This and That

Here is what we have been up to lately, in no particular order:

The kids just finished up Awana for the year, and we took advantage of their annual photo booth to take our first whole family photo in, probably, years.  So sad!

Three years in, and I still feel like I'm flying by the seat of my pants with homeschooling!  I'm constantly experimenting with our schedule and trying to figure how to make things work best for us.  We have our core daily activities down pretty well, but I was struggling with the other stuff; history, science, etc.; the subjects we don't do every day.  I tried doing these things once a week, but I would forget, or wouldn't be prepared, and we just weren't getting to them.  Then, I started experimenting with unit studies for these subjects, and it's working great!  We still do our daily work, but then we'll also do one of these subjects every day for a week or two as well.  Doing it this way allows me to just plan once, and it gives us a chance to really get into the subject.  I'm loving this!

Linus keeps growing and learning new things!  He has gotten really good at pulling himself up, can walk along furniture, and just learned how to crawl!  I kept him in his Moses basket as long as I could, but he finally figured out how to get out, so I had to move him into a play pen.  It took a bit of thinking to figure out how I was going to fit him in the bedroom with the kids, but we did it! 

We finally had several days of sunshine in a row, and I started working in the garden!  I am so behind!  Our poor yard always needs a fair amount of work in the spring!  The kids, though, took advantage of the sun by getting out the pool for the first time!  Seth also got the rope ladder up on the playset, so they've been enjoying that, too!

Benjamin and Joanna just finished up two months of swimming lessons, a first for them!  They started out really hesitant and nervous, but they ended up loving it and doing great!  We had to take a break due to schedule conflicts, but they're looking forward to going back!

Benjamin lost both of his front teeth, which makes him seem like such a big kid!  He also decided to try to earn and save up money to buy a dinosaur toy he wanted.  It took him a little while (at mostly 25 cents a job), but he did it!

Thanks to lots of good recommendations online, I almost always have a big stack of books from the library, and I try to sit and read for a while every day, usually during rest time or before bed.  I have read a ton the last couple of years, and while it is not always easy to fit it, it is so rewarding!