Week ten is upon us. We had a very laid back week as all our written work was done by the end of week nine. So we relaxed and enjoyed the week, and wound it up with a big excursion to the Botanical Gardens in the city on Friday to "end" the term.
Monkey spent some of his birthday money on two Lego Building kits at Aldi, so he spent some time browsing the books and building little robots and other interesting creations.
All three boys continued to do daily work on their online Reading Eggs program, and Munchkin enjoyed Math Seeds as well.
Monster especially enjoys helping Nana with her 4 Pictures 1 Word game that she plays on her tablet.
Monkey is always doing some drawing...
There has been a renewed interest in playing Guess Who.
When we arrived in the city, we wandered down Pitt Street and then George Street, stopping into a couple of shops to pick up textbooks and supplies for next year. Then we wandered the rest of way down George Street and had a look at the Tank Stream fountain. We've known about this fountain for YEARS but never realized what it signified until now when we read about the original Tank Stream that the Europeans discovered when they first arrived. So we decided this trip to the city would beautifully add to Monkey's ongoing Australian history unit.
Finally we got into the gardens... the first thing we spotted were a pair of Wood ducks.
The beautiful view of the city skyscrapers behind the gardens. It always amazes me how quiet and serene the gardens are, with the bustling city so close behind it.
Our first stop was the big pond to see the eels and the fish. Some other garden patron decided it would be a good idea to feed the fish/eels peanuts and chilli chips. Interestingly enough they ate them all... in a frenzied swarm!!
Our next stop was the Tropical Flowers section...
I absolutely LOVE Hibiscus flowers and photographing them is fun.
I had some fun photographing this beautiful butterfly.
I couldn't find a sign for this plant - but it is a member of the banana family.
The scenery I enjoyed while the boys chased each other in the grass after our picnic lunch.
A beautiful selection of the flowers we enjoyed along the "spring flowers" walk.
The main focus of this trip to the gardens was the "First Farm" area. We wandered around admiring the crops, trees, and plants that were growing, and also learned a lot from the written information available.
I continue to be amazed at all I am learning as I homeschool the boys. I never knew that tobacco plants grew such tiny, cute little flowers.
This is a prickly pear plant.
Some more beautiful flowers as we wandered to other parts of the garden. Excuse the blurry white marks in the top left corner of the right-hand photo. This beautiful plant was in the greenhouse but it was closed for the afternoon when we got there.
I discovered that these flowers that I'm rather obsessed with photographing are African Daisies!!
In honour of the 100th Anniversary of the end of World War 1, there were poppies growing in quite a few areas of the garden.
Picture books enjoyed this week...
Monster and I finished this book during his evening read aloud time...
Two of Munchkin's favourites this week...
Independent reading for Monster (left photo) and Monkey (right photo)
Final picture book selections for the week for Munchkin...
And another independent selection for Monster - I'm jealous of how quickly he is able to read books.
