For all the sesquipedalians out there...

I hope you all enjoy this as much as my family did, word nerds that we are!

Mockus Latinus

So, with "Natus" and "Iulia", my duo oldest discipuli, we spent the last hour in STITCHES making up silly Latin words or phrases such as "O-us snappus, est!"  (Mockus Latinus words must end in "us" or "a" and all phrases or sentences end in "est".) 

Translation:  So, with Nate and Julia, my two oldest students, we spent the last hour in stitches making up silly Latin words or phrases such as "Oh Snap!"  (Mock Latin words must end in "us" or "a" and all phrases or sentences end in "est".)

Try translating this to see how quickly my day is going down the drain...

Natus madus Helena sniffus Natus' armpitus est.  Iulia saidus, "Natus mortus Helena!"....

sigh....

At least they are having fun!  Now the two year old is calling her older brother Natus!

The shortest of posts...

...just to say that since school has started and my computer has started to die (and I'm just too busy to set up the new one), I haven't had time to blog.

The three year old continues to have eczema that bleeds because it's so itchy.  His geographic tongue looks better, but not completely healed.  All his food needs to be made separate from everybody else's because of his wheat, dairy and egg allergy...

I'm crabby as all get out because all people under the age of 5 have been destructive.  Baby learned to unload all the clothes out of the dressers in our family closet/laundry room.  A baby lock has since been installed on the door with express instructions that the baby is only allowed in for diaper changes.  She also regularly unloads all the books and magazines at her level.  My kids are getting really good at sorting.
 
On the bright side, and I want to thank GOD for Chocolate Emporium for peanut free and dairy free M&M-wannabees.  For those with allergy issues, you might want to check them out....and Illuminated Ink for there beautiful products which have kept antsy girls at bay.

Last Day of School Dinner

Here was the menu for our last day of school celebration:
Tandoori Chicken
Naan
Rice
Peas
Salad
Strawberry Icebox Pie with Pat-in-the-pan crust

I'll include the recipes one by one for easier searching.

Upcoming Post - the Move!

After many tears and discussions, we decided to move our home school to







are you ready for this?










to our Family Room. Yes, I do have the best husband in the world that is so insistent on doing what is best for the kids (and his sobby wife) that he suggested the family room.

You see, I was thinking about moving everything back down to the basement. I would have done it in a heartbeat, but he reminded me of why it didn't work in the past (and he was right).

My husband is my voice of reason. We have a very good marriage. One of the most important things my husband does for me is to slow me down. My processing speed is pretty fast, meaning I think something through, devise a plan of action and then execute usually before the average person has thought about it. It's a very bad trait some of the times and a very good trait other times. It's also pretty jarring for most people. Most people are not prepared for the speed at which I move and thankfully, my husband is, well, most of the time. One of his most important character traits is his adaptability.

Well, I digress...so, shortly I will post pictures of the new "Learning Room" as my husband has renamed our former Family Room. Stay tuned.

The Spelling Bee

Little Woman and Little Princess participated in our home school spelling bee yesterday. Little Woman is also working on a merit badge for American Heritage Girls on Cake Decorating. Here's her final project for the badge. And, besides completing her badge, she came in 3rd place in the Spelling Bee. Her missed word? Cajolery. We're very proud of the other kids and want to wish the winner, a bright and wonderful young man of 10 who will go on to the Minnesota Regional Spelling Bee.

Suggestion from the Com Box

Bearing has been to my house and seen the school area and laundry area. She suggested I post pictures so you can see those them. DISCLAIMER: Real life here...I didn't pick up, this is what it looks like in REAL LIFE.
First the school areas
The girl's area
* The top row of shelves contain manipulatives and supplies such as extra notebooks, index cards and miscellaneous activities.
* The bottom row of shelves contain game supplies, work books, a very WIDE variety of craft supplies and some coloring books.
* The bins on the left of the desks contain more arts and craft supplies, personal storage for projects unfinished and craft books and ideas.
* The girls each have two magazine holders for their curriculum (white boxes in the center of their desks).
* There is a great time line on the wall under the shelves.
* Each girl has a desk lamp.
* On the backs of their chairs are additional pouches for personal items such as notebooks, drawings, flash cards, pencils/pens, etc.
* The white plastic drawers on the left are FULL of colored paper, chalk, chalkboards (9x12), white board markers, white boards (9x12), color crayons, colored pencils, thin tipped markers, thick tipped markers, scissors, paper punches, tape, glue, glue stick, stencils, rulers, glue dots and new writing pencils.

