Micah at 2 Years Old

2 Year Check Up:
Weight: 27.7lbs 50%
Height: (I can't remember the inches) 50%
HC: 49cm 50% (The doctor made a comment about him growing into his head. Haha.)

All of the questions asked concerning development raised no red flags for autism. Micah is ahead in his verbal and cognitive development. Dr. Macias was impressed that he can already count with little assistance to 10 and knows at least 2 colors and can recognize almost all of the upper case letters in the alphabet. He's also impressed that he's been saying 7 word sentences pretty consistently. He said a 3 word sentence is usually a sign of a 200 word vocabulary so Micah has obviously exceeded that. I just pointed to his big brother as the attributing factor because as much as I would LOVE to take credit for giving Micah one-on-one attention in that area it doesn't always happen.

Potty Training

Micah shows an interest in potty training every once in awhile, but it's definitely on his terms. He has gone pee several times in the potty and poop only twice, but he has to sit there a looooong time. I'm okay with letting him choose when he wants to be trained, but I've also got a few tricks up my sleeve (like a few toys he can only play with while he's on the potty). I know Jackson being potty trained at 2 years old was an anomaly and I'm not going to rush Micah because that could back fire on me big time.

Personality

Micah is my strong willed boy. He can be stubborn when it comes to saying "sorry" and when asked to do something specifically. Discipline takes longer because of that sometimes, but I know it will all pay off later.

A positive spin on the strong will is that he usually knows what he wants and rarely changes his mind about it. That made his birthday and will make Christmas really fun this year. (He's been eyeing a toy guitar in the Toys R Us ad as of late.)

He loves anything with buttons and anything having to do with music. Singing, the piano, the guitar, etc. He regularly makes up songs about random things he plays with or sees and loves it when the rest of the family makes up songs too. Although he can be pretty bossy about what bedtime songs he wants sung to him at night. :) But he also loves to sing along and I think that's adorable!

He is such a goof ball sometimes and gets the giggles right before bed. I love it and probably give in to it too often making it harder for him to settle down for the night, but I just treasure the times we have alone in his dimly lite room giggling about his silliness.

However, he's pretty shy around strangers and it takes him awhile to warm up to even family members, so don't be surprised if you don't hear him singing or even talking when you first meet him.

He ADORES his older brother and wants to do what ever he's doing. Most of the time that makes for a great play situation, but sometimes it can cause conflict over toys or my attention. I've resigned to the fact that I may have to buy multiples of the same toy to keep the peace (cheap toys that is ... I'm not that crazy). For example, one of my smarter purchases lately were two $1 flashlights. They will play in a closet with those together for at least an hour. I love that my two boys are such good buddies.

One of Micah's favorite things to do is find a place to hide and be alone. He loves forts and I think for his sake we might have to have a club house/tree house in the future. I remember doing that myself as a child and even now I tend to be rejuvenated more when I'm by myself than when I'm with other people.

Micah is almost hyper observant at times and catches on to things I would have never thought he would. He is such a little sponge lately ... the other day he was trying to say "hypothesis" and "ominous" because he heard us talking about it. He has a great memory too. That mixed with his strong will may be a challenge for Colin and I as he gets older. We're just praying he uses it for the greater good.

Our Prayer

Dear Father,

Thank you for Micah. Thank you for 2 years of life with him. He belongs to you and is a gift to us. Use him and everything about him for your glory. Help him to desire to know you more and be more like Jesus all the days of his life.

Amen

Birthday Cake on a Stick

Micah turned 2 years old today! We celebrated his birthday yesterday since Colin was home all day.

The day started out with birthday signs (made by Jackson and me) and decorations,





blueberry muffins with birthday candles and scrambled eggs (made by the boys) and pears (a few of Micah's favorites).



Then we opened presents and played until it was time to go to church.




We enjoyed a wonderful worship together as a family and then came home and had a quick lunch and long naps. After naps we all had cake pops!


Why I haven't heard of cake pops until now is still a wonder. It is SO much easier for a young child to eat and easy for Mommy to clean up afterwards. It helps with portion control and it's just plain fun to eat just about anything on a stick. It was my first attempt at making them and I think I'll have to make a new batch for the celebration we have with family on Novemeber 5th. If your adventurous and want to try them out and get lots of good decorating ideas you should check out the Bakerella website here. It's where I got the idea for the Mickey Mouse shaped cake pop.




