat at home more often

~ Use hand weights daily

Marie-Anne

Life with a new baby

Life sure is different around here. That’s an understatement. We are adjusting to having a baby around. Alex loves his little sister, but sometimes resents the time we spend with her. We are going from having one child who can do a lot of things for himself to having someone who depends on us for everything and having to meet Alex’s needs also. Sabrina is so cute, but I think she’s much cuter during the day than at 3 am. I am thankful that my mom is here- she’s a great help. We are blessed.

Marie-Anne

Happy 4th b-day Alex!

We celebrated Alex’s b-day today. Mom, Alex, Sabrina, and I went to Toys R Us and she got him almost the rest of the imaginext city toys plus the helicopter. I got him the police horse. Tonight we (Alex, Sabrina, Frank, mom, and I) went to Peter Piper Pizza. Alex had a blast! He almost forgot he had more gifts. Alex also got a couple of shirts, a pair of pants, a Thomas book, a mirror, and a model solar system from Frank’s parents. He got a talking fire fighter helmet from Jennifer. From us he got a construction magnet set, a drill, and some Bob the Builder toys and books.

Marie-Anne

Fisher Price Imaginext

Alex got a gift card for being in the Toys R Us b-day club. He chose the imaginext fire fighters. Alex loves fire fighters- he is one after all. We later went back and got him the fire station set for a becoming a big brother gift. My mom bought him almost the rest of the city set for his b-day. I love these toys almost as much as Alex does. We will probably get him the last few in this set for Christmas. Of course he also wants all the other sets, but he can’t have everything he wants.

Marie-Anne

Shots hurt

Shots hurt- no duh, right? When it is your child they don’t just hurt the one getting them. Alex got his 4-year-old shots today. He got 5 shots and had blood taken from his finger. He was already scared before we got there. When the nurse pricked his finger he sobbed, “God, heal me!” I had to hold him down and even then he came off the table twice. Alex was so upset that several times on the way home he would burst into tears and tell me how mean the doctor was to him. I’m glad he doesn’t have to get them that often.

Marie-Anne

It's a Girl!

Sabrina Marie Rendla was born at 5:06PM Wednesday, November 5th 2008. She was a whopping 9lb 10oz of healthy baby. Mother and child are doing fine.

Induced

Sabrina Marie Rendla is scheduled to be induced on Wednesday November 5th, unless of course, she makes her grand debut before then. Poor baby isn’t even born yet and already I’m impatient with her: HURRY UP, SABRINA!!! I’m tired of being pregnant.

Marie-Anne

Collage idea

Tonight I was cutting out some cute pictures in one of the workbooks Alex already did to make a cover for his farm lapbook. Alex came in and started telling me where to glue everything so I cut out some extra for him to make a collage. He is having a blast making that! From now on instead of just throwing the workbooks away when we are done I will cut out the cute pictures so he can make collages any time he wants.

Marie-Anne

Saving on birthdays and Christmas

I shop for b-days and Christmas throughout the year. When I find toys that Alex wants or would love on clearance I get them without him knowing. Right now I have 3 sets of Bob the Builder tools that I got for less than $6 each and a Bob the Builder truck that I got for a dollar cheaper, among other things.

I also get the b-day party stuff, (plates, cups, table cloths…) on clearance or from the dollar store. Several times throughout the year I go to the party store just to see what they have and if anything that Alex would like is on sale or clearance. Last year I got Bob the Builder stuff for a dollar each on clearance. (Since it was just family for his b-day last year I’ll reuse the Bob the Builder stuff next year.) For this b-day I got dinosaur stuff from the dollar store and some more on clearance at the party store. Well, I planned to use the dinosaur stuff this b-day, but Alex asked for firefighter decorations. So hopefully I’ll be able to find some on sale.

How do you save on b-days and Christmas gifts?

Marie-Anne

Preschool websites

Alex has discovered preschool websites. He loves Barney, Thomas the Tank Engine, Bob the Builder, Clifford, Sesame Street, and fire fighter websites. He asks to be online 2-3 times a day. He is pretty good at most of the preschool games. He has fun and is learning at the same time. The bad thing is he usually throws fits when it’s time to get off.

More on lapbooks

We have completed 5 lapbooks and are working on the 6th. Since Alex is only 3 they are pretty simple using things like connect the dots, mazes, worksheets, coloring pages, and simple experiments. Alex loves making these and he shows them off to guests. Several have games included and he loves to play the games. We have done one on Rainbows, Nutrition, Ocean Animals, Zoo Animals, Knights and are currently working on Farms. Along with each lapbook we watch kid documentaries, check out websites on the subject, and read books.

Marie-Anne

Baby shower at church

Sunday was the baby shower and potluck at church. It was a lot of fun! We had over 30 people there and everyone had a good time. We got a beautiful baby swing, a bouncer, bottles, clothes, diapers, wipes, pacifiers, a beautiful blanket one lady made, toys… Everyone was so sweet. We brought Alex a big brother gift of a couple toys and a book about becoming a big brother. Not too much longer!

