fun here*

It was a pretty quiet week around here. Gabby, our afternoon nanny, had to leave us unexpectedly so the big activity was working with Penni to cover as many hours as possible. It’s hard, though. We have child care past 6pm for a reason so accommodating a sudden change has it’s challenges. Hopefully we’ll have someone new in place soon, though.

Sammy spent a day as Darth Vader, when he wasn’t in class.

On Tuesday, the kids caught a toad (Toadie) in the yard. They even put a fly inside with the toad to give it some food. Eventually, though, Jason helped them understand that Toadie needed to live their full, free life out of captivity.

Goodbye, Toadie!

Apparently this is one of Sammy’s favorite spots to watch videos on his iPod. Looks cozy!

Thursday was a beautiful day and the kids’ teacher was out after their 9am meeting so Penni packed a lunch and took the kids to a playground for a few hours. Definitely a benefit of virtual school.

SSA are doing work on work tense and nouns, verbs, etc. I peeked in one of their workbooks and thought it was cute to see what the kids chose for proper noun examples. In order, it’s Amaya, Steven and then Sammy’s work.

Pre-bed shows and device time + cuddles.

Amaya wanted me to take a picture of her making this face lol.

Early Saturday morning I took Steven and Amaya to their school playground. Sammy stayed home with Daddy. These two had a good time together but said it’s a lot more boring without Sammy there.

The kids also had hours outside in our yard yesterday. Hours. I love this time of year when it’s getting warmer and we have the promise of months of warm weather to come.

Steven took this picture of me resting on their swing. <3 (Sammy reminded me I should always hold on with two hands.)

Daddy and Amaya had a shopping trip on Saturday afternoon to get Amaya all set with her gear for softball! She’s joined a girls softball league for 1st- 3rd graders and the boys are doing baseball again. Amaya’s practices start this week. I’m psyched for the kids to get back to after school activities but a little stressed about the scheduling with our nanny change.

Saturday evening baseball with Daddy

On Sunday morning, while Jason and Sammy were at the grocery story, Steven and Amaya spent ages doing art tutorials of Animal Crossing and PJ Masks characters.

Amaya’s drawing of Isabelle, Cherry, KK, Owlette and Luna Girl.

Steven’s drawing of Cherry, with a “Joy Reaction”.

Steven’s PJ Masks puppets.

Meanwhile, when he got home, Sammy got busy with magnatiles.

It was a big cooking day with a new Raddish Kids kit. We started with Strawberry Cupcakes. They were delicious, hot out of the oven. I didn’t even need frosting on mine.

As a Schitt’s Creek fan I had a great time telling the kids they were going to have to fold in the strawberries. Sammy did not disappoint when he asked, “But what does it mean by ‘fold’?” (Reference)

In the afternoon, we made a delicious dinner of country ham sandwiches complete with homemade biscuits. Amaya was a huge fan of the apricot mustard dressing.

Watching the Masters while dinner cooked.

After dinner, Amaya and Sammy volunteered to model their Raddish Kids aprons, which have many, many patches at this point. Amaya wanted to take “at least 10 pictures”. Sammy wanted me to take a picture “that looks like he’s just walking by.” Mission accomplished.

Book time is the best time! I got the kids some books at their level but they generally still prefer that I read them at bedtime.

On Friday night, though, Amaya did a phenomenal job reading a level J Flat Stanley book to us. They do all of their daily reading time in breaks between zoom meetings, often via online books, so we see the kids’ skills growing in huge leaps. I’m honestly amazed at how much they’ve learned this year, especially in this unusual environment. No reading just for fun, yet, but maybe someday.