Magic and Mayhem

Hello stranger! Sorry I’ve been gone so long.  Something about five kids kind of takes up more of my time….

Here’s a bit of what we’ve been up to lately!

1.  We took a trek to Nebraska to hang out with the fabulous Tiffany and company. It was wonderful (of course).

2. Anna wrote, directed and produced a music video starring her friend Jessie (and herself in a few parts) that she edited and put to a song. I kind of love it and am so impressed!

3.  Jack, Victoria and Anna attended the Young Writers’ Conference at a local college. It’s always neat for them to meet published authors and get great new ideas.  The keynote speaker was very interesting and Jack got to take another cartooning class from the author of the Eek and Ack books, which he loves.  I also bought him the rest of the set, so he’s doubly happy.

4.  We hit the Marshall library while in town for the conference and got dozens and dozens of new library books. It’s a little embarrassing how happy new library books and big libraries make me. 

5.  Anna started guitar lessons from a local mom/teacher. She may start taking choir lessons too.

6.  Victoria started attending a monthly young writers’ class. It’s small and just for teens, and so far she really likes it.

7.  Jack has been going to town on the Snap Circuits set he got for Christmas. He makes so many contraptions on it and he even programmed it to play “Happy Birthday” for me on my birthday yesterday, and light up for a “candle” for me to blow out. 

8.  Anna has been helping Daryl with the city museum and learning lots of history with him. Daryl is the president of the historic society and curator of the museum.  He’s learning about old farming and gardening tools that have been donated and teaching her as he learns, plus they’re learning lots of old railroad information (it’s also an old depot).

9.  Alex learned about completing circuits. Jack has been teaching him about electricity and circuits through his new circuit set.  We’re also reading books together and talking about letters and letter sounds.

10. Victoria and Anna have gotten back into altered books. It’s a fun hobby and I hope to start doing it with them (and Jack and Alex) myself soon too.

The kids have also kept busy with photography, playing with friends, internet research, drawing, reading, watching educational TV (and non!), playing Wii, making pillow forts, doing math online, playing physics games, writing stories, writing odes, helping with housework and babies, chatting with friends on the phone and online, playing outside, bird watching with Dad, fighting with siblings, playing with pets (their own and other people’s!)…

I’m feeling the itch to move towards a little more planned schooling with the kids now that Fiona is a little older and life is settling into our newest normal.  Lapbooks, activity sheets, A Little History of the World, altered books, Friendly Science, cooking with kids and art projects are all calling my name.

Of course, so are Pinterest and Facebook and new magazines and the laundry… 

Latest writings…

How to make fire with ice!

The complete 10-week Poetry for Kids course

This is somewhat inappropriate at times but does a good job of summarizing the involvement of different countries in WWII.

I’ve seen Facebook history pages before and it seems like a really good way of teaching history.  Anybody know of other links?

So far, this holiday season is not looking like it’s going down in our family history as one of the best.

Everything is just a little off…

We didn’t have snow until the first of December so it didn’t feel like Christmas until very recently.  I’m busy with baby Fiona, so I have less time for holiday magic.  We haven’t taken our holiday picture, finished our cards (we hand make around 50 every year!), written our annual letter, put up lights outside, decorated inside (other than the tree and Christmas lights in a couple of the kids’ rooms)…

Balancing my writing (which is really starting to be a good source of income) with homeschooling 4 kids at very different levels, cooking, cleaning and trying to meet the needs of 5 children (one of whom is a newborn!) is a challenge right now.  It is very cold so we’ve been stuck inside, and the isolation of living in a small town is not helping.

Alex has been really bouncing off the walls and driving us all more than a little crazy.  He’s a sensory seeker (he likes it loud, likes to move, barely feels touch unless he runs into a wall and then is likely to like it) and in a small house, that can lead to more than usual mayhem.  I’m really brainstorming about how to meet his physical needs this winter, since there are no gyms nearby and it gets so bitterly cold outside.

I’m also trying to figure out more social interaction for the kids.  They get plenty of “socialization” but the girls don’t have any friends nearby that they really click with and I know that’s hard.  Jack has a new friend next door, but he’s not necessarily the best influence.

