Homeschool Discoveries

Happy (day after) Thanksgiving!  We had a quiet celebration with just our family yesterday:

Before Tony’s bike accident (read more about that here and here if you are just joining us), we had plans to travel to the Chicago area to celebrate with his side of the  family.  However, an 8+ hour trip in the car, while possible, just didn’t seem very practical or necessary at this stage of his recovery process.   My family lives in our area, but didn’t have any Thanksgiving plans.   Figuring this wasn’t the year either to invite friends or family over for a big shindig, we just celebrated as the six of us!  I think this is the first time in our ten years of marriage and maybe only the second or third time in my whole life that Thanksgiving didn’t involve some kind of big gathering of family and/or friends.

While I was feeling kinda bummed about our lack of big plans for Thanksgiving in the days leading up to the holiday, when the day actually arrived, I really enjoyed the laid back day! We have so much to be thankful for!

Here are a few highlights from the rest of our (short) week:

1.  After spending the week following surgery with his leg in splints/gauze/ace wrap, DH was given a big “boot” at his clinic appointment on Wednesday.  He’s still not supposed to put any weight on it, and he should still spend the majority of time with it elevated, but the boot provides a bit more protection for his leg and makes it seem a little more reasonable for him to sit on the floor with the kids or leave it not-propped-up and under the table at dinner and not worry as much about it getting bumped!

2.  We had beautiful weather this week (up until the temp started dropping like a rock yesterday afternoon!) — weather in the 50s and 60s in November is MN is heavenly!  After 60 degree weather yesterday morning, now as of last night we have snow on the ground!  Fun Minnesota weather!  (And yes, I was closely watching J with the sticks! He thought they were pretty fun to scoot along with).

3-5.  We did light school days on Monday and Tuesday, with our “Thanksgiving Break” starting on Wednesday.   For spelling this week we played games.  On Monday we reviewed spelling words outside while running, hopping, jumping, and so on.  Then on Tuesday we played the Logic of English games of Phonogram Bingo and Phonogram Tic-Tac-Toe.

6.  For math this week, I worked on two RightStart B lessons with Mr. E on telling time, and worked with Miss M on subtracting time and adding/subtracting measurements with feet and inches.

7-8. On Monday afternoon we headed to the monthly “homeschool day” at The Works, a science and engineering museum we recently got a membership for.   The kids did an hour-long workshop about electrolytes that involved testing various substances to see if they could conduct electricity.  Then they made a wet-cell battery!

9. Yes, we jumped the gun and put up the Christmas tree before Thanksgiving.  Typically I wait until after Thanksgiving to do it…but with our lack of travel plans this year for Thanksgiving, I was looking for a few extra fun diversions…and we started the decorating process last weekend.  🙂

I made a super quick trip to Target last night while everyone was asleep to get a couple items, but the rest of our weekend plans are for fun and relaxing at home as a family. Well, maybe I’ll do a little online shopping! 🙂 I hope you have a wonderful weekend, whether you are shopping or relaxing or doing more celebrating!

I’m linking up with: