Pickin' Apples
On the way to the apple orchard.
Good thing Daddy is pulling this HEAVY load!
Ky sharing with his sister. He is SO sweet!
A big apple for such a small mouth!
A lot of effort goes into eating an apple!
Alaina picking her own apple
"CHOMP!"
"CHOMP!"
"What are you looking at? Haven't you ever seen a baby eat an apple before??!!"
Playing with a leaf.
A present for me??!!
What neat paper you gave me!
What's this?
Our schedule booked up SO fast! We had no idea how we were going to get apple picking in. We ended up doing it the Sunday after Alaina's b'day which was already a busy weekend. We went to church and then drove straight to the apple orchard. Last year we picked a week or two before Alaina was born--this year we were definitely late, but still had some good picking.
We like to pick at an Orchard which is less "commercialized" and more of a local picking farm. They also have wagons for you to use which comes in so handy with the kids and the apples. It was also nice because we gave the kids their lunches while they sat in the wagon.
We ended up picking some Gala (there were very few left) and Cortlands. Cortlands are better baking apples, while Gala are better eating apples. We gave Ky & Alaina each their own apple in the wagon which bought Rob and I even more time to pick without having to chase the kids. Alaina loved having her own apple and she did very well with it. She would bite off the skin and spit it out and then eat the juicy flesh. I was impressed. Ky was also a great guy sharing his apple with her.
By the time we picked 2 or so bushels, the kids wanted out, so we recruited Ky to help. He did pretty well. Alaina then also wanted to follow suit and attempted to pick a few of her own. It is so neat watching her try to be a big girl. When she finally did pick her first apple (took a lot of work) she immediately sat down and started gnoshing on it. (Those are the pics I took of her in the grass.) She was so proud of herself.
The highlight of picking apples was when Ky started pulling down his pants in the middle of the orchard because he suddenly had to pee. *SIGH* As a boy there are times when we have gone to the park or similar place and their has been no restrooms--so I would take him behind a tree and have him go...well apparently he figured this was a similar place (which technically it was--there were no nearby bathrooms but lots of trees.) We were lucky that no one was nearby. Rob ran him near a tree and let him finish--however we felt bad and really hoped nobody would pick any apples near that tree for a while....Hmmm...I should delete the name of the farm we went to. Done!
We weren't really able to enjoy a lot of our time at the orchard because the kids needed to be put down for their naps. And it turned out to be a good thing that we left quickly since it rained shortly after that. It was a beautiful day though--which we were surprised by since it had been so cold.
I have no idea how many apples we picked--but it was close to 100lbs I believe. And we still have some of these apples in our fridge to eat one month later. We made apple butter, apple sauce, apple pie in a jar and apple jelly (from the peelings & cores). These recipes are listed in the side of the blog under canning. We did the apple jelly for the first time this year--YUM! What an awesome way to use those cores that you would normally just toss. By the way, I have been adding a lot more recipes to my blog lately--check out pumpkin casserole under vegetable sides or peanut butter pumpkin bread under breads! YUMMY! (can you tell I have been harvesting pumpkin??? Lots in the freezer!)
The last couple pics are for Adam and Liz. These are of Alaina opening your gift. Being a baby she was of course MUCH more interested in the paper. And was actually a little upset when I took it away and gave her the piggy. However now she loves to drag the piggy everywhere. She has such a love for "baby dolls". She loves to hug and hold them. She also has a stroller that she puts them in and pushes them around. So neat to see my little girl trying to be a mommy at her age.
Finally....For several weeks now I have been trying to upload a video on the blog of Ky and his math abilities. However blogger does not seem to like this video because it fails every time. If you have a FaceBook account you can see it there. Otherwise I will just have to tell you....A couple of weeks before Alaina's birthday, Ky was asking me to help him out with the "Where is Thumbkin?" song. He wanted to know which finger was what person. From there he started figuring out how he could use his fingers to show numbers. Then one day I talked with him about adding fingers. He didn't seem to get it, so I quit. The next day he came up to me and was like "Mom 2 fingers plus 3 fingers makes 5 fingers". He put up 2 fingers on one hand 3 on the other and added them. I was SO PROUD. I then asked him to add 4 + 4 AND HE DID IT!!! He totally understood. So at 3.25 years old my boy is able to do simple addition. The video was of him adding. Currently he is working on adding numbers greater than 5 and he is doing a GREAT job. We are also working on writing numbers--so he can write his answer to problems when he sees them in a workbook. He is doing pretty good, but is struggling with 2 and 5. I am sure he will figure that out soon enough.