Marie-Anne

Baby Shower at Frank's job

Today was the baby shower at Frank’s work. It was wonderful and a lot of fun. One lady made a beautiful and yummy cake. We got so many things for Sabrina that I couldn’t list them all. We got a Pack N Play, Diaper Genie, high chair, baby bathtub, clothes, gift cards, rattles, bowls, hooded bunny towel, diapers, wipes, swaddlers… One lady made an absolutely adorable rag doll that I’ll keep for Sabrina’s kids when she outgrows it. Another lady made a beautiful sweater, bonnet, and booties set.

Alex wasn’t forgotten either. He was the life of the party in his fire fighter costume. We got him a toy pump action fire hose that’s made like a backpack. He also got two puzzles and a fire truck that makes sounds and came with a fire fighter.

(On the way home we visited a church member who gave us a crib.) Isn’t God great?

Marie-Anne

Alex the fire fighter

I got Alex a fire fighter costume so he’s been a (very cute) fire fighter, (even more than usual) most of the afternoon and evening. I was planning on waiting until after Halloween, but it was only $5 and Frank had given Alex some money so Alex agreed to give me his money to pay for it when we got home.

Our red car has been a fire truck almost every day for months. We are fire fighters who are going to fight a fire almost every time we go somewhere. And Alex gets calls on his toy cell phone from people whose homes are on fire. “Hello. Is your house on fire? Ok. Is everybody out? Ok. We’re on our way, bye.”

For the past few days Alex has played games in the kids section of a fire fighters’ website. When we were in Phoenix I took Alex to a fire fighter museum and he still talks about it and asks to go there. I am planning on scheduling a time to tour a real fire station in a few weeks when we start the firefighter lapbook.

Alex says he has to grow big and strong so he can be a fire fighter when he grows up.

Marie-Anne

Las Vegas Zoo

Today I took Alex to the zoo. Las Vegas’ zoo is the smallest zoo I’d ever been to. It didn’t take long at all to go through it, which was fine with me because I was hot and tired.



We went inside the gift shop to rest in the air conditioned building and then walked around again, this time going into the goat’s pen. This was our second time being there.



Marie-Anne

Lapbooking

I recently discovered lapbooking- using manila folders as a portfolio of a child’s work on a certain topic. To see an example of a lapbook go to- http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/SchoolinRhome/Lapbooks/

Alex and I started our first one yesterday on Rainbows. Yes, I got the idea from the blog I mentioned, but since I’m new at this I’m making it simple. I’m only using one manila folder; on one side I have the water cycle, on the other side are some worksheets that I shrunk to fit, (two are the color wheel, one is a color by number, and the other is tracing the letter R with a picture of a rainbow. In the middle I have a mini book on Noah’s Ark and a Bible verse. I’m still trying to figure out what to do with the rest of it.

It’s fun, but takes some planning. I’m already looking for ideas for other lapbooks, but we will finish this one before we start another one.

Marie-Anne

New Creature Butterfly craft

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new 2 Corinthians 5:17

For Sunday School our craft was a butterfly mobile. I found some cute butterfly coloring pages that I copied and pasted into a Word document to get 4 to a page. I printed them on colorful paper and had the kids color them with markers. I used long lollipop sticks from Wal-Mart’s craft section as the cross. Then I used embroidery floss to tie the lollipop sticks together and to tie the butterflies to the sticks once I hole punched them. All the kids loved them.

Marie-Anne

Louisiana

While Frank headed to Florida Alex and I went to Louisiana. Monday and Tuesday we mostly visited at Mom’s. I thanked them several times for getting electricity back just in time for my visit. The hurricane came through the week before and they just got electricity back as Mom was driving us from the airport.

On Wednesday we went to lunch with Dad and a few minutes from the house we saw a box turtle crossing the highway so we stopped to get it. Alex had never seen a box turtle, (though he has seen a desert tortoise). He was very excited and watched it crawl around in a box for a while and kept picking it up.

After lunch I took Alex to Adam’s Pest Control to see their amazing collection of bugs. Alex was very excited and ran from display to display and back again. You would have thought it was the greatest museum in the world instead of a lobby. I was impressed with their collection too. I had never seen so many butterflies.

We left there and headed to Colfax to visit my Nana and Jimmy (my dad). While we visited Alex let the turtle crawl around on the floor which was fine until he decided to push the poor thing like it was a toy car. The turtle’s traumatized for life. When Courtney got home from school she drove Alex in her dune buggy. I told her not to go too fast, but what’s too fast to a 17 year old? She came right back and said Alex started crying. He said it was so fast he got dizzy. Then Alex kept going on and on about on the way home until I told him he’d be in trouble if he mentioned it again.

After we showed the box turtle to Mom and Mamaw we let it go near one of Mom’s flower beds.

Thursday Mom, Dad, Alex, Amelia, and I met my friend Tiffany at Chuck E. Cheese.This was Alex’s first time there and of course it was Amelia’s (she’s one). Both of them were excited and really enjoyed every bit of it. Alex even ate some pizza, (unlike at Peter Piper Pizza).

Later Mom and I took Alex to the Louisiana Maneuvers and Military Museum at Camp Beauregard. We didn’t actually go inside the museum, we will do that next time. Outside they had tanks, a helicopter, a plane, hummers, and several other pieces of military equipment that I’m not familiar with. Alex of course loved every minute. We didn’t stay long just long enough to see it all and for Mom to get some pictures.

All in all it was a real good trip, but I’m glad to be home.

Marie-Anne