Term Two: Week Eleven ~ The Finish Line

 

Our final week of the term. We made it. Once again, term two was not our friend. With both boys sick, but taking turns, it meant a complete loss of routine. However, because reading is such a core component of our schooling, I almost never feel like the boys fall behind. We will hit the ground running in term three.

We finished these two books Tuesday afternoon and I called the term officially over. "The Moral Compass: Stories for a Life's Journey" Edited and Compiled by William J. Bennett is a daily read in our homeschool. We alternate this one with the first book, "The Book of Virtues" and read it alongside the Bible. These books are packed full of stories, poems and fables from around the world. Each help drive home a particular moral or life skill and they are wonderful reading. 

"Darwin on the Beagle" by Harrison Christian was an interesting read and we learned much more about Charles Darwin than I expected to. Whilst the book was mainly about his travels on the Beagle, it also delved into his personal life, his health problems, and his frustrations with his research and writing. It wasn't a fantastic read (we gave it a three star rating) but it was an interesting way to end the term.

Two achievements earned in Duolingo this week.

Sunday was hubby's birthday. After church we went out to lunch together as a family. Once we arrived home and I had finished my batch cooking for the week, it was time to start the dinner festivities. First up Munchkin whipped up a batch of brownies from scratch. This was the first time we attempted a recipe as opposed to buying a box mix. Something weird happened when we cooked them, but in the end they tasted delicious and hubby was happy.

Dinner was homemade pizza. I prepped all the various topping options (there were many) and then we got busy making them to order. There was even leftover which surprised me.

School holidays means time for projects they don't normally make time for. Monkey got busy one afternoon crafting a Light Saber out of toilet paper rolls. He used every spare roll we had and still didn't have enough. Thus this is the only photo I have. They still duelled with what he HAD. Perhaps there will be more Light Saber construction in the future.

Meanwhile Munchkin made some play dough. I cooked the batch for him and then he got busy colouring it. He had some issues, and the lighting doesn't really show these colours properly, but he was really happy with the purple ball in the bottom right corner.

Friday was another solo trip to the libraries for me. No youth group for the boys though it was the last meeting for the term. We are hoping and praying that life settles down for our friends so that they can enjoy dinner and youth group with them regularly in term three. It wasn't my best trip to the libraries. I somehow missed picking up three books. Thankfully, a quick call to our main library when I got home determined that they WERE on the shelf, and they promised they would hold them a full fortnight for me (another bending of the rules). In the meantime, I renewed Munchkin's Spanish as he hopes to work on it over the holidays, I picked up ONE book for myself, and the rest was reading for Munchkin. Not shown in this picture (not sure why) are two books I plucked from a "new books" display for Monkey. One drawing book and one about famous buildings around the world. Hopefully he finds them interesting and useful.

Over the month of June I did a LOT of reading and made good progress with the tremendous number of books I had borrowed in May. Reality hit me and I returned at least four unread with the intention of borrowing them another time. Now that it is officially school holidays, the challenge is to see how many of these I can finish before the beginning of Term Three. I have six on the go (as seen from the bookmarks on the right hand side of the photo) and as I finish each of them I will start one of the ones on the left.

The weather looks to be interesting over the first week of school holidays. If all this rain eventuates it will be a good week for reading and catching up on paperwork. We only just had three days of sun after a previous stretch of a full week of rain. It looks like we may have a wet winter this year instead of the dry winter they predicted. Time will tell...

Not my best walking week. With the rain I only managed one walk to the shopping centre for groceries, and then the trip to the libraries.

A rather random Wordle Week. Several close calls and one bomb.

Books I Read in June

Another month has come and gone and this year is officially half over. Time is flying. But there is ALWAYS time to read and I read (finished) many wonderful books during the month of June.

My two favourite reads for the month (and scoring 4.75 stars) were "Born a Crime" by Trevor Noah and "Diamond Promises" by Anna Jacobs. I knew of Trevor Noah, and I think his comedy is hilarious, but I knew little about his life. His book was exceptional and far exceeded my expectations. Anna Jacobs is a prolific author who writes really wonderful stories based in England and Australia that just warm my heart. They have just the right balance of tension and relief and I often turn to them when I need a mental break from my heavier books.

In a very close second place are all the books I read that I gave a 4.5 star rating. They were as follows: "Murder on the Orient Express" and "Death on the Nile" by Agatha Christie, "The Incredible Life of Hubert Wilkins" by Peter FitzSimons, "Raising Readers" by Megan Daley, and "The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul" by Deborah Rodriguez. Each of these were exceptional in their own right and for vastly different reasons. If I had to choose a favourite it would probably be "Murder on the Orient Express" because the ending shocked me.

My four star reads for this month were: "Elizabeth Macarthur's Letters" Edited by Kate Grenville, "Espresso Tales" by Alexander McCall Smith, "Shanghai Girls" by Lisa See, "Battle for Australia" by Bob Wurth, and "The Queen" by Andrew Morton. My favourites from this group would have to be "The Queen" and "Battle for Australia". I learned so much more than I already knew from reading both of these books. It was also interesting to learn about Elizabeth Macarthur's life through the lens of letters she wrote to friends and family. "Shanghai Girls" was a confronting read and would be difficult for anyone who has experienced war, trauma, or physical and sexual abuse. "Espresso Tales" was a light hearted a fun read and I'm enjoying yet another series by the author through reading these books.

Finally, I read "Teacher, Teacher" compiled by Megan Daley which was a lovely book highlighting wonderful teachers and educators. I think my expectations for it were too high though and it was only a 3.5 star read for me. There was nothing inherently wrong with it, I was just expecting more.

Many of these books fulfilled prompts for the 52 Book Challenge that I participate in, and two were buddy reads with my mom. Together we thoroughly enjoyed "The Incredible Life of Hubert Wilkins" and "The Queen". July is here and with it comes our scheduled two week winter school holidays. I made a good dent in the HUGE collection of library books that I borrowed before I thought carefully, and if all goes well I'll finish many of the remainder during July.

This collage shows the books I read aloud to the boys during the month of June. Two of these will feature for discussion in my upcoming Weekly Review post. Stay tuned for that.

Finally, for fun I'm including the wonderful reading stats graphics that Storygraph generates for me at the end of every month. As this is the halfway point of the year, I will also note that I've read (finished) 83 books already for the year. My yearly goal is set at 100 books and I will not change that. I could possibly beat my personal best but will wait to see what happens in the second half of this year.

 

Term Two: Week Ten ~ Emotional

 Another weird and out of sorts week for us. Monkey was still sick. He continued to sleep and rest. Thankfully he is slowly moving away from his nocturnal behaviour and thus able to be awake more during the day. Munchkin worked hard and completed an entire chapter of math in two days so I declared him finished and awarded him extra holiday time. We did lots of reading but finished no books. We will continue some reading over the winter break and Munchkin will work on Spanish. Otherwise the goal is to get everyone well and keep them that way.

Our week started with a combined event at our church to say goodbye. The other congregation that shares our building, and welcomed us with open arms eleven years ago when our previous building was sold, have had to disband. The reasons are varied and incredibly political and have left us all feeling angry, but nothing can be done. Thankfully, we can continue to meet in the building, but they must find a new home. We shared communion, learned lovely things about the history of their congregation during a reflection period, and enjoyed a delicious morning tea together.

My attempts at an artistic photo of an old house while out running some errands Sunday afternoon. I only had my phone with me, and should have zoomed in. But I liked the bare winter look of the tree in front of this older house. I didn't get the effect I was trying for, but oh well.

I'm much happier with these two photos I took whilst out for a short afternoon walk with Munchkin Sunday afternoon. From the blooms in the first photo (which looked similar to the buds forming in his Snake Plant) we learned that Agave plants and Snake Plants are related. I also loved the wild look of the vines and flowers entwined in the fencing with the sunset in the background.

Wednesday night hubby and I went out for a spontaneous date. No special reason, just because we could.

Another solo trip to the libraries for me this week. Monkey improved greatly through the week, but was still sick. He missed our combined church service on Sunday, and opted not to travel to youth group on his own on Friday either. No photos of my trip, just this book haul for the boys. I battled rain and wanted to be home before dark. Only one book for me - a new buddy read to start with my mom.

Munchkin and I managed another walk Saturday afternoon in between all the rain. These beautiful flowers against the small patch of blue sky were a nice contrast to the general dreary grey which was our rainy Saturday.

I completed the monthly challenge again.

And earned a walking award this week as well.

Two short walks with Munchkin, one trip to the shops for groceries, and the trip to the libraries means I got good walking in this week.

I had a good Wordle Week - ending with a fluke!