{Addendum to week 15}

Suffice to say, I had a breakdown last Wednesday, requiring Scott to don his cape and be a superhero and come home so that I could temporarily run away.  It wasn't pretty folks.

The Week That Everything Fell Apart {week 15}

Gah.  I had finished this post... saved it... or so I thought, before navigating away from the editing page.  And now half the post is gone.  GAH.  Well, I'm not gonna finish it.  So there.

So here it is.  Week 15.  And you'd think that I have my stuff together, right?

Monday  Scott preached the previous day so he took Monday off.  So we did too.  Since CC is not in session, we're only schooling four days a week.  So no biggie that we took Monday off.

Tuesday  Sometime between 7 AM and 8:30 AM, our router died.  After 40 minutes on the phone with Verizon tech support, it was determined that, yes, our router was in fact dead.  This normally would not be a big deal; we've got smart phones that have internet access.  BUT.  My lesson plans are on an online program called Homeschool Tracker Online.  And I print out each week's lessons on my wirelessly networked printer.  So that was a problem.  But Scott, the Idea Man, said to go up to church, use their wifi and printer.  Genius!

So i lugged all three kids (who needed to get out of the house after being cooped up during the ice storm) up to church and set up my stuff in the atrium and got to work.  An hour later, I was still trying to get my lesson plans up to date.  Working in the atrium wasn't the hottest idea I've had.  One person after another would stop and talk to me for 15+ minutes.  Which was GREAT because I don't get to talk to these friends very often.  But BAD because each conversation was delaying our day.  After I finally got our lesson plans in check, a staff member graciously printed my 4 pages for me.

By the time we got home, it was already 11:30 AM.  Where had the time gone????  Unfortunately the kids had been kind of wild while we were up at church (specifically while we were in the atrium and I was working/talking).  So I was D-O-N-E by the time we got back home.

No school was done on Tuesday.  Kind of a biggie that we took that day off.  Because we'd have to play catch-up the rest of the week.

Oh, and our router started mysteriously working Tuesday night.  Humph.

Wednesday 

That week after Thanksgiving {week 14}

It's SO hard to get back in the swing of things after a break!  We took off all last week (as I assume you already knew).  So Monday morning was full of groans and whining.  "But Mom, we don't have CC today. How come we are still doing school?"  And, "But I don't wanna do school!!!".  That last quote was from me.

Monday  Scott worked from home on Monday and laid down the law with the kids.

1. they should get dressed, go to the bathroom, and brush their teeth before coming downstairs or doing anything else in the morning
2. they should be in their seats and ready to go by 8AM each morning
3. they are to thank me each day for the privilege of homeschooling and to express gratitude to me for being willing to homeschool them.
4. watching TV and playing video games is a privilege that they earn each day.  Good behavior, good attitudes, clean rooms, and finished chores will allow them to watch TV and/or play video games each day.  They should assume that they won't be able to do those things until the above behaviors are completed.

I am SO thankful for Scott.  He is a great father and husband.  :)

We also took our annual family picture on Monday.  We're not sure we are going to do Christmas cards this year (it's so expensive with the number that we like to send out!).  But we still wanted to get a family picture.  It turned out pretty good!  I'm very pleased.

Scott & I even got a picture of just the two of us.

 

I tried to get a few pics of the kids...

And finally...  

 Tuesday One kiddo had a TERRIBLE attitude on Tuesday.  So TV was taken away for the day from that kid.  Things did get better that day with that particular kid.  I think they were frustrated that they didn't know how to do something and things quickly got out of control.

I also quasi-started Christmas decorating on Tuesday.  I don't know why I'm not into it this year.  Bah humbug.

Wednesday & Thursday We managed to do school and get everything done.  A big ice storm was to come through on Friday, so I ran quite a few errands (in the very cold) on Thursday.

Friday  We woke up Friday to a quasi winter wonderland.

But instead of snow, it was practically all ice.  Our poor trees.  They are so weighted down with ice; I hope they make it.

We were iced in all day yesterday, which wasn't terrible.  We kept our power the whole day (many of our friends didn't have power) and were warm and toasty inside.  And Scott was home too!  Later in the day, a neighbor took our kids sledding over at the local elementary.

And being iced in meant that I could no longer ignore all the Christmas junk that had taken over my living room.

It wasn't pretty people.  And I had put decorating off long enough.

It took me practically the entire day to finish.  But... drum roll please... I finished.

There's more; I just didn't take pictures of all that I did.

Saturday's temp isn't supposed to get above freezing, and the streets re-iced overnight.  So I don't predict we'll be getting out on Saturday either.  Scott, who is preaching Sunday morning, usually likes to practice up at church the day before he preaches.  I'm trying not to cringe at the thought of him driving up to church (it's only 4 miles or so).