On top of all this smartness of my son--he is getting very close to reading. I have not taught him all the letter sounds yet, but he knows a fair amount of them and has started putting them together. He understands how C, A, and T make the sounds to make CAT. I have also caught him attempting to sound out a word here and there. He also recognizes some words by sight--for example "Zoo" or "Train". It is so neat to know that we are on the cusp of this GIANT world that is about to open for him.
Last of all, I should mention that Ky has been writing his name for over a month now. He wrote his name for the first time in August. We were at Play N' Learn and the teacher asked him to make a mark on the paper so everyone would know it was his. Well Ky proceeded to write his name. He wrote it backwards (NALYK)--but he wrote all the letters! AMAZING! Now he can write it perfectly. But he totally blew me out of the water when he did it. I would scan it and put it up in the blog, but sadly my printer/scanner is not working. I will get a new one for Christmas and then post it.
And finally since I am talking about all this, I will inform you that "NO, we are not putting Ky in preschool at this time". However, when asked I reply that Ky is in "Jessica Schnake's Preschool of Love!" and I am pretty positive that he is learning WAY more than he would be learning in preschool without the expense. Not to mention THIS is part of the reason I am staying at home with him. Right now I want to be the PRIMARY influence in his life. He will be in school for 13 years of his life (minimum), why should I push him into the "organized" classroom any sooner?
Ky loves doing his schoolwork. We do it every day after nap--and if I don't pull it out, he asks for it. (Okay side-note--ky doesn't really nap anymore, but he does have quiet time in his room. I then get him up early while Alaina is still sleeping and this is our special school time together.) I have so MANY workbooks. The Dollar store and Target offer such a great variety for only $1 each. And yes I do have more curriculum beyond the workbooks--but since my printer is out of order, a lot of that fun curriculum is being put on hold until Christmas.
I have had people ask me or tell me that if Ky isn't in preschool then he isn't being socialized. I laugh and say to them that he has more socialization time than most kids in preschool. He has friends he is with everyday of the week. I also have had people tell me that he isn't learning how to behave in a classroom. And to that I also laugh. Ky and I go to story time once a week where he sits on the carpet with all the other kids for 30 minutes. He also attends Sunday school which has a similar atmosphere. He is one of the better behaved kids in both of these situations.
I have also had people tell me that he is not going to learn to do things without me--or be comfortable in situations without me. And to that, I have already proven them wrong.
When Rob and I talked about Ky & Preschool we decided that instead of investing in Preschool we would take a little money each month and invest it for him to take a class of some sort. The past 2 months, Ky has been in a Sports Lead-up class at the Y. I leave him with this class for 45 minutes. (I also get to work out upstairs---and I can actually watch him in the gym below in his class.) He does just fine with me dropping him off. In fact he is excited about his class. And once again I will add that he was one of the better behaved children in this class. It's also neat that I got to watch him from above because then later I can talk to him about what he learned and even add to it or help him remember it. Dropping him off in preschool, it would be harder for me to build upon his lessons if I don't know what he is learning day to day. In Jessica Schnake's Preschool of Love--the world is our classroom and the learning never stops! (What a great selling line--don't you think???)
I also have to add that Ky's next class is a science class which will take him through Christmas. The geeky side of me is VERY excited about this. I can't wait to see what he learns.
So there is my "justification" for not sending Ky to preschool. Does it sound defensive? Probably...but I feel that way when so many people ask me why he isn't in preschool.
One last note--more for my Madison friends. So Dane county has a program called Play N' Learn. It is like preschool, but the parent attends with the child and it is FREE! Ky loves play N' Learn. They have circle time with stories and songs, open play time, Crafts, Explorations, and a creative snack (often they make the food--I should say the kids make the food look like something. One day we made school buses out of graham crackers!) If you live in Madison, google (I mean Swagbuck it) it or give me a call. If you live somewhere else see if your county/city has something similar. It is a very neat program!
Hmmm...this blog ended up being much longer than I planned. But I had been meaning to blog about preschool--so this just seemed like an opportune time. Stay tuned for future blogs including a trip to Indy!
