Home School Update

It's been awhile since I actually wrote much about home schooling, so I'll take some time for a little update before I have to go work on dinner.

We are in Week 24 of Sonlight Core C, and it's going great. The kids are absolutely loving our current read-aloud, In Grandma's Attic, which I highly recommend. There are follow-up books which I hope to get for the kids for a birthday or something like that, because the stories are just too good! Ted is also thoroughly enjoying these chapters. I love hearing him laugh out loud with the kids.

Science has been a big hit these days. We just finished the Usborne First Book of Nature, ending with the chapter on moths and butterflies. We ordered a butterfly habitat and caterpillars from Insect Lore, and this has been GREAT! We all love watching the caterpillars--they grow noticeably each day. Any day now they will be crawling to the top of their little jars and morphing into the pupa stage. Then we'll carefully place them in the butterfly habitat and watch eagerly for when they begin emerging as butterflies! Hopefully we'll be able to capture some on video. I'm taking pictures daily so we can see the changes. It will be fun to go back through and see the slide show, which I will be sure to post.

We've also enjoyed "Science in the Kitchen" experiments. Fridays seem to be our experiment days, which works out well. Overall, science is probably one of the favorite things to do and read about around here.

In history/social studies we are going through the Usborne book Wild Places and are nearly finished with the jungle section. I had to suppress a giggle when Charis commented that the ladies drawn in various jungle life activities "weren't very modest." We did have a little discussion about how cultures vary in what is the norm!

We've also read some bios of Christian heroes, including William and Catherine Booth, Adonirom and Ann Judson, and Hudson Taylor. In our Bible story book we just finished the Old Testament and are moving on to the birth of Jesus. AWANA keeps the kids busy memorizing verses, but we also have at least one home school verse per week that we work on together. Charis is actually finished with her handbook and will likely earn her review patch in the next week or two. I'm not sure what she'll do after that for the rest of the year! Tobin will also start working on his review patch before too long.

In math, Charis is on lesson 18 out of 30 in her Math-U-See book (Beta). I need to order the Alpha book for Tobin and the Primer book for Arden, but I'm trying to decide whether it's urgent or if I should wait a little longer and just order Charis's Gamma book at the same time. She is working on column addition now, adding such things as:

509
493
687
+215
-----

She does quite well at it when she takes her time.

Tobin's handwriting continues to improve, and he's much more willing to do written work these days than he was even a couple of months ago. Charis struggles with writing assignments, mostly because they aren't her idea and I think they overwhelm her a bit. Once she gets going she usually does all right, but this is the area where more tears are shed than any other!

Arden is on lesson 78 in his reading book. He's at the transition part where they are trying to wean the students from the markings over the letters, and it's proving to be much more of a challenge than it was for the older two. I'm not too surprised, though, because he IS quite young. I'd be glad to shelve the book for awhile, but he wants to keep plugging away. He's not doing too badly, but he's definitely not going to be ready to make the leap into other books when we finish this lesson book. I may pull out Phonics Pathways, which I used for awhile with Charis, and see if that helps him some more.

Charis and Tobin continue to enjoy their weekly PE class, which lately has included archery, volleyball, and tennis. They come home each week full of stories of all their friends, which include the teens in the group! I love that they get the chance to interact with all different ages of kids. I suspect that Charis has a little crush on one of the older boys, but she doesn't even know how to voice it. She just keeps saying that he is her friend and he is so nice. He's 15. :-) I know the mom, and the family is so neat. I'm generally impressed with home school kids anyway (why else would I be home schooling, ha!), and watching the older kids look out for the younger ones and be good role models for them really warms my heart.

Arden and I enjoy some special time while the older kids are at PE. We usually read and play some games together, and then I give him a TV treat while I get some extra work done around the house or on the computer. Kenna is usually napping during that time anyway.

And speaking of our youngest home school student, Kenna has been battling sickness for almost a month straight. She had finally gotten over whatever virus she had previously when she got hit last Thursday morning with a terrible fever that lasted for over 2 days. She mostly slept and thankfully did take quite a few liquids. Saturday afternoon she broke out in a horrible rash, and after much research, we concluded that it was roseola and we didn't need to take her to urgent care after all. The next two days she didn't want to sleep at all, but once we got past the Super Bowl party, she slept great that night and is back to her normal schedule, praise the Lord. The rash is all but gone, but she is obviously still recovering. Her voice is scratchy and pathetic-sounding, and she isn't quite herself. But at least there is no fever, and her appetite is slowly getting back up to speed.

A Home School Family

A lady in our home school co-op posted a link to this great video about a home school family. If you're in home school circles at all or know folks who are, you'll get a kick out of it!

I shall return later with a home school update of our own, but for now this will have to do, as it's time for lunch!

Baby in the Bubble Bath

I couldn't resist snapping some pictures the other night when Kenna was enjoying her bubble bath. Unfortunately, the lighting made the background look yellowish. So I converted the pictures to grayscale and LOVE the results. I can't wait to scrapbook these photos!

