Weekly Wrap-Up

This is our first week doing a full five days.  That’s good because I doubt that will happen next week. LOL  The weather looks good for a Busch Garden trip on Friday.  =o)

We had a big review in First Language Lessons .  In one section Mackenzie had to proof read a paragraph that had capitalize errors.  I swear, if that child does not start capitalizing the word I, I might have to hurt her.  She even missed it when it was the first word in the sentence.  LOL  It’s like a total mental block for her.

We’re really getting starting to get into the Civil War.  I love how Sonlight makes history so personal for you by using living books instead of a dry textbook.   We are reading The Perilous Road and Across Five Aprils right now and they are really bringing the history to life for us.  We’re getting such insight on what it was like to live through that time.  Across Five Aprils, with it’s story of brothers fighting on opposite sides, is particularly emotion.  I love a book that can draw the emotion out of you.

We also started Lincoln: A Photo-biography which is, obviously, not historical fiction.  But it is so good.  It gives a real picture of what Lincoln the man, as opposed the president, was like.  It cracks Mackenzie up that such a famous president was a slob.  Now she feels that there’s hope for her and her messy room yet. lol

It was a little disappointing to read that Lincoln, although he was against slavery, did very little to stop it during his early political career.  Even when entering into the Civil War, slavery was not his priority.  Saving the Union was.   But in the end it did become his priority and he did the right thing even though it was the hard thing.  Such an awesome man with a tragic ending.

Along side of The Story of the USA and The Landmark History of the American People, these books make history our favorite subject.

We also read Life on a Plantation (Historic Communities)which we picked up when we went to Jamestown.   Excellent book with great pictures. 

We started another pocket in American Civil War History Pocket.  This pocket is focusing on the life of a Civil War soldier.

As a side project, we made homemade ink from berries and wrote a letter as a Civil War soldier would have.  We smashed some raspberries, added a little vinegar, and viola!  Homemade ink.  It was fun but Mackenzie is very happy that she can use a pen or pencil.  Much easier.

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This week our assignment in I Can Do All Things was more color mixing.  Neither one of us is particularly good at making vibrant colors yet but it sure is fun.

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We’d been finishing school early, before lunch, almost everyday last week.  (Woot!)  And so Mackenzie asked to do an extra art project while the Wee Babe was napping.  Her drawing/painting came out BEAUTIFUL but boy was it an ordeal.   I know she’d love for you to check out here work and comment. Although I’m sure she’d be a tad embarrassed that I ratted her out.  LOL  But I need to write down this stories so I can share them with my future grandchildren, so it had to be done.

Piano lessons are going GREAT!  She loves it and she has a little natural ability it seems.  She came home so excited today because the teacher said that she could work ahead in the book.  Not bad for the only kid who’d never touched a piano before.

We had our third soccer game this weekend.  It didn’t go so well.  It was hotter than hot, our star player was away, and there were no subs.  So the only break they got was the 5 minutes at half-time.  They got creamed.  But on the bright side, they executed better team work then they usually do.  Might that be because they couldn’t rely on their lovely friend, with the amazing kicking leg, to do all the work?  Hopefully, they’ll continue to do this when they have their “star” back.

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And that was our week!  Be sure to check out how everyone else’s went over at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.