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Home Preschool Ideas

Preschool is to prepare kid to go into kindergarten. They need to learn social, emotional and intellectual things. When looking at my children and my situation I decided that I could provide a preschool environment for my children and save the $75 - $100 per month spent in tuition and gas.

The targets that children need to reach before entering preschool are these...

(these are from Ready! for Kindergarten)
Language and Literacy

• enjoys being read to and can retell a story
• recognized the names and sounds of 12-15 letters (lower case)
• repeats beginning and ending sounds in words
• speaks in complete sentences
• prints his or her first name (Capital first letter and the rest lower case)

Math and Reasoning

• counts in order 1-20
• recognizes numbers and quantities 1-5
• names and sorts items by color (12 of them), shape (15 of them), and size
• understands concepts like more, less, same, over, big and small

Social and Emotional

• settles into new groups and situations
• can concentrate for 5 minutes
• follows simple directions
• shows kindness and concern for others

With this guideline I have come up with a way to school my kids at home. Here are a few ideas...

 I created a closet with lots of kids games, puzzles and craft supplies. I then filled a jar with blue sticks with the activities and another jar with songs. Here are the games that I had or made up that I thought would be great learning for them...

• twister
• name that letter
• your baby can read video
• string beads
• color pictures
• nursery rhymes
• read a book
• freeze dance (freeze when the music stops)
• name that color
• I spy (colors, shapes, letters around the house)
• Sorry
• Bingo
• blocks
• red light, green light
• yahtzee
• duck duck goose
• simon says
• Prepositional friend (name a prep like under and then have someone hide a toy under something)
• playdoh (make letter or number shapes)
• name that shape
• Hide and seek
• hokey pokey
• musical chairs (teaches kids it's ok to lose)
• sing songs
• cootie game
• hang man

 below are the nursery rhymes

 below is a game that I made up. The kids have to sort the beads into piles and put then in the right place in the eg carton. Teaches sorting, number recognition, and colors.

 Below is "I spy" I say I spy the letter K. What sound does the K make?

 We decided to read all the books we could. So far we have read 16 new book since the 1st of September.

 Preposition cards are fun for the kids.

 After we read a book we talk about the feelings of the characters. We talk about what would help them to feel better and what we should do if we felt like that. This has been great!

 There are a lot more things I have made up but I want to talk lastly about this book. It has been so good in giving me ideas. My friend lent it to me and afte I kept it for so long she gave it to me!! Check it out!!

Bedroom

 Look what I did today! I gave my room a makeover!

Dear Anyone,

Dear Anyone,

I write to write. A few weeks ago we found a bump on the back of Atti's neck. The Dr was concerned and did blood tests. The were ok. We made an appointment to have it uptrasounded. We canceled that when the bump mysteriously disappeared. Now it is back. Along with lots of fatigue.

I am scared. I hope my baby is ok. I will continue to wait for the doc to call back. I will go through with the ultrasound now.

I hope he is ok.

Sick Glicks

4 sick glicks

3 pink eyes

2 runny noses

1 bloody ear ache

I heard Phoenix talking to Atticus...

Atti, I have one pink eye and one blue eye.

Why do you have a pink eye?

Because I pick my boogers and then touch my eye.

The worst part of being sick is that we were leaving tomorrow to visit Jennifer and her new little Madison tomorrow. I guess we will just stay home.

Today wad going to be a cleaning and packing day but I think we'll make it a movie day.

Later...

So we watched Reading Rainbow about math and cooking so we made what they made, a lasagna like dish with rice then spinach then cheese then sauce. We also made biscuits in spooky shapes and to finish it off... Cocoa and Molasses cookies!! YUM! Here is the recipe...

Ingredients


1/3 c. butter

1/3 sugar

1/3 blackstrap molasses

1 egg

3/4 c. flour

3 Tbsp. cocoa powder

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 c chocolate chips

Directions

Mix first 3 ingredients until well blended. Add next three ingredients and blend thoroughly. Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto un-greased cookie sheets and bake at 375 for 5-7 minutes. Makes 2 1/2 dozen cookies.

After cooking we napped, then played outside on the trampoline. Then inside for Nacho Libre then the Wii. Before bed we blew up balloons! What a day!!

Brandon

Ok so I thought about this today and I can't go to bed without blogging it.

A couple weeks ago Brandon called from work and told me that he would be coming home because he was having a wardrobe malfunction. So...I had the worst ideas in my head. Spill? Stain? Wrong undershirt? Tennis shoes instead of dress shoes?

He walked in and I saw at once what the problem was...

I CAN NOT believe he came home because he was wearing black shoes and belt with brown pants! Hahaha!!!

Gotta love it!

Land of the Free, Home of the Brave!

We went to the fair again on Friday and also to the Othello Rodeo. I love going to the rodeo because of all the excitement. My favorite part is always the opening when the Rodeo Queen displays the American Flag. I always get teary.

County Fair

 This week I have been working on teaching the kids animals and the letters they all start with. I told them that we would go to the fair as soon as it opens up. So, on Wednesday we went. We went to the vendors then the animals. Atti was scared of all the animals so I had to hold him while I pushed the stroller. It got to be too much so we went for icecream. As soon as we got the icecream Brinna messed her pants...and her clothes. She looked so cute and chubby in the stroller. I thought I'd give her a taste of icecream and this is the face she made... She kept licking her lips! It was so cute!

