Trying to Raise Educated Souls for God

A crazy, perfect life

2012-01-26T23:53:00.001+08:00

I live a busy, but nearly perfect life. I thank the Lord many times each day, and occasionally remember to thank my husband too. I could never express my thoughts eloquently and so I'll send you over to read this fabulous lady's blog post about it:

I couldn't remember how much Wiggles paid for teeth and there was little to choose from in Wiggles' wallet and so DD2 received 5 pieces of money totaling 70c. She then used the money and a bunch of her savings to buy a packet of 12 small chocolate bars (I keep them on hand for Feast Days with other Catholic homeschoolers) and promptly shared them out with her siblings. They were all amazed, astounded and reluctant to begin eating the chocolates, as it was before breakfast. Was I sure they were allowed? Maybe they wanted me to go off by myself to check with myself. Or maybe they thought i was playing a mean joke on them, where as soon as they started eating, I'd come and take them away from them. Could they have another? Yes. And another? Yes.

My theory is that once they're gone, I don't get bugged any more, they are only going to have high blood sugar levels once and surely it's better for their teeth. And sometimes it's nice to shock them.

This morning, day 2 of the heat wave still stretching off into the unknown, there were already casualties in the garden. My lettuce seedlings have disappeared, and a number of pumpkin, melon and something else I couldn't remember or recognise seedlings look to be on their way out. In other news however, one blueberry bush seems to be recovering from it's dose of neat chicken poo by DH. The goji berry bush thing looks to be getting ready to flower.

We had a pool BBQ this evening (We virtually never entertain - I can count the number of times on one hand. I stink at it. I stress before, during and after. I am socially uneducated. DH doesn't ever purposefully go out of his way to acquire more work to do. I give him more than he could ever accomplish, and he chats with the same people nightly without any effort, kids or stress, while playing computer games with them.). Anyway, in the middle of this summer heat wave, without warning, it poured, twice. 2 dozen wet people with wet towels, needing dry ones. Wet food. Muddy house when I'd spent most of the day cleaning it and intended to be outside all evening. Mountains to clean and wash in the morning. Poor DH worked VERY HARD. The kids had a fantastic time.

An ideal fortnight for me would be to leave the house about once. We've been out or had visitors or both every day for over the past fortnight I think and I'm frazzled. I feel we've hardly had a day home since Christmas. This always seems to happen in school holidays. It happened last holidays too. I look forward to schools going back this next week. Tomorrow mum is looking after my brothers' 4 for the day and so there will be a lot of fun, but a ton of mess and work. All I dream of is perhaps a week off to clean out my life and house. I have dreamt this for years now. I did think wryly tonight, that if I'd decluttered as I would like to, I would not have had enough towels for everyone.

Blogging on the iPad

2012-01-25T17:00:00.001+08:00

I'm blogging while the kids are cleaning up their pigsty of a mess from nap time. I could get used to the ease of this on the iPad, except that I can never go back and edit a post once posted. So I have to create a new one with each thought. Also, it does not keep my paragraphs, I have to add the HTML break code. Except that I can't go back and edit, so will have to wait until I turn my big computer on one day to edit all the messy posts from the iPad. I don't know when I'll do that however as there are horrible things on there that suck my time, like banking to do, kills to pay, emails to read and then have to reply to, websites that suck you in, homeschooling research that does the same thing.

It's taken me a fair few posts to realize how to work the iPad's text suggestion. In windows you click if you want the suggestion instead of your own text, if you ignore them, they don't bug you. Apple however is very annoying if you like your own spelling as it defaults to replacing your words with what it deems are more appropriate and you have to stop to 'unclick' the suggestion if you don't like it.

I also don't like that there only seems to be the equivalent of a backspace key but not a delete key. I never would have projected how annoying this would be. I like how a new sentence automatically gets capitalized however.

My boys are toilet trained

2012-01-25T16:48:00.001+08:00

2 weeks ago we went cold turkey with the boys' nappies. We left their bottoms nude day and night for the first week. The I got fed up with the fiddling this encouraged, both purposefully and absentmindedly. DS1 was only in nappies for night time and we've had 1 accident from him.

DS2 has had very few accidents during the day and only 1 at night. He's reliably spaced that as long as I ask him to go every hour or two, we're safe. He's beginning to tell me when he needs to go, if I'm nearby, or even stripping off his own bottoms and sitting on his potty himself. He has been my easiest child to train! Woohoo, God is always giving me pleasant surprises, which is lovely as DD3 is my earliest mobile child and that provides some challenges. Like falling off the bed last week in the middle of the night in her sleep, on her head.

Little package of daddy's sauce

2012-01-25T16:31:00.001+08:00

I awoke from a nap to find that (in the words of dd2 herself) a little package of daddy's sauce (either sweet & sour sauce or tomato sauce, I'm not sure) fell out of her mouth. We older humans would simply call it a tooth, but there's you go.She dropped it while telling me for the first time and frantically searched for it. She was showing me moments later and dropped it again which resulted in a much longer search by all members of the household. I'm not sure it'll survive until tonight when Wiggles the tooth mouse is supposed to exchange it for coins. I'm wounding about his chances of EVER getting a tooth of hers. He had to go and find the last one in a park. Tooth is now in a jar to increase Wiggles' chances.

wasted days and wasted nights

2012-01-25T12:52:00.000+08:00

Wasted Days and Wasted nights"......actually they used to be wasted when I was a teenager and for the first 3 years of marriage when we had no air-con and when we have no power (like we didn't this when I was trying to make porridge for breakfast, and banana cake (for lunch as cousis were coming and we had very ripe bananas) and put a load of washing on before the electricity price doubles at 7am (and I have to go for a walk with a friend anyway, which didn't end up happening after all - DH was leaving for chiro too early and DD was too dangerous to leave with granny). Now thank-fully we do have air-con, but I just really like that song.So, the purpose of this post was to record a fairly foul night that didn't drop below 30 degrees Celsius until after 1.30am and only sank to 25.7 degrees (at the airport - mum maintains that our temperatures here are usually between 1 and 2 degrees hotter than the official temperatures recorded 30km south and near the river) by 5.30am, shortly before sunrise, which put a stop to their downward climb.Yuk.I do remember it only getting down to 27 degrees Celsiusone night last year.I'm trying this on my iPad for the first time and I can't fix the font or size.

Brace for the heat

2012-01-22T23:29:00.001+08:00

Tomorrow will be 36 degrees Celcius

and then

as far as the eye can see (so 6 days at least) the temperature will not dip below 38 degrees celcius (100 F).

...my poor garden................

She's learning like lightning

2012-01-22T22:55:00.001+08:00

DD3 is sitting herself pretty adeptly and is now able to get out of her sitting position elegantly.

In other new, her nether regions are rather raw. She's been poohing 6 or more times a day for 4 days now and it's burnt her skin. (I think the amount and acidity is due to the amount of chocolate I've been eating. I think I've finally made the link after 5 babies - now for the self control). Tonight, in the 1 1/2 hours it took me to sort out dinner, DD3 was nappyless and poohed 3 times, wee'd 3 times (resulting in 6 baths in the kitchen sink) and then DS2 added a wee and bath to the mix. DH was in charge of the baby and it took ALL his time. If that had happened during the week, there would not have been any dinner.

Luckily the other children were contentedly playing a long-winded, imaginary game with little plastic animals. It was lovely to hear.

DH goes camping and misses milestones

2012-01-21T22:57:00.000+08:00

Milestones occure here thick and fast these days. DH went camping with his best friend overnight, had a WHALE of a time, but missed DD2 swimming and DD3 sitting. DH and his best friend mostly spent today playing in a stagnant pool of water from the Avon River. It was lovely to see him return with eyes so full of life. He was dead tired however.

I'd like him to get the camping genes firing up again. The kids would love to go camping. We haven't been for almost 2 years.

DH wants to repeat the camping with his best friend, quarterly. They solve the problems of the world you see, and dream up all sorts of hair brained ideas. Luckily, once they return to real life, they never get around to it, and by the time they next meet, they're on to other things anyway.

I'd better get on to organising my day off as a result of winning our weight contest, or I'll never get it. Yesterday was a day he'd taken off for me to have my free day, but I ended up spending the day messing about with DD2 and the opthamologist and new glasses shop, while DH had 3 of the kids and then he skidaddled leaving granny in charge during afternoon rest time.

DD2 can swim again

2012-01-20T23:36:00.000+08:00

DD2 swam without floats for our last swim last year. So far this year, so has slowly been reducing her floats. This afternoon, she finally gave the float jacket the toss again. Woohoo. A dodgy looking doggy paddle, but it'll suffice.

DS1 immediately got the jacket. He and DS2 are managing with 8 or 10 out of the 16 floats available.

DS1 is working on not freaking if the water level goes above his shoulders, and blowing bubbles in the water.

DS2 swims for a couple of meters with his face under the water.

DD2 only learnt to put her face in the water this week. We went from not getting her face wet EVER, to being able to sink her whole head under.

DD3 spends her days floating around in a blowup seat. She's learnt to twist to be able to go the direction she wants, and to kick to get movement. She loves it when I take her out of her float seat and hold her deeper in the water, enough for her to splash with her arms. In the seat, she can hardly reach the water with her arms. She is not concerned about getting water splashed all over her face and even occasionally taking a mouthful. Life it far too fun to complain about that.

DD1 is working on her backstroke. She can do a length of the pool. She bomb jumps and can swim for many seconds under water before surfacing. She likes to dive down to touch the bottom. She and DS2 have all sorts of jumping in games and competitions.

That baby sat!

2012-01-20T22:36:00.000+08:00

DD3 sat herself up. From tummy to bottom. At 7 months to-the-day! She was nappyless and so the distance from bottom to floor what marginally less than at any other time of the day and this may have aided the process. We were all so excited and so she collated an instant audience, much to her amazement.

Don't count your chicks

2012-01-18T23:14:00.000+08:00

Don't count your chickens before they hatch. The girls keep telling me this. Ok, so purhaps I can mark off what happened below, as unit study on the previous saying.

1 chick from 7 eggs in the hands of a very unlearned family.

From our 7 fertilised eggs received from a lady from MAss on Christmas Day, 1 hatched Friday evening or Saturday morning and died or was killed. 2 eggs disappeared the same night. Bosco killed a rat for the first time that night (her cage is beside the chickens) and a hawk was chased away from the doorway to the chicken's smaller internal cage area where the mother hen was sitting on eggs.

Could it have been a snake? A snake was found curled up beside the altar in the church this week (our substitute priest leaves the church open for people to visit whenever. It would have had a long way for the snake to slither, as the only doorway in is at the back of the church, within a foyer, the foyer surrounded by brick paving, road and car park.

We took the 2 hens we thought were sitting and 4 eggs inside, giving them 2 eggs each. After a couple of hours of me continually placing 2 eggs under 1 hen and finding her sitting as far away from them as possible, trying, trying and trying again, I put her (greyey) back outside and gave blackey all 4. 1 hatched Sunday night. Today (Wednesday) I took the remaining 3 eggs away. DS1 crushed one and there was a fully formed chick inside. I'm not sure of the state of the other 2 eggs. I hope it wasn't their 2 colder hours when greyey wouldn't sit, that killed 2 of them. It could also have been Thursday when the girls 'helpfully' took 4 eggs out of the nest to put in another place for another chicken to sit on - who didn't actually. I only discovered this move 6 or so hours after. It's been REALLY hot too. Who knows?

Ouch!

2012-01-18T22:48:00.000+08:00

That baby popped up 2 lower teeth at once and without any sign of discomfort. 6 3/4 months - DD3.

Another great library find - Whose Garden Is It?

2011-12-27T15:26:00.000+08:00

I really enjoyed this book. I must have ordered it into the library at some point. The author is May Ann Hoberman who wrote "Seven Silly Eaters" which our 5 year old loves. I must source some more of her books.

