A Week of Rest and Decking the Halls

We are officially on winter break. We are taking most of the month of December off. We are only doing school on Tuesdays with our friend S. Otherwise, it is a time of rest, catching up on projects that have been set aside and embracing the season. This week was mostly spent on rest.

What we counted for school this week ~ We did do a bit of light science with S. We made bath bombs and played with Insta-Snow powder. We learned through hands-on projects more about chemical reactions and then watched them under a microscope.

• Anne volunteered at the local elementary public school with S for three hours. They helped a first grade class make gingerbread houses. It was an insightful experience for Anne. The teacher asked them back again. We will see if this leads to an ongoing volunteer job.
• Dean spent four hours doing art with Miss Laura. He is working on a portrait and came home talking all about noses and how to draw them.
• They both attended dance classes.
• They both spent lots of time learning Christmas songs on the ukulele (Dean) and piano (Anne).
• Dean did some Christmas shopping, which involved him budgeting, using coupons at the store, and interacting with clerks (something he is very shy about and is hard for him).

Decking the Halls ~ We enjoyed making our home ready for Christmas. There is still lots of cleaning and organizing to do. It is amazing how many tasks get put aside between school and Nutcracker season. However, we are on our way and the room we call the library as well as our hallway are all decked out.

Anne especially loved setting up the nativity this year. She made it multi-layered with the shepherds and sheep on a "hill" above Bethlehem. 

She also enjoyed setting up all of the snowmen on the piano. She really wants to learn several Christmas carols this month on the piano, and the snowmen are cheering her on.

How we are resting ~ Anne and I have been "binge watching" a show or two a day of "Call the Midwife". We are loving the show. Dean has been playing his ukulele for hours at a stretch and watching tons of comedy skits on the Internet. We also had two pajama days this week!

A HUGE blessing ~ Dean had a close encounter with a mother bear in our carport this week. He was getting some costumes out of the car when the bear came running through. He had his earbuds in and was listening to music. He never saw her coming until she was inches away. He tried to side step her and she knocked him out of her way with a paw. He punched her in the head as she growled at him. Luckily, she was in a hurry and decided to keep going. He got away with only ripped clothes and a few scratches. The regional wildlife bear expert came out and could find nothing wrong with our yard or anything that we had done to provoke the bear. It is possible her cubs were in our yard and she smelled human scent between her and them. She has left them in our pine trees before. He told Dean that he had done everything right during the encounter but needed to always check around him when walking through the carport. It seems to be a regular shortcut for her. We are to start making lots of noise and even throwing rocks at her when we see her. This will hopefully help her to move along. We are so blessed that he was okay!! It could have been much, much worse.

Blessings, Dawn