Simeon almost 8

I mentioned to Simeon the other day that he was almost 8. Instead of the usual reaction of "I can't wait until my birthday", he said, "I know, Mom, I'm sad". I asked why he was sad, and he said, "Because I don't want to grow up and leave you and Dad."

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Liesel's letter to Santa

Liesel's letter to Santa:

 

Dear Santa Clause,

Please tell me more about Jesus. And please give me a horse and a spanking chart and a necklace. Love Liesel

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power peanuts

This morning, I asked Jude to help me unload the
dishwasher. He was scooping peanuts up off the table
with his tongue. I asked him again later to help me,
and he said, "MOM, I'm getting power!"

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a new toothbrush

Liesel got to open a Christmas present early last
night. Her toothbrush accidentally got flushed down
the toilet when it got flung across the bathroom just
as someone else was flushing the toilet. She got to
take it to Christmas show-and-tell today and tell the story.

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innocent inquiry

At the Outdoor Adventure today, put on by the Boy Scouts for prospective Homeschool members, there were many activities to participate in: archery, stardome, BB gun range, zipline, among other things. One of the stations was a reptile display, featuring boa constrictors, rattlesnakes and other reptiles. The two pimply teenage boys who so thoroughly gave us a full explanation of different types of snakes, their habitats, and their eating habits asked the children if anybody had any questions. Jude was the first one to raise his hand and ask:

"What are those red spots on your face?"

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Miss Broken Arrow

eating mushrooms

Last night on our way home from Life group we saw a
Lifeflight Helicopter landing at the hospital. So we
decided to stop and watch for a learning experience
with the kids. We watched as the pilot, EMTs and a
doctor and a nurse lifted an old man on oxygen onto a
gurney and wheeled him into the hospital. We were all
speculating as to what could be wrong with him. After
several guesses.......heart attack, COPD...etc, Jude
said, "I think he ate a mushroom."

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Jude's gymnastics skills

When John and Liesel were talking about the
appropriate time to use her karate skills...(if her
boyfriend was mistreating her and she might have to
use a karate kick or punch). Jude was listening to
this conversation and he replied, "Yeah, and if my
girlfriend is mean to me I'll just do gymnastics on her!"

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albino plants

Today we learned that in autumn, the trees stop making
chlorophyll or food, so the "green" of the leaves
disappear, making the leaves slowly die and leaving
behind the existing orange and red and yellow colors.
Simeon asked me if there are such a thing as albino
plants......I don't know....are there albino plants?

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the milk machine

Tonight we stopped at Walmart to get some milk. Jude
said, "Mommy just use the milk machine" (the breast
pump). He must think there is an endless supply there.

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lost cell phone

We spent all last Saturday looking for John's cell
phone. We had the kids looking and even offered a
bribe to whoever found it. The whole time we were
looking for the cell phone, I kept wondering what the
thump-thump-thump-thumping sound was that was coming
from the dryer. Guess what! The cell phone was ruined
in the dryer!

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Simeon is sad

Simeon asked me this morning why we have to grow up?
Expecting him to say he just loves the fun of being a
kid and not wanting the responsibility of being a
grown up, I asked him why he didn't want to grow up.
He answered, "Because when you grow up you have to get
married and move far away from your parents, and I
just want to live here forever".

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up dad's sleeve

Yesterday I told the kids to hurry up and get ready
because Dad had "something up his sleeve for tonight".
After driving out to Ft. Gibson Lake, having hot dogs
and marshmallows over the fire, watching the sunset,
the stars, satellites, Liesel asked, "Dad can we have
our prize now?" Dad said, "What prize?" She said "The
one you have in your sleeve"!

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Math fun

Liesel wants to keep up with Simeon in math. I get
alot of mileage out of that. Today we played "Math
War", an idea that I got off an online group. Each
player has a stack of cards #1-10, and they slap the
card down and see who can add them together the
fastest. Then we played "make 10". I slapped a number
down and we raced to see who could guess which number
we needed to make 10, then 9, then 8. It was lots of
fun. Then we read some stories and were done with
school for today.