It’s funny — we have a newborn but it is the older kids and other responsibilities that are pulling me in all directions and making life challenging.  Fiona is a fairy tale baby for the most part:  she sleeps through the night next to me and she’s a very happy and easy-going baby (as long as she’s held most of the time, which isn’t really a problem in this house).

Trying to parent five children well is a bit tricky!  I’m feeling like a bit of a failure at it all right now… Anna misses her friends, Jack wants more time with me to do things like cooking and crafts, Alex needs more time outside and direction, Victoria craves quiet and wishes she were closer to her friends, all of the kids want more one-on-one time with me, the boys need more read-alouds, we haven’t done fun homeschooling projects in far too long, Jack has been bored and stir crazy, Anna feels that she has too many responsibilities around the house, Alex seems to have a Omega-3 deficiency (he has “chicken skin” and “alligator skin,” plus hyperactive behavior), the kids are all getting on each other’s nerves and fighting, Jack wants me to start making green smoothies every day again, computers keep breaking, all of us need more exercise… and I have a two month old nursling, 4 columns to keep up with, a house that’s far too messy, daily migraines and chronic neck pain to deal with and things like cooking most foods from scratch.

Most days I feel pretty great about the life we’ve created together, but some days I feel as if there are just too many balls to keep in the air and I’m dropping most of them.

I have a full day ahead of me today, though, and I guess I’ll just do my best to be as fabulous as possible today.  Or at least not suck. 

In honor of the (shopping) season!

Someone commented on this video that she just wanted to share the gospel with this kid.

I know a lot of people have posted the whole “it gets better” thing for all the kids getting bullied.

But you know what?

Kids shouldn’t have to get enough religion that they can bear to stand their lives (or enough religion to change who they are so people won’t be horrible to them).

It shouldn’t have to get better in adulthood.

It just shouldn’t be okay for any people (little or big) to be violent or hateful to any other people (little or big), especially not to the extent that is ACCEPTABLE if it’s happening to kids.

You tell ‘em, kid.

If a child is being bullied and it’s not getting better, the child deserves to learn/live/be somewhere better. That should be a basic human right.

Homeschooling is an option for any child.  Alternative schooling is an option.  There are lots of options besides letting children live through hell and calling it a normal part of childhood.

Of course, in a perfect world it’s the bullies who’d have to go find somewhere else to be.

Courtesy Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

My goodness, I’ve been gone a long time! It turns out I’m not the best blogger when I have five children!  Who’d have thought? 

In any case, I’m here at the moment and thought I’d check in!

Here’s a bit of what we’ve been up to hereabouts…

1. Victoria and Anna have taken up needlecrafts. Victoria has especially taken them up, and has knitted and crocheted several fabulous pieces.  She even made baby Fiona a little hat!  (And one for herself!)
2. The kids are doing math online. Victoria has decided she likes Khan Academy so she’s using that.  Jack still prefers iXL so I may cough up the money for that.  Homeschool Buyers Coop has a bargain rate for the year so it would cost about $50 for him for the year.  I can handle that if he loves to do it.  Anna’s not sure which route to take, but it’s not much extra to tack her on to iXL if she goes that way.  I’m just happy math is getting done so often!  Even Alex is doing math, using a kindergarten program with Anna’s help.
3. We’ve been doing lots of poetry goodness. I’m still writing the 10-week poetry course for kids and we’re up to week 9 (24 poets every child should know).  The kids are having fun with the exercises especially, and I’m having fun writing the series and putting the assignments to the test with my kids.
4. The girls have been visiting friends. Victoria spent a week with one fabulous family in the Twin Cities, and then Anna spent the next week (plus!) with another fabulous family.  I love that the kids can go off and do this during the “school year” so often.
5. We went to the zoo. Our membership expires this month so we wanted to make the most of it while we could.  We especially had a blast in the monkey house.  I’m not sure why, but our family always relates to them! 
6. The kids have been doing art. Victoria has been doing altered books, painting and photography especially.  Jack has been doing a lot of drawing.
7. Anna has been writing songs. She has been writing songs for a few years now and is really getting into it lately.  She wrote a really great one the other day!  She’s also writing a book, which is pretty typical for Anna too.
8. Alex and I have been exploring phonics. We’ve been reading picture books together and talking about patterns (such as BAT right above RAT and both having the AT letters), rhyming, talking about letter sounds and so on.
9. Jack is on a cleaning frenzy. I told him that if the house was in order, his friend next door could spend the night on Saturday.  I imagine I’ll have to help a bit, but it’s nice to see him working so hard!
10. Daryl has been teaching the kids dice games, Silent Night in German, music, card tricks and other nifties. He’s playing “the gambler” at Pioneer Village for their Christmas program on Thursday night (it’s a recurrent role where he teaches people card games, old fashioned dice games, historic swindles and so on) and then on Saturday he’s singing “Stille Nacht” (Silent Night) at the Lake Benton Opera House’s Christmas program (to open the show!).  Anna may be joining him in the show too (singing with groups for a couple of carols).  They should make for some fun times!

