Adventures of Evie

 Friday is finally here! Today it was raining outside so I took this opportunity to test out some potential curriculums for next year. We tried out Reading Eggs today and it's been a HUGE hit. I'm always curious about these because whenever she tests independently at home for these she always ends up at or above her grade level. Yet when she is tested in school she always ends up scoring lower. My best guess is that the time limit at school and the amount of distractions prevents her from doing her best but it's frustrating because it means they go slower with the information and since she actually already knows it she ends up bored. That is a problem that the choice to homeschool would certainly solve if we do choose that direction. For now I'm just piecing things together to see what we like and dislike. She played with this one most of the morning until I made her stop. I'd say that's a win!

 Today Evie had a rough day at school. We had a fun morning but she wasn't very excited to go in and apparently her day didn't get any better from there. So after school I took her down to a new to her park. I haven't taken her to this particular park since she was about 2, right before COVID hit. She loved playing and her FAVORITE part was that she got to walk along the river. We found shells and stuck our feet in the sand and even though the water was freezing she dipped her feet in there too.It was a great way to end a rough day. 

Well therapy day is here again. Today Evie woke up in a sad mood and she really wanted to wear a super fancy dress so even though dresses make therapy harder sometimes I went ahead and let her. We're in a new building now for therapy too and that has made it a little harder to wait since the waiting room is really small and lacks the space and activities the other one has. But I digress. She had a productive session and we learned a lot so that's what counts. We are also officially almost one week out from our spring break trip this year and we are both READY to be on vacation!

  Today was another sunny day so we didn't do any structured learning or activities today. Instead we played together, swang, jumped, and just enjoyed the weather. I had really missed our lunch picnics and so did Evie so we made a point of doing that today. After school we headed to Nana's house to do an egg hunt. Evie got a TON of eggs and even got one that had $5 in it which she was super excited about. We are closing in on Spring Break this year and both of us are really excited about it. Only a week and a few days left to wait!

  Today we had a nice relaxing day playing outside. It's been so up and down with the weather lately that we're taking any opportunities we get to just enjoy the sunshine. So today we spent the morning painting a bird house and playing princesses. When Evie got home from school she hung the house up for all the birds to use. It was a fun day!

Today we had a snack activity! I gave Evie a sheet with photos of different constellations and a bowl of mini marshmallows and toothpicks and let her build her own! She had a lot of fun making them and even more fun eating them!   We got to see some of space at Boonshoft Museum too! One of Evie's favorite things about ANY museum is space. Today was no exception. She spent a ton of time looking at the planets, the stars, and and spacecrafts. She says someday she will be a teacher, an astronaut, a ballerina and the President. lol lofty goals. ;P

We are still talking about Astronomy this week and today we talked about how big the sun and moon are and why they look so small to us. I had Evie choose her favorite barbie doll and we played with how far back Evie needed to walk in the yard before we could make Cleo bigger than her. She had a lot of fun playing with this and making things bigger than or smaller than me too. We played with this all the way to the bus stop when, unfortunately, Evie took a bad fall and bloodied up her knee and leg. :( One more day left this week and hopefully it will end on a better note!   

We are still working on space and astronomy and today we made a space spinner. Evie got to build this and add the little light up sun, and earth and a moon and then she got to spin it around to see how the Earth orbits the Sun. As we spun it we talked about how this affects day and night and she got to really look at it and see how it works.   We had a lot of fun with this one and Evie was happy to tell me all about how the moon was formed and how it keeps the Earth steady and many other fun facts that she has already learned in previous weeks. It's always so cool to see how much information she retains from what we learn together. :)

  Today was an interesting day. Originally I didn't have anything planned for the week today because Evie was supposed to be at OT this morning and then we would have gone to my moms and there wouldn't have been much time for anything. But then things went kind of sideways. I got a memo yesterday that today was her picture day and they are taking class photos today. She really didn't want to miss that and I didn't really want her to be that one kid in the yearbook who shows up as "not pictured" so we swapped her therapy for another day and decided to send her to school.                                            I have an old glow rice bin that I planned to just let her play with since it's on theme with the week and it was mostly already made up. But then it was such a beautiful day that we said forget all of it and just played outside. We did several find the egg hunts, s...