I promised the kids that they could go on 2 rides each because it was dollar day but the rides weren't open. bummer. They were NOT happy about that at all but we got out with minimal tears. We ran into the preschool kids and it was nice for Phoenix and Atticus to see their friends. More pictures to come!

Fun for little to nothing...

I realized how much there is to do around here for little to no money. I remember when we were in college I would always complain that there was nothing to do but I just needed to open my eyes!!

Free movie Tuesdays at Reicherts
Library
Burger King playplace - just buy 2 ice cream comes or a french fry for the kids to share
Local parks
Walmart - we let our kids play in the toy isle for fun!
Pet store
Sprinkler under the trampoline
Movie night with popcorn
Games
Make a treat together
Thrift store shopping...kids love all the stuff

We just got back from dollar days at the County fair. We ended up spending under $10!

Mild or Extreme Couponing?

Lately we have been trying to find ways to skinny up our budget. Here is how we got started...

1.    Make a budget...here is how we did ours.

               Add up all of your monthly bills - Tithes and offerings, mortgage, electric, garbage, car insurance, phone, Internet, school loans

              Subtract the amount from your monthly income

              Whatever is left you need to tell it where to go - Savings, Food, Home Improvement, Car Maintenance, holiday, baby diapers and formula... Here is what ours looks like (We get paid biweekly so this is for every 2 weeks.)

200 food

45 diapers, formula, wipes

20 car

10 entertainment

30 home maintenance and improvements

5 clothes/shoes

5 gifts

15 other/copay

330 Total Biweekly

           This is really tight right??? So all this money comes out in cash. Whatever we don't use just piles up until we have a car problem or need to buy a gift for someone.

2.    The next step is to cut back. Here are a few ways we cut back...

preschool at home - saves $100/wk

netflix - saves $8 (I think)

Dates - we still go but we trade babysitting instead of paying a babysitter

Home made food - make tortillas, brownies, cakes and bread from scratch

cell phones - we don't have them, saves $80 ish a month

gas - we only go to the store once a week to save on gas

oatmeal - I but the 25lb bag at cash and carry for $15 and figures it costs 39 cents for all of us each morning vs 60 cents if we are having cereal that I got on sale.

groceries...I will talk more about this in a bit

Remember - debt feels yucky so things are tight and you will go without but you'll feel much better to get debt off of your shoulders! It's only for a little while.

Oprah said, "Nothing tastes as good as being skinny feels."

I say, "Nothing feels as good as being out of debt feels."

3. Now...groceries are the easiest thing for me to cut back on. There are a lot of ways to do it and I have learned that you have to do what's best for you. Here are a few questions to ask yourself before getting started...

Do I want to do this full time?

Am I a "brand snob"?

Am I buying food that I will use?

Here are the babysteps on how to get started.

Make a 2 week menu. Look in your pantry and see how many meals you can make out of the things you have at home.

Get a newspaper. Look for deals. Choose the items that you already use or can start saving money if you use. (DO NOT buy things that you won't use just because of the price!)

Look to see if any of those sale items have a coupon to go with them.

Bring your ads and coupons to Walmart and pricematch. When you get to the register just tell them you are going to pricematch and tell them the prices and the store before they scan each item.

Remember!! Don't spend more then your food budget. No borrowing allowed!

That's it!! Easy right?

Here are my rules when it comes to groceries...

1. Only go once a week

2. Have a list and only buy what's on the list

3. only make what we'll eat. fancy cooking in this house results in wasted food.

If you want to get more extreme in couponing you can print coupons and follow websites like grocerysmarts.com and frugallivingnw.com.

Classic

 When Brandon's coworker drove up in this classic Ford I just knew I had to get a few pictures. I grabbed Atti and he was a pretty good sport even though all he wanted to do was sit and eat his snack. These turned out SO cute!! Thanks Atti for being so sweet and letting Mommy play and thanks Everett for having such a (red) hot car!!

More pics

 This is our house. We do not own the metal shed or all this land. The property is shaped like a slice of pizza with the edge being the shed and the sheesy goodness extending past the little chicken house and out of the picture.

 Our first investment...the trampoline!

 work work work...trying to clean up branches.

 We actually got rid of the chickens and are going to make the chicken house a playhouse that looks just like our house. with little flowers. We will put the square foot vertical gardens there so that the future buyers can use it as a playhouse or a shed.

 We have been seeing lot of fun creatures!!

 Pure Joy!!

Look at my little twinners!! This photo captures every reason to have kids!

A glimpse of our new home

I love our new home! I don't know how we ever survived without a backyard! The kids love having so much space. We have a lot of work to do in getting the yard and garden area ready for the spring but me have mostly been just having fun!! I am inlove with all of the vibrant colors out here. We are surrounded by the most beautiful greens, blues, and browns I have ever seen! AND at night we have the most amazing stars to gaze at! This was a hard move for us because both of us like to be mobile and ready to leave at any notice. I really owe Brandon a HUGE thank you because he suggested buying this house and I know that it was for me. THANK YOU BRANDON!!!

Phoenix Funnies

These are a few things that Phoenix has been saying that I wanted to get out so that I always remember...

          At dinner - Mom, will you pass the cow?

          Look at that bug! It has a bum an it stinks it's toots! (stink bug)

          As she was looking at my jewelry - Oh my! This necklace is so beautiful that it makes me feel the spirit and my tummy likes it too!

She says things like this all the time!!! I love being able to be home so that I can hear all the Phoenix funnies!