Beginning chapter books

Well, D1 has progressed from beginning readers like Hop on Pop, to chapter books. He really enjoys the Henry and Mudge series, and has read I think ten of those now. He’s taking Accelerated Reader quizzes on the books he reads (at school) and that’s okay I guess, but I hate to see his love to reading become destroyed over the AR program and passing or failing book quizzes! I just can’t wait to have him home again.

A few nights ago, as we sat down to have him read to me at bedtime, he had a new book. Well, it wasn’t a NEW book, it was a book from his own bookshelf. It was Charlotte’s Web, by EB White. I put the E.B. White books on the shelf, thinking they boys would want me to read them to them. Nope. D1 opened that book and began reading it to ME. Now I know that this is around a 4th grade reading level book. I also know that he is reading it with *VERY* little help from me! He is learning new vocabulary and sounding out many multi-syllable words, and he’s loving it!

He told me yesterday that his teacher won’t let him read chapter books at school during silent reading. Maybe that’s for the best, as he does need someone sitting with him to make sure he follows the sentences. But on the other hand, if he CAN read it, why not LET him? Oh I SO dislike public education!

He has been reading a few pages a day to me from Charlotte’s Web. He is determined to read the entire book, and he found Stuart Little on the bookshelf yesterday too, and wants to read that as soon as he’s done with this one.

 

Nature walks

My 13yo dd J came back from walking the dog a little while ago, and said “Mom, you have to come with me! I have something cool to show you!”

We walked down the street, and up a walking path that leads alongside a man-made lake drainage ditch (called a “creek” but it’s mostly just swamp!). Part of it leads off, away from the creek, for additional runoff, and this is where she brought me. “Look right there.” I bent over the marshy water, and right there was a slimey pile of algae, with a hole in the center about 3″ wide. Inside were well over 100 tiny tadpoles, about 3/8″ long. There are also several other piles of frog eggs. They were wet but weren’t underwater, so I am not sure if they are dead or developing.

Around this area, there is more nature than I ever realized. J walks down there all the time, and she brings the boys there often. Along the way there is a rather large hole in the side of a hill, obviously dug out by an animal, as the dirt is all down the hillside under the den. If I had to guess, I would say this is where some of those noisy night time coyotes live. I had never noticed the den before, but now I’m thinking about staking it out with a camera. It is across the creek, in full view of the walking path.
There are birds EVERYWHERE. I could hear more birds than see them, but J described to me many kinds I’ve never seen before. And remember, this is less than two blocks from my house!

J managed to find a frog, which gave her a run for her money, but she caught it. It played dead for a few minutes and she let it go. There are little black spiders ALL OVER in the dead grass. UGH. I’m not a big fan of spiders, but these ones move out of the way really fast, so hopefully I won’t have to get a close up of any. I know there are black salamanders in the creek area, too. Actually we have one that lives in our sprinkler system control box in our yard, so we don’t have to go too far to see it.

All in all, it was a nice little walk, and I can’t wait to bring the boys over there to see the tadpoles and the frog eggs. I am curious how we could go about bringing some home. If someone who has done it could please reply and tell me what we need to do, I’d be very thankful! I’d love to let the boys watch the tadpoles develop, close up.

Near our house we also have owls and a nesting pair of hawks we see frequently. We have sparrows and blackbirds nesting in our birdhouses (the pesky woodpecker left the birdhouse, only to spend mornings pounding on the flashing of our house!) It looks like we have plenty of nature around us to keep us quite occupied for the summer.

 

NSD Layout #3

This was for a color challenge. We had to use at least two of these colors–I used all 4!
So here’s my layout: This one was planned a lonngg time ago! I have been taking sock-less foot pictures of D2 for months! This isn’t ALL the pictures, just the ones I decided to use for this layout.

I used a template (#47) for this one, by Trish H., and the fonts are Rock It & Shortcut
Papers are by me!

 

NSD Layout #2

This was a Template Challenge, and it took me way longer than I thought it would, but I like the way it turned out!

Journaling reads:
“At the age of 7, you really don’t know what being an uncle even means. Still, you take your job very seriously. Kaedyn just LOVES it when you talk to him!”

Template is by LaWanna DesJardin
Papers (some recolored) from Imagine by Fran “Little Boy” kit and some papers are by me
Atomic Cupcake Actions on the stitching, font & bookplate
Fonts are Arial Black & Adelon

 

NSD layouts

OK I promised I’d show you what I made! So far (6:50pm Saturday) this is what I’ve done…
For an Ad-Inspiration Challenge– Here’s the Ad:

And here’s my layout. I used the SBB Compliments kit (NSD Freebie) for this layout. I love the colors and textures!

I have two more completed but don’t have time to post them right now. More later!