Spring's first eggs

On a garden tree
In a bowl of twigs and threads
Five little eggs sit

Texas Bluebonnets

Driving down to Waco we passed fields of wildflowers, but nothing attracts my attention quite like acres of bluebonnets. The kids oohed and aahed over the hills that seemed to be painted with indigo and asked when we could stop to see some. We continued our journey without stopping, knowing that there would be some near my parents' home.

One evening, while the boys paddled the canoe with Granddad, Maddie and I hiked over to the neighbor's fields to check out the flowers. I took my camera so I could figure out some of the best angles for shooting pictures. Maddie and I walked till we got to the first obstacle: the dam was overflowing to a creek. I found a not-too-muddy spot and sort of swung Maddie over the water to land her in a dry spot. I followed. We walked up the small hill and realized it was covered with poison ivy, so I put her on my back, figured out a way to keep my camera from being kicked, and I went up the small hill toward the flowers. Thankfully, that was the end of the poison ivy. Maddie likes to have her picture taken with flowers, and we had a good time snapping photos in the bluebonnets. We did that for about 15 minutes, but that was enough to get a few cute pictures and to realize that I needed to bring the others over (on another night) a little bit earlier to get the sun in the right position. Here are some of the practice pictures Maddie and I got.

Two nights later, my parents helped me get all four kids to the field of bluebonnets. We bribed the kids with ice cream sandwiches to encourage cooperation (yes, bribery is an acceptable way to get four kids to look the same direction, at the same time, and smile nicely.) I got several photos I really liked, but we all got chewed up by mosquitoes. They all got their ice cream after baths. Thanks for helping me, Mom and Dad!

Educational Moments - Week 2

Allen has been working the night shift at work, so the kids and I headed to my parents' in Waco for a week. It worked out well -- Will and I could do school work while my parents kept an eye on the younger three. Since my mom loves doing laundry, and she did all the meal prep, it felt like I was on vacation! Thanks, Mom! Our first night there had a few raindrops, but then the sky burst into rainbows.

Will and I usually finished his lessons by early afternoon, then he would fish and play with the others till dinnertime. One afternoon, Will filled an empty jar with mud, a stick, a couple worms, and a handful of rolly-pollies. The jar became his fascination -- until a sibling checked it out, then it became a reason to fight. My dad told Will that they should hunt for The Great Gambusia. The name alone was enough to lure Will and Jon to my iPhone to look up what they would be searching for. While Ben and Maddie went shopping with Mom and me, Jon and Will stayed with Granddad to catch gambusia.... minnows. They filled a large jar with water and fish, and the boys loved it! Another day, they fished on the lake and caught an assortment of fish. They put the fish in the jar to observe for awhile, then they let the fish go. I think the boys enjoyed seeing the fish in the water instead of how they normally see them -- gasping desperately as the boys wriggle a hook out of the fish mouth.

One afternoon, Mom and I took the kids to the children's museum. We started in the optics and sound rooms since we had been studying eyes and ears and other senses in science. We have studied a few forms of communication, so we also explored the communication room with a bit of purpose. After we did our science lessons at the museum, Mom and I stood back and let the kids explore and play. We spent about four hours at the museum -- enough to wear all of us out.

That evening, the kids got a canoeing lesson from Granddad. In the past, the adults did the paddling, but Dad recently got some smaller paddles so the kids could participate more actively.

Saturday night, we had another educational couple of hours. The last two weeks, we have studied several composers, musicians, and music pieces. Our lessons have introduced the kids to classical music, new vocabulary, instruments, and how they make up an orchestra. Several lessons from this week have exposed Will to opera pieces such as Verdi's Anvil Chorus and Rossini's William Tell Overture, so I was thrilled to discover that a children's opera would be presented at the community college. The kids were a bit excited to dress up for the special event.

The theater was small enough that we were comfortable peering into the orchestra pit during warm-ups. Will identified the instruments and was able to hear them one at a time (instead of just picking them out of the music CDs).

The Chicken Opera was an age-appropriate performance meant to introduce children to opera, and all the kids had a blast listening to the chickens, rooster, duck, turkey, pig, and goats sing! Well... Ben interrupted the beginning of the second act to ask me why we weren't going home yet, but at least he was rather quiet about it. He was just sleepy. At the end, the performers (dressed as farm animals) greeted the children in the foyer, and that spiked all their attention. Maddie pleaded with Gramma to take her to meet the peacocks (ballerinas) and the turkey (a soprano with lots of ruffles in her costume). The boys all loved the fainting goats, and I think all the kids followed most of the storyline. It really was a neat introduction to musical performance for them, and I count it as a successful learning experience since it brought to life so many of our lessons from the last two weeks.

Educational Moments - Week 1

Though Will does have to sit (or stand) through all the lessons, the younger kids only join us when they choose to do so. All of the kids have loved drawing and science. All of the kids have done our music lessons with us. Maddie often sits and copies, in her best handwriting, our scriptures or vocabulary words, while Will works on math. We did our first drawing lesson on Monday afternoon, and it was a hit! In fact, Will was really disappointed that I didn't have it on the agenda for Tuesday. He worked his tail off and didn't goof off at all because he wanted to finish all his lessons with time to spare -- WOOHOO!! I think I have found a motivator for him (for this week, anyway.)

