4th of July

This year I was pretty excited about the 4th of July. I knew both boys were finally old enough to be in awe of the fireworks and could stay up late enough to watch them. This year was going to be good!

That afternoon we set off a few smoke bombs Bobby bought earlier in the week.

He also picked up a couple boxes of poppers and the boys had a great time throwing them all over the patio in the backyard.



I also tried to take some pictures of the boys in their 4th/summer outfits. I decided I didn't want to make anything too 4th of Julyish so they could wear it for the rest of the summer and the crabs fit the bill!
*Side note: I could barely get them to sit next to each other let alone look at me and smile so sorry Carter has his whole hand in his mouth but you take what you can get ;)




We'd also decided it would be fun to take the boys to see the firework show at the USS Battleship down on the bay. We were all set to go! Carter had taken a late nap and I had even convinced Parker to take a nap that day (something he hasn't done in a few months now)! Well, about 30 mins before we left there was a torrential downpour! We were really worried it would rain again as soon as we got down there so instead we took a drive across the bay. We had an amazing view of both the Mobile and Daphne fireworks as we drove across the bridge! The boys LOVED it! I tried to get a few pictures of some of the fireworks, but with the car bumping so much they were all really blurry.

When we got home we shot off some more of the fireworks Bobby bought. Parker was a little hesitant about holding the sparklers at first but Bobby was able to talk him into it and by the time we were ready to go in he was holding it all by himself.



We also got out a couple of the fountain rockets but only shot one of them off. After we realized how loud the first one was we thought we probably would've been run out of the neighborhood if we lit the other one being as late as it was.


Even though we didn't get to do all we had planned this 4th we still had a GREAT weekend! We are so blessed to live in a place where we can have fun times like these in freedom and safety! Happy 4th of July!

Watermelon Festival

We've had a pretty busy 4th of July weekend and while I'll post more about our actual 4th festivities first I wanted to share about the fun we had at the Watermelon Festival in Grand Bay. I heard about it through a local blogger who was posting fun things to do along the gulf coast this weekend. I didn't really know what to expect but the advertisement said free watermelon and I thought well if nothing else at least we'll get a little treat! I was actually pleasantly surprised by what all they had going on! The boys had a lot of fun playing in the bouncy houses, riding the little trackless train and checking out the petting zoo. There were also a couple local musical groups playing in a pavilion on the edge of the grounds and several crafters had booths set up selling some very cute handmade items.

I love the way the watermelon looks all piled up just begging for people to come eat up its sweet and juicy goodness.


Carter was more than happy to oblige the calls of the melon (and the man that kept yelling "COME GET THIS MELON!!!") but Parker...not so much :)


We also enjoyed a little fair food and...


a little sharing ;)




I think I need to add a porch and railing to our "musts for the next house" list just so I have a reason to get some of these cute little bunting flag!


Although I was a little apprensive about the festival, I'm really glad we went! The boys were in a super mood and we couldn't have asked for nicer weather! Just the type of fun we needed to round out our 4th of July weekend!

Froggy Jump

Like most boys, mine are very intrigued by any and all little creepy crawlies, squirmy wormies or hippity hoppities that inhabit our back yard. Pretty much any little creature that creepeth across the yard is a wonder to these two little guys. This morning was no exception!

Its a little hard to see but the frog is right under Carter's hand upside down!

Can you tell Carter was bit excited about Mr. Froggy's visit!

This guy was pretty excited, too!

Thanks Mr. Froggy for making two little boys' morning!

School Time: Week 3

Another week down means another post about our school time this past week! This week went much better planning wise. I was able to get Parker's stuff together every evening without much thought which makes for a much easier "school" day.

I also ordered a couple books


and a learning calendar (which I really like).


We had been using this bible


and while I like it, it doesn't have quite enough detail for Parker's age. Its great for younger kids that won't sit still for long because there are only a couple of sentences per page but Parker needs a bit more story to keep his interest. I had seen several blogs go on and on about how great the Jesus Storybook Bible is and they were RIGHT! I LOVE this bible! It reads just like any other children's book would and has beautiful illustrations. It also references how each Bible story ties into Jesus's life. If you don't have a children's bible for your preschooler I highly recommend it! The ABC Bible Verses is the book Parker's preschool program is formed from and I really like the stories in it. Each explains the corresponding bible verse in a very child friendly way without watering it down. I think its helping Parker understand what some of his memory verses really mean instead of being just words he has to memorize.

Also, I realized this week I've never posted a picture of our school board I made. Its pretty much exactly like the board over at 1+1+1 but without the pocket on the front (sorry for how dark the picture is, it was pretty cloudy when I took it).

Now onto our school stuff:
Letter: Hh
Number: 3
Color: Blue
Sight Word: "and"
Bible Verse: "Honor your Father and you Mother." Exodus 20:12
Bible Story: The 10 Commandments

I was finally brave enough to take some pictures of Parker doing a little cutting. I got the practice cutting sheet here and while I like it, I think it was a little too advanced for Parker's current cutting skills.



He did much better when cutting his memory verse so I may make a couple cutting sheets of my own with simpler lines.

He also worked on stringing some pasta on a pipe cleaner (this was actually one of Carter's trays but Parker begged to do it and Carter wasn't too interested so I let him).



Here he's working on his 1:1 counting the Pom Pom Number cards.


I gave him this sheet to work on while I did a little sewing one afternoon. I thought he'd have no problem with it considering he'd done one like it before so I left him to it. When he said he was all done I turned around and he'd stuck all the letters onto the little "h" side, oops. After I told him what he was suppose to do he got aggravated and wanted to go onto something else which was just fine. We did come back to it later on in the week and he fixed with little help. Also, excuse my son's dirty leg! I promise we do give baths around here...sometimes ;)


I've been meaning to post the Now I Know My ABC's letters we've been making but I keep forgetting to take a picture of them before we take the book back to the library, that is until now!


