Week 22 and Life

 *This post was the 3 week Christmas break, one week of school, plus life, because that happens too. MTH teacher- promise we did school.  Feel free to read it you want, but you don't have too, a lot of this is just an update for friends.

I've mentioned before one of the best things about homeschooling is you can travel, whether for vacations or necessity.  Because we live in such a rural place we, ironically, travel to Grandma's farm when we go to "the city" for medical appointments or shopping. Having Walmart 20 minutes away instead of an hour is kind of exciting. 

While at Grandma's, the youngest two went on a bike ride and the older two learned about different birds. 

Geese flying south

Cooper Hawk (we think), hopefully hunting mice, not chickens.

We had a pretend restaurant and movie theater where they learned about money and change.

And there was plenty of watching Wild Kratts and enjoying Grandma time.

Before the trip, we played games, enjoyed the rare snowfall, and made texture rubbings.

K discovered that if he put a small ball on the back wheel of A2's strider bike, and spun the wheel, that the little ball was just the right size that it would spin as well. He tried it with his own bike and learned it was just small enough to go under the bar and went around with the wheel.

When we got back from Grandma's, the plan was to finish up a few loose ends from school and enjoy the homeschool Christmas party. Well, life had other plans. We woke up Monday morning to find out our kittens had been throwing up all night.  Early afternoon I was making some candy to take to the party, when the cats were both vomiting blood! To make matters more stressful, the friends that were supposed to walk to our house, so we could take them to the party, never showed up!  Fortunately, my husband was home. He quickly wiped up the bloody vomit and jumped in the car to look for lost children, while I babysat the boiling candy and frantically called the vet.

Within the next five minutes two fortunate things happened: the friends were found- they had walked to a different friend's house- and we had an appointment at the vet. But the chaos didn't stop there. The appointment was in 80 minutes and, just like most other parts of civilization, we live an hour from the vet. 

I threw the candy in the freezer, so hopefully it would be ready in time for the party, gently set the cats in their crates, and headed towards the vet. While I was racing- at a safe speed of course- to the vet, my husband loaded up the kids to take them to the homeschool party.

Well... My husband's old truck had been sitting in the cold all week and decided it was not going anywhere.  He only made it one block before warning lights of all kinds began to scream at him.  Fortunately, my husband's parents only live about a block away, and they were able to give everyone a ride to the Baptist Church where our party was being held. (No separation of church and homeschool here.)  The kids decorated Christmas gift bags for all the truckers that drive through our little town. 

In the meantime, the cats were x-rayed, rehydrated and given nausea medicine as a very expensive Christmas gift to them. I brought them back home to rest, got bonus kids back to their parents, and enjoyed a nice dinner.

The next day we once again attempted to finish school up.

J finished writing her silly stories, which we will publish in the coming weeks, we did some OT for our kids with sensory needs, and wrote thank you notes to grandparents for the birthday and Christmas gifts they gave the children. This is one small way I hope our children will learn gratitude. We also continued to read as much as we could.

Speaking of reading, we noticed J reads exceptionally fast and understands what she reads too. I wanted to have her take a speed reading test especially after she read book 4 and 5 of the Dragonwatch series in one weekend. Those ain't tiny books! (430-600+ pages).

For reference, the average 5th grader silently reads between 150-200 words per a minute. Adults read non fiction, on average, at 238 WPM. We had her take a couple speed reading test at fifth grade level. She averaged 300 wpm on non fiction with over 92% reading comprehension. She loves books. Coincidentally, she wants to be a librarian when she grows up.

Lastly, we finished up with a final math/science/technology project: Building a marble runner.

 As you can see, we used high tech building material.

J was the mastermind designer. My favorite part was where the marble "flew" from one tube to the next.

A wanted to make sure we could see the marbles rolling down and cut holes in the tubes.

Overall, it turned out pretty good.

Then is was Christmas break!  First, everyone helped clean up the house.

"I got the laundry."

"I'll do the dishes."

Then we baked cookies and brought out the snacks.

CHRISTMAS!

(Thank you My Tech High for the funds for A and J's Legos, games, and books.)

A got a dream Lego Set and books. J got books and drawing supplies. Santa's elves also found good deals for K and A2. The family has new games to play together, too. 

Our pet Dragon got a box.

Boxes are kinda his thing

The dog got a ball and the other cat a toy mouse- she ran off with it before we got a picture.

The rest of the day was spent eating candy, playing games, and talking with family.

The next day chaos struck again. Our old freezer, that we had just filled with food, decided to stop working. We think we salvaged most of the food, but between the vet, the truck, and the freezer this was our most expensive Christmas yet. At least for the first time in forever we were all healthy!

We enjoyed more snow, which the whole community has been praying for, and snuggled under blankets as we watched movies and read more.

We also celebrated another birthday and Grandpa took the the boys ice fishing.

All in all, it was a good break.