1. Today was day two of snow days this week. I have no idea how many we've had this year. More than 7? Less than 12? Anyway. Yesterday, we began a bit of a "school" routine for school days that we will likely continue in to summer breaks. The first day we only had two subjects. Today, B expanded to 5 and M participated in a random amount of those as age appropriate. E colored and then painted with water colors--- mostly just black water, truth be told. The five subjects were: Math, Penmanship, Reading (his actual reading homework from school), art (x3), and in the afternoon we had a science block too.
2. I feel strongly about the "psychology" of math. For example, when I believed I was good at math and had fun doing it, I was good at math. At one point something happened to change all that and the whole thing fell off the rockers. (Don't get me wrong, I was still fine at math, but it was no longer fun and not part of my future career). So, one of our goals with our kids is not just for them to be good at math, but for them to enjoy it. I messed up on day one of home school math with M and gave her too advanced problems without a solid enough/fun foundation. We fixed that today and she flourished. With B, I had been giving him problems that match what I see him coming home with from school. He answered every single one (roughly 250 in two days) correctly, which tells me they are too easy :) So, I bought him a few new math aps and left him to his own devices while I worked for a bit to see if they would pique his interest. They definitely did and it appears that Brent and I will be explaining multiplication this week :) Pro tip: the way to teach B anything is to have an ap/game involved. This is how he learned to read. Seriously.
3. Art projects: Now, I know these were totally "day 1" projects from a pinterest perspective, but they are fun and were enjoyed by all. I think it helped that they were familiar and made it possible to do multiple projects with multiple kids involved. First, we made watercolor paintings. I encouraged them to make as many as they wanted, but at least one about winter and one of a topic of their choosing. Then one child made loom bracelets while the other worked on cereal bracelets (this doubled as snack time). The loom bracelets are good for concentration, patterns, dexterity, and FUN! E loved the snack bracelets, but lacks the dexterity to really make them, so we worked together. He insisted on only cereal in bracelet form the remainder of the day.
4. Science: I feel like we often repeat the same science projects, but as it has been awhile, we made music with water in glasses and listed to arrange them from highest pitch to lowest. Then we made our music rainbow colored by mixing colors in the glasses to create a rainbow. Then we had to reorganize as some had changed slightly. Then lots of playing and talking about sound and light. The other project was a general goo making project involving Borax that didn't go perfectly well, but was still interesting. We also check in on our ongoing bulb forcing project and talked about plants. I did by a human body ap too as B is studying the body at school, but so far he isn't sure what the point is so we'll have to work on that tomorrow.
5. E is feeling better. He probably wasn't 100% today, but much more active and able to hang with his siblings without needing to touch me at every moment. He did sit in my lap for an extended time while Janna was putting foils in my hair and we waited for Brent to arrive. Totally random experience and only possible with a member of my family doing my hair! Thanks Janna!
6. My birthday was this weekend. Brent and the kids surprised me with Birthday pancakes and Kari was here to sing along for the birthday fun. Then Kari and I went running in the drizzle, which was lovely and my first time running outside since October and first time ever with Kari. Then I scrapbooked a bit before a big lunch with 20 or so people at Cow Calf-Hay including lots of fun presents. Most of the rest of the day I just hang out with Tracie and M while the big boys went to a different birthday party and E slept. It was a pretty chill day, but lovely. (Save that part where it ended with E getting sick...)
7. I am signed up to run the 5K at the OKC Memorial Marathon Race on April 27th. I had hoped to do a longer distance this year, but injuries made that unrealistic. I'd love to have you join me in running, walking, volunteering, cheering, or whatever. Let me know if you are interested and here's a link to sign up. http://register.bazumedia.com/reg/external-link-ref?la=ff6c37d75a7f6ecaeae8535c1d064c68808518b4
8. This weekend is our nephew Matthew's birthday party and probably Grammie's celebration too. I'm very excited to have everyone together again!
9. This seems obvious now, but for future reference, it was in the 70s on Friday and the single digits by some periods of Saturday and Sunday. Sunday included thunder snow, thunder sleet, earthquakes, regular snow, swirling winds and all kinds of crazy. We stayed indoors :)
10. Also, I got new glasses, my kids are not big fans of me wearing glasses and E, in particular, tries to pull them off of my face. That said, I kind of like these. They are a bit different in shape and the prescription makes me a bit woozy at first after wearing contacts so much, but it is convenient at times.
Ps. This is the sleeping on Brent's chest that I mentioned in yesterday's post. Yes, I blogged two days in a row. Shocking, right ?
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