The week that has past

What swimmers we have! All the kids have made such great strides....Olivia was freely going around the baby pool and even putting her face in during simon says, Jimmy started running full face through the fountains...not minding at all that his face was wet, Joe started jumping in and swimming back tot he walk all by himself!, Thomas has now refused to wear swimmies, and so is trying to swim all around the big pool...even though he can't quite. As for the big kids Zeno has totally taken to the water...swimming all by himself, where last year he wasn't even sure he would get in the water! Maeve and Grace have almost every stroke, and are just working on mastery, which I have to say has put a fire under Elliot's belly to learn his strokes...and Miya was not in swim lessons this week as she helped out in the Right Brian Studio and took a doll making class...what cool dolls she made...the boys called them Zombie dolls...not sure how she liked that but they were really cool.

Here are a few things to ask the kids about from swim lessons:

Preschool and younger:

Ice Cream scoop arms
Doggie paddle
Popsicle Stick legs
Blowing bubbles

School Age

Laps were the name of the game for all but Zeno and Thomas...
Learning how to use the leg buoys
All the strokes, Freestyle, Breaststroke, Back Stroke and Butterfly
Front and back blast offs into strokes
Going off the diving board

This week we will work on diving for the big kids and strokes for the younger guys...

This week it will be hot...please remember to send the following:

Water Bottles
Books
Library reading logs
Library Cards if they are allowed to check out books

We will also start keeping a journal for the next three weeks, so let them know there will be a bit of writing coming their way. For the preschoolers we will be focusing on our letters and numbers....identifying as well as writing them.

As always...have a great week...I know we will!

Talley

Recent hapenings...

Well so much has happened since the past post that I am not sure where to begin...the end of tball season really threw our family for a two week whirl wind...and just now are we getting back on our feet....the butterflies arrived, Joe and Olivia got married, we went to Navy Pier, and swim lessons started! Check out the new links to the photos to read all about it...one of my favorite things so far has been the paper mache the school age kids did...they had to have a moving part...Miya had a head, with a mohawk, Grace had a soccer ball with flowing flames, Zeno had a telescope, and Maeve made an army truck with wheels that moved...great job!

Anne is our swim teacher for the next few weeks. The little guys, or group one, will be on Mondays, and they had their second lesson today...she was so impressed with all the improvement in just 4 days! Way to go...ask the kids about blowing out the candles under water (blowing bubbles), ice cream scoop arms, and Popsicles legs, and the noodle train we made today.

Anne will work with group 2 on Tuesdays...but let them know...Maeve and Grace did laps today with their intro lesson!

I have updated the summer schedule to include the swim lessons...

As always, please let me know any questions you have, suggestions, and how the summer is going...specifically how you like or dislike the summer experiment with PayPal...

Talley

The Week in Review

Digging in the dirt! So fun....at least the took it from one side and put it on the other...

Paper mache galore...Zeno even tackled his dislike of the feel to make his! The goal...make a paper mache sculpture with a moving parts with things you can find in the house...look for them coming home soon...fun all around!

Light saber battles galore since the street is closed...extra battle space!

On Friday Thomas started the Santa game...he sat in a stack of chairs, and Joe, Olivia and Jimmy pretended to sleep, and "Santa" delivered presents to them...only after they navigated the stack of chairs to sit in Santa's lap!

Another trip to the Library!

Today was another trip to the library. I think we have probably been to the Maze or Main library every day since school has let out. Though I wish our street was opened...it is fun to run, bike, pogo stick and give piggy backs on...this was the prefered method of travel for the preschoolers, but of course the big kids had already walked to and from Lincoln and played for at least an hour...they were troopers...maybe tomorrow will be warm enough for the pool! Father's day presents are made...just have the finishing touches to put on them...and then we start the art project for the week...paper mache scupltures...we will see what they build...they challenge...it has to have a moving part (for the older kids of course)

Here's to another day!

Father's Day Week

This week is all about the Dad's...at least that is how we will start out the week. We will be making gifts for each of the dads and coming up with our plan for the summer. My goal for the older kids is to have them work on a project all summer long, or a few smaller ones. For instance Greg has become really interested in helping feed the hungry, so we are going to focus a lot of his work around that desire. Hopefully we can find something all the big kids want to learn more about, and something that has a service aspect to it.

Grace and Maeve Wojcik join us this week. They will be here Monday, Tuesday and Thursdays of most weeks. It will be nice to have a group of older kids to work with all summer...We will have a blast at the pool and working with all the little guys.

As for the little guys, we started work on our preschool workbooks...some pages were a challenge, but others were surprisingly easy...it is really neat to see what they can do when presented with workbook pages so foreign.

Again, please make sure to have the following:

Pool Passes
Towels
Swim Suits
Sun Lotion (if not already donated)
Water Bottle
Books (for older kids)

The menu and summer schedule is posted and updated.

Have a good week!