Wrapping things up for the holidays

I am in finishing mode.  If yiu're a runner, you know what I mean.  The finish is in site and I've got energy left, so let's get there!!!  This week we are going to wrap up the Human Body.  We are going to start and finish our small unit on US Geography.  We are going to finish the first lesson of subtraction.  We are going to take on a couple of tall tales and be done with that section.  I am so excited that all of this can be finished up by Friday so that we can sit back, relax, and enjoy more than a week of vacation for our Thanksgiving Holiday.  I am planning to put my feet (with their fancy polished toes) up and let the swelling go down!  Thanks to my sweet friend, Amanda, I had an awesome pedicure and some good old-fashioned girl time yesterday.  Thanks to Dr. Ed and Lisa, our kids got some much needed attention on Saturday morning and an awesome playdate.  Thanks to my super husband (of 8 years tomorrow), I had a lot of time off my feet this weekend and actual time to rest.  Throw all that together with some nesting and we are cruising to the holidays.  I'm going to try to tackle some small things in the month of December for school, but let's face it, every school in America-public, private, charter, home, etc- will be in holiday mode after Thanksgiving.  It's time for making Christmas crafts, singing Christmas carols, and reading Christmas stories.  If I were teaching public school, we'd just substitute the word "holiday" for Christmas.  It's a great time to review and have fun without too much stress.  We have no idea what our Christmas break will be like, so there is no need to start any new big project.  We are going to desperately need a routine when January rolls around, so it's okay to loosen things up for a couple of weeks.  The major assignment of Ingram School for the month of December will be to keep Baxter from coming early!!!

Maybe I'm not so bad after all

I've been exhausted all week and feeling like I haven't been on my "A" game for school.  We're plugging right along and covering the basics, but there haven't been too many exciting extras!
So, this morning as I have a headache and a sore throat and Rachel is going back and forth with a fever and now Ford doesn't feel well, I just decided to turn on a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse for everyone so we could just relax on the couch.  I always feel bad about resorting to a show, but sometimes you've gotta do what you've gotta do.
Ford made me feel a lot better, though, when he said, "Mama, this episode has a lot of personification!"

On this week's episode of Ingram School...

We are almost through with all seven continents!  Rachel thought it was hysterical that we started Antarctica on the day that it was calling for snow here!  (Unfortunately, after waiting all day, we didn't get to see the five minutes of snow...must have been showering and brushing teeth before bed!)
Rachel started subtraction and really seemed to get it!  I guess when other people in the house are always taking things away from you, it makes sense :)
We began reading Fables yesterday and all of the kids like listening and talking about personification.  Every story we read after that, they had to point out the animals who were talking or wearing clothes!  Super cute!  Our first fable was "The Lion and the Mouse" and Ruby loved that someone small could help someone big.  She kept telling me all day how she was helping even though she was little!
There are zillions of ideas out there about the five senses, but honestly, we're being pretty boring and zooming right through them.  We did so much with them last year, so we're just reading a story about each sense and focusing on the organ associated with it.
Rachel signed up to read to a therapy dog at the library yesterday.  She did a great job sitting right down and reading three Biscuit books.  I was most proud of how she didn't need me to sit with her!!  Ruby and Ford and I just wandered around the children's room and checked out books.  For some reason, the subject of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory came up this weekend and they really want to read it, so last night we started with the first three chapters.  Rachel and Ford loved it!!  Ruby could take it or leave it...she's not so good with a book that isn't full of pictures!
We will finish up the continents this week, finish up the five senses, read the rest of the "required" fables, and try to get a good grasp on subtraction.  Coming up next week, it's time to start talking turkey!  I'm hoping to do lots of fun crafts and spend time talking more about what we're thankful for while still getting in some good math and reading before the Thanksgiving holiday.  To wrap up the Human Body, we're supposed to talk about taking care of our bodies including eating healthy. Ni guess we could all use that reminder before we have a week full of stuffing, cakes, pies, and more!

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!!

