Category Archives: pre reading

getting the most out of a day

usual work day, i think cloning might be in order – though hopefully i could have the version where they forgot to clone the body fat, and that is just halved between my doubles! so having done my duty, driving home i thought i should try and do a music practice with SB [usually i feel a bit up for nothing] so i did, and we had a lovely piano practice together [we don't do these often enough!] then, whils waiting for dinner, i got some really easy first steps in french books and SB, BB and myself chanted words for farm animals, practiced saying if we would want one or not, and if we wanted an enormous one or a little one. SO feeling better that have done what they want!!

not sure what else they did with the day. SB did some french earlier, they had model crocodile making equipment out on the table! def some magic school bus watching!

After tea, sb and I watched the second half of the european womens gymnastics, which she really really enjoyed. telling me how one days he would be watching e and r, as they were v clever and were going to be in competitions! oh and that fran would be excellent at the floor! she read some of her new earth book [ours a fraction of cost as ex library!] mainly the volcano section, and the read to me the magic tree house hawaii one. following on from the fab gawain book, sb wanted some more king arthur, and we happend to have an orchard books legend of king arthur, so have started reading that to her. it is a nice read, but morpurgo def a better man with words! as i left, she was reading a chapter of the magic school bus volcano.

looking forward both to our st georges day weekend, and also to out camping trip at the bank hols :smile:

Just another Tuesday

Morning, off to the Library. SB on her inline skates, BB on scooter. So took much longer given SB’s skating speed at the moment. BB very funny, she is very much into mad scootering at the moment. Zooming along shouting madly, she was scootering along, going ‘look I can steer’ when she crashed straight into a telegraph pole :lol:

Library, storytime for BB – SB sits and reads other things now, a bit of craft sticking making tulip pictures. which BB insisted we bring home and put up over the cooker taking down old artwork. Finding some more books – SB brought home 9!! Mr Men books. I told her she would have to read them all herself as i wasn’t going to read them (really dislike the Mr Men books), a bit of nattering and home.

Met Trish, other HE mum and child C in library, and they came back a bit later for coffee/lunch and playing. Trying to play indoors didn’t quite work, but decamping to the garden and the sun was much more successful.

After they’d departed they made birthday cards for Helen, and wrapped presents. SB had to go over the road and buy some more wrapping paper. except for crossing the road (which she can do fine at the zebra crossing, but just likes you to watch her in case she isn’t sure about it) she manages such shopping trips OK. BB stuck a strip of paper together and wrapped it up to make what was apparently a fish for Mummy.

SB got on with some more Getty and Dubay handwriting, followed by some maths. Stuff on money (Dollars and Cents – it’s Singapore maths, but it’s all decimal so she’s happy with that) all pretty easy stuff. Was a litle stuck on what writing say 65c in Dollars meant and why it was $0.65 – she got the hang of it though. Though I mad a bad job of trying to explain decimal points. which reminded me we need to do stuff stuff on fractions reallys.
Meanwhile BB played one of those impenetrable 3yo kiddie games with a seemingly random selection of objects, in this case something like a teaspoon, a plastic dinosaur, a plastic tub, a pair of nail clippers and wooden lolly stick.

I did stuff like get dinner going, hanging up washing etc.

Sat and read a bit (of one of the numerous new Book People books) of a book about Rainforests, which some how involved a conversation on rabbits eating their own poo :? They then sat and read some of their library books before dinner.

a blog filled day

we are awaiting the ending of an ebay auction which we would have liked to have won. we have placed a max which is low, but reasonable, but is obviously lower than the reserve. i hate reserve auctions. i refuse to ‘bid up’ to see where the reserve is. And I think in this case it was obviously at something unrealistic, as we are nowhere near our max bid yet. grumble grumble moan moan!!