The pictures were real and in great detail. Plants were recognisable. It's a story about whom a garden really belongs to? The gardener, the plants, the worms...................? We discover how much of a garden depends on the interconnected relationships between animals, plants, insects and humans. Each page had a new form of life briefly asserting why the garden belonged to them.

Each page the kids nodded in agreement. By the end, we had a lovely discussion about whom a garden really belongs to. I enjoyed the thoughts the short sentences provoked. Something to mull over.

Christmas Weigh-in

2011-12-25T05:25:00.000+08:00

62kg - lost 7.5kg in 9 weeks, 1/2kg short of my goal, but DH graciously let me win. He managed about 5kg I think (he gained 1kg before Christmas with all his fancy work and friendship group outings). I managed a fairly strict Advent not being in the workforce and being in control of our food at home and exercising a fair amount.

'That baby' is on the move

2011-12-23T20:39:00.000+08:00

'That baby' has figured out how to inch herself forward on her belly. Great timing. 2 days to Christmas wrapping and all sorts of forbidden goodies on the floor. DD3 is 6 months and 2 days.

Baby Bilby, where do you sleep? Another Great Library Find

2011-12-09T16:52:00.001+08:00

A Lovely book about Australian animals, and in the pictures are many other animals camouflaged in the same environment. A Hide-and-seek book that teaches you where a number of different animals sleep.

Baby Bilby Where Do You Sleep by Narelle Oliver. Cheapest today, from Borders.

Weigh in

2011-12-09T15:24:00.001+08:00

65kg today - on par with DH - he has also lost 4.5kg. 3.5 to go in just under 3 weeks 2 days.

After 1 ½ weeks I had lost 2 ½ kg and then just sat for afew weeks from around when DH's back trouble began. I’d lost momentum and havenot been eating brilliantly, but have been doing ok with the exercise. I’m gladto know I have managed to lose a little more. Woohoo.

DD1's lost front tooth

2011-12-05T22:00:00.000+08:00

Teeth are dropping like flies around here. I'm glad DD1'sremaining front tooth fell out tonight. It broke into two perfectlongitudinal halves. I shall have to explain that I asked 'Wiggles' if Icould keep it. A perfect specimen for when we study teeth.

She'd been complaining and unable to eat for the past week. Tonight at dinner it had twisted completely around and wasbackwards. She now looks like such a little girl with 3 teeth in aline missing and not an adult tooth in sight.

Dh's been singing, "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth" a fair bit around here. Timely of DD1's tooth to oblige to illustrate the song.

For the record, they each got $1 in 5 pieces of money. I'm pretty certain though that DD1 only got 50c for her previous teeth. Inflation is obviously approaching Zimbabwean level around here.

DD2's first tooth

2011-12-04T22:23:00.001+08:00

DD2 lost her first tooth today. The lower front right one - but one. I discovered an adult tooth already sticking up behind it a couple of weeks ago, with no sign of any wobbling.

DD2 didn't know she'd lost it. I don't think I ever managed to not know I'd lost a tooth! That is a fairly big deal!!!

Anyway, she lost it at some point while playing in a park, and so in a little glass babyfood jar, next to her pillow (she insisted on leaving the lid off so it was easier for 'Wiggles' the toothmouse to put the money in there) is a note:

Dear Wiggles

I lost my tooth today at M***** Park. Please could you find it there?

Love

DD2

This tooth mouse is an amazing creature. He managed to find many a tooth I'd lost as a child. He wrote me a long detailed letter in TINY print about his horrid ordeal with a flat bicycle tyre the time he didn't come to collect my tooth for a couple of days. Poor thing.

He has dutifully followed my family around the southern hemisphere and now pays my children '5 pieces of money' for their baby teeth. He's collected 6 of DD1's so far and should visit her again tomorrow hopefully as she's been unable to eat properly for days, with a front tooth that is very loose and spent dinner twisted completely backwards in DD1's mouth.

The '5 pieces of money' are 50c I think. I hope. I can't remember what he's been paying DD1, as since the girls have been selling their own eggs, and all children putting their own money into the church plate (Well, except for DD2 today. He just couldn't seem to part with the coin tightly clenched in his fist, for either collection at Mass today) and buying their own tiny presents for themselves and cousins, the value of money has changed somewhat, recently. At least it's 'pieces of money' that count.

DD3 - rotating and going backwards

2011-12-04T22:04:00.001+08:00

DD3 spent the last week rotating on her belly and beginning to push herself backwards. This baby, along with DS2 (and I can't remember any before that, except DD1 who didn't at all) have LOVED being on their tummy since the beginning. I have always put them to sleep on their tummies though, and DD1 I NEVER did.

Poetry from poo - DS1 answers in poetry

2011-12-01T21:22:00.000+08:00

I think I am beginning to see the joy families feel when they share a read-aloud book together and then some of the quotations eneter into usual family dialogue. The same joy people receive quoting shakespeare in certain circumstances.

I called DS2 in from playing outside. It was late morning and we were having a poo day.

DS1 had needed a bottom wipe after a poo (in the toilet), DS2 pooed in his cloth nappy and leaked, requiring a bath, DD3 pooed while on her tummy and swivelled and skiied on the copious quantity that escaped her disposable nappy (cloth ALWAYS catches it) requiring a bath, and then REPEATED the entire event again 1/2 later!!!! I was then able to join the children outside to water the garden. DD2 received a fresh deposit from a chicken down her back, which required drenching by the hosepipe (I enjoyed that!). I stood in dog poo (DH insists the dog knows where to poo and DH supposedly had until Christmas 2011 to teach her (or I was giving her away) as he was not picking up her poo - partly as it is difficult to find), which made urgent the time spent removing dog poo from beside a number of my bushes and from under the swing DS2 likes to play on. As I removed the last pile from beside a blueberry bush, I remarked to the children at the large quantity and size range of slaters found beneath a piece of concrete fencing nearby. DD1 and DS1 immediately appeared and began collecting up every slater they could find.

As DS2 responded to my call and moped through the doorway on the way to the bath before lunch, I remarked, "Were you sitting on poo?"

He replied distractedly, "I was sitting on a whopper of a whale."

I found this amusing. Here is one of the poems we've been learning as a family at the meal table:

Whopper!

I am sitting in the middle
of a whopper of a whale,where there's scant illumination,
and the air is still and stale.
My monotonous enclosure
is predominantly gray,
and is surely no location
I would choose to spend my day.

There is no one to converse with
in a whale's digestive tract.
I am bored with my surroundings,
and I wish that I had packed.
Without any sort of warning
I was eaten like a bean.
Now I'm stranded in the center
of a living submarine.

I see no way of escaping,
so I'm throwing up my hands,
and unless I'm extricated,
I'm not making any plans.
I'd appreciate suggestions,
simply drop them in the mail.
Just address them to the belly
of this whopper of a whale.

Jack Prelutsky, from A Pizza the Size of the Sun

DD3 rolling, rolling, rolling

2011-11-27T22:07:00.000+08:00

DD3 rolls. And rolls. And rolls. Towards her left shoulder, in astraight line. I place her one side of the room and within a fewminutes she's reached the other end and I have to pick her up and put her backat the start. (I don't just turn her around as she could manage toroll down the stairs).

She's not talking, spitting, blowing disdainful noises anymore, in anattempt to talk to us. Obviously her month or two of being HIGHLYverbal has been dropped for the moment while she concentrates on her motor skills.

No poo

2011-11-23T21:00:00.000+08:00

I have not used shampoo (adetergent) for 3 months and finally my hair feels very soft andsmooth. SUCCESS.

I use
1 TBLSP bicarb in about 1 cup water
rinse
1TBLSP apple cider vinegar in about1 cup water
rinse.

Lovely.

DD3 - 5 month weigh in

2011-11-22T21:58:00.000+08:00

22/11/11 - 5 Months, 2 days

We missed her 4 month checkup (Homeschooling SPorts Day instead) and will see the health nurse at close to 9 months instead, and so I ducked in to weigh her when we happened to be walking near.

63.5cm long

7.48kg (The boys and DD1 were 0.5 to 1.5 kg heavier by this age, while DD2, was this weight at 8 months. She must have been pretty slim. DD3 has got some chunky thighs now.)

The axaman

2011-11-15T21:03:00.001+08:00

DD1 kept going on about the Axaman when chatting about one of tonight's Rosary mysteries.

"Do you mean was one of the men on the cross next to Jesus a woodcutter?"

"No."

.....

Eventually, "Oh, Axaman, do you mean TAXMAN?"

"YES" (finally mum gets it)

Zaccheus. He was the one up the tree. Well that was today's gospel reading, though unfortunately we didn't get to Mass.

After taking my sister to the airport at 4am Friday morning and having to remove 2/5 the car seats, I got enthused as DD3 was needing to change from her capsule as she was complaining loudly, and removed all seats to clean car, and removed all covers to wash. One cover needs sewing to repair and so the car is not ready for children yet. Deadline is by tomorrow when we have to go out for Chiro and Gym.

DD2 & reading .....or not

2011-11-15T20:50:00.001+08:00

DD2 is doing reallywell. We're using

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons bySiegfried Engelmann

This morning I bought the book online as I thought 6months of continuingly borrowing the book is a bit cheeky and must mean thatthe book is worth getting.

She can read 'stories' containing 7 sentences. The problem is that the '20' minute lessons are taking over 1.5 hours and Ihave to threaten and shout. We're up to lesson 45 and it's not so straightforward any more. Many word pronunciation suggestions are just not how we pronounce them. Many words have the A symbol when I say 'a' and vice versa.

Today she asked, "Why isn't schoolwork fun anymore. Why do we have to do this book? (Uuuuh because I’ve just bought it was my thought process) Did DD1 have to do this book?"

Now, I don't want to admit to my answers in full, butthe answer to her 1st question was along the lines of, "It's not all goingto be fun" and the answer to the 3rd question is a, "No".

And part of the reason I wanted to homeschool was to not kill the love of learning.

She also is despondent about drawing as it is not asgood as DD1's. I read a tip from another mum to pull up some oldpictures from when the older child was the younger child's age toshow. I intend to do that.

DS2 & scissors

2011-11-14T21:09:00.000+08:00

We let scissors and sticky tape reign free here. It means I have to keep an eye on the children carrying scissors pointed end down. My mum has instilled a healthy fear of a kid losing an eye as an uncle of mine did on some wire while playing in the garden as a child.

Well, today 26 month old DS2 who LOVES cutting, cut the feet and tails off the plastic animals his siblings were playing with.

Last week he cut 3 holes in his trouser leg.

Struggling through

2011-11-07T21:12:00.000+08:00

I am VERYTIRED. DH is still bedridden (has to use a potty), the kids havebeen up the last 2 nights (DD3 and DS2 with pink eye) as they have no curtains(DH was busy doing them when he put his back out and I have not yet got amoment to try to learn how to drill the wall (dad’s away) and so DS2 keepsgetting up to play at 1am due to the bright moon – I have 7 loads of washing tofold, staring me in the face and have not yet got to that.

I'm just counting off the days until Saturday when I may be able to get some sleep.

Sunday early morning MAss - check
DH’s 3amadoration last night - check
Mine tonight (have to go 1/2 hour earlier to cover someone)
Friday, leave at 4am to drop familyat the airport.

I have my own sty in my eye, so know I’m running onlow batteries.

DD1's second book

2011-11-07T15:19:00.000+08:00

We picked up "The Big Duck" by Anne Adeney and Anni Axworthy from Reading Corner Phonics (ISBN: 9780749691523(hbk) or 9780749691615(pbk)) and she read it stright through in 1 sitting. I was a lovely little book, with a great twist at the end. I enjoyed it too.

I must find more in the series.

DH down for the count

2011-11-06T21:21:00.000+08:00

DHpinched a nerve yesterday and is bed ridden, and I’ve been really strugglingwith the obedience of the children and discipline. We attend theLatin Mass every fortnight and as this was the fortnight, I tried to bring themmyself, but we’d dropped my dad at the airport before hand and so I’d had towake the children at 5.30am and they were tired and VERY DIFFICULT, both at theairport and at 7.30am Mass. They’d all needed the loo by the timewe arrived at Mass and then we stopped to help a little girl who’d cut open herknee, and so after coming in so late and the boys in particular set to behorrid the entire rest of Mass I gave up. DS2 had hurt DD3 bymistake and she was already tired and so although I contemplated passing her toTherese who was directly in front, I thought she’d possibly whinge louderthere.

