Roller Coaster World

Ingram School could easily be compared to an amusement park on any given day!  It has been such a week of ups and downs and extremes that I feel like I'm just going from one ride to the next.  We even have a feel of Epcot these days while we work our way through the continents.  Rachel and Ruby love reading stories about the animals that live in Australia like kangaroos, koalas, wombats, and today there were even dingoes!!  We started the human body in science this week which is a lot of review since the goals are to learn about the five senses and how to eat healthy and take care of your body.  Those are things all three kids are familar with.  Ruby is cranking out capital letters these days with little help like H, L, F, E, P, B, R, Y, and V (sometimes U).  Ford doesn't want to be on that level any more so he has fully committed himself to learning lower case letters and only writes his name in lower case now!  Rachel can't be outdone, so she really wants to know when she can start cursive.  Where does this competitiveness come from?!?!  Ford loves doing his math in which he is still counting blocks and shading blocks.  Rachel finishes up addition facts and starts subtraction (!) next week.  She couldn't be more thrilled!  I've been trying to do more crafty things but my patience doesn't hold out for long these days.  However, today's weather was so beautiful that after doing our work we went to the park for recess and then had a paint party at the picnic table.  Thank goodness for washable paint or I might not have been able to handle it.  Ruby basically laid across the poster board at one point and Rachel took the sponge to her face, but I let it go and even enjoyed it!  We ended up with an awesome abstract painting that they all worked on and a portrait of (surprise!) Thomas, Percy, and Edward in the mud.  Ford did the trains and mud.  Rachel painted a beautiful landscape in the background with a sun and a flower (but not a sunflower).  Ruby immersed herself in sticks, sponges, dot markers, and every.single.paintbrush on the abstract piece.  They were very proud of their work and were great helpers when it was time to clean up.  And here's the best part:  no one whined or complained when it was time to clean up!!!  Merr Christmas to me!!  Everyone is resting now.  Rachel even got under her covers to rest because she starts tennis today (everyone's favorite winter sport!).  I'm excited that she'll get to be with kids her age and get some exercise.  Basically, we're just trucking along on this ride for 8 more weeks until Baxter comes with a new ride for our family to experience!!