Life and Lists

After finishing The Golden Goblet about two weeks ago, as promised to my kiddos, we started Mr. Popper's Penguins. We flew through this easy read, and the kids enjoyed it! I don't think I've read it aloud in about 5 years, when my oldest was in second grade. Once again I was reminded that the book is superior to the movie.

The kids and I were in much need of an outing this week, so we took an adventure into town. We normally don't venture out into the city, only because it means a full day of it stuck in traffic. But we were due to get out for the day, and I kind of wanted to explore a back way that I'd been told about, thus avoiding the thick of the traffic jams. We got to town within 30 minutes--a very exciting feat in itself. The first stop was a clothing store where we found some new t-shirts, pants, and a couple of dresses for the girls. I noticed that some of the clothes in this store were actually "Joe" brand from Superstore in Canada--not quite Joe brand prices however. :)

While travelling in the car we started Trumpet of the Swan from Audible. It was an easy way to get through the first five chapters.

I am pleased to say that the adventure home from town was a pleasant drive on a gravel road through rice fields where the locals are making mud bricks at the moment. The road was nice and wide, and we kept moving on an average of 40km/hr. This was so much better than sitting in standstill traffic wondering when we would be home. So we will definitely take this route again! It was dusty and bumpy however, so the audiobook had to be paused, or else we wouldn't have been able to hear any of it.

We will continue to read Trumpet of the Swan in the evenings or during our morning school time next week. Such a sweet story. And it inspired each of my kids to start writing questions in their journals before going to bed tonight. Just like one of the characters in the book who keeps a journal full of questions he thinks about before drifting off to sleep.

We finished up Unit 1 of History Year 1 with The Good and the Beautiful, so we have resumed our chemistry studies. That will carry us through most of June I think. I'm guessing after we're done with that, we will be ready for an extended break from history and science. It's so nice to see the kids coming to the end of their Spelling and Math books. Pretty soon here we will take an extended school break---probably July, and then pick up new stuff in August. I will be making some changes to our upcoming school year, as per usual. It's all part of it though. I've been told by other teachers that it's perfectly normal to tweak and change things as the years go by. Nothing stays the same for very long.

This past week, the kids and I also made a Day in the Life video. Mostly for ourselves, for memory's sake. But we also sent it to family and close friends back at home.

On My Side Table

Many of the ebooks books I requested from my library a couple of weeks ago have started to come in now! I spent most of Friday evening, typically movie and pizza night with the kids, reading this one on my phone. One nice thing of reading on my phone is that it doesn't require any light.