Our Week

What would Halloween be without our pumpkin? Of course this year Selena was insistent she was going to do it all by herself. We didn’t allow her to use the knives to cut the pumpkin, but she did manage to scrape every single piece of gunk and seeds out all by herself. This year however, we did things a little different. Instead of doing this early enough to make pumpkin pie, we waited until evening to carve the pumpkin. We had a power outage early that morning, and since it was out for several hours, Selena and I actually drove to Lacey and spent the day with friends. She wanted to make a Jack-O- Lantern anyway so after she cleaned it all out I asked her what type of Jack-O-Lantern she wanted. She was pretty surprised, but gladly described the Jack-O-Lantern of her choice.

After we finished up with our Pumpkin fun we cleaned up and Selena got to put her costume on. Now her costume came from our friends in Lacey. Both her girl’s wore this when they were Selena’s age. It is so pretty and I still can’t believe she loaned it to Selena. It is velvet, has pearls around the neck line like a necklace. Came complete with the hoop to give it the full skirt affect.

She played Queen Selena all night long. If you have followed our blog for long you know that we do not celebrate Halloween in the traditional fashion of going trick or treating. We did have fun having such beautiful royalty in our home for the evening though.

School has been going well, while a little slow since it does require so much more writing on Selena’s part. We usually can get through 3 subjects a day depending on how much writing there is to do. Some pages might take us a couple of days to complete when it asks her to write every number from 1 to 100. Not that she isn’t able to do it, but being only 6 and working on such intense material does make it a little more difficult for her to complete it all. We will get through all this beginning review and move on to new concepts soon, and then I believe things will smooth out for her.

She has also been having fun helping me in the kitchen of late. She took her lesson on how to peel a potato pretty serious, and actually peeled two potatoes all by herself.

Off topic here, many of us blog to share with family, some blog to have a way to remember the fun moments with our children, and other’s blog to share information or fun activities with whoever may come by their blog. When I first started this blog I truly had no direction for it. One of my first posts was in part to my memories of my family and their homestead, which you can read more about here.  This week to my surprise I had someone leave a comment on this post. As we dug a little bit, shuffling back and forth information we discovered that we are actually cousins. We never really know who will come across our blog. We’ve had so much fun sharing so much information about this place, our families homestead. It has been especially interesting for me, since she grew up not far from this homestead, something I always dreamed of doing. Two cousins who have never met, didn’t even know each other existed has now been united by one simple blog post.

Been Thinking

Ever since Selena was real young I have been thinking about all the wonderful things I want to share with her. All the things I learned from my Great Grandma, Grandma, and Mother. All the things I learned through the years on my own, the things I shared with my older children. As I made a comment in my post yesterday, I finally am feeling inspired in our new home and feel so many of these things will be achievable.

After talking to a few friends of mine who have or are still homeschooling, knowing that they used Far Above Rubies with their girls, they directed me to just what I have been looking for. I knew there were similar curriculums (if that is what you want to call it) for the younger girls. Papa and I have been going over every aspect of this avenue, and are both very impressed so far with the potential. What are we talking about?

Next year we are going to start our new year using Keepers of the Faith, Little Keepers of the Home. There are clubs which resemble Awana, and Scouts, but we do not have any such club around here. I researched and found the nearest one to be in Tacoma. Anyway I can purchase this just as an individual family. Selena would have a workbook to work through and if we choose would receive awards for completing the sections. This first of the series is geared for ages 5 – 7 then the next level 7 – 14, then we would advance on into Far Above Rubies.

The materials cover simple homemaking skills and get more advanced as the child gets older. One sample in the first handbook is how to properly set the table. They go through Bible memorization, reading the Bible, with plenty of fun craft projects to cooking and baking. They also have units on gardening and nature, animals, and plants. I believe the one thing that really intrigued me is the simplicity of the material, how many of you know how to sew a button hole without a sewing machine? I remember as a child being amazed that my Great Grandmother and Grandmother could do this but it was something that I was never taught myself.

Since we have moved in here I have shared many times over how Selena is just in love with the domestic side of homemaking, from sweeping and moping the floors, vacuuming, washing the dishes, cooking and baking. Well all this and more are covered within these handbooks. I do believe we will get Selena the awards, and award them as she earns them, she just will not have a sash, but instead we will make a lovely wall quilt to display all her awards and accomplishments on, something her and I can work on from the beginning and finish off the final year (or something like that) this is not in gold, but we will do something.

