Hits of the Day…..

The two big hits of our first day back at school were a nature walk and writing words in salt. Going on a nature walk with Gage is extremely entertaining.  He gets so excited about EVERYTHING and he doesn’t miss a thing.  We saw water striders in the creek, spiders, caterpillars, a really nasty algae filled pond, some cat-tail buds (don’t know the correct term for this) that had not yet opened, and plenty of other things.  Gage even ran into one of his friends on the way and so he enjoyed having his friend come along.  At first, I was afraid he wouldn’t pay attention to his surroundings with a friend there, but that wasn’t the case at all.  I think our friend got a kick out of Gage’s zeal for nature.  Shea had a great time, too, playing in the little stream, and he is the one who found the caterpillars.  He told me before we left for our nature walk that he wanted to find some caterpillars, and he did.  On the walk home he started saying, “We had a good time on nature walk, Mommy.  We found caterpillars, and wocks, and this stick.  Me like nature walks.”  I do, too, Shea.

As for the salt, I never knew it would be such a hit in this house.  Gage hates writing, and so after he finished his copywork for the day, I sat him at the table and poured salt on a plastic plate.  We smoothed it out and he wrote his spelling words in the salt.  He LOVED it.  I couldn’t believe all the words he spelled, and he kept asking me for more.  Shea saw what we were doing, and didn’t want to be left out.  So, I poured some more salt in a plastic container for him and he happily occupied himself for at least 30 minutes.

We finished school around 2:30, so our first day is officially finished.  Now, I’ve got to do something about the piles of laundry and the wreck surrounding me that is supposed to be a home.  I might need to vacuum up all the salt, too, and make sure the caterpillars we brought home haven’t escaped.