The Many Adventures of Naters

Quote of the week

2011-12-10T15:41:00.001-07:00

Last night we ran into one of Nate's park friends at DQ. Nate was talking to the mom and told her he was going to French school.

She asked him: Parles tu le français?

He replied with a nice big "Yup!"

My afternoon in Kindergarten

2011-12-07T16:12:00.003-07:00

Yesterday I got to volunteer in Nate's Kindergarten class. I was a few minutes late, and when I got there, Nate was just leaving the class to take the attendance to the office. He was the special helper for the day. The kids all sat on le tapis (the carpet) and sang songs while the teacher played guitar and sang with them. And Nate got to sit up on a bench, since he was the special helper. Later, they went to music class, where they practiced for their upcoming musical, The Littlest Reindeer. After practising all their songs, they go to do some dancing. Nate had tons of fun, even if he didn't always remember what moves they were doing.

After music class, they washed up and had their snacks, and then had free play for awhile. They have all kinds of activity centres, from kitchen to computers. Nate coloured for a bit and helped me with a project I was given by the teacher. I was making covers for the kids's art portfolios. Each one had the student's name and picture, so Nate found everyone's picture for me.

It was a great day in Kindergarten, and Nate was pretty good, so I'll be back again in the new year.

Fun with Food

2011-12-07T15:58:00.004-07:00

For the last few weeks, Nate's class has been learning about food. They started with vegetables. One day they made pictures of faces using vegetables. Another day, they had to bring in their favourite vegetable chopped into bite size pieces. Nate brought carrots. When they got to class, they used everyone's veggies to make a vegetable soup. Nate had 2 helpings!

Next they talked about fruit. They brought in their favourite fruit (Nate brought apples) and made a giant fruit salad! Two days later, they brought in more fruit (mini oranges) and made fruit skewers.

Last week, the teacher brought in a bunch of ingredients and asked the class what they thought these ingredients would become. Lots of guesses later, they found out they were making bread! Buns to be exact. She also had some ingredients for the kids to shake together and make butter. When asked what they thought they were making, one kid guessed bologna! Nate was pretty close, guessing cheese.

Today they had a super special treat. Byblos Bakery, known for their pitas, came to the school and the made pita sandwiches. The kids were encouraged to try some new ingredients, so Nate added black "onions" (olives) and mushrooms to his ham and cheese. He says he really liked it.

And the people from Byblos brought bags of pitas for all the kids to take home! So generous :)

Quick quotes 2

2011-11-10T10:17:00.001-07:00

Today Nate was playing a computer game that taught him about money. Coins specifically. He told me the names of some of the coins. Nickel, loonie and toot!

Quick quote

2011-11-06T21:40:00.001-07:00

Today Scott handed Nate a navy and white striped shirt to wear.
Nate: A jail shirt! Why are you giving me a jail shirt?!

Halloween

2011-11-04T11:36:00.002-06:00

I think it's safe to say Nate had a great Halloween this year. He dressed up as the Alien from the Toy Story movies. It was his second year wearing the costume, but hey, if the costume fits....

On Friday our community had a Halloween event at the Towne Hall. We met up with Nate's friend, Evan and they had lots of fun decorating cookies, doing crafts, getting their palms read and just running around.

Monday, of course, was the big day. Nate got to show off his costume all over the place. First at the dayhome, where one of the girls brought caramel apples for everyone. Then at school, where they had a Halloween assembly, and a class celebration. And finally, the ultimate event....trick-or-treating!

We went out with Evan and his mom, and ran into quite a few other friends along the way. It was great to see them have so much fun getting candy and various other things. He got a couple of playdohs as usual, and one house was even giving out Hot Wheels! Nate kept saying he wanted to go home, but then he was right beside Evan at the next house, waiting for more candy. We finally called it a night after 2 hours, when Nate said he was tired and his feet were sore. Mine were too.

All in all, we got 2 full grocery bags full of munchies, so we're set for a few weeks at least!

Fall

2011-11-01T10:32:00.001-06:00

Nate has been learning lots at school about nature and how the leaves change colour in the fall. He drew this picture to show different coloured leaves.

Hands

2011-10-30T17:45:00.001-06:00

Here is some of Nate's art. The blue hand is from his first day of school. The teacher read them a story called The Kissing Hand and then they got to make one. In the centre of the hand is a heart.
The turkey is something I'm sure most people are familiar with. He made this one at the dayhome. The feathers are made by cutting out handprints.

