Weekly Wrap-Up - August 28

What a week! The landlord decided our house needed to be painted, so we've had days when we couldn't even get in and out of our house because they were spraying paint or pressure washing. And we never knew from day to day WHAT they'd be doing, so it's been rather . . . chaotic. Here are a few highlights of what we've done this week.

For our art study this week we continued to learn about Picasso. Sassy and MiniMe each chose a painting to copy. So of course, Little Bit had to paint too (I forgot to take a picture of Sassy painting, they had to take turns since they each needed the book). I should have taken pictures of their "paintings", they were great!

History continues to study various Native American tribes, this week with the Indians of the Northwest. We had fun making paper models of the cedar houses the Indians in that area built, but will have to finish up with these Indians this coming week, since we weren't home some days.

While not included in the curriculum we're using, since so many of the Native American tribes used lunar calendars, we decided to detour abit and talk about the phases of the moon. Ok, so really, I just wanted an excuse to do this fun illustration, where we used oreos to represent the various phases of the moon. I started out trying to cut the top cookie (after removing it) to the right size and the put it back, but that was challenging, so after the first few I gave up on that and just scraped away the frosting for the part that needed to be black. Doesn't look quite as good, but was much easier. Needless to say, once we were done with our lesson, we ate it :)

One of the days when we couldn't be home, was PERFECT weather, so we spent all morning at the playground. In addition to plenty of playing on their own, we did our Spanish vocab while they were on the swings, great for my kinesthetic learners! And, since the day before, they'd each gotten a new watch that includes a stopwatch, they took turns timing each other on obstacle courses that I made up. So we had great fun with that.

Another side-effect of the painting, much to Little Bit's dismay, we had to take down her toddler swing (since it hangs on the porch) AND their normal outdoor play area is the patio that's attached to the porch, so was too close to the painters. So one of the days we did stay home, I suggested that, while I hung laundry, the big girls should take Little Bit up by their swing (in a tree up the hill from our house) to play, since it was shady and away from the painters. So, they proceeded to teach her to swing on a "big swing". She still opted for the toddler swings at the park, I suspect the flexible seat of the big kid swings there was abit more . . . daunting . . .than the solid wood of the swing here at home, but she did fine on the big kid swing here at home. She was funny, she kept saying "me no fall in the muuuud!" drawing out the word mud in the funniest way (while not muddy under the swing (well, today, after Irene's visit last night, I'm sure it is, but it wasn't that day), since it's shady and the grass has been rubbed away, it does tend to be a hardpacked dirt that looks kind of like mud. She also decided to ride on the tire swing with her sisters at the playground. It's the typical playground type, that's attached to a spinning thing at the top, and then the tire lays flat so people can sit around it, so each of the 3 girls sat on one "section" and held onto the chains closest to her while I spun them. She loved it!

Friday Daddy took all 3 girls to Grandmom's house for the day, which is always a treat. Little Bit was funny when they got home, she wanted to nurse right away, of course, but kept stopping to tell me things . . . me go potty at restaurant (they stopped at Wendy's so she could go to the bathroom on the way home), and other momentous happenings in the life of a 2 year old LOL.

Sabbath after church, we stayed for a potluck meal at the church, and enjoyed visiting with friends during that. The girls had great fun playing a "hide the magnet" game that Miss P came up with for all the children to play :)

And then we came home and battened down the hatches for Hurricane Irene's arrival. All we got was wind and rain, though our power was out for a few hours during the night. Nothing like having the power out to realize how truly DARK it is at night LOL (we typically leave a low light on in the bathroom, and another one over the kitchen sink).

Also, a couple pictures I forgot to include last week, from our fun playdough playdate :)

Miss P helping Little Bit, and her friend, J use the playdough "spaghetti factory"

The big girls had fun with the playdough too

The "Spaghetti dinner" MiniMe made (in case you can't identify it all, there's the fork, laying on the napkin. Spaghetti with red sauce and 3 (vegetarian) meatballs on a blue plate. Then the knife and spoon. And also a glass (goblet) with . . . cherry juice, I think she said. In it. The rest of the stuff in the picture was just other stuff that happened to be sitting nearby. So that was our playdough fun from the week before.