Today  we start a new week of school.  IT seems like the last two weeks we didn't get much done.  The 1st week we spent cleaning and painting the dining room because we had company coming for the weekend. Now hopefully we can get back to work. This week  we are studying Canada, The French and Indian wars, simple machines, and all the other normal subjects.  The kids are making big notebooks.  They each have a "world" notebook, a "Native American" notebook, a "States" notebook and  a small "Simple Machines"  notebook. They make a new lapbook/notebook for each science unit we cover.  Then they each have a notebook for all the history/grammar/spelling stuff. 

   They have been adding to the big notebooks for a few years, and will continue to add things as we study each country, etc. in the next few years.We really love using Learning adventures.  This history based curriculum is really neat. 

      We finally put our timeline up on the wall!  It is fun for the kids to make all the little icons to put on it.  It really helps in discussions to point to the timelime and see in time where we are.

    Gotta go......

We haven't got much "school" done lately, but quite a bit of learning about real life.  My husband came home for a few days.We sort of take a break from school when he comes home.  He's an over- the -road  truck driver.  He was gone this time for 16 days.  My kids are all learning what not to do for a living.  This is really helping them realize that they need to start thinking about what each one is gifted in and persue it .

     I was outside vacuuming the cab of the semi and I was turning to go out on the step to vacuum the floor ander the seat and the next thing I knew, I was falling through the air( which seemed to last forever, and I was thinking all kinds of things),

and landed on my neck, head and upper back. I laid there  for about 10 minutes, wondering if I should move.  Anyway , I survived.  Don't wear flip flops  when

you clean out the cab of a semi.

      The kids had testing last Friday.  Most of them thought they did pretty good, except dd#1 who had to go to the bathroom so bad she  only did a few of the math problems.(Oh great)  She said she thought that since it was a timed test, they only graded you on the ones you had time to do.. ..I guess..   I'll try not to think about it

        DS #1 is now into skateboarding.  AT lleast it's good excercise, and good for coordination.   I guess I'll go lay down, my neck is hurting...........

      Here I am today wishing I had started school earlier in the day, so we could have accomplished more.  However, since we had a big dishwashing battle this morning, which turned into a " cleaning the whole downstairs thing", we got a late start. Oh  yeah,  I forgot that I NEEDED to take a walk (or, if I was a kid I would say I needed to run away), and while I was walking and pondering ( de-stressing or something ), I had a great idea.

      What if we all worked together and made a really neat "nature trail" through the woods to the swamp, where we could go and observe frogs and geese and stuff.?Isn't that a great idea? Wouldn't it be good for the kids to promote health and fun togetherness?  So I went back in the house and told everyone I had a great idea.  They immediately stopped their frantic cleaning (before mom get's back) and listened intently.  I said "Let's make a nature trail"   ...silence.    "You know, a neat trail through the woods that is all cleared with little signs naming unusual trees and stuff."  more silence .  #2son  kid says, "what for?"    So I make a little snack for them all first with  squares of cheese and saltine crackers and apple slices. They liked the snack.  #2son says "how did you cut the cheese into such nice little squares?"  someone else says, " they fit so nice on the crackers"  .  Anyway, we

all went outside , across the huge expanse of yard (which we will soon have to mow for hours on end.), and to the woods. 

           We started to make the trail, clearing sticks and stuff.  It went along pretty good for the first 5 minutes.  Then #1son says "when I go outside I get all itchy on my arms, and what's this bug bite, and why do we have to do this?"   #1daughter says "it's too hot in here, and there's probably mosquitos"  Then we reach wetter ground.#2daughters's new white sneakers are getting black mud inside them.    So we get a good idea of laying down as many sticks as we can find to make walkways . 

    Everyone works hard breaking sticks.  As we walk it gets softer and wetter. More Sticks!  Logs! We need logs to walk on. #1daughter entertains #3daughter by pretending a bent over tree is a horse.  Of course #3daughter falls off and starts crying.  #2daughter keeps wanting to walk in the real soft part and I keep telling her to go back until we get enough sticks across it.  #3son finds some neat ferns starting to grow.  He attaches one to the end of a beaver-chewed stick.  Then he notices some really neat moss.  #1son finds an old junkpile .  He gets distracted and starts

digging around for stuff.  H e gets some old tires and we put them in the mud to walk on.  Then he proceeds to hang various things from a tree, such as an old vacuum cleaner, an old heater, and misc.He thinks it would be really neat to hang a whole bunch of junk in a tree, except he doesn't have enough string. (thank goodness).

      The baby has a dirty diaper of course  The three girls ask if they can go in the house now.  So I take them back, change the baby, and go back out .  I find the boys still on the trail(Amazing).  While I was gone they explored back to the swamp, and found out there's nothing to see except more wet, swampy woods.

#2 son says he wants to go use the computer.  So I tell him and #3 son that they can go in now.  So it's just me and #1son.   He says we really need a tractor to move logs in the right places to walk on. I say "yeah, you're right , it's too hard"  So we come to the conclusion that we all got a little excercise anyway. Then we see a tiny little brown tree frog.  It was worth it all after all.

     Anyway, we DID  finally get some academic school done, but we also learned a few things in the woods.