Growing Everyday

Beka was at a birthday party tonight. Some of the girls started a game of duck, duck, goose. And it got me thinking about the different games we have played in my house. There were many winter nights that we played duck, duck, goose. But once Beka and Jared were into the game, we changed it. We played dog, dog, puppy and letter, letter, number, and color, color, shape. The different themes kept the kids interested in the game and also reinforced concepts.

As a family, we play hide and seek alot too. At first, it was all about the counting. Could Beka and Jared even count to ten. Now, when we play, it is more about can I scare the daylights out of the seeker? Maybe, I need to start making the seeker count by 2′s to 40 or something.

I, also, remember playing so many word games with the kids. Outside on the swings in order to earn an underdog, they would have to spell a word, tell the beginning or ending sound of a word, solve a math problem. Beka and Jared would ask to play this game.

I haven’t been making learning a game lately. With school and homework, learning has become about worksheets and memorization. I need to remember these games we played and how fun learning should be.

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I have written about Beka and her love of Fancy Nancy before. She just loves those books especially the I Can Read ones. She just recently bought the newest one with her birthday money. After reading it, she decided to send the author, Jane O’Connor fan mail. It is a really cute note that Beka wrote to her. I can’t wait to see if we get anything back.

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With getting a dog, things have changed somewahat around here. There are walks and training to fit into the schedule. We are alert for things that Kahla should not have. There is a little more cleaning to do. They are little things and totally worth it. But I feel the kids should pitch in too. So this week their job was to cut up hot dogs that Andrew uses when training Kahla. They did a really good job.

Also, having Kahla has brought up some interesting questions. Kahla is already spayed so both children wanted to know how the Vet got all her baby parts out. I let the Vet answer that one. Then, Jared wanted to know if dogs had belly buttons. We figured they must since they are mammals but no one had ever seena dog’s belly button. Mr. Google solved that one for us. (In case you were wondering, yes they have beely buttons but it is just a hairless scar on their bellies that you usually don’t notice)

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My little girl is now 7. I can’t believe how fast the time flies. She is maturing everyday and comes up with something new to tell me or create everyday. She wants to enter the Science Fair this year. That will be a new and interesting experience. First Grade has been hard on her but she is perservering. Beka has undying curiousity and a love of all animals insects included.

This past year Beka has grown so much. I can’t believe how tall she is already. She loves to swim and really enjoys Daddy teaching her all the strokes. She loves her brother even though they fight sometimes. She finally has the dog she has been begging for.

Beka loves math which I am pretty sure she did not get from me. Reading is not her favorite activity unless a new Fancy Nancy book has just come out. I am hoping to get her started on another series soon. I am just so excited to see how she grows over the next year.

Beka decided she wanted a chocolate cake with yellow frosting, rainbow spinkles, and her name in pink icing. We had fun making the cake.

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Yes, I am feeling lazy.

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Beka has taken up finger weaving. So far, she has made three necklaces and a bracelet. It is something relatively easy for her to do and kinda mindless, but it keeps her hands busy.

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Yes, we play with oobleck all the time. I just like make the slippery slidy stuff and the kids enjoy running it through their fingers and over their hands. This time we added food coloring to make it more exciting.

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Beka and Jared have so much energy. So even though it is freeezing cold outside, we decided to take them to the park. And we brought Kahla along just for some added excitement. We didn’t stay long, just long enough to run around a bit and get rosy cheeks. By the time we left, both kids were complaining about being cold, but were much more civil to each other. When they are cooped up for too long, they just start sniping at each other for no reason. And with Jared crafts only help for so long.

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Beka and Jared really like ice cream as a snack. Sometimes I even make them milkshakes. Anyway, all the ice cream eating leaves me with lots of ice cream containers around the house. So, I took three of containers and some left over tissue paper and had the kids decorate them. We used a mixture of glue and water to make the paper stick. The project kept the kids busy for an hour. Beka is using hers to store her slippers so Kahla can’t get to them. And I think Jared is using his for some of his action figures. I am using mine as a makeshift trash can for now. This was a fun project and as Beka pointed out a way to recycle.

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Christmas break gets long and boring without some exciting projects to do. So I found this experiment online and it turned out really great. Do you know what happens to an egg when you leave it in vinegar for 24 hours? I didn’t before but I do now. The egg loses its shell when it is left in the vinegar. It ends up looking like this.

Now supposedly, if you leave the egg just sitting out on the counter for another 24 hours the shell will return. Unfortunately, I don’t know this for a fact because the kids were playing with the egg and broke it. But they did clean the mess up themselves and this gives us an excuse to try the experiment again.

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