This was our first week back at homeschooling after Mr. M going back to work on The Bachelor! This past week was the premiere of The Bachelor – so it was a very busy week for him! I don’t know if you watched, but I did – those girls are cray cray! (Not judging…much! Ha!)
After about three weeks off, Paprika started back at piano lessons and also with her Spanish tutor. Thankfully, she had been practicing both over the break – so it wasn’t a rough re-entry for her. 🙂
The girls played a TON in the backyard. One day, Paprika (8) really indulged Violet (3) with lots of outdoor playtime. She pushed her in the Cozy Coupe, singing her songs for an hour! I joked that this counted as Paprika’s PE for the day. Ha!
Of course, Violet couldn’t have been happier!
Violet is becoming her own little artist – and I let her have free play whenever she wants on the back porch with chalk, markers, etc. She usually leaves the markers on the whiteboard and I come back to find little drawings like this one:
But when I went outside, I saw she had drawn ALL over the top of our kiddie table. I wasn’t too concerned, since I picked this table up on Craigslist for $5 a few years ago and I have more than once contemplated putting it on the curb for someone else to enjoy. Needless to say, it is very decorated with her artwork now – and she even signed her name!
I felt a little bad that I didn’t even know she could write her name – I mean, I wasn’t expecting it since she JUST turned 3. But based on her older sisters, I should have figured… 😉
I cut Paprika’s hair this week! With all the swimming we’ve been doing and how long it had gotten, I had to do it! Our morning routine is much easier now – and it’s so much easier for her to take care of! It’s still long, which she likes.
The other girls won’t let me cut their hair – they’ve NEVER had haircuts, can you believe it?! So, truthfully, I wasn’t ready for it either!
Paprika’s haircut:
I cut and color my own hair and I am Mr. M’s personal hair cutter, too (for almost 15 years now!) For my cuts, I started out by learning how to cut my own hair myself (it’s tricky for long hair) on YouTube – and then for color, I use a box. I think I have finally – after all these years – found a box color I love!
So, one funny story from this week:
I put Ginger (5) and Paprika (8) to bed and then I fell asleep. A few hours later, I got up (undoubtedly to go to the bathroom – ha!) – and they were not in their beds. I went out to the living room, and they were curled up together on the couch reading a Math book!
They were seriously up in the middle of the night reading books – and the book they happened to be reading at the time was their read-aloud Math Book (Life of Fred). I couldn’t even get mad at them for being out of bed…it was too cute!
Reading math books together before bedtime with their daddy. I guess they just couldn’t get enough!
So, another story from this week:
As I may have mentioned before, I kind of look at the learning in our homeschool as divided into two sections:
1) There are the skill-building non-negotiables that we practice every day (Math, Music, Spanish).
2) There are the “softer” subjects (History, Science, Grammar) that you can kind of pick up topic by topic or by osmosis (pun intended! ha)
Then there are the subjects that come pretty naturally in our homeschool: reading, for example. Reading IS a skill-building subject – one that you should practice – but my kids love to read and are naturally very strong early readers (hyperlexic) so I don’t have to push that at all. I guess reading would also be non-negotiable, but I don’t really think about reading that way because it IS the foundation. This makes no sense, right?! LOL
My philosophy is that to become really skilled at certain subjects (Math, Music, Foreign Language, maybe even Art), you have to practice on a regular basis. And for our kids, math is a non-negotiable that Paprika hasn’t been too excited about doing.
So as far as Paprika and Math go, I have to get creative! Long story short – this week, for Paprika’s math, we did a “lucky money” project.
Basically, Paprika (8) had been feeling “unlucky” for days – she was being really hard on herself about a toy breaking, slipping on a piece of paper, and spilling a bowl of graham crackers. These are unlucky things when you’re 8 years old! Ha!
I told her that I had all this money leftover from when I used to travel: a pretty big coin collection of NOT valuable coins from all over the world.
Of course, I didn’t tell her they weren’t valuable – I’m just telling you. 😉
I have also collected coins (again, not valuable!) – since pretty much forever (probably since I was younger than Paprika).
I told her that the coins in my collection were LUCKY, since most of the coins aren’t being made anymore – and that for every math lesson she completed, she could pick out one coin to keep.
Well, she thought that was the most special thing EVER – and since then, she has been set on doing as many math lessons/day as she can. She is living, breathing math at the moment – and I know it probably won’t last – but it’s fun for now.
One cool thing we did was that with each coin she earns, we look up on Google Maps where in the world the coin comes from (some are just US State Quarters even) – and then we read more about the country and talk about the culture. It’s kind of like a geography/history lesson tacked onto our Math lesson…
And of course, all this coin earning has led us to discussions about exchange rates, the Euro, why money is worth more in some countries than others…just things like that. Paprika also likes to dream about traveling – and this is one neat way for her to daydream about all the places she might visit one day. Russia is BIG on her list of hopeful destinations because of all the snow! So, I might be buying some cheap Russian coins on Ebay. Stay tuned. 🙂
I know I mentioned it before, but we’ve been reading a TON of books lately – since I’ve become pretty immobile, it’s our go-to activity.
Ginger (5) is a great reader – and she has actually been teaching Violet (newly 3) to read. Violet also watches Ginger do her math lessons – she is always right by Ginger’s side. Later, Violet will come to me and tell me all about what Ginger is learning. Which means Violet is ALSO learning. Funny how that works out, right?!
Paprika is back to reading one chapter/book per night (about 150 pages before bedtime). She’s been mostly reading biographies of scientists and historical figures…and then a lot of Magic Tree House Merlin Mystery books (which I count as historical fiction). Like I said, we are a little light on History right now – but it’s working out okay. 🙂
Tomorrow (Friday) the girls are going with me to my weekly OB appointment – and I think we’re having an ultrasound – which I count as Health AND Science class. See how I double that up?! Haha!
The End!