Throughout this year I will be ordering the books and preparing the materials that we will need for our first year. I am not sure exactly when our first year will begin, but I will say I am truly looking forward to sharing all these treasured things with Selena. This will still allow us to explore and fill in all the other curriculum necessities such as reading, math, history, and science.

Anyway that is what has been on my mind lately. Selena truly seems very enthused and excited. I believe we will have a lot of fun as we learn, sometimes truly learning together.

Tid Bits

We didn’t have much of a chance today to do very much around home. This morning though I did make Selena a new puzzle from an empty box we had from some Goldfish Crackers. We worked with that off and on through the morning. Selena enjoyed the last puzzle that I made her and had started asking for another one, or a new one. Sorry I didn’t take any pictures of this puzzle, but if you want to get an idea of what I am talking about you can see our first one here.

I was very proud of Selena while we were at the Church for my meeting today. Since the meeting was at 1:00 p.m. Selena was missing her nap. We moved the meeting to the back classroom and had Selena go into the Nursery to play. She played through the first half of the meeting by herself, staying very well satisfied with all the new toys that she discovered. The second half, she came into the room where we were and played quietly with some blocks in there, as well as scribbling on some paper. A few times she slipped out just to go see what Pastor was doing, and got a little upset when he didn’t share his apple with her. Curiosity got the best of her, when she just had to know what was behind one door, only to discover to her surprise that it went out the back of the church, since it was raining out, she didn’t go out of it. She did very well considering the meeting ended up lasting a whole hour and a half.

She is very happy to know that she is now going to be in a Sunday school class. It looks like what I thought would be a temporary position will become a full time position, and both Pastor and his wife feel that Selena will do just fine in my class, since it is K – 3rd grade. I feel very strongly she will do just fine in there as well. Now I just need to find the time to go up to the church and clean up the classroom and set it up the way I want it to be. I will worry about that though in a couple of weeks. Right now I am still going to be over the Nursery, but that is no big deal since Selena is the youngest one at church. We do have it pretty well set up and ready to go should a family come with a young one in need of it’s use during service. We are praying though that as we grow someone will step up and want to work in the nursery.

I know that Selena is wanting to write another story, so I am going to fit that in tomorrow. We have snow in the forecast, so if it is going to snow I hope it does so early, as we really do need to get to town. I really do need to try to find a new background for the bulletin board. I thought we had something at the church that would work only to discover today that this was not the case. I haven’t looked at our local gift stores, to see what they have in gift wrap, so I might try there first before going all the way to town. Maybe I will luck out and get something that will work here locally.

As you have noticed I am just kind of rambling this evening. All of this just kind of hit me off guard this month. I know it will smooth out as we proceed forward. I just feel very grateful that Selena is such a helper, and does do very well in situations like this. At a time when she could totally be uncooperative, she has the ability to just go with the flow. This all coming from a little girl who does like her schedule and generally does not like anything to upset her routine.

Friday Tid Bits

As many of my readers remember we were blessed to have some beautiful weather for a few days over the past weekend. We had a lot of fun playing outside. I was truly feeling hopeful as this week started that Spring was truly trying to arrive. The last few days though have brought cold temperatures and rain. Ok, so Mr. Winter wants to hang around a little bit longer. I must admit though that unfortunately with this jumping around in the weather my poor hands, feet, knees and neck are really starting to bother me, arthritis is no fun.

We are getting things ready for Palm Sunday. Ticia where are you when I could use you to make Selena’s costume? I know you could whip one up so fast, as I sit here struggling with what to use for it. The person in charge of the play was showing us how to use a sheet to make the costume last night at rehearsal, but Selena refused to be so bundled up…so off I go to find something else to use. I can’t say I blame her though, I don’t think I would want a sheet wrapped and tied around me in such a fashion.

Papa is getting ready to go on a business trip leaving Sunday and not returning until late Thursday. I must admit I am not looking forward to his absence and I am sure that Selena is really going to miss him. While this is a business trip, I do believe Papa will enjoy some down time with some of his friends and co-workers. He does need some time to get refreshed, laugh and have some fun with people other then us.

