New Rituals...

I have been trying to scramble and get organized, as I keep mentioning, and well, with my son's new routine of twice-a-week preschool, I have gotten much motivation to get moving on some of the things I have wanted to do for a while now. For example, I have developed a little routine with the kids for learning. This week, we have been working on learning a song of the Russian alphabet...they are loving it so far, and even though it is not really easy, they are starting to catch on so well! It is a new melody for them, whereas the Serbian alphabet song goes to the same tune as the English ABC song.

Aside from learning the Russian alphabet song, we are working on some seasonal songs...I have only chosen one for now because I do not want to overload them. I chose a song that's new to me (I haven't learned any 'seasonal' Russian songs before other than Christmas ones)...and I YouTubed it to find a clip of the song. We listen to it 3 times each morning and sing along to the best of our ability. It is a lot of fun for me because I really love to sing, and the kids are so enthusiastic! The song we are currently learning is about leaves falling from the trees, and it's so fun for me because it has opened the door for many teachable moments that I never even thought about. We have talked about the leaves changing color and falling from the trees...about fall meaning a change in the temperature outside....the birds flying south...many topics that are really not something I intended on teaching them about. Now, when I say "teach" I am not talking about us having a sit-down session at the table. I still really am a firm believer in kids learning through play at a young age like my kids are, and so I don't want to make too much of a structured "school" session at this point. But I do love making a point to sit on the couch with them and just talk, listen and sing along to our songs each morning.

Other days, when we can, aside from these little lessons, we try to squeeze in a morning walk. It is hard to time the walk properly in between the baby's morning nap and lunch time, but today we managed. I want to be outside as much as possible these days before it gets really cold.