Garden Update

Back in March we had a great time planting a backyard garden. The was the second year in row that we attempted a garden and we had very high hopes of producing a lot of vegetables to eat this summer. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate and the extremely hot temperatures did not allow many vegetables to grow. We actually were only able to eat two very small yellow squash and a handful of lettuce. This did not bother the boys at all. They have had a great time watering their plants, examining all of the bugs that the garden has attracted, and most of all, watching our sunflowers grow. For some reason the weather conditions must have been just perfect for sunflowers because we ended up with six plants and dozens of flowers. I would say that this garden, despite its lack of produce, has been a huge success and we are looking forward to trying again in the fall.

Painting the ocean

As part of our ocean unit this summer, we are creating an ocean scene in the playroom with all of the animals that we are learning about. The first step was to create an ocean background. I do not have a large piece of blue paper and the budget for materials is tight right now so we made our own by painting a large roll of brown paper.

We haven't painted in quite a while and the boys were very excited.

Mateo reminded why we paint OUTSIDE!

We had planned to paint the bottom of the ocean yellow for the sand, but the boys decided to add their own touch and put their hand prints in the "sand." I like their idea much better and there was no way that we were going to paint over those precious hands.

When we were done we celebrated with "paletas." Diego, as usual, inhaled his in five seconds. Mateo generously shared his with his brother. Great afternoon!

Early Summer Vacation

This last few weeks we have done very little "school" in our house. If I ever get around to downloading the pictures, I would love to share some fun activities about bugs that were a big hit with the boys.

Summers in Texas are hot, I mean HOT! You can usually go outside for a couple a hours in the morning but by 11:00 it is unbearable. Spring and Fall are just about perfect so we have been spending every free minute outside enjoying it. Here are some pictures that I took of the boys last weekend. (Yes, they are still in their pjs. Doesn't everyone play outside in their pjs.?)

Mateo just learned to climb to the top of slide by himself. His favorite activity to do up there is have Mommy put ALL of his plastic dinosaurs at the top of the slide so that they can slide down. And repeat. And repeat. And repeat.

The boys never tire of hunting for ladybugs. We have dozens of them right now. I am still working with Mateo on being gentle with the poor insects. It has got the point where I no longer show him when I find one. I can't have any more deaths on my conscience.

Diego is very gentle with the ladybugs and often asked if he can keep one for a pet. This is a big deal since last year he would not even touch any sort of creepy-crawly.

Mateo is smelling a flower.

Playing with the hose never gets old.

I hate to categorized my kids..... yet. :) But, if I had to I would say that Diego is definitely the intellectual but not athletic one and Mateo will either be a soccer player or a sky diver. I swear that kid would jump off of anything.

Come play at the Childhood 101 We Play link up.

Taking learning to the sandbox

Playing in the sandbox is one of my kids' favorite things to do. I received a set of uppercase and lowercase letters awhile back and they have just been sitting in the craft closet awaiting a creative lightbulb to go off in my head. Yesterday before going outside I asked the boys if they would like to go on a treasure hunt. After making various pirate noises that I took as a "yes," we headed to the sandbox. A very simple, but fun game of "dig up the letters" ensued. My favorite part was Diego trying to teach Mateo his letters and Mateo happily repeating whatever Diego said just so happy to be included in the game.

Farm living is the life for me.....

Recently Mateo and I had a rare, just the two of us, excursion. We were invited to a birthday party at a farm. We had a great time together and it was fun to spend some one-on-one time with him.

He spent much of the morning following around this farm dog. This kid is quite an animal lover.

He got to explore a wooden train.

And.... he rode a pony for the first time. He did not want to at first but when it was time to get off, he started yelling "MAS, MAS."

Fun in the Sandbox

We have had just gorgeous weather lately and this is pretty much what you will find the boys doing everyday.

Gardening

Now that our weather is improving, we have started working on our garden. Last year Diego and I put in a small garden with carrots, zucchini, beans, and marigolds. We had a bit of success but it was mostly a learning and fun project for the two of us to do together. Mateo was not invited to help last year because he just wanted to eat the dirt.

