This past Monday morning marked our return to reality: Jay went back to work after a delightful week and half’s vacation, and the children I put away the wii, laser tag, and Christmas movies, taking out instead our books and school tasks.
It was a hard week. No one (the Mommy included) was too thrilled about resuming school work. There was weeping, there was whining, there was gnashing of teeth. Ok, maybe no real gnashing, but we got pretty close!
Despite all this, things were looking up somewhat by Friday, and overall, we ended up accomplishing more than I would have thought we could. And there was some brilliance in the midst of the hardship, for this week, I finally got smart, and put my $5 roll of Ikea paper to work for me!
Each day during schoolwork with the older children, I struggle with how to effectively spend time with Josiah and alternately, how to prevent him from bringing constant interruptions to the flow of learning that is going on. It is hard, and admittedly, it is my least favorite part of homeschooling. When I complain to Jay that I am missing out on serious quality time with my preschooler, he reminds me of mothers who work outside the home, and never see their preschoolers between the hours of 8 and 5. That usually puts a stop to my whining. Ahem.
Nevertheless…I have continued to look for creative ways to engage my four year old, and earlier this school year I brought home this beauty from Ikea to help….
At $14.99 this is worth every penny!! Josiah has used the chalkboard and whiteboard happily for several months. But on Monday, I brought out the drawing paper roll…and the real fun began! He put on his “smock”, we chose paints and brushes, and used these awesome little paint containers that my wonderful MIL bequeathed to us. (Thank you, Grammy Ruth…these are sheer brilliance!)
See the holes in the top? Just perfect for your paintbrush. After some trial and error, I thinned out the tempura paints with some water, and they were perfect for creating fine art!
When Josiah was done painting each day, I covered every paint container with that sticky saran wrap and we were able to keep the same set of paints out all week for him to use. He had a blast, and was so proud to show off his paintings!
I really like his use of color and mood in this one. Very modern.
This is a more traditional rendering:
Oh he is so yummy…
Wonderful! I had unrealistic expectations of using those back when I was teaching Toddler 2 Sunday School — don’t know what I was thinking!