Journal 1/28

Yesterday was a snow day, so the kids played in the snow, drank copious amounts of hot cocoa, watched a lot of tv, played on the computer and wii and generally relaxed and enjoyed themselves!


Today dawned very gray and cold. Everything was coated in ice. So no more fun snow for us!

• Said a rosary with everybody (except Rick!) that hasn't happened in a long time. Each kid took a turn reading from our scriptural rosary book (I helped Becky) and leading a decade.
• Sean and Becky resisted mightily doing the itty bitty bit of copy work I asked of them today. Put me in a royal snit!
• Josh sequestered himself away all morning and finally finished reading Tom Sawyer which he announced rocks!
• Will practiced songs for the house band.
• I have no idea what Hannah was doing for most of the day. She did come down and make those pop and bake crescents (which I personally think are horrid). I did at one point take Huck Finn up to her and remind that she needs to read it now!
• Sean, Becky and I played 'smaths which is like a math scrabble but my brain was so fuzzy I couldn't wrap my mind around it. After awhile we decided it was an incredibly boring game and gave up.
• Sean has been creating so many funny little cartoons on his pivot program. He loves it! He spent the bulk of the day doing that.
• Cancelled the VT appt. My driveway is still a sheet of ice and is my street. Too chicken to try to venture out.
• Becky has watched: The Flintstones, The Jetsons, Yogi Bear and Pink Panther. She just announced she is going outside to play and I can hear her velcro-ing on her boots and singing to herself as she prepares for her outing.
• Josh and I had a nice catch up session doing Confirmation prep. I read to him from the St. Joseph's Catechism. Man, does the SJBC make faith dull!!! And the art is horrible! And today we were giggling over the comparison of being confirmed making you into a soldier for Christ. One of the illustrations has a picture of different guns and over each gun was something the Holy Spirit would give you to make you strong. So there's a picture of a revolver and then it says 'encouragement'. This cracked us up. "Yeah, I'll encourage you allright. Bang!' Over the rifle it said "good example." Can you believe this???? Oh my, how pathetic! We also read from the Gospel of John and discussed the Holy Eucharist.
• Rick and Hannah went and got carry out for dinner.
• I read next chapter from the Wanderings of Odysseus about how he gets away from Calypso. Rick is really getting into the story! Read a bit more from a book about colonial life on a farm in Pennsylvania in 1766.
• Rick, Sean, Josh and Becky watched The Last Mimzy.
• Rick is still reading Twig to Sean and Becky
• Said prayers with Grandad on the phone, cell phone that is, our phones seems to have gone out for some reason.
• Hannah baked peanut butter cookies to take to her friend Katie tomorrow. Hannah is flying to Texas tomorrow for a long weekend visiting Katie and Phil at U. of Dallas.
• Hannah and Rick are watching Lost and they've captured people who speak Latin. How sinister! I can't understand a thing they are saying. Is it classical or ecclesiastical pronunciation?
• I'm going to bed and reading more Huck Finn.

Journal 1/26/09

• Becky said a rosary with me this a.m. We talked a bit about the Joyful mysteries.
• Will gave Becky his ipod to keep her quiet while he worked on his Math/SAT prep. She walked around the house singing the Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B very, very loudly
• Josh woke up in a terrible mood but he finished all his math homework last night, so he could proudly show that to the math tutor.
• Sean and Becky very reluctantly did a little copywork. Actually Sean happily tried to memorize his poem but really dragged at copying it over. His poem is:

If no one ever marries me,

And I don't see why they should,

For nurse says I'm not pretty,

And I'm seldom very good --

If no one ever marries me,

I shan't mind very much,

I shall buy a squirrel in a cage

And a little rabbit hutch;

I shall have a cottage near a wood,

And a pony all my own,

And a little lamb, quite clean and tame,

That I can take to town.

And when I'm getting really old --

At twenty-eight or nine - -

I shall buy a little orphan-girl

And bring her up as mine.

By Lawrence Alma-Tadema

Becky's poem is:

Father is pater and mother is mater

Sister is soror and brother is frater

All children should obey both his father and mother

And brothers and sisters should love one another.

(Now I can't seem to turn off the block quoting. Hmmm.)

• Anyway, Becky actually did a reading page from the Little Angel Readers TM.
• Both Sean and Becky played with pattern blocks
• Then they set up a whole village out of blocks and little figures on the floor of the basement downstairs. They set up a store where they can buy seeds for their crops and have run a railroad from it to the town. They are also planning to live on fish and crabs as the town seems to be located near a lake. The lake also has a hot dog stand which they have high hopes of making lots of money. Nothing like unschooled economics and urban planning!
• Sean created stick figure cartoons on some new program Rick downloaded for him, called Pivot. Becky is avidly watching.
• Mom, Josh, Sean and Becky did a little Greek.
• Read And Then What Happened, Paul Revere? aloud to Sean and Becky and they were actually interested in it!
• Josh did his Kolbe vocabulary and started an essay on Tom Sawyer
• Hannah and Will are reading Huck Finn
• Will wrote a new song on the guitar and played it for us at lunch.
• Hannah slept until 1:15 or something! Slug!
• Sean got really into making animated cartoons using the Pivot program. He had a blast all afternoon with it. Didnt have the heart to make him study Latin.
• Hannah did some grocery shopping for me. That was very nice!
• Took Sean to piano which was later than usual than both he and Will had Music theory.
• Hannah went to work at 5 and worked til closing
• Josh and Becky stayed home and watched TV/played on computer
• Came home and did most of Latin homework for tomorrow's class with Will and Josh

Journal 1/9/09

• Got up early and went with Will to the 6:15 a.m. teen Mass. I hadn't gone in over a year. It was a very small turn out. Hannah didn't want to go because she's been fighting insomnia so she's trying to get back to regular sleeping hours. It was nice. Stopped at Dunkin' Donuts and brought home a dozen.


• Sean really likes his new piano piece Bye, Bye Blackbird. He's got everybody humming the tune. He practiced it some this morning.


• Rick had a make up Econ class for Hannah, Will, Josh and David.


• During the class Becky and Sean did a Friday Freewrite. I am feeling so free from not having to go to co-op on Friday mornings anymore! Yippee! Becky insisted on making a study carrell out of a cardboard box and then decorating it like little schoolroom. It's cute! Sean's freewrite involved writing out the words to Bye, Bye Blackbird!


• Sean read aloud lot from the 4th grade Faith and Freedom reader, This Is Our Land. He read the first story which is taken from Henry Huggins and Ribsy. He was so proud of himself for reading so much so well! He kept stopping and saying to me, "Aren't I reading well?" He announced he loves to read and he wants to be like Rick and read out loud well. I could tell he was trying to read with expression just the way Rick reads to them at night.


• Becky did a little worksheet on alphabetizing words from the Little Angels Teacher's Guide. She got a couple wrong and there is no rhyme or reason for how that happened. I didn't bother to correct her though but I felt it would simply put her nose of out joint.


• Did a tiny bit of Shiller math with Becky and a bit more with Sean.


• Sean did a little bit of review in Latin for Children. We seem to be stuck on 2nd decl Neuter. And I feel we need to go back and review everything prior as well.


• We've taken a break and some kids have been playing Maple Story while Becky watched cartoons on Boomerang.


• Read Sunday's mass readings aloud at lunch. Read a couple of stories from the CHC's Devotional Stories. Led to a discussion about the differing attitudes towards such books as Harry Potter. I take a different point of view from the writers of the story. I also read the 3rd chapter in Rosemary Sutcliffe's The Wanderings of Odysseus. The kids protested against me reading it to them, but I said please just humor Mommy on this one! So they've listened begrudgingly though I do think they are beginning to become intrigued.


• Becky has made up a game using the electronic key finder Grandad gave me for Chanukah. She hides the key and then I have to use the little remote thing to find it!


• Hannah hopefully is reading Little Women. She is going to write her Am. Lit paper on it and its role in reflecting and developing the American Identity.


• Will got his Steely Dan album and is listening to that.


• Josh finished all the Redwall books we have in the house. Now needs to get to library to see if he can get out Marlfox and Lord Brocktree. He's been reading Tom Sawyer for Kolbe and has started in on the Moomintroll series.


• Took a nap


• Practiced Menuet in G Major. I haven't practiced in a few days because I was getting so frustrated by my very clumsy fingers. But today I played the first half very slowly and haltingly but mostly(!) without error. So now I feel a bit more confident about continuing my efforts. I get so envious of Will and Sean who can play both hands together so quickly in learning a piece. That, to me, is so hard. I can feel my brain groaning with effort. Their fingers just fly over the piano and once they learn a piece they don't make many errors.


• Josh did some Kolbe vocab and some math homework.