ASL Day, Take two...

We thought you all would like to know that we had an ASL day without any (er, many...) tears finally!

We decided to back things up a lot. We didn't start signing until breakfast, and stopped signing after dinner. The only penalty for talking was that you had to sign what you said, then do your age in push-ups. Needless to say, Mom did NOT talk all day long. Because I literally can't do more than 10 girl push-ups...so.... But Sam can't do 7 real push-ups, either, he does some crazy kid version. Which is fine :) We also said that you only had to sign when you were inside the house, not if you were outside.

And, the kids did a better job. There were still some temper flares. There were still some tense moments. There were a few serious door slams, and one moment when Mom signed so emphatically, Dad came out of his "office" to see what was going on. And of course, a few times Sam went outside to yell something to Mom, who somehow managed to not hear him, so he stomped in and fingerspelled the whole sentence with an exasperated look on his face :)

We celebrated with generous bowls of ice cream.

And Sam, Martha and Jane are all signing more. It's been soooo good for them.

The older kids want to do a 2-day long challenge. I said the little kids have to review all the Signing Time movies to strengthen their vocab first, which will buy me a couple of weeks. I'd love to do a 2-day challenge myself, but 2-days of reminding people not to talk all day does sound a little exhausting...

Still...it's getting easier!