Pre-school: Learning Letters

I have been keeping an eye out for ways to integrate more formal learning for John during the day. I do realize that he is learning all.the.time and soaking up everything we say and do together. However, I want to make sure I am giving him some tools to begin a foundation for formal schooling - especially since he is interested in it.

For Christmas, Uncle Aaron bought John the Letter Factory from Leap Frog. I put it on John's wish list because it was mentioned in this great post I read on learning to read written by a homeschooling mother. John has been watching it probably once every other week, on average, and loves it! He also has learned most of his letter sounds by watching it and being quizzed with flash cards. He knows we are proud of him and so he is very proud of himself.

Several weeks ago I began reading a book called Mommy, Teach Me to Read. It is loaded with good ideas and I highly recommend it!  I've already implemented some of the author's recommendations for teaching letters. I bought some magnetic letters and I let John just play with them when he wants. However, we do put them away after he is done with them because I want them to be a special toy and I don't want to lose any of them!! In a little while, I will use them for more formal teaching, but for now, he loves playing with them and making "words" with them. He lines them up on the fridge and makes the letter sounds. It's an especially great activity for him while I'm making dinner! ;) I started taking pictures of his words and telling him how proud I am of him. In the pictures below, you can see the progression of his own pride. At first he was uneasy about me taking a picture, but now he runs to me and asks me to take his picture with his words. Very cute!

Thanksgiving 2010

We had quite an eventful Thanksgiving week! We decided to leave pretty early on Wednesday to head for Bellingham. There was still snow on the ground from Monday, but it seemed pretty safe. We didn't want to drive in the evening for fear of the road getting icy. We were blessed to have left early because once we got to Lynnwood Andrew noticed that our car was in the red zone on our temperature gauge. We found a mechanic that could look at our car, but not until Friday. So we toyed with the idea of leaving our car and renting a car for a couple of days. As it turned out, once we got to the mechanics, Andrew asked if they were sure they couldn't squeeze us in that day. The man said he would see what he could do. We waited for about an hour, not sure if they were even working on it. Sure enough, they were able to fix it and we were on our merry way again...

Until we drove another 50 miles or so. Andrew noticed that the car was getting hot again. We made it safely to Bellingham and decided to take the car in again on Friday.

Thanksgiving day was SO wonderful! We woke up to a flurry of snow falling from the sky with about 2 inches of fresh snow on the ground. I love the feeling of being stuck at home when I have no where to go!

I provided the mashed potatoes, as I have for 3 years in a row, and they were very yummy! (I'm a sucker for good mashed potatoes). Mom St.Hilaire cooked a feast! Jenna brought the green beans. It was a very delightful dinner, with exceptional company!

Thanksgiving dinner

There was a crazy rain and wind storm on Thursday night. When we woke up, there was hardly a trace of snow on the ground! On Friday we took the car in again. They told us it wasn't going to be finished until Monday. We were supposed to leave on Saturday morning because I had a baby shower to go to back home. I was very sad to have to miss the shower, but it was nice to have a couple of extra days with Andrew's family! I was also able to catch up with a few friends.

Dinner on Friday night (second round of Thanksgiving dinner!)

Grandma let John play in her kitchen drawers! =)

While we were there we watched the movie Karol: A Man Who Became Pope. It was so inspirational and I highly recommend it. I was worried that the actor playing Karol would not be good enough to play the role, but I was quite impressed by him. Watching this movie made me think about what really matters in life: our relationship with God! It was appropriate to watch for Thanksgiving, because it reminded me of how thankful I am to be part of such a wonderful Church!

We picked up the car on Monday and headed home... only to see that the engine was still getting hot. =( We're not sure what to do now.

Train of Thought

Last Sunday at Mass, in the short time between the consecration of the bread and the consecration of the wine, I had this train of thought:

The smell of a woman in front of me reminded me of a lady I took care of when I worked at the Courtyard (dementia care facility) --- which made me think of dementia and I wondered who is the youngest person to ever suffer from dementia --- which made me wonder if I will ever get it --- which made me wonder if you could have symptoms of dementia for being overly tired (because I was feeling tired) --- which reminded me of a movie that Andrew and I watched part of (but turned it off because it was pretty bad) called The Machinist with Christian Bale. (It is a creepy movie about a man who suffers from insomnia and has not slept in over a year) --- and I wondered if it is even possible to go a year without sleeping --- then a gory scene from the movie began replaying in my mind where there is an accident at a factory and a man's arm gets stuck in a machine and is torn off and his severed limb is shown spinning around and around on the machine (Ick!)

So there I was grimacing to myself, when I was drawn out of my mind by the words, "Do this in memory of me." (and then the bells rang) Then I began internally reprimanding myself for thinking about such a horrible scene during the consecration! Not being aware of the path that led me to this thought, I wondered - why was I even thinking about that movie? And then I traced back my thoughts to see how I got from listening to the consecration of the bread to replaying that gory scene from The Machinist. And it all began with a smell... It's amazing how something as simple as a smell can trigger such a quick chain reaction in our minds! I say "our" because I hope I'm not the only one who has this problem! =)

I think that Satan really manipulates and tempts us with these little distractions. This might be a great failing for a lot of the "good" people out in the world. Outwardly, a person could look very good and holy, while internally they let their minds trail off. It is so easy to be distracted and turned away from Our Lord in our minds. And this is a problem that no one has to know about. We can hide this disconnect from everyone, even those closest to us. There is no one to hold us accountable because this is a problem people don't really talk about much, other than saying "I get distracted."