As for Selena and I we truly do not have many plans for this time that Papa is gone. Selena does have a play date on Tuesday afternoon. She is going to go play with the Pastor’s boys for about 4 hours in the afternoon. As for myself I don’t know what I will do yet. I have thought of seeing if a friend of mine would like to go with me to have a good Mexican dinner. I have really been craving some good Mexican food, and my family is not real fond of Mexican food, so I might just see if this will work out. Either that or I will come home and enjoy 4 hours of complete quiet, which will probably drive me batty.

I have been noticing that more and more families are interested in exchanging postcards of late. I wanted to share with you a family who is looking for other families interested in swapping postcards. You can visit My Grace Is Sufficient For Thee, I know they would love to start receiving and sending postcards. I know for us our adventures through the postcard exchange has been so much fun, and has opened up our geography studies in so many ways.

Tid Bits

Yesterday, I overheard Selena spelling words and playing with her keyboard. I stopped to see what she was doing only to find that she was actually typing the words out on the keyboard that she was spelling. I guess I need to open word on my computer and let her have some fun practicing the words she can spell. She was so proud of herself, I laughed at how she hit enter after every word, as well as she would hit backspace when ever she made a mistake.

We were really busy at the church later in the morning. I have agreed to take over the Nursery. It hasn’t been used in a long time so it needs a lot of sprucing up. It appears it came the dump off place for any and every toy that was hauled into the church. Today Selena and I sorted through toys and threw away all the broken toys. I brought home all the plastic blocks to sanitize them in my bathtub. When I dumped them in the tub, Selena started to take her clothes off thinking it was bath time. Come evening after dinner I went in to finish the blocks. Selena got so upset thinking that they were her blocks. Why was I packing them back up to put in my car. I told her to go look for her blocks, which were sitting right where they always are kept, boy what a sigh of relief from her when she finally realized that Grandma indeed was not giving away her blocks.

The secretary at the church gave Selena a package of stickers, that were decorated for a baby. There were some for a baby girl and some for a baby boy. She told Selena to take them home and make a beautiful sheet with the stickers. When we got home Selena ran into her bedroom. I asked her what she was doing and she informed me she was making her sheet. She thought the secretary meant to decorate her bed sheet. Tonight she did grab a piece of card stock and making sure she had the stickers for a baby boy made her baby brother a card. Now we just need to stick it in the mail.

One other thing that Selena did on Wednesday evening while playing doctor and giving Papa a good examination, she looked up and informed him that his teeth were cantellated. Papa wouldn’t believe that this truly was a word, so I had to google it so he could read for himself what it meant. Now where she picked this word up from I have no idea, but she definitely heard it from somewhere. I have been trying to figure out what Math show she might have been watching that she heard this word, but for the life of me I haven’t been able to figure it out.

Anyway that is what we have been up to the past couple of days, I will be back down at the church today finishing up, as much as I can. I won’t be able to finish it all, since we have to replace the crib, rocking chair, window blinds, and a few bins. Now if only when we get it all done we get some little ones to use it. Pastor feels very strongly that if we “Build It, They Will Come.”

Can You Tell?

Can you tell that these two are related?

This is jut unreal how much our new grandson looks like his older sister. They are both about the same age in these pictures, just a few days old.

Things seem to be going well for Mom and Junior. I am happy to hear the calmness in my daughter, and she just seem so bonded, and attentive to his needs. I can’t help but think that Mom truly just was not ready to have a baby when she had Selena. We continue to just pray and hope that things continue to go great for both of them.

Selena isn’t asking as many questions or wanting to exchange the puppy for her baby brother here lately. She has spoke with Mom several times, and is always congratulating her. We hope to have a visit from Mom and baby this summer, I know Mom is wanting to come up about June, so we will do what we can to make it happen.

We got more snow today, I can’t believe it has been cold enough that we have not lost any of the snow that fell on Thursday. In fact in all time I have lived here I don’t ever remember seeing ice cycles hanging on the eaves. It has been so cold we have not been able to get out to have any more snow fun, in fact now our snow is pretty crunchy, and guess what it is snowing as I type this. March is definitely coming in like a lion, will it go out like a lamb?

While Papa is nursing a lot of stiffness and pain from falling twice in the parking lot at work on Friday, Selena and I did some painting. I got the idea from Christy at Superheroes and Princesses.

Selena enjoyed making these pretty little flowers. She tells me these are to remind her that Spring is on its way.

