A Week, Briefly (Feb. 13, 2023)

 I'm still recuperating from a stomach bug.

Several of the kids got it, and Sir Walter Scott just started now.

It made for a short school week, and while I'm recovered enough that I can get up and get going for a few hours,  I'm exhausted and foggy for the rest of the day.

Exhausted and foggy is where I am now.

I honestly remember very little about the week, and I'm only going on pictures now.

Sunday

We celebrated Valentine's Day early so that we could be mostly together.

We had our traditional treasure hunt.

The older kids are very tired of it, but I made them play along because their older sisters had to play along for them, and they still have younger siblings who think it is all fun.

Then we exchanged valentines.

The oldest 3 girls weren't present, nor did they have valentines prepared, but the rest of us exchanged away, and this is where it all becomes worthwhile.   The sweetest spirit of love and family settles over us as we do this every year.

We watched an episode of The Chosen (Season 3 finale next Sunday for us!), we had a good dinner, and we ate lots of Valentine's Day candy.

Monday

 

Beautiful weather helped me send the kids outside to make nature counting pyramids.  We started with easy--just 1-10--in order to get the idea settled in their brains before I assign harder ones like skip counting pyramids.

Ladybug's (I love how she found eggshells in the compost pile!)

Baymax's

Mister Man's

Lola's (3 has the tiniest pebbles imaginable)

Beowulf's (so clever to use snowballs!)

Brothers (His was so large that it was hart to get a picture!)

I know we did things like read and draw and talk, but I can't remember the details.

Tuesday

Rain.

I couldn't stand the idea of being in the house all day, so we braved the rain and walked anyway.

It was cold and wet, but everyone became reconciled after a bit, and the complaining turned to games and singing, and we were all quite happy by the time we got home.

One of the piles of wet gear

For Morning Meeting, we'd watched a little video about peacemaker cookies.  Little Princess volunteered to help the kids make them.

And then we ate them!

At some point we watched Aladdin (I counted it as school because it is a Persian fairy tale).

At another time we watched A Bug's Life because we'd read about ants in our Insect book.  I had the kids look for things in the movie that are real about insects.

And there was lots of reading and drawing.

Wednesday

Sugar Bear loves watching language lessons on Duolingo.

I know we went through our usual morning routine . . . 

Baymax and The Munchkin stopped to clear some debris from the creek.

 . . . and then in the afternoon I pulled out marbles, paint, paper, baking trays, and aluminum foil for marble art.  Everyone but Brother did it, but I only got a couple of pictures.

The paintings came out unique and beautiful.

The kids are really proud of their art displayed on the wall.

I had to do Lola's and Ladybug's hair, so we watched Akeela and the Bee in the evening while I combed and styled.  Nature Angel warmed up chicken nuggets and veggies for dinner because doing hair is a looooong process.

Thursday

We had a show.

I was nauseous but holding it together.

It was a busy day that included Sir Walter Scott taking the kids to the library in the morning while I ironed white shirts.

No pics because I was busy with littles the whole time.

The show was well-received.

Avoiding TMI, I'll cut the story short there.

I spent the next 48 hours in bed.

I did try to get up and do what needs to be done, but I couldn't stay up.

Along the way, Brother, Baymax, and Beowulf fell victim to the bug as well.  Little Princess and a bunch of our babies had it the weekend prior.  Nature Angel seems to have had some variation of it because she shared in the exhaustion and general malaise without the actual GI issues.

Ice and freezing rain caused all evening activities to be cancelled.  

Friday

Sir Walter Scott and the older girls ran the show.  I was completely undone by getting breakfast on and conducting Morning Meeting.

As far as I can tell, the kids read and played games all day.

Saturday

Grocery shopping did me in, but at least I got it done.

I also managed to read aloud to the kids, and we're about 90 pages from the end of The Dark Frigate.  It's quite a dark story, and the pirates are really evil.  I've edited here and there where the descriptions of death and carnage are too much for us.

My little boys do NOT see pirates as romantic or fun now!

Our little kitty Cleo disappeared sometime on Saturday.  We think it must have happened when we were bringing groceries into the house.  We spent 3 hours searching for her at first, and then we added another hour later in the evening.  

We've been leaving the garage door open about 8 inches, so that if she comes home, she can get into the garage at least, and tomorrow we'll start calling the shelters and posting her picture online.  She's just a 5-month-old kitten, so she's not fixed, not chipped, not registered or anything because our vet won't do all of that until 6 months.

The distress in our house is palpable.

And our microwave broke.

(My kitchen situation is getting ridiculous.)

On a positive note, Pixe went whitewater rafting on the Nile!  No pics yet, but I'm hoping!

She also started volunteering at the infant orphanage in addition to her daily teaching responsibilities.

Oh dear, I'm sliding back into complaining--right now, I'm so consumed by lethargy that the idea of starting a new week tomorrow feels impossible . . .