A Week, Briefly (In Which We Forget and Then Remember to Look at the Moon)

We read about it.
We talked about it.
We planned on it.
We set alarms on our phones for it.

And we still managed to NOT go out to experience the awesome astronomical event of Sunday night.

Nothing went wrong.
We just forgot.
And didn't notice the alarms that were supposed to remind us.

C'est la vie.

Monday
Preschool book of the week:  Gracias*Thanks

We dove into our usual routine easily.  Mondays are our review days for The Living Christ.  I love watching Mister Man, Ladybug, and Brother get into singing.  Their little voices get big, and the expressions on their faces as they hit the high notes deserves a photograph to appreciate--perhaps I'll put that on my priority list next week.

We've finished the first quarter of lessons from The Mystery of History 2.  We had a blast running through the review questions included in the text.  It turns out that Nature Angel remembers Roman emperors quite well, while Super Star really absorbed the material about the Jewish revolts.  And all of us got to know the 4 saints covered in these lessons quite well.

We're learning Te Damos Gracias, Senor, Por Las Manos for Spanish right now.  It's always agony for Pixie to be introduced to new words and phrases, but as it has always gotten better with experience, I trust the same will be true this time.

I was invited by Schoolhouse Review Crew to submit a sample product review as a step in the selection process for their 2017 crew, and I chose a nature study guide.  I dove into reading it while I put the babies down for naps, and in the afternoon, the littles and I headed out for a nature walk.  That walk was so simple, so brief, so rewarding.

We stopped to study this poison ivy so that we'd recognize it in all seasons.  I snapped the picture for a future nature journal activity.

The kids loved, loved, loved crawling and slithering through the leaves . . . practically bathing in them at times. :)

Rose Red is trying a new system to getting her schoolwork done; she's choosing to focus on one subject each day (other than Seminary and Spanish).  Monday was writing day.  She wrote a funny little moral story last week, and she spent the afternoon turning it into a play for Girls' Camp next summer.   She also went with Sir Walter Scott to renew her driver's permit--she's determined to get her license this time.

Pixie, Super Star, and Belle took a long bike ride in the afternoon.

We remembered to look at the moon!  It may not have been at maximum fullness, but we marveled at its brightness nonetheless.  Pixie tried so hard to get a good photograph of it, but she didn't have the right equipment.  (There's a note to self for Christmas!)

photo credit:  Pixie

Tuesday
In Morning Meeting we only read one verse of Alma 42 for our Book of Mormon reading!  Our conversation was so rich and so long that one verse was enough.

Later, during Symposium, we dove into our study of Asia.  We started by watching this video just to get a feel for the vast variety of the continent, and we tried to fill out blank maps of Asia.

Ha!  We have a lot to learn!

We got interested in the Dead Sea, so we watched this video.

Then we spent time studying random facts about Asia as a whole--highest, lowest, largest, smallest sort of facts.  And we studied a proper map so that the next time we try to fill in a blank map we'll do better than today!

Nature Angel is writing a new story.

Rose Red focused on US geography for her personal studies.  She also had an orientation meeting for her new job at Freddy's.

Pixie whipped through her individual schoolwork quite easily, then babysat and made dinner while I ran errands.

Super Star learned how to make a book at Shutterfly; she's completing a cookbook for a Personal Progress project.

Little Princess completed the boring, boring assignment (sheesh!  who thinks up an assignment like this?) of writing out the numbers from 901-1000 for math.  I'd have let her skip it, but she sometimes still reverses her 3's and 6's, so I figured the practice wouldn't hurt.  She eventually got into the assignment and showed me her completed work proudly.

Ladybug keeps sabotaging her opportunities for personal freedom.  It was a rough day for her.

Mister Man is quite enjoying The Storybook of Science.  He's delighted with the heft of the book and with the fact that it is going to take us several months to finish it together.  He finished reading And Then What Happened, Paul Revere?  He's still working on Farmer Boy.  He's mostly enjoying a library book we borrowed last week, Richard Scarry's Funniest Storybook Ever.

Belle faithfully works each day.  She finished The Windy Hill, and I gave her All Creatures Great and Small to read.  If she likes it (and I believe she will), there's the rest of the series for her to delve into.

We brought home 58 new library books, but we returned 50, so the increase isn't too bad.

