Week 6 Wrap-Up

It’s been a full week.  I cannot believe we are halfway through our first term (and 1/6th of the way through our learning year).  We had a beautiful nature walk on Monday afternoon, some downtown park play with friends on Thursday, and a nice long hangout with my lifelong bestie yesterday while her oldest daughter gave my oldest daughter a little sewing lesson.  Precious memories!  They made a beautiful little handbag together.

Friday night is always family night around here, and last night we included four first year university students in on our fun and games.  Three of the girls are from Nigeria and one from the Bahamas.  They are all a long way from home, are the oldest in their families, and miss their younger siblings.  I think they enjoyed eating pizza and giggling with the kids and us over a rousing game of Apples to Apples.  I have to admit I did feel old though.  These girls were born the year PJ and I were married.  And as our ten year old won round after round of our game, I began to realize she was more on their mental wavelength than I was, and PJ and I are just plain out of touch.  How did that happen?  Has it really been sixteen years since I wandered that campus?  Wow!

Favourite one-on-one moments this week:

Speaking of how times flies, I am feeling rather baby-less these days.  My Little Mister is growing and changing so quickly. He had a real big boy haircut this week, and it was the first time he didn’t fight and squirm and scream.  He actually sat there so nonchalantly in his diaper as I took the clippers to his long blonde locks.  He looks adorable with his new doo, but way too grown up!  Then the very next morning I noticed his diaper was bone dry, and I asked him if he wanted to have a pee on the potty.  He was game, and after leaving him there for about five minutes he comes trotting out to the kitchen triumphantly announcing he had a pee.  Sure enough!  What is happening to my baby?!?!!

Boo had another experiment from her Drop of Water book this week.  We blew bubbles and “caught” them to examine them and watch them grow thinner and thinner and then pop.  As per the instructions I was wetting the rim of a small glass with the bubble solution.  We caught a bubble (after a few burst attempts spalattered on our faces), and I tried to put the dome of our cake plate over top to protect it so we could examine it, but it was too high.  I didn’t have a lower glass so Boo has the idea to use one of her square plastic blocks.  I’m thinking this won’t work, but we give it a try and what d’ya know.  The bubble sat on the block under the dome quite nicely.  The dancing rainbows of bubble film are really a beautiful sight!

Our nature walk this week was a first…the first time we were all on our feet.  

Now that Little Mister is big enough to sort of keep up, we are no longer restricted to stroller friendly trails so we went to one of our favourite secluded spots.  Lance could run off leash, and we could enjoy the beauty and quiet of the woods.  This trail is near a river so we also spotted lots of mosses.  C-Bear has been reading through Ellen McHenry’s Botany in 8 Lessons.  It was a substitution I made for her this year since she had already read Storybook of Science (which is one of the science selections for her Ambleside Online year this year).  The last couple of weeks she’s been learning about bryophytes, and I am hooked.  Mosses and liverworts are fascinating and beautiful!  So that is what my eye and camera were attuned to as we walked on Monday.  Look at that carpet of moss!  Doesn’t it look soft and inviting?

We sort of abandoned our study of invertebrates this week in favour of the changing fall leaves.  We collected leaves of all sizes and shapes on our nature walk on Monday.  I kept them in a file folder under our huge Shakespeare volume to keep them flat.  Then on Friday at breakfast we talked about how the leaves change colour every fall, and later during our journalling time we incorporated a little art lesson.  I gave each of them a blob of each primary colour and challenged them to experiment and make fall colours with their paints.  Then we painted the underside of the leaves and stamped them into our journals.  It was really fun to experiment with colour mixing even right on the leaf surface and see what it turned out like on the page.  It was a chance to introduce the primary colours and colour mixing to my year 1 daughter.  Even Little Mister got in on the fun.  I stamped leaf prints around the edges of a page of my journal and plan to copy a nice fall poem in the centre.

From my journal of thanks this week:

• the encouragement of a great Sunday – baptisms, communion, evening service kicking off for the season – the energy, the love, new faces, and smiles
• so thankful to have PJ home safe after his flying trip to the funeral
• a full and wonderful Monday including a family hike on our favourite trail
• the beauty of fall in this place!
• thankful for a meal plan this week (and the food on hand to fulfill it!)
• the blessing of another taste of summer this week – in October!

From my commonplace this week:

Quick as a thought goes flashing through a man who’s traveled the world – “Ah to be there, or there!” – as his mind swarms with journeys, fresh desires – so quick in her eager flight flew noble Hera now. 

from The Iliad by Homer, translated by Robert Fagles

Not that I have traveled the world, but this quote made me hope that someday my travels will “swarm” my mind and give me sweet memories to cherish when I can no longer go far!

The nearest thing we have to a defence against them (but there is no real defence) is to be very wide awake and sober and hard at work, to hear no music, never to look at earth or sky, and (above all) to love no one. 

from Till We Have Faces by C. S. Lewis

This quote makes me so sad.  But is this not how many people try to “protect” themselves when they misunderstand God and their own purpose?  Oh, let us believe, above all, that God is good and His love endures forever.  Let us hear the music, relish the beauty of creation, and love as He has loved us!

Keeping company today at Joyous Lessons and linking up with Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers weekly wrap up.