*Five. One. Four.

I'm writing Friday's blog on Sunday because I just got back from a wonderful weekend in St. Augustine with my sister. Oh, and last night we saw Wicked in Jacksonville. Amazing! But this blog isn't about my love of musicals, so let's revert back to Friday.

Friday was Field Trip Day! But before we left, I had Bubs and Z work on their name activity. Bubs was almost able to do it without her name card! She only mixed up the last A and H in her name.

Around 10, we gathered up the homemade cupcakes (for a quick picture) and headed off to the fire station!

We got to the first fire station and the bay doors were closed, which means they were out on a call or training, so we had to go to the next one. We showed up and I knocked on the door to ask if visitors were welcome and with a HUGE smile, the Lieutenant said, "Absolutely!"

And let me tell you, the kids were certainly welcomed. They walked in and practically ran the place! It was only the Lieutenant and one firefighter at the station and they were so happy to have the kids in the building. The kids were shown EVERYTHING.

The very first thing they got to do was go in the fire truck. They were buckled in, tried every piece of clothing on, pushed buttons (the truck was off) and the firefighter was blowing up rubber gloves as balloons. The kids were in heaven! Sensory overload!

Wow. It was intense. They nearly got to touch everything. And that was only outside! Then they got to go inside and get a tour of the place! From their rec. room to their kitchen to their bedrooms to the office.

You'll never guess what they got to do next! The Lieutenant asked me quietly if they'd be OK using the hose. The actual hose that's connected to the fire truck. I couldn't believe it! I said yes and the firefighter asked the kids if they wanted to pretend to be real firefighters putting out a fire.

"We can use the hose?!"

Babe made the connection immediately. They ran outside and the truck was started so they'd have pressure to the hose. They put out a cone in the parking lot for the kids to try to knock down with the water. It was great! I was still in shock that permission was granted for this to be done!

Can you believe it!? It was fantastic. Everyone had a great time and I think the fire staff had more fun than the kids! We took one last picture of everyone before we thanked them a million times and headed back home.

But of course the kids wanted to go back into the truck, so the guys let them!!!

Obviously, everyone had a great time. We made it home in time for lunch, and I let the rest of the day be chill-day. However, Babe got a piece of mail from her aunt, a teacher at the Florida School for the Deaf and Blind. The letter was written in Braille! Since Babe is the same age as one of the oldest blind pre-schoolers at the school, they will become pen pals. So to end the day, Babe wrote a letter to her new pen pal.

We also sent him a fork. My sister is going to try to get a video of him guessing what it is. Then this preschooler will write a letter back to Annabel with a blind-related game (probably something to do with Braille), and then we will send him back something to try to guess. Fun, huh? My sister and I both think it's a great opportunity for both kids!

What do you think?

Third Week, 4th Day

In Math today we finished Chapter 1!!! Before I told Babe, though, I set up a kind of quiz in the playroom with three different piles of random items with the intention of reviewing all previously learned Math terms.

I had her to sort this stuff by color,

this stuff by shape,

and line this stuff up shortest to tallest.

Well guess what? She passed Chapter 1 in Math. With flying colors, really.

I wasn't able to get a picture of anything else before Z and Bubs started playing with everything, but I did incorporate other Math terms like top, bottom, under, over, right, left, nearer, and farther and Babe was able to do all of those. Very awesome. After her worksheet, I told her that she just finished Chapter 1 and her eyes got pretty big. I told her, though, that the coming weeks in Math would be pretty tough because it will be stuff she doesn't know yet.

"But you're still gonna teach it to me, right?"

Yep.

Thursday is library class for Bubs and Z, so after Math we free-played and then headed off.

After lunch, we went right into Reading Comprehension, where she had to read a wordless story. Calvert provided one about the first day of Kindergarten for some children, and before I had her "read" it, we went through the book and I asked her questions about what was happening in each picture. Then I had her go back to the beginning and "read" the book. Her dialogue tone was pretty cute (when she had the mom and teacher talk), and she made sure to say something about everything she could see in the picture.

For example, the first picture is of a boy getting out of bed. Behind him, under the covers, there's a stuffed animal. She "read", "Good morning Rabbit! I'm going to school today! You get to come with me because you are my show-and-tell!"

After she "read" that book, I gave her "Goodnight, Gorilla" by Peggy Rathmann, which is one of her favorite picture books. It's so adorable that I enjoy it too. On each page, she spoke as the mouse (who stole the key from the zookeeper and is letting all the animals out of their cages).

"Shh, stay quiet (insert featured animal). Follow me. We are going to sleep in his house tonight!"

I laughed out loud.

When she got to the page where the zookeeper's wife wakes up, I almost died.

"DEAR! Why are all these animals in my bed?!"

So cute. And after that, I'd think she got the jyst of telling wordless stories.

I had her do her online Checkpoints, then we discussed her favorite things to play and made another list.

#2, Elephant Chase, is a game I made up in the pool that we played a lot at the beginning of the summer. The way it's played is, she stands on the diving board and I stand in the middle of the pool. When she throws a sinking elephant toy in the pool, she jumps in while I go and find the elephant. If she can swim to the steps and get back on the diving board before I put the elephant on the diving board, she wins. It's awesome exercise for me and she has a blast racing me. So really, I win too! I'm actually surprised she remembered it to add it to her list.

After she made her list, we moved to Science, the intro to her five senses. She was able to name them all, so I read "My Five Senses" by Aliki. We concentrated on sight today, so we talked about how there are different colored eyes. We went through everyone in her family, and then I told her that some kids don't have the sense of sight, and that some of Aunt Dani's students are blind, which means they can't see.

"I know!"

"What do you think they do if they can't see?"

"Well, they get new eyes like that dolphin got a new tail in that movie!"

Wow.

I told her that most kids can't get new eyes and that they don't have all five senses.

"So they only have four senses?!"

Mhmm.

To engrain how important our sense of sight is, I had her sit on the couch and I wrapped a handkerchief around her head to block her eyes. Then I told her to walk to the fridge, get a Capri Sun for herself, walk back to the couch, and poke the hole to drink it. She stood up right away and felt for the couch to walk along it. As soon as she stepped out into the "open" she got nervous and put her arms out in front of her to feel for the counter. Then she walked along the counter to the fridge, opened the door, went right to the correct shelf for the juice! And then walked back.

She unwrapped the straw and wanted to go all the way back to throw the wrapper out. So she took the same route, but I about lost it again when she ended up in the dining room and slipped her hand through the back of the chair to throw the wrapper out. She picked it up, turned around, and proceeded back to the kitchen to the real garbage can.

When she got back to the couch, she poked the straw through the Capri Sun.

Kind of.

I was dying while she was doing all this and when she started drinking it, I took the handkerchief off so she could see what she did.

She laughed too.

After she refreshed herself with the juice, we ended Science and I brought out her Me Book from yesterday and had her draw her family on the second page.

Cuteness to the max. Can we all just "awwww" in unison at how they are all holding hands?

We ended the day with a quick final discussion on what to be when she grows up.

"I want to be everything."

She even watched the provided online video about how to tell what you want to be when you grow up, and one of the things listed in the video is to find things you're good at.

"Well I'm good at everything and I said I want to be everything when I grow up!"

OK then.

I gave her "When Poppy and Max Grow Up" by Lindsey Gardiner and she read it to me and Bubs. She was so excited about this book because she had to turn the page in her reading log to write it down! A whole new page!

Another day done!