I’ve been pretty good about doing monthly updates for Susie, but I feel like the big kids have developed a lot this summer, too. Since Tommy is exactly five and a half today, I’m doing a three-for-one update!
Life in our home is very much how I always dreamed. Books, legos, and doll clothes are scattered everywhere. No matter how much laundry I do, someone’s hamper is always overflowing. Daddy is almost always home for dinner. We’re at that wonderful stage where all three kids understand and obey when I tell them to go get their shoes to go out, and two out of the three can put them on by themselves (the third just searches through the shoe pile and brings me her shoes to put on). And when we get home, they’re finally trained to automatically go to the closet and take them off. Even Susie has started going over to the entryway and sitting down for me to take hers off. Tommy, and to some extent, Lizzie, have both learned how to put books back on the shelf the “right way” (upright, spine facing out). (If only they would do it without being reminded…) Daily activities include lots of coloring (it’s amazing how many art supplies we go through), making forts out of all the couch cushions and pillows, and dancing. It’s a lot of sweet chaos.
Tommy has started taking showers by himself in the past couple weeks. We signed him up for daily swimming lessons, so he needs to bathe midday instead of the evening with his sisters. One day after swimming, I was just too busy trying to get the girls lunch to do it myself, so I handed him a washcloth and told him to take a shower. He’s decided it’s “more work than a bath” but that he likes to do it himself. The girls miss him in the tub, but he likes being a big kid. He reads all the time–there are books turned upside down or with bookmarks all over the house, on pretty much every flat or comfortable surface. We’ve been doing a little break from formal schoolwork before starting kindergarten for real this coming Monday. He is painfully shy in new and awkward situations, like strangers teasing him in the grocery store. He has learned to skip. He is still a sweet little boy. I know the other boys in his Sunday School class have already lost their sweetness, so I’m assuming that’s going to be happening this year. Inevitable, but sad for his mommy to accept!
Elizabeth has totally embraced little girl activities. In the past month, she’s really gotten into playing with her dolls. Lucy no longer is dragged nude around the house. She’s a very clothed teddy bear, usually undergoing several outfit changes a day. And Betsy (the real doll) is finally a real presence in the living room–she is fed, changed, taken for walks, and put down for naps in her new bed all day long. I’ve even had to babysit for Betsy while her mommy goes out to play in the back yard. The dolls aren’t the ones changing their outfits; their mommy insists on changing from head to toe at least a couple times a day, and she still runs around a lot just in panties. Yesterday we had a huge meltdown because there were no clean panties to put on in the morning. Gentle reader, Elizabeth has plenty of panties, and I’d already done her laundry once this week. But apparently she’d been changing into clean panties every time she woke up–from naps or in the morning–as well as every time she changed outfits. No clean panties! Crisis! The waterworks did not dissipate until I’d thrown a load of panties in the wash, fished out an old pair of training pants (because nothing would induce her to borrow a pair of Tommy’s boy underwear for an hour), and ordered more panties online. When I put the large stack of washed and dried panties back in her drawer, she exclaimed, “Oh Mommy, ThLank You! That’s just what I wanted!” (Not a typo–she usually turns her “th” into an “l” sound.) Elizabeth is usually perky and cheerful as soon as she wakes up in the morning. She’s the only morning person in the family, and her chipper chatter with those who are still in bed often results in a grumpy brother or mother telling her to “please go talk somewhere else.” She is still napping for a couple hours in the afternoons.
