I want more like this!

What a good day we've had!

My plan was to start Sonlight K and stick to the Instructors Guide schedule as much as possible, to see if that works for us. Jade has been getting on fine in many ways, but I feel very disorganised and out-of-control and felt that many days slipped by with nothing much going on. Maybe that's just a perception thing, but I thought it would be good to try a different way and find out if it's better.

Things didn't start quite according to plan as Shannon and I slept till about 9am and Jade slept till 9.40am! Jade has been having great trouble falling asleep at bedtimes, despite a consistent bedtime routine, so she was awake very late and hence slept late. I was glad, though, as she needed to catch up, and so did I! She's doing it again tonight, though - she was settled down at 8pm after a nice bath and stories, and here we are at 9.25pm and she's still wide awake.

Once we were up, dressed and breakfasted, we started work. We started with a Bible reading (Beginner's Bible) and beginning to learn a memory verse. I wrote the verse down and Jade decorated it. She then asked to copy it out herself, and who am I to refuse, LOL! So we ruled some nice wide-apart lines on a sheet of paper and she got on with it. Excellent!

Then we moved on to 'Hero Tales' with the introduction to the story about Gladys Aylward. Jade and Shannon were playing with the Duplo while I read to them. We checked out the locations mentioned (London, China) on the globe. After that it was time to get Jade ready for her afternoon of school, so got her dressed and made her lunchbox up and took her off to school.

I came home with Shannon and we had lunch together while watching CBeebies. Shannon snuggled up next to me while I read a book. It was lovely and cosy. After that we went into the kitchen to prepare dinner, and she came too and stood on a stool and played in a sinkful of water, and then played with a bowlful of flour. That took an hour, and afterwards I wanted to get some Usborne phonecalls done. So we sat at the table, and she scribbled and drew while I phoned round all the local schools getting the names of their Literacy Co-ordinators. When I had finished phone calls, I went through the pen/pencil box with Shannon, getting her to scribble with each pen and shouting out the name of the colour after me. She loved it and we did this for absolutely ages. I also demonstrated the pencil sharpener to her, and took the opportunity to throw away several felt-tip pens which were pretty much dried up.

Then it was time to get the dinner in the oven and then go and collect Jade from school. We came straight back home, I refused a request for the TV to go on (proud emoticon!) and instead we all played a game of Farm Lotto. This was Shannon's first try and she did really well! She seemed to get the hang quite quickly of taking it in turns, and then with a bit of encouragement, spotting when she had picked up an animal that was on her card and putting the picture piece onto it. We must do that again soon! We were all set for a second game but something distracted me/them (can't remember) and then Jade requested more of the 'learning books'. So I read the first section from the "Language and Thinking for Young Children" which was the story of the crow and the pitcher. It's a pretty short story, and then I gave her the option of either drawing a picture of the story, or doing an experiment with a jar of water and some stones and watching the water level rise. She chose the latter, was very excited to see it really did happen, and did it twice! Then we sat down and started on the story "The Boxcar Children" and by popular demand I did three chapters instead of just one.

By then it was time for me to prepare the veg for dinner so I left them playing. I got dinner on the table by 5.10pm (early for me!), then a bit of TV for them and a bit of computer time for me and upstairs for bath at 6.15pm. Jade loves a really long bath, so she was in there till about 7pm and then more stories and cuddles till Shannon fell asleep at 7.45pm and I left Jade to settle down for sleep. 2 hours later, we're still waiting. In the end I have told her to switch her lamp on and just read. She's always taken up to an hour to fall asleep but not this bad till recently.

Now I have to go into major planning mode for my Usborne 2007 Catalogue Launch party - need to order some new titles and get invites and posters done. Oh, and watch ER!!!!!