First week of school

We've had our first week of school and it went pretty well. But, before I describe how everything went I thought that I would introduce pseudonyms for the kids. They are at least partially age-related so they will have to be adjusted through time. Child number one (girl, age 4) is now going to be referred to as the Pillow-fight Fairy. Child number two (girl, age 2) is now going to be referred to as Adrenalin Junkie. Child number three (boy, age 6 months) is now going to be referred to as Rug Rat. Now that we have this out of the way, back to our original subject: the first week of school.

We had a good start on Monday (one of the busiest school days)and most of the planned for items got done before 10 am. I was very pleased. Tuesday was just the opposite and it was the lightest scheduled day of the week. I don't remember what got us off track. Nevertheless, a good week was had by all. Pillow-fight Fairy and Adrenalin Junkie got to fingerpaint and play with clay. Pillow-fight Fairy's new spelling lessons are currently in a review phase so those will be going fast for a while. She has taken to doing her memory verse for Sunday very well and has completed the first McGuffey Reader. I plan to have her copy out and memorize the poems that were in it. She loves poetry. We also made it to our first Library story-time and checked out some books for the week. A weekly library trip was part of my life growing up when I was in elementary school (and before since I had older brothers) so I would like to do that for my kids as well. Rug Rat had some break throughs this week too. One more tooth and the ability to sit up for extended periods of time count as break throughs for a 6 month old (the tooth especially). He is also doing well with cereal. He's been cleared on rice and oat cereal. Tomorrow we start training on barley. It's an exhausting regimen and he takes two or three naps a day to keep up his energy reserves.

Other items of note: We planted three young shade trees and 36 strawberry plants this week. I told my husband today that our very large backyard is starting to look not quite as empty. This brings our tree-planting total up to 17 since we moved in nearly 4 years ago. It really did need that many trees. We have two more trees planned, but it was the wrong season to get those at our local nursery.

Also, I've nearly got the finances back in order after, well ... the first of the year. As a result, I've decided that the record keeping will need to be computerized in the future. I've done my record keeping and budget planning mostly on paper for the last decade and have now decided that it is too slow, when time is a rare commodity. And since I'm the one in the marriage handling three kids during the day, most meals, homeschooling, and finances, I need a better way to keep up with it so that I don't get so backed up. By the way, if you think that list makes my husband look like a lazy, its not true. He works long days, does most of the yard work, extra projects (like building patio and pathways himself), practicing harp so that he can play for two weddings this summer, and assisting in the clean up of muddy children after an evening of fun in the backyard. That doesn't even count what his responsibilities are at church (song leader and sometimes teacher).

I was also reminded this week why I want to keep the extra activities down fairly low. The above list is a good wake up call. Have you ever sat down and made a list of everything you do. Try it sometime and you will probably surprise yourself and decide that you need a vacation.

That's all for now