Thisafternoon I had a nap as DH has a holy hour in the early hours tonight that Ineed to cover, and awoke to find DD2 and DS1 had completely depleted 8 tubes ofpaint and then painted with their hands and feet, not thought to wash them offand had been going about their usual business for an hour or two. There was paint all over the floors, walls, cupboards, couches, toys andclothes to clean up. I am taking this as a trial to keep mypatience and so at the moment I’m cool, calm and collected and aiming to staythat way whatever the devil throws at me. And I do feel I’m inbattle as I attended the ‘Day with Mary’ yesterday with the girls for only thesecond time ever, and got home exhausted to the disaster of a house with DHbedridden in the middle of installing a curtain rail in the kids’ bedroom withdust and tools strewn and who’d needed to get the boys help with lunch andchanging nappies, and so it was a pigsty that with the addition of the paintepisode, I am still not on top of.

A wonderful day at home

2011-10-25T22:22:00.000+08:00

Rainy day and while I did no cleaning (which was desperately needed), weachieved much and I’m left feeling satisfied, but not very rested.

Girls finger knitted a dolls scarf or necklace.
We read lots of overdue library books.
We read a few chapters from the next Milly-Molly-Mandy book.
DD2 did her reading lesson in less time than usual.
DD1 did 2 pages of her LEM phonics book 2. We almost always only do 1.
We covered much of our usual flash cards, questions, memory work atbreakfast. This works best. Around the table… Captive audience, and itall becomes a game/competition. Plus,as the younger kids chime in occasionally with an unexpected answer, I’m hopingI’ll have less to teach them as we move down the line. DS1 proudly presented me with 3 letters he’dtaught himself to write, and he answered one of DD1’s phonics questions beforeshe could figure it out. DS2 is workingon recognising digits from 1-5, though often answers any number between 1 &10.

The Weight War with DH

2011-10-25T22:00:00.001+08:00

Right. We have entered the battle zone. I am the heaviest I've ever been. I obviously did not vomit enough this last pregnancy. I remember with DD1, loosing over 10kg in 7 weeks, and so my aim is to lose 8kg by Christmas. DH thinks that's rediculous and that I could never do it. THAT is enough motivation to win. The winner gets a day OFF (as in the other person has full control of the kids for that day. He will play computer and watch movies all day if he wins. I will clean/sort the house :( as I just can't seem to find the time any other time.) and if I win he will read a book I dictate. I have managed to get him to read 1 lousy little book in the almost 10 years of our marriage. He had refused to read anything on parenting, birth, pregnancy, homeschooling, vaccinations etc. His opinions all come out of thin air I inform him.

Anyway.

I'm just going to finish my chocolate chip icecream now though, so there is not the tempation you see, and to not waste freezer space for 2 months, and as weigh-in is in the morning. :).

So bye.

Sports Day

2011-10-24T21:53:00.000+08:00

After an incredibly tiring day full of sports 'games' and a race as part of a larger homeschooling sports event, DD2 told me her favourite was running the 25m race. (All 6 seconds of it.) I could have arrived at 2.30ish and left at 2.40ish! Good thing I had those few seconds on film to forever immortalise her regal running posture.

The children loved the day. I enjoyed watching them, but will ENSURE DH has the day off to accompany me next year. I found it more stressful than taking 5 to the Royal Show.

Eucharistic Adoration thoughts

2011-10-18T10:55:00.002+08:00

I have been going to Eucharistic Adoration since DD3 was 7 weeks old - the morning of my eldest's 6th birthday - that makes it 11 weeks. My husband has been going for over 3 years now, and apart from occasionally filling in for him when he's sick, I have not made my own effort to go. Without 'having' to go, I just never got around to it.

After going to Mass at the nearest parish to us that holds Perpetual Adoration, the Sunday evening when DD3 was 6 weeks old, I decided to put my name down to fill the 4am slot on a Tuesday morning. That means I have promised and HAVE to do it, otherwise the person before me will wake up Fr. to do the shift I miss. The first few weeks, DD3 was still waking at midnight or just after to feed. If she fed at 2am I'd have to take her with me, as she would most likely need to be fed while I was out. Now she is sleeping wonderfully and I wake her to feed her just before I leave.

This does require me to plan the prior few days carefully and go to bed at 8pm or earlier Monday evening to ensure I am rested as I need to wake at 3am to feed and change DD3 and then leave at 3.30am for the 25min drive to the chapel. When I return home at 5.30am I then stay awake and have some of 'my' time then, rather than the previous evening. I would love to go to bed early EVERY day and wake early EVERY day to my personal things (like homeschool planning, researching, blogging, emailing, paying bills, folding washing, putting washing on etc. ) but I have VERY seldomly had the self motivation to GO to bed early, when the house is finally peaceful in the evening and I would like to do some of those things NOW.

Anyway, the fruits of the Eucharistic Hour are wonderful.

I wish to encourage anyone thinking about going. Even with 5 children - IT CAN BE DONE. Even with a baby - IT CAN BE DONE. Even living 1/2 away - IT CAN BE DONE. My only concern is the next time I am suffering from morning sickness. I am not yet sure that I could add - IT CAN BE DONE, and so I'll update that part in a couple of years. If it was a daytime hour, at the moment - I COULD NOT DO IT. I do not want someone to babysit for a couple of hours per week, when I can just go at night when my husband is already home. I am not confident to take my children with me for more than a very short visit, which I try to do whenever we're driving past. Sometime in the future (perhaps only in years), I may see if my eldest wants to accompany me. Currently I have been able to stick with this when I fail every attempt to not eat chocolate (except during Lent), to exercise more, to go to bed at a decent hour, to ban myself from spending money or researching books for a predetermined length of time. I guess I need spiritual help to conquor poor self-discipline - a continual confession topic.

Eucharistic adoration grounds me for the week. I focus on God and the spiritual aspect of my life if I'm reading a spritual book and praying a lot, but so easily I can get distracted with normal, every day secular life if I'm not reading something spiritual (in a very general sense of the word).

I get time to thank God for all the blessings He has bestowed on me, time to evaluate my life, think over my failings and try to determine how to better myself, pray for all the many people in all facets of my life,

family
friends
priests
godparents and godchildren
pregnant friends and family
souls of friends and family departed and babies miscarried by friends and family
souls wrapped up in the horrid industry of abortion,

thank our Lord for all these people too, meditate on the Rosary and if I have time (which I have only done once so far, and that is by starting the Rosary in the car on the way to Adoration as otherwise I ALWAYS run out of time) read the bible. I am starting off at the end of Samuel, just before where I ended up (2nd Kings) with a group of other Catholic Homeschooling mums trying to do a bible study following Geoff Cavins' wonderful program.

So, thought from this morning, brought to mind due to resurrected topic in recentconversation regarding skirts, Saints and Popes.:

From the commentryalongside 2 Samuel 11:15 in my NavarreBible.

St. Josemaria Escriva writes: “The eyes! Through them many iniquities enter thesouls. So many experiences likeDavid’s! – If you guard your sight you will have assured the guard of yourheart. (The Way, 183)

Book Notes - "A Little Way of Homeschooling"

2011-10-18T07:49:00.000+08:00

Notes from the book, “A Little Way of Homeschooling” by Suzie Andres. By no means exhaustive of what struck me,but just a compilation of the bits I happened to read while remembering a penand being able to hold a pen and underline passages i.e. not lying downbreastfeeding a difficult newborn at the same time. Next time I read this book I hope tounderline pertinent passages from the missing chapters.

Cindy’s Family – pg33

As I gave up traditional curricula and the associatedresearching, planning, and implementing of it, I noticed that a vacuum of timeemerged….

I’m not deep intoimplementation as my children are so young, but I do realise how much time getstaken up with planning anything and the related researching. Plus, I love learning so much that I go offon my own rabbit tales and never seem to complete the research phase enough tosign off on the topic. Eventuallytopics just fall by the wayside as other rabbit trails expose other topics thatseem more interesting and begin to take up the time instead.

Pg. 34

I had time to pursue my own enthusiasms, and naturally Ishared these with the boys, many of which they adopted as their own.

I have found,listening to others, that often an interested teacher caused the child todevelop a lifelong interest in a subject. Sometimes it was a subject that up to the previous year they’dhated. It’s amazing what someone else’senthusiasm can do. Someone can talk tome about a topic that I’ve never previously been interested in, but if theirexcitement shines through, then before long, I want to know all the abouttopic.

There will always be holes in our education and a lifetimeto fill them. We discovered thatlearning is an incredibly fun and fulfilling experience, not another chore on ato-do-list.

I need to remember theformer sentence and I hope the latter continues to be a description of myfamily’s learning experience.

Pg.35

While the unschooling approach as we practice it may soundsimple, I don’t want to make light of the inherent difficulty it involves:namely, it requires us to give up the school mentality that dominates society.

This school mentalityis what I grew up with, what I was ‘educated’ in, in doing my Graduate Diplomaof Education to become qualified as a teacher. It is sometimes difficult to see outside the box.

…some basics that I hope for my children……a love of readingand writing; math, science, and history literacy; and a good understanding ofour Faith.

These would fit myhopes too.

Pg 36

…when kept in its proper role as our servant, curricula haveserved us very well……..when my boys were young, we used the Baltimore Catechismand books in the Faith and Life series.

We’re currently tryingto learn the Baltimorequestions and I keep seeing the ‘Faith and Life’ series mentioned. I hopeto investigate that further at some point.

Pg 37

……….what is the real purpose of education? What is the reason for learning about ourworld and the people in it? We willsettle for no less than love and truth, ultimately found in Christ himself.

I subscribe to this,but must remember to continually realign my daily thoughts to this andprioritise my time accordingly.

Terri’s Family – pg 64

…how has unschooling ………..made a difference for my children?

- by allowing the children to attend Mass everyday if they so choose.

- Unschooling also gives the whole family time tovolunteer.
I would like to implement a bit of thissomehow. I just struggle with thefeeling that taking children anywhere means we are well and truly ‘descending’upon someone in our masses.

- We don’t have to go on expensive vacations toget our together time.
I need to remember this when I get theoccasional moment of envy.

- They don’t think of the work adults do assomething mysterious and scary, and are at ease in social situations because wenever excluded them. I am also thankfulto my parents for not hiding the family finances from us. Dad’s income was never a secret, neitherwere their plans for saving to move countries, or their loan repayments onhouses. We knew the cost of groceriesand we knew the amount mum and dad had left over and so I never had anyinterest in asking for things or feeling upset about not having what othersmight have had, as I knew there was no room in the budget for it, so whybother? I hope DH and I will be able toget this right somehow too.

- We have the time to learn to be kind. ………..for the millionth time……..”If you wouldlike to use the toy, please ask nicely, and she will give it to you when she isfinished.” I like the idea I read somewhere,that when a child sees someone playing with a toy they would like to play with,first they should ask to play with it when the other person is finished ratherthan asking for it right there and then as that is placing their own happinessabove the happiness of the child who is already playing with it. I also stress in our own sibling warfare athome, that if another sibling asks for a toy and you don’t want to part withit, you are well within your right to say that you are enjoying playing with itand either invite them to join you or inform them that you will let them knowwhen you are finished. BUT THEN, youalso have a responsibility to not take too long with it, but to make a smallsacrifice yourself to give it up sooner than you would perhaps have liked. My older kids help the younger ones and areterrific at entertaining them. Theyounger ones give the older ones the unconditional love that teenagers reallyseem to need. Now that is something great to hear from someone further along the journeyand with 6 children.

Maria’s Family – pg 72

As a student I learned to perform, rather than be concernedwith knowledge or virtue. […] I grew dependent on the feedback of teachersand others, overly attached to their response to my performance.

