A reading breakthrough!

Eve has had a reading breakthrough recently! I am so excited! Her exact skill level has been up for debate (between Alan and I, anyway) but was un-testable because she was pretty uninterested in reading. She read sometimes, mostly for Alan, but not with any regularity. Lately however, she has been reading with gusto!!

They started reading groups in school two weeks ago and she is very excited about that. She comes home and tells me all about who is in her group and what they read. Today she told me that in her book at school was the words “very” and then another one “kind of slanted” (italics). I started to explain what that meant, but she stopped me and told me how she read it in class. I don’t really know how to write it here, but she read it as “very, very” very (regular), very (emphasized)! She said her teacher was surprised that she knew what that meant and stopped to explain to the other kids.

reading group p1

Each day she brings home a picture and a sentence that she wrote from reading group. This one says “Bears eat fish and berr.” I asked her what “berr” was and she said she forgot to write the rest of berries. :)

reading group p2

“Bella and Rosie brot sunglasses to the beach.”

Along with the reading has come a big step in writing. She is much more apt to write now, and sound out her words. Sometimes the spelling is correct, sometimes not, but she’s trying! Which is huge!

doodle pro

On our snowless-snow day last week I wrote a message on the Doodle Pro saying, “Snow, snow, where did you go?” On the very snowy next day, Eve wrote this: “Happy Sadrday. There is snno every where.” With a picture of a house and a sun and a rainbow and snow balls.

She reads to me at bedtime quite often now, and she reads very well! She reads books I didn’t know she could read. One night we were reading Truckery Rhymes (a silly poetry book) and she started off saying she would read every other poem, but then she got excited and insisted on reading every poem! She read an entire “Little Bear” book to Alan the other night. Tonight I was reading her a chapter book and several times I stopped and asked her where I was and she always pointed to the exact word I ended on. She’s reading right along!

spelling

These are Lex’s spelling words. He is supposed to write each one three times, but he never does. Each Monday we go through the list and he spells them all correctly so he doesn’t bother with the practice. With Eve’s new burst in reading she is getting in on the spelling game too. Now on Mondays after school she reads him his spelling words (with my help when she needs it) and he spells them. I LOVE IT!

I’m super excited by this. Reading is kind of a big deal in our house, in case you haven’t noticed. We do a lot of it! :)

Valentine’s Day Treats

We will be jettin’ out of here on Valentine’s Day, but that doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate anyway. The kids finished their class Valentine’s Day cards today. We are going to bring them in on Wednesday and their teachers have promised to distribute them. My guys are eager to return to a bunch of Valentine’s Day cards waiting for them after vacation. :)

This afternoon we made cookies.

chocolate

Someone’s had enough chocolate already!

kisses

They were giving each other silly kisses. I tried to get a picture, but instead got this weird shot. :)

sugar

Fun with sugar. Eve had the job of rolling the dough balls in sugar. It took much longer than necessary, but she enjoyed the sensory experience.

hearts

While Eve played in the sugar, Lex got the first shot at putting the hearts on the cookies. These are definitely fun to make! (that table in the background sums up my life! Messy, colorful, healthy, sweets, kids!)

yum

Cookies!

eve

Eve got a turn at the hearts too. I could NOT get a picture of her with a non-talking mouth! :)

I have been wanting to make these cookies for awhile now. Holding off until it’s actually close to the sweet holiday. They are peanut butter blossoms (with the unholiest of deliciousness – Jif peanut butter!) with Dove and Hershey hearts instead of the usual Kisses. So YUMMY! We will be delivering these to various friends over the next few days, while saving a few for ourselves, of course!