Susanna has gotten into dolls way earlier than Elizabeth did, obviously because she wants to do everything her sister does. She calls them “baby” and hugs them and pushes them in the stroller. She expresses quite an opinion about what she’s going to wear. Dresses are preferred, especially if they match her sister. She’ll run to the hair basket in the bathroom, grab headbands and bows, and bring them over to me one at a time to put in her hair–the more, the better. She loves having her hair done. When I ask her if she needs a diaper change, she’ll let me know by lifting up her skirt to make it easier for me to check. Her main words are Mommy, baby (=herself or a doll, depending on context), yummy, and no (=yes). She’s started babbling a ton, especially when she has my undivided attention, and she definitely understands commands. She is not great on the obedience front yet, though. All her gums are bulging with new teeth, but none have popped through since her 7th and 8th at the beginning of the summer. She complains about going down for her morning nap and can push through without it if necessary, but she still usually sleeps an hour and a half in the morning and 2-3 hours in the afternoon. And–thank you, Jesus!–she is currently sleeping in until 7:30 am.
Here’s a typical moment at our house: Elizabeth-clad only in her skivvies-dressing Lucy, Tommy reading, Susie crawling under the dining room table to look for scraps.
And here’s Susanna’s latest fancy hairdo
And all lined up and ready “to watch something.” Um, we might have gotten addicted to the TV during the Olympics.
Ohhh – they are growing up too quickly! I am glad that Lizzie is enjoying her dolls more and the picture of Susie looks so much like her big sister!! Miss all of you!! 🙁
Emily- I still love reading your blog and getting a peek into your life. Jason is so high energy and never stops talking and it is my DREAM to get him to love reading at an early age, like Tommy, to give me a bit of a break. He is starting to play quite a bit with words and sounds and can tell what letter any word starts with, and can spell a few BASIC words. He is starting to understand letter blends and loves to sit with me and give me a word to sound out with him- with me writing the word. (Not that this is close to reading…but just wanted you to know where he was for advice) What would you recommend at this age (4 in Feb)…I am a teacher but am clueless until elementary school!!! I am just trying to go more with interest and not push him, but he seems to be interested in many things as long as he has my full attention.
PS. As far as I can tell you are one of the best examples of homeschooling that I have ever seen! Tommy’s bible recitation was awesome!!! Really…you have made me consider doing it up to K!
I know this is a controversial subject, but since Derek and I both were reading at age 4 (and obviously never suffered for it), we lean towards early reading if the child is interested. We started Tommy on phonics when he was probably 3 1/2, and I had success with The Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading (by Jessie Wise). I taught in the classroom setting, too, and even helped teach my baby brother how to read back in the day, but I didn’t know how to go about it with my own kid! I like that OPGTR is phonics-based, logical, scripted, and has no pictures. (I tried Phonics Pathways and hated it because there were no directions, and Tommy was distracted by the random pictures (like an atom when learning short a sound–what little kid knows what that is?) and would guess the words based on the pictures instead of sounding out the letters in the words.) We find OPGTR fun, even without all the bells and whistles. Around his 4th birthday, he just stalled out on putting together vowels and consonants. So we took a break until 4 1/2, at which point he could easily read off hat, cat, sat, etc, and we went on from there. He had not even completed half the book, however, when he suddenly just took off right after turning 5 and started reading real books. (I am making him finish going through the book to teach him the rules–hopefully this will help with spelling down the road.) He was entranced with the My Father’s Dragon series, and Derek wasn’t reading it fast enough to him, so he started reading it on his own. I didn’t believe at first that he had taught himself the rest of how to read, but he really did. That it how I learned to read (phonics foundation, then too impatient with my mom’s pace through Little House, started reading them myself). So I think that reading really engaging books to the kids is probably just as important as the five minutes a day spent going through a phonics book. And severely limiting TV.=)
With all that said, I’m not planning to start Lizzie on phonics any time soon, as she hasn’t expressed any interest. She looks at books all the time, but with three people in the house ready to read to her all day, she doesn’t seem to have the same incentive as Tommy did. That’s fine with me–it is SO NICE having an extra reader in the house, but since he steps in to read to her when I’m too busy, I have less incentive to have two extra readers right now.
Thanks Emily! I will check out that book..when I am in a country where that is possible! You have NO idea how excited I am to have a library in Dec!
Love this update about your sweet little ones! They grow up so fast…it’s amazing!