It was Jj week in the Smith household. We packed it full of fun! One of my favorite moments was at church on Sunday when a gentleman asked Elias about his letter of the week, and when he found out we were on Jj, he told Elias that “J is for John” (his name). Elias has been talking about John all week since then.
Elias really has the Jj sound down. He knows that J says juh. However, he is still not really correlating letters with their sounds in new situations. For example, we were talking about our last name (Smith), and he said, “Smith starts with Jj”. Hmmmm…..oh well. He can identify all his letters really well. We’ll keep working on letter sounds.
Here is what we did this week for Jj:
Saturday: J is for Japanese Gardens
The weather was beautiful so we decided to get out and about. We visited the Portland Japanese gardens, and we invited Nana to come with us! Elias enjoyed the gardens, although, both my husband and I want to go back some day without kids so we can enjoy its tranquility a bit more.
Looking at the carp
Elias sat and looked at the waterfall for quite awhile. It was very beautiful with huge trees as the backdrop.
I just had to get a picture of Simon in the garden as well.
Elias leading the way in the natural garden
Sunday: J is for Jumps
Sunday was Fathers day so we had our annual tradition of swimming. One of Elias’ favorite things to do at the pool is jump in the water. He did jump after jump at the pool and had a blast!
Monday: J is for Jellyfish
We made a jellyfish craft. I had Elias paint coffee filters with water colors, then cut strands of ribbon for tentacles. Then we hung them from our ceiling. Elias loved making the jellyfish, and I think they turned out pretty cute. He points them out every day. We also checked out some books on Jellyfish at the library. We read them together to learn about jellyfish. I was surprised to learn that they have no brain. Elias liked learning about different types.
Tuesday: J is for Juggling
Juggling is my husband’s forte so I let him take over for this one. Watching Elias try to juggle was one of the cutest things I’ve seen in a long time.
Wednesday: J is for Jewelry
I purchased some Froot Loops and we strung them onto pipe cleaners to make bracelets. Elias is still working on his fine motor skills so he needed a lot of help. Eventually we worked out a system where I held the pipe cleaner, and he used both hands to string the froot loops on. I’ve also seen it done where you stick the pipe cleaner vertically into some play doh to keep it stationary, but the pipe cleaner bent to easily for us in this instance. Elias enjoyed pretending he was fishing from the bowl of Froot Loops. Uncle Scott would be proud!
Thursday: J is for Jack and the Beanstalk
I had never read this story to Elias so we checked it out from the library and read it together. Elias really seemed to enjoy it so we’ll read it again and again!
Friday: J is for Jesus
Friday is usually our Bible day so what could we do but J is for Jesus? I read Elias the story of Jesus feeding the 5000. He did not want me to stop at the end of that story, though, so I ended up reading all the way to Jesus washing the disciples feet before he wanted to move on to something else. I had a little craft planned to go along with the story, but Elias was very uncooperative. We’ll have to try again tomorrow. He was supposed to lace together a basket that would hold five loaves of bread and two fish. Here is a picture of our craft:
