Is It Really Friday?

I suppose I'm suffering from the "What happened to my week" syndrome! It definitely flew by!

Today, daughter and I finished up our "The Story About Ping" Five in a Row (FIAR) book. She really enjoyed it. It's funny though, to watch her battle loosing her "freedom" to play in the morning and the "priviledge" of getting to have school time with Mommy. She's a bit torn! I think once I get the routine squarely in place, she'll feel better about it.

We are still having trouble getting up on cold, dark mornings, and so our day is...well...short. Oh for a bit more sunshine! I'm regretting not taking our annual trip to Florida, but I can't think about that too much while we have so much to do.

Son, also, is having a bit of a time adjusting to his sister getting first dibbs on my mornings. I moved his "on-your-own" studies to the front-end so that I could handle the preschool things while daughter is more attentive. He's not sure he likes that! He asked me four times today when I was going to be with him. Hmmm.

Speaking of his lessons, we had another fabulous week studying the Tabernacle. What was supposed to be one week in our Judah Bible Curriculum (JBC) has turned into almost 6! I found this incredible lesson plan online and it has fit in perfectly with our Principle Approach/JBC methodology. It's amazing to me how much of the symbolism son understands. Much of it still blows me away. Horns on the 4 corners of the altar=Jesus, the Horn of our Salvation. Amazing! The Bread of the Presence=the very presence of God, and without the smoke of the incense so that we might see Him clearly! So cool! There is so much to be excited about that we just keep going! No hurry!

I was finally able to put my hands on a set of the Edith McCall history books that I'd heard so much about and were highly recommended in Truthquest. In case you're interested in this wonderful set of books that are no longer in the libraries (unless you have a "poor" library, which is better!) they are available through Royal Fireworks Press. I googles Edith McCall until I was blue in the face, and could find nothing. Somehow, probably through the Truthquest Yahoo group, I found this company that's re-publishing. Son really loves these books about all the heroes of history. He read one (we found used) last year at age 7, and it was no big deal. He's flying through them now. So I'd put the age at 7-10 for read alone.

The rest of our week included starting daughter on "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons". I used this with my son before we found "Spell to Write and Read" (SWR). Even though SWR is much better, I thought we'd give this a try just for a little start. I found myself adapting it to SWR anyway, but the book is friendly for her. She really loved it and unlike her brother, she was able to do the writing. Son, at that age, would have none of that! First born thing?

Well, she likes it and even "wrote" a little in her "Ping" lap-pages we created. (Not a file folder backing, but colored paper for our notebook approach. )

Both children are trying the violin. This will be interesting because it is just about the only instrument that I couldn't teach to them if my life depended on it. Son's getting pretty good on the piano, and daughter just wants to do what brother does. It's convenient--REALLY convenient!--that they have a music store full of instruments they can choose from at no charge. Grandpa's legacy! I doubt daughter will continue, but son is doing very well so far. Having asked to play it since he was 5, I figured I'd best not wait any longer. My own longings to play cello have been heightened by all this. Getting a Yo-Yo Ma CD from the library doesn't help! :)
Back to the SWR thing...I realized today that according to grade levels, which I DO NOT believe in or follow, son would be finishing 3rd grade in another 38 weeks at the rate we are going. Hmmm. I think we'll bump us his words to 30 per week and see if we can at least make a dent. At the worst, he'll be...gee...ahead of the public schools anyway!!! No pressure!

As far as his recovery from his injury. We have passed the one week mark and he is chomping at the bit to play--REALLY play. He misses his buddy who is on vacation, and all the friends I won't let him see for fear of a wrestling, play time. One more week should about cover it. We did have to take a trip to the Chiropractor this week for his neck which, as you can imagine, hurts from his head slamming and bouncing off the ice! ICKKkkk! Not fun to think about. I'm a bit tired of people asking me if I saw him fall. The truth is God is merciful and if I had seen him go down, I would not have been able to function, let alone get him to the hospital. For whatever that's worth, which kinda seems like a lot at times!

So, big weekend plans--laundry, book sale, laundry, freezing my rear some more, laundry. That about covers it! Is it really Friday?