A Day in the Life--August

Linking up with Tristan at Our Busy Homeschool.

Today is our 2nd day of easing into homeschooling routines.

Though I did get up and do my personal scripture study and got breakfast made (homemade granola bars), it has not gone as smoothly as the first day. :)

I2 shows me his "dinosaur's" hiding place, and the granola bars happened to be in view right behind him.

E14 forgot to set her alarm,
and
I forgot to wake the little girls on time.

Usually being late means missing breakfast, but as it was my fault the little girls weren't ready, and as E14 was good-natured, apologetic, and jumped up immediately to do what work she could I delayed breakfast until we were all ready.

M12 was NOT late, so she read while she waited.

A7's first day on the job of spot cleaning the kitchen floor.

 

There's always laundry to take care of!

H5 is learning to make her bed.

We were only 1/2 hour late.

Then I found out that kids had skimped on their chores, so we talked about accountability and made a few adjustments to our chore chart.

After breakfast and clean up were done we re-gathered around the table to write the first round of thank you notes to those who hosted us on our trip.

The empty chair belongs to E14, who was already finished with her letter before I remembered to take a picture.

While the big kids went off to complete their chores correctly, the little guys decorated their letters with stickers left over from the long car rides.

Everyone is off to independent activities--mostly reading or skating.  Dad is on his second-to-last-day of vacation, so he's busy with household projects.  Last night he fixed I2's broken closet door, so I think he's hanging it back up this morning, and he's been talking about mowing the yard.

Getting the alignment just right  . . .

and done!

 I am settling down to a long session at the computer recording the school plans for the last couple of kids for the upcoming school year.

Tired and sweaty after skating.

They were so hungry after skating so hard that the three littlest ones ate up every single piece of left over granola bar!

Tired after skating all morning.

But first I need to get the letters into the mailbox.

******************
It is now after lunch.

M12 made it--tuna, crackers, grapes, and  blueberries.  H5 and I helped.

Before she made lunch, M12 got a cold drink ready for her Dad.

H5 cut up the pickles for the tuna

 Dad is not mowing right now after all.  Rather he's organizing the wood pile . . . it is currently a paltry thing.  Our plans for building it up did not come to pass, so we're weighing our options and organizing as an act of faith that we will be able to get the wood we want/need.

Tired, sweaty skaters are reading books or playing quiet games.

E14 has been flying through a book or two a day lately.  Nothing hard, just fun reads, but she comes to the table in the mood to talk about what she's reading, and I like that.

I've got to lie down.

But first I need to get I2 dressed.  How I manage to neglect dressing him day after day is appalling and completely confusing to me.  Dressing him in a timely manner will be one of my personal quests this week and this school year.

*******************
I never did lie down.

But I did make a chart for H5 with all of the special dates/events that will happen between now and the birth of the baby.  She caught my on my way to my room, "Mom, when is our baby going to be born?"  I decided it was time to help her answer that question for herself.  The other kids gathered around and helped me choose cute clip art to make the chart fun.  Now it is hanging on the wall for her to reference and cross off each event as it happens.

That took a long time.

Then, realizing that the girls were around, I opened up our library website and ordered books for M12, S12, and J10 for their first month's geography work.

Then S12 asked me to order used copies of the last 2 Harry Potter books for her.  She used her birthday money to pay for them.


J10 took the camera and played with it for a while.

One of at least a dozen pictures of I2 being intentionally goofy for the camera.

One of a series of pictures of A7 and H5 doing somersaults

 

One of a series of I2 running from the end of the hall all the way to J10.

 

Now M12 has the camera while J10 and S12 star.

Selfie of the "medium girls"

M12 did my hair.  (Heaven!)  And took a picture of it.

The stake seminary requirements arrived in my email inbox, so I printed them and gave them to E14 to study. 

I moved a load of laundry.

 Kids have scattered again.

M12 read and read and read.

H7 and A5 played "spa," but were so embarrassed to be caught at it that they froze.

A7 called me to the front porch to see the grasshopper she found.

We realized our apples were ripe. Most were wizened, oddly-shaped little things but there were two beauties--here's one of them.

We cut up the best of the apples and ate them still-warm from the sunshine.  Heaven!

S12 made a "potion"--I think it is a love "potion " though who her intended victim is remains unknown.

Dad has been working outside for hours.  E14 took a cold drink out to him.  It's hot today.

Eventually he DID get to the lawn--what a lot of work he did!

*********************

 The day is over.  I spent some time sweeping and cleaning the back porch while H5 and I2 played in the mud just off the porch.

  A7 got her skates back on.  I forgot to take a picture of her.  I did, however, find this spider web.

It's hard to see.  It got wiped out the next day when we moved the swingset around, but within 20 minutes I saw the spider come out of the corner and start weaving again.

We had spinach alfredo pasta with broiled chicken and cherry tomatoes for dinner.  During dinner we had family prayer and scripture study, then it was off to the church for youth activities for the oldest 3 and a Relief Society (our church women's group) presidency meeting for me.  Dad kept the younger 4 home for baths, books, and bed.

Poor J10 is one of the big girls in our family, but she has nearly a year and half left before she can join the older ones in church youth activities.  She will really feel like the middle child she is every time they leave without her.

After a brief stop to pick up some ibuprofen for Dad's aching wrist (he hurt it on our vacation and keeps aggravating the injury) and a couple of new binkies for I2 (there's no way he's ready to stop using one yet), it was about 9:00 pm when we got home.

I2 was long asleep--it turns out that A7 had snuggled up next to him in bed and read him stories until he fell asleep--but the others were still awake because Dad had spent the evening finding funny baby videos on YouTube to watch with them.

When I got into the house, everyone scurried off to bed, but not until H5 told me all about the funny baby who stole other babies' binkies.

I found that a couple of older girls had NOT completed some chores from the morning, so they had to go to work immediately to remedy the situation.  I got into bed with a good book while Dad waited for them to finish their work so he could tuck them in.  He stayed up to work on a work-required computer education course.

I fell asleep.

My day was done . . . though I think the older girls were awake for a while longer, and poor Dad's day didn't end for hours.