2012-05-29: Nigel Reading with his Eyes Shut

Tonight's story time began with Dad reading Dr. Seuss' I Can Read with my Eyes Shut. Nigel decided he could do that, too, with the sight words book his teacher, Miss Shanny, sent home with him (Sharing Time).

He would look at the page and memorize what it said (silently), then close his eyes and recite it, pointing in the air to the words as he went. The sentences with four to six words he did consistently, and only forgot words in the longer sentences (7+ words).

2012-05-26: Humming Brahms' Lullaby

Nigel has a Glow Worm toy that plays music. He often plays in his bed at night before falling asleep, and loves to listen to music during that time. When he doesn't have a radio available, he will sometimes listen to Glow Worm, and regardless of what he is listening to, if he is very familiar with the song and really enjoys it, he will sometimes sing along.

In the living room today, he started humming Brahms' Lullaby to Dad, and hummed the entire segment Glow Worm played, then asked Dad what that song was. He included every note, and matched the tones pretty well, making it very clear what song he was humming.

2012-05-24: Counting M&Ms with Mom and Tenty-Five

Mom has been working on math skills with Nigel lately, after pre-school. Today, they were counting M&Ms, which is one of Nigel's favorite ways to do math. They counted by ones from one to forty-five, with him needing a bit of help transitioning to thirty, and again to forty. Upon reaching forty-five, he spontaneously skipped ahead to fifty-five, then proceeded to count by tens up past ninety-five to what he called either "tenty-five" or "ten-oh-five" (Mom wasn't sure which he said, but probably "tenty-five").

2012-05-15: Nigel's Reading Update

Nigel has been working very hard on his reading. Mom and Dad got a set of twenty-five simple sight reading books and had a great idea for encouraging Nigel in reading them all by himself. While he had been practicing them here and there, as he felt interested in them, they thought it would be very significant if he were to read each one of them, all by himself.
Mom made up a super tall chart, and Dad printed and cut out of paper a cone and twenty-five ice cream scoops, each labeled for one of the books. Nigel was told that each time he read one of the books from cover to cover, with no help and no mistakes, he would check that book off and get to stick its ice cream scoop onto the big chart, which was hung on his bedroom door. After passing off every one of the books, and sticking all the paper ice cream scoops onto the cone, he would earn a trip to an ice cream store for a real ice cream cone of his choosing!
Nigel started reading immediately. At first, he would practice one to four books each night, getting ready to try to pass them off. It wasn't long until he was checking off almost one per night, and on one night, two books! Nigel had little trouble with any of them, and most days he would successfully pass off a book. Dad reserved one book for last, though: "I Did It." After Nigel had passed off the other 24, the order of which had been left up to Nigel to choose, Dad brought out "I Did It."
Having not practiced this book, it was a little while until Nigel was ready to try passing it off. The word "did" was particularly troublesome for him. Mom and Dad decided to let it be put off for a little bit, then come back to try it fresh later. Nigel was better at reading "did" instinctively than phonetically, and if it didn't just flow out on the first try, he really struggled with it, and the experience was becoming unpleasant. They encouraged Nigel to try reading bits and pieces of other books for a few days, and interestingly, one of them had "did" in it, and Nigel read it pretty well most of the time.
After a few days off, Dad asked him if he wanted to try "I Did It" again. He nearly got it one hundred percent right on that try, but not quite. Dad then put off trying for one more day due to Mom's work schedule, so they could go out for the ice cream the evening after the pass-off. Sure enough, on Monday evening, May 14th, just before bed, Nigel read the entire book, all by himself, with no mistakes. "Did" had become an easy word for him now.
For the ice cream, the family went to Maggie Moo's, and invited Grandma and Grandpa to come along. Nigel, unsurprisingly, got strawberry ice cream (pink - his favorite color) with M&Ms (his favorite candy) mixed in. It was a delicious reward for a truly impressive accomplishment. Nigel has worked very hard to get to this point, and it was high time to formally recognize that work.

2012-04-28: Park City with Dad's Family

The family had a busy and eventful day today. The plan involved going to Ray's first birthday party. (Ray is Devin's younger brother.) Between other commitments and Nigel falling asleep in the car, however, that didn't happen, and Mom just dropped off a present for him as the family headed to Park City to meet Grandma, Grandpa and the Black family.

The previous weekend, Nigel had been out riding his bike, and had fallen over and scraped his ankle. Friday morning, the scrape was looking infected, and Mom and Dad took him in to be checked. It turned into a very long visit to the doctor's office, first waiting in the waiting room, then waiting in the examination room, then waiting for anti-biotic shots in each thigh, then waiting 20 minutes to ensure no allergic reaction occurred. The whole process took about two hours. Nigel was very brave about the shots, but they hurt a lot! The doctor said not to get his cut wet for a whole week, and to come back in the next day to check its condition.

On Saturday morning, the family trucked back in to the doctor's office for the follow-up check. The scrape looked much improved over the previous day, and it was a much quicker visit this time. (That office is always slow, so it still probably took half an hour.) That was very good news. The downside was that, despite the improvement, Nigel still was supposed to stay out of the water for the whole week, but everyone else was going swimming in Park City. Nigel was very impressive in how well he restrained himself from even considering swimming, even when Uncle Kerry asked if he wanted to just float around in a little boat! Nigel insisted that he could not get his cut wet, and stuck firmly to what the doctor had told him to do.

The afternoon in Park City was fun, despite the lack of swimming. The kids rode scooters and bikes. Dad forgot to bring Nigel's bike, so he put Nigel on his lap while he rode Grandma's bike around. The girls thought that looked like fun, so they all wanted turns to be pedaled around the plaza on Dad's lap. Nigel did get to borrow Haley's scooter a few times, which he enjoyed.

It was a late night getting home, and Nigel was very tired the next day because of that.

2012-04-29: Wanting a Puppy
During lunch today, Nigel asked if one of his stuffed dogs, which he has now named "Tan" (because he is tan-colored, of course), was alive. After clarifying that he wasn't, Nigel said, "I want a puppy that is alive and walks with no help."

2012-04-28: Park City with Dad's Family

Nigel has been a bit injury-prone recently. He fell down riding his bike and scraped his ankle, and it ended up getting quite infected. At the doctor's office, he got shots of antibiotic in each thigh, and he was very brave about those, but everyone could tell they hurt a lot more than he had anticipated. He will need to take an oral antibiotic for some time, as well.

Today, the family went to Park City, where Grandma and Grandpa have a time share at a resort, and spent the day with grandparents and the Black family. The girls all spent a lot of time swimming, but Nigel was being very careful to keep his ankle away from water. The doctor told him to not let it get wet, and with the pain of the shots he got, he was not going to let himself get wet under any circumstances. Isolating him in a pool float with a towel wrapped around his leg was enough to convince Mom and Dad it would be okay, but Nigel insisted that was not okay, and wouldn't go near the pool. Good for him, of course.

During the afternoon, the kids went to the exercise room with Grandpa and Dad, and while Dad wasn't paying enough attention, Nigel managed to get his fingers caught in a running treadmill's belt, tearing off a good bit of skin from two of them. Again, he was pretty brave about it, but now he had to keep that hand away from water, as well.

The kids rode bikes and ran around, but it was disappointing not to be able to swim.