1st Day Back to {home}School, Among Other Things

We did it! We finally got unpacked enough and got our new learning room organized enough to start back to school! Frankly, I was starting to get worried...ha

Today went very well though. So far I am extremely pleased with our new curriculum choices for math and language arts. Now, if I could just actually get some lesson planning done... And get the finishing touches done in the learning room, so I can blog it!

In other news, it has been a bit of a traumatic week...pet-wise.

Last weekend a sweet friend (who had asked my permission beforehand) brought the kiddos their very own little fish tank with two goldfish. Well, on Sunday we noticed that The Princess' fish was pretty lethargic...dead, actually. She was sad, but she handled it fairly well. And we went to the store that evening and let her pick out a new goldfish.

Well, today during our school time~the fish tank is in our learning room~we noticed Mr. B's fish was acting funny.

And then he was dead.

It was a bit of a rough time. My son is a drama king and my daughter is the drama queen...they both melted down. Of course, I felt terrible, but what can you do? We'd already had the talk about how goldfish have short lives. "Just work on your handwriting page, kids. Ignore the fish floating on his side...." Oh my. We had to just stop for a short while, say a prayer, flush the fish and make a promise to go fish shopping right after school before things could go on.

Sandwiched between the fish funerals, the kiddos found a baby blue jay in our backyard. It was a fledgling, fully feathered. I think it may have fallen out of its nest, but there were no protective parents trying to peck our heads, so I'm not sure what happened to it. When my kids went to look at it and talk to it, it started following them around like a little puppy. It was pretty cute and they, of course, were enchanted by it. Gave it a name and everything:) My kids are big animal lovers, if you can't tell.

Well, the next morning they ran out to see if the baby bird was still there (I was a *meanie* and wouldn't let them bring the bird in the night before, of course). And it was dead.

So then there was a bird funeral.

Needless to say, I hope there are no more pet funerals this week. It's been a bit much for the kids, bless their hearts, and a bit much for me, too, because I like to protect them from hurt.

Here's looking forward to a drama-free day tomorrow!

This post is linked to:

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

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my blessed life

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