Joel and the frog he found outside.
Joel is now 5 years old. Wow, can't believe THAT! He is reading. And reading well I might add. We had started going through the book "How to Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons" back when Levi started it, but Joel kind of died off. He would lose interest and such. So, we stopped. Then pick it up again in a few months. He would pick up right where he left off like there was never a problem. Go well for a few more lessons then..*poof* stop again. So, we went back and forth like that for some time, getting nearly half way through, but he would still have 'bad days' once in a while. So, we've basically given up on that. Yet, he reads so well. He picks up every Dr. Seuss book in the house and reads it fluently. He reads the more advanced books we have for FIAR studies rather well too. And no, he doesn't just have them memorized. He's actually READING them, because he's read some himself that we haven't done a study on, never even opened!! He does better at sounding things out than Levi does. Levi likes to play lazy with his reading at times. But Joel will at least try to sound out just about anything. If he's wrong, oh well, he goes on as though he knows exactly what he read...if you're not there to catch and correct his mistakes ;) He enjoys doing school work. I haven't done as much with him as I had with Levi by this age, but he has picked up a lot and really does enjoy it. He's like a totally different kid if I give him something constructive to do. If I just let him go and play all day, he's wild and drives me crazy!! But if I have a few pages of stuff for him to do or reading assignments, the day goes much more smoothly. He needs that structure, ya think? Well, that's about all I have for this page at the moment. I was just updating some things, popped over here and realized how in need of help it was so wanted to put SOMETHING more recent up for anyone stopping by ;)

ok sorry, not uploaded this one yet..hold on ;) Joel's fifth birthday! He requested a rocketship cake this year. Not too bad, I managed alright with that one. The wings were a bit more trouble than I had anticipated but we ended up ok.