ThadenPierce School

I love the clothes I’m finding at our local thrift shop (that I’m just getting around to exploring) but we also found a great school buy. There was a set of early reader books, 10 in a special little binder and it still had the stickers for the kids to mark which books they had read.

It closes with a magnetic clasp and each book slides into a page protector. I love it, and more importantly Mo loves it. We had heard good things about this series from a friend but it lists for $16.95 per set – our thrift shop find was $2.49!!

So explore thrift shops, there are all sorts of great school finds if you know what you’re looking for…

Declaration of Independence

Scan of the original.

The kids are picking out red & blue outfits as we discuss the flag and it’s meaning. And we’re watching School House Rocks! America Rock. That’s educational, right?

I’m really not feeling ambitious enough to attend the community parade and we knew we weren’t going to attempt the fireworks – way past bedtime. But next year when Joseph’s not so little I may be willing to trek around for these things.

Between visitors (good distraction) and Kit being sick (bad distraction) we’ve just been thrown for a loop these last two weeks. I’m struggling to get back on track because when I mention lessons I hear protests. We sat down and had a little chat about that and we’re resolving to pick back up with lessons. It’s really my issue, I get too distracted by chores or phone calls or projects and let myself wander off. I NEED TO TAKE LESSONS SERIOUSLY and not answer the phone or emails while we’re having school.

Bennett starts his speech therapy next week which means we’ll have speech Monday through Thursday from 11am to noon, pushing Kit’s work schedule around so he has to work afternoons now and doesn’t get home until dinnertime. That means I’ve got to get on the ball so dinner prep and lessons are done in the morning while we’ve got Kit here.

It is now officially too hot to do anything outside so Kit and I have to exercise early and the kids aren’t playing in the yard. It’s making us a bit stir crazy so we’re trying to do library trips weekly and have friends come play. Even errands have to be done really early or else the car & carseats becomes excruciatingly hot – it does not help that our recently recharged AC in the van stopped working again yesterday, thus forcing a very pricy repair that’s not negotiable in the Texas summer heat.

So summer’s had some challenges but I’m determined that we’ll get back on track for July.

Sitting on couch holding ice cube to Joseph’s sore gums as he frantically gnaws on it. Bennett came to sit by me and is reading me Go, Dog, Go with the cutest inflection. He informed me, “Mom, there a lot of dogs!”

I’m finding him every day sitting down with a book reading to himself. I love it. “Look at those dogs go. Go, dog, go!” When he saw the exclamation point he repeated the sentence with enthusiasm. “Go, dog, GO!”

Really, one of these days I do plan to do lessons with him, teach him some grammar or something… I don’t know. But it’s kinda fun to just see how he’s developing these skills simply from being exposed to reading. Not that this system works for all the kids. We potty “trained” the first two kids by ignoring the issue and they trained themselves. That system did NOT work with Bennett, but ignoring the reading and letting him learn on his own seems to be pretty effective. I know each child will need varying levels of assistance and we do need to to do some formal language lessons with him at some point – I just didn’t plan to do that for at least another year. He’s only four! But I don’t think we can realistically wait another year to start grammar lessons, I don’t want him to form bad habits or struggle because we didn’t help him fill in some of the language gaps.

He’s a hoot. When he asks me what something says now I don’t tell him, I ask him what he thinks. Walking to church through the parking lot he asked me what the road said and I asked him – he read it, “No Parking.”

Christopher side note – he’s hooked on The Magic Treehouse series. He started a new one last night as we got ready for scripture in prayer. Before it was time for lights out he ran back into the living room to tell us he finished it. We asked questions to see how much he remembered – yep, he read it that fast, I think he takes after me with the speed reading. I told him I’m going to time him next book because I’m curious how long it took. He’s reading two or three books a day so we do need to find something more challenging before he finishes this series.

Bennett’s sitting on the toilet, Emy’s on the potty chair. They’re chatting as they both pee before bed and we overhear, “Texas is over here, South Carolina is over here. South Carolina is yellow.”

Bennett’s pointing out states to Emy on the shower curtain map of the world. While they pee. I about fell over laughing.

Christopher started his second piano book and we played our first duet together! It was lovely. For your listening pleasure – Duet

So Kit’s proposed we have a self reliance week. I think he called it “Common Sense Week.” If there is anything the kids can do for themselves, they have to do it and we’re not going to help (unless safety is involved.) All those times they stand there in the kitchen with a dirty plate and ask, “Where do I put this?” We’re not going to tell them! (Right now we always ask, “Where do you think it’s suppose to go?”) If they need help with something and ask, then we help. But otherwise, they are ON THEIR OWN for anything and everything they can feasibly do without us. If they don’t know how to do it, we’ll teach them.

I’m liking this idea. We may need to make it an annual tradition. Perhaps not a week, just a day now and add more days as they get older? But it is really important to us that they learn to do as much as they can for themselves so they are reasonably independent and functioning when they leave home. It’s too easy for me to do things for them but I’m robbing them of the chance to learn to do it for themselves and I’m making my life harder by not enlisting their assistance in running this house. It’s an investment of time to train them now but I know it will reap rewards for our family and for their future families.

So, we’ll set a date and we’ll do some preliminary training and we’ll try survival week at the Thaden-Pierce house. This should be entertaining…

We finally have a sunflower! And it’s enormously tall, as you can see.

Aunt Rebecca and the cousins brought some newly hatched chicks to visit today. They borrowed the eggs from a friend and were able to watch them hatch and they’ll soon return them.

Joseph was frustrated we wouldn’t let him hold one.

Emy & Bennett were very gentle but we stayed close.

Moira & Christopher are begging for some eggs to hatch.

Our history group studied Shakespeare today and did some brewing like in Macbeth.

Here are the kids gathering with their dragon scales, eye of newt, and toe of frog. I thought it was interesting the history book refers to them as the weird old women, they do not call them witches. And when Lady Macbeth kills herself they say she “died of a guilty conscience.” Which I think is nice, it lets us explain as appropriate for our kids’ age/maturity level. (And Katie’s right, I should point out that the real speech from Macbeth is very NOT PG rated. I like the Lamb kids’ versions of Shakespare – they edit as needed for kids. Shakespeare does have some gruesome stuff…)

The baboon’s blood was red vitamin water. VERY yummy brew.

1 WITCH. Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.
2 WITCH. Thrice and once, the hedge-pig whin’d.
3 WITCH. Harpier cries:—’tis time! ’tis time!
1 WITCH. Round about the caldron go;
In the poison’d entrails throw.—
Toad, that under cold stone,
Days and nights has thirty-one;
Swelter’d venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot!
ALL. Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
2 WITCH. Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg, and owlet’s wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
ALL. Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
3 WITCH. Scale of dragon; tooth of wolf;
Witches’ mummy; maw and gulf
Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark;
Root of hemlock digg’d i the dark;
Liver of blaspheming Jew;
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Sliver’d in the moon’s eclipse;
Nose of Turk, and Tartar’s lips;
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver’d by a drab,—
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,
For the ingrediants of our caldron.
ALL. Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
2 WITCH. Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.