gosh i'm in the 3rd trimester!

well, tomorrow (the baby count down is wrong on my page and i'm too lazy to change it!)

trish came to see me today. all looks good and "orlando" is head down now.. slightly off to one side today, but head down!

i'll see her again at 29wks.. gosh, that's only 2wks away! for my anti-d as i'm A- and clive and the kids are all *something* positive. and no lucozade as i can't stomach the stuff!

why is it i'm pregnant when teh summers are HOT?! we woke late today (unheard of for my two to sleep past 6.30a at the latest) i was first up at 8AM!!!! good greif, i had a lie in! sian and beth got up next at 8.50 and clive finally surfaced at around 9.30am.

i'm counting down to bath and bed time here as i am dripping with sweat and doing nothing. i hate being inactive but i just get too nauseous when i start playing round. not to mention my spd is starting to kick back in again (forgot to mention that to trish.) i'm not even thinking about going to hte gym, there's no air con up there i'll either faint or throw up!

next week is our last sign class before september. good greif it's gone quick. sian and beth have learnt a whole host of signs, how to put them together as a sentence AND the grammer taht goes with BSL as opposed to grammer when you speak. (ex. in BSL "what's your name?" is signed "name you what")

Only 3 Weeks

of sign classes left before we take a break for the summer. Dom (teacher) and John (interpreter) are very happy with how well Sian has been doing- and so am I for that matter! Even baby Beth is doing well and can sign short sentences and recognize ALL the signs, she only signs about 50% of them though as she can't manipulate her fingers for some yet. It will come, meanwhile it brings laughter to us all as she valiantly tries.

I hope they don't lose all their signs over the summer and I will try to make sure we practice daily. I'm pretty sure they'll be wanting their fill of "Something Special" every now and again still LOL.

Some of the girls signing

Sian signing "B"

Beth signing "Pig"

Sian signing "S"

Beth signing "doctor"



So this week the girls learnt to put together simple sentences at their sign class. The video shows one example. AND Sian knows the British Sign Language (BSL) alphabet even if she can't recognize the printed letters! They both have laminated BSL alphabet place mats thanks to this website. I've used this site to help me with odd words or to create phrases before now- there are 500 signs on there which has been very helpful!

It's EDUCATION that's compulsory

NOT school. I wish I could get that into people's heads. Clive and I have decided to Home School indefintately, we want the girls to enjoy *learning* and not learn x,yz because the national curriculum says that's what is a 4yo should be doing at a certain time. Babies learn to roll, sit, crawl and walk at different times. That different time zone extends to children and education. It's why a 3yo girl may be able to sing the "ABC" song at the begining of nursery, but a boy who's birthday is at the end of the same school year may not know it till the end of the year.

it's why sian at 4 still can't hold a pencil properly, but her 2yo sister can. they have different learning curves. sian can learn and sign reliably. beth understands signs but can't sign them back. sian recognizes numbers and some letters. beth can count but doesn't recognize any numbers yet. it will come when her brain is ready to process it.

time to join either HEAS (although maybe not till they're a bit older) or education otherwise
for some support and advice. i've been using muddle puddle for my early years stuff as it has links to all sorts of lovely pictures and games.

Sign class #2

i'm a bit late with this one! The girls have another class tomorrow! So, last week they reviewed

• apple
• banana
• orange

and added

• table
• chairs
• cupboard
• bed

it's amazing how fast 30mins flies by. sian picks up the signs really quickly. Dom will show them the picture and sign together first and teach them new ones. then he plays "where is" where he does the sign and sian has to point to the pic. after she has to sign what ever he poitns to. beth doesn't get it quite so quickly, but by the next lesson she knows the signs. i think it's partly her age, and partly she's shy around Dom. Sian has no such problem!!

Sign Classes

The girls had their first sign class when we got back. Mama however, got it wrong and got them there 30mins late. Why didn't someone phone me to ask where we were?! I knew they had a team meeting, but I had memorised it as 11am, so the girls lesson was 10.30am. Nope, it was meant to be 10am. *blush*

Anywho. We got there, and the girls learnt/reviewed some fruit signs

• apple
• banana
• cherries (new)
• grapes (BSL rather than babysign)
• orange

Boo was rather shy, but she did a few signs for Dom. Sian on the other hand, couldn't wait to get there and show off her skills! Of course, she does have a year or so's advantage over Bethy LOL. I did get told they both showed promise though.

We went to our home ed group on Thursday. Sian was sooooo excited to be tehre again. Must try and meet up with some of the otehrs too. We did teh body this week. next time it's road safety, something every child needs to learn. Sian is improving, I sometimes forget she's only 4.

Body Experiments.

Pulse: get a smallish blob of blu-tac or similar, stick a toothpick (we used wire ties from sandwich bags with the same result) into it. Place blu-tac on your wrist, just below teh base of your thumb. can you see your pulse vibrating through the pick?

Stethoscope: get the inner tube of a kitchen roll (do NOT unroll the whole thing, it will upset Mama!) place it on the left side of your chest, get your friend/sister/mama to listen and see if they can hear your heart. Swap.

Cookery Lesson

today we baked an apple cake with fresh apples. mmm. mind you, we have NOOO idea how it came out yet! i'll find out later i hope.

APPLE CAKE

4tbsp (appr. 4oz) self raising flour
4tbsp (appr. 40z) caster sugar
4 oz (ish!!) butter
2 medium eggs
2 large(ish) cooking apples, peeled & grated
1tsp cinnamon

grease a cake tin well and bake in a preheated oven at 200 for 20mins (roughly)

Beth counted out the spoons of sugar- wiht a little assistance. Sian did the flour all by herself and then they "miscked" those two ingredients together. Both kids (with help) cracked an egg into the mix and stirred it. Then Mama added the butter and apple/cinnamon mix and we gave it a good ol' stirring together. add a couple of kisses for luck! transfer to greased cake tin. give the kids the bowl to lick out and put in hot oven.

Paulton's Park

Requires a picnic for 9. Yup, nine people. So we went to tescos to get the ingredients for it. The girls had to remember certain items. And Beth excelled as she remembered the milk that Mama forgot! MInd you, she also started eating the cheese triangles before i'd even got to the checkout LOL.

Signing with Justin

aka 20mins in front of the box. There was an episode I've never seen today. The girls both picked up the sign for "digger" and later on, they both used signs around and about. Sian noticed that some toys had been placed in a box so they looked like they were signing "butterfly"

Yesterday we

put on some rock n roll and had a "dance lesson" for 30mins. who said pe had to be football/netball/rounders LOL. Today, Sian tried out some ballet and she's not too bad at a couple of karate moves either (front kick & basic punch) pity i can't get her into a karate session till she's 5.