A memorable day

2011-10-28T20:49:00.002-06:00

Every day, when Nate and I are walking home from the school bus, I ask him "What did you do in school today?"

Today his response was "I dunno....Friday stuff!"

Naters goes to school

2011-10-14T19:10:00.005-06:00

After two years of begging (and two weeks of changing his mind), Nate finally started school in September. He's in a french immersion school, and loving it! The very first thing he got to do in school was pick his coat hook.

Every week he sings me a new song in french. Sometimes it's a classic like Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes, and other times it's a "Hello" song, or "snack song". I'll try to record him sometime soon and post it.

One of the boys from Nate's soccer team is also in the same class, and they ride the school bus together, so of course they are now best friends. It took Nate a few weeks to bother learning the other kids names, but they are all good friends now. One day when I picked him up after school, he got upset and started to cry. All the other kids came over wanted to know if he was ok and what was wrong. So sweet!

I don't usually pick Nate up from school, but that day was a special day....we got to bring Mirabelle home with us! Who's Mirabelle? Why the class guinea pig, of course! I'm not sure who was more excited about Mirabelle spending the weekend with us, me, Nate or Caper (our new dog for those of you who rely on this very poorly updated blog to get your info about us).

This week the class had their first field trip, to Fish Creek Park. They learned about nature, and how the leaves change colour in autumn. And they got to do some leaf rubbings and other fun things. Even though Kindergarten is just half days, this was an ALL DAY field trip. Not only did Nate get to be in the same group as his buddy, but they also got a ride to and from school together for extra fun!

The Modern Stork

2010-09-04T08:41:00.002-06:00

Driving home the other day, Nate suddenly says "I want a baby, like Mateo and Andreas have a baby." He had been playing with Mateo and Andreas earlier that day, and they have a baby brother.

Us: Why do you want a baby?

Nate: So I can look at it.

Us: Well, if you want to look at a baby, we can go visit Kate. She's a baby, and you can look at her.

Nate: But if I have Kate, than her Mommy doesn't have her anymore, and she'll be sad. I need my own baby.

Us: And where do you think you get a baby from?

Nate: The Baby Store

Us: And how would you pay for a baby at the baby store? You don't have any money.

Nate: I know! You could get some from Daddy's pocket!

Us: I don't think that's going to be enough. And even if it was, you can't just get a baby right away. You'd have to order one and wait a long time. And by the time it was ready, you wouldn't want one anymore.

Nate: But I do. I want to order one. I REALLY want to order one right now!

Luckily, he seems to have forgotten already.

And before any of you get any ideas, no, there is no baby on the way, and no plans to change that.

Sharing the love

2010-09-04T08:28:00.003-06:00

This morning Nate looked at Scott and said "Daddy, I love you."

Then he turned to me and said "and Mommy....I like when you play catch with me."

Humongous.......Big Tree (while combing hair)

2010-08-15T17:06:00.002-06:00

Some cows

2010-08-15T16:56:00.002-06:00

Big Cow:

No audio, but another big cow:

From our trip to the zoo...

2010-08-15T16:31:00.002-06:00

Big Elephant:

Little Rock Elephant Ten (cuz there were 9 of them, but he thought there were 10):

Big Lion:

another WHALE!

2010-08-15T16:25:00.002-06:00

Humongous Whale (don't ask)

2010-08-15T16:18:00.002-06:00

2010-08-15T15:54:00.004-06:00

One of Nate's latest "favourite things to do" is have me take videos of him on my phone. Not just random videos, but videos of him standing in front of something like a statue, and he yells out what it is. We've done a few of these lately. I'll post what I have and try to remember to update as we get more.

Sea Creature:

Whale:

Our little monkey, and other interesting noises

2008-03-15T13:55:00.003-06:00

Nate has been practising his animal noises. He used to have to see a picture of the animal, but now you can just ask him, "What does a cat say?" and he will mew. He woofs, roars, growls, quacks, ribbits, bleats, neighs and moos. He also makes noises for elephants and pigs, and he mimics a monkey shreaking "EE EE" while touching his pointer fingers to his chest (trying to copy our hand-scratching-armpits motion).

His Thank You is starting to develop, and he says Hi and Bye. Peaking suddenly around a corner, he will say "Buh" for boo.

