Well yesterday' to-do list smugness rather evaporated when it was 1:20am this morning and a wide awake 3 year old wanted to play lego! All was going well until the gym called and said there was a last minute space for me on the spinning class and so I decided to go. O fell asleep just before I left but woke up when our decorator called round whilst I was out. Obviously he came because I called him in the morning thinking I was being oh so efficient slash organised! So, when I arrived home at 8:15pm, the trio where all wide awake and, as it was light, O said "Good Morning!" And the consequence was a cheese sandwich picnic, with S reading Roman Mysteries and O doing jigsaws, north of 9pm in Grandma's bed!
Yesterday afternoon I found a spare 1/2 an hour to re-read "Teaching Reading" it is a fabulous little book and refreshing my memory was very comforting and reassuring. It reminded me to stop talking in terms of E big "stuck" on his reading. Actually his reading age is spot on for a 5 1/2 year old and the final books (the 12s) are really for 9-10 year olds. It is tricky for me to adjust my expectations though when S, now 7, completed the whole scheme in 3 months flat when she was 4. The book is also so old that it could have been written last week. The cycles in fashions and approaches to reading have evolved so many times since it was published it is almost contempory! It also talks about the benefits of small class sizes and one to one in learning to read and was, probably with out really meaning to be, was very pro home ed!
Talking of S, she's gone very political! Yesterday afternoon we were all asked to sign a political petition about getting a puppy, and when we wouldn't sign she forged our signatures! And she made a placard for a "puppy now" (she glued a wooden stick on the back!) I am not sure where she has learnt about activist politics but she wants a puppy and got really cross when Grandma and I refused to search the Internet for one so, after some head scratching and thinking, late last night I texted a good friend of mine who has a Dalmatian and that is where S is now. Out on a dog walk! I am hoping to find daily opportunities for her to interact with dogs until the novelty wears off and, if it doesn't, we can have an informed conversation about it as she will understand the major responsibilities involved in pet ownership.
In between a very late night and now we squeezed in a visit to Fisher Farm for coffee with Grandma and 45 minutes of toboggan run which was almost as calorie burning as last night's spin class! It is brill though, only a few months ago O had to sit in the pushchair and watch whilst I carried up the tyres for S & E but now all three can slide and what's more they can all carry their own transport up the steep stairs! There are times when a close age gap is tricky, certainly three under 5 was pretty full on, but there are bonuses too like today when everyone is enjoying the same activity. Then we had a spin on the pedal go-karts. I landed up with two passengers, just what my quads needed! and there was high drama as a geese chased a crow that had caught a tiny baby rabbit in its beak...........
3 comments:
Chiara is desperate for a dog too. She wrote to father Christmas last Christmas stating that she's wanted a dog for seven years and she would like a dog more than anything else. It was so sad and so sweet; I just can't do a dog right now for a multitude of reasons! I hope the dog walking helps with S. Perhaps she's a born activist ;)
That toboggan run looks like so much fun! My son would be in heaven. We've been getting questions are here too lately about getting a pet. I'm secretly glad that I have really bad allergies to many animals. But we might break down and get a frog for starters.
A frog! I never thought of them as pets!
The dog walking was great for S, really got her thinking and talking about the responsibilities involved.
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