Week 11 - Family photos, woods, erosion, and muffins

And now I think I am caught up (at least for a minute).

This week was a bit unusual for school scheduling but I suppose that is the beauty of homeschool, flexibility. 

Monday we had an appointment with my friend Jamie to take our photos. She is quite talented and somehow always manages to get a Christmas card worthy shot. This is no small feat with 4 young children.  We tried to get a couple of just the two of us but that might have to wait until we can have a babysitter. Anytime Patrick was told to get closer to me there was a pair of arms wanting him to hold her. Ah parenting. School on Monday consisted of just math. 

On Tuesday morning we opted for a saunter in the woods. This week, Micah's science topic happened to be erosion.  The local conservation group has been working on a bank repair project for several years and so we read the signs at the trail. This was not as interesting to the kids as continuing down the path so I quickly let that plan go. It drizzled on us a little, we meandered off the path on accident and I am pretty sure that everyone cried at least once. Sometimes, that just happens. 

We went home and did school work during the afternoon which seemed to work alright. We all did a science lab with Micah that mimicked weathering and erosion. I had them build a tower of sugar cubes and then they used an eyedropper to drop water on it and watch it slowing erode away. 

Wednesday we had to have a discussion about respect and patience and cooperation. The boys were starting to have some trouble with all three of these while we were doing school. We talked about why those things were important, what the other options were if they were really unhappy and what we should do next. They agreed that we should all work a little harder at compromise and the rest of the week went a bit better. 

Emmett continues to work on his poster about the plotting of a story, area problems, and multi step/multi number multiplication. 

Micah is working on his reading and subtraction.

Jonah worked on learning to write his name this week! I'd say this is pretty good. 

He also loves to help me cook and bake. One night he helped me make pumpkin muffins. Norah was all about getting up on the step stool and "bothering" Jonah. It was making him crazy and so I gave her two small bowls, a set of measuring spoons and a couple of scoops of dry oatmeal. She immediately sat down on the floor and poured, stirred, dumped, and scooped to her heart's content. When she was done she helped me sweep up the oatmeal into the dust pan and dump it in the trash can. A quick once over with the vacuum and all was well, muffins were made, and nobody was crying. Win/win/win. 

Norah is also really excited about cutting and scissors so she practiced cutting with Mad Matter Sand, paper, and several new pairs of scissors.