This second week in December is ALWAYS a whirlwind.
My son turned 8 this week... the lucky guy had two birthday celebrations.
In addition to this, Anna had her first Spivey Hall Children's Chorus concert and my sister and brother-in-law were visiting us from New York.
I can honestly say at the end of the week that I am TIRED, but it's a very happy tired.
Throw in the extra things we did and I'm wondering: How Did We DO All of That?
- a trip to the Governor's Mansion
- a performance by the Air Force Reserve Band
- TWO birthday dinners (one with the best birthday cake ever!)
- piano lessons and LOADS of piano practice
- a trip to the LEGO Discovery Center
- the kids volunteering as "Mystery Readers" at their former preschool
You can see we were BUSY this week! I'm amazed this post is even getting up on time.
This weekly post, however is a priority for me.
I'm learning through homeschooling to just do what I can and not worry about the rest. Somehow it will all get done and life is too short to let worry get in the way.
I look forward to each Friday so I can read your posts and be thankful for the many wonderful bloggers I have come to know.
We'll start with the very end of last week.
I was such a proud mom as I sat listening to Anna's Spivey Hall Young Artists' Concert. I have never heard such beautiful children's voices in my life. Truly.
The concert was recorded by NPR. It was THAT GOOD. (I know I'm bragging. Bear with me.)
I wrote about the importance of giving your child an anchor because I know just how much this activity means to my daughter.
My sister and her husband visited us from New York. It was so nice to have them here. We had a little birthday celebration for Grant and just got to spend meaningful time with them.
We went to the Southern Living Home in Senoia, GA, and later that evening went to dinner (just adults - yay!) in downtown Senoia. If you are familiar with The Walking Dead tv show (I am not, personally), Senoia is the town where this series is filmed.
They say you need to beward of Zombies there. It's created a fun atmosphere in this small southern town.
Many other shows and movies have been made here. It's quite a unique place and it was fun to take a day and just explore!
We actually had a very productive week of school despite all of the "extracurricular" activities.
The kids have been getting distracted from their work downstairs, so we once again set up tables in the "schoolroom" (which is also an upstairs family room/library/craft room) and this worked WONDERS for concentration.
I'm still adjusting to homeschooling a middle schooler, and I'm formulating a big post about this for after the New Year. It's hard, friends - we've struggled this year, but it's all working itself out.
Anna began a unit study about Galen, using the book Galen & The Gateway to Medicine. I can tell from the outset this is going to be a great study, and she remarked to me several times this week how much she enjoyed it.
The kids read quite a bit this week. I think the favorite was a new book that arrived from Tommy Nelson, Fire Prophet. We continue to read The Shakespeare Stealer aloud and want to finish this because The Hobbit is next on our list.
Grant started working with maps in Saxon Math. I.LOVE.SAXON. That is all.
The kids played a lot of Pick-Up Sticks this week. I made a printable scoring sheet and made it available for download on my blog. I think Pick-Up Sticks would make a great stocking stuffer.
I am so thankful a friend of mine mentioned taking the kids to the Georgia Governor's Mansion for their free Christmas tour.
We met the First Lady, Sandra Deal, and had our picture taken with her. She was so gracious.
The theme of all the trees in the house were different Christmas Carols and there was live music playing throughout. What a treat!
It was one of those mornings where I just thanked God for this opportunity to homeschool and my kids probably thought I was a little crazy telling them so often how lucky they are to live this lifestyle.
You just don't get these experiences inside the walls of a traditional school.
We are officially on hiatus from school until 2013.
Next week will consist of fun crafts, baking, and loads of reading aloud.
Anna has her piano recital next week.
Grant is in a musical at church.
I should think about Christmas shopping. (Actually, we don't buy many gifts, just one large thing for each child and a package of books for each of them.)
I had sad news this week.
My Godmother, who was suffering from Alzheimer's, passed away after a long battle with the disease.
She was a faithful woman who never missed a single birthday, Christmas, or special occasion in my life.
When I heard the news about her passing I was happy she was relieved of her pain and had gone to her eternal home, but it also made me solemn for the day. I was blessed to have her as my Godmother and have many good memories of that.
Next week I have a present for you!
We are always learning a lot of Christmas Carols and this year Anna is playing four carols for her recital.
We've been researching all of them, making copywork, finding interesting arrangements, and will share them with you next week.
I'm very excited because she is helping me with this project, and will even provide some of the music for the series! I hope you'll join me next week.
Maybe it can provide you a little bit of light school for the week before Christmas.
I hope you will also join me for Collage Friday.
The rules are simple: Write a post using photo collages to document your homeschool week. Grab the button from my sidebar and use it in your post or display it somewhere on your blog (or text link back to this post). Then, sign the linky and visit other bloggers on the list.
The Collage Friday Community is a fun place to be on the weekends!
(By the way - I love using inlinkz for this link-up. If you host a linky, you might want to give them a try... just click on the graphic.)
