Hannah's Birthday Gift

For Hannah's birthday, we decided to take her to the Wilderness Lodge in Pigeon Forge. They have an indoor water park, which is one of our favorite things to do together as a family.

Here's David enjoying a pose with a bear that decorated the lobby.



Here's a picture of our room. It was a great room, with a sleeper sofa, refrigerator, and microwave. You get to start using the water park as soon as you get there, even if it's before check in. You can also use it the day you check out. One night can be almost 2 full days in the park.





We all spent a lot of time in the wave pool. It was so strong. I think being smaller since it was indoors really gave it a lot more strength than the bigger, outdoor types. She is the one near the middle in black and white.




Here's another view of the water park. It's a great place to visit and play. She really thought it was a great gift.

Hannah's Birthday

I finally am updating my photos from the last few months, so here goes.

Hannah's Birthday:

Her aunt sent these lovely flowers. They are a bouquet collaborated with the Smithsonian. It is inspired by the 19th century bouquets, Tussie Mussies.




On her birthday, we went bowling with our best friends. Her best friend happens to be my best friend's daughter.







Here are the siblings being their fun-loving, silly selves.








Here's me and Jenny, my best friend. I'm so thankful God brought her into my life. We don't have any family in the nearby area, but having good friends makes it easier.

Time to Catch Up

Things have been so utterly crazy in my life. I can't begin to think about catching up the blog as far as academics. From the 2nd week of March through mid April, the kids and I went out of town 3 times to help care for my grandmother and mother. My grandmother is bed-ridden with a brain tumor, mini-strokes, and seizures. She is at home with helpers coming in and my parents living there. My mother lost her sight in both eyes and had to have surgery on one of them. She is having a slow recovery, but should regain her sight in one eye. They will deal with the other later.

We did manage to get school work done, but it has been more of the essentials than any fluff. Co-op lasted through the first part of April. I was able to plan all my trips around that so we could be there since I am the director.

We had some fun times, too. Hannah turned 13, and we went to a resort with an indoor water park for her birthday. We felt like 13 was a time to do something really special. We went to visit Darin's family for his spring break. I'll post pictures later.

Week of March 1st

This week has been a little crazy. We did attend co-op on Monday, but the rest of the week was not our norm. My mother, who has been taking care of my grandmother for about 6 months, lost most of her sight in the past two weeks. She is diabetic and has an auto-immune disorder that can attack organs. She needed to have some procedures done on her eyes, so I went to be there and help her and my grandmother.

I dropped the kids off with my sister and went to my grandmother's house. The kids did actually get some schoolwork done while at her house (a little history, language arts, and math), but they mostly had fun with their aunt. Hannah is attending a discipleship retreat at our church. She'll have lots of bible study sessions. I'll do some more work with David this weekend, so they will get some school days out of this week, but not a full one.

My mother has fluid in her eyes that is seeping in from outside her eye. The diabetes has weakened the membranes or muscles around her eye allowing it to happen. While I was there her vision did improve slightly so we hope her body is absorbing the fluid. The doctors can see enough into one to know she has some bleeding going on, but could not see in the other at all.

Being available for family is such a blessing of homeschooling. I'm so glad that I could be there to help, and I know I could not if I were working and the kids in school.

Week of Feb 22nd

Monday means co-op, so we started our week there. Both always enjoy their classes and time with other kids. We studied the virtue "work" in Bible, reading about the rebuilding of the wall and lots of scriptures about work and not being lazy. Both the kids had library books about Beethoven and did notebook pages from their reading. We attended a homeschool gathering at an indoor play business. That day had 4 hours of PE! As far as our other work, both continued on in their LA, math, history, and sciences.

Week of Feb 15th

This week was a week off of school because their Daddy had the week off as well. We were going to have co-op, but had to cancel because of so much sickness. The kids really missed that. Hannah had her last writing class this week. She is really going to miss it. The instructor is considering offering a Vocabulary class next year as SAT prep.

We did get to go visit some family this week, but had some bad news about expensive repairs needing to be done to our heat pump. Ah...that is the joys of home ownership!

Week of Feb 8th

Wow, it's been busy. I haven't had time to update this in quite a while, so here goes. The week started off with co-op as usual. In Bible we continued studying about being generous and giving. In music we are still studying Beethoven. We read "Beethoven Lives Upstairs" and watched the movie of the same title. We are continuing our Poetry reading day.

Hannah had an interesting writing assignment from her outside class. She had to develop a "criminal justice system" for an imaginary country. She was to determine what punishments should be in place for major crimes. She also finished the book, "The Hound of the Baskervilles" for her book club. She continued in her grammar, math, and did labs in science, as well as 2 more lessons. In history she read about the early years of agricultural and industrial revolution in Europe as well as the Seven Years' War.

David began new Light Units in his math and language arts. He LOVES his speed drills in math. He is racing with himself to see how much time he can leave on the clock. He read about the Seven Years' War in history, as well as beginning some social studies topics in government and economics. He is working in his critical thinking books and seems to enjoy those.