A Week, Briefly (Jan 23, 2023)

 I'm not posting pictures of the rashes, but we've got Hand, Food, and Mouth Disease here. 

All eight babies and 3 of my own.

Some have had light rashes and hardly any fever; some have had dreadful rashes and have been utterly wiped out by the fever.  

We didn't know what it was until everyone had been exposed several times, so we just rolled with it the best we could.

But it did make for a looooonnng week.

And a low-energy week.

When we did anything, we read, but we rested most of the time.

*The teens and I had mini-Symposium 4 days.

*The younger kids and I read Joan of Arc and Mary's Garden.

*We've stayed devoted to Hans Brinker, in spite of the agonizing chapters about Dutch history and geography, and now we're near the end and the interesting adventures of the Brinker family.

*We've read several more pages of The Children's Book of Virtues.  It's funny to see the kids' faces as I read a story that applies to one of them in particular. :)

*The babies are currently enamored of Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear?, Goodnight Moon, and The Big Red Barn.

*We finished this:

*We started this:

*Little Princess worked on an essay about Irina Sendler.  It's not done yet, but she's doing lots of research, and this is self-motivated writing, so as long as it takes is just fine with me.

*Nature Angel practiced the guitar, finished Circe, did some Algebra, worked on an afghan, and she took several naps.

*Our morning tables were:

     Craft stick puzzles

     Felt Friends--at least that's what we call them--they're felt pictures and backgrounds

     Dinosaur coloring pages

     Calico Critters

      . . .  and one more activity that no one in this house can remember!

Monday

The kids and I got out the seed packets and counted the weeks back from our last frost date to know when and how we can plant our various seeds. 

Whoo hoo!  We were able to start the cabbages and peppers this very week! 

Then I gave the kids free art time to paint or draw as they wished.

I'm pretty sure Lola is trying to decide if she's going to eat and have the privilege of painting or just sit there staring at her squishy because eating is too much work.

Tuesday

I did not take notes, nor did I take very many pictures, so this is the playdough that I made in the afternoon for everyone to play with.  It is an interesting playdough made of 1 part hair conditioner to 2 parts cornstarch.  

It's kind of like oobleck, but also like playdough.

It's messy.

That's for sure.

And it smells really good.

The kids like it.

It's super silky smooth!

I gotta admit, I liked how it felt in my hands, too.

And then, strangely, the kids got really into cleaning up!

They worked so hard and went the extra mile to do dishes, clear counters, and wipe all the surfaces!

I picked up and vacuumed the living room and tried to offer lots of praise. :)

Then this picture of Lola and Cleo is here just for fun because they were both so sound asleep after evening reading.

Wednesday

It snowed overnight!

The temperature was above freezing, and the snow was wet and heavy, so I sent the kids out right after breakfast to make the most of the snow before it melted away.

Faux snowball--most of it is a mini basketball!  The snow was so wet and clingy!

You can see the snowball rolling went right down to the mud!

Nature Angel and Beowulf took the snow on the deck railings and rolled it up like quilt batting!  

Lola (with some help from Brother) built this wooden sled.  It worked well for a while, but then it started getting stuck.  It was so perfect that this happened while we are reading Hans Brinker because it illustrated perfectly what happened to Hans' wooden skates and why new skates were so valuable to him.

I love it when Nature Angel takes pictures!

We came inside for popcorn and hot chocolate and stories.  Eventually, I turned on the 1948 movie version of Joan of Arc starring Ingrid Bergman.

There's a gate in front of the stove because we had lots of fires this week!

Thursday

This pic makes me laugh because it looks like he's reading, too!

Sugar Bear likes to draw during Symposium.

I love seeing my girls do schoolwork while caring for babies!

This is Sir Walter Scott doing his continuing education for work as a nurse.  It's a stroke class.  He's actually discussing the signs and symptoms with the kids and accepting their input.  (Lola and Ladybug were more engaged before I took the photo.)  They were literally helping diagnose his simulated patients.  It was such a cool moment of "take your kids to work" . . . at home.

We skipped all church and CAP activities because everyone was tired and/or ill in some way or another.

Friday

This is after our walk just as I turned on Dinosaur Train for the kids so I could lead Symposium.

Sir Walter Scott was showing videos of how things spin above, below, and at the equator--in Uganda--because Pixie is going to be living maybe an hour away from it, and she's going to send us pictures of her standing on it!  (And, yes, that is dinner mess from the night before. But we ate it for lunch!)

After snack, I had the kids work on their maps of Europe.

I kicked them all outside for the afternoon, but they came inside 1 or 2 at a time and played games or read until I asked the older girls if Sir Walter Scott and I could have a date night.  They said yes, so I gave dinner instructions to Nature Angel and Belle and left them to it.

The kids were up late, late, late watching movies, but it was fine with me!

Final Note:

Last Sunday, Lola and Baymax were baptized, and then we had a big family dinner.

A sweet friend took photos the week before for us to just have as treasures.

On the day, all 14 of us were together, so we got an impromptu photo.

And by impromptu I simply mean taken by a friend . . . because it took real work to herd us all into the same part of the room at the same time!

(Yes, Beowulf had his eyes crossed in ALL of the photos.)

 We also took some quick shots in the church beforehand.

8 always seems so little when it comes to baptism time!

Yes, Lola is doing a cartwheel down the church hallway. :)

It's the end of an era--all 12 of our children are now baptized, and I'm realizing how much and how little that means all at the same time.

Sure, we work hard to teach and love our children . . . to be examples of how to love and serve the Lord.  It's the single most important job of every day for me.

But this is only one little step on their lifelong journey to discipleship.  A decade from now . . . what will they choose?  What will our best efforts have done for these two babies of mine?

Of my 4 adult children, 

   1 has completely rejected everything we believe, 

   1 talks a good talk, but she's not walking in faith,

   2 are living lives of faith and service.

I love them all.

I love them so much it hurts.

But I'm not arrogant enough to think that baptizing 12 children is much of an accomplishment.

The real accomplishment will be when I finish this life having taught my children light and truth, loving them unconditionally, all of my days.

I've got work to do!