Tickers and Trivia

I moved a couple of tickers over to my sidebar from my other blogs.

For the Walk to Rivendell challenge, a tip of the beanie to my daughter, who told me about it a few years back. I guess if I can make it to Rivendell, I can keep going to Minas Tirith or to Lonely Mountain, depending upon if I decide to be in Bilbo's company or in Frodo's.

I don't exactly WALK -- I ride on the exercise bike, which Clare tells me is within the rules. But I managed to start up a habit of riding again after a prolonged lapse during the holidays. I am trying to alternate 5 miles one day with 3 miles the next. Today is my easy day.

The other ticker is for our progress through the "academic year" of 180 days. Here in California we are required to keep attendance records, 180 days of a 4-5 hour day. So the ticker is a fun way to keep track of where we are and how far yet to go. There have been days when I would have let the homeschooling slide altogether if I hadn't remembered the ticker.

I have a weight maintenance ticker too but I would blush to put it on my sidebar right now.

Speaking of tickers, Aidan has recently been fascinated with a wind-up alarm clock. He carries it everywhere. I can hear it behind me somewhere right now though neither Aidan nor the clock is in sight right now, which gives me this Captain Hook sort of feeling.

I think it may be a good opportunity to work with clocks a bit because the Spell to WRite and Read curriculum has some activities to work with clock faces in order to prepare for directionality in writing. It also has some activities for children with gross motor delays who are otherwise ready to learn to spell and read. I really like this program and have been studying it this week trying to figure out how to get it off the ground for Kieron, Aidan and Patrick.

The other ticking thing that has been fascinating Aidan recently is his old oxygen saturation monitor. He discovered it under a dresser and had me reassemble it. It makes a high-pitched tick which changes tone as the oxygen levels and heartrate fluctuate. He keeps checking his sats and announcing the results with great enthusiasm.

The speech therapist is working on "functions" with him, so she showed him a train and asked him what it does. He said, "It takes you to Hanford and Bakersfield!" That's because we rode on the Amtrak with him to convey his older sister part of the way to Santa Paula for a visit to Thomas Aquinas College (and from thence, to the San Francisco Walk for Life. .... the last time Clare was in SF was related to Aidan's liver transplant and subsequent hospital stays, so going back to SF brought back all kinds of associations with that time in our lives).