A Fly On My Homeschool Wall

We finished our family New Testament studies yesterday.  I feel like singing. Not because we're done and it's over (because we will, of course, stay immersed in the scriptures year 'round), but because we actually persevered and finished this particular course of study.  It was such a sense of accomplishment to pick up all of those full journals and plunk them in the "2013-2014 Completed Schoolwork" box. It's so fun to turn my attention to planning for the summer and the coming year.  We're still working our way to the ends of our math books.  And our current literature books/journals will be completed at almost the exact same time.  There might be a difference of a few days, but for the most part I think we're really done next week. We'll loaf about--sleeping in, reading long hours, hiking, going to the zoo--for a week or so.  We'll just kind of rest and stretch for a bit.  Perhaps just long enough to get bored and start looking fo...

I have only 4 children at home this afternoon and evening. The big girls are away at a soccer meet. The house feels so quiet.  The quiet is both soothing and odd at the same time. Only 5 of us at the dinner table.  Though we chitter chattered through our meal, it still felt so . . . small. It makes me realize that we're soon to be on the shrinking end of family life as children grow up and will leave home.  I know there will be growth in weddings and babies to come, but before that, there will be a lessening. Makes me a little melancholy. And glad that my husband and big girls will be home in an hour to fill the house with laughter and bickering, talking and activity. This afternoon was peaceful.  We went to the library.  We read stories.  We made dinner.  We flew kites.  We're closing up the house for the night and settling in. It's a good life I have the privilege of living.

I woke up dreading yesterday.  I am a homebody, and yesterday was an out-and-about day.  It was a day when I had to consult maps and drive somewhere new.  It was a day when kids' activities kept us from having a family dinner.  It was a day when I had to be well-organized and cheerful and adventurous, even though I wanted to be relaxed and quiet. But it was a fun day. Together the kids and I met some friends at the zoo.  We all learned all over again that we don't enjoy field trip type outings (we had 17 kids between us).  It is far more fun to go to the zoo just as a family, but it was good to see our friends.  It was good to talk, to visit, to put our own desires aside for a short time to meet the needs of others. But next time we'll just invite them over to our house. :) Later the kids and I packed up and headed out to E14's soccer game.  There are 2 weeks left in the season, and we are all ready for it to be over.  Instead of be...

This morning I read from The Doctrine and Covenants section 127 .  It is about the need to properly record ordinances that are performed on earth. Standing out in particular to me this morning is verse 7: "That in all your recordings it may be recorded in heaven; whatsoever you bind on earth, may be bound in heaven; whatsoever you loose on earth, may be loosed in heaven;" I've had this very verse floating around in my head for a few weeks now. And today I came accidentally across it in my personal studies. I don't think it is an accident.  I think it is inspiration . . . even command . . . to do a better job at keeping our family history.  To write intentionally and purposefully.  Not to waste time at the computer--not to spend more time at the computer--but to sit down and write. That the treasured (and mundane) moments of our family may be preserved.

The oldest 4 girls and I are reading and journaling our way through The Book of Mormon .  Each of us has a composition book, Book of  Mormon, and a reading chart .  We read and either write about what we've read or copy a scripture we particularly liked in that day's reading.  Without fail the kids have all chosen to copy a scripture . . . every day. I wanted to fuss a little, but I held my tongue, and I'm glad.  Though the kids sometimes are thoughtless about what they copy, and they're often clearly searching for the shortest possible verse, at least they're copying the word of God. Once in a while as I check off their work, I'll add in a tiny comment: "That's beautiful." "How sad" "This verse makes me want to grow a garden!" Nothing astute or fabulous or insightful--just a little something more than a check mark on the top of the page.  Over time the kids began to write little notes back to me: "It make...

 I'm linking up with Tristan at Our Busy Homeschool :) The kids have loved reading over our past few “Day in the Life” journal entries.   They think I choose   boring days, though. “Mom!   You need to choose a day when something happens to write about!”   they nearly chorus.   “Write about a day when we go to dance!” Today--Thursday, April 10--is a dance performance day.    It is a day when much will happen. ******************* Frustratingly enough, my day begins at 2:46 am when I2 wakes up thirsty.   He takes it upon himself to bring his empty cup to me, which doesn’t seem like a problem at all as I fill it, give it to him, and tuck him happily back in his bed.   He seems perfectly content. Before I can even go back to bed, H4 cries out.   She’s fighting a cold . . . and losing.   She has to dance today, so I gave her garlic and honey before going to bed last night.   She’s sleeping bette...