we had a playdate today with rainbows friend [RR for short]. she was obviously in a bit of a weird mood from the start, dropped off by her mum early in a tearing hurry [our girls stilll in pj's!] (Note From Chris: Early here was 10.20 :-) )they started playing ok, but after a bit our girls keen to go outside and enjoy sun, couldn’t understand why RR not so keen. but apparently she had watched a film on volcanoes. we prob live in one of the least likely areas for a surprise volcano in the world! it was oK if she wore S’s clothes though, and I went out too. fair enough, i sowed some seeds and interacted in minimalistic reassuring fashion. [a tsunami would be much more of a worry really]. SHe’s a lovely girl really though, just caught on an ‘unusual’ day – and no more off planet than SB can be. However, she did graze herself on slide, so i carried her in and settled her in front of magic school bus, and upset mine by insisting they watch it with her. pizza decorate yourself for lunch perked things up, and then after lunch i did an ad hoc weaving with scoobido fish dreamcatcher thing – which sort of went ok, BB and RR both gave up, and i finished theirs, but they tod me which colours and when to put pony beads on. SB did hers beautifully, but with a fair tension on it, so it is more of a tube fish!

BB showed RR her magnets, and a long discussion about magnets ensued, and a bit of iron detectiving. am planning to do some magnet stuff tomorrow. wish i had sorted out stuff to make an electromagnet, maybe next time. the older ones prob know it all already. hmmm

they went off and played happily for a bit, then a something or other, and I ended up hugging RR and chris SB whilst watching magic tree house and eating apricot scones [lovely] . so peace and happiness returned, chris and sb walked her home, and played for a bit there, as she was much happier back on home turf [obviously being about 200m away, no risk of volcanoes!]

BB and I did other bits and pieces together during the day. she was still wailing about lost dinodoors [if anyone goes to magna, or anywhere else that sells them, could we pay you for a 50p stretchy lizard?] so we made some about of fimo – a t -rex and 2 babies, that could also be eaten! we then went on to make the yummy apricot scones. mmmmm. We read alot of books together, and did some counting and guessing starts of words, and lots of singing. we also made a fish out of airdrying clay, whcih she insisted had a sad mouth [like prunella scales in that supermarket advert!]
Chris picked up BB from the floor at some point in the afternoon, and she really hurt her arm. not a dramatic pick up or anything, but she was really tearful, and held it as if broken. i checked all over and it seemed fine, so calpoled. after an hour of no mvt i decided we should go to have it xrayed, and she wailed and stormed she wasn’t going, and suddenly it was fine to push me away with it etc. yep, it isn’t broken!

anyway, relaxed bed time. chris has started on peter pan with SB, and we played battleships for our evening game.

ISQ

well, SB reading loads- we got given some animal arks, and she has loved them, and read loads of them. also she has read the sonlight third grade detectives, all the magic tree houses, and all the magic school bus chapter books i had so far, and also horrid henry. these are all nice easy reading books for her. she has stretched herself with reading ballet shoes again, but 21 balloons was a bit difficult [well, its language is quite ornate!]. so i have bought some more 3rd grade detectives and magic school bus from amazon, as well as a couple of other things…

SB has done an enchanted learning booklet about african animals, [nearly a lapbook!!] and continued to read the ‘box books‘ about them [she chooses something to be interested in and we together find books around that and stick in the box for her to find and read as and when she fancies] she also wanted some explorer stuff, so a couple of explorer books threw themselves into the amazon basket too [all that disappointment from non-tent buying as we can't find a khyam ridgipod porch, and geting the rest without doesn't make sense for us]. She has regularly done her maths, still a fair bit of webkinz. oh, and although short we have done a lot of violin practice together, and she has done piano independently, and some with today. i think she prefers the piano at the mo, well, there is no setting up to do.

BB has continued her dinodor fest, and with chris has started to make a papier mache landscape for them to live in, she got 2 more from Merry as part of my bonus spending. SB bought herself castle keep, so we have played that every evening, and she is getting very good at it. in fact, if you click on the links, you can see my order at the mo! SB and BB have obviously got a bit more of a surprise coming! BB also been entirely fixated by watching magic school bus, though have persuaded her to let me read her lots of dinosaur themed books [katie and dinosaurs, picturepedia dinosaurs, various dinosaur fact books]

they went on an egg hunt today – as chris twittered, it wasn’t entirely successful…

surprisingly productive duvet day

after a really lovely, but emotionally challenging easter, i have found relaxing and sleeping difficult, so having overslept this am, i declared duvet day.

[oh, just in case chris doesn't blog, he and sb did loads of map related things yesterday, as well as library and a power cut]

so, when i got up, they were breakfasting [and SB was reading at the same time] BB and i did jigsaws, read books [with a bit of alphabet and number recognition] and tickled. SB did some maths and made and wrote in a birthday card for my dad using paintshop. crafts was a clear request from BB, so i got out an easter craft we hadn’t got round to at my parents, and painted easter window decs. still having glass paint, we then painted some of our takeaway boxes – bb plans to put dinodoors in hers!

BB and i read about birds [another fascination of her is eggs], and SB read a ‘box book’ about why tigers have stripes. SB and i played about with violin practice, and then a viola that mum has given me so that i can play a lower line than before. i realised that although i have messed about with a cello, i have never played the viola before. BB baked scones with chris, and we enjoyed them as a snack afterwards.

we all looked at our science growing experiments. the ones in the dark had grown very tall to try and find light, and had pale leaves [but still tasted ok], the ones in the fridge had only just started to sprout, the dry ones hadn’t done anything, and we have topsy turvied the bean, and discussed the effect of gravity. we also started our grow your own mushroom kit. they decided the spore and straw smelled yukky. chris and i rather liked it! lets see if it works [our previous mushroom forays in leeds failed totally]

since it was duvet day, we then watched numerous episodes of magic school bus back to back [thanks to some friends oop north]. i really recommend them. yep, they are in the all pervasive american, but there is a lot of science in there, they use the proper words, and it is still enjoyable rather than worthy. i had BB trying to tell me all about the crabbity zooey ones [zooplankton] following one about food chains in the sea. and i learned something in the how hens eggs are made one!

SB did a bit of education city, and then a lot of webkinz, which she has really got into and enjoys. we also did a good tidy up. so, all in all a very productive duvet day i think! [oh, and we did lots of my favourtie things - like snuggling, cuddling, tickling and laughing]. oh, and chris set fire to the rubber seal on our pressure cooker, as he lit the wrong gas rig – sigh!!! [also cue much choking and spluttering]

hmm

i think i must be tired. have found today v difficult. want to wrap in a duvet a hibernate!

chris took sb to drama, which she loved, bb and i played with bricks and blocks, went into garden for a run around, recovered the veg patch where wind had blown off mulch, looked at spring plants and played hide and seek. we watered our seeds in the propagator and looked at how our science seeds were doing.

chris’s parents popped by to drop of easter eggs, and stayed for lunch and afternoon until sb off at rainbows. we did do some violin in that time, and bb did some of her ‘match and sort’ both girls looked at a road safety thing.

i cooked nasi goreng for tea, and realised i was temper challenged when bb wouldn’t eat it as she doesn’t eat rice – since when! so i have taken myself off to the naughty couch, and will eat chocolate and have an early night

bring me fire!

today had a raucous wake up call, and both girls were kicked out of our bed and went downstairs to watch raven, until SB complained BB was la-ing too loudly [which she was].

we started with crafts, as both girls keen to hama. SB used the fab gold beads from merry to make a lovely heart. BB also hama-ed a heart and played with the maxi hama too. BB then did a sticking play [bits of polystyrene to other bits!] should bin it soon… kept us all occupied for a bit, with general chatting.

i was reading elsewhere disclaimers on what is blogged, and i have to say that i am presuming people will know that i hug, tickle and play silly games, we talk non stop [like wind tunnel here some days] and there is low to high level sibling bickering depending on what kind of day it is. no, i don’t really know why i blog. perhaps in case i get alzheimers, or if there is some external need to remember? i don’t know whether this blog would actually do what i guess i would most want it to, to say to my girls how much i love them, have always loved them and always will. and that i attempted to be the best parent i was capable of being, and i tried hard! it possibly wouldn’t cos i bang on about what we have done, but i guess that is the focussed HE bit. And yes, because i don’t blog our stream of conversation [which i couldn't even if i wanted too] i guess this isn’t the full picture either. but, i am this kind of blogger, so this is what you get. i think if you know me you are more likely to fill me and mine around the words, rather than try and make us out of the words?

