Weekend Edition

Ever wonder what it is like in our little world of home schooling? Most days, I go over the calendar and the weather with Finley, then we sit down together to do a couple of worksheets. Reanna completes the work assigned for the week on her own, then checks her own work with the teacher editions I've handed over to her. If she has any questions, she asks. I wasn't being very timely correcting her work last year. Weeks later, I would find something she wasn't doing correctly. That wasn't exactly the best way for her to learn. (I do administer the quizzes and tests and correct those, lest you think...)

Some days are a little less organized. (That isn't saying much.) Take this past Friday for example: We loaded up into the van and drove to Shelby park. Reanna scooped up some pond water in a jar. Then we looked for an acorn, as we had read about them in Your Big Backyard, a magazine Finley receives. We checked to see if the nature center was open, but it wasn't. Then walked the trail a little ways to see if there was any murkier water to be found.

When we got home, I was starved and so were the kids, so as I juggled fixing lunches, attempting to eat myself, and nurse Ziv, I got out an old (and I mean old) microscope that I had salvaged years ago from a school that was undergoing renovation. Reanna and I sucked up floaties in the pond water, then checked them out under the microscope to see what we had. We found a fairly unimpressive blob, some plant material, then we hit pay-dirt.

A water flea:

Only ours didn't have the eggs inside of it. You should have seen it in action. Eventually, after developing an excruciating headache from staring through the little lens for so long, I pricked my finger so that we could examine some blood platelets. I was a little disappointed to discover that they were much smaller that I had imagined. We needed a stronger lens to really see the little blobs well. Reanna also tried to extract some goo from a fly to compare it with our blood, but that didn't work so well, either. I can't tell you exactly what we learned, but it was fun.

Yesterday, the kids spent the day with Aunt Molly. They went to a pumpkin patch and to cousin Victor's soccer game. Chris, Ziv, and I went with some other friends to see the Grascals play in a Bluegrass Underground show. It was quite fun. Even if you aren't too familiar with bluegrass, the experience is well worth the relatively inexpensive $15 ticket and pleasant drive.

Today, Nana is coming over to see the kids after spending a week on a cruise ship. Then, hopefully, we will all get a good nap in to recover from all the excitement of the past several days.