Oh the fun of planning for next year... NOT!

In his free time, the nuclear engineer Daddy taught our budding plumber how to remove the blue 1970's sink from the guest bathroom and replace it with a 25$ one piece used sink from the Habitat For Humanity Re-Store shop. I keep trying to explain that learning a trade is the best way to pay your own way through college.

We reviewed Uranus and Neptune today and introduced Pluto and the Kuiper Belt from Apologia Astronomy. We've built a volcano to demonstrate the largest volcano in the Solar System from Mars and soon we'll explode a rocket to demonstrate the space exploration to Saturn. The topic of science keeps getting more and more interesting as I consider that the Well Trained Mind formula asks me to take my kids into chemistry next year. I've looked at at book called "Real Chemistry" and continue to explore other options as well. But for now, we will move from the Astronomy topic into the Flying Creatures Zoology I book from Apologia as well to discuss habitats further in the context of birds, insects etc. I'm an Earth Science geek and will do whatever necessary to get the kids outside and explore during all this craziness.

I was so pleased to hear about the amount of stars in the sky when we were out on the southwest Iowa farm over the weekend. The boys have learned to look up and enjoy the night sky without all the lights of the city. BUT, when we come back to Chicagoland we also look up to count how many planes are lined up for landing at O'Hare. Amazing!

But for now, the seed trays are clean and ready for seed-starting mix. It's past time to get the garden growing and I'm finally ready to put it together with my junior gardeners. They've been ready for a while to get at the digging part. They've been diggers for most of their lives come to think of it. Speaking of digging out, this is a picture of our efforts to clean up the driveway during January.