Saturday, September 29, 2012

Fall has arrived~!

 Crisp morning of 46 and the sun is shining so brightly. The Green Ash Tree is bright yellow this year.. The leaves on the trees have never been so colorful as they are this year.  I just love fall with the air so clean, no humidity and ending the day with it being so warm.  It could stay this way until next March.. I know I'm living in the wrong state.   But I do like all the seasons that we get to have here in Iowa.. I really do like the snow which I hear this winter according to the Farmers Almanac we won't be seeing much snow.. It worries me a bit as the Mississippi River is shrinking and the creek behind our property is not flowing anymore.. This creek always has water in it regardless how dry it has been. We are in a severe drought here in our area and I was hoping for lots of snow to replace what we lost this summer.. Now I hope our well holds up and it doesn't dry up.. That won't be nice..
Took this picture of Mr. Squirrel hanging upside down on the bird feeder. He found the bowl of grape jelly the Orioles had and they left and the hummingbirds left and now I guess he thinks it's his turn.. Sorry the picture is not closer, took it with my phone..  I only have 1 squirrel and he gets fed well. Today I'm going out to the corn field and gather corn and put it in a big plastic tub and store in my garage.. That way I'll have it for this winter and Mr. Squirrel won't go hungry.
Ben decided to climb trees again and he is getting to be quite a climber.  He needs a tree house like his Mom had when she was his age.. She pretty much lived in the trees to read books, do her homework, play with her dolls..
Yesterday Ben came home from school and said he got in trouble.. He called his teacher stupid and told some girl she was a fart.. Boys and their language..He doesn't like to do the lower case alphabet and refused to do his work at school.. So his teacher wrote in big letters..HOMEWORK on the top of the page.. So he called her stupid.. When I brought him here I tried working with him and he just broke down and cried. I had made oatmeal raisin cookies and told him we needed a cookie and milk break.. and gave me some time to talk with him and get.the primary paper that I had bought that has the dotted lines to divide the upper case and the lower case letters.  I gave him a sheet and I took one.. I had him watch how I was making the letters, and told him to  make the same letter on his page. We went one letter at a time.. It worked and we got his HOMEWORK all done..  I think he was just having a hard time knowing how to make those letters and putting them in order.. Later I got out some computer paper and showed him how to put tempera paint in the middle of the folded paper and then smash it together.. I was showing him what symmetrical was and he was so excited to see what the design would be when the paper was unfolded.. I told him we would let it dry and the next time he comes we can take scissors and markers and make something out of what we might see  in the design..  He said the one looked like a 3 eyed monster.. I have colored paper and we can glue our designs onto the paper after we cut them out and use markers to draw on them.. Should be fun on Monday after school.. I pick him up at daycare pretty much everyday after he is dropped off after school and bring him to my house so I can play with him until one of his parents comes pick him up at 5 or 5:30.  We always have a good time when he is here and I like it because I get to see him once a day.. Wish my other grandchildren lived close to me so we could have more time to be together..I'm sure their parents would like that too..  Have a great Saturday ~ ta ta for now from Iowa:)

5 comments:

Lisa @ Two Bears Farm said...

Hope you get some rain!

Pierce loves to climb things right now too. This resulted in him accidentally falling through a window screen and dropping about 8 feet last weekend. Scared us all to death, but thankfully he was okay.

I hope next week is easier for Ben.

JSpeas said...

Awwwww. Such a great picture of Bennie. Glad youwere able to get his homework done with him. That was a good idea to do it together. Fall has started here also. The trees are beautiful.

John Going Gently said...

ben is a photogrnic little sausage

Kerri Farley said...

Beautiful colors!!!

Barb said...

I came to visit you from Kerri. I have a Grandson named Ben, too. As a former teacher, the drilling for the letters is tedious business, especially after a "hard" day at school. You did just the right thing with the cookie break and the fun activity. Try having him label some of his drawings or you write a little story that he dictates about a drawing and use the lined paper so he can see how you make the letters. Maybe ask him to copy two or three of the words from your model. I hope Ben eventually likes school and his teacher!