After cake pops, Micah picked out a movie of his choice and we sat in front of the TV and ate chicken nuggets, mac-n-cheese, broccoli and smoothies (more of Micah's favorites) as a special birthday dinner treat.


That night as Colin and I were reflecting on the joys of the day he said, "I've come to realize that my parents probably got more enjoyment on my birthday than I did growing up." SO TRUE! What a blessing to be able to celebrate LIFE! May we never take it for granted.

P.S. Micah has his two year check up on Thursday, so I'll be sure to post another blog with his stats then.

"School" Part 2

A while back I wrote a blog entitled "School" laying out the fact that Colin and I haven't decided what we are going to do in regards to schooling for Jackson yet.

We still don't know.

Partly because we still don't know where we'll be living, but partly because we just haven't made up our minds.

Since my first post I was able to go to a homeschooling conference here in town. Here are a few things that I got out of the event:

1. We've got time! Jackson is FOUR! Most states don't require you to declare your intent for education until age 6. I think I was just feeling a little peer pressure watching friends and family send their kids (who are actually older than Jackson) off to school this fall.

2. We can make our educational decision one year at a time. If we choose to do homeschooling for the first year that doesn't mean we have to commit to it for the rest of Jackson's academic life. However, I've heard from several parents that it's much easier logistically to start homeschooling first and then move to public or private schooling because of the hoops the government requires you to jump through when you change (each state is different though).

3. Homeschooling is a lifestyle. It will affect our family as a whole ... perhaps not more than public or private school, but differently. It will be a lot of work on my part.

4. Homeschool communities are essential. Parent's swap tips, curriculum, set up co-teaching arrangements, group field trips, events, sports, etc. You name it, they do it. I'm not sure I'd even consider homeschooling if there is not a homeschool community where we will eventually live.

5. Every body's reasons for homeschooling are different and not all of them are because they want to "shelter" their kids from the world. I wanted to walk away from the conference with "my reason to homeschool" or even "my reason not to homeschool", but I didn't want to walk away on the fence or with someone else's reason for homeschooling. After a looooooong talk with my husband, I think we both concluded that our reason for homeschooling and what excites us most about homeschooling is being able to tailor our children's education to their strengths and weaknesses.

Like I said before and contrary to what it sounds like from the list above, we STILL have not decided officially what we'll be doing once Jackson turns 6 years old, but we've got a little time.

In the mean time I decided that I needed to do "School" this year with Jackson to see if I could handle having more structure in my days, weeks and months as the "teacher."

So, at the beginning of September we started the "Five In A Row" curriculum that I mentioned in my first blog. Only this time I am much more consistent and structured in what I'm doing for Jackson. It also means that I take weekly trips by myself to the library to load up on books for the week's lessons.

We've also started "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons." Jackson has had a grasp on phonetics for a long time now, but has yet to have the confidence to just put the sounds together and start reading. We're only on lesson 8 of 100, but so far I can already see his confidence level growing in reading AND writing.

Anyway, here is what we do for "School" in a typical week. Note: "School" lasts about 45 minutes to an hour depending on how much I want to get accomplished and how quickly we can get Micah down for a nap in the afternoon.

Everyday: Calendar, Prayer, Weekly Bible Verse, Reading and Writing

Mondays: Review the Sunday School lesson from church.
Read the story for the week.
FIAR Christian Character and Bible Supplement

Tuesdays: Read the story for the week.
Social Studies

Wednesdays: Read the story for the week.
Art/Literature
Supplemental worksheets (optional)

Thursdays: Read the story for the week.
Math/Science

Fridays: Review/ Catch Up
Pbskids.org

Friday's are typically my days to clean the entire house, so we don't have "School" on those days. However, Jackson does get some time to play on the PBS Kids website and they have a lot of fun educational games on it that I'm comfortable with.

Here are a few pictures from the week we read through "The Rag Coat" by Lauren Mills



Jackson's "Quilt" he made during his art lesson. He LOVES to cut with scissors!



Pretending to be a "coal miner" in my closet during his science lesson on coal was one of his favorite lessons for this book.

Anyway, I know this was a long post and I know it may seem like I've dropped off the blogging planet, but I'm here! I have SO much I want to blog about and so little time ... isn't that just about every blogger's mantra?! ;)