Carter's working on spooning. He's worked on this one before but this week he was actually able to get a couple on his spoon all by himself.



He also worked with the Monkeys in a Barrel. He had a pretty hard time getting them to hang by himself so he didn't spend very much time with these.


Well, I think that about sums it up! I'm hoping to do a Week in Rewind post later today so be on the look out for it!

Preschool School and Tot School

This past week we kept things pretty light in the school department. This was due to poor planning on my part. I thought doing my planning on the weekends for the next week would work but the planning is taking a little longer than I thought. I've decided to do a couple weeks in advance that way I don't feel overwhelmed with it every Sunday night. We were able to complete the entire lesson plan for this week but didn't do much beyond that (as is pretty evident by the lack of pictures). Poor Carter hardly had any trays to do this week and the ones he did do I didn't get any pictures of them :(

I promise this won't be the case for the next two weeks. I already have both weeks planned out and all but a few projects put together. I think my goal will be to have 3 weeks done in advance! I also need to get my "stuff" organized a little better so putting it out every evening won't be a chore. Anyways, onto the important stuff.

We worked on the following things this week:


Letter: Tt
Number: 2
Color: Blue
Sight Word: :the"
Bible Verse: "Thou shall not steal." Exodus 20:15
Bible Story: The 10 Commandments


Parker's working on a color puzzle I made for him.



Here he's practicing the lines that it takes to make a "T" on his Getting Ready for T sheet.



Now onto the real thing! He did much better this week taking his time and trying very hard to stay on the tracing lines.



As with the first week he is blowing me away with how easily he is picking up his sight words! The easy reader this week incorporated this week's and last week's sight word so he was able to read most the words all by himself!

I did an assessment with Parker this week to see how much he already knew and what we needed to work on. Overall I was pretty impressed with what he already knew especially when it came to how many little letters he already knew considering we haven't worked on very many of them yet. There were a few things he needs a bit more practice with or some reminders on.

Parker's preschool program can be found here and Carter's Tot School ideas came from here. Also, here is a list of the blogs/websites I get most of my ideas or printables from in case you were wondering:

Confessions of a Homeschooler - she has a wonderful preschool program. I use a lot of her printables to supplement the program I'm doing with Parker from 1+1+1=1.

Totally Tots - so far I'm only using this site for their "Now I Know My ABCs" posts. I can tell they have some great stuff beyond this but I haven't had a chance to really go through it yet.

Making Learning Fun - GREAT free printables!

DLTK's - another wonderful printables site!

I hope that gives you all a few resources to start doing some "school" with your kids!

Sweetness!

Just when I think having boys means a shortage in the sweetness department God blesses me with moments like these!

Praying Hands

Sweet Snuggles

Big Hugs

Schools In Session!

While most of the country is out of school for the summer here at the Stinson house hold we're just starting back up! As you'll remember we tried to do a little of this while I was pregnant but with being pregnant and then having a newborn I didn't keep up with it like I wanted to/should have. I now feel like I have the time to get everything together and with both boys able to do "school" its been that much more fun to plan and do. I'm using the preschool curriculum from 1+1+1=1 and her workboxes idea for Parker. For Carter I'm also using the 1+1+1=1 blog but with him I'm doing the Tot Trays and Tools from her Tot School section. They are LOVING it! Over the weekend Parker probably asked a dozen times each day if he could do school today! This week we worked on:

Letter - L

Number - 1

Sight word - see

Bible verse - Matthew 5:16

Bible Story - Daniel in the Lions Den

Want to see exactly what we've been doing?

Parker reading from his Easy Reader for the Letter "L". I was amazed at how quickly he picked up on his first sight word "see"!


Working on his road letter. He put the cars on it at first (you can see a couple next to his arm) but took them off and starting drawing on it before I could take a picture.

These are Pom Pom Numbers I made to help Parker with number recognition and counting. He needs a good deal of work with counting 1:1.

He really enjoyed these!

We also worked on his gluing and cutting skills. I took pictures of the gluing but I was a little too stressed during the cutting exercises to take any pictures ;)

We also got out the playdoh just for a little fun! This was Carter's first time playing with playdoh and of course he immediately took a bite of it when I wasn't looking. After he realized it didn't taste very good he didn't try that anymore!

Parker also worked on his fine motor skills with transferring cotton balls with tongs. These are some of the Tot School Tools I mentioned above. I'm using some of them for Parker as well as Carter.

Carter working on pouring from one container to another.

Here he's trying to string pasta on a pipe cleaner. He had a rather hard time and wanted me to help him a lot with this one.

He did far better with this activity than I thought he would. To make this tool I took a old bread crumb container and punched holes in the top with a hole punch so he can stick pipe cleaners through the holes. All the pipe cleaners are different colors so when he starts recognizing colors we can add that level of difficulty to this exercise.

When I did school with Parker before I found that he didn't want to sit still for long while doing our bible study but I saw on this blog where she introduces rather important information to her kids while they eat lunch, GENIUS! I decided breakfast would be a perfect time for us and I was right. They both have been listening really well to the story and Parker actually wanted to talk about the story a little after its over. This was also I good time to work on his memory verse. I was worried this week's verse was going to be a little too much for him to remember but he actually surprised me by only needing help with a couple of words by the end of the week, WOW!

I can not tell you how much fun we are having with our "school" time! I feel like its given us a little more structure to our day while having LOTS of fun together!

This picture really has nothing to do with school but I just thought it was sweet. Parker's been teaching Carter how to sing and dance to London Bridge is Falling Down and they both get such a kick out of falling down together! Too Cute!

I'm hoping to be able to post our school fun weekly so stay tuned!