A new week, A fourth week Oh Best Beloved

We've added Explode the Code as well as Spelling Workout today. We did well to discuss ancient India and listen to a few of Kipling's "just so stories." The sun chapter from Apologia wasn't so overwhelming at all and we'll finish it tomorrow. Then we'll go on to Mercury for a day on Thursday. We'll also review Ceasar and move on to the fall of Rome and the birth of a Savior.

My students did so much cleaning last week due to the fact that I inherited a different, new-to-us vacuum. There was a basil bread recipe for enticing workers. I also found the Habitat for Humanity ReStore in Elgin on Saturday. That was interesting indeed. We recovered over a quiet weekend from the previous when an Iowa aunt and uncle with cousins visited. We had explored Millenium Park with the Air and Water show on the shore of Lake Michigan at Navy Pier.

So, soccer is in full swing and piano lessons begin too. I've signed up the little girl for gymnastics and we look forward to an adventure over Labor Day Weekend. We'll have 20 days of school by then, so hoorah for diligent students!!!

Soccer Started!

Both boys enjoyed their soccer practice last night and I enjoyed them on the same team. There was not as much running on the first practice, but it was a beautiful evening in Chicagoland. My little Pooh went off merrily to an Indian Princess meeting with Daddy and returned late very bouncy trouncy.



We finished ancient China and the Olympics study, and now have done a few days of ancient India too. We've studied the definition of astronomy and some information about the Sun. I'm prepping for a study of Mercury next week and the continuing saga of Rome through the end of SOTW I soon. I'm anxious to move on to the life of Jesus and the prophets because of my Fall Bible study in Acts. I'll be even more ready to get to a study on Byzantium because of my background in Turkish studies.



BTW, I was at the library (God bless those librarians in the Children's section of our Village library) and read a wonderful children's story from the non-fiction section called The Donkey of Gallipoli: A True Story of Courage in World War I. The artwork was wonderful and made me more interested in visiting Cannakkale some day on a trip to Turkey. I hadn't been there before because I don't usually visit sites of horrific destruction. I didn't have to see the Twin Tower site to know it happened and thousands died. I won't need to visit Auschwitz to know that millions died. I won't need to stand on Omaha Beach to know that freedom is paid by the lives lost. I certainly didn't go out of my way to find the site of death on the Aegean coast where so many died during WWI, but may now just to honor those who paid with their lives.

Olympic ceremony sketches

Almost without seams...

A few snags, but nobody got hurt (squirted with a water bottle though). We didn't sit at desks at all, but the kitchen table and library room floor. It was a reduced workload and we finished before lunch after doing Bible journey journal, prayer/pledge/ weather observations (stormy Mondays seem to be my first day of school destiny), described familiar curriculum materials and durations. We read a portion and narrated a fiction story that describes the Olympics to kids. We listened to a few stories of the world pertaining to ancient China and then finally accomplished a devotion draw/write from "Right Choices." We will be sitting in the green reading chairs soon. It was way too overwhelming to begin the first day of school without help from the Daddy (who flew for work to SFO) in the storm waking everyone for a super early breakfix. I didn't loose any of the materials I needed. We will watch an old version of Tom Sawyer before box pizza for dinner, but right now the students are building an imaginary legoland.
PRAISE GOD!