September 20-27, 2013

Em... So I'm just doing weekly updates apparently...

Park and bike riding with Dad. Mall with Aunt Dotty. Sunday school (story of God's promise to Abram and related crafting), church, and socializing at the park after church. Grocery shopping. Bible study (with plenty of older ladies to dote on Lucy). Library (more Magic School Bus computer game). A trip to the Chuck E Cheese today, because I was tired Lucy having to put up with such a boring mum.

Lots of writing (she tells us what she wants to write, we spell it, she writes the letters) and making books, tags, and signs. LOTS of playing with her assortment of action figures. The last two days they've all been traveling around in their RV (which I believe was being used as a school bus). Thursday she did almost nothing else all day but play with those guys. At one point she tried to make a kite. Today she made a wedding cake out of Duplos.

Watching My Neighbor Totoro, Blue's Clues, Elmo, Pirates Who Don't Do Anything, Hairspray, Brave, Cars...

Reading Scaredy Squirrel books, and.... no, mostly Scaredy Squirrel books. She had me read some Jesus Storybook Bible last night.

 

Surprise party made out of Legos -- note the traffic cone party hats.

 

 

This week's library visit included a little chat about banned books, and how just because someone doesn't like something, doesn't mean they should want no one to be able to read it; and the fact that no one ever tries to get boring, stupid books banned. The challenged ones are always the interesting ones. Then I checked out In the Night Kitchen and And Tango Makes Three, but she hasn't had me read them to her yet.

 

 

A drawing of  Totoro, a soot sprite, Mei, Lucy, and a soot sprite. She and Norman watched Totoro while I was at skating.

 

 

Play gym thingy at the Chuck E Cheese. 

Thursday, September 19, 2013, etc.

Whew, the days just get away from me sometimes. What Lucy has been up to lately:

She set up her old broken play laptop and her wooden cash register together to imitate my set up of transferring VHS tapes to my hard drive. The VHS tapes were the two-hole wood pieces from this tool box set. She was also pretending her old broken little calculator was an iPod. She's push a button and then start singing a song in the middle, then push another button and stop.  [PS - Yes, old broken electronics are awesome toys. Maybe when she gets older she'll want to take them apart.]

She wrote this out.

I said, "Oh, you spelled 'Lu-lu!'" and she was like, "No, it says 'Lu-lu-lucy!', like Piglet says when she's scared and needs help from someone." Ohhhhh...

She found some pompoms and some cardboard bingo markers in the craft drawer and decided they were tiny plates and food for her dolls. Man, that takes me back... Exactly the kind of thing I used to do.

Wednesday we went to the library and she played that Magic School Bus computer game again. She loves that thing! This is like from the mid 90s or something. It's super fancy. Then we hung out with like a two-year-old and his mom, playing non-magnetic magnetic poetry.

Today we went to a Talk Like a Pirate Day book and craft event with a local homeschooling group. We dressed up like pirates, she made a pirate puppet, and ran around playing with the other kids.

[Okay, she looks kinda deranged here. And like she's missing teeth, but she's not. She's got her princess wand tucked into her belt, and she's wearing a fuzzy tiara.]

Oh, and she refused to be a pirate, but instead had to be a princess pirate. Obviously.

Today she drew a picture to send to a friend in the real mail!

She's been watching Cars, Despicable Me, Bear in the Big Blue House, Charlie Brown.

Last night we read a Magic School Bus book about flowering plants.

Thursday, September 12, 2013

I woke up to Lucy setting up her nap mat and crawling tunnel thing in my bedroom, saying she was going to do a circus. The circus soon morphed into some church announcements (with "juice hour" instead of coffee hour, because "kids can't drink coffee, because it's full of decaf").

She finally let me read her that Scaredy Squirrel book. At the end, he's roasting marshmallows over a toaster. Which I didn't even realize you could do, so we tried it! I had some corn-free (read, made of actual sugar) marshmallows I'd found at the health food store about a month ago. The outsides got ever so slightly crispy and the insides got all melty! Lucy tried it, but she didn't like it! LOL. What.

I was cleaning the kitchen, and from the other room I hear, "How do you make paper??" So I tried to explain it, but then I realized that there's probably a "How It's Made" episode about that. Sure enough! So we watched it. It also told us how jeans, desktop computers, and pane glass is made. But I think they lost Lucy around the end of jeans.

Asked to have her toes painted red, so she watched Curious George while they dried.

