It's been one of those weeks that we've just powered through. I'm glad we have a good rhythm this year for our school. It's helping to get some days out of the way before the winter doldrums hit us! Although, last week and this week I ended giving the boys Friday off. Last week I made them help me clean out our greenhouse and this week, we just had a lot of errands to do and house cleaning to do.
Monday morning was pretty routine. We did our usual work here at home. In the afternoon we had our bi-monthly art class and then a 4H meeting. Art class is always nice as many of us moms are able to sit in a side room and visit while the kids have class.
After art we had our bi-monthly 4H meeting. I run a local club. This is only our second year. Our focus last year was on GPS/GIS. This year we added Adventure & Challenge and Arts & Crafts to that focus. Our plan is to do an art project each month and then an Adventure or GPS outing on the second meeting of the month if the weather plays nice.
Working on their luminaries
This week was an art project week. We made decoupage fall luminaries and thankful tree paintings. I found both ideas on Pinterest. They turned out pretty cute actually. The hardest part was finding fake leaves that would work for the luminaries.
The luminary doesn't have a great link, but these is the photo showing the supplies and really, it's pretty easy to make. I also found battery operated flickering tea lights at the local dollar store so everyone had one for their luminary.
Monday evening I attended a homeschool mom encouragement workshop. It was excellent. I talked about it earlier this week.
Tuesday, as always, was our busy day. My oldest son is still taking his college readiness class. I have to share that I am so pleased with well he is doing. He really seems to like it. He's struggling a bit with math still, but he just told me this week that he's finally beginning to understand it. I've seen such a large amount of growth in him. I'm very glad we opted to try this class out.
The two younger boys and I hung out at the pool again for a couple hours. Poor kids though. This week they asked if they could swim when they didn't have lessons. They had opted not to bring any schoolwork to the pool and to finish it later. The instructors don't mind if they swim as long as they don't interrupt the lessons going on.
Well, for my youngest son, this worked out fine. He had his lesson first, forty minutes, and then was able to pretty much swim for another hour while other lessons were going on. However, my middle son also opted to get in the pool at 9:15. His lesson didn't start until 10:30 though and he swam for the entire time before that. He's in a higher level so most of his lesson is working on endurance and stroke. The poor kid was so tired and really struggled to keep up. Lesson learned. No swimming for the entire time before his lesson next week!
My youngest getting a chance to jump in the pool at the end of his lesson.
I start my day really early on Tuesdays as well. I get up at 4:30, have my quiet time, and then go to the gym for a 5:30 class. It's a strength training class. I try to do that twice a week along with my Zumba. It makes for a long day though.
Tuesday nights my hubby and I also attend a Bible study so it also makes for a late night. We have been doing a survey of the Bible. It's been excellent and, while I'm usually pretty tired by the time we get there, it's very much worth it every time.
Wednesday is our nice quiet day at home. We have music lessons in the morning. This week they were later than usual because our teacher had car trouble. I honestly can't remember what else we did on Wednesday other than lessons and karate that evening. I am working to have more days like this!
Thursday is another early start day for me. Although, I have to admit that this week when my alarm went off at 4:30, I rolled over, reset it to 6:30, and went back to sleep. I was just so tired I could just barely open my eyes. I had even gone to bed early the night before! I just needed the sleep I guess.
My oldest spends the first two hours of the each Thursday at math lab which is part of his college readiness class. He was the only one there this week. He also uses it to work on any other homework he may have for the other classes he takes as part of that course. His brothers and I did the weekly grocery shopping and then just parked in the local grocery store lot - way at the back - and did the rest of our book work for school. One of the best perks of homeschooling.
One reason I wanted them to get as much done as they could then was that we also had our bi-monthly Spanish class today. I knew that by the time we got home, we'd all be too tired to want to do much else. I like our Spanish teacher. She's a young mom fluent in the language. She used to teach high school Spanish. She will be leaving for the mission field next year with her husband and son so this will be our last year using a tutor.
As soon as I got home, I had the boys quickly unload the truck and I hopped back in and headed downtown to meet my hubby for lunch! I mid-week date! We rarely get to do this since I babysit a two-year-old. However, I haven't had him for a couple weeks as his mom is out of work for awhile. I miss having him around, but I have a lot of flexibility in my schedule these days.
I did get to spend a few hours with him this afternoon though. His mom had a follow-up appointment for the surgery she had last week so I watched him for them while they went to that. It was so nice having him back in the house for a little bit.
Thursday evening I have been going to a Titus 2 women's Bible study. I talked about that this week as well. I also plan to share weekly about the things we're learning. We are actually over a month in. It's all been excellent so far.
Friday, as I mentioned, was a day off for the boys. The younger boys still had their play practice but that was it. We all had a nice quiet morning. The younger boys are in a homeschool production of A Christmas Carol. My middle son will be Bob Cratchit and my youngest will be both in the group of carolers and the poulterer - the gentleman that sells Scrooge the big turkey at the end of the story. I think they are both really enjoying themselves.
After play practice I decided it was finally time to finish outfitting them for the colder months. I had checked earlier this week, after we had already had our first snow, and realized I had no snow pants for my youngest, neither boy had snow boots that fit, and both had sneakers that had seen much better days. Off we went to see about remedying the situation.
I started at a local thrift store and not only found snow pants for my youngest, but I also picked him up a much needed pair of work boots. I ending up also picking up an absolutely gorgeous long coat for my middle son to wear in the play. It was a very pricey coat but I paid only $11 for it. Such a great score!
We then headed for the local box store and bought sneakers for both, snow boots for both, and work boots for my middle son. Phew! Hopefully their feet won't grow that much this year and these will last more than a season!
This was one of my more relaxed weeks and for that I am very thankful.
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