Definitely Related

It's been awhile since I posted some pics. I'm in the middle of a rather complicated dinner--I've never done twice-baked potatoes before, and they sounded yummy, but I've been in the kitchen for over 2 hours working on those, the meatloaf, and the "Walrus Salad," so I'm taking a quick break after putting Kenna down for a catnap.

I need to download the latest pictures, but I took this one of Tobin and Kenna just a week and a half ago. Tobin decided Kenna needed to have her back scratched. They were so cute together, and I thought it would be interesting to get comments from other people: What do you think, do they look alike? I think Kenna most resembles Tobin, but some people say no, definitely Arden. I'll put a picture of Arden below Tobin and Kenna, and you can see what you think. And just for kicks, I'm also posting a picture of Charis at approximately the same age. No matter which sibling you think Kenna resembles most, I bet everyone agrees that all four are definitely related!

Pinkeye Update

I forgot to mention in the last post that Charis's eye is MUCH better! And praise the Lord, no one else in our family has it. I'm still supposed to be putting eye drops in for a total of one week, and I'm realizing now that I forgot to do that this afternoon. Oops.

An acquaintance told me she used to work for an opthamologist, and she said that since pinkeye is a virus, eyedrops don't do a thing. It just has to run its course. I'm not sure whether I believe that, because her eye has shown such obvious improvement. But if it cleared up so quickly on its own, then hey, I won't argue the point.

I Need Another Weekend!

It's not even 5 p.m. Saturday and I'm ready for bed! Yesterday we had a good morning focused on school, and the rest of the day it seemed I was either cleaning the house, prepping stamping projects, or prepping food for today's lunch for my class. I'm pleased with the results--the house looks great (if you don't go into my bedroom or bathroom, LOL), and 8 ladies thoroughly enjoyed the Birthday Bonanza card class. They stamped 12 cards, 3 each of 4 different designs, and they were very sweet and complimentary of the class as well as the food I served them. (Sarah J, your crockpot recipe for beef stew was a HIT!)

Since Ted is at a men's snowboarding retreat this weekend, I ended up shuffling kids to and from church for Sparks-a-Rama practice from 10 to noon. A friend came early to the class so she could be here to let the ladies in as they arrived, so we hustled to church, dropped off Charis and Tobin, made a stop at the potty for Arden, came home, and then did the whole process all over again about an hour and a half later. I think the last guest from my card class left around 2 p.m.

It was such a gorgeous day outside that after everyone was gone, I quickly packed up all the kids, leaving the mess until later, and headed for the park, where we spent a glorious hour and a half, soaking up the sunshine. Tobin made friends with a boy who was maybe 7 or 8 and was an absolute joy to watch. You could tell he was the firstborn in his family! Definitely a leader, but he was sweet to let the younger boys choose their roles. They were playing some kind of Star Wars scenario and ran all over the equipment on their "space ships" or "escape pods," depending on what was happening. It was so fun to watch them playing and see my kids interacting with complete strangers, yet acting as if they had known them their whole lives. Kids are so great that way! Kenna didn't do a whole lot. She crawled very little but seemed to enjoy watching the commotion. I really hated to leave...I could have stayed and watched the kids a lot longer, but I knew Kenna was going to NEED her nap after being awake for over 3 hours.

So now we're home. I got the stamping stuff put away, after making up the rest of the cards. (I had one lady not show up, and she didn't let me know in advance, either, sigh.) I cleaned up the kitchen, folded a huge load of whites that I left in the dryer yesterday, and got the last load of the week started in the washing machine.

Now it's almost 5:00, and I can't stand the thought of going down to the kitchen and coming up with something to eat! The kids barely even had lunch...they munched homemade French bread but weren't interested in the beef stew, unfortunately. They also had fruit and chocolate chip bars. Nice balanced meal, eh?! I'm really tempted to head to McDonald's and let them play on the playground. But that would involve letting Kenna crawl on the filthy floor. The McD's over by our old house did have a nice toddler play area, so if I want to drive half an hour, I suppose we could go there...but it's also Saturday night, bath night, and I don't relish being out very late and having to wrestle hyper kids through the bath routine.

Calgon, take me away!!

The Best Laid Plans...

It's 2:30 p.m. and I am EXHAUSTED! This day did not turn out at all like I was planning--PE in the morning, with a grocery shopping trip after we dropped off the big kids so I could have my afternoon free to prep for my b-day card class. Instead, Charis woke up with what I was pretty sure was pinkeye (turns out it is). Poor thing looked so pathetic. Her eye had been completely crusted over, and it was so puffy she could hardly open it. I spent a good amount of time on the phone trying to get through to the pediatric appointment desk. Finally someone picked up the phone, and we were able to get an 11 a.m. appointment on base. Since Kenna desperately was needing a nap, I ended up telling Tobin that he would not be able to go to PE. I had thought about letting him go with a friend, but I felt I didn't know any of the other moms well enough to call up and impose, especially since I didn't know how long we'd be on base and I wouldn't be able to say when I could pick Tobin up.