Halloween

Happy Halloween!  It's a wild day around Ingram School.  We started bright and early by going to Baba's to check mail and get papers and we had to be there by 8:00 to see the new Curious George Halloween special.  Finally, a show that didn't produce whining and crying at the end!!  It was super cute and totally worth it.  I miss Curious George.  I always thought those episodes were cute and we usually learned something.  The kids don't like the drama and today's movie was pretty dramatic, but after hiding behind the couch, Rachel really loved it.  Ruby and Ford loved it, too...they didn't have to hide their eyes as much!!
We came home and did some handwriting and read some Halloween stories and even worked together to bake Jack-O-Lantern cookies.  They had a lot of fun decorating them...candy eyes and all!  Ford started his numbers in his math book today and when he finishes those, he'll be ready to move on to the Kindergarten book and the world of lower case letters!!!  He is so excited!  I think Rachel is just as excited for him!!  We colored some Halloween pictures and Rachel and I worked to make a list of possible candy she might get trick or treating tonight (Ford and Ruby chimed in, too, with their favorites).  I wrote the list of candy and then she wrote it in her handwriting, too.  Tomorrow we'll check off all the things she got in her bucket.  I was going to try to make a chart, but I'm afraid we won't have much candy left...we'll see what happens tomorrow after Papa gets a chance with their buckets :)
This afternoon we have violin.  Rachel is going to wear her costume (she is a witch), but wait for makeup when we get back home).  Allen is lucky enough (or maybe I'm the lucky one!) to leave school a little early today and bring Ford and Ruby home to start getting ready in their costumes and make some food to take to a Halloween party tonight.  When Rachel and I get home, we'll do some quick makeup on everyone, then make our rounds to Ms. Lisa, Dr. Ed, G.G., Aunt B, etc and then head to the Shives.  We're going to load all 5 kids in the wagon and walk down to a Halloween party/dinner thing and then go trick or treating.  We'll see how long we make it!!  It's going to be a wild and crazy afternoon, but I think we'll have a good time.
I've been reading several blogs this afternoon while waiting for Ruby to go to sleep and I've got lots of ideas for the upcoming months as far as holiday planning and de-cluttering go (I know, I have the extreme opposite problem of a hoarder, but it is what it is).
Tomorrow we'll start talking about what we're thankful for and drawing turkeys.  I'm ready to start emphasizing with the kids, too, that we need to be grateful for all that we have and try to do nice things (and meaningful things) for those that don't have as much as we do.  Rachel is starting to learn more and more about that through Daisy Scouts but it can't hurt to talk about it with Ford and Ruby, too!
I'm also trying my best to get a little more exercise in my life (we'll call it P.E.) because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel when it's not okay to eat whatever I want just because I'm pregnant!!  I heard a lot of songs yesterday that I used to listen to while running and my feet were getting a little itchy to get back to the pavement!!
Here's to the end of October...I can't believe how fast the next two months are going to fly!!!

Friday thoughts

--I love cold weather, but boy, has it been cold!!
--Baxter is going to be here before you know it and it will be like he's always been a part of our family.  I clearly remember the feeling I got when each child was born of how weird it was to think of our family without them!
--Halloween is next week, then Thanksgiving, then Christmas...this time of year is so fun, but flies by! And did I mention that Baxter will be here at the end of all that (let's hope we make it that far!!)
--I'm ready to have my energy back and not have aches and pains and be hungry all the time. Hopefully we can get Baxter adjusted quickly so I can get into a better routine of school and planning.
--I love my kids so much, even on the days they drive me crazy!!

Yesterday was so much better, I couldn't even blog about it!

Not one second of TV yesterday made for a much better day (a little sleep helps, too!).   The kids had a great time at story time and we did some extra work because I had a big surprise for them today.  We got up and out of the house at 7:50 this morning!!  I took everyone with me for my 30 week appointment (technically I'm still 29 weeks, but Baxter is definitely measuring a 30!!).  They were really well behaved and Barbara even let them put in an order for the kind of stickers they'd like to have next time so the office girls could order them!  We left there around 9:30 and got in the car with a snack to go to the zoo!!!  It was super cold today but we had a blast looking at all of the animals Rachel's been studying.  It's cool that now she know lions live in Africa and lemurs live in Tropical Rain Forests in Africa and South America.  We ran and ran and learned lessons about avoiding school groups because they're wild and rarely use manners!  Rachel also wanted to know if we could have T-shirts made that say "Ingram School" for when we go on field trips (very observant, that girl!).  We had an eventful afternoon of taking everyone to violin practice...no one would stay with Ms. Lisa at GRACE girls because the girls were being loud and obnoxious.  Ms. Luci was a good sport and even though I didn't get to pay much attention at violin, we made it through!!   We swung by to see Papa real fast and then went to get Baba's mail.  I remembered on the way that we had free Kidz Meal coupons for Zaxby's (everyone should join their Kidz club, it rocks to get free meals for Halloween, Back to School, and their birthdays!!).  Dinner was easy!  Then we played and relaxed a little before having an early bedtime due to the exhaustion!!  It's 7:30 and I haven't heard a peep!  Maybe we should go to the zoo more often :)