Our Week in Review (June 3rd-9th)

Most of this week can be summed up in 3 letters VBS.  It was VBS week at our church so Monday through Friday from 8:30-12:15 we were at church.  I was the Science Leader again this year and had Anthony and Christian as my youth helpers.  We picked up Chelsea and Liam and brought them with us.  Nick was the Recreation Leader (someone filled in for him Monday when they were on their way home from D.C.)  Alex was a floater working wherever they needed him, mostly crafts.  Our VBS theme this year was ROAR which focused mostly on the Israelites in the Old Testament with one lesson on Jesus in the New Testament.  We learned that When Life is Unfair...God is Good!  When Life Changes...God is Good!  When Life is Scary...God is Good!  When Life is Sad...God is Good! When Life is Good...God is Good!  We had a great group of children this year and amazing adult and youth helpers. 

The science station was a lot of fun.  On Monday we played with tumble drums, dominoes, and marbles.  On Tuesday we played with catapults, and hoopoe birds and watched an amazing egg experiment.  On Wednesday we played with presto changos, made elephant toothpaste, and did a color changing water experiment.  On Thursday we played with optichromes and made an optical illusion with fish in a fish tank.  On Friday we made slushees in a bag (I will never do this again with this many children!) and did the Diet Coke and Mentos experiment (they love this one!)

Other Activities this Week


Monday the boys finally got home.  I say finally because when they were about two hours away one of the vehicles traveling with them had car trouble and they were stuck on the side of the road for quite awhile.  They got home about 3 hours later then we expected but they made it.  We found out their ranking in the competition later in the week.  In the obstacle course they placed 71st in the challenge course they placed 46th and in their engineering notebook they placed 46th with an overall rank of 62nd out of 84 teams in their category.

Anthony waiting for the car to get fixed

Wednesday there was a 4 H Leather Making workshop from 9-2 that Lily, Christian, and Alex were very interesting in attending.  So I dropped them off and then took the rest of us to VBS.  When we were done we took our sack lunch and went to the EH House to eat and wait for them to finish up.  They made, stained, and painted two coasters, a key chain, and a bracelet. 

Thursday after VBS the girls had their music lesson.  Later that evening our AG agent came out to help give one more shot to the pig to hopefully completely clear up the pneumonia.  She is eating great and acting what appears to be normal for a pig.

Friday after VBS we went grocery shopping and then had pizza and a movie that night.  It had been several weeks since we have all been home to do that on a Friday night.


Lily and I finally  had a chance to play with our embroidery machine this week.  We practiced making a few designs on some scrap fabric and learned how to download designs to our computer and transfer it to the machine with the usb.  This is a design we downloaded and transferred.

I was trying to get some pictures of our baby goats all lined up.  They were not real cooperative.  Sugar and Frank were the twin brothers and are almost 6 weeks old.  Frank (the red goat) is a monster, he will be a really big goat.  Sugar (the goat with the light colored face) was the runt and is much smaller.  Betsy (white with the darker colored face) is 3 weeks younger then the boys and is almost as tall as Sugar, wider, and feels like she weighs more. 

Frank and Sugar

Betsy and Frank

Sugar, Betsy, and Frank

Sugar and Betsy

Alex has been working with his new show goat some now that they are used to us. 

I hope you had a great week!

Happy Homeschooling!

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Our Week in Review (May 27th- June 2nd)

It has been a week!  A lot of good things, but a lot of very stressful things too. 

Monday was Art's birthday.  He had to work so we didn't do anything very special.  The girls had music lessons because we were not able to have them the Friday before.

Tuesday was the Nature Seekers 4 H Meeting.  We went to Grandview and went canoeing.  The children had a great time, I think they would have stayed all day!  I even went canoeing for the first time ( I don't love being out in the water) and I had fun too. 

Wednesday we went berry picking with 4 H at the Southwest Arkansas Research Center in Hope.  We were able to pick a few strawberries and lots of blueberries and blackberries.  Some of the berries 4 H kept for our jam and jelly workshop next week and some went home with all of the 4 hers. 

We had lunch and then I had to say goodbye to my boys who were heading to Dallas to fly out to D.C. the next day.

And yes they were well taken care of as I knew they would be and yes they are old enough to go on a big trip but this mama missed her boys and it was very hard for me not to go with them.  I could not be in two places at the same time or split myself in half.  They were completely fine to go without me but it was very, very hard for me.

Thursday morning Christian and I went out to take care of all the animal chores and noticed there was something wrong with the pig.  She had not touched her food from the night.  I changed it out and fed and watered the rest of the animals.  At lunch I went back to check on her and she still hadn't eaten and then she started coughing.  Bad.  Then she threw up.  I took a video of her coughing and sent it to Nick (they had just gotten off of the plane) and he showed it to Samantha (trip chaperone and Ag agent) who called the vet and told him what was going on. She was pretty sure it was pneumonia.  They prescribed some medicine and I had to run and pick it up.  But...I had never given a shot to a pig.  Googling it did not make me feel more confident, actually it made me a lot less confident.  So Samantha called her husband to come over and help me give the pig her shots. While we were doing that Emmie was getting ready for her first recital rehearsal.  We were there for about 3 hours.

Friday morning the pig still had not eaten and when she tried to stand up she started swaying.  I thought she was dying. So I called the vet again and made an appointment.  The girls had music lessons and then we ran to the co-op and Walmart.  I bought a dog cage to carry the pig in because my three oldest boys were gone and I could not hook up the livestock trailer by myself.  As soon as we got home we loaded the pig up (who had not moved since that morning) and ran her to the vet.  It was definitely pneumonia and he gave her a second antibiotic. Raising livestock is NOT for the faint of heart.

When we got home from that I had to get Emmie's hair and make-up done for pictures and dress rehearsal.  We were there until 9:00 that night.

My boys in D.C. did send me a few texts and pictures.  Friday was their free day and they got to go to the zoo and the Smithsonian Air and Space museum and see the Washington Monument, WW 2 Memorial, and go by the White House.

Saturday the pig was still not eating but was coughing less.  The boys competed in the Obstacle Course Challenge.  Samantha FaceTimed me so I could see what was going on.  They ran it in 2 minutes 19 seconds, 35 seconds faster then at Regionals.

And it was Recital Night.  Emmie won a trophy for perfect attendance.  Her ballet was to How Does a Moment Last Forever and tap was to You've Got a Friend in Me.  The finale was The Greatest Show.

Sunday the pig finally ate!  She is still coughing but acting much better.  The boys completed the Challenge Course and I was on FaceTime again ( I couldn't see anything but Samantha could tell me what was going on.)  They got more points then they did at Regionals.  But, there were 199 teams at this contest and they did not end up placing in anything.  It was a great experience though and they will take what they learned to next year's competition.

I do not know what all they got to do on Sunday afternoon because the biggest exciting thing they texted me about was getting to see the President in his car!  You can just see President Trump in the back window.

We had our VBS Kickoff Party at church Sunday night.

We did a little bit of Math this week and Christian completed his MineCraft course on Code-a-Kid.

The boys are on their way home.  I can't wait to see them and hear all about their trip!!!

I hope you had a great week!

Happy Homeschooling!

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