We’ve also been busy with the baby, of course, and have been up to all of the usual stuff… lots of reading, cooking, playing, computer fun, and utter chaos. 

All in all, life is very good!

This infographic has some cussing but I think the info is too good not to share with my kids.  I think this is one of the biggest lessons we need to teach before we send our kids out into the world, because bad moves can have such lasting consequences.

(Sorry it seems to have snipped off the ends of the graphic!  I can’t seem to make it small enough to fit but big enough to read.  Go here to see the whole thing and read a bit about the history of credit cards.)

This is why we have no credit cards or loans (not even for our home or van).  This is also why we have a Freecycle couch and thrift store clothes.  The freedom feels better than any shopping spree (and I know, because I learned the hard way!).

Here’s 10 ways we save money and keep from relying on credit.  I think these are some of the most important lessons for me to pass on to my kids, and it helps us live well and have time together.

What works for you?



This is exactly what I wish all college profs and textbook authors understood. 

Sorry I’ve been gone so long!

Fiona is doing marvelously and we’re all madly in love with her. She’s a really sweet, fun, adorable little girl and about as easy as a baby can get (which is great for a fifth baby!).

I’ve had a few bumps in my recovery. I developed an infection from the C-section and was on antibiotics for a while.  That finally cleared up and then a few days ago I came down with mastitis.  I seem to be finally kicking it, but it really did a number on me.  I’m treating it naturally because I do not want to get on any more antibiotics (using them while nursing can set Fiona up for asthma, allergies and such, not to mention make us both more likely to get thrush, yeast infections and related maladies).  I’m still hurting and feverish, but nowhere near as sick as I was the past couple of days.  My fingers are crossed that it will be gone by the start of next week.

I’ve been keeping up with my free 10 week poetry course for kids and this week I wrote about using free writing to jump start poems.  While doing research, I found some fun sites and wanted to share them here.

• This page of  Writing Exercises has prompts for journals, memoirs, free writing and more.

• This page of Writing Exercises has writing tips, Q&A’s and over 200 writing exercises or prompts, mostly geared towards fiction writing.

Here’s the poetry courses so far:

• Poetry for Kids: Week One — Cliche Busting
• Poetry for Kids: Week Two — Finding poetry in song lyrics
• Poetry for Kids: Week Three — Easy poetry forms for kids
• Poetry for Kids: Week Four — The sounds of good poetry
• Poetry for Kids: Week Five — Poetry crafts and games
• Poetry for Kids: Week Six — Free writing!

Other new homeschool related posts…

• Free virtual dissections online
• The Purple Cabbage pH Experiment
• C-SPAN and Lemony Snicket try to teach kids about Occupy Wall Street

We’ve been pretty busy for having a newborn in the house (which might explain why I keep backsliding in my recovery!).  Some of the things we’ve done lately include going to the Science Museum, two trips to Mankato to see friends and family, and even a short trip to Nebraska to hang out with Tiffany and her family.

Fiona mostly hangs out in my sling during the excitement or in my arms (or Daddy’s).  And don’t worry, I have all sorts of safeguards to keep her little immune system safe during our escapades. 

All in all, life is pretty awesome, illnesses and setbacks or not!