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| 1 Monday I gave them watercolors and paper and asked them to play with colors, filling the paper as much as they could, scattering here and there and mixing as they went. Then together we weaved pipe cleaners into St. Brigid's crosses. We worked on maps of the Persian Empire revisiting old landmarks with which we have become very familiar, and see the area new again too from another people's point of view. Katie helped Quentin make a "W-is-for-Wagon" project to add to the almost complete alphabet. and then she weaved a Valentine basket for Quentin, who found it a bit too hard to do for himself. |
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| 2 Tuesday For the day that marks the middle between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, we created much with blocks, in the kitchen, Groundhog Hot Chocolate for "Tea"time... in our imaginations; knights on horseback... and for Candlemas, we took the sheets of watercolors they made yesterday, and made them into candle holders. |
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| 3 Wednesday We stepped back about 400 years and imagined we were with Galileo as he made discoveries through his telescope. We looked at pictures of Jupiter on 9 consecutive nights and noticed four star-like points of light on either side of the planet. We were able to see, as Galileo did, that these points of light change their positions in respect to Jupiter. These are not stars but moons! I gave them the names of these four moons. We looked at their patterns of movement and James told us the order of the moons from closest to farthest from Jupiter. Using Sweethearts, which was the closest things at hand at the moment, we demonstrated these positions using the information from the charts. Then, looking at a photograph of Jupiter, we could see its Great Red Spot. We talked about how it is like a hurricane or tornado that has raged for 100's of years or more. With that in mind, we got out James' tornado tube and had lots of fun. After much experimenting with how stringed instruments make different sounds, I gave them some supplies so they could make their own stringed instruments. Then we traveled back further in time back to about 550 BC to Cyrus the Great of Persia. We talked about how he took over the nearby land of Media to make a great empire. We made puppets of Cyrus the Great for play and to add to our collection. |
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| 4 Thursday Steven and I went to my Rheumatologist appointment this AM, and being some distance away (the next state over), Katie watched the boys. She made them chocolate chocolate-chip pancakes. They played many games, from board games to relay races. Later, in the afternoon, I set things up for them to make chocolate covered heart-shaped strawberry marshmallows with sprinkles. |
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| 5 Friday Another medical appointment, this time Physical Therapy, which it looks like I will be going to three times a week. This time we took the three youngest boys with us. Quentin entertained us on the ride by saying things like, "Five four times is twenty, right?" and "Four doubled is eight, isn't it?" Between the appointment and stocking provisions in for the coming snow storm, we were out until into the afternoon. When we got back the cord of wood we had ordered had been delivered in the driveway. in the driveway. After the groceries, school supplies and wood was safely where it should be, Steven went to work at his computer and we put "pearl swirl" in James' tornado tube and he was quite fascinated with it. Sam has been having trouble keeping up with the plot of the story, The Ides of April, so we made him a chart so he could keep track of the characters and what is going on. In fairness to him, the book is a murder mystery set in Rome. The names are unfamiliar and hard to keep separate and the action with clues embedded is dense and sometimes hard to follow. And then, as night fell, so did the snow. |
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| 6 and 7 Saturday and Sunday |
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