Then we met up with some new friends at a playground/farmers market. Lucy played hide and seek, Little Red Riding Hood (which looks remarkably like tag with a girl, a wolf, and a basket), and helped me pick out some vegetables.

Then we were about to leave, but this lady came up to us and said she and the rest of her artists guild had some free art for kids to make! So of course we had to do that.

 

[Coloring a pre-printed canvas.]

 

 

[Blowing watercolors around with a straw.]

I read her The Dark by Lemony Snicket (highly recommended, by the way).  

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Library Day. She discovered the Magic School Bus games on the computer there, which was a major coup. She learned all about geology and volcanoes and rocks and canyons. She was fascinated. And before that she had the computer read her Green Eggs and Ham.

I checked out another book about Scaredy Squirrel (one of her current favorite fictional characters). She hasn't actually let any of us read it to her yet. She's just been looking at it and trying to read it and figure out what's going on by herself.

She spent a bunch of time playing with blocks/dolls.

I had to explain to her why she can't dig in the dirt of the sunflower seedlings. :-/

Painted with watercolors and put some of her Blue's Clues color mixing knowledge to use and was very excited about it.

She decided to watch Cars with Scaredy Squirrel. She spent a whole lot of it explaining things to the imaginary squirrel as if he had never heard of the movie.

I read her No Roses For Harry!

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

My day started with spelling my name for Lucy while I was still half asleep so she could write it on a piece of paper. 

Then she was drawing pictures of TVs and remotes and things, so everyone would know what her electronics shop sells. 

Then while I was in the shower (apparently the whole time I was in the shower), Lucy and Norman were working on this sign for her pretend shop (Norman spelling and Lucy writing):

 

We watched The Price Is Right. We ate lunch. We watched Blue's Clues (Steve goes to college, building with blocks, play pretend school which ends up at a pizza parlor [these preschooler shows and their school propaganda -- nobody's school day ends up at a pizza parlor except on the TV!]). 

Somewhere around the episode with the blocks, she got out her wooden blocks, and built a playground just like Steve was doing.

Then she built a school.  

 

[Here are all the students and the teacher painting at easels.]

Then she got the Duplos involved and built a pizza shop. This went on until dinner. And also after dinner, until Lucy and Norman played hide and seek.

Dotty read her that Bear in the Big Blue House book about the potty. Again.

Also our sunflowers are coming along nicely! Lucy thinks they're pretty cool.

Monday, September 9, 2013

Grocery day! So many errands. Lucy had this grand, exciting plan to pick ice cream for her One Thing from the stores, but then she saw the Naked-type smoothie juice and picked one of those instead (a common occurrence). I was very surprised, but she seemed content.

She did some math this morning before we left. And while we were driving, actually. Addition, subtraction, and practicing writing the numbers on her dry erase workbook, and learning to count past 20.

Watched a Laurie Berkner DVD. Watched Blue's Clues (one about school and one about show mythology [seriously, if your kids' show runs for 5 seasons, apparently you start making up complicated back stories for the characters]). 

 Played "candy counter" with Norman (in which she sells him a box of chocolates to give to me, and by "box of chocolates", we mean a large Sandra Boynton board book). She wrote this card! Norman told her which letters to write, but she drew them without help or guidance. 

 

Dotty read her The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes.

Sunday, September 8, 2013

 

Church. Sunday School (apparently they talked about Cain and Able). That little blueish-purple thing on the side is a "Dory fish" -- there is a large tropical fish aquarium where the church meets. She also made a cotton ball sheep. Then we had to have some hard talks during the church service about stopping yourself from doing things you want to do (scream and flail) so you can help other people (your parents). Then after church playing and eating at the park, as will become normal. Unfortunately at the park she got a taste of kids being exclusionary, not wanting to share, and running away when they see you coming. She thought they were playing, but they were extremely upset with her. It looked like this: 

 Once again, more talking. She wasn't particularly upset, but I still am. Sigh.

Then she went to the bouncy castle place with Dotty. And then to get frozen yogurt.

Later after they got back, she got out her new tennis shoes (with laces) and had me show her how to tie the laces. She just did one shoe, and then after I showed her on that one, she took it back off. Aaaand.... done!  :-)

After dinner she kind of read us this book. Mostly we pronounced the word "yes" in a bunch of languages and told her whether or not we could speak them.

I read her When You've Got To Go.

Saturday, September 7, 2013

Poured her own cereal this morning (as she's been doing... she chose a box of cereal for her One Thing at the grocery store the other week).