I have a fair bit ofthis problem too and so it is difficult to go against the grain when people Ilook up to and respect may disagree. Like my dear parents. Thankfullythey have been supportive of many of my choices.

Pg 73

I remember when I was starting our homeschooling. I may – just possibly – have hadpreconceived notions about how things were going to be. But then God threw at me something calledlife…………..I learned to let go and live with those constant companions, trustingthat my children would learn and want to learn.

I fear this is where Ihave to head. I am still at thebeginning of this quote.

Pg 74

As a mom who reads aloud to her kids, I have learned howinvaluable discussion is. Until I hadexperiences it myself, no one could have convinced me of the richness and depthof learning that occurs in this way.

I wholeheartedly agreewith both the thought process and experience. I find our meal time discussions around the table very fruitful inuntold numbers of ways.

Pg 75

I find it exciting to see that what works for one child maynot work for another.

Too true!

…Chesterton wrote in his essay “The Emancipation ofDomesticity,”

‘How can itbe a large career to tell other people’s children about the rule of Three and asmall career to tell one’s own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same things toeveryone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No; a woman’s function is laborious, butbecause it is gigantic, not because it is minute.’ (46)

Sabine’s Family – pg 95

I am convinced that our Faith is best internalised throughunschooling.

…when it comes to passing on the Faith to our children, thebest thing we can do is model it for them. We let them see us praying for them and others, asking for forgivenesswhen we’ve made mistakes, inviting them to pray and allowing them to accept ordecline the invitation.

….she likened learning to love the Mass to learning to lovethe symphony. Children won’t learn tolove the symphony by being forced to attend and to sit still and to“appreciate” the music. Instead,exposing them to the music you love, talking about the instruments, andteaching them about great composers is much more likely to get them interestedand to develop in then the same love for music that you have.

….If a parent truly loves the Mass and believes it is heavenon earth, the children can’t help but fall in love with it too.

Oh wouldn’t that benice. If only I could give thatexample. I am still learning to lovethe Mass myself. Sometimes I do,sometimes I really struggle.

It is crucial for us to be close to our children now; thatis the heart of the matter.

Susan’s Family pg 99

‘Love God first, and do as you will.’ – St. Augustine, “Sermon on the Epistle of St. John”

When I asked how they managed, she said that with each childtheir faith grew, and she had to depend more on God.

…if I want to happily unschool, my life needs to be theexample. I hope to follow St. Francis’suggestion of preaching the gospel always, using words only when necessary.

So true. I really struggle with saying unkind or atthe very least unnecessary words. AndI’m really struggling with self – discipline regarding chocolate and getting tobed early.

Karen’s Family pg 119

“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever ishonourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever isgracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise,think about these things,” says St. Paul to the Philippians (4:8)

…a truly worthwhile education means to me: I want to instilin my children a love of learning about all things true, good andbeautiful. Our ultimate goal is to lovethe Lord with all our heart, soul and strength (Deuteronomy 6:5). That begins with learning about andembracing our Faith and it ends up encompassing all the beauty and goodness Godhas given us.

Bible verses to learn.

Karen shares awonderful example of how she answered the question of why God allows evil fromher 10-year old.

While reading historical fiction set during the war, wediscussed the Holocaust. Mythen-ten-year-old said, “Mom, how could God let this happen? He’s so good. He could have stopped it.”

How does one explain the problem of evil to a child?

I began by telling her that she had asked an eternalquestion, a philosopher’s question, a wonderful question. I said that people have lost their faithover that question when the answers seemed inadequate, elusive or wrong. I took her back in time, to Adam and Eve andasked what God gave them.

“A choice!” she said.

“Yes, a choice. Heallowed them to choose good or bad, right or wrong, didn’t He?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you think He did that?”

“Hmmm…I don’t know. Wouldn’t it be nicer if He’s made them obey?”

“Well, yes, in some ways, it would be nicer.” (I remindedmyself to explain felix culpa to herlater.) “But let’s think about what kind of a relationship comes out of makingsomeone do something.”

From there, we put on a little demonstration. What would itbe like if my children were mere puppets I could control? What if I cold manipulate their mouths and, ventriloquistlike, throw my voice so that I could hear them say on command, “I love you, Mommydear.” Both of my older girls lapsedinto fits of giggles as Lizzy played the puppet, mouthing the words. The demonstration made its point: puppetsaren’t capable of real love. For loveto mean anything, it has to be freely given. Had God made us pliable puppets, our love for Him would bemeaningless. I told the kids that theywould read a similar (if more eloquent) explanation someday in C.S.Lewis’ Mere Christianity. I summed it up this way: “There’s a world ofdifference between a puppet’s artificial “I love you,” and the feeling I getwhen one of you gives me a picture you’ve drawn, or a gift you’ve made, andit’s something you’ve created p[purely out of love for me. That kind of “I love you” is real, and meanseverything to me, because you’ve chosen to do it.”

Then we talked about the freedom God gave human being – ourfree will – allowing us to make choices about everything, including love. Where the possibility of true love exists,the possibility of utterly rejecting love co-exists. And where the possibility of rejecting loveexists, there is the potential for evil. Some people will choose evil.

The discussion grew, organically, from the book we read andthe time I allowed for talking. Talkingmake us most of our curriculum.

When a writer deliberately reminds us of a scene fromsomething else, it’s called an allusion.

I give the girls names and labels for those interesting,intricate ways in which ideas are woven together, build upon each other, andinspire new thoughts and connections. As they get older I encourage them to keep making connections, and soon,one happy day they start pointing out so many connections that sometimes myhead hurts.

…making connections and looking for the ways in which the“subjects” of life are interwoven paves the way to a greater understanding ofboth education and life.

Video on YouTube of a dad singing his bedtime version ofPachelbel’s Canon in D. ………promptedme to be sure they knew what was being parodied.

….education is “an atmosphere, a discipline, a life” (94) from Charlotte Mason’s Philosophy ofEducation.

The Way of the Saints

Maurice and Therese by Bishop Patrick Ahern in which areassembled the correspondence between St. Therese and her spiritually adoptedmissionary brother Maurice Belliere.

Pg 171

God is merciful Love. Therefore, our miseries satisfy Him in a way our perfection couldnot. Weakness and littleness providethe proper object for His infinite mercy. The smaller we are and the greater our needs, the lower God must stoop tosave us, and thus the more God’s compassion is glorified.

Pg 172

Don Bosco’s motto: “amo et fac quod vis”: love, and do whatyou will.

Pg 173

Don Bosco […] “that education takes time, that time must beprovided for a gradual response from children” (Educational Philosophy, 52).

St. Francis de Sales…………aman who had conquered his own choleric and impatient disposition in order to“attract souls to Christ, because more flies are caught by a spoonful of honeythan by a barrel of vinegar” Educational Philosophy, 158).

Oh, how I aspire toridding myself of my impatience and temper too.

Pg 174 – St. Don Bosco’swriting:

…a friendly informalrelationship with the young, especially in recreation. You cannot have love without thisfamiliarity.

I struggle to play with my children. I crave peace when they are playing anddon’t really feel like putting my desires aside to go and play with them. This is something hard to want to do, yet Iknow from reading a book of Don Bosco’s dreams that near the end of his life,while he was away from his school, the boys were not going so well and soulswere being lost. He had a dream inwhich the answer came from the fact that the teachers were no longerinteracting with the boys during recreation and therefore buildingrelationship. They were engaging intheir own conversations around the perimeter of the boys’ play. How does this really translate to ahomeschooling mother? One who cansometimes crave an adult discussion with another like minded homeschooling mother?

Preventive, …..disposing thehearts of our students that they ought to be willing to do what we ask of themwithout need of external violence.

It is certainly easier to loseone’s temper than to be patient; threaten young people rather than reason withthem. I would say that it better suitsour lack of patience and our pride to punish those who resist us, rather thanbear with them firmly and with kindness…[but] if we want to know how tocommand, let us be careful to first learn how to obey, and let us set our firstand foremost to make ourselves loved rather than feared…

In certain more serious momentsit is more useful to turn to God, to humble oneself before Him, than to letloose a torrent of words which, on the one hand only harms the one who deservedthem, on the other hand does nothing for the one who deserved them. Whenwe see our efforts prove ineffectual, and we have only thorns and brambles toshow for all our labours, believe me, we must put it down to defective methodsof discipline.

Pg 175

Young people often needconvincing that we have confidence in their ability to improve, and feel thereis a kingly hand to help them. You canget more with a friendly look, with a word of encouragement that gives hisheart new courage, than you can with repeated blame, which serves only toupset, and weaken enthusiasm. Usingthis system, I have seen real conversations among those one would otherwisehave believed impossible. Allyoungsters have their off-days ---you have had them yourselves! Heaven help us if we do not try to help themto get through them without trouble. Sometimes simply having them understand you do not think they acted frommalice is enough to ensure they do not fall again into the same fault.

Fr. John Bosco

Feast of St. Francis of Sales 1883

A Philosopher’s perspective pg 181

Unschooling, then, is the method of education which does notseparate learning from the rest of the child’s life according to time, place,or persons. It allows the child tolearn according to his interests and abilities and makes the desire to know,rather than fear of punishment, the primary motivation for learning.

Oooo, I do sometimesslip into threatening mode if a child is messing around.

…we are all born with original sin, […….] one might objectthat children don’t want to learn what they need to know,

Pg 182

When St. Thomaswrites about the natural moral law, [….] he sees the natural law as a set ofinstructions from our Maker that direct us toward achieving real happiness,both here and hereafter. A similar lineof thought leads Aristotle to define happiness as the activity of the soulaccording to virtue (Nicomachean Ethics, Bk. 1, Ch. 7)……Moreover, obedience tothe revealed precepts of the New Law makes us happy in an even higher way thanthe natural law could. …our job as parents is to prepare our children forhappiness in the next life by directing them toward true happiness in this one.

Pg. 183

We can push our children to succeed, partly because we thinkit is good for them, but partly because their success reflects well on us. ….asparents we should be content to give each child the kind of education that willbest promote his own happiness.

I have definitelyfallen into this trap many times already in my decisions in raising mychildren, however, I hope I am managing to move away from self conceited reasonsfor decisions. The path towards a moreunschooling approach and taking the time to ‘smell the roses’ and watch mychildren learning and instead strewing their way, seems to help to guardagainst this problem somewhat.

I do have thisniggling thought to mull over however:

Success in whatsociety appreciates (e.g. academics or sport for example) breeds selfconfidence and acceptance, which can breed motivation (good and bad) and selfsecurity and therefore happiness or at least contentedness in a person thatwould have difficulty being happy with a low paid menial job because theirhomeschooling parent did not push or extend them to learn and understanddifficult concepts or skills that at the time they may not have enjoyed. However, a person gaining self confidencethrough other avenues may be secure enough to be content doing what societydeems beneath them and therefore gain some sort of happiness.

The Catechism keepspopping into mind:

Why did God make us?

To know Him, to serveHim, to love Him in this world and to be happy with Him forever in heaven.

And my reading of thesaints this morning alluded to how ‘knowing Him, serving Him and loving Him’would bring happiness in this world. Iam still trying to understand that. Mycurrent mode of thought would be that the happiness referred to is somethingsociety can not necessarily easily grasp as it would be manifest in a way thatsociety and potentially even that soul prior to its abandonment to our Lord,could not see, understand or appreciate.

Pg. 184

…we desire to know even when we receive no further advantagefrom it. …even when our looking at something is of no use to us, we still liketo look at it.

Hence the allure ofthe craft fairs, where I can gaze at aisles and aisles of other people’swonderful ideas and exquisite crafting and somehow feel almost as content as ifI’d been able to do the creating myself. There is the added bonus of not actually having the clutter created,myself.

Pg. 186

…a child can’t learn simply anything right away. His mind needs to take in one kind ofknowledge before it can handle a higher kind.

Hence the argument for/ explanation of ‘scaffolding’ as learnt during my Dip. Ed. Year.

