Monday, January 18, 2010

Life Updates

Life Updates...

Emma: Her reading skills astound me each day. I LOVE hearing her read stories! It has been wonderful for me to experience firsthand many of the reading components I learned about during my reading-teacher course curriculum. Em's teacher and school use the Beka learning program which teaches phonics. Em constantly "sounds out" words wherever we go. I am a HUGE phonics advocate. Many of my 8th grade students don't have the same skills Emma already has. Due to being taught with the "Whole Language" style (wherein students memorize sight words, rather than learning letter sounds and blend sounds) I have many students who struggle with "word attack" and have NO idea how to break words into syllables or how to determine root words and affixes. It is awesome seeing Emma's early success and witnessing the beauty of phonics in action.

DH: Is currently working on a children's series. He never thought he'd want to write for a young audience, but thus far he has really enjoyed it. I'm thrilled he has been writing so much. Since graduating from college, DH has never had a job that truly used his skills...I'm glad he is putting his "smarts" to good use...and in a way that he finds gratifying.

Work/School: Continues to be cumbersome, but I DID manage to get 3 weeks of lesson plans done last weekend so that I could have this weekend totally OFF. Sweet! DH and I mostly finished turning Em's old room into an office area yesterday. Now DH has a writing nook! :)

I've used the 3-day weekend to get TONS of cleaning and laundry done. You know---all the deep cleaning stuff I should've done during winter break, but spent lots of time in my PJs reading and playing online B.oggle cooking with Emma and her new E.asybake Oven instead.

TTC: The doctor's office called to say they needed to re-schedule my appointment, as the CPN my appointment was scheduled with left their practice at the beginning of the year. I was a little annoyed with having to re-schedule. However, my re-scheduled appointment (on Feb. 16th) is with the head of the practice who is also the awesome OB that delivered Em. (The appointment is for my annual checkup, plus fertility counseling.) I guess at this point, what's another month of waiting?

MLK, Jr. Today Em and I are home from school. I'm babysitting her good buddy, Adrian while his parents are at work. Thank you MLK, Jr. and all the others who contributed toward making multi-racial friendships possible. Em and Adrian have been good buddies since they were less than a year old.


Big smiles...


Adrian on the monkeybars.


Emma's Turn. (Note the shirt I got for her at OU last summer, "I love OHIO this much!"


Crossing together...

I've enjoyed spending the day with them. Conversations between 5 year olds...SO precious! Let freedom ring!

15 comments:

Sunny said...

Sounds like things are going really well! Waiting the extra month to see the doc is annoying, but could really pay off to see the big man. Keep us posted.

Marie W said...

They are both adorable! I am sorry that you have to wait a little longer, hopefully the Dr. will have a plan of action for you and dh. Dh has lots of guts and determination! (can I have some? ha!) I have started and stopped writing over and over..... the unfinished books are still sitting in the closet. Sending some love your way!

Danifred said...

Love the picture of them crossing each other on the monkey bars- too cute!

It totally sucks that you have to wait another month for your appointment- I'm hoping it goes WAY better than expected though!

Carrie27 said...

That totally stinks that you have to wait another month, but hopefully it will be worth the wait, especially since you will be seeing the head of the practice.

I'm envious of your husband.

Mrs. Gamgee said...

Sounds like a perfect way to spend MLK day.

That's so exciting about you hub's writing. Do you think he can bottle a little of his motivation and you can send it my way?

Miss Em's reading skills are great, but really, I wouldn't expect anything different. When parents value reading it shows in their children. Three cheers for her and YOU!

Anonymous said...

How cute are they?! It sounds like things are going well and that you have had a productive couple of weeks!

Laurel said...

Cute pics! I just realized Em looks different-- are you guys growing out her bangs? Cute! :)

Anonymous said...

Thanks for visiting. I have been bad about reading everyone's blogs lately. I hope to catch up soon. happy iclw

Rach said...

What truly beautiful children!

Sorry to hear that you have to wait another month to see the Dr!

ICLW
Rach
www.thegalwho.wordpress.com

AnxiousMummyto3 said...

Hey Alana,
I'm counting this towards ICLW but you know I'll come regardless.
That is so fantastic about your daughter. You must be so proud of her skills. The pictures are gorgeous!!! Thanks for your lovely comments, they mean so much to me :)

daega99 said...

Hopefully time will fly to the appointment!

They're too cute!

ICLW
http://daega99-arewethereyet.blogspot.com/

junebug said...

I love phonics. Recently I learned of a new system where phonics is combined with a signing movement. It was developed for deaf children because the signs matched the movements of the mouth and helped to distinguish the difference in sounds.(like the diff 'tween the sound of the two o's in robot) It has been very successful. They found it just as helpful for hearing children. Anyway, I just found it fascinating and your post reminded me of it.
ICLW

Big Mama T said...

I love the phoincs system too. I think it's interesting how they'll sound for months, then one day it all just clicks and they're reading everything...

ICLW

Mocha Dad said...

I love it when I find families that love words as much as we do. My wife is also writing a children's series and we encourage our kids to read all the time.

Lisa said...

It sounds like you have a ray of sunshine breaking through the clouds on every facet of your life...rewarding job, loving and interesting husband, a beautiful, sweet daughter and now, getting to see the head of the practice instead of one of the juniors. That's great. I have really enjoyed reading your blog.

Lisa (yourgreatlife - ICLW#44)