Update

We have all been sick here at our house for well over a week. Marco was first, then Lucia, then Sylvie and me. Julio's missed out on being sick so far. The first week, it was like; we'll stay home, but go out if we have to. Then, it got worse, so we just stayed home. Sylvie hasn't been sleeping; she would wake up screaming in the night and doing the hurt sign. I finally took her to the doctor yesterday and after an x-ray and 3 hours, we found out she has pneumonia. I came home and went straight to bed with a fever. I've been coughing so much, my stomach hurts. So, who takes care of the sick mom? So far we've missed out on park Friday, any fun weekend activitities, church, an FHE at a new friends' house, a Valentine's party with our former ward's playgroup, play dates...I can't wait for this to end!

The aforementioned pictures

Lucia and Marco at a friend's Valentine's party.

Sylvie wanted to be part of the group.

Marco in his Chinese mask.

Lucia with her Chinese lantern and her zodiac sign-she's year of the monkey!

I really don't feel like blogging

I have some pictures to upload, but the computer won't read my card...
So, this is my blog-I can complain if I want to. I'm tired. My kids haven't been sleeping well for about a week now and I'm feeling extremely sleep deprived. Plus, I have a terrible case of athlete's foot. From what? I have no idea! But it hurts! So, enough griping for now.
Last week we had a Chinese New Year's celebration with about 20 of our homeschool friends. It was a great success-despite Marco getting injured the night before and having to go to the doctor's. We learned about the Chinese zodiac, made lanterns, felt potstickers, red money envelopes, and had Chinese snacks. Lucia has started her Friday classes at the charter's learning center. She's had art and science, but because of a scheduling conflict with our play group-we'll switch her to an emergent read class. She is doing really well-can count money, and is blending simple words. She's got quite a repertoir of high frequency words. Since we started learning about money-she became interested in Lincoln. So, we read and studied up on Lincoln. Tomorrow we are going to a Valentine's party at a friend's house. The only thing about homeschool is feeling so secluded. I'm home with kids all day and don't get out much. I'm also just...tired. The days go by so fast and I feel like a lot of things don't get done. Oh well.
Until next time!

My Dear Sweet Girl

Lucia is a lot like me in many ways, but she has a lot more redeeming qualities than I have. First of all, she's very sweet. The other day she says to me, "I love my family, but Sylvie is my favorite person in the whole wide world. I love her so, so, so much!" It's true-she is always sweet to Sylvie and helps to watch her and take care of her. She is also very sweet to Marco, despite his being difficult at times. The other day as we were getting ready to leave the park, Marco started to throw a tantrum. So I said, "Let's race to the car and see who gets there first!" So Lucia went back to where Marco was crying and held his hand and said, "Ready, set, go!" Then she let him beat her to the car and said, "Good job Marco!"
Doing homeschool with Marco is not easy because he wants in on all the action. As much as I try to keep him occupied, it doesn't always work. So, after I was getting a little frustrated with him, Lucia said she would teach him. So, she did her own lesson on colors. They sorted our letter magnets into different colors and then she took Marco on a "Color hunt" around the house-let's find something yellow, blue, etc. The whole time she was encouraging him and praising him. It was so cute! She is a very good sister. She always helps him clean his room and do his chores and lets him watch what he wants to watch. Sometimes I think she has an old soul. She is more mature than I am sometimes! I love her very much and am so grateful she's my daughter. I learn a lot from that little girl.

Random Pictures

A couple of wild turkeys on our back fence.

The sinful fallen chocolate cake Julio made for me-delicious!

Last week we had to do PE in the garage due to the rain. We made an obstacle course. Here is Lucia crying because she was so frustrated with the jump rope. This week she starts gymnastics and her science class. Finally!

Rain inside, rain outside and MLK Day

It's been forecasted that we will get 6 inches of rain this week! UGH! We got up to go to the dentist this morning. When we arrived, the power went out and so we came home. The was our morning. So, I tried to fill the wet afternoon with educational stuff inside. Since there was so much rain outside, I decided we would talk about MATTER today; solid, liquid and gas. We read a book on it and then to demonstrate, we did the old hot water in a glass bowl with ice in a pan on top. The kids could see the different kinds of matter together and how they change. Then we drew pictures of it.

Also, in homage to Martin Luther King, JR. we watched his Let Freedom Ring speech and talked about him. The kids colored his picture. Lucia pointed out that at the top of her picture where the hands are together-one has white skin and the other has black. She is such a perceptive and sweet girl.
Figuring out this whole homeschool thing has been harder than I thought. We get our curriculum this week, so it should be easier. I hope...

Another week, another post

Freshly trimmed bushes-new roof

The front room (kids are watching the tv)

Homeschool central

The master suite.

Master bedroom

Week one of homeschool is done. I have really enjoyed spending time teaching Lucia. It has been a lot of fun working together on her learning. We have yet to speak to her assigned teacher from the charter school-we enrolled last Monday and they sent us a beginner packet to start us off. The teacher was assigned last Tuesday, but hasn't called yet. I called on Thursday and they sent her an email, and still no phone call. So, we just keep doing our own thing, and I'm fine with that. I do really enjoy teaching. I guess what I don't like is the politics, behavior issues, and all the paperwork of teaching in a public school with 20 students with 20 learning styles and backgrounds. It's fun teaching my own daughter and tailoring the instruction to her learning style because I know her and I love her! Anyway, we have our dining room set up as homeschool central and that's where we do our work. My parents gave us an old secretary desk where we keep our supplies and we have a bookcase with all the kids books in there too. This last week we tried to do something each day. We went to the library, the mall, the park. We are still trying to get our routine down and each day we find something that works and other things that don't. I got a white board and that is where we post our chores for the day and our calendar. I've found that the kids can't do jobs without some supervision. They can't do too many at once. If we are going to go out, we need to do it before lunch. Homeschool works best when Sylvie is napping. Marco needs to participate or have something to distract him. Lucia has a kindergartner's attention span (about 20 min. at a time on one task). We need to do a variety of activities a day. These are just some things I've figured out this week. Trial and error-that's how it will be for a while.

I've had some requests for pictures of the house. I tried taking some, but our camera sucks and I haven't quite figured out how to use it beyond point and shoot. The house is coming together. Julio was very busy this weekend-he pruned all the bushes in the front yard, installed smoke alarms, and cleaned out the garage. I was so proud of him. Here a few shots of the house. I will take more and hopefully I can get a shot of our neighborhood turkeys (there are about 14 of them that roam around) and the millions of squirrels in our yard. Can't wait for nicer weather!

Have a good week!