Second Trimester weeks 17-19.

I can't believe we are already half way through the second trimester! Wow. It's been a good few weeks. We registered, we had our 20 week ultrasound, and we have some showers coming up!

I am so so thankful to be feeling well and to have a pretty easy pregnancy. I have honestly been feeling really good for the most part. My hunger level has gone back to a normal level (I was so hungry the first trimester), and I don't feel as tired as I did before either. I have had a few headaches and backaches recently, but it hasn't been too bad.

We are so excited! The past few weeks Kley has been super excited, which is so fun to watch. He will be such a good dad, and I'm so thankful to be on this journey with him!

Week 17- This week I started wearing maternity clothes mostly. I can still fit into a few stretchy skirts, flowy shirts, or pants with drawstrings, but for the most part wore all maternity.

Week 18

Week 19

Children's Progression of Drawing.

In reference to my last post about children's writing, this is an interesting article about children's progression of drawing.

I am super excited for the day my child draws our first family picture. I will totally frame it. :)

Children's Progression of Writing.

This might not be interesting to some (or even most), but it's completely fascinating to me- children's progression of writing. When I used to teach in the 2's, I never got to experience this because they were all basically scribbling. But, now that I teach in the 3's (with a few 4's), I get to see much more of the scale and it's absolutely incredible to watch to me. 

It's so amazing to be a part of children's learning, and watching them learn to identify/write letters, to even sounding out sounds and some words, is so exciting.

These stages are from Creative Curriculum (not the pictures, but the stages).

1. Scribbles/Marks

2. Controlled Linear Scribbles- Starting to realize that writing goes in lines from left to right.

3. Mock Letters/Letter-Like Forms- This is not a good picture, but it's the best I could find. It's when they aren't writing actual letters, but they realize that each letter is written separately and write a mark of some form for each letter they are attempting.

4. Letter Strings- Writing real letters, but it doesn't mean anything and they aren't trying to write actual words.

5. Early Invented Spelling- Starting to sound out words. This is a child writing, "I want six dogs."

6. Late Invented Spelling- Starting to sound out more sounds in the words. This is a child writing, "I want six dogs" again.

This would be an example of really late invented spelling.

I just love watching the progression and get so excited when my kids master another level!

Good Manners crafts.

1. I had my kids all decorate a flower, based off of this poster, and wrote a "good manners" phrase on it that they suggested and made a good manners garden.

2. "I will show good manners by..." coloring sheet.

Then, I just did a few other really basic crafts, like glue/glitter and stamps/ink pads because I got some new kids this week and that's always an adjustment period.

Exercise crafts.

We didn't do a ton for exercise crafts either, since it was Memorial Day week and we also did more exercise activities outside!

Sometimes crafts totally bomb that you think were going to be awesome, and sometimes a craft you aren't that excited about turns out awesome. I wasn't expecting that much from this craft, but I was so proud of my kids in the end! I had them follow a few steps- color the balls, cut them out, glue them on a piece of paper, and write their name on it. That's a lot of steps for them, but they did so well and they looked great!

Sports painting.

Safety crafts.

1. I had printed off a bunch of different safety coloring sheets, and let them pick which one they wanted to color. Here are a few below.

2. Stop, drop, and roll watercolor painting.

3. Stop light scrap gluing.

4. "I will practice safety!" dot marker coloring sheet.

Nutrition crafts.

This week we didn't do many nutrition crafts because we spent most of the time making our Mother's Day gift, which was good too. So, we just did color sorting healthy food and made a giant food pyramid together.