Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Week #10

I can't believe how quickly the days have passed away! It's been a whirlwind of activity around here and doesn't show signs of stopping. In fact I may be facing a few loop-de-loops! :D

A recap of last week (#10)

Monday we began our butterfly lapbooks. I wanted to start them a couple weeks ago but we never got to it. So I gave the kids the folders I canabalized and a bunch of printouts. We filled out some diagrams and that's as far as we got. They totally lost interest. We read Becoming a Butterfly by Anne Rockwell. Great book. We also read a couple chapters in A Wrinkle in Time. Our word of the day was AUGMENT. and we did our workbooks. Seems like an easy day, right? Except we were coming back from fall break and none of us were feeling like digging in - me included! In math we are working on multiplying decimals. Ugh! Such a difficult concept to teach. Anyone have any handy tricks?

Tuesday, being the first Tuesday of the month, was our MOMS group meeting. It takes up the whole of the morning. I love the group and at the same time I'm glad it only meets once a month. So we did our workbooks and read some more in A Wrinkle in Time. Our word of the day was ORDINARY.

Wednesday we went to our homeschool group meeting. We joined a couple weeks earlier and the kids absolutely LOVE going to this group. So that takes up our morning as well. But, we got up early (thank you time change) and did all our workbooks! So when we got home we had lunch, we finished reading A Wrinkle in Time and we started our US State Study. We are beginning with Maine. I used 2 folders so I could have 4 flaps. We filled out some worksheets, labeled some maps, looked through some atlases. I checked out some of those books they have at the library for each and every state or country (almost) in the world. I love those books, but they can be a little dry. So I had them look through the books at the pictures for right now and stop to read anything they thought was interesting. Our word of the day was EXTRAORDINARY.

Thursday we were supposed to do some more on Germany, but our internet was down so after a few minutes fiddling with it, I gave up. I have no patience with technology. So we did our workbooks and we started a new book, Phineas L. MacGuire...Erupts! by Frances O'Roark Dowell. This book is hilarious! Chapter 3 had us rolling! And our word of the day was COMPREHEND.

With DH's new schedule at work he now has Fri through Sun off. So Friday we went to Sea World, had lunch out (chinese) and just played the day away.

Saturday the kids were at Disney Quest with their friends so DH and I had "a date" and spend a couple hours at the Masters Art Festival in Downtown Disney. There was some really great art there! We even found something we'd like to have when we finally get a house!

Sunday we went to 9am service, went to lunch, picked up some milk, dropped it off at home and went back for the 5pm service. We spent the rest of the evening watching Stargate Atlantis season 3.

And now it's a new week! :D

Friday, November 2, 2007

Fall Break (week #9)

I woke up Monday morning and just did not feel like doing anything. So I figured since we had so many other things going on this week we'd take our fall break like planned.

I spent my time finishing up halloween costumes for everybody. The kids spent their time watching movies, reading books and magazines, and playing video games. And of course, we did the grocery shopping, ran errands, did laundry, cleaned the RV, blah, blah, blah...

The highlight of the week was, of course, Halloween. The kids couldn't wait to get at the candy. And once again I had to remind them that they wouldn't be eating any of it. I know they have a hard time understanding why I throw it all away, but it's just the way it is. After trick or treating we went to the church's event at the Fun Spot. The kids had a blast riding the bumper cars and driving the race cars, while hanging out with friends from church. They got a small bag of candy there too and that one they got to keep. I took them to the store today to pick out their own halloween candy.

Here is a pic of the kids in their costumes.




K wanted to be one of Lily's "Lola" characters from the Hannah Montana show. I'm glad she chose black/white Lola since it was super easy to come up with the outfit. The biggest expense was the wig and I really feel we got ripped off. What a piece of garbage! I didn't have any white extension hair in my stash and I didn't have time to order any so we had to use it as is. It worked I guess.

J is the manga character Naruto. He's been wanting this outfit for over a year. We looked on the internet and ebay and couldn't find one for less than $100! And most of them looked horrible. So I made it myself. I went to JoAnn's and picked up a pattern that included pants, shirt and vest. I altered the vest and shirt pattern to what I needed and spent about $40 all total for all the little details. I even made those funny little shoe things out of some felt and his flip flops. When I finished the jacket, he put it on and didn't take it off for hours! I think he really likes it. My DH said I should make up a bunch of these to sell on ebay. Yeah - I have plenty of time for that.

I didn't get to dress up this year. All my costumes are in storage in MI. But my DH said most people would think I was in costume anyway because of my dreads. He's such a smart aleck sometimes.

So now it's late Friday night and I haven't done anything to get ready for school next week. Can I take another fall break? LOL Next Tuesday we'll take off because of MOMS group at church and Wed. morning is the homeschool group so we'll probably take that off too. Plus DH's schedule at work changes next week and now he'll have F/S/S off. Maybe we will take another week off....I don't see us getting much done anyway!

Well then. To the weekend! :D