Weekly Wrap Up – Vermont

We took the entire week of Thanksgiving off from school.  We did however head out on a couple of wonderful field trips.  We visited Monticello and went on an outing to the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Monday night was our city’s Christmas parade.  In the three years we’ve lived here we’ve never gone, because of sick kids or bad weather.  This year was great!  Temperatures were in the low 40’s, so we bundled up, parked in an out of the way place and hiked a couple of blocks to the downtown area.   We managed to sit on the corner of  the intersection where the parade started.  It was a lovely parade, 1.5 hours of  lights, glitter and Elvis.   Yeah, Elvis and his friend Elfis.  The theme was “A Rocking Christmas”….so there were at least a dozen Elvis’ (or is it Elvi?).   Elfis was an Elvis look alike with BIG pointy ears and a gold leisure suit…shudder.  The kids loved it, so it’s all good.

This week we were back to the old grindstone.  Although, I have abbreviated our work load somewhat for the month of December.  We won’t be working on All About Spelling this month, just to make it last longer after the holidays.    Science is on hold until January as well.

Math:  This was a great week for both girls.  No major obstacles, no blank stares or tears either.   There were no crazy new skill introduced randomly.  

Geography/History:   We’re hitting yet another small state this week, and thus doing only one week of studies on Vermont.     One interesting fact for me was that we had a president named Chester Arthur (seriously, no clue).   However, I felt much better when I read that he was the “unknown president”…apparently I’m not the only one who didn’t remember him.   Then to wrap it all up, we had pancakes with maple syrup for dinner on Thursday.

Books we used:

Profiles of the Presidents, Calvin Coolidge; by Robin S. Doak
Profiles of the Presidents, Chester A. Arthur; by Andrew Santella
Maple Harvest, The Story of Maple Sugaring; by Elizabeth Gemming
Jip, His Story; by Katherine Paterson

First Language Lessons:  This week we worked on seasons, abbreviations and was/were usage.   Still loving this program!

Latin:   Ah, Christmas words in Latin.  This is greatness!   We even have “Joy to the World” in Latin, but for the life of me, I can’t get the big words to the right tune for anything!

Awana:   Olivia just finished up her missionary section of her handbook.  She had to find a missionary, pray for them and then write a letter to them.  Her letter was the sweetest thing!  I copied it and put it in her “creative writing” folder.   Lindsey is still plugging along with her weekly verses.

Piano:   Olivia is doing so well with this!  This week she started playing “Away in a Manger” and “Silent Night”.  It’s sounding really good too!

Ballet:   Nutcracker is coming up fast!  Olivia had a 2 hour practice on Wednesday and another 2.5 hours scheduled for tomorrow.  Next week is stage rehearsal EVERY SINGLE NIGHT.  We’ll see how that affects our productivity!

Life Skills:   The girls are still learning how to change diapers and burp and feed the baby.   The biggest issue we’re facing is that my husband works to 2am and the baby arrives at 7:30 am.  Due to her schedule (or lack thereof) at home she’s screaming a great deal of the early morning, which is causing the husband to not get sleep.  We’re re-evaluating this situation.

Tonight is a fun “Sugar Plum Fairy” party at the ballet studio.  Both girls are going, and then afterwards we’ll be heading to Pizza Hut to redeem our BookIt! coupons.

I hope everyone else had a great week!  Be sure to visit the Weekly Wrap Up!