Commuting to Preschool

Yep, I'm doing it.  Again.  For the third time.  But I can't resist!  I love BYU preschool!  And Colton was SO excited for his first day.  He has been telling people he goes to BYU since May.  And now, he finally does!

 

 

From where we live, it takes me approximately 25 min each way (give or take red lights and slow people), and sometimes I have to come home and pick up the other two before I go back to get him.  But is it worth it?  Yes!  And soon I will do a post about turning car time into quality time.  But for now, can I just tell you a few of the reasons why we love it??

 

One, how many preschools have an awesome fountain front (or back - depending on how you look at it).

 

Two, they have a cool class pet named Webby, whom we get to bring home and babysit for a weekend. (Which coincidently happens to be when Uncle Mason is visiting in a few weeks.)

Three, they have... The. Best. Playhouse/fort. Ever.  And they change it around to become all kinds of different things.  Check out this post from when Cody was there.

 

Four, they have sinks and toilets that are just the right size! 

 

 

Five, they have an awesome playground with the biggest sandbox ever AND awesome new two seater bikes!  And someday I will take a picture but they also have this 10ft+ windchime toy thing with pots and pans and spoons dangling down and the kids love to play with it!  (wouldn't be so cool on my back porch, but I love it there!)

 

Six, he IS following in the footsteps of his big bros. 

Check out this post from two years ago if you really want to be blown away.  I cannot believe how they have changed!

 

 And of course, BYU sells the one and only (that I know of) Cookies and Cream Milk made right there in town.  yum. 

 

But best of all, we love Miss Dorie!  She is THE best teacher/parenting coach/friend ever!

 

When I left Colton, who had no trouble at all, I said "One last picture.." and this is what I got:

That's him blowing me a kiss.  sniff, sniff.  Love that boy!

 

And this is Colton by the time we got home on his first day:

 

Yep, this is going to be a great year.

 

 

"I'm going to get bigger"

1st day of 3rd Grade

1st day of Kindergarten

1st day of Preschool

Corbin and Cody were very excited about their matching shoes.  They had fun planning how they would walk into school holding hands, and how Corbin would come to the fence of the kindergarten playground and say hi, and how Corbin would watch out for anyone who was being mean to Cody.  Cody was excited to be at the big school with Corbin, and I think Corbin was equally as excited to have his little bro there with him.  I hope it lasts!

Colton told me he was going to get bigger once I let him go to preschool by himself.  And he was so excited, he didn't even want me to get out of the car.  No fear, no doubts, ready to take on the world.  His mommy actually doesn't want him to get any bigger.  I love this little man!

A whole three and a half hours a week to myself.  What I am going to do without my sweet little boys!

 

A Bittersweet Goodbye

Two days after his "Car Culmination", Cody had his last day of preschool at BYU.  We were very sad to say the least, but Cody is also very excited to start Kindergarten.  We will miss all of his amazing teachers, especially our good friend Miss Dorie.  This preschool has been such a good experience for Cody and for us as parents - we both learned more than we could have any where else.  I am grateful for their dedication to helping Cody become a successful learner and for helping me learn how to work with him on critical life skills.  I feel like we got a double bonus as I had the opportunity to team with them in helping Cody grow and develop and prepare for his future schooling career.  I called Dorie my "parenting therapist".  I felt good knowing that he had a teacher that cared about his development and his future as much as I did, and that we could work together on doing what was best for him. 

Thank you, Miss Dorie!  We will really miss seeing you everyday!

And thanks to all the other student teachers who made this experience so much fun!

The Car Expert

In Cody's preschool, they do project based learning (remember the spiders?).  Well, this last quarter, they have been learning all about CARS and Cody is definitely a car expert.  The parents were invited to the culminating event this week and Cody got to show us everything he had learned, and though I had been following what they were doing, I was quite impressed...

He showed us how to check the oil and the other fluids in the car.  He knew right where they were and how to tell if we needed more.

After showing us all the different car parts (headlights, taillights, runner, muffler, etc), he showed told us all about the wheels- including how to tell if we needed new ones and how to change them.  Have you ever heard of the penny test??