So, to make it up to the kids, I played games with them here at home while Kenna napped, then we all left the house a little before 10:00 to make the 40-minute drive and have time to park and get inside 15 minutes before appointment time. Thankfully Kenna did great the whole time we were gone. We had the appointment, getting in and out in record time, got the eye drops from the pharmacy, then went to the ATM and Burger King on base to pick up lunch. Then to the commissary to get my groceries, filled up with gas, came home, put Kenna to bed, put eye drops in Charis's eyes, unloaded the van, put away the groceries, discovered people in my back yard taking pictures...!!! Turns out they are from the HOA, and thankfully we aren't in trouble. :-) They just need to catalogue the plant life in our yard since we border the outside part of the community. In case of water damage, etc., and in the event the HOA would need to replace the walls, they need to know what kinds of trees and bushes they would need to replace in the yard.

Anyway. Kenna is sacked out, and the kids are playing quietly, so it's time for me to do some card-stock cutting! I'm excited about my Birthday Bonanza card class this Saturday morning. If all ladies come who signed up, I'll have 8 people here stamping away!

Funnies from the Boys

I'm sure everyone is riveted to their computer screens, waiting for an update on how much or how little sleep I've been getting, LOL! Well, sorry to disappoint, but instead of moping about how I was awake for three hours last night, I'm instead going to move on to remembering a couple of comments that made me chuckle. I'm sure I'm not the only one who could use a good laugh! (Today was filled with no less than 3 all-out temper tantrums by 3 different children, so trust me, I did not spent the day in a laughing mood!)

*************
Sunday morning as we were getting ready for church, Arden asked me, "Mom, when will we stop going to church?" I told him probably not until we got to heaven, because then we would be with Jesus and wouldn't need to "go" to church. I was surprised when he adamantly told me he would stop going to church when he turned 100.

"Why?" I asked, wondering if he had plans to suddenly become an atheist in his old age.

"Because then I'll be so big I'll poke through the ceiling," was his serious reply.

*************
Last week Tobin had an exercise in his language arts notebook that involved matching short words to make larger compound words. Some were obvious, but more than a couple actually could have been combined different ways. Examples: Sand box, sand bag; hand set, hand bag; swing set. It didn't help that half of the selections were on one side of the page and the other were on the back side.

So Tobin goes through and does a great job of creating words. I wasn't looking at the answer key, but I did notice the potential difficulties with the selections that could have gone various ways. It didn't bother Tobin, however; he simply put the remaining two words together to create his own compound word: upbox.

"Hmmm," I said. "I think the leftover words maybe should go with different words. That is kind of a silly word, don't you think? What's an upbox?"

I was kidding. That was a rhetorical question. But Tobin looked at me as if I were the dumbest mom on the planet and answered, "An elevator!"

Wanted: An Uninterrupted Night of Sleep

Amazingly, in my hotel bed in California just over a week ago I slept 7-8 hours straight just about every night we were there.

Welcome back to reality!

Tuesday night I was awakened for no apparent reason at 2 a.m., but, since I was awake, I trotted to the potty. (Does anyone else have issues with waking up at night to use the bathroom even though you're not pregnant anymore?!) Back in bed, I lay awake, coughing and hacking. I could tell I was keeping Ted awake, so I got up, worked in my stamp room to create a project for my stamp club, had a snack (I was also hungry--what's up with that?), and went back to bed, where I lay awake for another half hour and finally dozed off just in time for Ted's alarm to go off at 5:00.

Wednesday night Kenna woke at 3 a.m. and nursed. Since she so rarely nurses these days, I don't mind middle-of-the-night feedings since they don't actually happen much at all. She hadn't wanted to nurse right before bed, probably due to being overstimulated from our night at church. So I wasn't too surprised that she woke up hungry. She promptly went back to sleep. I did not. At 4:00 I decided to get up and clean my office. Wow, did it need cleaned, and I was pleased with the results, though I hadn't planned to do it in the middle of the night. At 5:00 I bundled up and went for a 3-mile run, so I was up for the day.

Last night Kenna woke at 2 a.m. This isn't a usual occurrence by any means, but she is now battling a runny nose and fever, so again I wasn't too surprised. She nursed well and didn't make a peep after I laid her back down. I'm fighting a cold/cough myself, so I hacked awhile after lying down, despite taking another round of cough medicine, and finally got up to get a cough drop. I fell asleep before I finished it and woke at 5:45 to find a miniscule blob between my tongue and the roof of my mouth. That is a WEIRD feeling to wake up to.

It's amazing how we can take a simple thing like a good night's sleep for granted! I'm not sure why I've been awake so much at night this past week, but maybe God's trying to get my attention about something. The middle of the night is about the only time I get any peace and quiet, so maybe I should start making a cup of hot tea and doing my devotions the next time I wake up and can't get back to sleep!

Hmmm. This post has made me sleepy. I think I'm going to take my contacts out and try taking a nap!

Apparently I Have a Western Accent

Who knew there was even such a thing?! Guess I morph into whatever location I'm currently in. If I had taken this test as a junior higher, I would have had a southern accent; as a high schooler, a northern one.

What American accent do you have? (Best version so far) Western Western is kind of neutral, but not quite since it's still possible to tell where you`re from. So you might not actually be from the West (but you probably are). If you really want to sound "neutral," learn how to say "stock" and "stalk" differently.

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