Also agrees with myvery basic understanding of Charlotte Mason suggesting to read chapter books inslow sittings rather than satisfying a child’s requests and reading the entirebook or large chunks of it in one sitting. Small bites can then be digested, mulled over and incorporated into our(and the child’s) current understanding of the world and of life.

Pg. 187 – Paraphrasedby me

Review:

1. Educationis for the good of the child – what a child learns should be taught to him forthe sake of his happiness, not for the benefit of the one teaching.

2. Allchildren are natural learners, and that what may seem to be an aversion tolearning in them actually results from how we try to teach them.

3. Thestudent’s mind is the active cause of learning – teachers can only help italong.

4. Childrenare often ready to learn the same things at different ages to other children,but also that some children are more suited to learn some things thanothers. Hence a fixed curriculum is notthe best choice.

I need to digest andthink over some of points 3 & 4. Iwholeheartedly agree with point 2, and point 1 I’m most of the way there with,I’m just trying to work through the generalisation with a number ofhypothetical cases in my own mind.

Pg. 188

The parents of the unschooled child trust that their childreally wants to learn, and so they can leave aside the external rewards andpunishments schools use to make children study.

Unschooling respects the different minds of differentchildren and helps each child to fulfil his potential to learn.

…keep in mind that children learn best my imitation.

Pg. 189

Parents still need to discipline their children; to restrictfreedom when it is conducive to the true good of the child.

Definite Catholicview/understanding.

There are then a heapof resources listed at the back of the book, other books to read, websites,magazines, blogs, prayers.

Enterprise

2011-10-02T22:37:00.001+08:00

The combination of wanting to multiply DD1's tooth money that seemed to come rolling in with 2 teeth falling out in short succession and reading Milly-Molly-Mandy's fruitful enterprises has meant that the girls are eager to sell things.

They've been collecting grass to dry to then sell to people.   I'm not quite sure to which people and for what.   I also have an array of weed flowers 'planted' in pots along my wall, getting ready to sell.

4 days ago, the family came up with the idea of having their own chickens with eggs they could sell to my grandmother who goes to the markets with my father every Saturday to buy her veges and eggs, and to sell to grandpa.   The girls then also decided to grow some lettuces and radishes to sell to the same poor unsuspecting relatives.

So early evening 4 days ago, we filled pots with my super-dooper mixture taken straight from Mel's square foot gardening book and sowed some seeds.   They have been lovingly tended to every day to ensure their 'soil' doesn't dry out and today (4 days later, right on schedule) the 8 of 9 radishes and 4 of 6 lettuces popped up their heads.

There was great excitement in the air and learning from granny while they showed her their crops.

Woohoo, that baby slept through!

2011-10-02T22:24:00.002+08:00

She did, she did. Amazing. 3 of the others didn't do that till over 12 months, and DS2 till at least 10 months from memory. DD3 is 3 months 1 week and woohooooo. Although I didn't benefit really as I went to bed FAR too late. But she...................

Fed at about 7.30pm

I think I put her down around 8pm (problem is we thought we'd put everyone to bed just after 7, only to find it was 8.30pm. Our main clock had slowed RIGHT DOWN and I'm not even sure when. It could have been slower than normal for days. This happened a fortnight ago on a Saturday night too and I didn't realise in the morning and was horribly late for Mass. I keep putting in partially used batteries - that's why.)

And she woke at 7AM for a feed. WOW. Way to go my amazing little angel.

It is interesting as yesterday was the first day she began giving us a piece of her mind. She spent the day kicking while on her back and managing to manouver herself around a little and would squeal indignantly if anyone picked her up! Purhaps all her exercise and excitement wore her out.

Books this month

2011-09-30T23:55:00.000+08:00

Great Books that have stood out this month

Library finds we stumbled upon: (as in the kids got it off the shelf)

Duck Books we've enjoyed

Ben & Duck (Sara Acton) was a lovely find at the library. It's Australian and so is not at Amazon from what I can tell. The author is the Illustrator and the book tells the story using both the pictures and the words - as in, unless you look at the pictures you will miss bits of the story by only reading the words. I loved reading it multiple times and it held the interest of my toddler. Review here, purchase here. - Great
First the Egg (Laura Vaccaro Seeger) is a very clever book that teaches you a little and explores the age old question, "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?". Each page has a piece cut out that forms one picture against the following page, and a different picture against the previous page. It's lovely, interesting for me to read over and over, and kept the toddler amused. Cheapest for us Ozzies at Abebooks. - Great
The Library (Sarah Stewart). A girl loves book and grows into a lady that doesn't want chocolates, shoe or clothes. Just books. Eventually they take over her house and she donates house and all to the town council which converts her house into a free library. Eventually she had to move into a friends' house and as 2 old ladies, they sit there reading books day after day after day. - Good

July photos done!

2011-09-26T01:18:00.001+08:00

Woohoo, July photos added. Only 2 months behind now. The most up-to-date I've been for almost a year!

Read alouds 2011

2011-09-25T16:00:00.000+08:00

About February

The Enchanted Wood (Enid Blyton) We we unable to source a pre-80's version.

May

The Faraway Tree (Enid Blyton) We sourced a pre-80's version that included Dame Slap.

August

Duckling diary (Lucy Daniels)To be honest, a book I found pretty boring, but the girls would request chapter after chapter to know what happened to the abandoned duckling found by a little girl.

September

Betsy-Tacy (Maud Hart Lovelace). My almost 5 & recently 6year old girls loved this as it's about 2 little girls their ages (one turns 5 in the book). Theylive in a time when travel is in a cart behind a horse, when play is paperdolls lovingly cut from clothing adverts eagerly awaited for and then prized,when a 'cubby house' is not a posh, large bought house, but the wooden box apiano was delivered in. A time when thechildren deal with infant birth and infant death, when manners areimportant. A lovely book about REALlife in the days of old. They go to church, listen to their parents,fight with and play with their siblings and consider eating their dinner up ona hill along the road they live on, as being a wonderful treat. Iam pleased to see there are a whole bunch more books about their adventures andhave ordered them from the library.

I have just realised there are more LITTLE PEAR (1931), books as well as Betsy Tacy books. I will have to hunt them down.

LITTLE PEAR AND HIS FRIENDS (1934) is easy to get, but MORE ABOUT LITTLE PEAR (1971) will cost me $27 and LITTLE PEAR AND THE RABBITS (1956) I can only source for over AUS$90!

All I want for Christmas is

2011-09-24T22:28:00.000+08:00

my two front teeth...............DH's been singing that all day, but DD1 doesn't get it.

She had her 3rd lower tooth fall out on Thursday (since her first 2 fell out 16 months ago) and one of her front teeth fall out today (2 days later). We're learning a Frog poem by Hillaire Belloc where the frog doesn't want to be called names suck as 'gap-a-grin' and so I had a perfect specimen to explain to the children what that nickname meant. So DD1 is gleefully being called 'gap-a-grin' and I can't stop laughing at her when she tries to speak her 'ssss'.

The delights of having children to tease, and since they won't be going to school to get the teasing, they've got to learn to deal with it from mum and grandpa.

DD1 lost a front tooth

2011-09-24T22:00:00.000+08:00

DD1 lost another lower tooth

2011-09-22T22:00:00.000+08:00

DD3 - 3 months

2011-09-20T06:38:00.003+08:00

DD3 is 3 Months today and for the last 3-4nights has only woken once. Last night she went for over 7 hours between her feeds, from just before laying her down around 7pm until 3am. Until now it has been almost always between 6 and 7 hours. She then woke at 6am and is back sleeping now.

Her lastpoo was on Sunday, after 9 days, and she had waited 6 days the time beforethat. Man it was a mission to wash outof her nappy. Better than glue – now surelythat is a business idea if one can somehow neutralise the smell. DS2 I remember also going through a stage ofonly poohing weekly. I’m glad I’d readthat this was normal before it happened. The first 3 children poohed a number of times every day all throughbabyhood, but they were fed upon waking, to sleep and any other time they dareda whinge. DS2 just didn’t want thebreast for comfort, and DD3 is on a lovely routine instead of being fed all day. The routine has nothing to do with the clock,she is merely fed upon waking, and then laid on her tummy and given the dummywhen she gets tired (she may need the dummy put back in her mouth a few timesas she loses it while snuffing around), and she goes to sleep before long.

Today she was up on the counter with DD3 (and often had DD3’sskirt in her face or mouth) while I baked and cooked all afternoon and I didsee her manage to get her thumb in her mouth a number of times as she gottired, and her eyes begin to close, but I think as she relaxed while driftingoff, her hand would flail away and so she’d come to again.

Oh I do enjoy life with a baby, especially ones that sleepwell as the last 2 have done.

Otherwise, the last of the sick kids seemed to be fine bylate last week. I still have a thickphlegmy cough, but it’s no trouble, I’m still full of energy and my coughs tendto stick around a while, and so life goes on.

Spring = Portuguese millipedes

2011-09-18T21:49:00.001+08:00

Spring is here and that means Portuguese millipedesEVERYWHERE.

Even transplanting out my various peas a fortnight ago, Ifound many curled up in the seed skins of the seedlings. In one skin I found 4 millipedes.

Tonight on my way through the laundry I drowned 21millipedes and 2 slugs. The slugs I’venever had so prevalent before and I’ve been catching 2-3 per night in thelaundry room. This laundry room has 2external doors and a hole in the wall where the builder was supposed to put alight switch. It is a room less than 3m* 2m and is the entranceway for many critters from outside, to the inside.

YUK!

Blogging along - June done

2011-09-15T21:24:00.000+08:00

Woohoo, I have just finished adding the photos to my blog up until the end of June. I do it month by month and never seem to catch up.

DS1 stops thumb sucking - cold turkey.

2011-09-15T16:24:00.000+08:00

DS1 decided a few weeks ago to stop sucking his thumb. Cold turkey. A sibling mentioned it to me one day and Irealised I hadn’t seen him sucking his thumb for a couple of days. He agreed. That he’d decided to stop and so he had. We’d occasionally asked him to take histhumb out of his mouth in the preceding few weeks as he had a large, permanentblister on his thumb. Well today,looking back at photos of him sucking his thumb I realised that he hasn’t forperhaps up to a month now. Kidscontinually amaze me!

Thumb sucking has been fairly easy for us so far, with 3 giving up without struggle.

DD1 - 18 months

DD2 - 9 months

DS1 - 3 years.

And my mathematical mind sees a pattern. Hold on.

DS2 never took it up.

Still a pattern. Can you see it? It could be plotted.

DD3 is still trying, but as the dummy works so well, I've not taken the time to teach her, and she doesn't have a lot of opportunity to practise as if she whinges, someone is always around to oblige her with a dummy rammed in and she immediately looks blissful, though she doesn't ever want it unless she's tired and ready to sleep - what an easy baby. I do want to switch her from dummy to thumb though.

DD2: a bully?

2011-09-15T16:01:00.002+08:00

I fear DD2 would be the school bully and consequently I'm so glad to haveher at home, where she can't usually get away with much without an adult beingnear. Today she was hitting DS1 with a dress-up fairy dress (whichhas sequins and so can be sore) and refused to stop. She couldn'ttell me why she'd done it. She does spiteful or nasty thingsoccasionally not necessarily for 'fun' as far as I can tell, but more just tosee what happens or what reaction she can get. She's a hardone to figure out.

Daily Porridge

2011-09-07T22:14:00.000+08:00

Daily Porridge Recipe

Our usual porridge –began from recipe in Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions book.

· 2 cups filtered water slightly warmed

· 2 cups oats

· 4 TBLSP either (yoghurt, whey, buttermilk orapple cider vinegar)

· 1-2 TBLSP chia seeds

These I place in asaucepan sometime during the morning for the following day’s breakfast.

Next morning I add

· Large dollop of honey with wooden spoon I willthen stir the porridge with

· Sprinkle of shredded coconut (1/4 – ½ cup)

· cinnamon

Oh, I keep forgetting to add some SALT!

