Day Two

The first day school went really well!  The kids were happy and excited to get their work done earlier in the day. They were glad they got up early.  My son even apologize for having been so critical of the change in our previous normal.  They’re actually looking forward to day two!

As for me, it was nice to get all my work done early, too.  I’m not normally a day person, so this has been a nice change of pace. I’m even looking forward to seeing how things go today, maybe even more than the kids.  After all, starts are easy – it’s maintaining them that’s hard.

Assuming I can get them out of bed, lol. 

How are you doing with your resolutions?

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Finished!

It is with great pride and joy that I announce my kids are done with school for the rest of the year!  They worked so hard for so long and managed to actually finish 10 days early.  I can’t even begin to tell you how excited they are to have the next 6 weeks off of school.  :)  Now let the fun begin!

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It started with Math

“Oh, honey, you only needed to go to page 27, not 30!” I commented to my son last week.

“I know.  I just wanted to get this book finished so I went ahead.  Wait, will you make me start a new book on Friday if I finish this one early?” 

“Of course not.  Did you forget?  You can always do more, but you may not do less on your assignment plan.  If you go ahead, well then you’ve done work toward your next day’s assignment.”

“But, you won’t make me start a new book early?” 

“Look baby, if your Thursday assignment is pages 31-33, and you’ve done through page 32, then you’ll only have 1 page to do on Thursday.”

“So, if I finish my math book on Thursday, then I won’t have math on Friday?” 

Yeah, he’s a stickler for details.    “Correct.  If you finish your math book on Thursday, you’ll be able to skip math on Friday because you’ll have already done Friday’s work.  I won’t add to your schedule, you don’t start your new math book until Monday.”

Skip to Thursday night, I noticed the scary sound of silence coming from the kid’s room.  I got up to investigate what was causing that lack of sound.  I saw each one on their respective beds, school books in their laps.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“We’re doing our Friday work tonight so we have a day off tomorrow,” replied my son.

“Yeah, we’re doing two schools today so we can have a no school day tomorrow!” piped in my daughter.

I was kind of dumbfounded.  I mean, it’s one thing to think of putting your nose to the grindstone and just getting something done when you’re a kid, but to actually follow through and do it?  Well, I was pretty impressed.  They earned their own 3 day weekend.  How awesome is that?  For a brief moment I wondered if my kids might just be adopted.   

Little Drummer Boy

Okay, I confess.  When I was a kid I wanted to be a drummer when I grew up.  I remember the look on one of my 8th grade guidance counselor’s face when he asked me what I wanted to be as an adult.  I said, “A drummer and a race car driver!  I can’t decide.”  I lacked sufficient coordination though (to be either!), so now I am content to drum my nails on everything and annoy the crap out of the rest of you. 

In one of my son’s schoolbooks, he’s reading a little about Scotland and learning about Scottish things like bagpipes, so I searched for a video so he could see what they looked like and how they sounded.  While I was searching, I came across this video of the Top Secret Drum Corps, a group of Scottish guys who drum in their spare time.  I encourage you to spend the 7 minutes and watch it.  They are awesome!

And you will spend the rest of YOUR day drumming! 

Breakfast at night

Ever have an “attack headache”?  That’s what I call them, lots of things really, that seem to just pop up out of the blue with no warning?  You’re just going about your day and all of a sudden BAM!  It might be a headache, a muscle cramp, an itch, etc.  There’s no buildup to let you know something’s coming, it just hits.  I hate attack itches!  I had a headache like that today.  I’ve never actually been shot in the head but sometimes I imagine that pain like I felt today might feel like getting shot. 

Why do we do that?  “It felt like getting stabbed! … It felt like getting run over by a truck! … It felt like my head exploded!”  Hmmm. 

Anyway, I took some meds which knocked me out – who knew Ibuprofen could be so powerful?  And the kids, bless them, came in and sat on the bed next to me and quietly did their schoolwork while I dozed. 

Seriously. Proud.

They put all their books on my desk for me to check when I came to so everything was right there, waiting for me. 

After that, I made pancakes for dinner since Darc had something special going on with work, and I had the kids watch the original Star Trek episode that enthralled me so much when I was little.  They actually liked it!  My daughter liked seeing Kirk kick some alien butt best.  That’s my girl, loving the rough and tumble of it all, lol.  It was fun, sharing that with them. 

 

School Days

My son knew the ride had to end sooner or later.  He was not looking forward to it.  He got the entire week off last week, due to my being sick and his sister’s dental adventure and by that time I figured, heck, what’s one more day?  Just make a clean week of it and pick up on Monday.

He was dreading the day, but actually things went much more smooth than he thought they would.  Of course, I knew that would be the case, but he had his doubts.  He got through his work in 3 hours.  To him, that is a nightmare of a day.  He simply has no concept of what a traditional school day looks like, so to him, even the short days he has seem long.  Oh well.  I know one day he’ll look back with fondness at this time in his life, and wish he still had only 3 hours a day of school. 

The MiniNess breezed through her day too.  I’m going to add some art stuff at the New Year so I’ll be checking out art supply places online to see what there is to see.  I’d love for them to have an easel or art table but I really don’t have room for that kind of thing here.  I’ll come up with something though. 

Other than that, not much news.  How about you?  Did you do anything over the weekend?

So far

So good!  We haven’t come across anything that really needs addressing so far in the proofs we’ve gone through.  Looks like this team has done a great job.  The book looks almost identical to the text Darc submitted.  Last time, the team that first got a hold of his manuscript practically re-wrote the entire thing.  What a nightmare that was!

This time around, different team, different results!  It’s been painless so far, just a little time consuming reading the text over again but otherwise, I’m really pleased at this point. 

I think that’s doing great at nearly half-way through!

Elsewhere in the DarcHouse, my son starts his next year’s curriculum on Monday so we’re gearing up for that. 

How’s by you?