Tuesday, April 20, 2010



I didn't realize until late this evening that this is National TV Turn Off Week. Middle Girl had mentioned it when she came home from school one day last week, but we'd never really discussed it further. Ironically, the television has been on more this week than in the last three weeks. Middle Boy's been sacked out on the couch with a stomach bug, so it's been mostly for his benefit, but I think we've all watched a good deal more than usual.

The thing is, though, that we're just not real big television watchers in the first place. Even when they turn it on of their own accord, the kids hardly ever sit in front of the tv for the duration of an entire show. There are a couple of things they like to watch, but Middle Boy is far and away the only child meticulous enough to pay attention to the times and dates that his show airs. I think the girls must get it from me, because as much as I've enjoyed certain shows, I've always been notoriously bad at remembering when something is on and turning on the television.

(At this point, I make a mental note to myself that Food, Inc. is on PBS tomorrow night at nine and I've been wanting to see it. I'll probably end up missing it because I have a Girl Scout meeting that will run until 8:30 and then I'll get home and there will be things to do and it just won't cross my mind again until I'm getting into bed for the night.)

In other news, my digital camera has died. I was taking pictures of the kids on an Easter egg hunt at my parents' and set the camera down outside. I forgot it was there until, several rainstorms later, I went searching for it in my bag and came up empty. It wasn't a great camera by any means, but I'm mourning the pictures of Youngest waddling through the woods in search of plastic eggs that died with it.

Eldest is still working through a long, slow math lesson block. I think we may do another mini lesson block on math over the summer so we can finish covering all the grade 4 material. She's been reading almost non-stop lately, and as she didn't start reading on her own until just over a year ago, I'm loathe to call her away from it for lessons. Her homeschool Waldorf class performed their play last week - Jacob and Esau. Since the program starts a new "grades class" every two years, the class she's in is doing a third grade curriculum this year. It works out well because we don't get overlap with things she does at home. If anything, she hears stories we heard over a year ago and is glad for the retelling.

Middle Boy has started a new main lesson block on "saints". We're finishing Gandhi and will be moving on to Mother Theresa. I think he's really enjoying it. His class's play was The Pied Piper of Hamelin. Very sweet.

I think I'm too tired to form much more coherent thought, so I'll leave off here for tonight.

Saturday, March 20, 2010

The sun is (sort of) shining through the hazy sky, and the kids are playing outside with light jackets on. I'm ostensibly cleaning house (though here I sit with a nursing baby dozing on my lap) and enjoying the open windows.

The dive headlong into our next math block has begun and I'm very proud of our progress. I realized that we've been too busy to really get down to circle time in the mornings, so we've been reciting arithmetic facts in the car and it's actually been great fun. I feel like we'll be done with fourth grade in total by June, and our second grade lessons are already winding down for the year. Next year will be first, third and fifth if the little one comes home from public school. I am so looking forward to the fifth grade. Botany! Geometry! I can't wait. (And, um, the future-fifth-grader is plenty excited as well, I think.)

We've also been mapping the Erie Canal for local history/geography. Having grown up here, I don't think I ever got a clear picture of the canal's significance, and it's fascinating to see how our local geography shaped, and was shaped by, the canal.

Another load of laundry is calling my name, so I'll end this post here. Maybe I'll get the hang of this "blogging regularly" thing after all.

Sunday, March 14, 2010

So nearly a month has passed again, but I am still determined to start blogging more often. Hopelessly optimistic, that's me.

Our home school lessons have been on hiatus for a couple of very busy weeks. March was supposed to be a math block, and we'll be starting that tomorrow, pushing everything else forward a couple of weeks. My perfectionist tendencies go into overtime every time we have a math block approaching and I keep putting it off until I feel everything is perfect (which never happens, of course). I've decided we're just going to dig right in now and then if we don't accomplish everything we'd like, we can do a long, slow math block over the summer.

The kids adore math, so this is my problem, not theirs.

We've been doing a lot of reading aloud lately. Middle Girl is reading "When We Were Very Young" by A.A. Milne. She's very into poetry right now. Middle Boy is reading "Highway Robbery" by Kate Thompson. All three kids are currently enamored with "The Highwayman" by Alfred Noyes (as sung by Loreena McKennitt), so this book fits in perfectly. And Eldest and I have been reading Anne of Green Gables. Oh, Anne. My first literary love.

Eldest is also reading "Beowulf" (a graphic novel version), and "Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing". Next up on her list is "Ella Enchanted".

Tomorrow Middle Girl is off school for conferences and I promised her I'd help her make her own knitting needles. I made a bunting baby for the little guy this week and I'm feeling very much in a handwork groove. Speaking of the wee boy, he's telling me he's ready for bed, so I'd better oblige him.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Oh, the Toddlerness of You!

It's been that kind of few months in which there has been much to blog about and no time to blog. The girls turned 6 and 10 at the beginning of January, but more on that later. The big news around here is the very first birthday of Sir Babypants.


The birthday ring and lemon cake:

first birthday ring

For five seconds, he even wore his birthday crown:

ONE!

Sweet potato soup is good birthday food:

birthday grabby boy

And this one, I couldn't resist. Those eyes, swoon:

Eyes!

He is fearless, single-minded, happy and funny. Oh, is this boy funny. And he knows it. We just started a parent-child Waldorf class together, taught by a dear friend, our amazing kindergarten room teacher at LCG. He is having a fabulously good time there with all the other small people. At home, all he wants is to keep up with his siblings (who are luckily willing to slow down to a reasonable pace for him).