A large family, homeschooling, adoption, special needs, whatever strikes my fancy, sort of blog.

A large family, homeschooling, adoption, special needs, whatever strikes my fancy, sort of blog.

Friday, January 1, 2016

Our Last Week of 2015


Without doing school, I didn't think I'd be taking very many pictures, but I surprised myself.  Mostly the kids are playing with new toys from Christmas, and I'm in the sewing room.  It's been nice to have a break.


Hannah's hair had gotten super long, so I gave it a big trim.  It's much more manageable now.


The girls were having a tea party with their new tea set, and Lukey came over to check it out.  (You can see in this picture that Hannah's still got plenty of hair.)


All 3 students have gotten in some computer time this week.  I like that Reading Kingdom and XtraMath are so short that they don't quibble about "doing schoolwork" over Christmas break.


I've been doing some rearranging in the school room, and I left the button sorting activity out for Katie, knowing that she would enjoy it.  In the war on clutter, we said goodbye to the basket of board books that used to live in this corner where the globe is sitting now.  I kept about a dozen favorites, and the rest got donated.  Now that Katie is learning to read, I figured it was time.


Zach and Heather gave all the kids mugs with cocoa and candy canes for Christmas.  Brianna was feeling artsy as she enjoyed hers, and drew this.


Paul gave me a new table and chairs for the school room for Christmas.


The folding tables have worked, but this will be nicer.  Now the kids won't have to put something under their work when they color, to keep the table texture from showing through!  I never realized I took smooth tabletops for granted until we were working on a table that wasn't smooth.


And what have the teens been up to their last week off?  Eli has been getting in time on a favorite computer game.  Sam has had wrestling practice every day.  And Brianna is off at Winter Camp with friends.


I set out to do a "top ten posts of 2015" blog post to wrap up the year, but quickly realized most of my top 10 read posts were about Luke.  This has been a wild and crazy year for our family, starting the year with 8 kids at home, then 7, then 9, then 10, then 8 again.  Zach was deployed overseas for 6 months, and then he, Heather, and Brayden moved from the town we live in to an air base over an hour away.  The kids miss seeing Brayden regularly.  With Josiah and Sam both making plans to leave the nest in 2016, this year will also bring changes to our household dynamic.


Katie did one of her ABC book pages.


A huge box arrived this week, that I had no memory of ordering.  Turns out, it was a prize pack that I won from Mod Podge Rocks and Unfinished Wood Co.


What a huge haul of crafty goodness!  I have no idea what I'm going to make first!  I ended up using one of my Thirty One bags to hold all the Mod Podge stuff.  And I filled up the box that it all came in with things to get rid of, to offset new stuff coming in.


I finished the other two pairs of pants for Luke.  The inside of the cowboys is thin stripes, and the inside of the pandas is black Chinese characters on a charcoal background.  If the panda fabric looks familiar, it's because it's left over from Katie and Luke's nursery.


The size 4-5 fits him well, with plenty of growing room.  We actually met the mama behind the reversible pants pattern that I use when we were in China adopting Katie and Luke.  She has 4 Chinese daughters.  I'm a little sad that this is the last size of this pattern.  I used to use it for Eli and Jack when they were little. 

Jack & Eli, summer 2005

 I even made a couple pairs for Hannah's first winter with us.  Looking at old photos, I've used this pattern in every size to make literally dozens of pairs of pants, both for my kids and for others.  


Luke is not crazy about modeling, or standing in general.  He spends most of his time sitting, and cannot change positions on his own.  I have him stand holding onto his crib rails after I change his diaper, so I can pull up his pants.

We'll be back to our school routine starting Monday, but with appointments on Tuesday and Wednesday, I doubt we'll manage a full week's worth of school.  We'll be learning about King George the Third and then zooming over to Russia to learn about Catherine the Great.  It will be nice to get back to our normal schedule.


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10 comments:

  1. I'm looking forward to getting back to our normal homeschool schedule, too. How fun to have a pack of craft supplies come in the mail!

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    1. One of my teens is counting down to graduation, and when he mentioned there's only 5 months of school left, it made me eager to get back to it.

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  2. Wow, you have sewn a lot of reversible pants. Don't worry, I'll show you how to enlarge the pattern when I see you next later this month!

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    1. I should show you old pictures sometime. Tons and tons of those pants. I've done 13 for Luke, 2 for Hannah, *lots* for Eli and Jack as toddlers, several for gifts, and even some for swaps. They're so quick & easy!

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  3. Awesome week! I love the pants. They are so cute. What a great surprise to get all that art supplies and your husband is so clever. The table and chairs look great.
    Blessings, Dawn

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    1. He's great with tools. I'm looking forward to getting the table up to the school room and making our new setup work. :)

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  4. That modge podge box looks incredible!

    And I LOVE those pants.

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    1. It is! I was really overwhelmed by how much they sent! Now I need to get on pinterest and find some ideas for how to USE it, lol. :D

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  5. Oh that looks like a neat prize from Mod Podge!

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    1. It was a little overwhelming! I've started a project, though, and I've got a couple more ideas floating around in my head, so that's exciting. :)

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