Sibling Class

William took his sibling class tonight at the hospital. He was so excited to learn how to become a big brother. He kept asking to go to class all day. He did an amazing job in the class, and we were really impressed with his actual interest in the class. He first learned how to hold a baby, and the rules involved with that. When we first walked in the room and saw all the baby dolls he did ask "Momma, are those real babies?"

He then learned how to change a diaper. He thought that was really fun, but later told Colby that he would not be helping with that because it is "ICK". :) The kids then watched a little movie about being a big brother or sister and learned about the umbilical cord, feeding (the breast feeding part of the video led to some interesting comments from our son LOL!), sleeping, and what they should do if they are feeling sad or angry. After they finished their snack we went on a tour of labor and delivery. He seemed a little anxious when looking at some of the medical equipment, and did ask a few times if Mommy had to stay tonight.

We are amazed at how excited he is getting about the arrival of his brother. This morning he sat next down to Sara, leaned over to her belly, kissed it, and said "Hey Thomas! How's it going in there? I love you." He is so sweet and is going to do great!

With love,
The Tates

Building for His Cousin

Tonight Will decided to pull out his legos and build some new things while I was cooking dinner.  His cousin Lauren came over for a sleep-over last week and they ended up building a fire truck, police car, and fire station together.  As I was watching him build the police car he says to me "Mom.  I'm gonna make Lauren impressed."  His little memory is fascinating to me. We really haven't talked too much about Lauren's visit in awhile, and I was just so impressed with what he remembered the most.   

Working on the police car

As he continued working on it he says "I'm making it more better. She can't believe her eyes when she comes back."

Most "awesomeness" police car

The new and improved fire station

New and highly modified fire truck

I had such a fun time watching him recreate what he and Lauren made last week.  He can't wait for his cousin to come back over so he can show her his new and improved creations!

Good night all,
Sara

A Morning at the Zoo

Colby had Monday the 2nd off, and we decided to spend the morning together at the Houston Zoo.  Sara's former colleagues gave us a family membership as a going away present when we moved.  Such an awesome gift!  The Houston Zoo is beautiful, and has some really interesting exhibits that they don't have in San Antonio.  Those of you that know us, know how much we love the San Antonio Zoo.  We had a wonderful morning exploring the majority of the zoo.

Checking out the meerkats

Pretty Asian Elephant

Cheetah

The Houston Zoo has a wonderful giraffe exhibit

The boys checking them out.

Will and his favorite animal. 

The zoo has a fantastic carousel, and Will was able to ride it today for the first time.  He had so much fun. 

Getting ready to go

Mommy watching :)

Will and Daddy

After his fun ride!

After his ride on the carousel we headed to the Children's Zoo.  They have a great petting zoo.  Will loves to go and brush the goats.  The funniest thing about the petting zoo is that the animals are literally asleep as all these kids run around brushing them.  We are convinced that they may be narcoleptic. 

The goat was SOUND asleep!

Pretty Brown Goat

So Gentle :)

  We were also able to watch a keeper feed the fruit bats in the Children's Zoo cave area, which was really interesting.  William did verify with the keeper that the bats were fruit bats and not vampire bats because "I do NOT like vampire bats". LOL!

Checking out the cave drawings after the feeding time for the bats.

Funny looking meerkat.

2 Funny Looking Meerkats.

Another awesome cave to explore

After our cave exploration Will played on the playground for a bit before we checked out some more exhibits.  We really enjoyed the African Forest area where we could see several chimpanzees.  Very neat!

Rhinos

Watching the chimps

Cool Masks

Such silly boys

Beautiful fish

Neat Jellyfish

After the African Forest Will and Colby checked out the aquarium as we headed for the car. 






























We plan on checking out more of the sites around Houston after this weekend since we will not be traveling until after Thomas is born.  We can't wait to see some of Houston's spectacular museums and attractions.

We are heading to the farm this weekend to visit with Colby's family for his Mom's annual Epiphany party, and to celebrate Christmas with Memaw and Pawpaw.  Wishing everyone a great rest of the week!

Take care,
The Tates

Our Montessori Lessons

I have had a few friends ask what lessons I work on with Will at home and I thought it would be nice if I just explained his winter lessons.