anyway, we did some work. I have been encouraging bb, in the hopes that stimulation will improve her stroppiness. but trying to balance this against SB’s needs too. SO today BB and i have played alot with the digicolour, done some pre-handwriting practice, done basic counting and matching and sorting, and looked at some letters. She declined violin or recorder practice. we read loads together and sang and did geomags shapes. when SB first had geomags – and for ages afterwards – she mostly used them to make lollipops. BB is entirely different [well, she is about lots of things!] and really wants to make 3d objects – today she made 3d star and a pentagonal house. [3d]

SB and i did a violin practice together, looked at some of the languages section on education city together. SHe also did some handwriting practice and singapore maths. she has read loads of the magic tree house books, so bang goes the plan of reading books around them, as she’s not so keen on re-reading, ho hum! planning to get some magic school bus chapter books and some dk level 4 readers. we get loads of books from library too, but she is a bit of a reading machine. would like some interesting fact based books to offset rainbow fairies and animal ark a bit! SB declined moving and grooving, latin, piano, science kit and barefoot buddhist tales.

both girls did some cbeebies website and colouredsome printouts, and some fighting over the digicolour. [i failed to buy one from sarah years ago!] we had a long discussion about birds as we fed them, and i bought this patio stand to put some of our defender feeders on, as they are hidden in the trees – good for birds, and not so much for watching girls! but it was significantly reduced! [as are some of the bird feeders]

chris doing some more de-ivying around veg bed and a big burn. both girls helped and played with fire [cringe] but no burnings! [bb was keen to discuss burning and dying] they sort of climbed a tree and messed about a bit. prepared for the big storm if it happens by putting toys away. bit concerned as we have plastic bag instead of a pane of glass in the big window, and the conservatory looks like it might fall down if you breathe on it. hmm.

i think that might be it?

oh yes, Sn did a fiar bit of ds-ing, and she is thinking of buying mariokart with her birthday money. we played continuo for our evening game

red red red red blue yellow

today i thought i had better get organised and be as active and there mother as i could. plan to exude a calm environment and not screech. started off well with chris cooking me breakfast, as i am a bit knackered cos i slept with sb last night at her request – always leads to a dreadful night sleep for me, but it is an occasional treat for her, and i am trying to climb up the motherdaq.

i think i am going to lose track, as it has been a busy day, should have twittered! i know SB did a fair amount of education city. once she found the bit that said what the games were going to be about, she chose grids, multiplication etc, and enjoyed it. i will pay to go up a level, as this one def too easy. BB and I did lots of playing with merry’s borrowed digicolour, and i realised that BB not only can count to 10, but does recognise all the numbers as well [even if it is 1, orange, pink, 3,4 etc...thanks numberjacks! i liked that 12 was purple orange - sigh!!] BB did some games on the ‘puter whilst SB and I read the india chapter from SOTW2 [which i know she has done with chris before] and looked at some pictures of the caves and findings from the gupta empire. we also played a bit of spin the globe with SB and BB, finding which countries we landed on. SB read and did the jigsaws in an explorers book whilst BB and i played, and then SB did violin practice with me. she did some very good sight reading, and we are working on rhythm – at the moment it is easy bits quaver speed and hard bits minim, rather than whats on the page!
then we had lunch…

in the afternoon, the girls were keen to go out skating. there was a fine drizzle so SB was in charge of seeing when it had cleared up. this was obviously a mistake – or perhaps the mistake was in me not confirming, as we ended up going out in heavier than light drizzle! oh well, there i am walking the village with a v straight leg skating sb – who was just starting to losen up as we approached our front door on the way back, and bb, being v cute on her skates.