Played outside. Used the sprayer on the hose to spin her pinwheel really fast, then Norman showed her how to use it on her new water wheel. :-)

She and I played "tic-tac-toe" on a board that she made with the dry erase pad -- not quite a standard setup. LOL. Then she was writing "ojo" again. Then we were talking about uppercase and lowercase J's. Then she turned the page on her dry erase workbook and found a page with a house. So she decided to draw a picture of House. Dr. House. With his doctor bag. And the first two letters of his name. Naturally. (And that's a couch that turned into a bench. I don't know.)

 

[This one is from the other day, but I forgot about it. It's a map. Street, two cars, semi truck, stop sign, speed limit sign, sidewalk, yard, house.]

Went to the park with Norman. She's getting really good at riding her balance bike, apparently.

Played hide and seek with Dotty.

At dinner, she read us a book. Seriously, she gave a dramatic and annotated reading of I Love My New Toy! (Elephant & Piggie). It was awesome. She needed help with one word, I think.

She took a bath with her foam letters, and read the "OH MY" I left on the wall for her (and Norman) to find.

Dotty read her All About Scabs.

Thursday and Friday, September 5-6, 2013

 

We went to a children's consignment sale. There was free popcorn! Lucy got to see the cool bridge we have around here.

I got her a new (to us) dollhouse at the sale. I'd been looking for a plain, sturdy wood one for a while. This one is great and so was the price! (Elmo is a baby in a crib with a nightlight in the photo.) 

She watched Winnie the Pooh.

Dotty read her If You Give a Dog a Donut.

Friday: She created an office for herself (looks like the offices at the bank we've kept having to go back to lately). She made herself a name tag with letter stickers, then insisted on making me one with "Jessica" instead of "Jessie", so I spelled it out for her while she found each sticker.

Watched Blue's Clues (measuring, playing store, birthday party, numbers, and counting to 100).  

[PS - Have I already mentioned this here? If you have a Wii, you can download an Amazon app for free that will let you watch Amazon streaming from your TV. Which means if you have Amazon Prime, you can watch all the free shows and movies from your TV! And you can set up a PIN so your kids can't just buy stuff willy-nilly through the Wii. Very cool!]

Threw her own pretend surprise birthday party. I gave her a new dress-up dress.

She wanted to know how they get the two cars to your house if you win two cars on The Price Is Right, so I looked it up and found an interview with someone who won on the show. Cool info.

She also knows how to switch to the Wii on the TV a different, easier way than I had ever done it. Seriously. It's starting. She can work the TV remote better than I can. Insert all the cliches! here.

Met and played with a new friend while I chatted with her mom.

Played with her instruments and old, broken microphone. That was fun to watch.

Dotty read her That Big Guy Took My Ball! (Gerald and Piggie)

She wanted me to write down the names of the two kids we met at the park a couple weeks ago. Then she decided to try to write some of the letters. Then some numbers. Then a "hunting bag", which it turns out she meant what I would commonly call a "hobo sack". Then I made her a "hunting bag" for real with a stick and a bandana. She loves it!

 

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Church. New church, actually. She's slowly learning that one hour per week, if we have to pick, we're going to pay attention to God instead of her. She isn't taking this very well.  She enjoyed meeting a bunch of new people, and she spent the sermon in "children's church", which seemed to be a discussion group for elementary-school-aged children on the sermon topic.  She also worked on a coloring page, during which time she uttered the following: "Oh, and I can color the clouds blue! ....Wait a minute. Clouds are white." Really? I feel like most kids don't figure this out about coloring until they're like 6 or 7. I know I didn't.

After church they all meet up at a park to eat snacks and hang out, so she got to play on the playground.

Watched Sesame Street Country Songs. I insisted on it only being played once. My ears! 

She went to the mall with Aunt Dotty. They took photos in the photo booth, which Lucy always asks to do with me, but I always say no. Aunts are fun.

After they got home, I read her a book about signs. Then we put together a wooden puzzle of lower case letters. She seems to know about 90% of the names of the lower case alphabet. Then she wanted to spell things with the letters, so I got out more wooden letters I have so we would have enough. She had me spell the names of some of the characters on Bear in the Big Blue House, because she spelled "Ojo" first.

Then she and Norman played hide and seek. And "tag your day", I think? ("Tag your day" is like "tag you're it", except you walk instead of running. We made this up a year or two ago, but I have no idea why she named it thus.)

She sang and played instruments with Dotty after dinner, I think? 

Then Dotty read her Harry the Dirty Dog again.