"Whatcha doing?"  we'll ask.  " 'Coo' " he answers. (School)

Wednesday
Everyone's score on labeling the countries of Asia improved, and we began reading about life in the early Middle Ages in Europe.  The kids drew pictures as a way of narrating what I read aloud, and I laughed over and over again at their funny, clever drawings.

Rose Red focused on grammar for her school, but then she also worked on writing her play.

It was a good day for Ladybug.  She was helpful, cooperative, happy, and got to do school!

Mister Man and I read The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere together.  He liked it!  The art knocked his socks off, and we had great conversations about poetic language.

The littles and I gathered then compared leaves to a couple of scavenger hunt sheets I printed out from Creative Nature Study.  We simply tallied what we found, and they all so enjoyed finding leaves and bringing them to me and deciding where the tally mark should go.  Eventually they put the leaves in my hair and threw them in the air and slid and jumped and simply . . . frolicked.

photo credit:  Pixie

photo credit:  Pixie

Nature Angel's sharp eyes picked out this bit of fox fur on the ground.  We've seen the fox several times crossing into our woods.

Little Princess was thrilled with how large this wild ginger leaf was.  It tore, but she still wanted a record that she found it.  We had a lot of fun finding the tiniest and biggest leaves we could. (Nature Angel found the smallest one--perhaps only 3 mm across!)

It was the kind of joy that goes beyond words.

Then I had to pick grass seeds out of Ladybug's hair because the kids ran through some tall grasses and the seeds stuck to her like they were magnetized.

But that was fine.

Church activities took the oldest 5 and Sir Walter Scott away for the evening.  The littles and I had a sweet evening at home reading stories (once our exhausted and grumpy Baymax was asleep [he's getting over a cold]).

Thursday
The morning was hectic because some of our dance clothes disappeared in the laundry.  Six of us hunted high and low for the missing items, but they never turned up.  Fortunately we had alternate clothing that could be worn.

Once that problem was solved we gathered for Symposium.  We had our usual start, but for our main lesson we took everyone (except Rose Red who stayed home to focus on starting Til We Have Faces for her next literature project) on an "I See God" nature walk.  When we got home the older ones wrote poems about their experiences, and I helped the littles with their journals.

Little Princess carefully drew the beautiful maple tree.

Here's Brother illustrating his journal entry.

Belle's poem

Then we quickly ate some peanut butter sandwiches and got ready and out the door.

We had to turn around twice(!) for forgotten shoes.

Seriously, I am usually so much more organized than this.

Then the show was great!

The dancers all introduce themselves to the audience, and there was an audible sigh of delight when Pixie brought Brother and Little Brother forward to say hi.

They danced hard in Mountain Music.

Pixie, Super Star, and Belle danced in Sweetheart of the Rodeo.

All ready for Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend.

Nature Angel is holding a corner of the blanket, and Little Princess is just coming out from under it in Bicycle Built for Two.

Super Star has a lovely singing voice, and she had a chance to let it shine in Bie Mir Bist Du Schoon.

No one fainted!!!

Little Brother captures this lady's heart when he hugged her instead of shaking her hand.

This woman took hold of Pixie's hand and wouldn't let go.  She couldn't talk, but she clearly wanted to communicate something and be in touch with the dancers.

Some popcorn, drinks of water, outside play, and a lovely dinner later we read aloud and headed off to bed early--exhausted by the exertions of the day.

Friday
Whoa!  A cold front arrived!  We went from short sleeves to coats and gloves overnight!

That didn't deter the littles from riding their bikes, though, and I'm glad.  They need the physical exercise, and the challenge of riding in the windy cold brought a sparkle to their eyes.

We had a quiet morning, filled with the usual routine--just a bit later than usual because everyone was so tired from Thursday.  For our main lesson during Symposium, we watched this video about the middle ages.  It gave us lots of food for thought.  Our main conversation centered around how historical "facts" are often actually best guesses based on evidence.

Our afternoon was slow and peaceful, too.

The littles played with playdough.

 I spent a long time helping Rose Red with math.

In the evening I drove most of the big girls off to the homeschool Thanksgiving Dinner/Game Night activity.  Traffic was terrible, and I was gone for almost 2 hours, but I had the babies with me, and Rose Red was a good babysitter to the others.  We'd finished Ramona the Pest on Thursday evening, so she started Winnie the Pooh with them.  They LOVE it!



 (Linking here)