on our return, BB and I made cookies, i think SB was doing something on cbeebies. then i was bored, so i suggested we made coil pot easter eggcups. luckily both girls thought this was a fab idea, so we all sat down and did coil pot eggcups with air drying clay. SB made hers independently, and BB insisted that i roll her sausages [shes not so keen on mucky hands - despite always painting them!] put proved to be totally fab at winding up the coils. they decided to keep the ridged look and only smooth slightly. SB went on to make a really good model pig for nana, and BB an enormous but fab coil pot. we did this for nearly 2 hours, and I realised that joint craft sessions are what really make a home ed day for me, sitting there altogether enjoying fiddling with stuff. And so sweet that bb said thankyou to me at the end for helping her and enjoyed it. think this might be a cue.

whilst doing this, we had some lovely symphonies in the background to listen too – possibly aiding my chill factor.

washed hands and ate the baked cookies – yummy. SB back on cbeebies and bb and i read some red nose readers together and she was wild for a bit. i think she is a bit like animal from the muppets at times, maybe she needs a drum kit. SB’s birthday money burning a hole in her pocket, and she was thinking of ds games, and stuff merry sells. i remembered that i had found the other 2 games we were given with SB’s ds, and got them out. SO intially SB did a lot of brain training – hence the title, and then went onto the mario game, which she has enjoyed. BB, bless her, pretended to be playing her ds with a picture of a ds. my heart went to her, as she was being totally adorable playing it. she has been told she can’t have one till she can read, so she was making do. i am feeling the need to buy her a present. either a couple of this range, or the new range merry was considering – which is unbearably cute. gah – more of my excellence money spent on the girls!! it did pale sooner than the real deal did for SB, so she watched some bob the builder and magic school bus. At tea, BB insisted that i write her maths questions whilst she ate, i wondered whether she was in the right blogring family! did 2 pages of assorted match and sort!

Anyway i worked really hard today at keeping cool, especially at SB’s diddley daddleyness, and contrariness, and BB’s threeness, and i think it all came together. but i am truly knackered. couldn’t keep this up every day!

nots and tots

i just liked that name of the group that SB went to today, already blobged elsewhere! BB went to her playgroup, which she does v much lie. SB went to n&t to do some french, not finish making a roman sandal and discuss hadrians wall. she enjoyed it, and didn’t moan to me there had been no latin (edit – ah, but she did mention the lack of it at N&Ts). might have been my fault as i told her to be careful to remember it all as we hadn’t been for so long! I was left at home, and we will draw a veil over why i was too sick for work…

on their return, they were all ravenous, and sb ate 3 oranges – so multivits and body shop cocoa butter lip slave must have done the trick for the angular stomatitis then! BB immediately got back into her skates – which she totally adores, and skated about. SB and I did a violin practice [with me sitll lying on couch!] and then she skated off too. they all went out for a good skate about in the sun with chris.

BB did some singapore earlybird, and SB singapore2A. Then SB dived into the pile of books we had picked up from nots and tots, and really bookwormed her way through the rest of the day. BB and I read some books together as well. BB and SB both had a short recorder session – I am trying to instill that recorders can make music as well as shrill shrieks. And yes em, i do remember you saying they should explore the noises, but shrill shrieks are killing me!!
The girls did a final bit of skating on a walk with Chris before tea, BB was cream crackered so I then took her off to bed, and Chris and SB started a huge k’nex edifice – a space needle, to find some bits missing right at the end. this is from the k’nex given on monday, so we haven’t had chance to lose them yet, so chris is going to write and complain!

I am feeling very fatigued, but not particularly v, so hopefully things on the up. have watched 2 episodes of damages – which i really enjoy, we are heading to the denouement at juggernaut crash speed. excellent.

i have put piccie possible ideas in a set on flickr, i need to work out what i actually want i guess!