The boy's area:
* Desk with desk light and two magazine holders for curriculum and papers due/done/to be filed.
* Bottom shelf text books, puzzles, nerf guns and legos (this is a boy's area)
* Top shelf and bins on the left contain more manipulatives, games, personal storage for the boy and busy items for the preschoolers in my life like all the broken crayons the girls have rejected, magnetic letters and lacing toys.

I'm sorry to say I WON'T show you the area just to the right of boy's area because it is a big, fat, disasterous pile that only I can navigate. That is a 2'x3' countertop with my teacher manuals, in and out bins, file folders, magazines, notebooks and other random junk that I seem to not be able to put away ;-).

Now for the family closet/laundry room:
The changing area - on the left is 10 drawers for Wee One and Tinkerdoodle. Notice (if you can) the laminated labels hanging down with pony tail holders. That is so someone other than me can not only dress the little ones, but also put their laundry away for me. What you cannot see is to the right are 10 more drawers. Four are mine and six are Little Princess'. On top is a shelf going across which holds clothes en route out of the laundry room, destined for storage because someone has outgrown them. Behind the changing pad are diapers and supplies. Below the changing pad are the dirty laundry hampers. One for dry dirty clothes, the other for wet dirty clothes. Tinkerdoodle has been potty trained for more than a year, but still has accidents. Testy Tiger wets during naps regularly. And Wee One wears clothe diapers occasionally. The wet hamper has a lined wet bag and cover to reduce "smells".

The other storage unit has three sets of ten drawers for Little Man, Little Woman, Testy Tiger and myself. In between each set are hanging rods above and sorting hampers below. On the left are whites (non linens) and colors (non pants). On the right are pants and linens. If you want my laundry sorting philosophy, I'll write about that someday. Notice the drawers are not perfectly tidy. That is because my kids must fold and put their own clothes away. I don't do it for them. I have to do mine. All three little kids' drawers are labeled so ANYONE can put away their laundry and help them get dressed.

Other things you can't see: Washer and dryer with shelves above for storage of: paper towel (I buy in bulk from Amazon Subscribe and Save....love it!), toilet paper (same - bulk from ASandS), laundry detergent (ASandS), white vinegar and baking soda, other various laundry aids, paper plates, plastic cups, and facial tissue (ASandS).

To the left of dryer is a folding table. Above the folding table is a hanging shelf where all of my very tall dear husband's shirts hang to dry.

ON top of the washer and folding table are 4 baskets. One for dear husband, Little Man, Little Woman and Little Princess where clothes come out of dryer and into the respective baskets to be folded by the owner. I put the rest in a basket below folding table.

I also didn't include pictures of my computer desk, book shelf and preschool/toddler storage. The preschool/toddler storage cabinet is 3' wide and 6' tall. It contains: playdoh and playdoh toys, puzzles, paints, preschool activity books, lacing games, magnetic games, special toys (like Hungry Hungry Hippo and Shark Fishing), dominoes, spin paint and other miscellaneous things I pull out when I need to keep the two little boys busy. I have a paper cutter and laminator stored on top to keep little hands safe.

The other thing I'll post later is bookshelves. I have more books than the local public library. Really. I do actually have them sorted and the kids have been trained to put them back in their places. Finally.

As you can see it's all pretty compressed. I do need to do some decluttering...you know, when I'm not so busy.

Winter Doldrums...

Do you have them yet?

I do. I am itching to move my homeschool around. AGAIN. (Can you hear my dear husband sigh and shake his head?)