Last night was our final show for the 2013-2014 American Rhythm year (that's our dance troupe).  It was a friends and family recital, and some friends did, in fact, come.  My hands are so busy in rehearsals and during the show that I have no pictures at all.  My husband says he filmed most of the numbers our kids are in (22 of them!) with his phone, so we'll see how they came out when he gets a chance to upload them to the computer. The kids are sleeping in.  Yesterday was long with rehearsals all through the middle of the day and then the show set up, show itself, and show clean up in the evening.  I'm tired, too.  I'm glad for a break, but I can honestly say that I look forward to signing up for another year.  I'm so very nervous about it because it's a lot, a lot, a lot of work, but the rewards are good.  Really good. At one point H4 tripped and fell.  She fell hard, and it really hurt.  I picked her up to comfort her, rocking h...

We got up to watch the lunar eclipse last night. J10 read a book about Helen Keller that had a copy of the Braille alphabet in the back.  She voluntarily spent hours writing messages in Braille (not actually raised dots--just drawn dots). We didn't have dinner until 7:00 pm yesterday because the sun eventually came out, and my husband was building bunk beds, and I had to return an overdue book to the library, and no one had anywhere to go, so we didn't have to have dinner at a certain time.  I offered apples to anyone who got hungry before that. I2 likes games.  He's destroyed our games closet because he knows how to carry a stool out of the kitchen, but he spends long hours arranging and rearranging pieces of games.  The floor is a mess, but my boy is so very happy. H4 is learning to read.  She asks me almost every hour of the morning, "Is it time for my school yet?"  Her happy blue eyes fill my spirit with light. We went barefoot on Saturday....

I've been thinking and thinking and thinking about my oldest child.  She's been a puzzle to me ever since she was old enough to voice her own opinion (and she did that rather early).  I love her.  I love her so much that I am often blinded to both her faults and her strengths.  I pray daily that I might see her as God sees her and that I might be a blessing to her. She's 14 now.  She has a season of monumental growth right on the horizon.  Of late, she and I have been deep in question-asking and decision-making. The other night Daddy was frustrated with her.  "She won't do anything!" he huffed.  "I'm trying to help her out, and she just refuses." Because I wasn't the one she'd been difficult with, it was my job to listen to him blow off steam and to be the voice of reason. Except I wasn't reasonable.  "I know!  I can't understand it either.  She just refuses to work at anything on her own.  I've been watching and ...

Yesterday was a joy.  I woke up with absolutely not one item on my calendar.  Nothing framed our day, not even Daddy's work schedule.  And I milked it for all it was worth. We didn't even have a proper breakfast.  Instead as soon as kids had their chores done, they were allowed to fix themselves a pancake left over from last night's dinner.  As I made large, whole-grain-apple-and-cinnamon pancakes that the kids piled peanut butter, applesauce, and homemade syrup on top, this was more filling than one might imagine. Once everyone was awake I sent the big girls off to do their independent school work while I discusses triple bunk bed plan s with Daddy.  We're building the green ones, only switched so the doubles are on the right with the single on the left, and we're modifying them slightly using these plans for inspiration. H4 asked if she could do school, so we did.  She read her first 4 words-- at, fat, mat, rat .  We called Grandma to r...

Today a conversation with E14 about the common core turned into questions and answers about the president and his family.  We had to google some answers. As M12, S11, and J10 joined the conversation we kept talking.  They asked if Daddy could run for president.  The answer to that question turned into a lecture/discussion about how presidents are elected and why some people claim you're "throwing away" your vote if you vote outside the two main parties.  I was amazed to see the lights in the kids eyes as they listened, and I loved the intelligent questions they asked for clarification. By that time we were at the table having lunch, so the little guys were listening.  They wondered how big the white house is.  We googled that one, too.  We clicked various sites until we found one we liked.  Because I was in the room and directly supervising their searching, they were allowed to click on a featured Youtube video that looked promising.  T...