DD2 learning how to read

2011-09-07T20:04:00.000+08:00

Wow, this is exactly how DD2 reads EVERY TIME using 'Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons'. Just like Dory from Nemo. I could copy the whole post word-for-word.

Sickness

2011-09-07T06:40:00.000+08:00

We have all been sick since a few days before theend of winter. Everyone has had athick, running nose, phlegmy cough and high temperatures for a couple ofdays. DS2 was the first one to get itand is the first one well, 11 days later. DS1 seems to have had it the worst – 4 nights of high temperatures, thesnot and cough and also an earache in each ear. He is such a good sick person, he’s quiet –it even took him AT LEAST a day to complain of a sore ear and then it was becausehe was so sore he couldn’t sleep and was crying. Kid’s 2,3 & 4 are excellent sick people,they don’t whinge, just sleep a lot. DD1 didn’t really get it much at all and yet she did whinge.

PHOTO to come – Poor DS1’s cheeks after a week of snot and wipingwith his left arm, smearing the snot across his left cheek. It must be pretty toxic snot.

DD3 feeding

2011-09-05T06:42:00.000+08:00

We finally feed comfortably, her semi upright,but sort of straddling my opposite leg to the side she’s feeding on. She feeds lying down at night now, but withher head propped up onto my arm as otherwise the milk does begin to come outher nose. This is much easier andrequires me to be far less awake. Ichange her bottom 1ce per night and she wakes twice.

Spring bugs

2011-09-04T22:38:00.000+08:00

Spring is here for better and for worse.

In last 10 minutes I have set the mouse traps for the kitchen for the first time since autumn, caught 1 slug, 2 portuguese millipedes, 1 daddylong legs spider, 1 weird fruit fly thing. This was just in the main kitchen living room and the bathroom. Only yesterday I vacuumed up all spiders and millipedes I could find in the house, obviously there is now vacant real estate for others to claim.

We've never had a slug problem before, but the kids have got them twice on their feet outside, I stepped out of bed in the middle of the night and stepped on one, and I've found 3 in the house and many outside eating my seedlings, just in the past week or two. Slug slime is very hard to remove. I find melaleuca Sol-u-mel works well.

You know you're a homeschooler when

2011-09-01T23:44:00.001+08:00

I love this quote, "Yep, you know you’re a homeschooler when you start sacrificing your scrapbooking supplies in the name of school." from http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/blog/2011/08/our-schoolroom-on-ikea.html

DS2's 2nd birthday

2011-09-01T22:45:00.000+08:00

DS2's second birthday. Learning to 'fix' things with real tools.

He had some cousins over for lunch and a play.

Aunt Countrycook brought a custard tart and so I was let off the hook regarding making a cake.

After dinner, we feasted on smarties and jelly sweets. We sorted the smarties, and tally-graphed them, then we began to learn about multiplication, using the little piles of sorted colours.

Then DS2 discovered a DUPLO POLICE MOTORBIKE. Just what he wanted as he and DS1 (3 1/2 yrs) have struggled to share DS1's duplo police motorbike.

All his bounty. We gave EACH child a hula-hoop.

DS2's gift from his godparents. His Godmother is fantastic at getting gifts that are just perfect for any young aged child she's buying for.

Postles Creek

2011-08-31T19:18:00.000+08:00

Mum: Where do we find the chief truths which we are to believe (Baltimore Catechism)

DD1: From the Postles Creek.

UWA "Save the Children" Book sale

2011-08-24T21:33:00.000+08:00

DH has took a reduction in pay from May, to be able to take off one day per 2-3 weeks, to be more a part of the children's young lives and to experience some of our homeschooling experiences with us. He took the day off today and is trying hard to learn to go on an outing without an aim, dealine and time limit, but to wander with us, to see where the childrens interests take them and to stop and watch them if that is all that is required.

After myself and 5 kids went to thechiropractor (DH doesn’t agree with using a chiropractor, which is a pity as he could be goingfor free – our Chiropractor only charges the first 4 in a family) we headeddown to my first uni, UWA, to attend the annual ‘Save the Children’ booksale. It was the 6^th andfinal day, where you pack a box with books for $15. I remember stumbling upon it 11 years agowhile I was still a student and lugging a LARGE box, jammed packed full ofcraft and sewing books that I had forked out a mere $5 for, home on my 2 hourbus, train, bus trip home. I was achingbut in heaven. It took me about a monthto read through everything.

Today we brought home just over 3 boxes, and there were NOcraft or sewing books.

The children were excited, but puzzled. They couldn’t quite grasp the bit about,“Choose whichever books you like and put them in the box”. Really? Do you have to pay? Can I havethis one? Really? They tried to bring me each one to check,but I was not interested as I was trying to scour myself. DD1 lasted the distance (2 hours) and placedmany in the boxes. DS1 kept with us for½ the time, while DD2 after carefully selecting 2 books was ready to go outsideand wander with daddy and DS2.

Thereafter, while daddy got the job of carting the booksmiles away to the car, we more gentile members of the family picnicked oncarrot sticks, cheese, wholemeal rolls, raisins, apple, nuts, strawberries anda biscuit each for the kids.

Was thatBig Ben, I was asked? Could we climb upthere? Do you need to go in anaeroplane to get up there?

I then experienced my old uni with fresh enthusiasm, throughmy children’s eyes.

This photo is taken from the same spot as the long distance photo above, and the children are climbing a stone bench you can just see poking out from behind the left of the pram. Now isn't that a lonely zoom lense?

We watched ducksand birds, saw an ENORMOUS tree (with branches that could easily span ourentire garden), lay across a cut tree stump that was wider than DD1 is tall,went over a bridge to the main library, investigated the main, big library andthen wandered to the Swan River. Thechildren were so excited to see the rows and rows of books in the library, theyran excitedly up and down the isles, sometimes just to run their hands, alongthem, some small people, to push the wheelie stepping stools along, and some tocount how many books of each colour. Theywere very quiet. Then we went up afloor and found……………..rows and rows of books, and then another floor, and thenraced daddy and the lift all the way down to the bottom again. They didn’t want to leave but daddy wasseriously flagging and I knew they’d enjoy the river.

They had continual questions. Found letters engraved on the wall that wereas large as DS1, saw the tamest kookaburras we’ve come across yet (the ones inour yard are fairly prolific but definitely not tame), and investigated alecture room. Actually the mostenjoyable part was that the lecture room had two doors entering into the samecorridor and so they ran in circles in and out the room with mummy holding onedoor and daddy the other.

Then the river.

I had packed spare clothes and so we let them investigate and get wet. The girls found shell and feathers to placein their treasure sacks (nappy bags) and the boys played rough. DS1drew in the sand with a stick and chucked stones into the river, DS2 chuckedhandfuls of sand in the direction of the water, and while bending down with hislegs straight to look for more sand (while standing on a beach) managed to gethis hat wet in the lapping waves.

This was the favourite part of their day they told us in the car on the way home. Mine was watching their excitement and enjoyment throughout the whole day, and of course the books I'll peruse over the next few weeks or months. DH's was probably getting home, or collapsing into bed.

M&M bribery enticed them along the shore to the car asour 5hr parking was up. They had tocatch up to daddy a few times to get one popped in their mouths.

Now I need to quickly look through the boxes while they’reasleep to remove any I deem inappropriate. I got a number with art prints in them…….and……..well……..art stretchesthe boundaries of decency sometimes.

Girls' drawings

2011-08-24T05:30:00.000+08:00

My girls like to work with paper.

DD1 draws. Here is a recent drawing she did while still 5 )her backwards 5 in the corner tells me). The Rosary, and I can't remember what else.

DD2 however, likes to create with the paper. She has only got into drawing the past 6 months and any drawing has an elaborate explanation to go along with it. Here I discover the back of my kitchen cupboards have become a new display centre.

We obviously do not have enought room to display the prolific art that she creates. Can't remember what these were, apart from the pink one being a house. Here is a girl she made.

She makes boxes, clothes, boats, parcels, houses, animals. ANYTHING can be sculptured with paper, scissors and stickytape.

What's a bible verse?

2011-08-23T19:36:00.001+08:00

I tried to get back into learning bible verses today. Something we've done off and on for about 3 years now, never very successfully. We're still trying to remember the original 8 verses. Anyway, we read a story about John 3:16 and tried to learn it again, a number of times this morning. At dinner I asked if anyone remembered their bible verse to tell dad.

DD2 responded, "What's a bible verse?".

I meekly remarked to our homeschool principal (DH) that we obviously hadn't got too far.

Look at my ten cents

2011-08-22T19:08:00.000+08:00

DD1, 'Mum, can you take a picture of my ten cents?'

She meant sentence.

The faith of a mustard seed...........

2011-08-22T05:43:00.000+08:00

It poured for the few hours before dawn. We had a Catholic Homeschooling Feast Day Celebration planned for the Crowning of Our Lady.

During prayers before breakfast DD1 prayed, "Please let it be sunny for us to play at the feast day?"

The sky was dark grey in every direction and the rain heavy. I had a thought of how I'd explain away the raining for the rest of the day, and after prayers mentioned that we would take raincoats and so therefore still be able to play. I then completely forgot about the prayer.

On the way to the Feast Day it was drizzling and by the time Mass was finished and the games and activities began, the sun was out and remained out the rest of the day.

On the way home I remarked that the kids were lucky it had been nice and sunny.

DD1 remarked from the back of the van, "I asked Jesus to make it sunny". I could imagine the statement followed by a "Duh!"

Oh the faith I lack.

30 years & a skirt from DH

2011-08-20T08:56:00.000+08:00

My 30th birthday, and the present I asked DH for was a day of peace. He took care of all 5 children today, just bringing DD3 to me to be fed every few hours. I was able to sew something fun for the first time in a couple of years and I made, from start to finish, a skirt for myself out of 2 men's business shirts I bought on sale last winter, and some material I had in the cupboard. I always struggle with matching and imagining different prints together. I like it however, though it's a little fluffier than I would have liked, and has a few other annoying points, but I'll probably never get around to changing them and so here it is.

This was a photo DH took from a terrible angle. I think I'll have to hang the skirt up and take a photo myself to get a better one.

DD3 update

2011-08-19T06:43:00.000+08:00

8 weeks, DD3's been sleeping well, burping well and lyingsometimes to feed for 3 weeks or more now. Been waking 1-2 times per night for a number of weeks now. Been poohing once per day from about 5 ½weeks as opposed to after every feed.

Small stresses of motherhood

2011-08-17T21:21:00.003+08:00

“God put me on thisearth to accomplish a certain number of things. Right now I am so far behindthat I will never die.”

Bill Watterson quotes (American Author of the comicstrip Calvin &Hobbes, b.1958)

Another day like that today.

The book I read recently and mentioned in this post, “Please don’t drink the Holy Water” by SusieLloyd mentions her internal feelings when hearing heaven described as abanquet when all she can think about is the planning, the preparation, theenergy needed to ensure kids sit and eat properly and then the washing up. Willthe angels do this, because until that is answered, the image of a banquet isnot quite the peaceful, enjoyable experience I’m sure the writer is trying toinvoke.

Even the stress of hand-me-downs. I can not resist accepting them as there isoften a lovely surprise piece of clothing, either very practical, pretty orexpensive but necessary (e.g. winter jackets – I have never bought 1 DeoGratius but all children have one in nearly every size (and if they don’t theycan fit into the previous size or the next size for another winter)). Problem is, the bags sit for a day or two(or more J)then I need to go through and take out what I like, then I need to sort thatinto size, then get out of storage, the box of clothes in that size and pullout all the clothes within it to determine which of the newly received clotheswould be useful to keep, or which from the old box could be replaced by thenewer clothes. I then have bags ofclothes remaining, that wait for days or weeks to be taken down to our localSVDP shop.

I find this stressful and while I used to enjoy goingthrough all the clothes and having things organised, I’m now trying to employ amore minimalist approach and severely restrict children to 7 pieces of any typeof clothing and be strict about what is practical, yet modest and requireslittle effort for me regarding the washing chain. Girls have pretty much just black leggingsto go under skirts. Clothing needs tostand up to mud and dirt, but washable, not need ironing and then still looknice enough to go out it or for Mass. Iwould also love to be able to sew some of their clothes.