                                         This week is Astronomy Week! Evie loves space and stars and always has tons of questions about all of the above. So this week I decided to play into that and do some projects themed around stars and constellations.  So today we made a constellation lantern. First we put the lantern base together and then we used transparent paper and some sticky stars to make some constellations on the sides. Evie really wanted to do mine and hers and then I did the Big Dipper and we made one side sort of random. Then we slid the paper into the sides and lit the lantern with a reusable tea light. It was a fun project and Evie had a lot of fun looking at constellations and choosing which ones she wanted to make for this. Plus it looked so cool at bedtime! ;)

  St Patricks Day is here! Since Evie has a big class party today and I have conferences we kept it pretty simple today. I set up a rainbow scavenger hunt and at the end of it, of course, was a pot of gold coins! She LOVES scavenger hunts so she wanted to repeat this one a few times and since you can mix up the clues however you want to we were able to repeat it in different ways which was fun.   Then it was off to school! Her conferences went well but she's had a very tumultuous year at school. Her teacher was out a few times early in the year, she had some issues with her HSP on the bus and then as soon as those things resolved her teacher ended up in an accident and hasn't been back in weeks. Not only was that upsetting for Evie but it also resulted in her class being shuffled around, having new subs everyday, and finally getting a long term sub who is now also leaving. It's been a mess and to top it off she's recently had issues with the person next to her in class ...

Today we played with "secret" colors. I filled up some containers with baking soda and put a drop of color on the bottom of each one. Then I challenged her to figure out the colors with her bottle of vinegar and put them in order of how they appear in the rainbow.  After they were all completed we played with trying to make them react again and talked about why some of them did react and why some didn't and why they eventually stop even when there is still baking soda left in the jar. It was a really fun science experiment for Evie! :)

Today we did some sensory play. I gave Evie some cutters, press molds, and a mat with a rainbow on it and just let her play with some homemade calming dough. She had a lot of fun stacking them, making little "cookies" and animals with them and of course hunting through them for the coin!   One thing I love about homemade play dough is that you don't have to worry as much about it all getting mixed up since it will eventually go in the trash anyway. It's also really fun to be able to add our own colors, scents, and add ins if we want to. We both had a lot of fun playing with these! :)

This week is St Patricks week and today we did some art! This week in addition to her projects I hid a golden coin for Evie to find. Today it was hidden inside this little cauldron I made in advance. Since I was out all weekend and needed to catch up at work, I made a video in advance for this one and she LOVED following along and doing the project with me on YouTube. Once she finished up she got to go grab mine and eat the chocolate coin!   After school today we had some errands to run and Evie found a mermaid she wanted to paint so I set her up to do it while I put away groceries. When she was finished she used her extra paint to mix up colors and see what she could get! Then we painted some different things on the scrap sheet. We use these just to keep the table clean when she paints but I love that she always decorates them when she's finished. <3

  Last week we had Fairytale Week which was supposed to culminate with our Cinderella movie night. However, a series of unexpected events and illnesses postponed it so today Evie helped me work on some of the final decor for it and we also did some spur of the moment projects. For our movie nights we try to keep things pretty simple by repurposing decor we already have, using clearance things we find as we're out shopping for the week, or by DIYing things. For Cinderella we wanted to have a carriage as the center focal point so we reused a paper lantern from Evie's second birthday party for the carriage part and then I used my cutting machine to cut out some wheels that we reconfigured a bit to fit across the bottom of the ball. But we didn't have any good paper to use for them so we just added some glue and Evie got to smother them with tons of glitter. But of course after that she wanted to play with more glitter! A few weeks ago I set up some busy bins for her so I had h...

  We've reached the final day of Fairytale week! Today we played a poison apple game! So basically the rules are simple; you pick up the apples and try to match them but if you get the poison apple you're out! Evie had a lot of fun with this game After we finished our game we used the props we've been making all week to act out some stories. Earlier this week I printed out some fill in the blanks fairytales so we could add some details and have easy story starters. We used her doll castles as well. Finally we took a trip to the store. For this one, since she HATES the grocery we played a game where she had to fill her cart with items for the Evil Queen so that she could bring them back home and give them to the queen in exchange for the trapped princess. She really got into the game and was a huge help at the store for once! Fairytale week was a fun one! Can't wait for next week. :)

  Today we had a sensory day. I set up this mining sensory bin for Evie to do as part of fairytale week. I filled it with black beans, plastic glass, and then I tucked in some colored gem beads. I gave Evie a sheet and asked her to find the colored precious gems in all the glass. She did pretty well with it although the diamond was tricky for both of us!  I have cut down on sensory bins over the last year or so since I always think of them as being for younger kids but Evie really still loves them so I see more in our future! Once we finished the game it was lunchtime so we went outside to work on finishing up Evie's new swingset. We got rid of her plastic kiddie one last year and she has been really itching for another one since. This one has taken a few days to get set up due to time constraints but we finally finished it today and she was SO excited to get out there and play on it. We even took the picnic basket outside today and had a picnic underneath of the play house pa...