J10 came to me a couple of days ago, "I'm allowed to spend unlimited time looking up things on my tablet, right?" I wondered where she was going with this.  "Umm, not really unlimited, but you can spend extra time beyond your regular turn if you're doing research.  And you know you can only do that in a common room of the house that has other people in the room with you," I answered cautiously. "I want to look up a bird I saw in the field yesterday.  It was beautiful--black with red markings on it." I don't know why I was so cautious--this is my least-likely-to-try-something-sneaky child, "Yes, you may look it up." She then spent some time looking for it. And she found it! It is a Red-winged Blackbird .  She pored over the site she found, reading all about it, feeling so proud of herself for what she'd accomplished. She inspired her sisters, too.  They all ran together to our bird-identification posters to study and ...

 . . . was seeing my children's faces light up in spontaneous recognition of a favorite/memorized scripture and listening to their cries of delight when a story or moment of inspired instruction touched their hearts. We all loved hearing Elder Aidukaitis tell us, "One should not roam through garbage!" I think it will be our new family watch-phrase. :)

--I receive  printables about General Conference in my email inbox every 6 months. --I stumble across ideas on blogs . --My kids come home from church with handouts and challenges from their primary leaders/teachers. All are great ideas.  I have no criticism of them.  I've even printed a few of them out and let my own kids have a go at them. But I've found that for the most part they are distractions from the real event. If a kid is playing conference bingo, I'm usually hearing, "Mom, Mom, did he say 'faith?'" instead of hearing the talk about faith. It's the same for the kid playing conference bingo--listening for isolated words instead of messages. E14 has received numerous packets encouraging her to use her general conference experience as a Personal Progress value project.  She has successfully ignored every one of them, choosing to nap instead of listen or take notes. Nevertheless, I've felt faintly guilty over the years...

My little girls requested princess books from the library.  Among all of the Cinderellas and Rapunzels we found a copy of The Magic Flute. We've read and read and read it. This morning I found A7 reading it aloud  to H4 and I2. On a whim I did a quick YouTube search for The Magic Flute. First return--a full length version by The Metropolitan Opera House with James Levine as conductor. 2 hours 46 minutes . . . hmm . . . a little long . . . but I gave it a shot. I called my littles to the computer just to see what would happen. They sat, mesmerized, for the whole 2:46 as the opera was performed in its entirety in German. They knew the plot, so they were never lost.  As the final curtain fell, they turned to me with shining eyes, "That was fun!  Can we do more?"

I was dreading going out.  The rain and dark skies had left me rather listless.  Part of the field trip was supposed to take place outside, and there was thunder and lighting. I2 and H4 were adamant that they wanted to just stay home.  I seriously considered skipping the whole thing. But Daddy was home for the day, and he offered to come along, so after gathering enough rain/cold weather supplies for a small army off we went. I'm so glad we did! One of the moms in our local homeschool support group is a diver for Underwater Rescue and Recovery.  We have the only team in 5 states!  They used to be under city jurisdiction, but the city moved them to the county.  After a while the county set them free.  Now they are non-jurisdictional and completely funded by donations.  All members of the team are volunteers.  They recover everything from human beings (by the time they're on the scene, though, it's too late for saving a life--they said, "...

This morning, as part of her phonics lesson, H4 and I were supposed to make a silly shopping list for items beginning with the sounds /m/, /f/, and /b/.  We took turns coming up with items. We laughed. A7 joined us. I2 joined us. S11 joined us. We all came up with the goofiest items we could imagine buying at a store:  Babies!  Monkeys!  Moms! Perhaps they're not very goofy, but we laughed and laughed together. **************** Today I had to do some shopping.  I hate shopping.  It sucks the life out of me and leaves me more drained than dealing with several crying toddlers (I know this because I'm the nursery leader at church.) Today's shopping took far longer than planned and left me listless, foggy, and frustrated. We barely had a proper dinner, and when it was over I simply could not face the kitchen.  I was trying, trying, trying to remember that if I just put one foot in front of the other it would be fine, but I couldn't....