Homeschool Mother's Journal

In my life this week... My awesome hubby was off from work on Monday and made pasta from scratch.  Something he has ALWAYS wanted to do.  It came out AWESOME!!!  I am so fortunate to have such a fab hubby and I am so happy that it is once again the weekend--Yay!--and hubby will be home with us for two days!!

Both A and P were sick.  High fevers, stuffy noses, horrible coughs... My mom used to get grouchy when I was sick and I used to think she was angry with me for being sick.  Now I realize that it's just sort of this sadness that settles in over seeing your most beloveds not feeling well.

I have been addictively reading Anita Shreve.  I've kept up with yoga, as I promised myself I would on vacation.  And I painted an awesome - if I do say so myself - door poster for Read Across America at the library (where I work part time).

In our homeschool this week... The girls were sick, so school consisted of things like preposition bingo (which I created at the suggestion of Easy Grammar).  We had fun with it.

It was a nice, fun, relaxing activity that didn't stress or strain sick girls but reinforced the prepositions.

We played lots of Mad Libs, even though laughing brought on coughing attacks.

I am blessed that my girls LOVE to read.  They spent hours each day laying in my bed with a book (laying in bed all day with a book is in my top five favorite things to do)!  

P did Teaching Textbooks and A and I worked on dividing a two digit number into a five or six digit number.  Khan Academy calls it Level 4 Division.  

We allowed the girls to watch the movie "Troy".  I know it's rated R.  Don't judge.  A friend of ours who teaches sixth grade history has an edited version of the movie and we watched that.  There was a lot of violence, but hey...it's the Trojan War.  I am glad that the girls got an idea of what Greek Warriors looked like.  Hubby is glad that they didn't find Brad Pitt  HOT (although I pointed out that Brad Pitt is older than us and the girls have mentioned "hottie lamotties" before! lol).

After watching Troy, the natural thing was to read the Odyssey.  I was thrilled that our library had this graphic novel based on the Odyssey.  I think it was a great introduction to the Odyssey and the girls have been getting a lot out of it.  Actually, we read it at night when Jason is home and we have ALL been getting a lot out of it!

The illustrations are gorgeous!

Places we're going and people we're seeing... The girls were too sick to go to choir or craft time or homeschool swim or skate this week.  But I went to work, got ready for Read Across America next week and caught up on gossip conversation with my public school mom friends whose children attend our craft time programs.  

My favorite thing this week was...  Listening to my girls playing and hearing them call Ken "Odysseus" and Barbie "Penelope" and realizing the four Barbie dolls stranded in the middle of the floor were supposed to be sirens.  I was so blissed out that for a minute I thought I had entered the Land of the Lotus Eaters.

What's working/not working for us... This is where I lament about A's disdain for math and admit that I gave in, though I said I would not and I ordered Math U See Epsilon.  Upon further investigation, I liked that Math U See would cover fractions so thoroughly and felt that even if she grudgingly slogged through JUMP Math, Singapore, Teaching Textbooks, Aleks she may not have mastered fractions and we may well end up buying that program next year.  Why waste a year?  A took the placement test and placed into Epsilon.  But I am NOT buying another math program until she finishes one of the ones we bought.  She basically has a sampling of everything out there!

Homeschool questions/thoughts I have... There was a point where I realized we had not done school in over a week and I freaked out fretted about it.  Then I realized that the public school kids were on vacation part of the week and none of my girls' public school peers knew what the Odyssey was, never mind pretended Barbie and Ken were Penelope and the suitors and Odysseus!
A photo, video, link, or quote to share... On Thursday afternoons when I go to work, my AWESOME Mom comes and brings Chinese food and teaches my girls how to sew on a machine!!  A and P are ALL ABOUT American Girl dolls and making clothes for them.

A made this outfit this week:

She is very proud of herself,

and I am VERY proud of her, too!!

A was VERY proud of how close the sides match up :)
and obviously we need to clean those stitches! lol

I am pretty impressed with the pleated skirt!