Tuesday – letter T – Temple – Turtle – Truman – Truck – Tiger – Triangle. Also the All about Me theme. Weight & height was fun to do. Write down a few facts. Draw a picture of my fam (I love Truman’s drawing!). Peaches and Conference Mix for snack. Lily broke her arm yesterday. Aaaak – she was a trooper trying to color with her left hand. I’m grateful for Wendi who encouraged me to do preschool. It helps me have fun with the kiddos!
Field Trip to Burgess Orchard in Alpine today. We took neighbor Lily along. She is a great pal for Truman. Tru, Lily, and Eliza enjoyed a slice of free peach, a baby gala to enjoy, and the best apple cider sample from Big Red Barn. Liza ate through most of her apple. She was overjoyed! We’re sad to see peach season end, but we also enjoy apple season! Apples with caramel… apple crisp… apple dumplings… yum!
This lady is so darling. Her name is Vanay (as in the feminine form of Van). Her dad, Van Burgess, ran the farm. She was telling me about what a great athlete he was and played basketball at BYU. She is a delight. She used to teach kindergarten so she showed us the star inside the apple. She let the kids see how the apples were shined by bouncing along a soft roller. She gave Tru the hugest apple pick from the day… honey crisp!
On our drive home, we went the back way by the temple. “Bemple” Liza shouted from the back seat. The kids love to see the temple!
Tru was sent to timeout before bed for being defiant. Sigh…
It took him 30 minutes to attempt to calm down from his sadness.
We brushed teeth while he was still crying.
And then prayers…
Tru while still sobbing:
“Grateful I can not have a sad day.
Grateful I can have a great day and a good good day.
Grateful the whole family could eat dinner with me.
Grateful I can not have a sad day.”
Poor Tru.
Today in the car he said, “We can do hard things” related to him learning to put on his seatbelt.
He’s learning so much these days… or hopefully learning at least.
Controlling emotions is often a HARD THING for most of us here on earth.
We can do it with God’s blessings!
Preschool went pretty well today. Tru didn’t even have a tantrum. Hopefully he’s used to the schedule. I love preparing lessons… more tiring to execute, but this has been good for me to do with Truman. 3dinosaurs.com has some awesome free printables for preschool. Today we learned about the letter A and the number 2. We test-tasted apples. Lily liked all of them. Tru and I didn’t like the granny smith as it was way too sour compared to the others. I think my favorite flavor was Gala… favorite crispness was Fuji. Pink Lady are really my favorite but they are usually too expensive to buy. Anyhoo… we had exercise time, watched part of Johnny Appleseed, for snack pretended to plant apple seeds, grow pretzel trees with broccoli as leaves, and then ate apples. I liked the Ants Tru was drawing on his picture. Last of all, we threaded apple jacks necklaces. Lily’s motor skills were more advanced and she quickly put hers together. I helped Liza and Tru. They enjoyed eating them.
Last year I so wasn’t up for doing preschool at home with Max (and Tru & Liza as guests). I even talked with a friend about trying to do a simple one. Interesting that one year it sooooo wouldn’t work, but this year we can pull it off. Fewer kids at home to quarrel/teach makes a difference on my emotional capability I guess.
“M” letter at home preschool today. Muffins, M&Ms, Marshmallows, Milk. If you Give a Moose a Muffin Book. Totally awesome moose antler hat (sorry for the tantrum photo of Tru… but this was a major reality… a nice tidy schedule throws him off, I’m afraid). Watercolor paint letter M. Mountains, magic, mom, max, monkey, moon, mm-mm-mmm. We had 5 little Monkeys jumping on the bed song. Itsy Bitsy Monkey climbing the coconut tree. And last of all to get all wiggles out – 3 little monkeys jumping on the tramp! What a time! And then I took a nap. True Story.
This is how Zuzu used to look – at birth – at age 1 – and at age 2.
This was her yesterday. I blinked and she grew up!
When Tru was a wee babe, some of us thought he looked a bit like Grandpa Larry Nelson… something in his chin, his lips, his ears. I was thinking about this again recently. Not perfect twins, but a few similarities.
I was showing my kids these heritage photos this morning. I especially liked the Missionary poses with the hats! I believe both Larry & his dad Lawrence are both on the right… As in my right! The unfortunate thing was that these two never met in mortality. Lawrence died in the Flu pandemic of 1918 while his wife Blanche was pregnant with Larry. The glorious blessing is of life after death and that we know they have greeted each other as father and son. Such a sweet reunion.
Out of the blue, Truman decided to show us his MAD face. We asked about his happy face. We had to tell him to laugh to get his real smile. And boy howdy does he love c-c-c-corn. Today in Preschool he learned about the letter C. He said that a Cat ate a Cookie. He told Hannah in his cute Truman voice that he loves carrots and corn and it makes him so happy when mom and dad make them for him. Good thing we had Corn for dinner. Tru is quite the kid. He’s learning to tell stories. His imagination is awakening. So grateful for happy times with him!
Tru is 3. He will not make the deadline for Kindergarten next year. His friend Lily does make the deadline. Thus, they will be in different grades. Sigh… we like Lily. She is nice to Tru.
When Wendi asked if we wanted to do a very casual preschool with Tru & Lily, I hesitated. I wasn’t sure I could commit to anything that involved people outside the family…. meaning I didn’t want to disappoint or let down if we were running on fumes. But I decided it would be good for me to do this for Tru since it was with only one family… = 2 kids! Hopefully I won’t disappoint! Plus, neither of us wanted to pay $70 a month for the neighborhood preschool.
Today was our first day of preschool. Please note: I am a much better preschool mom in my mind, than in reality. LOL. Lots of ideas… not enough energy or time.
But our first day turned out okay.
We had a play time.
We put together the alphabet with blocks.
The kids can count to about 20 … not 26 quite yet.
They had fun identifying the letters. Easy Peasy for them!
We had a snack.
Color & cut out flash cards. (p.s. when tru was cutting with scissors he said, “I am soooo happy.” Lily couldn’t understand why. His first time with scissors!!!)
A learning activity outside on the tramp throwing a ball and saying the alphabet and counting.
Then craft time… cheerios glued onto the letters in their name.
Hopefully I’ll get into a better groove and be creative and prepared ahead of time.
Overall… I’m so glad we are doing this. It is so good to do creative things with my kids. It forces me to sit down with them and teach. Lame that I wasn’t already doing that. Liza hung out with us which made it tricky, but now she can participate in her own way.
The first hour I was thinking, “Wow. I could totally have a small preschool when Liza is that age and Tru is in Kindergarten.” About 3/4 way through I was thinking, “Wow. I’m tired. This requires a lot of constant activities and patience.” Isn’t that the way it is!
Go Preschool!
Max and I are Graham Crackers and milk buddies. Liza joined us for an afternoon snack.
Whenever I go to use my phone, Eliza thinks she needs it. I think here she was instagramming a picture of a York peppermint patty.
This is a bit of what I heard in the dryer. Thank you Tru for the rocks in pockets. The screws were Jimmy’s from working outside.
Hannah had her first volleyball game with the city league. Her team color is brown. Her team name is “Mustache Jaguars”. They won their first match. Hannah is in Outside Hitter position in this picture. Fun to learn a new sport.
The flowers in the garden finally bloomed. I think they are calendula and they were planted to protect the tomatoes from some bug. They are cheerful.
Tru always smiles when he plays baseball. Plus, he is quite a good little hitter.