Weekly Report again

I am so glad this week is over. I can't say it has been the easiest week for us. It should have been a very normal week but for some reason, time change, colds or something really threw us for a loop and things around here were a bit dramatic most of the time. Maybe that is why we have spent so much time outside this week. We just needed it. I know I needed it. My kids got along much better when out on walks or at the park then if we were home trying to read books or play. They couldn't even seem to watch a movie together this week without a bunch of fighting and wrestling going on.
A big part of the problem was this little guy.
He is a lot of work. I can't even truely explain how difficult this little guy makes life some times. He is SUPER TWO going on 16. I just felt like every time I turned around he was either into something he shouldn't be, destroying something, or fighting with Ian or Sophie. And when he wasn't doing one of those things he was crying and whining because I stopped him from doing one of those things.

We did actually do some school work this week but I can't say we did a whole lot. We read through the next two chapters of Story of the World which are about India. We learned about Hinduism and Buddhism.
Sophie actually really like the stories of Buddha. Here is a drawing she did of the Buddha which she drew while I read to her about Siddhartha and his quest to find peace. We really enjoyed the Books by Demi about Buddha.We will probably spend a little more time next week talking about India and the Jataka tales. All my holds at the library haven't come in yet.

We have been listening to the Magic Flute a lot lately. I found this book at the library and it came with a CD to listen to. Sophie loved it. We also found the Classical Kid's CD, Mozart's Magical Fantasy. We have listened to it a few times already. Sophie now sings the Queen of the night's songs on and off all day long.
Here is a drawing she did of Papagueno and Papaguena.


planted an Amaryllis in January and we have been watching it slowly grow taller and taller. Finally this week one of the buds started to open.

Here is Sophie, earler this week, showing off the plant and how tall it has grown.
Today the 3 blooms that emerged from the bud started to open. Sorry I didn't get a picture of it. But Sophie drew a picture of it today.She looked up in a book all the different parts of the bloom and labeled it on her drawing.

We also broke out the markers and tried our hand at doing a picture in pointallism. I had orginially planned to paint but thought better of it and stuck to just markers. Here is our finished products. Mine of course is on top. Sophie's is on the bottom. She had a hard time slowing down and working just with dots. It frustrated her a bit.
While doing this project we discussed color and how by putting two colors next to each other your eye combines them into a different color. I used my flower to demonstrate this. I started with yellow marker and filled in the flower with yellow then used pink dots all over to make the flower peach colored.
I think Sophie understood the idea. She tried the technique a bit on her tree and easter egg that she drew.
This project was fun for me. I always love to draw and try new techniques. It really did take a lot of patience to sit and just tap out the dots of color but the effect really is beautiful.


Grandpa will be happy to know that the kids love to watch Muzzy. I don't know how much spanish they are actually learning yet but they are enjoying watching the tapes. I only show them the spanish now and they don't seem to mind. I know Sophie is picking up a few Spanish phrases just from watching the tapes. They even have enjoyed listening to the audio tapes too. I need to start making more of an effort to teach them Spanish. But at least watching the tapes for now is at least exposure to the language.

That is about all we did. I know we read books other than school books too. We have read Berenstain Bears books over and over this week. And Magic School Bus books have also gotten read through too. And my kids have been requesting Poppleton books lately as well. Thank goodness for the public library!