The above photo was taken a month ago - when she *finally* sat up on her own at about 7 months! She knows ALL about having her picture taken and always does a cute smile when she sees the camera, and then of course she wants to look at the preview shot to make sure she looks nice enough. :)
My boys! Abigail took an old Dora curtain and tied it around Clement to make a baby sling for him so he could wear his doll! He loved and wore it for quite a while too.
My girls! Deborah loves the Fisher Price farm that Clement got for his birthday a couple of months ago. She especially enjoys it making animal sounds when she presses the buttons and opens the gates, etc.
Now that Deborah is sitting up on her own, I often find all 4 children playing together. It's lovely! :)
At the beginning of June the boys we all had a cold. The boys were feeling rather out of it one afternoon, so Abigail wanted to be a nurse to them and brought them pillows & blankets, drinks etc and kept them entertained with books.
We had a lovely afternoon at the beach a few weeks ago. It's wonderful being only a few miles away from the sand and sea, though it was actually the first time we've been since we moved here over 18 months ago.
Benjamin enjoying a quiet time by himself
Deborah's first time at the beach - enjoying the warm sand between her fingers and toes
Clement having fun in the sand. It was his first time to actually play in the sand, as he slept through our visit to the beach in Saltburn last year.
Our new inflatable globe, which makes Deborah look tiny next to it (it's around 67cm in size). I've been doing regular lessons with the children for over 6-8 weeks now and really enjoying it. We usually sit down for just over 2 hours each morning and do maths first (Tee-Jay for Abigail and Abeka for Benjamin), English (Language Lessons for the Well Trained Mind), Science (we did a CLP book first and now we're starting Abeka science books), and history (The Mystery of History). It's great to have children who actually enjoy learning, though sometimes Abigail would rather be playing outside. She's only legally "school age" from August this year, but I decided to start them a bit early so I felt I was in a routine of things before I actually *had* to be doing it. Of course, Abigail has been reading for about a year now and devours books all the time. And Benjamin has amazed us by teaching himself to read! :) He's not totally there yet, but his reading skills are quite impressive - and already very good as spelling simple words. He's not writing letters yet (as he gets a bit stressed when they're not perfect enough). But he's finally working on all the numbers and doing very well, so I think we'll get there eventually. He still gets a bit confused with 3 and 5, but the rest of the numbers he can do really well. Anyway, I sometimes worry how I can fit everything into a day/week - looking after 4 children, cooking & baking (and trying to make most things from scratch!) AND teaching the children, but as I go along, I realise it is possible - especially with a bit of organising and planning of my time. It's not easy, but it's so worth it! And when I'm at the table with Deborah on my back in a sling, and the other 3 at the table learning, I feel there isn't anything I'd rather be doing, and how happy I am to be there with my children as they're learning things for the first time. It's a very special time and I'm glad I'm the one to share it with them and not someone else! :-)
My happy little girl
Looking ready for summer - even though it now feels like winter yesterday/today!
Trying to climb the stairs before she could even crawl properly!
Deborah thinks it's lots of fun to have a brother that shares his food with her - mummy thinks it's rather messy! :)
At least not everything Clement does with her is so messy
A perfect hide-out for a little girl
A young Blue Tit we found in the garden
My girls in matching dresses - though Deborah wanted to escape from her sister's arms
Looking sweet
A very big mess in my living room! At least they were happy - and not hurting each other. :)
Making her way round the house and finding things to get into - she loves a box of random toys to pull out!
The space created in Benjamin's room by selling his large train/play table. I've been trying to completely re-think his room to make it more suitable to his particular likes/needs. He was getting rather annoyed with the large drawers filled with random toys that were part of the play table. He likes things to be organised according to type/colour/brand, etc, so I thought maybe he would prefer something smaller to sort his toys into. I also wanting to include things like a bean bag and other things that might help him with the sensory overload he often seems to be struggling with.
Further view of his room, though I might relocate the bookshelf to another room
All 4 having fun in Benjamin's room
Enjoying his air-filled football bean bag seat, and new toy bins next to him.We're making progress with Benjamin's assessment regarding the concerns we have about autism/aspergers. So far we've had the speech & language therapist at the house twice, the second visit being this morning. She agrees with us that he has a very good grasp and use of language, so that isn't really something he's needing help with. But she does notice how inflexible he is when it comes to play and organising things, obsessiveness etc - and of course his inflexibility is what often ends up resulting in violence when one of his siblings does "the wrong thing" (i.e. anything different to how he thinks it should be done, even very minor things that don't relate to him at all!). Anyway, in two weeks we're supposed to have the educational psychologist come for a home visit - our first time to meet her. And then I think the next step will be for the 3 of them (pediatrician, speech & language therapist, and educational psychologist) to meet together to discuss their findings etc and see if they thing a diagnosis is appropriate. But I think it will be after the summer school holidays before they do this, so likely to be some months yet before we hear any sort of conclusion. But for now, I just continue to research things myself and seek for answers. His sensory issues cause a fair bit of problems, particuarly as sounds bother him everywhere we go - and he just doesn't like to be around crowds - even very small ones. But the past couple of weeks he's seemed to be struggling a lot more than usual, and puts his fingers in his ears *just* to speak to us - which means the volume of his voice is a lot louder. :-/ And I think the "sensory overload" ends up making him on edge even more, and then more violence, etc. Also wanting to research "social stories" - how to write them and how to use them, in the hope that we might eventually get him to better understand that it's *not* okay to hurt other people - and also about dangers as well, as it's very scary when he's ended up in a busy road more than twice. :( His sense of danger is rather lacking.
My silly boys, who I love very much! :-)
Deborah hiding in a corner - I couldn't find her at first. She's just so quiet most of the time, exploring the house and having fun. She's almost *too* independent!
Clement looking very grown up here. We made "coffee clay" to use for a project in our history lesson - but Clement had too much fun making a dozen different things out of his clay to want to join in and do what the others were doing. However, he actually stayed in his chair for about an hour, which is very impressive!
Abigail with her finished "cunieform" table made out of coffee clay! :) She loves anything craft/art related, so she really enjoyed this project.
