so my crew took to the bunkbed and built a fort. I hardly saw them all day...
Sunday--it's a dog's life. Lazing about in the sun and snow
playing dolls
watching Jostie flicks on youtube
Sledding
in April
Monday, April 4, 2011
Friday, April 1, 2011
Friday, April Fool's Day, 2011
Lazy morning waking today. You might have thought it was Saturday.
It seemed we were all very content to lounge around and have a slow morning.
And much cuddles and pillow fights.
While father and son stared at each other in a very serious looking staring contest, I slipped away into the kitchen.
I made a lot of noise. Pomp and ceremony, you understand. I was only preparing for an amazing breakfast.
I called to everyone:
PANCAKES!
And they ran like a herd of elephants into my kitchen.
Moo-hahahahahaha... April Fool's!
They were not impressed when I served them oatmeal...but life's like that. You don't always get what you expect. ;)
After breakfast, I told everyone to go do something quietly. And while they did, I hid 19 scripture verses on Foolishness and 19 verses on Wisdom around the rooms they typically clean each day. The catch was that they had to do a very thorough cleaning job in order to find all of the verses.
After I have hidden the verses, I catch my crew reading in a walkway. I announce that it will soon be chore time.
And then, they vanish. No sight of them.
Only silent greets me.
I search and find....THIS
How to punish this type of behaviour?!?!?!
The kids quickly do their chores and find all 19 Foolish verses and 19 Wisdom verses (Thanks to the book "Instruction in Righteousness" for the quick access to verses)
We then list all the traits belonging to the foolish
My youngest girl writes most of it out. We only get through the Foolish verses today, but incredible discussion happens.
In case you are wondering, a fool: is despised, dies, causes pain, is lazy, gets in trouble with his words, speaks evil, mocks, makes his family sad, has a broken relationship with his/her parents,chases fantasies, makes poor decisions, doesn't value precious things, acts silly, talks too much, their laughter is mean and loud, they trust in themselves and they live selfishly.
Don't be a fool!
Train play
Drawing pictures of the Old Woman who Swallowed a Fly
An interesting discussion on whether or not the Old woman could, in fact, chase a horse in order to swallow it
Magnet fishing with the gummy fish. Yes, that is a paper clip for the mouth. My kids came up with this. This is what happens at my house, when I go to throw in a load of laundry
Our neighbours next door lost their grandmother this week. It's been a sad week for our little friends.
We pray for them and think of ways to cheer them up.
We discuss death, funerals and how people need support in sad times.
Easy to do with our watercolour sponge paints
...made a bouquet to give to our friends. We made cards and pictures and sent it over in loads of love.
Bike riding
Playing with neighbours
Our neighbours leave for the funeral and we go over to clean up their house. They called and asked if we could. It was exciting to serve their family this way.
They had left over punch which they said we could drink...so we did!
And in the midst of my cleaning up...where is my crew. Silent and gone. I find them here...playing farm. I just love the pictures of my crew together! Look at the pout on my little man
This is a wall hanging in my neighbour's house. Isn't it gorgeous? I love this. I need to go shopping with her. She has an amazing eye for all things beautiful.
And we drank some punch
We came home and read the book THE APRIL FOOL which was quite funny.
But not to fear the librarian called us, as she does every Friday to inform us that our books had come in. And since we don't want to walk to the library in snow tomorrow, we walk today!
Youngest daughter insists on bringing the little doghouse we decorated today. Can you see the chimney?
And the skies threaten to pummel us with snow, but we carry on, refusing to change course due to a few angry clouds.
We chat with the librarians. A lady comes in and says that it is start to "spit" outside. Who's spit exactly? The clouds. I signal my gang to hightail it outta there and we do.
We race home to tea and conversation.
And we read Milly-Molly-Mandy.
And Rox-a-boxen
And Never invite a Dragon to Tea
Then we discuss fire escape plans and review calling 9-1-1
Meal and menu planning for the month.
