A large family, homeschooling, adoption, special needs, whatever strikes my fancy, sort of blog.

A large family, homeschooling, adoption, special needs, whatever strikes my fancy, sort of blog.

Saturday, March 20, 2021

Our Spring Break Week


Our Spring Break was a week earlier than Jack's will be.  We're winding down the "year" in our curriculum, so after the next two weeks, I'll be cobbling together random bits to get us through the rest of our 180 days.  It's nice that we've worked really hard, and accomplished a lot!  If we were going to be homeschooling again next year, I'd just start on Creation to the Greeks, the next year of My Father's World.  But since the kids are headed back to school next year, I don't want to purchase the materials I'd need to do that for only 7 weeks.  


This project was something different.  The girls used glue over a very simple ocean scene, to make a raised picture.  Then we wrapped the cardboard with foil, and used a q-tip to outline the glue bumps.  The colors were added with Sharpie.  


Origami shamrocks


Katie's "stick & ink" (toothpick & liquid watercolor) drawing.


I'll just take a picture of the bookmarks the girls colored...  Oh Grumman.  


For some reason, Grumman spends more time on Katie's desk than on Hannah's.  So I took this picture on Hannah's.  


I'm fascinated at how different these faux tie dye paintings turned out!  We used pan watercolors, and a wet on wet technique.  Hannah used very little paint on her brush, and achieved a pastel look.  


Since this week was Spring Break, we didn't do any math or scheduled learning, but we did do art, projects, and some St. Patrick's Day related things, such as acrostic poems, journaling, summarizing a reading passage, etc.  


Our household seems to function best when we stick to our routine, at least a little bit.  


My leprechauns, Shenanigans and Malarkey.
 

Clover!  


The good news is, we had some sunshine, so we could take pictures!  The bad news is, there was sun while we were taking pictures.  Sigh.  


We had corned beef and potatoes for dinner, of course, but I realized even my lunch was green.  


Jack in his St. Patrick's Day shirt.


Josiah made cupcakes for me to frost and rainbow-ify.


books, books, books


Sam got his driver's license yesterday!  No grinning DMV picture, as he's about 6 years too old for that.  


These didn't turn out as well as I had hoped they would.  Shamrock watercolor paintings with gold paint marker accents.  


Katie's St. Patrick


Katie's plate bunny


And a lousy picture of Grumman.  He snagged a pipe cleaner animal, and decided to combine two of his favorite things:  Pipe cleaners, and shoe smell.  I'd toss the pipe cleaner for him, and he'd bring it back to the shoes.  If we could combine rattle, shoe smell and pipe cleaner, I think he'd be ecstatic.  

I've been doing some thinking about what I want to do in the autumn when the kids head back to school, and I just completed the first training to be a volunteer ESL tutor through our library system.  I'm not 100% sure this is the road I'm heading down, but I wanted to at least explore the option.  I love books and literacy related causes, so this seems like a good fit.  As Josiah pointed out, I'd be helping other people become productive members of society.   

4 comments:

  1. So much art!!! I wonder if it is because you're schooling 2 that you have the energy to organize all of that . . . and then I realize that's not the case. You have a gift. :)

    The girls' St. Patty's day dresses and leggings are so cute. We noticed the day for the first time in 21 years--usually we are too busy with birthdays in this season, but with kids growing up and celebrating elsewhere, we weren't too partied out to notice the 17th. We had corned beef and cabbage for the first time ever. It was yummy.

    I know you'd be a marvelous ESL tutor. If the program fits you, you'd be an amazing blessing! I hope the exploring goes well!

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    1. There's been a real shift in my priorities over my years as a homeschool mom. One of my biggest regrets is that there were years when my bigs were small where we didn't do art. I was always waiting for everything else to be done--which never happened, of course.

      I love corned beef. We have it at least once a month.

      Someday I'll figure out what I want to be when I grow up. Sigh.

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  2. You all do so many wonderful activities. I love the St. Patrick's day Darth Vader shirt. My boys would love it. I too am starting to think about what things I may do next year with all of my crew graduated. Of course, with all the special needs in my household, it will still be a bit before I can completely dive in to other things. Your idea sounds interesting.
    Blessings, Dawn

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    1. Jack needed shirts, so he got a Valentine one and a St. Pat's one. :) Oh, and a Top Gun one.

      Back when my crew all went to school for the first time, I spent some time on Volunteer Match, exploring ideas to see what I wanted to try. Aside from Sac Tree, I think most of my efforts went towards animals or book related causes, but there's lots of areas. I'm sure you'd find something that piques your interest. Tutoring requires an hour a week for 6 months commitment. Even if I end up working or volunteering a couple days a week come fall, I'm pretty sure I could handle that, too.

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