Winter Break

I don't think you could wipe the smiles off of the kids faces knowing we are now on our two week break.

It is a wonder we even got some school work done.  The workmen showed up Monday afternoon and worked on the patio roof.  Thank goodness they didn't come until close to lunchtime because otherwise we would not have gotten any school done.  They were just too interesting to watch.  They stripped the roof, replaced the rotten spots, and put a flat roof covering down instead of shingles since we essentially have a flat roof.

Early the next morning, (thank goodness I had showered and dressed), there was a knock on the door.  It was our friend from Sunday School, Gerald, with his painter who spent the day priming and painting the patio.  We had to leave for karate so we were gone for a lot of the afternoon.  Gerald called me to see if I wanted him to paint the trim and backdoor as well.  I declined, since I had planned on painting it anyway.  Then when I got home, I looked and saw just how much trim there was and how high it went.  I may have not declined so quickly had I been at home and looked outside.  Live and learn.  It's on my list of things to do this two-week break.

Despite all the distractions, Henry finished up his kindergarten math curriculum.  It was way too easy for him.  I had been doing two lessons a day for the whole semester and this past week, we did 3-4 lessons a day.  I'm not sure he was ever challenged by it.  But it's good that he experienced a lot of success and he's excited to start first grade math in January.  He ran around the house saying he was in first grade.  This can be the confusing part of homeschooling, they can be in different grades in different subjects.  There's always the joke that homeschool kids don't know what grade their in.  Henry's in kindergarten-ish.  There's always the "-ish."  One of his last lessons was sorting things by weight using a balance.  He had gotten them in weight order and then happily uncovered each cup.


We've had some real improvements with our card-playing attitudes.  Henry just decided one day this week that he wasn't going to throw a fit when he lost card games.  He lost a game of Uno to Todd, paused, looked at him (holding back lots of emotion), and stuck his hand out to shake.  "Good game."  He did the same to me a day later.  It was shocking to witness after full-fledged tantrums over losses.  We are loving it.  It seems the card-playing tantrum-throwing moved on to Caroline.  She sat down to play cards and announced, "It's my turn to win."  We don't play that way, and she lost.  When she gets upset, she cries and wails and throws herself on her bed.  This is how she puts herself down for so many naps.  She starts out upset, lays on her bed with her blanket, sucks her thumb, and before you know it, she's out like a light.  If she should go take a nap when she's married, her husband should know that she's probably not tired, she's mad.

Getting in the Christmas spirit, Josiah pulled the grocery ad out of our recycling box.  He said he was reading it looking for what to get Todd and I for Christmas.  He snuck over to me and pointed out what he was going to get Todd, a Family Size bag of Lay's potato chips.  Back to his ad and a few minutes later he went to Todd and pointed what he was going to get me.  Dove soap.  Thanks?

Saturday we went to a kid Christmas program at the church where our kids did VBS (Vacation Bible School).  This church does everything really big.  So they had this Christmas play with lots of puppets.  The puppets kept breaking out into song, singing Christmas-themed words, but using popular songs.  Sort of like Weird-Al-esque.  The kids probably had no clue that one puppet was Bruce Springsteen, and some others were the group Queen, but it was cute for the parents.  During one number, they had a disco ball.  It was the funniest thing to watch, all the kids were reaching out to touch the squares of light as they moved.  It was very much kin to cats-chasing-lasers.

The kids favorite part were three giant birds singing using blacklight.  It was very cool how they did it.  I didn't get a good picture.

This is the same church that does train displays each December.

We've spent Sunday staying warm.  Saturday it was 77 degrees.  We woke up this morning and it was 36.  When we got to church, we saw that there were kids getting baptized in the baptismal, which as I've mentioned, is outside.  The water is heated, but it has got to be cold when you get out!

Now our two weeks begins.  I have a whole list of things to accomplish, much to Todd's delight (not so much).

Caroline took a few selfies this week, too.  She asked me to hold the phone for the second one, but it was very much her doing.