What we've been up to

I thought I would give a general update on all of the kids and what they have been up to lately. I'll go from youngest to oldest. :)

Elena is doing well. She's growing like a weed and is able to share clothes with her sister now. She is getting quite the little attitude, espcially considering she still isn't walking yet. LOL She cruises everywhere, but refuses to let go to walk. She will stand in the middle of the floor and clap and dance, but no way will she take a step without gripping something with all of her might. She still has only 8 teeth, loves playing cars with her brothers and includes the sound effects, will push her way through a crowd. The funniest thing she appears to be doing now (which I really shouldn't laugh at) is sassing us. If you tell her "no, no" when she goes after something, she will sit down and bob her head from side to side and say "ya, ya, ya, ya". It's hilarious! Totally backtalking, and only 13 months old. LOL Can you imagine what she will be like as a teen? Yikes!

Cassidy is still sweet as ever. She is totally into the princess scene right now. EVERYTHING is princess this and princess that. She is showing some interest in potty training again, so we have restarted the process. Hopefully we will have success sooner than we did with Jacob! She loves playing wiht little purses and plastic bracelets and she carries her "purple baby" everywhere she goes. She is such a little mama.

Joshua is doing well with therapy. This week's speech went a little better, but he is so overly distracted in the room that it makes it hard for him to get much accomplished. OT was a little different this week because Mindy was sick and not there. So, we had a sub. She was great and Josh never missed a beat. She asked if he does ok with the beans and rice, and I told her yes and that he needed work with messier things. I also explained that we had just started the brushing and joint compression. She took out some foam puzzle pieces and some shaving cream. She called the shaving cream snow and had him roll the puzzle pieces in it and then put them together. I couldn't believe it, but he actually did it. He got upset if even the least little bit of the cream touched his hand, but he never once cried, which to me was amzing progress for only 5 days. I'm hoping to see even more progress next week.

Jacob is doing well and school is going well also. I have discovered LapBooks on the net and as soon as I saw them I knew the kids would enjoy making one. So, today Jacob and I put together our first one - Animal Habitats. I have no idea if we did it right, but I am assuming so long as he learns from doing it and retains the info, then the goal is met, right?

So, here are some pictures of our first lapbook:

Cover:


Inside:


Inside left - flaps open: Inside right - flaps open:


My printer is not currently hooked up to my computer, so Jacob had to actually draw out things we didn't have stickers for. He was not too happy about having to do school today, but once we actually started the lapbook he had a blast! He had so much fun finding the stickers, figuring out where the animals live, what the book should look like, decorating the cover, and drawing the animals. I think lapbooking will become a regular addition to our homeschooling routine.