I had a good visit on Saturday with a friend of mine who has her degree in Early Child Development. We were talking about Selena and some of the different behaviors we have been seeing. She really helped to ease Papa’s mind when she referred to her being so bright, and that much of what we are seeing is truly just from her being too smart. She explained to us that her mind is just working constantly to learn all she can about everything, which we knew, but that this also leads to a very high energy sometimes defiant child. I’ve tried to explain this to Papa before, but until he heard it from someone else he just couldn’t except it. He has been banging his head against the wall asking what is it that we are not doing right, or where did we go wrong. I believe now that he will be able to adjust a little bit better and not feel so overwhelmed when Selena just is on the constant go. She told Papa when things get like this, to remind himself that she is going through the “gifted syndrome”, of course we really don’t like labels such as gifted especially at this age, but it is an easier way for Papa to relate to what is going on with his sweet little princess. I am glad he now has something to relate this too, as believe me it was about to drive me crazy the way those two were beginning to bump heads so much of the time. Papa finally said that his co-worker who has her Masters in Mental Health was telling him the same thing, but until he heard it from a second person it just wasn’t sinking in. I know that this evening his reactions were a lot different towards Selena, and things did go quite a bit smoother, and believe me she had a very high energy level this evening, and was having a hard time just shutting her brain off to go to sleep.

First Day of Summer

Today marks the official first day of Summer. I am beginning to think we will not have much of a Summer here. We woke up this morning after a cloudy, cool, and wet weekend to more of this.

People are wearing their heavy coats and jackets, long sleeved shirts and pants. Our temperatures are in the lower 60’s and the rest of the week is suppose to be more the same with rain moving in on Friday.

A little look back to a year ago today you can see that Selena was wearing sun dresses, Papa was wearing short sleeve shirts, and it was sunny.

A Quick Update

Our Storm must have blown through pretty fast. Don’t know how much damage if any out on the coast. We never lost our power, and really didn’t have any limbs in our yard out of the neighbor’s pain of a tree. I would say the coast was hit harder then we were.

We are excited as Papa comes home today!

The Little Things

Papa is away this week on a business trip. We’ve missed him very much, it just doesn’t seem the same without him coming home everyday. We sit here today, (Wednesday) knowing that we have a terrible windstorm moving our way. The sustained winds on the coast could reach as high as 50 to 60 mph. Mama is feeling uneasy as she does not like to hear about wind storms coming our way.

Currently the winds are not that strong, but they are whistling around the house and pretty gusty. Mama knows though that these winds can change anytime to sound like a freight train. She has kept my mind off all the banging and different sounds that the wind is making by reading a lot of books to me, and playing a lot of games. I have toys all over the living room but mama says it is ok, we will clean them up before bed tonight.

Mama did take me fishing today! It was a lot of fun!

I caught one! I was so proud of myself. See it is a big one!

The lights have been flickering, the last 5 minutes so Mama has the back up lights ready to go, flashlights, and oil lamps. She also has the sleeping bags just in case we spend the night in the dark. She says we will camp in the living room if we need to. I am trying to talk her into building a tent for the night. Maybe she will do it even if we don’t lose our lights, now that would be fun!

Anyway, stay tuned and we will let you know how we make it through the storm! I have enjoyed being home with just Mama as she has let me have a lot of fun and hasn’t worried about all my toys all over the place, but I do miss my Papa! Hurry home Papa!

A Must

How many of you struggle with the seatbelt idea with your children? I know we have had a few struggles with Selena playing with her seat belt, wanting to take it off, or complaining about it. We have two car seats, while Selena would prefer to be in the “Big Girl” car seat she will not keep the seat belt on. So she is still in the convertible car seat which I know isn’t as comfortable for her anymore.

A good friend and blogger Dyslexic Different Thinking Me had this video posted on her blog this morning. I had Selena watch it with me. At first she was mesmerized by it and didn’t catch the theme. We then played it again and I pointed out the main theme of the video, she has been running around now since playing seat belts. My hopes is seeing it from this point of view she will decide seatbelts are a good thing.

Just a Few Odds & Ends

Look what I found on my camera today when I went to download the pictures of our Geography lesson:

I was informed this is the piano

These both are off the TV, from Between the Lions

Isn’t that a lovely shade of carpet we have in our home?