Our next project is learning body parts. Nicole has helped him learn where his nose is. Now we need to teach him the rest of his body.

Grandma was out for a visit a few weeks ago, and Nate had lots of fun showing her his books. Unfortunately, her visit happened to occur at the same time as a few firsts for us with Nate being sick. He developed his first fever, which resulted in a trip to the walk-in clinic. Antibiotics were prescribed do help with what was thought to be an infection. A few days later, we spend my mom's last night here at the Urgent Care Centre after discovering a rash all over Nate's trunk, front and back. Turns out Roseola was the cause of his whole week's worth of ailments. He's fully recovered, and back to his normal silly self.

In addition to being a great musician, Nate is also proving to be a wonderful artist (no bias here!). A proper artist needs his own space, so we went out and got Nate his own little table and chair. He quite enjoys using his new furniture, whether it's to create his latest masterpiece or to have an afternoon snack.

Nate seems to have learned that when someone is struggling to get a lid of off a jar, or similar situation, they make a bit of a grrrr noise. Whenever he sees someone in one of these situations, he will grrr on their behalf. The other day, he had his dayhome provider in hysterics while he grrred for her as she struggled with some uncooperative bananas!

Soccer Monster

2008-01-09T21:33:00.001-07:00

So, I've mentioned that Nate likes the Backyardigans, and he loves to sing and dance with them. Last night he was watching an episode about soccer, and right after Pablo (the penguin) says a rather emphatic "SOCCER", Nate said "GAKKAH" matching Pablo's tone and inflection. If I remember correctly, I believe both hands were clenched and in the air too. And before you worry that we dump Nate in front of the tv and leave him there, rest assured, we are watching with him....as soon as he knows we have a show on for him, he is crawling up on our laps to share it with us.

A few more updates on the last posting....

In addition to saying "Aaaah" after having a drink, Nate also says "mmmm" after having a bite of food, especially veggies. Peas appear to be his favourite right now (a trend among all of the kids at his dayhome)

Nate continues to give us (and toys and other objects) kisses, and the other day at the dayhome, he ran over to Reese, the dog, and sat down with her on her giant pillowy bed. Reese started to lick Nate, and Nate leaned over and kissed her on the top of her head. It was very cute.

Nate has learned how to completely dump a bin of toys all at once in order to climb into the bin...much faster than taking them out one by one like he used to do. But now, once the toys are out and he is in, he wants the toys put back in the bin with him so he has something to play with!

I can't remember if I said before, but Nate says "thank you" now. It sounds like "ta du".

Nate isn't just a singer/dancer...he's an all around performer. He knows how to make us laugh, and often does silly things on purpose just for the sake of being silly and getting a laugh. Most recently, he has started to peer around corners at us. I don't mean he walks out from behind a wall or corner and face us....he really does stay behind the wall or corner, lean forward with one knee bent, and poke his head out.

He has also seen me typing on the laptop a bit too much lately, sometimes while he is on my lap, and now he wants to type too.

Happy Holidays

2007-12-28T20:45:00.001-07:00

As you may have noticed (if anyone is even noticing), I haven't posted anything since I created this blog. Therefore, I have many Nate-isms to share with you. In no particular order and point form, here are some of the things that Nate is up to lately:

Nate can use a fork now (much better than his spoon)

Nate likes to wear a bucket on his head

He also likes to wear mittens...not necessarily when he is outside. He gets a pair of mittens on and starts clapping! And last night he even wore my gloves, and thought it was hilarious.

We bought Nate a bucket of Bristol Blocks, and his favourite thing about it is to empty out the giant plastic container and sit in it. He also likes to use the lid as a seat, or put his face to it as if it were a window and make faces.

Nate is a fantastic present opener....he can find the seam in any wrap job and had so much fun opening presents that he crawled under the tree to get more if we were too slow!

He loves the Backyardigans, and will sing and dance with the opening song.

Nate now says Thank You, and calls the cats "Ees", after Reese, the dog at the dayhome.

He waves at pictures of people.

He has his 5th ear infection, but this time really likes his medicine, sometimes asking for more.

Nate has a sip of his water and then says "Aaahhhh" as if it were the most refreshing sip of water he has ever had.

He gives awesome hugs, patting us on the back, and has started giving kisses (sometimes licks)

That's all for now.