Wow it's been a long time!!

Hey everyone! Sorry it's been so very long since I've blogged. I haven't been entirely tied up with having a newborn and 2 young kids, but I have been tied up in trying to maintain the household and getting through the holidays!
We've been homeschooling, but not at the same speed and with the same gusto as before. It just hasn't been practical for us, but we'll be doing more soon.
What I love is that DD has been learning to read more and more. We haven't done many reading lessons, but she has been reading to me a LOT from readers that we have. I got out some Hooked on Phonics readers we'd gotten free from another homeschooling family a while back and she can already read several of the "real" books (the ones that don't just have 3 words a page). At first, she resisted and told me that the words were too little and that she "couldn't" read this kind of book by herself. Now she reads them alone with VERY little assistance!
We've taken the approach of reading where I read what she tells me to (usually a page or a sentence) and she reads an equal or greater amount. We keep taking turns until the book is through. It's going VERY well!

I did an assessment with my DS today. He will be turning 3 in about 3 weeks and I wanted to see where he was at. He did very well!
Letter Name Sound
-----------------------------
A Yes No
B Yes Yes
C No Yes
D No No
E Yes Yes
F Yes Yes
G No Yes
H Yes Yes
I No No
J No No (Though he did tell me that it "says JUMP")
K No Yes
L Yes Yes
M No Yes
N No Yes
O Yes Yes
P No Yes
Q Yes No (he said it says "k" and then said "like duck" - so close!)
R Yes Yes
S No Yes
T Yes Yes
U No Yes
V No No (he said it says "buh")
W No Yes
X Yes Yes (and said, "like FOX!")
Y No Yes
Z Yes No (said it says "sssss")

I guess the Leap Frog Letter Factory DVD is paying off! :) I'm so proud of my little 2 year old son and his retention of the letters and their sounds. We'll keep loosely working at it and it'll make reading instruction easier in a year or two for sure!

We played around a bit on Starfall.com today. They have printables for each letter of the alphabet and on them there are suggestions for little games. SIMPLE things like jump if the word I say begins with the /j/ sound or stay still if it doesn't....or thumbs up if the word I say begins with /s/ or thumbs down if it doesn't. The kids LOVED this! DS played along copying his big sister. DD had a blast! She thought it was silly and creative and fun.

So far, so good!
I'm considering focusing mainly on this kind of thing for the next little while and adding in some math instruction as well.

Speaking of math, does anyone have any experience with Math Mammoth? Does anyone know if Grade 1 would be appropriate for a mathy 4 1/2 year old?