This time of year is so hard for homeschooling!  I think it's hard for teachers in public and private schools, too (as well as students).  Who wants to sit inside and study fractions when you could be outside playing in the sunshine?!  (Just ignore the fact that your eyes are itching, you're wheezing and coughing, and your nose is running!  It's warm and sunny!  Flowers are blooming!  Trees are budding!  Bushes have tiny, little leaves!) 

< twitch, twitch > < has spring overload >

(Us Ohioans often suffer from sunshine deprivation.  Sudden and prolonged exposure sometimes leads to springtime dementia.)

And, yes, we could do an outdoor study on botany or go on a nature walk.  We do this as often as possible, actually, but there are just other days when you don't want to go to those lengths but you also don't want to be stuck inside either.  So, for our sanity, I'm taking breaks here and there.  I had two weeks scheduled off starting next week, but I think I'll save one of those weeks and move it to May.  We are also allowing for more "field trips" and "non-traditional learning days."  Since we homeschool year-round, this works for us.

Anyway, we just finished up a book about Marie Antoinette.  (That has sparked an interest in me to continue reading on my own.)  The girls enjoyed that, and we've moved on in history to Napolean and then Lewis and Clark.  We'll probably pause here for a while so we can read The Captain's Dog which is a book about Lewis and Clark's expedition, from the viewpoint of their dog.  It's good so far.

In the midst of this, I'm trying to plan for next year.  It's been slow-going because of the whole, looming HIGH SCHOOL issue.   Eek!  (Let's not think about that right now, okay?)

And just today I got the coolest thing in the mail!  A while ago, HSLDA alerted homeschoolers to a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.  As long as you agreed to partner with at least one other homeschool family, you could apply for the grant, and the NEH would send you some artwork.  Well, of course, I roped Carolyn into it, and then sort of forgot about it.  Occasionally, I'd get reminders from them that stuff was coming, but I honestly thought it would be some posters or something.

Well, it is AWESOME!  We got 40 poster-sized works of art, ready to hang and thickly laminated.  We got a terrific teacher's manual to go along with the artwork as well.  I think we have to write some kind of essay at the end, and I have promised to display the artwork as well.  The trickiest part will be deciding how to share everything!  And I will admit that the fleeting thought crossed my mind not to remind Carolyn that she had signed up with me.   I couldn't do that, though.  And, anyway, the artwork arrived today as I was heading out the door to spend the morning and afternoon with her.  So I was excited to bring it along and look at it all with her.  We are both surprised at the quality and are excited to use it!

I wanted to add the link to the NEH site.  The initiative is called Picturing America.  http://picturingamerica.neh.gov/