Going Against the Flow: Term Two: Week Five/Week Six/Week Seven ~ Thank Goodness For Books

Another combined blog post as we struggled to get back on routine.

After the funeral and subsequent family get-togethers, (a lunch and TWO birthday parties) two of the three boys got a bad cough that ramped their asthma into high gear. I think we visited the doctor four times in about six days.

All I can say is that the title is appropriate... thank goodness for our love of books!

The following photos are from Week Five...

All three boys are enjoying a magnets/electricity unit we are working through.

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The following photos are from Week Six...

This is what lunch time looks like for us these days... I generally don't eat my breakfast until about 10am, whilst the boys generally eat at around 8am, so I'm not hungry when they are. This works well for our routine though. I fix their lunches (a hot lunch this particular day) and while they eat I read three chapters of the Bible and then some information and/or picture books depending on how long everyone takes to eat, and how much "spare" time we have.

I am pleased at the growth and maturity I have witnessed in Monster this year. I keep increasing his workload (particularly his writing) and he just takes it in stride and gets it done.

The two older boys completed a notebooking page on Thailand. You can find more information about these GREAT pages HERE.

Monster has been doing some SERIOUS independent reading... he found a new series by Lemony Snicket (left-hand photo) that he is thoroughly enjoying, while still making progress with the other books he has from the library (right-hand photo).

I found another excellent series of books on water (specifically about Australia) and Monster and I are enjoying the information we are learning. This will just about wrap up Monster's big unit study on water, with the exception of a big research project on a water disaster!!

Monkey enjoyed learning a bit about the culture of Thailand...

Monster and I are busily wrapping up his unit on Ancient China...

We added circuits to our electricity unit and all three boys enjoyed these books.

Monkey is working hard on PRC books...

We finished these read alouds... I read the ANZAC Animals book to all three boys, while the First Fleet book was part of Monkey's HUGE Australian History unit we have started!

Some new books I found out the library... we particularly enjoyed learning how chocolate is made... all four of us already had a pretty good grasp on the other two processess.

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The following photos are from Week Seven...

This is the FIRST week since the death of my father-in-law that I've felt like MAYBE things are starting to resemble something close to normal... though I do recognize that it will be a NEW normal. So I decided it was time for the boys to resume their household chores...

Each day (Monday - Thursday) we work together to clean one room/area of the house. This particular day was the bathrooms. One boy (Monster) cleaned the benches and sinks, one boy (Munchkin) wiped the mirrors, and one boy (Monkey) mopped the floors. There were varying levels of enthusiasm but the work got done. For now I still do the "dirty" work (toilets and tub) but the boys have been warned that soon it will be time for them to do that chore as well!

Munchkin had a TON of books that had been renewed online the maximum number of times, so he knew that meant they had to be returned... so MANY of the books read this week were those as he enjoyed them ONE more time!!

To extend the electricity unit study a bit more for Monster we are also reading about Ben Franklin... some of the books are at a level for the younger boys to listen to, and some will be for Monster during his evening routine read aloud time.

We finally wrapped up Thailand with this lovely book... I had plans for us to eat at the local Thai restaurant, but with the boys sick it didn't happen. We might still make a recipe we found in this book, and/or watch The King and I, but time will tell.