This month is proving to be a very challenging month for me. As many of you know we found out that Selena only has the one kidney. This brings point in hand why I disconnected the Internet when I was diagnosed with the cancer. As I look more and more up about these conditions dealing with children and kidney problems, and no I can’t find anything just about a child having one kidney, it all has to go into renal failure. Well I did find a medical center back East that does have information about Chronic Renal Failure, which I believe is what they would place Selena under. I know that sounds horrible, but no it is not, it is just a term used for a child that has one kidney or a chronic condition involving the kidneys, but not putting them in the category of Complete Renal Failure.

Anyway as I am reading this I read such things as frequent urination is a problem to be checked and watched for. Great, the last couple of days Selena has started having a lot of accidents. I have to gather myself, remind myself that it is not uncommon for a child to slide backwards a bit, and ask myself is she really going more then normal, the answer is no. Another thing they tell you to watch for is loss of appetite. Oh brother, the list just goes on and on, one could drive themselves crazy. No more Internet searches until we see the specialists, I PROMISE!!

Well, this month is the time for my 3 month check up on my cancer. No, I doubt anything is going to change, but at these times I get a lot of worries and frets. Who wouldn’t? I am pretty sure this time I will have that expensive PET scan, it is a $4000.00 scan and we have never had to pay a dime for it before, but now with our insurance change I am sure we will have to pay at least part of the bill. I just don’t know how much.

That brings me back around to Selena, having to drive her clear to Seattle to see these specialists. That is a 104 mile drive in one direction. Traffic is horrible the further North we go, so we are probably looking at a 3 hour drive considering the traffic and depending on what time of day we have to be there. They squeeze in as much as they can in one day, so they say to expect to be there the entire day. Does Motel sound good about this time? At least it does to me for one night anyway.

Anyway if I seem a little scarce here on the Internet, you will know in advance, my plate seems a little over loaded right now. We will still keep focused on our homeschooling, as I do not want to throw Selena totally off track. I know we will get through this, and will look forward to hopefully being able to have Selena’s follow ups done at the Satellite Office in Olympia, once everything is done up in Seattle. That is our hope anyway especially considering I do not do well in Seattle traffic.

Ok, I am done with my little rant here. Thank you and sorry if I have bored you to death.

What other’s don’t say..

I wanted to share a funny post about comments we have heard from other grandparents  since we made the choice to raise Selena.

*One day when shopping by myself, I ran into someone from church, she looked into the cart and asked, “Where is the thing?” I picked up the loaf of bread in my cart and asked, “Is this the thing your looking for, it is located in the next isle over.” Of course she was asking about Selena.

*One day when I made a comment to someone I was tired, I was informed, “This is why at our age we are not suppose to be raising children.” I looked at her, and just said, “That is funny you feel this way, my Mom was just a few years younger then myself when she had me.”

*I loved this one, “We just adore the time we have to spend with our grandchildren, but it is truly a blessing when we get to send them home.” I replied, “We too adore the time we have to spend with our grandchild, but we are so blessed to have her 24/7 and not miss a moment of her.”

*Someone asked me one time, “Don’t you miss being able to do all the things that people do when their children grow and leave home?” I just replied, “Oh you mean go through the empty nest emotions? No, I don’t miss those moments for nothing! As far as what other people do, we do the same things we just get to share them with our granddaughter.”

*I think though the most ridiculous remark anyone ever made to me was, “It is such a shame that you are sick, and you have to tend to your grandchild.” My comment was simply put, “More parents go through illnesses and have to continue to raise their children, they just can’t send them away because they are sick. Have you ever thought that these precious little one’s actually keep us going?”

These are just a few of the wild comments I have heard from so called friends.

All I have to say to any of them is: IF I HAD TO GO BACK AND MAKE THESE DECISIONS AGAIN, YOU BETTER BELIEVE NOTHING WOULD CHANGE!

Now I just want to let all of you know, All of you have excepted me just where I am, I have never had any offensive remarks, questions, or comments left on my blog. You all have been very encouraging, supportive, and absolutely wonderful in your acceptance of Selena and I into your circle of the blog world. I hope you all know I don’t blog much about personal issues, but a few have privately asked, I respect you all for your understanding. I have welcomed those who ask, and am not ashamed to answer your questions, but I do thank all of you for respecting my desire to keep our circumstances private.

