Once again, you ladies humble me with your nice comments.  Thanks!  I'm not worthy!  But really, thanks!

Thursday of this week was an especially good day on the homeschool front so I thought I'd write about it.  And if I need encouragement in the future, I can refer back to this post to remind myself what a good day looks like in our home.  My dh taught at the college today and I was up early enough to see him off, his lunch in hand.  Carmen got up at the right time to prepare for swimming lessons.  We were ON TIME!  I didn't drop anything on the shower floor and she had a great lesson.  Unassisted back float - a big step for her.  Only took six, 6-week sessions to get this far (sigh - that translates into $210 but I know it's worth it - please, please let it be worth it!)  Anyway, it was a great lesson and we came home for our usual after-swim snack of hot chocolate made with real milk and toaster pastries from the natural food section (a bit better for you than Pop-tarts!)  The boys were up, had eaten breakfast and Alec was ready for the day, Chad not far behind.  Everyone did their math and the boys copied from the book of Luke.  We don't do spelling on Thurs.  Carmen did several pages of math from her current fav math book and then read the entire story out of her reading lesson book.  The stories are getting longer and sometimes it's difficult for me to be patient (shame on me!) but she did a great job, only needing help sporadically.  I was supremely proud of all she had done that morning!  I gave the boys a few chores to help me with, I did the dishes, then we had lunch.  After lunch, Chad loaded up the bicycles into the van and we went out to the river walk along the Columbia.  It was a warm afternoon but, as usual, the wind was really cold.  I walked while the kids rode their bikes.  We love doing this and this was the first time it's been warm enough to ride this year.  We came home to rest and then my husband came home from work.  He decided he wanted to finish watching a movie he'd started the night before and we decided to let the boys watch with him (a rare thing here but it was about WWII and they are currently interested in this part of history).  Meanwhile, my daughter asked me to tea so she set a lovely table and I sat down with her and her stuffed deer (I think it's a deer, we made it out of a big woolly sock, a quiet fellow!)  We had fun and I realized how important this kind of play is.  She doesn't play with her plastic dishes very often and I need to teach her how to be a good hostess and manners and all.  It was all so pleasant that I ended up falling asleep when we were done!  A quick nap and then I was ready to make dinner.  After dinner, I read two more chapters from "On The Banks Of Plum Creek" to Carmen, with the boys listening as they were doing whatever they were doing.  Now, I'll back up here for a sec.  During dinner, there was negative talk about each other so I told everyone to say something nice about the person to their right.  And then say something nice about the person to their left.  We all got to laughing and it did the trick.  And, shock of all shocks, when it was my dh's turn, he said this, "Mommy is a talented writer".  Whoa!  My dh does not compliment freely and I was speechless when I heard this but recovered quickly enough to thank him sweetly!  During all this, someone said the word "mummy" for some reason and that got Carmen to thinking.  Suddenly, she wanted to know all about mummies (meaning dead people).  My son pulled out a book I got last year about mummies and she was fascinated.  So, of course, on Friday, she spent a lot of time drawing mummies and asking (and asking!) all kinds of questions about mummies.  That led to discussions about death, the soul, etc.  It was really disturbing to me but I know she is just curious so I answered all I could and looked up what I didn't know.  I personally can't stand to look at mummies so it was difficult, to say the least.  Then I started comparing the beliefs of the Egyptians (many gods) to our belief (monotheism) in one God.  The true God.  I usually try to turn talk toward the Lord whenever I can.  I don't want to miss an opportunity and God can use anything to teach our kids (and us) more about Him.  Anyway, I've digressed again, but at the end of the day on Thursday, I realized how well the day had gone.  And after reading others blogs about their homeschool day, I thought I'd better write it down so I'd remember!  Other things thrown into the mix of our day usually consist of Carmen drawing and creating and Alec trying another project that will either be impossible, really messy or will need a trip to the store for some obscure item (tonight he wanted me to go get wire - sorry kiddo, stores are closed!)  Chad practiced his euphonium and spent his free time reading about airplanes, a new hobby of his.  He's also reading a James Harriott book about dogs.  Alec is really into the Pathway Readers series and I let him stay up a bit later on Thursday because he wanted to finish a chapter.  In our house, I am realizing, learning never stops, it just pauses for meals and bedtime.  And speaking of bedtime ...