How Does Your Garden Grow?
Mostly great! The girls have loved watching it grow, since we're finally getting the right mix of rain and sunshine. We had a few worrisome weeks with all cloudy days, but everything seems to have recovered except for one tomato plant. We even had a little pepper growing for a while, but some passing critter decided it was just too tempting to resist and nipped it off at the stem! We even installed a little rain gauge to help us determine when we actually need to water (not often at this point). The girls have gotten a real thrill out of reading it every few days and keeping track of the measurements in our rain log.

We decided to throw in an experiment in the dying tomato plant's square: One day at lunch,  I sliced into a tomato that had been sitting out on the counter only to discover that all the seeds inside had sprouted! I showed the girls this fascinating find, and they immediately declared, "Let's plant it!" So we pulled out  a trowel and planted the entire tomato. Now we wait!

So sad for the poor tomato plant!

Let's Play Pretend!

Bug even provided reading materials
for her clients.

Rather than setting up elaborate storylines with figures, the girls have lately been creating their own settings to play grown-ups in. Around the house we've had a hair salon, library, church, and a child care center (like at the Y). Some of these have been pretty involved set ups with handmade signs, sign-in sheets, and check-out processes.

I think my favorite of their pretend plays to eavesdrop on is "spyentists." They don their swimming goggles, commandeer the downstairs bathroom (because it makes a convenient time machine), and pretend to be time-traveling scientist who stop the bad guys before they can commit their crimes. Monkey and Bug started it, and at some point Lion joined them as "May O'Neil," a scientist/ninja and daughter of April O'Neil and Michelangelo. Oh, they make me laugh!

Household Responsibilities
Part of our family culture has been that, well, we are one family, we live together in one house, so we all need to work together to take care of it. Recently, in an effort to do a better job of keeping up with the housework, the girls have been given a few more routine responsibilities. For awhile now, they've been picking up their room and the playroom, clearing the table after dinner, and cleaning their own bathroom (supervised, of course). Now, the big girls are also responsible for vacuuming the playroom and their bedroom and Lion helps me sweep the hard floors downstairs. They also fold and put away their own laundry, and I've started teaching them how to sort it. (This is the part of education formally called "home ec".) In fact, lately we've been designating one day a week as chores and games day--we do all our weekly cleaning jobs, go grocery shopping and spend whatever spare hours we have playing board games and working on special projects (liking pulling out the painting supplies last week).

Fun at the Y!
Swimming lessons have finished, but we've still made it to the pool one day week. We've been going during the day, when we practically have the pool to ourselves, but sometime we'll make it to the family swim time when the splash pad is turned on. The girls have a fantastc time practicing their swimming and just messing around in the water. Bug has made it her goal to swim the length of the lap pool (the official goal she has to meet in order to move up a level in lessons). She's got a ways to go, but she's planninng to practice and make an attempt every time we go. Lion has also set goal for herself: to swim the length of the therapy pool. She's almost there! Monkey is also making progress in the water--gaining confidence and slowly improving.
The girls have also spent some time in child watch (the Y's childcare program). The big girls are almost too old for the nursery, but we made it more enjoyable by timing it for them to attend a Music & Movement class. Next week they're going to try a kids' yoga class.

Three R's

One of the joys of home schooling: lessons in the screened-in
gazebo on a beautiful sunny day!

In the past couple of weeks, I've refilled their binders and we've picked up our normal full schedule of formal lessons. Nothing terribly exciting to discuss here. We transitioned back pretty smoothly and everybody's making progress! If you really want details on what the day-to-day academics look like, message me and I'll happily fill you in! I haven't been detailing those here because I have actual records of those lessons elsewhere, and I figure it's just not as interesting to read.