I don't think people realize how dangerous distractions are. The vessel for our prayers is our thoughts, for even the vocal prayers we say originate from our minds. So if our minds are easily distracted, then prayer probably comes as a difficulty (at least, I know this is true for me!). I'm not sure how I can concretely work on controlling my train of thought; I welcome any advice! I hope that eventually I can keep my thoughts centered on God and on good things. I hope that someday I will be united to God throughout the whole day, by being vigilant regarding what thoughts I allow myself to dwell on, making sure that they are always pleasing to Him.

7 Quick Takes ~ Vol. 13

Hosted at Conversion Diary

1. I'm not sure why, but I haven't been feeling too inspired lately in regards to blogging. I'm sure you have noticed by my lack of posting! I have been busy - but no more busy than I have been in the past. Regardless of my inspirational drought, I will keep pressing on and do my quick takes this week. =)

2. We went up to Bellingham for Thanksgiving. It was very refreshing to be with Andrew's parents, Lou and Jenna, and friends. Mom St.Hilaire sure is a great cook! I was in charge of the mashed potatoes, which turned out well. Since I generally don't eat turkey, mashed potatoes are my main dish for Thanksgiving. Yum, yum, yum, I love potatoes! While we were in town, I was able to visit with some friends that I took care of when I worked for Catholic Community Services. I hadn't seen either of them since before our wedding, so it was great to catch up!


3. I've been busy baking Christmas cookies. I am trying to get a bunch done a head of time so I have less to do around Christmas. Hopefully they make it to the freezer before we eat them all now! Here are the recipes for the cookies I am making this year:
Buckeye Balls
Chocolate Toffee Crunchies (SO good!)
Lemon Drop Cookies
Chocolate Crackle Cookies
Ginger Cookies
Holly Christmas Cookies

4. Andrew got a beer brewing kit about a month ago. He just began brewing his first batch of beer last Sunday. If all goes well, it will be ready by Christmas!

Beer - Yum!

5. We just saw the movie "UP" last week. I really enjoyed it - So much that I watched it again last night. See it. It's good!

6. Another recommendation: I just bought the book Super Baby Food. It is very informative and I am learning a lot. It has great recipes for making your own baby food. Under the guidance of this book, I made some brown rice for John. First I ground it in our coffee grinder. It turned to powder and then I boiled it in some water. I felt very accomplished - until John showed great disgust during his meal. Maybe I can doctor it up somehow...

7. John is SO CLOSE to crawling! I bet he will be crawling within a week or two - definitely before Christmas! Today he was holding himself up on his hands and then flexing his legs out so that he was holding himself up by his hands and toes (See pictures below). It looked like he was ready to do a push up! Overall, John is doing great! He is a healthy, happy, and joyful guy. I love spending my days with him!

Look at his cute little toes flexing! =)

"Fireproof" (and baby stuff)

We just went on a double date with my parents yesterday to see the movie "Fireproof." It is truly amazing! We all left with "salty cheeks," as Andrew said. My cheeks were more than salty, I was sobbing during one scene. I don't think I have cried that hard in a movie since I saw the "Passion of Christ" for the first time but it could have something to do with me just being more emotional lately.

For all the married couples out there, this is a perfect date movie. (And for all our unmarried friends, it is just a great movie- so go see it!). I think it really dug to the core of problems in marriages. Although Andrew and I are pretty new at this whole marriage business and do not really have the problems presented in the movie, I could definitely understand and relate to the movie's message, just because it's main message was "love is a choice." True love is not easy, sometimes it means we love people when they are not deserving, but just look at how much Christ loves us, and we are SO undeserving. We must approach marriage with the same spirit of dedication that Christ has in His love for us.

I don't want to spoil too much... so I won't say anymore. I just praise God that people are making movies like this and I know we need to support them. I know it has been in theaters for a while now, so it may be heading out soon. So if this message is coming to you too late, it would also be a good rental later on ;)

*******In other news...

Andrew and I went to our second doctor's appointment. We did switch doctors because of some pro-abortion vibes we were getting from our other doctor. As it turns out, one of my coworkers has a husband who works in the same clinic as our first doctor. He is Catholic and shares our values and beliefs.

So this was our first appointment with him. He was really great. We heard the baby's heart beat (insert salty cheeks here). We only got to see the heart beat with our first ultrasound, so this was the first time hearing our baby. We heard the little tyke loud and clear!

At our next appointment (December 10th) we will have another ultrasound and we will get to find out the gender of our baby. We have decided that we want to know. I figure, it will be a surprise either way... we will just be surprised a little earlier =) Andrew was talking to our friend Lauren about this and she also added that it is nice to be able to call the baby "him" or "her." The unborn are so dehumanized that it will be great to refer to them with a gender specific pronoun. Plus, then we can get going on figuring out a name! At this point, we really have no clue about names... and any names I suggest are apparently too "old-ladyish." I don't see what's so wrong with Esther or Agnes.