He's Cuban?

Ava just found some fruit picks in the pantry that look like little arrows and dumped them out on the floor to play with them. Chase sat on the floor to play too and put one in his mouth and said, "I'm Cuban!". I said, "you're from Cuba". I had no idea what he was talking about. He looked at me in shock that I did not know who "Cuban" was.

"You know Mom...the guy with arrows on Valentine's Day?!"

Homeschool Memoirs #3 Routines (Running Late!)

Hmmmm... My title probably shows that I am a bit lacking in routine....or maybe I have not allowed much margin in my life ( I have been thinking a lot about having margin in life this week since it was the subject du jour at church this past weekend).

We don't have too much of a schedule for school. I do try and make sure the kids are up around 8ish. This is not a problem for Chase at all and he is usually up long before 8. It is a problem for Gabriella! I would like for them to eat breakfast and then "get ready for school". If I allow them to dilly dally, it makes it that much harder for them to get on task for the day.

If Paul is home, we often start the school day off with prayer. Shamefully, we pretty much never start off that way when he is not home ;( Both of the kids almost always start out with math and then usually move on to spelling. Reading is always the last "regular" thing we do. Sometimes I let them have a break and they run around the backyard halfway through the morning, but that often backfires and it is hard to get them back to work. History is often saved for later in the day or sometimes nighttime. Again, waiting to do it often means we skip it and play catch up later on.

The main subjects are pretty much always done by lunch time. After lunch, I try to get Ava down for a nap while the kids play quietly. They are not allowed to watch TV, play games etc until after I leave for work on T, W, and TH. The other days, they are not allowed to until after 3ish.

The kids have Keepers/Contenders every other Friday in the afternoons. The other Friday afternoons they are supposed to be doing a science co-op at Rebekkah's house, but we have not actually started that yet. Most other "homeschool" stuff we do outside of the house occurs on Thursdays with SLC.

I do have a strong desire to be more organized and definitely desire to have more margin in life to actually spend quality time with the kids. I will most certainly be reading what everyone else has to say about their routines to try and glean something from it!

The Office

I am not much of a TV watcher. Back when I was taking A&P in college, I would come home at night and watch Maternity Ward and always looked forward to it. Then one day, it mysteriously disappeared from the schedule. Paul and I do watch Survivor (yes, I think we are about the last ones on the planet to still watch it). That has lost much of it's appeal for me since nearly everyone I like on the shows is voted off. Adding to it's lackluster appeal is that Gabriella and Chase now enjoy watching it too. I know that sounds horribly selfish, but it somehow becomes less enjoyable to watch when you have a 10 and 7 year old asking all kinds of questions about what you think is going to happen now, who is going to win, why did this one lie, and many other questions involving strategy. But, I digress....

There is a show that Paul introduced to me last spring that I absolutely love...The Office.


Paul bought seasons 2 and 3 last year and we watched those together pretty quickly. I started watching season 4 on Hulu (without telling Paul, shhh!) during the day, but they pulled those since the new season is starting and they just released Season 4 on DVD this past Tuesday.

I just saw the commercial for Season 5 this morning and laughed so hard. I called Paul to tell him about it and was hoping he would get the hint to buy me season 4 so I can start watching it before the new season starts. I have been trying to find a link for it online and can't. When I do, I will be sure to post it so I can laugh whenever I want ;)

Little Artist

In a moment of madness ;) I decided Labor Day would be a great occasion to introduce Ava to painting.



I read in a book that it is a great developmental activity to introduce at this age, so I thought, What the Heck!



She eventually tired of that boring thing we call paper and chose to paint her sister's leg instead ;)



All in all, it was not nearly as messy as you think it would be to let a 19 month old paint in the kitchen. There was stray paint here and there and she did paint her hands as you can see.




And here is a pic of my little artist's masterpiece. Magnificent!