I read Bearing's Blog. Which led me to this. Which, of course, supports my desire to move. I always spend about 2 weeks in deliberation before breaking it to the dear husband. You see, I get a lot of guff. Not just from him, but from my whole family. I like change. I had moved 20 times in the 28 years before I married my husband. I am not the settled down kind of gal. I always like to move. It's a great way to clear through the clutter. I feel like there IS nothing better than a change of scenery.

Right now, most of our school stuff is in the kitchen. That isn't where it's always been. It's been LOTS of other places. The basement "amusement room" (as it was billed when we bought the house), which is a lovely long room with a gas fireplace and huge egress window. It is by no means dark and dreary. It's very bright and cheerful, for a basement that is. The problem is that that is where the toys live. It is virtually impossible to get kids to get school work done when all those toys are sitting there, taunting them to play.

That is when we moved up to the living room. Our living room is a very large room, 19'x14'. It's well lit, but unfortunately it is right by the front door. What could be wrong with that? Well, when anyone comes to the door, the kids bolt to see who it is. That's not so bad as the salt maps or cutting disasters left after art that are there for the WHOLE.WORLD. TO. SEE. I know, I know. I have issues. I have always been a messy, but I'm more of a closet messy. You tend to not know that about me unless I really like you and am willing to let you come over when the house isn't decent. The living room was never decent, so during that dark time we never had company. EVER.

Then, I proposed a move to the office. The office is at the back of the house. It was also largely unused. My husband had a computer desk in there and we had moved some toys up there. I bought a lovely kidney shaped, adjustable height table and new chairs. It was pretty good except it didn't fit us very well in terms of size. The usable size of the room is like 10x12. The new fancy table and chairs took up most of the room. Then Testy Tiger became mobile and would regularly destroy said room.

We got real school desks from IKEA and put them downstairs for awhile. The toys moved up to the office, that was the school room. We schooled down there again.

I rethought our strategy. It seemed the kids just wanted to be where I am. That is typically in the kitchen or laundry room. We changed office into a first floor laundry. That was, by the way, probably the best thing we have EVER done. Laundry room, right off mud room, next to kitchen in a house with 6 kids. And, it's a family closet (thank you Duggar family for that idea). We have these great IKEA ANTONIUS wire basket drawers. All 6 kids and I keep our laundry in there. Wash, fold, put away all in the same room. Except when I'm behind on the laundry, then it's Wash, put in a basket and wait until there is time to sit and fold. (Note to self - when will that be?)

We decided to do school in the kitchen, kind of...I had the kids bring their school stuff up and do school at the kitchen table. Unfortunately, things didn't get taken back downstairs. Finally, we brought the desks up and moved the table out. We got an IKEA folding table and 4 chairs. Right now the big kids do their work on their desks, eat at their desks and the little boys eat at the fold down table. When my dear husband is home, we eat in the formal dining room.

God bless my husband. He never complains about my desires to move things around. He does give me a very good-natured hard time, but never complains. The dear man will do ANYTHING to keep me from moving (to another house). He does, thoughtfully, challenge my reasons for moving things around when I come to him with yet-another great idea.

Here's my beef right now that is causing me moving angst: My kitchen is small. There are usually 7 people in there. Me and six kids, one that is almost mobile. The kitchen area is 10x12. That includes the cabinet space and appliances. The eat-in kitchen space is the same size. So, in that space I have 3 desks w/rolling chairs, 3 wall-hung bookshelves, and school supplies, a fold down table, 4 bar stools and a plastic set of drawers full of art supplies. I also have 2-1x6 cube shelves full of bins. Keep in mind this is not ALL the homeschool stuff. There is a 3' wide cabinet full of toddler and preschool supplies in the laundry room (remember how small that room was?) along with my computer desk, a book shelf, washer, drier, changing table and clothing for 7 people in my house. And yes, there is more homeschooling stuff still in the basement. So sue me - I have six kids. I have to keep curriculum around for 7 grades. I'm sorry. I have stuff.

It's a full house, both with bodies and stuff. I proposed moving the school stuff back to the basement. It's the least used space in the house. My dear husband contends the kids want to be where I am (which is usually in the kitchen). He's right.

So, whether you've been to my house or not, please feel free to post suggestions while I go read Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius. One of the fruits of these exercises is contentment. I need that, don't I?