Birthday parties galore

There has been a birthday party for one of Sasha's friends pretty much every weekend. We haven't gone to all of them for one reason or another (study circles, being sick, etc.) But here are some pics from the last two she went to.

I also included pictures from two new games Sasha has learned: The card game, "Go Fish" and the board game "Guess Who". She plays them really well!

Here she is at the birthday party today trying to help this little boy fix his mask... (or maybe breaking it!):



Being incredibly gentle with this little baby... she was that little baby not too long ago... I can't believe how quickly she's growing:



Thoroughly enjoying her homemade birthday cupcake (what a great idea!)



Playing Go Fish:



Drawing with her stamps. I love these close-up shots of her focusing:





At another birthday party where they painted little ceramic figures:




Spaced out, waiting for the paint:




Caring for her baby (she's anxious to have a little baby brother or sister - We'll be continuing the adoption process once we move to Houston. We would have had to pay extra money for a home study here in Boston, and another one in Houston. So we're waiting to do it all at once after we move. But we talk about it often, and she knows pretty much how the whole thing works!).





Playing Guess Who:

Every time we ride in the car, Sasha wants to play the Guessing Game! This is actually a really cool game. It's great for developing vocabulary and thinking about things in a new way. We play for hours! I posted a video on youtube.

At school doing one of the "practical life" activities - spreading jelly:



We watched Sasha's friend, Milo, while his parents were at a meeting. He's such a sweet little boy! He really got into mazes (Sasha loves them as well).




They did some cooking:




Eating cinnamon toast:



and drawing:



When Sasha reads, she likes showing everyone the pictures, like her teachers do at school. This has been one of her favorite books for a long time. It's called "Feast for Ten" by Cathryn Falwell. It's a great book! Beautiful illustrations and good for learning and practicing counting.



Wearing the new, beautiful dress that Mima sent her, and which she put on as soon as she took it out of the package! She was so happy!





Looking cute in her chef's outfit:





Hanging out at the laundromat:





She loves getting caressed on her back!

Abdu'l-Baha, in talking about the importance of educating children, says that training a child in morals and good conduct is far more important than book learning. He also says, "If, however, the child be trained to be both learned and good, the result is light upon light.”

The following ideas were taken from the Core Curriculum website:
Spiritual Qualities Chart - This is a way for Sasha to be aware of important virtues and of how she is developing them.
This week we started with Reverence. We talk about what it means to be reverent, how to hold the prayer book reverently (during prayers the other night at Feast, she put the prayer book on top of her head!), we talk about how we sit, and how we don't sit, and about what we do while others are praying. And after each evening prayer session we'll place a sticker on her chart. This won't be used as a punishment if she doesn't show reverence. It's only a reminder and encourager.



She and I decorated the picture frame shown above. She chose the picture to remember her Bumpa...


We've started talking about the kingdoms of God. We made charts, similar to what we did when learning the seasons, but with the names of the kingdoms instead. Under each name she sticks pictures of objects belonging to that kingdom. We've just started with the mineral.

Here she is helping me put the charts together and cutting out the labels:



We've also started to talk to her about other religions. It's a pretty abstract concept for her at the moment, although when I was telling her about baha'i children's classes, she asked me what they were. I mentioned that she would be learning about God and about being loving, and that there would be baha'i children there. She then said "I'm a baha'i!" So, whatever that means to her, it's something familiar. We don't want any religion to sound foreign to her, and we want her to "consort with the followers of all religions in a spirit of love and fellowship".

We've put up various religious symbols that she can start becoming familiar with, along with the places of worship for each of them. If you ever see our house, you'll see that the walls are all covered with various things: her drawings, labels for her to read, the days of the week, virtues, charts, calendars, reminders for James not to forget his keys, etc.!



In other news, we cut Sasha's hair last week!!! Except for once, we had never cut it. So it was getting very long and a bit damaged. She looks so cute with it short and it's so much more manageable! But we'll probably let it grow out again.




Decorating her play dough mat. She put in the children's faces: