What can we learn from toilet paper?

Overheard in my yard today: Last one to Pluto is a rotten egg!

Stealing the idea from Crystal, we made a scale model of the solar system in our backyard today. We measured with toilet paper and the boys thought it was hilarious. With a 1/2 inch sun, each sheet of tp is equal to 10,000 miles. We had it stretched across our yard and the neighbor's yard. The boys got a good idea of how far apart the planets are and they had fun doing Science!

Apologia had suggested a balloon solar system but I thought the toilet paper solar system would be more fun ... and I had toilet paper but no balloons.

one of those days

Today was one of those days when I thought my life would be so much easier if I just sent the little angels to school. I really want to accomplish more with our day but it seems we can never get it all done. Just when we get going good, the baby starts crying or the dog poops in the floor (!). School is not the answer though.. maybe I just need a couple less kids?? And the dog can definitely go!! Hmmmm, I may have hit upon a solution here... anyone need a crying baby or pooping dog? No? Come on, just think about it....

Book-It for Homeschoolers

Some people think external rewards for reading take the joy out of it. Will the child who reads for rewards continue to read after the pizza runs out? Some people say reading for a reward is not as rewarding as reading for one's self. Therefore, those people don't appreciate Pizza Hut's Book-It program. I say, "Hey, it's free pizza!!"

So if you are not one of those people, it's time to enroll your little readers for free pizza. You can call 1-800-426-6548. Or for those of us who'd rather enroll without talking to an actual person, you can visit the Book-It Web Site.

You may have tangible wealth untold:

Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.

Richer than I you can never be —

I had a mother who read to me.

- Strickland Gillilan

Brrrrrrrr

Reason #57 to love homeschooling:

It's thirty-three degrees with cold blustery winds. I'm so glad my babies will be in their nice warm beds tomorrow morning instead of bundling up to face the weather.

Adventures in Parking

Parking lots... they look so organized, all those straight lines and numbered rows. But, beware! Just when you think you have them figured out, they make a flaming, and very public, idiot of you.

My public humiliation was on Thursday. I had taken Matthew to the doctor for an ear infection (um, actually, he already had an ear infection but you get my meaning) and we stopped at KMart aftewards for his prescription. My little troop was amazingly well behaved! We reached the pharmacy only to find it closed for lunch!! Pharmacists can't eat between customers?? We trooped back out to the parking lot and headed for our blue van. The boys circled to the passenger side and proceeded to yank repeatedly on the locked door. I tried to find the keys while juggling a sleepy baby. I found them. I pushed the handy button on my handy remote. Nothing. I pushed it again. Nothing. I tried the door handle... still locked. The boys were pulling on the door on the other side. I was beginning to panic... not real panic, just a bit of alarm at the thought of not using my handy remote. Could I actually put a key in a lock?? I hadn't done it in so long. I glanced up and saw it.... a van identical to the one we were surrounding. It was in the next aisle. Uh-oh!! We trooped over to that other van, laughing all the way. I looked around. KMart's parking lot was very quiet. I didn't think we'd been seen. But as I strapped Matthew in the driver's side, I looked across through the open passenger side door. There was a woman sitting in her van a couple spaces over laughing hysterically. She rolled down her window to make sure I knew she was laughing at us. As it turns out, she'd made a similar mistake but actually got inside someone else's car before she realized what a dufus she was!! I guess I can be thankful that other van owner locked her doors! LOL


Jeff was quite impressed with my parking lot foible, but he decided to trump me today by screwing up in the rain!!! We were checking out at WalMart. The cashier was so-o-o-o incredibly s-l-o-w that Jeff decided to take the boys and groceries on out to the van. We were somewhere near the middle of the ten million cash register lanes (although only two of them were actually open) and Jeff headed out the non-grocery side of the store. We had made a point to park on the grocery side since we were mostly getting groceries. I didn't notice in time to remind him so he took a cart overflowing with groceries, three boys walking, and one very heavy baby out the wrong side of the store... into the rain. But the truly amazing part of this story is that he didn't realize he was on the wrong side of the store and therefore on the wrong side of the parking lot.

Now, I was still in the store so I can't tell you exactly what happened but reports say that it was raining. Jeff was carrying the baby. Adam was pushing the heavy, and not very well aligned, grocery cart between parked cars. Evan was whining (no one actually said this but I think it's a pretty good guess). Ryan was running ahead, scouting for the van. I'm not sure how long they hunted in the rain or how many people laughed at them. I know I was pleading with the cashier to just kill me b/c she was so incredibly s-l-o-w so they must have been wandering for some time. By the time I got out there, and I went out the correct side of the store, Jeff had just gotten the doors unlocked and everyone, and everything, was dripping wet. I'm just glad it was him this time. My shoes weren't waterproof.

Science

We've barely started our new science book, but we really like it. We dropped Sonlight and started Apologia Exploring Creation through Astronomy. We've been reading about what astronomy is and today the boys decorated the notebooks they'll be using for science. I have a stockpile of those 70 page spiral notebooks that go on sale for 10c every fall. They each took a notebook and decorated the cover with stickers. This is just about the most creative I can get these guys to be. LOL But they did enjoy this project enough to fight over the stickers! Ryan's plan was to put all nine planets in order (he refuses to accept that Pluto is no longer a planet). Unfortunately, the stickers weren't scientifically accurate. We had multiple planets with rings and the one that resembled Jupiter was smaller than the rest. He managed to come up with some acceptable arrangement eventually, but not before I told him repeatedly that all the planets were not represented. My plan was to read today's pages aloud while they decorated their notebooks. But I had to stop so many times to referee that I don't know how much they heard! Oh well, there's always tomorrow.

Baskets and Eggs

It's almost midnight and this Easter Bunny has finished Easter Basket detail. My boys don't actually believe in the Easter Bunny but they think it's fun to pretend. I've been annoying them all evening threatening that the Bunny isn't going to come down the chimney. They think I'm hilarious (little sarcasm there in case ya can't tell).

We had an egg hunt at church today. Normally I love hiding eggs but we were stuck inside b/c - and you're not going to believe this - it's thirty nasty degrees outside and there is SNOW on the ground... okay, most of the snow is gone but there's still a bit in shady areas. There's not too many places to hide eggs in sunday school classrooms. The kids breezed through and found all the eggs in less than five minutes! But we still had fun eating and playing basketball... mostly eating for me.

I'm not sure how the cold weather is affecting our tadpoles. They're not swimming at all, just hanging out in the bottom of the tub. They'll swim a bit if I give them a nudge so they're not dead yet. I assume they'll be okay though. Frogs all over the place are laying eggs in creeks and ditches and no one is bringing those little polliwogs into the living room.