Pre-school and more

We've been pre-schooling with Selena now for about a month. I have to get more manipulatives...she loves them and learns more with the hands on then anything. She does love to sit down at the table though and work on her little hand outs that promote fine motor skills while teaching shapes, colors, writing preparedness, and of course the alphabet and numbers. She really enjoys the Bible stories and is working hard on memorizing her Bible verses for AWANAS. She already knows 1John 4:10. She is never ceasing to amaze me. Ever since she began to talk she has never been able to pronounce her name, she has always called herself baby Selah. After a month of seeing her name on the felt board and pronouncing it everyday she finally is able to proudly pronounce it correct. I get such a kick out of her though as when she sees a picture of herself when she was younger she still calls herself baby Selah, it is like she has now grown up from baby Selah to Selena.



I took her out side yesterday for a while once the Sun finally decided to pop through the cloud cover. She was enjoying playing on her swing set, making lines and X's with her sidewalk chalk, laughing and giggling. Pretty soon she seen an ant, and here she goes, "Hi Ant!" Now I don't know if the ant answered her or not..."How are you Ant?" "I am fine today." "Where are you going?" "Ant starts with letter A" "A NT Ant" "Bye Ant" "See you later." Of course you know the ant just kept creeping on its way until it disappeared into the grass.



Everything with her of late has been "play this or that". For instance if you tell her it is time to go to bed she looks at you and says, "No, we play go to bed." or "We play pick up toys." What a hoot.

Selena's Tid Bits

We had a very nice surprise a couple of weeks back when Kelly, Nikki, and Lindsay came to visit. Selena loved playing with Lindsay, too bad the weather didn't cooperate to go to the park. I can't get over how much these two girls have grown. It was really nice to visit with Kelly and Nikki. To think we raised our older kids together, from Awanas, through homeschooling, etc... Now here we are with young children again. I missed them while they were gone on their journey, but was happy that they got to go do what they wanted to do. I hope to see them again here soon!

Selena has been doing some pre-schooling here lately. She is learning how to cut with scissors. She can spend a good 30 min. to an hour trying to cut paper. Actually she is getting pretty good and has created some neat crafts with the scraps she has cut out. I just love her intensity though as she works with those scissors, and trying so hard to get the fine motor skills to work.

Now don't ask me why on the hottest day through our heat wave, Selena decided she had to wear my coat. She looks like a little eskimo! Oh well, she had fun.

It has been a challenge with het lately, not a bad thing, she is just really getting more independent. She is growing so fast, it is hard to believe she will be 3 in December.

Tid Bits

Friday I went and got my hair cut, that was pretty exciting for me since my hair had finally grown out enough to actually get it cut into a real style. I have always tended to like my hair more on the longer side, but I really like this short hair style.

Have you ever grabbed your camera to discover that it has given up the ghost? I had a friend who wanted pictures of my new hair style, so I took out my camera, now understand I have never really liked taking pictures of myself, and truly usually avoid pictures being taken of me, just a hang up of mine I suppose. Well, to my surprise my camera told me it was low on batteries so I changed the batteries only to discover it would not turn on. After several attempts of switching the batteries around, thinking I had them in wrong I finally had to come to the conclusion that my camera of 8 years had just died. I called my husband who was in Aberdeen at the time and asked, I suppose I told him to get me a new camera. I figured he would just pick me up a cheep digital camera until we get something better, but to my amazement he bought me a Kodak Easy Share, a $200.00 camera. He told me that I deserved a better camera. I am still learning all that it does, but boy I love it. I have never had a camera that takes such sharp pictures and that will actually take pictures at night. I even captured a picture of the moon the other evening.

Last night to my amazement Selena suddenly looked up at me and said, "Let's play Red Light Green Light." Now I didn't even know she knew anything about this game. I know she has seen it played on Clifford, the Big Red Dog. Anyway I said OK, and told her to go stand by the far wall and gave her instructions on how the game was played. She ran at me as I said green light and froze perfectly in one place when I said red light. I guess she wanted to keep it going because when I said green light she turned and ran back towards the wall, but again stopping and freezing when I said red light. It was so cute, now why can't we have our cameras attached to us permanently to catch these moments?

This morning Selena wanted to play with her wooden letters, so I pulled them out. I was goofing around and put C A T together. Selena looked over and with no hesitation informed me that C A T spelled cat. I am really seeing where the free phonic curriculum is doing just what I had hoped it would do, by teaching her to sound out small words and also that things are read from left to right. I was so proud of her and yes quite surprised since we hadn't really moved on to C words yet.

I have so much I should be doing around here today and instead I am sitting here blogging. With that said, I suppose I should end this for now and get going on the dreaded job of laundry.