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Jude's burrito

Yesterday for snack Jude wanted a frozen burrito.
Because I was in the middle of a rushed conversation
with a friend, I agreed and popped to frozen burrito
in the microwave. When it came out I cut it into 3
pieces to cool. You would have thought I killed his
pet by the way he cried and wailed and grieved over
the loss of his "whole" burrito. "Why did you cut my
burrito? I didn't want you to cut my burrito!" I
deferred the situation to Dad when he came home. So at
lunch today, when I set the WHOLE burrito on his
plate, Jude says, "Mommy can you cut my burrito?" Go
figure!

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lost lizard

I felt very foolish last night, in my front yard with
me and the kids with flashlights looking into bushes
for our lizard, Elvis. I had left the gas stove on for
over an hour, and there were fumes in the house. While
it was clearing out, we played out front. I "rescued"
the animals too, setting the lizard down in the grass
to hunt for ants or crickets. Well I forgot all about
him until bedtime when one of the kids walked past his
empty cage...So there we were all outside, with
"roaring" lion and tiger flashlights that belonged to
the neighbor kids. Just as we were about to give up,
to my childrens sheer delight, Elvis was FOUND.
Hurray! No more tears being shed!

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platelets and white blood cells

Yesterday I found a scab on Jude's head. When I announced what it was, Liesel said, "I guess his platelets are working".

 

Today Jude cut his finger. When I tried to clean it and put a bandaid on it, he said, "It's OK Mom, the white blood cells will clean it for me".

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stories about the Bible

I was so blessed last night. John made a fire on the back porch, the kids all sat in the porch swing while John and I sat together on the bench. Liesel said, "Daddy would you tell us a story? A true story....from the Bible". It blessed me so much that she would naturally want to know more about the Bible, with no prodding or forcing from us.

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immune system

This week we learned about the immune system. We took Hope to the dr. to get her one year shots, and thought about what life would have been like in the "old days" before Edward Jenner discovered the small pox vaccine, and Alexander Fleming discovered that the penicillin in mold could be used as an antibiotic. Louis Pasteur helped us understand the relationship between germs and diseases, and Joseph Lister found that using antiseptics in surgery help reduce infections. So we went through the house and used every antiseptic we could find, to make a point. We looked at our neighbor's small pox vaccination site on his arm, and he told us his memory of getting it at about age 5. The kids were the most fascinated with the story of the Black Death that affected millions of people in Europe in the 1400's and how they didn't understand that it was self-inflicted by their own filth. We read the Pied Piper of Hamelin, and sang Ring around the Rosy. We were very thankful this week to be living in the age of vaccinations and antibiotics.

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homeschool first weeks

We are starting a new curriculum called KONOS this year. I like it because it incorporates all ages in the subjects of Bible, Science, Social Studies,History, Art, Music.Our first weeks we have been studying Cooperation (it's a character based unit study), and focusing on the human anatomy and physiology ( how the systems cooperate).

 

For skin we examined our skin cells, made ourselves sweat, examined our hair roots and fingernails, talked about our friend Pablo who was born without epidermis and how that affected his short life (he died at age 9).

 

For bones we drew pictures of people without bones, and made clay people with no bones, made a skeleton out of magnetix using joint magnets. Really fun.

 

For muscles we examined steak and did an experiment involving paper towel rolls, rubber bands and balloons.

 

For digestive system (our favorite) we did eating experiments, observed our saliva and timed our digestive process by eating Captain Crunch dye cereal (too gross to explain but use your imagination). We "digested" mashed potatoes through a balloon esophagus attached to a straw (the small intestines). We took rope and measured 30 feet of intestines and placed them inside our shirt to image how compact our intestines really are.

 

For circlulatory system we made the arteries and veins out of clay and attached them to a clay heart, with aorta, vena cava, lungs and all. We found out that if you attach every blood vessel in your body, it would circle the earth 2 1/2 times!

 

For respiratory we did some balloon experiments and we checked our respiratory and pulse rate at rest and exercise, to understand the relation between our circulatory/respiratory system and the demand for oxygen from our muscles. We (mom) also donated blood and the kids got to be a part of that.

 

We studied Antony Van Leewenkoek, the Dutch sailor who first saw microscopic life. We understand the importance of his discovery. Before the microscope there was no way to diagnose many illnesses. We have been having fun with our microscope, and we examined pus yesterday. The cells we think we saw were red blood cells, white blood cells, skin cells and bacteria. Next week we will collect pond water from Uncle Bob's pond and look for amoebas or paramecia or other types of protozoa. That should be fun!

 

Check back periodically to find out what else we are doing.

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