We just love the Montessori method and how kids so naturally gravitate towards it that we have been implementing more of it at home since we moved to Houston.  William currently goes to a preschool that uses many of the Montessori methods, but isn't as traditional as the one he attended in San Antonio.  Every afternoon we spend about an hour on his at-home lessons.  Some days are great days and others he complains about "not wanting a teacher at home" LOL!  Too bad for him that his momma is a teacher.  Just wait until he starts chemistry! :)  Part of the Montessori method is that students can reach their work on their own without adult help.  All of these lessons are on a bookcase on the lower shelves.  Each lesson is compartmentalized in either a tray or some type of box that he can easily manipulate.  He has to treat his work with respect and he can work with it either on his table or on his rug.  It takes me about 3 hours a month to prepare the work.  That includes internet search time, printing, cutting, and laminating.  Now that I am building a collection it won't take as much time as we do this every month. 

This winter William wanted to learn more about snow and the season in general.  I try to change out his themed work every month or so, and we always have a moveable alphabet , number beads , and books as part of his lessons.  We have to help him with both of those still, but he is really starting to be able to put words together with the letters using the moveable alphabet.  We have really noticed that he is able to actually read words now.  The other day Sara was making a grocery list and had written kitty litter down.  He picked up the paper and said "Momma. Who is Katy?"  Pretty good for really just starting on this a few weeks before Christmas! 

We are going slower on the number beads than what the link above shows. Sara wanted to make sure that he easily understands the concepts of 0-10 before moving on to bead work with the teens and tens (20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, etc).  He has a great concept of 0-10 and we are working on teens and tens.  Then we will move on to basic addition and subtraction. While he and Sara were working on lessons today he just started counting on his own and was able to make it to 30 without any help or mistakes.  Woo hoo!!!

So here are some examples of what we are working on this winter.  Sara will probably add some Valentine's themed activities in February, and she has some more activities planned for later in January when his current work gets "too boring".   For now here is what we are working on...

Animals in Winter-Learning about hibernation, migration, and adaptation. He also sorts the animals by which category they belong in.

Sorting the Animals in Winter

Sound recognition with the letter S.

Choosing which objects start with "s"

Sorting colors and learning the colors in Spanish

Working on color sorting

Counting cards where he must identify the number of snowflakes.  He then adds a snowflake on the correct number.

Counting the snowflakes in action

Using probability to build a snowman

 These are just a few of the things we have planned this month.  Some of the pictures have links to the websites we downloaded the material from.  There are a ton of free websites out there. 

We really enjoy doing this at home because it keeps Will entertained and not wanting to watch tv or play video games :)

Enjoy,
The Tates

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day 2011

Christmas Eve and Day were so much fun!  We really appreciate being able to spend time with our family at Christmas.  On Christmas Eve William and Tetaw both opened some very awesome books from the Herfurth family.  Tetaw's book was the girls reciting A Charlie Brown Christmas.  Too cute!

For the past 3 years we have hosted an Elf Dinner at our house on Christmas Eve.  It's a fun night of food, drink, games, and laughter with a red and green theme.  Here are some pictures from this year's dinner.  Thank you so much to Aunt Jolie, Uncle Mike, Nonno, and Nina for joining in on the fun!  Memaw and Pawpaw had intended on coming to San Antonio on Christmas Eve, but unfortunately Memaw was very sick with the flu.  :( We were sad that they weren't able to be with us on Christmas, but are so happy that Memaw is back to feeling better.  We are looking forward to seeing them in a few weeks.

In our jammies for Elf Dinner

Some of our awesome elves!

Jingle the Elf (our very first Elf)

Honey and Huggy (some new additions)

Let the fun begin!

Aunt Jolie and Daddy working on Will's Clownfish Blimp!!!

William and Nonno Elf

Daddy reading "Twas the Night Before Christmas"

Leaving reindeer food and searching for Santa

Santa must have loved his cookies and milk. He left a note!

We had a wonderful Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day was just as lovely.  William woke up later than normal, but we have decided that since Will isn't such a morning person next year we may try opening his presents a little later in the day so he can truly enjoy it.  He did enjoy getting Santa's gifts and opening his stocking :)

What else is in that stocking?!

Mommy and Will being silly on Christmas morning :)

William, Nana, and Tetaw :)

Little Christmas Angel ;)

Tate Family 2011

Nana, Sara, and Tetaw

And Christmas just wouldn't be Christmas without Margo joining us for dinner!  We played Will's new penguin game before dinner.  Nana made a fantastic meal and we stuffed ourselves, but it was SO good!  After dinner we enjoyed Sara's homemade chocolate cream pie with santa hat's. 

Playing the penguin game

Yummy Dessert :)

We had a wonderful Christmas trip to San Antonio this year.  It was so nice to be back in our favorite city surrounded by those we love.  We wish we could have seen all of our friends while visiting, but that just means we have to make another trip ;)

Love,
The Tates