What is in a May?

This is turning to be an interesting month. We are accomplishing a lot. We are moving at a slower rate and it feels almost as if nothing is being accomplished.

We have been reading about Poppy, a chapter a night. We did skip
almost a week because I ran a half marathon and had a difficult time recovering.  Hopefully we will finish by the end of next week. What is quite intriguing is how often since we began reading the book we have encountered opportunities to discuss the protagonists and the tension that exists between the main two. We even talked about it tonight when we watched Barbie in the Nutcracker, even though the roles are reversed here-the mouse is the bad guy and the owl is the good one.

We have been reading a lot of scholastic, beginning reader, Lego books at Sunlight boy's request. He picked up some Lego magazines at the library as well; sadly, these magazines are void of content-just pictures and concealed advertising.

We have been reading a lot of princesses books as well, some scholastic, some big-size fairy tales, at ballet girl's request. Ballet girl has been picking up some interesting books during our visits to the library.

We have been reading some adventurous stories such as the Wizard of Oz. This particular edition I first encountered two summers ago. Ballet girl and I read it together then but it is an entirely new experience with Sunlight boy in the mix. He likes the dark characters, he becomes very emotional and charged with expectations and excitement and judgments. I also find it interesting that the Wizard of Oz is not among the featured read-alouds on the many book lists that I have examined. I find this strange because the story is wonderful.

Ballet girl is really speed racing ahead in her reading. She reads fluently Bulgarian. What used to take us 15-20 minutes now is reduced to 5 minutes at most. We will up the time dedicated to Bulgarian next year, but for the time being her fluency is excellent. For English, after we finished the Piggie books, I wobbled until I found the next best sequence of beginner books-the P.D. Eastman beginning reader books and some other Dr.Seuss by grade level  books. According to this list Ballet girl reads around beginner second grade level.

Sunlight boy is becoming more and more enchanted by the piano. He demands his own piano time. He is allowed to explore the piano, press any keys as he pleases to get a good feeling for what sounds come from where. He learned his first song-Hot Cross Buns. He is very proud of himself. Ballet girl is cruising along nicely as well. She just finished The Happy Farmer. She is a very good performer. I am very proud of her.

Portuguese is moving along as well. Most recently I started our reading evenings with the Portuguese book

because by the time we were done with our regular reading we were all brain dead and nobody cared to think in Portuguese. I still integrate songs heavily, music, dance, and stories. I am going to actually sit down and design a curriculum with things I would like to definitely cover, and anything extra will be just welcomed, but we need a baseline as the bare minimum so this is what I will be designing. I will also set the rules on when and where we only speak Portuguese. This is very hard and I have struggled because my priorities are Bulgarian and Mathematics.

We have been reading a lot about rabbits around Easter. This is a wonderful book about friendships, respect and compromise. My children love this book and it has been a springtime read-aloud three years running.
Accompanying this book we read It's not Easy Being a Bunny and Honey Bunny Funnybunny.

We have two big events coming up-Dia Da Lingua Portuguesa No Exterior and 24-Маи, Ден На Българската Просвета и Култура! We will be very busy.

We are also going to go and see the play Charlotte's Web. I am excited because I am planning on reading this book in the next few months.