Updates--History, Tintin, Walks

So much to say, so little time...

Quick updates on the kids:

Jade:  He's almost finished with Gr. 3 grammar and would be already if I hadn't cut out nearly two months because of late pregnancy and early postpartum.  He's doing well on his spelling, is about to transition to cursive in handwriting about three or four weeks from now, is about to start on his regular Horizons math lessons again (since I finally went through with him all his math word problems he'd done on his own for awhile, some of which he got right, some almost right, and some undone which we did together), is enjoying daily devotionals, science lessons, and history lessons.  He bought more Hardy Boys books and a Tintin video game.  Did I mention before that Nathan took the boys to see the Tintin movie back in December?  Well, he did.  Jade's already read some of the Tintin books a second time.  I wonder sometimes whether he's too obsessed with Tintin.  I had worked up some reward dollars with Timberdoodle, so yesterday I ordered Gr. 4 grammar for Jade, and I had enough left to buy one graphic novel.  The latter is a surprise for him.

He got his bird house back, finished:

He made a pretty surprise rock craft for me:

In history we read about Stonehenge, the early Egyptians, and the Minoans.  Jade found some rocks that looked good to make his own Stonehenge look-alike, but he said it was harder to actually put together than it looked.  He couldn't get any glue to hold the stuff together well enough, so he did something slightly different.  I also wrapped him like a mummy, and he labeled a map in the Greece area where the Minoans lived.  We steeped some tea and dipped the map in it and used a lighter on it after it dried to try to make it look aged.  It didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped it would, but I think he had fun doing it anyway.

 He's been helping with many things as usual.  We went on a trip to the post office last week, and I couldn't roll my window or the window behind me down, and Jade said it must be a fuse.  Well, when I went into the post office he got out and went around and opened my fuse box and had the problem fixed by the time I got back out.  I started the Sub and pressed the window buttons, and they worked!  I love that boy!  Then one whole day and night and part of the next day Nathan was gone, because he had to go do some work for his dad, and Jade is the one who built a fire and kept it going for us so that we'd stay warm.  He's also helping Nathan build a new chicken house and work on some other projects.

Trusten:  He's doing a great job learning phonics and sight words.  He excitedly points to words he knows and tells me what they are.  He also is doing well as far as his tracing is concerned.  He's done mazes, circles, and squares recently.  I plan to soon teach him how to play some Funschool games online.  Jade was playing computer games much earlier than this.

Olivia:  She is so smart, perhaps too smart for her britches in some ways.  She seems to possess good problem-solving abilities.  Now as far as some other things are concerned, it's currently funny.  For example, a few nights ago Nathan and I were talking about chickens, and she roared like some sort of carnivore, and I laughed so hard.  I told her chickens did not make that noise and asked Nathan to make proper chicken sounds for her.  I'm excited, because I think we are truly going to get chickens again this spring.  It has been three years!  Nathan says we're going to get turkeys, too.  Anyway, I'm wondering how well Liv knows the alphabet, because I've not actively been teaching her, but she apparently recognizes at least some letters.  She likes the magnet letters on the refrigerator, and an example is last night, she picked up a lowercase 'y' off the living room floor, and said it was a 'y.'  I talk about colors a lot.  Like I normally do, the main way I use to teach colors is just talk about colors throughout the day, like, "Your shirt today is pink.  Look, I'm wearing some pink, too, right here.  That letter is green.  This pillow is brown."

Elizabeth:  Well, who knows what all is going on in her brain right now, but she sure likes to eat a lot of brain-healthy breast milk!  :-)

A picture before my first walk with all four of my precious babies...should have been a little more in the shade of the tree:

I'd regretted not taking my camera (and knew I would) on our first walk.  Everything is so beautiful around here, even in the winter.  For our second walk, I decided to take the camera.  You can see how busy the older three children stay during our walk.  It's not just walking.  It's exploring, climbing, running, digging, etc.  And what a beautiful walk!

The kids have spent a lot of time lately in the creek in our front yard, Jade busting away at the dirt with a rock hammer and finding all sorts of things:

I couldn't resist not taking some pictures of Jaden and Olivia early one morning (before Liv was dressed) of them together in the computer chair.  Jade was reading a book, and Liv wanted to snuggle up next to him and get him to spin the chair around.  So there they sat, Jade spinning the chair with his feet for Liv while he read his book.

Oh, I have so many wonderful pictures, but I can't post them all on this blog.  One more, a picture of Olivia and Elizabeth:

Oh, wait, one more thing to share!  Our friend Casey gave us a strange stone probably a year and a half ago.  He found it in his yard.  We've wondered off and on what it could be.  It looks like a petrified something.  It almost looks like a peach pit to me.  Casey said it looks like a rose, and it does.  Anyway, a few weeks ago Jade and I were looking at it again, and he said he wondered what it was, and I said I didn't know, but it did look like a rose.  Well, after I said that, he ran to get his rock guide and said he knew what it was.  It's a form of barite called desert rose!  Wow, finally the mystery is solved!

Our rock is placed on the page beside the book's picture

Until next time...