Friday Wrap-Up ~ Baby, It's Cold Outside!

We, like much of the country, have been experiencing record-breaking cold temperatures. We also have had our fair share of ice. We didn't get any measurable snow ~ just lots of ice. Thankfully, our power has stayed on. I wish I could say our kitchen water pipes were working, but alas, they are frozen solid. Even with two space heaters running all the time, one in the basement and one under the kitchen sink, the pipes froze. Thankfully, the bathroom water on the other side of the house still is running. We can walk down the hall and get water when we really need it. I think we will be using paper plates and cups until things thaw out. What do you think the next big project in our house will be? I think we will be trying to remove a metal chimney that runs near the water lines and is no longer in use, as well as changing out the leaky windows in the basement. We think they are causing the problem. Our lower level family room is 49 degrees this morning. Baby, it's cold outside!

The Kids Resorted To Sledding On Ice!

This was a week of holidays and we had lots of fun despite the chill.

Valentine's Day ~ My husband brought home lovely white roses. They smelled so good. The kids received miniature candy bars in plastic hearts at breakfast time and then we went out for organic donuts at a local shop. They were delicious! The huge news for Valentine's Day was that we had saved up enough cash to buy a new dishwasher. We have been washing dishes by hand for six months. I can't wait until it arrives next week. Hopefully, our water lines will be thawed out by then.

Presidents Day ~ We had lots of fun with our annual Presidents Day scavenger hunt. You can read about it here. Our theme this year was "Presidents who experienced attempts on their lives."

Mardi Gras ~ We celebrated Mardi Gras last week with our homeschool Culture Club when we studied Brazil. The kids had lots of fun making masks, eating King's Cake, Skyping with a man who had grown up in Brazil and learning a Brazilian line dance.

Ash Wednesday ~ We are doing about 40 acts of kindness this Lent. I am giving myself permission to let go and not guarantee that 40 acts actually will get completed, but that is our goal. I wrote out 40 ideas and placed them in Easter eggs. The kids can open up an egg each day and complete the act if possible or postpone it until another day. I will post some of our acts in coming weeks. They include ideas, such as leaving money in expired meters, writing thank you notes to favorite teachers, leaving candy for the mail carrier, cleaning up litter, giving a flower to our librarians, telling good jokes to friends, and holding the door for strangers. These are just a few ideas.

Chinese New Year ~ We celebrated the incoming year of the sheep with a Chinese takeout dinner from Panda Express. The kids loved their noodles and orange chicken. It was delicious. Our Little Red Riding Hood was born in the year of the sheep, so she was excited to learn more about the traditions of the Chinese New Year.

Timothy (our oldest son) scraped his plate clean. Orange chicken is one of his favorite foods.

We Accomplished School ~ With all this fun and ice, it might come as a surprise that we accomplished a fair amount of school. We got most of what I wanted done this week. It was a bit of a bumpy week, but we made it. There was lots of new loot on our first day of our latest five week unit. The kids received new spelling books, new Life of Fred books, level 6 Teaching Textbooks for Tom Sawyer (not shown), a unit study on Neil Armstrong, and a unit study on Minn of the Mississippi. I think it is going to be a great five weeks.

The highlight this week in our schooling was learning about aluminium. We learned about its strength, weight, and buoyancy. The kids watched a video, read about it and then made their own aluminium boats. They tested their buoyancy and strength by adding pennies. Tom Sawyer's boat won. It was still floating with 184 pennies in it.

Blessings, Dawn