How to change a tire:
take off the lug nuts (sound effects included)

 take off the rim

 then pull off the tire.  Then do the whole thing in reverse to put it back on (Cody did this in fast forward, so it was harder to get a picture.)  :)

Inside, Cody showed us their "Car Shop"and took down my order of what I wanted fixed on my car.

 They even had a waiting room!

Inside the shop, showing me how to change the oil.

We are so proud of our little car expert!  Not too long and I'm sure I will be putting all that knowledge to work in our garage!

The Spider Expert

Cody recently finished his unit in preschool on spiders, so they had their "culmination" where the parents get to come and the kids show them everything they have learned.  He always tells me how he is a spider expert and I think maybe he really is!  Here's what he taught mom and dad in our short 30 min lesson:

The parts of the spider; how many eyes they have; how many legs.  He even knew the pedipalps and spinerettes.

How the spider lays eggs and creates the egg sac, complete with eggs (nerds candy) and two different types of silk to protect it.

We even got to watch a video of it. . .

Then Cody demonstrated how the spider wraps its prey and gets ready to eat it.  He knew all about how it injects it with poison and turns it to mush so it can ingest it.  Heavy stuff for a 4-yr old!

At one of the other centers, Cody drew a spider and told us that they have blue blood.  He also drew an insect to show us the difference between the two.

Then he showed us the spider web in the top of the little playhouse that he had created with a couple friends during center time.  This is the perfect activity for him!

Thanks Cody for teaching us all about spiders!  We love our little spider expert!

A tool or a toy?

I hope this doesn't sound like bragging, but I love what my husband does, and he is SO good at it!  Obviously I hardly ever get to see him actually doing his job.  When we visit him at the fire station, we just get to see him hanging out, watching movies, eating dinner, blah, blah, blah.  But it sure was a treat for us to have Russ come to Cody's preschool this week.

He talked to them about how to get out of your house in a fire, when to call 911, etc.  My favorite part is when he talks about toys and tools.  He starts off showing a toy truck and a hammer (Colton was his little helper this time), and describes how toys are for kids and tools are for adults.  So then he pulls out a box of matches and asks if it is a tool or a toy and the same with a lighter.  And the kids usually get it.  They were so attentive and it is fun to see them responding to him. 

He also puts on his fire gear one piece at a time explaining what the pieces are for and making sure that all the kids know that he is still Cody's dad and not someone they should be afraid of.  He lets them come up and give him high fives and hugs and tap on his helmet and touch his airpack and most of them really love it.  There were a couple kids that already had a fear of fire drills and fire alarms and fire fighters and hopefully this really helped. 

Cody sure was proud of his daddy!

Hi Ho the Dairy-O

Last week we took a fun little field trip to a dairy farm and I think we all learned alot, including the mommies!  We all had to wear "boots" over our feet so that we didn't track any germs into where the cows were.  Before we started the tour we also got "Got Milk?" stickers and milk mustaches.  Ready to begin!

We drove in a big van around the dairy and got to see LOTS and LOTS of cows.  (I didn't really get pictures, because it would be out the window - and I think everyone knows what a cow looks like.)  We got to see the babies and the pregnant cows.  This dairy averages 25 calves a day!  And boy did those pregnant mommies look miserable.

We got to see how the feed the cows.  They grow all the food for the cows.  This here is corn all blended up.  They store it under the plastic and the tires keep the air out so it doesn't go bad.  What the cows end up eating is actually a precise blend of several different things.  We got to see the feed truck dumping the food for the cows, where they stay when they are not being milked, and yes, it was a little stinky.  But their stalls get cleaned 3 times a day, wouldn't that be nice!

We got out of the van to see where they actually milk the cows.  160 cows can be milked at one time and it takes just a few minutes.  They are milked milked three times a day and average about 12 gallons each.everything was very sanitary and very efficient.  It was kind of cool. 

 

Our tour guide was Ollie's Grandpa, one of the little boys in our preschool, and he did a great job!   Cody said his favorite part of the trip was his "Cow Tail" treat that they gave him.  It was a great field trip - we learned alot AND had fun.