Movember

My normally clean shaven husband is participating in Movember this year.

I can't say I'm a huge fan of the 'stache but it's for a good cause.

If you want to support his cause you can go to his Movember Page and donate.

http://ca.movember.com/mospace/9174225

FarmDay

With only one year here in the big city we want to make sure we take advantage of as many opportunities as we possibly can.

We were able to get tickets to the Agricultural Winter Fair.

Great fun .... but oh my goodness the crowds.

The kids LOVED the mechanical bull.

And hey, it was only a half hour wait to ride for 13 seconds.

  

So fun!

  

E has been talking for some time about wanting to get a chicken. So you can imagine his excitement upon seeing the chicks. I found out something new .... he's already named his future chicken.

Terrence.

 

The butter sculptures were on my list of things to see. Seriously, these were so interesting. 

 

The boys were thrilled with the opportunity to touch horses, and cows and goats and sheep.

While I question the agricultural-ness of henna tattooes we couldn't resist.



  

I'm glad we took the chance to see this.

Big Stuff

Great lunch with some gymnastics friends today.
Sushi for all!!

Other big news ... A had his eye appointment and as we suspected he needs glasses for distance.

We got the glasses today so there will be pictures tomorrow.

He is really surprised about how much more clearly he can see distances

On the Menu

E asked me if he could be responsible for dinner on Tuesday nights.

Great idea.
One little problem .... he forgot to tell me what he was going to cook.

(Even though I reminded him on the weekend, and Monday a.m. and evening and Tuesday morning.) M suggested we let him off the hook and order pizza.
Nope. We checked out the fridge and came up with a plan.

Here he is, quite literally, waiting for the pot to boil.

He did a great job.

He served us a meal of basil pesto spaghetti with sundried tomatoes and olives.

Delicious.

TheMoment

This is our fifth year of homeschooling.
By clicking here and here you can look back at the reasons we started and continue on this journey.

Like everything in my life, and I assume everyone else's, homeschooling has not been what I thought it was going to be.

I had visions of earnest excited early readers (1 out of 2), a home free of electronic devices that sap young minds (FAIL), and a space that oozed higher learning (we ooze noise and LEGO more than anything).

It turns out there's not a lot of 'home' in homeschooling and there is lots of getting off track and making a new, previously unplanned track. No complaints here. We love what we do and it's still a great fit for our family and the kids are growing, learning and becoming amazing people.
But the other day we had a moment. And I do sincerely mean a moment .... when I looked out and saw that which I had originally envisioned. It lasted just long enough for me to turn on the camera while they remained unaware and capture about a minute and a half of it for prosperity.

I figure we complete about 200 'teaching' days each school year. We've done four full years, that's 800 days, and all of September and October, that's another 60 days.

So after 860 teaching days in our homeschool life ..... I bring you ..... the moment.

Just for the record .... I prefer the way we do it.
One of these every 860 days seems about right to me.
What was new-homeschooling-me thinking??

Speck

Strange pictures?

These are pictures of my E walking across the street ... by himself ...

to get some poster paper from the Dollar Store.

See how far away from me he is in these pictures!?!

 

Happy Hallowe'en

 

Supplies

After a walking trip down the road to get supplies ... thank goodness for our cart ....

... we were able to get all the supplies we needed for A's costume. I'm not allowed to say what he's going to be. But if you can figure it out from this pile of goods then you'll have solved the riddle.

Fam Time

Little Pook-A-Roo wasn't feeling 100% bit she was still a wonderful little hostess.
 

We had a nice lazy Sunday morning.

 It seems like every time we go up to see AuntieLiz and UncleJ that there is some new country toy for the boys to play with. This time ..... a gator to drive.

Once UncleJ gets some breaks on this one maybe they can give it a try! 

Whatever the Weather

Our memorials were ready to be tested against the ravages of time.

Or our closest approximation of them anyway.

 

We used rain, acid rain (apple cider vinegar), wind and heat (blowdryer).

  

They were as much fun to destroy as they were to create.

Learning Objective ... Check!

And this is the video we made today. The boys informed me that because I wasn't willing to do a lot more pictures that it wouldn't be a really good stop-action but I think it served it's purpose ... fun!

Joshua 4:1-18

School Lessons

We took the chance while in Almonte to check out some of the many many memorials around town.

It's one of the topics that we have been studying in our latest school unit. Memorials ... and the effects of weathering. There were good examples of both!

 

So today we made some memorials of our own. Sugar cube memorials.

 

And when the icing they used to build them has hardened we are going to try some weathering experiments on them. 

We've been doing our best to keep in touch with the kid's friends.

The two most popular methods thus far has been calling on my phone or face timing with the ipad. This week we added Skype. So many ways to stay together while we're apart.