Grocery list preparing
Dinner eating
and finally a Wallace and Grommit film
Pure bliss today, my friends.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Thursday 03-31-11
Then mad cleaning and story reading and starfall games
Then my eldest decided that she should make some money. off to the neighbours to sell the rolls-$2.00 a piece!
Then off for a walk
Noah's ark awaits to be filled with all the animals
A few days ago, we collected sticks while on our nature walk.
Discussions on safety
Plan making for an upcoming visit at a friends house
And ending the day with a nutritional lesson on over-eating via the old woman who swallowed a fly.
Hi and welcome to my house...may I take your order
Drive thru talking, people!
It's all the rage at my house.
And when I say rage, I mean: I'm actually about to introduce it and I'm the only one stoked about it so far.
Drive thru talking is a communication technique that I learned about when I was dating my husband.
He sent me a video on how to communicate.
When we were dating.
It freaked me out. I thought I was dating a psychiatrist.
After my initial shock, I realized that the video had some really good things to say about communication.
And I realized that if my boyfriend was willing to commit to better communication, he fell into the "keeper" category.
So I married him.
And I have been trying to keep communication lines open since.
As I've been looking at various ways to strengthen my daughter's cognitive functions of Expressive Verbal Tools, as well as the Receptive Verbal Tools, drive thru talking is re-emerging as a handy little tool.
Drive thru talking is simple and easy to use (and if you call now, I'll throw in these steak knives for an additional $9.95. Did anybody else think that when I wrote "It's simple and easy to use"? No. Just me? OK)
Well, it's simple and easy to use.
Basically, you are practicing listening and talking to one another.
You repeat what the other person is saying in order to confirm that you heard correctly. Much like the do at a drive thru restaurant.
Hence the term: Drive thru talking.
Drive thru restaurants repeat your order to you because it's a quality control measure. It's their way of making sure you get the hamburger you ordered, instead of a fish stick that may have been in the back of the freezer for one month too long.
Let's take a look at an example that shows us what drive thru talking is not.
Here is a completely fictitious scenario from my marriage:
ME:Honey, can you pick up some milk when you are out? Love you, Bye. Have a great day.
MY MAN: Yeah. Love you too.
1 hour later
ME:Where's my milk?
MY MAN: ( a stunned look on his face and the overwhelming sense that he's missed something)
What milk?
ME: The milk. The milk I asked you to get when you went out. The milk you said, "yeah" to getting.
MY MAN: I don't remember that.
ME: ahhhhhhhhh!
That is an example of bad communication on my part.
It's completely fictitious. Never happened. Because, remember folks, I watched a video once about communicating over ten years ago. I'm a pro and don't make mistakes like that.
Here's how drive thru talking is really done:
Mom: Can you please take out the garbage?
Child: You want me to take out the garbage?
Mom: Yes, and please do it right away.
Child: I can take the garbage out right away.
Yeah! Success is achieved.
Good has been done here.
The garbage is going to be taken out and it's going to happen right away.
Why is this a good exercise for strengthening the Cognitive Functions regarding verbal tools?
Let's go over the points, shall we:
1. I said it is, and since I'm an expert in communication,
(remember, I once watched a video)
it's obvious that I'm right
2. It requires you and your child to FOCUS on what is being said.
When you instruct them and they have to repeat back to you what they've heard, you can determine if their INPUT Receptive Verbal Tools need strengthening. When you have them instruct you to do something, you can determine if their OUTPUT Expressive Verbal Tools need strengthening
3. Over 40 billion served makes a point (Get it? It's a fast food joke referencing Macdonald's restaurant. Did anyone else think that? No? Just me.... OK)
When using drive thru talking, focus on precision and accuracy. Stay away from generic words like:
that
stuff
thing
Opt for more specific terms like:
the catapult
your dryer lint collection
the mini-replica of the space station
And ask your child to do the same.
Precision!
Accuracy!
Now you say:
Accuracy!
Precision!
You know, as though you were practicing drive thru talking with me.
(Did anyone else get that? No? Just me...OK)
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