A Fly On My Homeschool Wall

 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. :)

Nature Angel said, "Every day lasts forever, but then suddenly the week is over." Yup. She's neither the first nor the last to feel that way. And I can't figure out how the days can be long and short at the same time.  They seem to go on and on, but at the same time, we can't fit as much as I'd like into them! Things that are working: *Morning table time for the babies--having a prepared activity for them to just walk right up to is a blessing.  This week I put out the following:      Mon--large pompoms and foam cutouts in muffin tins      Tues--playdough and laminated mats      Wed--Beans, bowls, scoops      Thurs--wooden puzzles and stacking blocks      Fri--Calico Critters The favorite by far was the bin of Calico Critters.  They fell into the world of make-believe so easily and lasted so long.  The beans were the messiest, beating the playdough by a narrow margin. :)  Nothing on this list cost me anything in the moment--it's all stuff we already own.