I then wonder if the stress, clutter and work that receivingbags of hand-me-downs is worth it? Mumrecommends declining the gifts. I amnot quite able to do that for fear of offending people and what if there ISsomething helpful, useful or lovely in there.

I need to remember, I can make do with little instead. I don’t need everything, neither do I need the perfect itemof clothing for the perfect situation.

Yet I thank God that this is one of the things I stress about rather than lack of clean water, lack of food, fear of violence.

Book news

2011-08-14T22:43:00.004+08:00

I have just finished reading 'Please Don't Drink the Holy Water' by Susie Lloyd and I LOVED it. I tried to only read 1 chapter per night as a bedtime treat, and each chapter I devoured. She just describes my life, my internal thoughts and struggles.

Why do we tell children off at the table to stop talking with their mouth full, when we have our mouth full - her little drawn picture then shows me at the dinner table. You know, trying to eat your own dinner, while answering questions, telling a few children to chew and swallow, feeding 1 or 2 or 3 children their solid food, while breastfeeding another.
Her 'adventures' with a puppy during her 5th pregnancy - YES, I was there too.
Her dilhemma with being healthy, but Catholic and so what wins your money after weighing up pesticides vs fair trade vs food miles, healthy food vs hippy health shops promoting global warming information and supporting abortion.

Duck 'studies'

2011-08-11T22:49:00.000+08:00

Ducks

We’re reading about ducks, crafting ducks and learning howto cook ducks.

Notes:

Ducks do not have much meat on them.
Duck fat is good to roast potatoes in and after throwing outmy first batch of duck fat, I see you pay $5 per 500g tub of it at thesupermarket.
I’m suspicious that duck fat makes cooked mince meat lookpink and ‘uncooked’. But I’m not sureit’s the duck fat or the fact that ½ the meat is Kangaroo mince, not all Beefmince. It is disconcerting.

We learnt this lovely poem. The kids are very amused at the ‘bottoms ups’ line.

The Duck (by Ogden Nash)

Behold the duck.
It does not cluck.
A cluck it lacks.
It quacks.
It is specially fond
Of a puddle or pond.
When it dines or sups,
It bottoms ups.

Duck Books we've enjoyed

The kids LOVE the ugly duckling and so we've read many different versions of that story.
Ben & Duck (Sara Acton) was a lovely find at the library. It's Australian and so is not at Amazon from what I can tell. The author is the Illustrator and the book tells the story using both the pictures and the words - as in, unless you look at the pictures you will miss bits of the story by only reading the words. I loved reading it multiple times and it held the interest of my toddler. Review here, purchase here.
Make Way for McCloskey (Robert McCloskey)
Story about Ping (Marjorie Flack) Read late last year - not for this unit.
Alexander's Outing (Pamela Allen)
Duckling Diary (Animal Ark Pets #10) (Ben M. Baglio) - Chapter book. I found it incredibly boring, but the girls where asking for more as each chapter ended.
Where's my mama? Hinkler Books. Illustrated by Sam Chaffey. I like reading this pop-up yet sturdy book, lovely pictures, sweet storyline. Ok, so it's about a chick, not duckling, but we read it anyway, along with The Little Red Hen.

Health stats

2011-08-11T22:30:00.000+08:00

Health nurse to do the health check of the bottom 3 kids.

DS1 - 3 yr check

DS2 - 18 month check

DD3 - 6 week check.

The spacing has been good as I was able to do the same checkups with the bottom 3 children when DS2 was born too.

I find the health nurse visits uncomfortable as more and more I seem to do with each baby goes against what is recommended by the nurse and I always feel I'm in trouble and have to justify.

I co-sleep, place baby on her stomach to sleep, do not vaccinate (doctor told me last week I was the 3 person he'd ever have request immunisation exemption in 35 years of practise), do not send kids to kindy or school, am not interested in contraception and am unconvinced that drinking milk strengthens your teeth, and disagree with the 600ml per day of dairy my 3yr old is supposed to be receiving (there wouldn't be much room for any other food and I'd go broke as I buy the organic milk at $5 per 2L).

Opposites

2011-08-10T22:10:00.004+08:00

I ‘played’ opposites with DS1 (3 yrs) as he was keeping mecompany as I put away the washing.

He gave me the usual answers to some questions e.g.hot/cold, up/down, black/white.

But then I also gained insight when he gave these answerswhich I can’t really fault. I justrealised I would have given ‘canned’ answers without thinking laterallyabout any word.

Opposite of fast?

Stop

Opposite of sweet?

Yuck

Opposite of flat?

Downer (as in a slope sloping down)

1 step forward, 2 steps back

2011-08-05T23:00:00.008+08:00

I awoke with 3 loads of washing to fold, one to take out that had washedovernight when electricity is ½ price, and one to bring in.

I woke to DD3 having poohed and leaked in the bed. We both showered and I straightened my roomand the kid’s room as I usually do and made my way to the kitchen to make thebreakfast, already most of an hour late with feeding baby and showering usboth. I walked in upon a toddler whohad poohed and leaked. He was changedand bathed in the kitchen sink. So,back to the breakfast. Kids are tiredof waiting and have made their own weetbix. Pick up the baby, she vomits down the back of my shirt, badly enough toneed to change it. Unexpected guestsarrive – 2 lots! They leave, baby pukesagain needing a shirt change and it’s time for lunch. Though a late lunch. The muffin I was going to make will takeanother 45min, and so I opt for anything I can find instead. Fruit as usual, nuts, yoghurt.

Rest/nap time. Toddler is the onlyone who goes down now. After reading tothe others on the couch while feeding the baby and getting her to sleep, I amalmost ready to begin the chores I woke up to. It’s 2.30pm. First I need to puton another load of washing from the pukes and poos.
I trudge outside to hang up 1 load of washing, take down 1 load of washing.

And then my day morphs into, “If you give a pig a pancake” or “If you give a moose a muffin”

………………. he’ll want syrup, then you’ll run out, so have to go tothe shop to buy some more, but it’s cold so he’ll need to put a jumper on, thejumper has a loose button, he’ll have to fix that first……………….

Anyway, I spy the 6 pot plants on the table in the garage/shed where I’mhanging the washing. They are dry andhave been waiting to be planted for over a week. I decide to carry them all out into thegarden to benefit from the winter rain that may grace us. I realise there is a little punnet of snowpea seedlings that were hidden in the leaves of one of the pot plants (I’dplanted a heap of seedlings in the previous week), bone dry and looking verylimp. They would need to be plantedNOW.

After planting they need to be watered. The ‘old’ hose was wrapped and knotted up with the ‘new’ hose that hadbeen purchased to fill and drain my birthing pool. I needed to disentangle the 2 hosepipesfirst and roll up the new one carefully, before putting using the old one.

I walked inside to the sound of baby crying for her next feed, looked at theclock and saw it was already time to get the dinner begun, to be cooked beforethe price of electricity doubled at 5pm. I still had not got to the sink post lunch and after feeding the baby Iwould be running late for dinner prep.

I fail to remember how the evening went, but remember that I rolled into bedwith less accomplished than when I’d woken up, as I still had not folded any ofthe waiting loads of washing but had created 2 more.

Activities and Play from the month

2011-07-31T23:00:00.000+08:00

Play

Those marble tunnels. The kids like them for short time periods. I enjoy them for longer than they do. Maybe they'll grow into them once they can make their own pathways.

Playdough. A common request from DS1. Not so commonly granted by me. We sweep out the room completely before we start. I now try to leave the room unswept afterwards, overnight, so that the playdoh on the floor dries and is easier to sweep up or 'rub' off the cork flooring without getting rolled into the broom or stuck into my socks. DD2 proudly showing a big blob she's lovingly constructed. DD1 is not interested in playdoh much anymore.

Our music box. Should probably be renamed raucousbox as there is not yet any music produced on anything.

How I love those wedgits for all ages. We have not yet hot an age where they arenot enjoyed and since I’m nearly 30 and I love playing with them, I suspect theadvertising’s age range of 3-103 is probably pretty accurate, though my under 3’slove them (if you remove the smallest, white 8 sided shape).

DH's leave for DD3's birth and Weekends

DH is great at playing and making up games. Here is some sort of shop'buying and selling game that they added to and played a fair number of time, with poker chips for money and the Rightstart abacus' for adding.

Weekday naps / school time

Some days I spend DS2's nap time productively with the children doing activities or 'school work'

DD2 doing a puzzle. It’s a new and hard one for her and so we began by just taking out‘pathways’ of puzzle pieces for her to put back.

Memory Game with DS1, he is learning the rules. The girls then came and played and while ithelped in some ways, it meant DS1 had to wait longer between turns and hisattention was already waning.

DS1 making tangram shapes with a lovely book that leads themthrough the alphabet, first outlining all the edges of each shape within thedesign, then gradually dropping lines, until the latter part of the alphabethas only the outline of the entire animal and you have to work out the ‘puzzle’of where the tangrams fit. None of ushave worked past the first 8-10 so far.

Some 'rest times' I set up a few activities and rotate the children through them for 1/2 hour each. The bean scooping and pouring is a favourite as long as I don't bring it out too often or they start going off on a tangent and making mess.

They 'play' with and sort shells.

I start placing the shells in the ice-cube trays in a pattern and they have to continue it. I happened to buy a few containers of different shells at "The Warehouse" as a teenager when I lived in New Zealand. My parents then shipped them over here with all our things and my mountains of clothes, material and other craft stuff. I never would have imagined when I bought them as they were cheap, when they would finally be used and by whom.

Some nap times are just everyone in a separate area of the main room, on a mat to designate their space and told to read books. Sometimes I will rotate them between each others' mats and pile of books every 1/2 hour. DD2 'babysitting' DD3 until she fell asleep.

And if the activities are going well and they're still wanting to play with them, DS2 joins us when he wakes from his nap. He still gives us a good 2-3 (sometimes 4) hour nap.

DS2 occupied scooping and pouring rice into different sized containers and a small jug. He loves this activity and has asked for it a number of times, pointing to the rice container at the top of the shelves in the school room.

Sleeping & cuddles

2011-07-31T22:31:00.000+08:00

That amazing 5 3/4 year old of mine is continually putting my baby to sleep! Now that is one reason I'd hate to have her gone all day at daycare or school!

That baby does often sleep on the floor too, and when she decides to sleep like this I wonder how it can be comfortable and how she can breathe. But I check and she can.

Pictures tell the toddler's story

2011-07-31T21:46:00.000+08:00

A picture tells a thousand words, and a series of pictures tell a story. Enjoy this story. Watch that toddler! DD1 was 'helping' cuddle the baby, but after posing, walks off.

First you try poking her eyes.

Ok ............cheese

Parent, "Do not poke her eyes out".

Toddler, "Eyes".

Toddler: serious, cross look at parent telling him off.

What?

Ok I'll kiss her to show her I really love her (and possibly get parent off my back).

She did it. She bugged me.

Hehehe, this is fun.

Ok, more kisses.

Over this.

Getting bored.

What are they watching.

Cubby house roof

2011-07-31T18:15:00.000+08:00

The cubby house roof was all measured out, built at ground level in the shed and then carried on. I did not get to the workers fast enough to take a photo of DH balancing, standing on the TOP of the vertical beams.

Hide & Seek

2011-07-31T14:12:00.000+08:00

DH blindfolded, trying to locate the hiding children. DD2's hiding spot was excellent. She moved the boxes out from the bottom of the bookshelf and then hid behind them.

DH could not find her, as every time he got to the boxes he assumed 'bookcase' and moved elsewhere.

He did eventually find this one, after feeling under the highchair on 3 separate occasions.

Big Ben and Clocks

2011-07-30T22:22:00.002+08:00

Something last week led DH to look up the ‘Grandfather Clock’ song onyoutube, using the ipad at meal time. Ilove that song. A folk song I learnt inchoir at Primary School. We havelistened to a few versions this week and the children are beginning to learnit.