  Today we made a beanstalk. Evie doesn't know it yet but all these things she's making are going to be used later in the week. We used this beanstalk to do some math first and then I let her fill it in however she wanted. I asked her to put certain amounts in, take away a few and see how many were left...etc. She had fun poking them in there and making it look the way she wanted it to. Then since it was so nice outside I set up her sandbox for her to play in.  When she was about 2 I got her one of those Step2 sandboxes with a lid and an umbrella and a picnic table. It cost something like $300 and then of course the cost of 200lb of sand to fill it up. It was great for awhile but the lid didn't keep out rain and over the course of the following several years despite trying loads of things to keep it clean it just...never was. So we got rid of it. She was sad about it because she LOVES playing in sand but it was always green, slimy, filled with worms, and just...gross. So we...

Today we are working on more art that will become props at the end of the week. First we played a little game of word soup though! Evie actually did impressively well with this. She is still learning to read and mostly they are doing sight words at school although they are weaving in some sounds as well. Some of these words were familiar for her and others were not at all. But she did well at reading my sentences and also creating her own! We also played with swapping around the words in the sentences to see how many ways we could make the same meaning with the words.  After that I gave her a wooden shape and a bunch of felt, tissue paper, foam, yarn and other supplies to make a princess with. She did great with this too. I had to draw on parts of the face for her but she had  A LOT of ideas about how she wanted the princess to look. She is very much into fashion and making clothing. She really wants to learn to make and design her own. We've been working on some fun things wi...

  This week is fairytale week! We are going to spend the first half of the week making some things that we will use in the later part. Today I gave Evie a bunch of pencils, pipe cleaners, and gem beads and let her make some wands, rings, necklaces, and crowns. When she finished she ran to put her princess dress on so she could see the full look. This was a really easy and fun craft and we spent the rest of the morning playing princess with the things we made. :)

  It's movie night! This week we are doing WALL-E. It follows our Eco Week theme and...it actually was the reason for the theme in the first place. A few weeks ago Evie and I got Disney Dreamlight Valley on the switch. We've been playing it together and when we got the WALL-E character she was very intrigued. What is he? Why is he? What is he from? Why haven't I seen Wall-E? So we gave it a go.She loved the movie and had TONS of questions about the earth and could that really happen and what can we do to stop it. So we decided to do a whole week of learning about the planet and how we can keep it clean and wrap it up with WALL-E round 2.  The menu for this one was pretty simplistic. We made pizza in a cup which was a tomato basil soup with mozzarella on top. I considered baking a crust onto it or adding some pepperoni or other "toppings" but Evie loves tomato soup and it was rainy and cold today so it seemed pretty perfect as is. She helped make the cheese bread f...

  Today we made some seed paper! It was chillier out today so we tried to squeeze this one in before it got TOO cold. Yesterday we shredded up some paper we got from Nana and soaked it in some water.  Then Evie got to add some dye into the mix to try to make it look pink. This worked pretty well but it wasn't as bold when the paper dried later. She had fun mixing it up and then we took it to the blender to get it really nice and pulpy.  After that we took it outside to smoosh out the water over a screen we made. Last we turned them out onto towels and Evie got to add seeds. I know you can add them into the pulp mix as well but I didn't want them to sprout and the paper is going to be wet for a few days at least since it's chilly and rainy out now. Once these are done we will cut then into shapes and use them in her bee garden next month. She really had a lot of fun with this one and it was such a cheap and easy thing to do. When I was a kid we once made paper in an art cl...

  Yesterday after we planted our dill seeds Evie REALLY wanted to play the taste game but we didn't have time. So today it was the first thing I set up for her (after breakfast ofc). It's a GORGEOUS day outside so of course we took it to the patio to play. The game is simple; one of us fills six little jars with bite sized pieces of food and the the other is blindfolded and has to try each food and guess what it is. This is a wonderful game to play with picky eaters. It helps you identify what they like and don't and it also eliminates them saying they dislike a food that they haven't tried because they cannot see it before it goes into their mouths. Evie used to always say she didn't like mac and cheese, but she likes spaghetti (so it didn't seem like pasta was the issue) and she loves cheese. I had a suspicion that she just didn't want to eat it vs she didn't actually like it. But we did a blind taste test with it and sure enough, she doesn't like ...