Queen For the Day!

I love this picture of Grandma!

Here's our Queen for the Day enjoying her birthday malt!

She's such a cutie!

Week 17 Highlights

Here's what we've been learning about this week--

Akenaton and Queen Nefertari

The Capture of Jericho



Tutankhamen

Ramses II

Achan, the Israelite

Greek word for this week is hydros, which means water

Still memorizing Psalm 23

Moriah has been introduced to mixed numbers in math.

She also got 100% on her math test!

Emma has been reviewing perimeter, area and volume in math.

Emma also wrote a small report on the Pony Express in grammar.

Moriah has been learning about adverbs that describe other adverbs.

We are still reading(and loving!) Treasures of the Snow.

We took a half day on Friday and met a friend for lunch, visited with Grandma, and ran errands!

Weeks 15 and 16--Highlights

In week 15 we learned about the tabernacle, the dwelling place for God among His people.

I found a book at a local bookstore on the tabernacle and it came with a model for the kids to put together.

Oh my, was that a challenge!!

It's a nice looking model, but I was hoping it could be done without much help from me. Instead, I finished it while the kids played out in the snow. Of course that was after I lost my patience and snapped at the kids. Yes, I snapped at the kids while working on a tabernacle model.
A tabernacle model.

There's nothing like being reminded of my desperate need for a Saviour while reconstructing God's dwelling place! As I worked, I thanked God for sending His Son, who was sacrificed for my sins. He has washed me in His blood and in Him I am made righteous.

Here's the finished tabernacle. In the courtyard you can see the altar and the washing basin in front of the tent. There's also 2 little people. One is a priest.

Inside the tent there are little replicas of the lampstand, the showbread, and the altar of incense. There is also a curtain to divide the holy of holies and a mini ark of the covenant. The kit also included and extra ark. It's a bit bigger and comes with manna, stone tablets, and Aaron's rod to put inside the ark. The girls like that.

Once the girls came in from playing in the snow, I made some hot cocoa to warm them up and apologized for my lack of patience with the craft. Thankfully, they are so quick to forgive...and to forget!

In other things:

Week 15 was the last week to work on memorizing the 10 commandments.

Week 16 they began memorizing Psalm23.

We are still really enjoying our read-aloud, Treasures of the Snow.

The Weekend Update

• Ryan had 2 appts in Flint this last week.
• One was with the ENT surgeon. He had a hearing test done which still shows hearing loss. The dr. said there isn't anything more they can do for him at this point. He also said there is nothing more they can do for the "popping" that he feels in the same ear. They gave us a few things to watch for and released him. So, on the plus side, no more visits to that Dr. On the down side, it looks like permanent hearing loss. I felt bad for him and didn't know what to say as we left.
• Then we saw the ortho surgeon and we talked about the surgery on the hip. Remember, he's producing bone where he should be producing scar tissue. That bone growth makes it like his hip his fused. It doesn't rotate, and he can't bend it very far at all. So, we saw the CT pics of the bone growth, and it's pretty big! It looks like it's not attached to the bone at all, that it is all in the muscle. Isn't that weird?? Because it's all in the muscle, it is very likely the sciatic nerve is in the bone growth. So they won't remove all of the bone, since the nerve needs to stay there! However, there is a risk of them cutting the nerve while they are removing the bone. There is also risk of swelling after the surgery causing damage to the nerve. The dr said he would do it if he were in Ryan's place, mostly because of his age. The dr is older and he has done around 6-12 of these surgeries, so he is experienced. Do we want to schedule the surgery?
• Ryan thought it over for about 2 seconds and said, "Yep! We've gotta try!"
• I think his secret goal is to be able to get into a catcher's squat again so he can catch for his girls...and maybe Aiden someday!
• The dr said the surgery would take 2-4hrs and they will do it at Hurley. They will look at his schedule and get back with us on a date, but we're probably looking at the middle of Feb.
• As for me, I have seen some improvement this week....yay! I'm glad it has continued so far, because it seems that a few times before I would take 2 steps forward, and then 1 back. My shoulder has felt like an attachment or something. This week it started to feel not so much like an attachment!

Highlights from Week 14

The Exodus

The Parting of the Red Sea

The 10 Commandments

Manna

Then the Lord said to Moses, "Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a day's portion everyday, that I may test them, whether or not they will walk in My instruction."

When the layer of dew evaporated, behold on the surface of the wilderness there was a fine flake like thing, fine as the frost on the ground.

When the sons of Israel saw it, they said to one another, "What is it?".....And Moses said to them, "It is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat."

The house of Israel named it manna, and it was like coriander seed, white, and its taste was like wafers with honey.

The sons of Israel ate the manna for forty years, until they came to an inhabited land; they ate the manna until they came to the land of Canaan. 

The Isrealites ate manna in the wilderness, but as they left Egypt they ate unleavened bread, or bread w/o yeast.

The girls learned about yeast, and did some experimenting with it.

We compared yeast to other plants (like trees) that are "food factories" and make their own food.

Emma said, "Like me! I'm a food factory.!"

I said, "Oh no! You are like yeast! You don't make your own food! You eat up EVERYTHING around you!"

I gave them some yeast and they "fed" their yeast various foods to see which ones the yeast would eat quicker. I love Emma's facial expression in this one!



One of the things I love about teaching the girls at home is the flexibility to delve into whatever may spark their interest. This week Moriah was fascinated by yeast. After our above experiment she pulled out an encylcolpedia and looked online for more information on yeast and fermentation. She spent the afternoon reading and dissolving more yeast!

Similarly, Emma developed a sudden interest in Custer's Last Stand. Seeing as we're covering Ancient History I don't know what brought this on! I'm sure my mom must have something to do with it! After a trip to the library, she was happy to spend most of her morning reading.

Other happenings and quotes from the week:

We had a superhero stop by. Several times.

Even a superhero needs some rest, but they always keep their weapon close at hand!

Emma had her first basketball game yesterday.

While watching her play Aiden decided he needed his sister for something and he yelled out,

"Emma, come here for a minute! I need you!"

 Towards the end of the game, although Emma's team was blue, he suddenly yelled,

"Go green!"