A Busy Week!

We've had a busy week here. Emma had her first day back at preschool on Monday, and that was a bit of an adjustment for us all.


I think Ashlyn has had the hardest time adjusting. On Monday, when she heard that Emma was getting her shoes on to leave, Ashlyn immediately ran to the laundry room and returned with her shoes. She wanted to go too! Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, there were lots of tears as big sister got to go, but she had to stay behind.


On Monday I tried to distract and cheer up Ashlyn with some music. The girl loves music and dancing, and it soon helped her forget that Emma was missing. There's one particular song that she loves, which involves jumping and counting. And now, anytime a song pauses or ends, she throws her hands up in the air, thinking that it must be time to count!


In a couple weeks, Ashlyn's and my mornings will become a little busier, as we will start music classes on Mondays and have playgroup meetings on Fridays. But for now, I'm enjoying some extra quiet time on the mornings Ashlyn decides to nap, and we're enjoying having some Mommy and Ashlyn time on the mornings she doesn't nap. (We're in that nap-transition phase, 2 to just 1. Kind of tricky sometimes, but we're doing OK.)


Emma loved the start of school, but she was disappointed that some of her friends from last year weren't in her class again this year. It sounds like she's made some new friends, though, and is excited about the new things she gets to do in the 4 year old class this year.

I've also begun working with Emma more in the afternoons, trying to build off of what she is doing at preschool. We have a reading and writing time each afternoon that she has school, and a reading time when she doesn't have school. We had been working on reading with Emma earlier in the year, but our efforts seemed to have lost momentum, as Emma seemed to get easily frustrated when we asked her to read. So this fall, I came up with a new reading incentive program that seems to be working well so far. I made a reading sticker chart, where Emma gets 1 sticker for each page of a book she reads to me or Dakota. When she earns 5 stickers, she gets a "book buck" that she can use to buy special books she picked out at the book store. I took her to Half Price Books today and she was like a kid in a candy shop, picking out a big stack to bring home. (We buy them at the store, and then she buys them from us when she has saved enough of her "book bucks.")

Our writing time has been going well, too. (Though, we're just a week into it.) I thought it would be more of a struggle, since we knew Emma had developed certain bad habits in writing her letters, and it's very hard for her to break a habit once she's started. But like I said, so far so good. We use whatever is her "letter of the day" at school that day. Monday it was "I" and Tuesday and Wednesday it was "A." She thinks it's special to be able to use that wide, lined paper that all the first and second graders use. We practice writing the letter several times and then write a couple words. But Wednesday was a real treat, as we tossed aside the paper, and poured out the pudding! I smeared pudding on a large plate, and Emma practiced writing her letters in that. She had so much fun, she forgot she was even working and learning.

(You can see Emma's reading chart hanging on the window in the background.)

In addition to starting school this week and spending the morning at the book store today, we also found some time to make a trip over to Jumpin' Jacks with some friends. Emma was thrilled to get to run around and jump in all the bounce houses with her bf, Natalie. She was also so proud of herself, because she finally conquered the giant inflatable obstacle course all by herself. There's one tall wall at the end that she's always had trouble climbing without someone to push her up, but she finally did it all by herself, and boy, was she glowing!

So that's been our week. A nice, gentle start back into a routine that only promises to grow busier as other classes, play groups and church activities get into full swing next month!