Edit- added by Chris

BB had a bit of a strop when we got to playgroup. She stayed today for lunch for the first time (gives us a bit more time before we have to pick here up if we are out), excited to be taking her lunch in her Thomas the Tank Engine lunchbox. But they are supposed to be put in the kitchen and anything requiring refrigeration put in the fridge. she was not pleased to have to give up her box :-) Of course being BB, she wasn’t that interested in eating her lunch it seems. she said she got grumpy because they wanted her to eat her sandwich – and when BB doesn’t want to do something she can be grumpy ;-) I had meant to say to them to not worry about what she eats of her lunch. So. after getting grumpy, she then fellĀ  asleep so I arrived to find her zonked out on the table :-)

mothering sunday

Actually I think my real mothers day present was just as we came away to Melrose, and SB bought me some flowers. i brought them to Melrose and popped them on the mantelpiece -they are prob still there as our leaving was a tad disorganised. But they were spontaeous because she thought I would like the wrapping. That really is a mothers day gift.

cards and flowers

i knew I would get a card, because on the way home I bought a card for my mum and little nanny, so SB came with me and chose one for me to buy [rofl!]. She chose a beautiful card that really suited her – a fairy one sprinkling glitter. i would have been just as happy with a home made one – in fact i suggested a thurs card craft to some dads at melrose, but they looked horrified/sheepish/you must be joking at me!!

Antway so i came downstairs and was told i was about to have breakfast in bed. oK, i hopped under the duvet on the sofa. what would i like? hmm, onions, sweetcorn and mushrooms on toast, no? err, scrambled eggs? no? oh, something SB can make – weetabix! So she balanced that, a cup of tea and a jamjar decorated with fimo and a dafodil in it. those that read twitter will know that she tipped it all off as she reached me. never mind i said, lets mop it up and try again, so she did!!

IMG_4331

What mothers day has mostly said to me though, is that I am not particularly shining example of motherhood. i used to be pretty good at the patience and joining in, but I had teeth in gritted mode so often today that i am suprised i can open my mouth. yes, BB is very challenging, but i think that a lot of it might be that i am just to crap to give her the attention she needs and sort out the right strategies. her and SB are screeching within 3 seconds of being left alone – and it isn’t all BB, but a majority. I can here my gritted teeth voice in SB too, which is awful. She just doesn’t care about anyones pov, whether she has hurt them, but wants what she wants when and how she wants it, instantly, always.

oops, this isn’t finished. i pressed wrong button, and will return!

SO, that has been quite stressful. for example, i bought a tiny mini violin magnet for SB to say i was proud of her for being part of the orchestra. bb whips it and says it is hers – actually before i have given it. sb looks dejected. so i do the oh no it isn’t routine. sb says its all right, bb cn have it if she wants. do you want it sb, shrug, sb do you want it. give it to who you want to mum. i gave it to you [counterpoint bb screaming its hers in background] i would like you to have it because i am proud of you giving the harder part a go and enjoying playing and getting your friends interested. well, i would like it. i take from bb – cue foaming at mouth screaming wailing and kicking. sb clenches it tightly, clear she wants it. i hug her and give her a kiss and repeat why its hers. bb in a total frenzy. oK, i should have had something for bb. but sb has a resigned and doleful air about surrendering everything to bb. should she be more encouraged to be assertive? surely if i was a good mum she would tell me what she wants? and does she side with bb to get her out of trouble because we overreact to bb??? aarghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

hmm, ok, so what have we done today? well, bb and i did some of her before the code letter f stuff [at her request!] and she was adorable. SB was doing education city science at the time. BB did some starfall and SB did some playing with webkinz. SB did some singapore maths and we did a rather excellent violin practice together. we had a stressful time getting her dance mat that hooks to the tv to work again [well, it was last used 3 years ago, when deemed too difficult] but i managed it. and i managed to get the melrose game on 2 different computers so that both could play it – well bb couldn’t so i did that for her at her insistence whilst she frothed and foamed and jumped on me until i stalked off. and sb please to see ‘her’ level. at tea, sb said she was bored and today was boring. i guess it was. but we have loads of stuff she could have done. humm. glumness alround.