I called last week a wash, but let's give it like 5 hours
743 hours
-5 hours
738 hours to go
EEK. . .I've been a bit slack about posting and there's just no way I'm going to go back and remember what we did two weeks ago! On Sunday we had a drive through KY, all the way through TN and into to AL! That ended up being a fun drive, the girls did pretty well, really, the scenery was gorgeous and at the end of it, homemade chicken curry and DEAR DEAR friends! We spent a couple of hours catching up, the girls made instant and new best friends, and then we hit the road again and headed back to Nashville.
Sunday was a long drive. . .one of the COOLEST things on Saturday was. . .well, besides crossing two states lines, was driving through Clarksville and seeing "Wilma Rudolph Parkway." I forgot she was from Clarksville, but I was able to excitedly point out the sign to Alani and then show her the second sign as we passed the actual parkway. . .she was pretty jazzed about that, since she LOVES her "Wilma Unlimited" book!
We swam back at the hotel and engaged in the nightly ritual of reading Little House in the Big Woods. . .which was so comforting as I took this final leg of the journey home with my two sweet girls and no one else. Then we snuggled down and fell fast asleep.
On Monday we headed to the pool for another 30 minutes before getting ready and checking out. Then we headed to downtown Nashville for a few hours before our 6pm flight. I was so excited to find that the TN state Capitol has a museum with a 100 years of Girl Scouting display, and it's free. We decided this would be our Monday activity. Monday kicked off "International Homeschool Spirit Week" and I was bound and determined to be part of it. The first day was "homeschool away from home." Is there any better way than to be 1200 miles from home? I think not! We hit the Nashville Farmer's Market, which includes an indoor food-court, Greek for lunch. Then walked the GIANT set of stairs up to the Capitol Building, only to find that it is closed for repairs until January! UGH. We waited on a friend who was supposed to meet us there, saw a statue of Jackson and Adams and read about James K. Polk and his wife, as well as the Catholic Church building.
In all of that I'd say we had a good 5 hours of school type work which included history, geography, the arts, math, healthy living and physical education :) We even stopped to ponder some funny looking acorns for a bit and stomp on them to see what the seeds looked like inside. . . science? I think so!
Getting back into the groove for the rest of the week was kind of tough. Tuesday was "comfy cozy" day. . .when do we NOT spend most of the day in our jammies? Tuesday evening was a tea for our new Girl Scout Daisies (2 have been added to our troop).
Wednesday. . . I took a new morning charge, so we spent all morning Wednesday getting the house cleaned up (after getting home at nearly midnight on Monday I couldn't even deal with it on Tuesday, though I did a little to prepare) . . .only to learn they'd be coming the next day. The girls worked on some crafting, which basically included lots of glue (it took four days for the white glue on Airi's project, to dry completely) and various colors, sizes and shapes of pipe cleaners/ fuzzy sticks. When Airi went down for a nap, the kitchen was so clean that I was able to let Alani freely "cook" up concoctions while I worked on dinner AT 1PM!!! It was like a solid hour or more of cooking and creating! Wednesday afternoon Lila and Clarissa came and then ice skating followed by small group. We missed "Crazy Sock Day."
Thursday was "Crazy Day" and we tried to dress the girls in silly patterns. I had to put nearly as much effort into cleaning the house on this morning, again, it's insane how easily it comes undone. Then we met with H's parents and sealed the deal. Alani practiced her violin a couple of times this day and there's really no telling how many games of "Sorry" she had engaged her father in by this point, as we'd been without a TV (toddler broken) since Tuesday evening. The game of Sorry is a great tool for math and strategy. Thursday evenings are pretty chill around here. I created Airi's Halloween costume, we were all in love, then I walked in the other room to start on Alani's and Airi decided she wants to be the same thing as her sister this year. . .argh!
Friday was "twin day." It's not tough to dress the girls alike :) We had Mr. H for the first time on Friday. The girls did all of the hard work and had a blast. We went to the park much earlier than we ever do, and before we knew it, 3 hours with this handsome little guy were over! Alani's violin teacher had to cancel on account of illness, so what we did in the evening, I can not remember, but by this point we were still not letting our girls know that they could watch all of their favorite shows on the computer yet, so games abound.
We played a lot of Ring-o-Flamingo during this week as well, a game the whole family could enjoy together. And each night we were still going strong with Little House in the Big Woods.
I set Alani to work on computer games a couple of times, but really, with the house cleaning and the new charge and the unpacking and getting back in the groove, we were lucky to get in ONE day of violin practice.
Saturday was a FOUR hour learning experience. We snagged free tickets to the new Museum of Natural History, free tickets to museums of your choice were available through the Smithsonian. You had to pre-order the free tickets, but it was a great opportunity to check out our new museum. I asked at the front how long it takes to get through and was told "about 2 hours." It took us FOUR! Four FULL hours! I was SO thankful that too many people were apparently home watching football games to come out and enjoy a free day at the museum, because it meant that there were not BILLIONS of people there. It was actually a little quiet, busy, but not bouncing off the walls busy. Plenty of room to move around, enjoy exhibits, do hands-on stuff without lines of people or small children shoving. SO wonderful and such a neat experience.
It's possible, in the future, we might consider a membership here. For now, it was a great springboard for considering which avenue to go with science. Alani was too busy trying everything out. . .but it wasn't overwhelming, which was wonderful. No one cried the whole trip. . .amazing, considering Airi was three hours overdue for a nap by the time we left!!! Maybe this week we'll revisit some of what we saw and Alani might be able to consider and decide whether she wants to learn about dinosaurs, plants, animals, land, water, bugs, solar system, rocks. . .it was full of 1st grade science options :)
What a very very full week! Just now, reviewing it, I hadn't realized there were so very many learning opportunities or hours in this week!
19 hours in my estimation, though actually there were more!
Wait. . . wait. . .we came home from a super long day at the Museum, put Airi down for a nap and I tested Alani for placement for her math. She got all of the answers for the 1b section, but I had to talk her through a lot of it. I didn't even test her for 1a, because I know she can breeze through it. So we're going to start at 1b and hope that's a good fit.
I'm soon going to have to break this down into daily blog posts about our learning, because I hope it will become more focused, but also because there are photos I want to share and extras I want to write. . .maybe I just have to keep that for my personal blog :)
20 hours!
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