Preston's Blog

Dallin's Birthday:  a blurry picture, but one that captures Preston's love for Dallin perfectly. Hanging out in Dallin's hammock. A game of checkers.  Checkers is currently one of Preston's favorite games.  He beats me by a landslide every time.  I'm pretty sure Dallin is the one person he cannot beat.  Prest is really into board games in general right now, and he and I (and sometimes Sariah, if she's up), usually play one first thing every morning. These are out of order for some reason, but these next pictures are from the Fourth of July: Preston thinks he needs a new snack for every part of the school day.  Here is his pick for story time: oatmeal, German pancake, and lots of oranges. Lost in thought after a watercolor painting session.  He was painting a portion of the fairy tale Snow White and Rose Red. Beeswax figures that Preston and I modeled and put on the window. Sariah is actually letting Pre

Preston is continuing to enjoy school.  One thing that is a huge part of first grade for us is the telling of fairy tales.  I believe that the archetypal symbols in fairy tales are important for young children, and that they really relate to them.  So each week during this language arts unit, I tell a new fairy tale that forms the basis for our learning for that week.  Story time is Preston's favorite part of school, and every day he asks if we are going to have a story and if it can be the *first* thing we do.  (Usually it's last--I like to use it as a bit of bait to get him through the other parts of school.)  We did have one fairy tale that proved to be a bit of a disaster.  I learned that Hansel and Gretel was too scary for him, which was proven when he ran from the table in the middle of it and refused to hear the rest.  Lesson learned!  I didn't try to force the issue, and before the next morning I'd looked through and chosen a different story, The Fishermen and H