It has also prompted so very many questions.

· Why did the old man die?

· How old is 90 years?

· Why did the clock stop? Did it really?

· Is this a real story?

· So the clock and the man were really born on thesame day?

DD2 is very concerned about why the clock stopped. Finally, after mulling this over for days,she informed us tonight, that if she was the clock and the old man died shewould also stop.

Earlier this week I pulled out a bunch of books about time and some time activities from the abyss otherwise called the craft room. We then began to make a grandfather clock each.

We are not yet finished. I thought we could go on to making mice andthen do Hickory Dickory Dock too.

Yesterday morning I thought about Big Ben and we investigated it on the iPadafter breakfast. We took a tour insideand saw all the steps. We saw how theyclean the clocks. We workd out that theclock face diameter is the length of our lounge/dining/kitchen room. We learnt that Big Ben is the bell and it isBIG. We learnt that the numbers arelarger than DD3, Big Ben weighs the same as about 14 of daddy’s little car oras much as a little elephant and is as wide as 1 ½ Uncle Bones’ and that theminute hand is the same weight as maternal Grandpa.

I then spent the afternoon rest time and evening creating a ‘unit study’ onBig Ben and the Clock Tower. There are some great resources already online, I just wanted to really tailer things to my kids and the world they know now. Wow, if mykids were older, we could extrapolate for weeks.

The layout of London
History of England and the clock
Elements the bell is made out of
Roman numerals vs our usual numbers
Gravity being used to keep the clock running
Imperial coins and how they’re used on thependulum to speed it up or slow it down
Government and about the minister kept locked upa number of times in the tower – he wouldn’t swear the oath to God.
The palace the tower is part of and the Royaltythat have lived there.
The interesting and varied reasons for the fewtimes that clock had stopped during the 150 years it has been with us, e.g.snow, heat, birds.
Learn about the weather of London.
Learn about what a starling bird is (the onesthat stopped the clock).
How a bell is cast.
The quarter bells play a part of Handel’sMessiah just before the hour.
Learn about Handel
Learn about the notes the bells play, learntheir pitch.
Learn about St.Stephen, as Victorians commonly referred to the tower as St. Stephen’s tower
Measurement and weight

I have collated things together a number of times before and keep findingthat I get excited and learn a heap (much of it subsequently leaves my brainhowever), create a heap of materials, never figure out how to determine whenI’ve ‘finished’ enough to begin doing the learning and activities with thechildren. I therefore never ‘finish’and we get excited about something else before I do much with the children andso I put it aside for another year.

This has happened with

Ants – HOURS of research and creating, butwaiting in its entirety for another year.
Seeds – begun and half used, but can extrapolatefurther this year
Ladybirds – lapbook we’re part way through afterHOURS of me researching
Insects – lapbook we’ve begun
‘How to make and apple pie and see the world’ –‘completed’ but so far never used
Easter Egg activities 2009 – Made and onlypartially used.

Well, I’ve got better and better at making this Lapbook/Unit Study thing.

This time:

I made a list of questions about what I’d liketo find out, BEFORE I started researching. Some info I stumbled on as I didn’t know to look for it, but the listhelped set limits on how far into the investigation I was intending to go.
I also made a deadline to be finished researching by the endof the day (which ended up being 1am and the things to be laminated justsitting in a pile with other things waiting, for a cheap electricity time - butI’m getting there)

So next week, hopefully we can do some fun stuff!

Tenderness, uncle & dad

2011-07-30T20:28:00.000+08:00

I love looking at the couple of old photos I have of my mum’sonly brother lying with me as a baby, or the few of my dad sleeping with me asa baby, and I love seeing these ones of my youngest brother with DD3. I remember his nervous first hold of DD1,his first hold of a baby ever. I loveto see his softer side with the babies. He’s now VERY comfortable with them.

I don't think I was ever as feaked of my uncle, as a baby.

This is a post dinner picture, when children are surrounding the 'walking encyclopaedia' to ask him questions. The iPad facilitates the elaboration of information.

DD3, "Oh daddy, I love you"

DD3's prints

2011-07-30T06:44:00.000+08:00

DD3's hand and foot prints done at 5 weeks, 5 days. I am getting worse and worse with each baby, at making the effort to do them. She's already a fair bit bigger than at birth.

Fridge Magnets

2011-07-28T23:31:00.000+08:00

Children given magnetic letters for the fridge, given nodirections and told not to bug the adult.........................collaborate and order by colour.

Soothing a baby - TODDLER STYLE

2011-07-28T22:55:00.000+08:00

Babywhinges and TODDLER TO THE RESCUE.

Thisis how you settle a baby toddler style.

Hello baby, what do you want?

I'll get you your dummy.

I'll put it in.

RAM .............

IT ..............IN.

Check that worked.

Yip, she's gone back to sleep. Job done.

DD3 smiles

2011-07-28T22:17:00.000+08:00

28 July - 5wks 3days first definite smiles. 2 for mum, 2 for granny, 1 big beaming onefor grandpa who worked for it in his usual goofy way. Granny and mum only had to look at her fortheirs.

Investigating those fingers. I look forward to her finding her thumb and we can forget the dummy.

DS2 adding to the noise

2011-07-28T20:47:00.000+08:00

DS2 is trying to communicate a heap but mostof it is ‘baaa’ and I can’t follow it. It’s annoying as he tries so many times throughout the day and is veryinsistent, but I just can’t seem to interpret it. Last week he started saying words all overthe place, but was still content to not try to get across anything. Now he’s adding to the noise level! Last week was the first time I had to tellhim to shush so that I could finish what I was trying to say to him as he wassimultaneously trying to say something to me!

Front Steps - woohoo

2011-07-25T23:15:00.000+08:00

See those steps?

That is a very satisfying sight! Much better than what my poor visitors have had to trample over for thepast 2 years. Thank-you very much dad.

Kids learning to cook

2011-07-25T22:37:00.000+08:00

The kids often ask to sit up on the counter while I cook. OftenI try to get them to do other things so that I can be quick. Othertimes I let them up but don't let them touch much and even forget to talk tothem and tell them what I'm doing as I am so focussed on getting things donequickly. But if I do take the time to let them join in, their joyis uplifting, and their focussed concentration is a delight to see. Some tasks now, they do really help me. I can ask one of the older3 to peel carrots and by the time I've done everything else, they haveoccasionally completed all the carrots needed - 1 job less for me to do.

Here, DD2 is stirring the white sauce and DS1 is cutting zucchini with a serratedsharp knife. I do give them the sharp knives, but only the serratedas they do need to have the back and forth motion to cut and so I hope it'd be harderto cut themselves by mistake than with a sharp non-serrated knife.

They're also good at grating cheese or carrots. They don'tmanage the whole LOT we need for a meal, butanything they do achieve is great - I don't enjoy grating.

Thank-you cards

2011-07-25T22:36:00.000+08:00

Having a baby and entering birthday season means many thank-youcards need to be written, as well as a few birthday cards and New Baby Congratulations cards. I’m enjoyingsome crafty creativity and making a mountain. I usually spend so long pondering what to make and what to use as I haveso many different craft bits and pieces. This time the key to my success was a small box of only a few things tochoose from, in a colour scheme. This Icould keep on the kitchen counter, place on the dining table to do somecrafting, and then pack up in a couple of minutes when needed.

This is the way to go. Now I may get on and do some creative thingsinstead of wasting all of my time dreaming them up and running out of time todo anything.

This seems to be a problemwith the attempts to homeschool too. Iconstantly spend too much time planning and preparing and then run out of steambefore actually learning anything with the children. It also stops me from doing many creativethings with the children, as the effort of collecting all the bits I need fromall over the place, means I don’t get organised before time is up and we haveto do something else (e.g. dinner, bath, bed, lunch, end-of-nap-time), or I don’teven get brave enough to begin collating.

I used to think it was all because of the overwhelming number of thingsI have, but after a fair deal of decluttering I think the problem includes abit of OCD symptoms.

Cubby house in production FINALLY!!!!

2011-07-25T17:00:00.000+08:00

And the cubby house has progressed rapidly, aided by grandpawho’s finished his uni course and would like to limit squatter camps beingbuilt that could be potential homes for snakes too. DH is bursting with ideas though and I’mhopefully development will continue much more quickly than it has to date.

The bed on top has me a little worried as the platform ishigh and it could be so easy to be knocked off. So, we have a viewing platform above and ahideout from the rain below. As I tookthis photo, DD2 tried to sit down on her chair and missed, falling to thefloor. I couldn’t stop laughing. She was miffed and not impressed with mylaughter, but at the same time bemused and so didn’t get too angry.

Bright eyed baby - not mine though.

2011-07-24T23:02:00.000+08:00

Dh’s best friend's beautiful, wide eyed baby girl with my kids that love babies.

Cousins and grandpa

2011-07-23T23:34:00.000+08:00

Grandpa lines them up to answer questions, quiz-show style.

That bald dude is the father of two of them.

Black and White Story in Pictures

2011-07-21T23:01:00.000+08:00

Another story in pictures:

Ordered chaos with Country Cook in charge

2011-07-20T23:07:00.000+08:00

Mybrother’s partner and mother of 4 occupying our own little playschool class inmy loungeroom. Some sort of ordered chaos.

3 in pink pajamas

2011-07-19T23:11:00.000+08:00

3in pink pajama bags. (Aah, the middleone is a boy, but he doesn’t mind yet. Now did you know, that even up until theearly 20^th century pink was considered to be a boy colour, andlittle boys were dressed the same as little girls until past toddlerhood. So back off.)

These are the 2 siblings that fight over each other the most to hold DD3. DS1 is not far behind and DD2...............well, where is she? Treasure any picture you see of her being maternal.

Kids with wonderful midwife

2011-07-19T21:50:00.000+08:00

Our midwife through the government homebirthing system was wonderful. Once again, a midwife who was very good with the other children bounding around, and what a boon to not have to go out to any appointments. I'd much rather include a picture with her face, but until I get around to asking her permission, this will have to do. It's from our last post-natal visit at 29 days.

DD3 sleeping again, but oh what a cutey.

2011-07-18T23:01:00.000+08:00

A treasured photo my newborn, being held by Uncle Bones.

I know I'm biased, but man I love that baby.

Dax' 3rd birthday

2011-07-16T22:22:00.000+08:00

The 3 year old birthday boy

I saw the pile of presents and had a momentary attack of discontent. Am I cheating my children by not giving them parties? My thought immediately following was, "Oh man, all that clutter to find homes for". My sister has a lovely home, she doesn't keep anything that is not in use and her kids are not swamped with toys. She and her husband are very generous with their time and limited money, though I struggle to understand some of the things my sister does spend her money on. I am glad God made people so different. There are things however that I do need to learn from her. My children have a lot of things as I always 'see' or can justify to myself, the educational benefits for years to come while they school at home. Then I see the mountain of things I have to house, and see pictures of school children learning to write on a shared blackboard under a tree and I wonder, "What am I thinking?". Our money is not just for us, we are duty bound to give much more of it away!

I really love the tops the girls are wearing; they aresimple plain tops that I embroidered last year. Unfortunately you can’t really see the designs,but I had fun designing the pictures.

Those skirts they’ve worn for a few years now, DD1’s in adress turned into a skirt. I’ve donethat to a few dresses we love, though I probably won’t any longer now that wehave another girl to come through and wear them as dresses. Skirts however are far more practical thandresses as they do last for a wider age range as long as I’ve put in buttonhole elastic so that we can adjust the waists easily as they grow.

Kids' bedroom setup

2011-07-16T20:00:00.000+08:00

The kid's current room set-up.
DD1 on top bunk
DD2 on bottom bunk
DS1 mattress on floor
DS2 in cot

Well, that is their designated sleeping area if there is a fight, but really, every night the older 3 choose a new place to sleep and usually there are 2 in 1 bed, 1 on another and an empty third bed.