We started our week with a field trip on Monday to the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. It was a very nice museum with four floors of exhibits. And best of all, it was free! A few things were closed on the day we visited, but it still took us about 4 hours to see everything else. Most exhibits focused on particular habitats in NC, such as the coast or the mountains. I particularly liked the displays of different animals, such as clams, sea turtle hatchlings, moles, etc. that bury underground. We went to a Meet the Animals show which the kids really enjoyed. They were able to pet a few animals, namely a turtle, a baby alligator, and a guinea pig. We were also given the chance to pet Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches. I declined. They declined. Ewwww. Daddy, on the other hand, not to be shown up by the lady holding two cockroaches in her hand, decided to give them a little pet. Pride goeth before petting a roach.

EG (5 yrs old):

My baby girl has a loose tooth! Waaaaaah! Sniff. Sniff. I told her to stop growing up. She’s all excited about it. She walks around wiggling her tooth and asking everyone “Can you see it wiggle?”

EG completed week 27 of Sonlight’s Core K. We’re nearing the end of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.  Dorothy is currently on her way to seek help from the Good Witch of the South in a last ditch attempt to get back to Kansas.  In Science K, we read about sound and how clocks work. She was very intrigued about the gears in a clock. I have this little chicken egg timer I was able to take apart and let her see the gears move. Her experiments focused on sound and included blowing across bottles with different amounts of water and straws of different lengths.

EG did a good bit of art this week. I guess we’re trying to make up for lost time. In Drawing with Children, we practiced drawing almond-shaped eyes in order to make “Leo the Lion” look a little less like Tweety Bird (see last week’s report). It took her a while to get the proportions right, but in the end, “Leo” was greatly improved by her just paying closer attention to the eyes. She was very happy with the result. I included a pic. We also talked about primary colors in How to Teach Art to Children, and she completed a few primary color paintings. For art appreciation, we read The First Starry Night about Vincent Van Gogh and analyzed a couple more paintings in Art Fraud Detective.

We didn’t get much accomplished in the memorization department this week due to the field trip and a doctor’s appointment. She did memorize Deuteronomy 6:4, which says “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one.” However, she mostly knew the verse, reference and all, before I even started working on it with her. She told me that she looked it up in her Bible after Sunday School on Sunday. We’ve been practicing looking up verses and passages the last couple of weeks, so she knew enough to try it by herself. I find that when she reads something herself she memorizes it much more easily than if she just listens to me read it. So now when we’re learning new verses or catechism questions we read them together a few times. She also finished memorizing question 93 of the Baptist Catechism.

Soccer has been very slow in starting this year due to the cold, wet weather. EG had her first soccer practice last Saturday, and her first game is this Saturday. She’s very excited about playing this season. I think she has a bit more confidence since she scored her first goal in last season’s last game. In her Gym&Swim class this week, she practiced dribbling a basketball. She didn’t quite have the hang of it, but she had fun just the same.

AZ (3 yrs old):

The Z-man is still working through Get Ready for the Code. He was still on the letter k this week. Sometimes he’ll do a few pages in the workbook, and other days he only wants to do one page. I don’t push him to do more than he wants.  In Sonlight’s p3/4, we’ve been working through Richard Scarry’s What Do People Do All Day? We’ve put some of the other stories on hold since he’s been listening in on The Wizard of Oz. He also continued working in his Kumon workbooks. He told me that one of his mazes was for the weekly report, so I included a pic.

In memorization, he learned the fourth commandment, “Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy”.  It helped that he has heard his sister say the commandments many times. He also finished memorizing question 10 of the Baptist Catechism, which asks “How many persons are there in the Godhead?”

The Z-man started his new session of swimming lessons this week. For his first lesson, he was the only one that showed up. We had a little bit of snow that day, so I guess the others didn’t want to venture out. So, the Z-man had a private lesson. He wasn’t able to participate in the Gym portion of his sister’s class this week, but he dealt with it very well. I always explain to him on the way there that he may or may not get to play. It’s not his class, and I don’t want him getting upset if he isn’t able to participate.

The Z-man enjoyed the museum. When a friend asked him about it, he told her about the animal show and how he had to wash his hands afterward. He was also quite captivated with the Dinosaur Attack video, which is what he is watching in the picture above. I’m surprised he didn’t have anything to say about the nosebleed he had on the third floor. Sigh. I really need to be more diligent about putting Vaseline in his nose before we leave the house.

SA ( 22 months old):

Little Man: The Disinfected Child. Little Man has gotten the idea that he needs his hands squirted with sanitizer every time he hears a toilet flush. And with our house having a woman in her third trimester of pregnancy and a 3 yr old trying to perfect potty training….well….the toilet is being flushed quite frequently, and as a result, Little Man stays rather disinfected.

He’s becoming Mr. Independent.  He wants to copy his siblings, and he doesn’t want to hold hands, even while going up and down stairs. He’s the child the mother has to drag screaming across a parking lot because he doesn’t want anyone to carry him or hold his hand. I never had this problem with the Z-man. He would cry if I didn’t hold his hand. Needless to say, Little Man’s verse to memorize is Ephesians 6:1, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.” Not that he can say it, but I know it’s being branded into his brain and one day he’ll finally understand it!

Little Man loved the museum. (Although, I would say that he mostly loved not being in his stroller.) He got very tickled over a seahorse, which is why he’s laughing in the picture below. These pictures at the museum really capture his personality.

Me:

I’ve been thinking a good bit this week about next year’s school. I’ve been watching some “For Sale” boards and ebay, and I’ve already bought a few things used. I’m just trying to bring the bottom line down a little bit if possible.

Last weekend we received the new chest-of-drawers for the nursery/Little Man’s room. We needed a bigger one than the one we had so we could fit clothes for two kids in it. We’re hoping to get a few more things in order in the nursery this weekend. So much to do…. I did manage to clean the house today with the exception of the kitchen floor (my nemesis). A clean house always makes for a nice weekend, and it’s always easier for me to do other things on my to-do list when there isn’t chaos and dirt about me. Here’s to a productive weekend!