Z is for Zoo!!!

Our last letter, the end of the alphabet, Z is for Zoo! We celebrated and went...can you guess...to the zoo! The threat of rain took away our plans for going to THE zoo, the San Diego Zoo, but that's ok because we went to our local, much smaller Santa Ana Zoo and had a blast! We hadn't been to this tiny zoo in years, and it was fun to revisit remembering the old and enjoying the new. We were a bit disappointed that one of their animals is no longer with them - the capybara. Our book this week was Capyboppy, the true story of a family that adopts a capybara. It was a fun book to read and a bit different then most of our books as it is loooooong. We read it as a chapter book taking the entire week to complete it. It's a fun book that had everyone laughing out loud. I just wish we had seen an actual capybara. This is where the capybara used to live:Oh well, we did see a cast of its feet :)

In other Z words, we made zucchini bread. Adam did not want to make it because he doesn't like zucchini so Beth made the bread. And everyone enjoyed eating it because, "it's green bread that tastes like banana bread!"

Next week we will wrap up the alphabet with a bunch of fun ABC books. And then summer, here we come!!!

Y is for Yes, it is Yellow!

Soooo...Y week came and I couldn't ignore it because we only have a few weeks of school left. I HAVE to finish the alphabet BUT I didn't have a Y book and hadn't settled on the theme...ugh! I'd feel bad but I was coming off a weekend of Jill breaking her leg. Truly, Monday was at the doctor's office and was a continuation of X week as we looked at x-rays. Tuesday came and I asked the family...what should Y be? Yellow? Yarn? Year? Hmmm...maybe I should have planned many weeks ago :) Wednesday snack came and I handed everybody alphabet cookies. These were Adam's:I asked him to read the word. We reviewed the sounds and then he sheepishly declared, "yes." He was so proud that he could read it. So fun to see him realize that he is going to be reading very soon! Can Yes be our theme? Yes!
Our other Y theme was yellow. Adam drew and colored a yellow boat with a yellow sun (sing with me - We all live in a Yellow Submarine!) And note the "yes" he wrote on his paper. He was so proud of that word that he wrote it to show Daddy later. The picture was drawn the next day to add decoration to his "yes."

When we took walks we looked for yellow. It turns out there are many yellow flowers and yellow leaves out there! There are also some unique yellows like these yellow pizzas (yes, that's what my children call them.)

We also spent time blowing bubbles (finding fun outside activities that entertain Jill stuck in a stroller!) Adam took on the challenge of catching them. He did this everyday!

Jill continued her move into the world of preschool practicing her cutting (take note of the pretty pink cast there :) I realized after I took the picture that she was cutting with her left hand. I'm pretty sure that she is right handed so I switched the scissors into her right hand. She didn't mind and just continued right on cutting her paper into tiny pieces. Hmmmm...Next week we will finish the alphabet with Z...

X is for X-ray

X is a challenging letter because really, it doesn't start any words with it's most common sound - "ks." It starts words with the "z" sound as in xylophone or xerus. Thi is why I am a big proponent of teaching x by using words such as fox or box. That said, I did x is for x-ray. We did fox last year and I considered ox but settled on x-ray. I found a fun book: You Can't See Your Bones with Binoculars. It has simple hand-drawn sketches with actual real x-ray films placed over parts of the body as it moves from the skull down to the toes. I'm thinking I want to own this book!And we enjoyed learning about our bones and the amazing way x-rays are used to take pictures of our bones and our teeth! I didn't plan too much for x-ray week, only a craft where we used chalk to draw x-rays of our arms on black paper, but life's circumstances gave us many opportunities to learn about x-rays this week.

Here's a picture of Adam with his x-ray craft:

And then, here is Adam at the Discovery Science Center where they have x-ray samples of different bones. We went to say goodbye to the Elmo exhibit and finding this exhibit was bonus! I love how Adam stood there studying the arm and holding it over his arm. He was truly deep in thought, so fun to watch :)

Then we had a dentist appointment where I could show Adam the x-ray machine that the dentist uses to take pictures of our teeth. (no pictures of that experience :)

And finally, we experienced an all-too-real example of an x-ray and it's purpose as Jill, Adam's sister, broke her leg. She slipped on some mulch and twisted it.It's a very unfortunate situation, although she's a trooper and doing alright, but what an opportunity to show Adam (and the whole family) actual x-rays of Jill's leg, and an example of a broken bone and what that looks like on the x-ray. I explained to the doctor that we just finished x is for x-ray week (he didn't seem to care and just wanted to move on...he's missing out!) Wish I could post a picture of the break. It's a spiral fracture and looks almost like a figure 8, very interesting (just wish it weren't so painful!)

So although it didn't end fabulously, X week turned out to be quite educational. We won't forget this one anytime soon :)