One of the favorite activities this week was when we dissected the cow eyeball. Cow eyeball?! Dissection?! In the first week?! Yessiree -- with five and eight year olds who learned more about eyes from that slightly slimy lesson than they did from a couple of days of looking at labelled pictures of eyeballs. I chose to do the lesson on Saturday because I wanted to have Allen there -- partly for moral support, but mostly because I was afraid I might need another adult pair of hands to help with the kids if I was a mess. I was SO glad to have his help for the picture-taking and for the hand-washing. The kids watched me dissect the eye, but then they got to hold all the parts as we talked about them. Ben and Jon were the most interested -- especially when I let them play with the vitreous humor and try to put the whole eye back together. I thought the lens was the neatest part since we could use it as a magnifying glass. Maddie enjoyed checking everything off the diagram as we found it, but she enjoyed reassembling the eye, too. Will and Allen thought the tapetum was really neat.

Will had an appointment with his counsellor today. When he enthusiastically explained what we did with the eyeball, her eyes got really big. She looked at me and asked why I would do that in the first week with young kids, explaining that most people don't dissect eyes until high school or college. I told her it was part of the curriculum we were using, and I thought the kids would remember more if we did an activity. I told her we believed that what was "normal" in school wasn't ideal for Will, so we didn't plan on doing it the "normal" way. Unless we try home schooling 100%, we won't know if it is a good option for us or not. 

One Day at a Time - First week of school

Just a few of my thoughts after one week on the new job:

It is REALLY hard for me to relax.

Since I am working on just one day at a time (prepping the night before), I am frustrated. I am a planner. I could probably tell you what is on the menu for dinner two weeks from now, so this one-day-at-a-time is a challenge for me. I could plan further out since I have curriculum and lesson plans for about a semester, but I don't know what Will has mastered or on what subjects he will need more time. Until I get a better handle on that part, I'm trying to do one day at a time.... and I remind myself of it by singing my new theme song:

One day at a time, sweet Jesus,
That's all I'm asking of you
Just give me the strength
To do every day what I have to do
Yesterday's gone, sweet Jesus
And tomorrow may never be mine
Lord, help me today, show me the way
One day at a time

Several people have already asked how things are going. I have surprised myself by saying it has been easier than I expected. Before a few weeks ago, I didn't think I had it in me to be a home-school mom, but I guess I've surprised myself with that part, too. Yes, Will tests me...daily... hourly, even. He does the bare minimum and then whines and cries when I have him redo the sentence with correct spelling and punctuation. He throws himself on the floor in a mock-tantrum when I ask him to do math and show his work. He pouts and frowns and grumbles when I ask him to sit still to hear me. Yes, it has been a tough week... BUT, every day started with a prayer asking God to fill me with His love and patience and perseverance, and He gave me what I needed. I did crash each afternoon from exhaustion. I did search the cabinets for a couple chocolate chips to "take the edge off." I did call Allen almost in tears a few times, asking what I had gotten myself into. But, overall, I think it went well. It wasn't much tougher than when I had him do his homework, but this way, we got the power struggles over by lunchtime when I had the energy to handle it.

This week, I think our biggest challenge has been working in the house when Ben, Maddie, and Jon are home. I've put band-aids down where they can reach them because one morning when Will and I were working on math, each of the three came to me twice (so it seemed) bleeding. Every time, it was a minor cut, but they were bleeding just enough that they wanted a band aid. I think we went through a whole box of cartoon bandages in two days, but at least we weren't interrupted again. It is tough for them to understand that I need to work with Will. It is tough for Will to be understanding when they need me for something. I know it will take a few weeks for all of us to be more patient and understanding with this new system. Our second biggest challenge is figuring out how to have productive school days on the days we need to run errands. We'll sort it out somehow.

This weekend, I will look ahead a few days, just to get a little bit of an idea of what is coming. I need to plan ahead just a bit because we will be driving to Waco part of the time, and I need to make sure Will has some independent work for in the car.

Spring Colors

If you go back through my posts from San Diego, you'll see lots of pink and orange flowers. Just seeing those colors gave me such a burst of energy, that I decided I wanted to see them at home, too. Today, we finished our lessons early enough to go to the plant farm. While the kids pretended to be on a jungle trek through the greenhouses, I filled my cart with vibrant lilies, snapdragons, and petunias that are the colors of sunsets and sherbet. I still have seeds planted that should flower later this summer, but the gardens seemed too sparse for spring. We put the flowers in the gardens before Allen even got home from work. Now, I just hope they survive :)

Kitchen Redecorating

At long last, I can give up on decorating my kitchen and living room. It's done -- or at least its "in progress!"

Though I can't say this is what I originally planned, it worked out well that we had enough wall space for some of these posters.

We hung the timeline in the stair-case because it was the only place we had enough wall-space for all 4000+ years. As we study characters and events, we will add a picture of them to our time line so the kids will be able to visualize the order. As soon as I finish getting them cut out, Will will get to put our first two weeks of characters up on the wall: Jesus, Samuel, Mary and Martha; Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, and Handel; Louis Braille, Helen Keller, and Alexander Graham Bell. You might be able to see "BC" with an arrow in the photo above. I did that to show the kids which way to read the timeline, but it confused the little ones a bit: they think BC means go upstairs, and AD means go down.