The Weekly Review: Week 71

SLP Idea of the Week

Take a 12 cup muffin pan and cut speech cards into circles that fit into the bottom of each cup. Also gather 12 small tokens of some kind (pom-poms, cotton balls, squinkies, etc. Have the child (gently) toss a token at the muffin pan and practice the word at the bottom of the cup that their token landed in. Then they toss another token into another cup practicing that word. The goal is to get a token into each cup practicing all 12 words along the way.

Ava this Week

Ava will be starting preschool soon. We're less than three weeks away from saying goodbye forever to our part-time daycare. The daycare was fine. I was perfectly happy with them and they did a great job of taking care of my children. I am not in the slightest bit sad to say goodbye to them (or to the monthly check I wrote to them). It does feel strange to think that soon I will pull out of their driveway for the last time. After all, I've been taking at least one child (and often two) there twice a week for almost three years. It feels nice to be moving on to the next stage though.

Weekly Michael

Originally I had intended to enroll the children in preschool five mornings a week in the fall. In order for Michael to attend the second level preschool room, they require five day enrollment. As fall rapidly approaches I have been realizing that I'm not ready for them to be away five mornings a week. After all, I'm still seriously considering keeping them home and beginning homeschooling a year from now.

So, I decided to keep Michael in the less structured preschool room and enroll the children only four days a week. I may reduce that to three days a week later. A side effect of this decision is that the children will be in the same room for preschool this year. Michael will be repeating in the same classroom (along with all the other students who won't be attending full-time including his best friend). Ava will enter the room for the first time. I think they'll enjoy being together.

Weekly Weight Loss

This week the scale reports a loss of 1.3 pounds. That makes up for the token drop from last week with an average of 0.75/week over the last two weeks. I'm doing fine with the calorie reduction portion of my agenda. I'm having trouble trying to change my lifestyle to regularly include more activity though. I always seem to have higher priorities than exercising (and those priorities are invariably sedentary). I need to remind myself that even 15 minutes a day is so much better than nothing and that I can exercise with the children around.