This year since both boys are helping we have doubled the size of the garden. We have plans to go to the store this weekend to buy some more dirt and seeds. For now we are just playing in the dirt (mud) and looking for "gusanos." My boys can not get enough of looking for worms! Last year Diego refused to touch them but this year he filled he bucket up with the creepy-crawlies. Mateo, who is eager to do anything that his big brother is doing, started collecting them right away. Diego wanted to take them inside to be his new pets but I convinced him that they (and I) would be much happier if they were outside.

Mateo is showing me a "gusano."

Mateo is feeding his worm grass.

Fun at the Grandparents' house

We love going to visit my parents for many reasons. For one, the boys get immersed in English. We speak only Spanish to the boys and most of their day is spent surrounded by Spanish, through books, t.v., Spanish preschool, friends in the neighborhood, etc. I am always amazed by how much Diego's English improves within a few days. Since I very rarely hear him speaking in English, it surprises me to hear him use sophisticated vocabulary and complete sentences. No matter who he is talking to, Diego always turns to me and speaks in Spanish. He knows that I speak English also but our language together is Spanish.

Another reason that we love to go to the grandparents' house is their big backyard. The boys spend hours running around and collecting rocks, acorns, pinecones, and, of course, sticks. Is there anything more fun to play with than sticks?

I loved this picture of Diego. He is taking his teddy bear for a ride in his little wheelbarrow just like Papa gives him and Mateo rides in the big wheelbarrow.

Learning Through Love

Susana at My Family, My Forever has started a new weekly link-up called Learning Through Love. I am excited to participate. This week was very busy since we spent most of it out of town playing and visiting my parents. Most of our learning involved the outdoors since my parents have a huge back yard. We played in the leaves, hunted for bugs, collected acorns and rocks, and played in the mud. We also found time to visit another pumpkin patch. Here are a few pictures of our fun (and learning).


D is looking for the perfect pumpkin.
M loved to roll around the ground and get VERY dirty. That's my boy!
M was fascinated with the leaves.
My niece is looking at a praying manthis that we found in the apple tree. Can you see it?

Top 5 of the Week

I decided to join in the fun with a new Mr. Linky on one of my favorite blogs Superheros and Princesses. The task is to write your Top 5 things that you enjoyed last week. Here is goes….

5. Homemade Playdough (Plastilina hecha en casa). We play outside when it is cold. We play outside when it is wet. We do NOT, however, play outside when it is cold AND wet. Needless to say, we have been stuck in the house A LOT this week. Thank heavens for the playdough that we made earlier in the week and the hours of entertainment for the boys (and sanity for mommy) that it has provided. Click here to get recipes in English and Spanish.

4. Maploco. I just added the widget for the Maploco on my blog and I have to say that I LOVE IT. It shows you where in the world your readers are from. Each day D and I look at the list and then find the places on our globe. So far we have located Japan, Australia, Argentina, Brazil, England, Spain, and Italy (just to name a few.)

3. Papa Murphy's Pizza. I do not know if you have this pizza chain where you live but it is awesome! It is a take and bake type of restaurant so I took the boys for the second time to watch as they made our pizza and we took it home to cook it. It is cheap, it is entertaining for the boys, and they give us free cookies while we wait. As my high school students say, “Score!”

#2 My son’s preschool. D attends a Spanish Immersion preschool two days a week while I am at school teaching. (I am a part-time public school Spanish teacher.) This week he was chosen as the Super Estrella de la Semana (Super Star of the Week.) This meant that mommy got to help him make a poster about himself (which I will brag, I mean blog about soon) and bring an item for show and tell. I was sad to miss his first-ever presentation so I was so excited when his teacher gave me pictures that she took for me during his presentation.

#1 Working part-time. It was a hard sell to my school district two years ago. I wanted to continue teaching, but part-time. I felt like I was missing so much the first year and a half of D's life when I would be gone from 6:30 to 5:00 or 6:00 (depending on tutoring and other after school activities). I was miserable. Nobody thought that they would accept my offer but here I am two years later and extremely happy. It is such a blessing to work part-time. I get to make some extra money that we desparately need, but I also get to eat lunch with my boys every day and take them to pumpkin patches in the afternoon. :)