Learning

Alyna and Ryan are both learning at such a fast pace these days. Now that Kellyn's schedule is a more predictable during the day, it's easier to plan my activities with them. On the days we're home I use Kellyn's morning nap (1 1/2 -2 hours) to do more preschool type activities now.

Yesterday we did coloring, playing with play-do, and the alphabet zoo on Fisher Price's website. Coloring and play-do activities always involve Mommy drawing/making letters for them. The alphabet zoo is set up so that they can press the letters on the keyboard themselves and it says/shows the animal with that sound.

Today I added in a singing time with them and Kellyn while I fed Kellyn her morning baby food. We've started her on just a little bit of fruit in the mornings and evenings because she's just always so hungry during the day. It has really helped her nap longer. We sang, "God made the big round sun", "Jesus Loves Me", "My God is so big", and "Oh be careful little eyes". Alyna was doing amazingly well following along with the motions to the songs. Ryan just giggled and played on the nearby rocking toy.

During Kellyn's nap we spent a while on Starfall.com going over the letters U through Z. Then we used the website's little program to discover the process of planting, watering, and then watching a flower grow. I printed some color sheets for them from the site. Then we took the baby monitor outside with us for play time. It is a gorgeous day and Ryan didn't even need to wear his jacket.

Alyna can count items from 1 - 10, and Ryan is trying hard to catch up on that. He really wants to be able to do it too. He knows all his uppercase letters now. Alyna is really working on the sounds of the letters.

Here's what she says for some of the letters every time she sees them: instead of "for" she says "a"... we'll work on that some day:
A for "me" (meaning Alyna)
R for Ryan
D for Daddy
M for Mommy
K for "baby" - she still refuses to say Kellyn's name but she knows the K is for her
H for Henrey (our dog)
T for Tessa (my sister's dog)
P for Papa
G for Grandma
N for Mommy... oops I have to correct her and say N is for Nana

And her first sight word is G-O that's "GO". She can also tell you all the letters in her name. Yesterday when she saw a lowercase "n" she said "n for me" because it's in her name. I'm just a little proud, can you tell?

Ryan is ever the sweat-heart. He still loves to give kisses to his baby sister and put blankets on her. It's no wonder the girls at church dote on him so much.

We're really working on the potty training now. Each of them has a chart up with spaces for stickers. When Alyna pees in the potty she gets a sticker. When Ryan even sits on the potty he gets a sticker because he's been fighting me so much on it. When they fill in all the sticker spots they get a special piece of candy. Each of them got 3 stickers this morning, and Alyna was dry that whole time. As soon as Ryan is more consistent with sitting on the potty I'll only give him stickers when he actually pees too. It took a over a week to fill in Alyna's first chart and get her prize, now she's half-way through it on the third day. It's almost time to challenge her to the next level.