A World without walls
everyday life while homeschooling overseas
As part of our Medieval Studies this year in history, we plan to celebrate each monthly feast from Medieval times. What better day to celebrate than the first day of school? We are using a book called 'Medieval Feasts and Festivals' and it gives detail on how feasts were run, what sorts of foods they ate, and many details on each of the monthly feasts of the year. It so happens that August is the feast of Lammas Day. I took a picture of the kids (and Devin) enjoying our lovely feast, printed it off, and used it as a journal entry for each of the kids. So, I will use their words to explain what the Lammas Day feast is all about: Peter: St. (sit) Sm. Bkn. (bacon) TD. (teddy) Bn (Mr. Bean). (Plus many pictures of the bread creations they made to eat.) Andrew: It was really fun and very filling! It was so cool! I learned the feast is about celebration. We celebrated Lammas Day, which is the feast of the bread. We ate pottage, roast chicken wings, pineapple and cherries. We 'brought home the bacon'! It was fun! We entertained people by dancing. Claire: The courses in order: 1 Fruit, 2 Bacon, 3 soup (pottage), 4 chicken, 5 bread, bread, bread, bread, bread. It was really fun! After I got into my pajamas, we did a peasant dance with me, Andrew and Dad. The festival Lammas Day, is in honor of bread, bacon, and harvest. Josh: I loved preparing for this feast! Making all the different flavours of bread was so fun! We lit candles on the table and turned off the lights for the best effect. We had five different courses and each of them were so good! And there you have it! It was a fantastic feast and good times were had by all. Here's to hoping all our feastly celebrations are as successful as this one! :) We finished it off with celebratory 'peasant' dancing.
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A dear sweet friend passed away today. Samah worked as a switchboard operator at the US Embassy here in Amman. She was a local hire, and Devin supervised her. Samah has become a special friend to us while we've been here. She is blind, but very funny and loving. We shared our audio books with her, and discussed books that we've read. The kids loved playing with her and bringing her chocolate. We always stopped by when we were picking up our mail just to say hi. One special day, we took her to the embassy park to have a picnic and play on the swings and slide! She had NEVER been on the swings or the slide!!!!! Another special day, she came to our house for the day. We went to Jingo's Jungle with the kids at the end of their school year and took Samah with us--where she experienced her very first roller coaster ride! We all got on the roller coaster with her, and we all closed our eyes so we could feel what she would feel. It was a special day for all of us. She was always full of smiles and laughs and funny things to say. She often told us she didn't know what she would do when we left next year. It never once occurred to me that she would leave first. Samah, we will miss you. My happy thought, though, is that now, for the first time, you can see. That makes me smile. I hope you can see it. I absolutely love watching my kids create. They're pretty amazing young people and can be so passionate! Here are some of our creations lately: Mini Lego City!! Andrew and Peter spent 2 entire days working on this Lego mini city. They have a book that gives ideas of things to do with Legos, so they thought, "hey, let's make a miniature city!", and off they went! They were so proud of their creation! Space Challenge!! Josh is doing Lego Robotics right now, and he's working on a space challenge that has him creating a mock mission to Mars. It's pretty complicated and impressive! I love the concentration and dedication he puts into this! He spends every waking minute (that I let him) over at the computer and the Legos putting this together and programming it all in! Rainbow Loom and Beading!! Claire is always hard at work creating beautiful works of art that you can wear. She makes necklaces and bracelets and is always giving them away to friends. Many times, I will pass her room and she'll have Andrew and Peter at work with her, stringing beads together and talking about whom they're going to give them to! :) We're studying the Romans right now, so I found an 'excavation' kit where you dig through the clay and find the 'ancient' artifacts. This one has Roman coins! They're hard at work using shishkabob skewers to painstakingly scratch away the clay to find the hidden objects. The screams of "I think I found something!!" is met with, "Cool! Let's find out which one it is!" and it makes my heart happy. And another weekend has come to an end. I often come to Sunday morning (which is our 'Monday') and wonder: What happened to my relaxing weekend? It's so full and busy, but very fun! We got to have all sorts of friends over for meals and fun. We made new friends and enjoyed old friends. Devin and I rearranged our house yesterday, so that was fun. I like to do that from time to time. We moved some beds around and some dressers, so now the little boys have bunk beds again, and the big boy has a big bed. :) It was fun to do and makes things feel a little more refreshed in our small cramped quarters.
Today, we'll be doing our usual swim lessons, and this afternoon, we get to welcome a new family! Should be fun! Our primary in church will be at close to 40 kids by the time everyone moves in. Wow. It's big and crazy and fun for the kids! :) Oh, and don't forget: Today begins the Perseids Meteor shower! Go and see the 'falling stars'! My favorite quote from the other day:
At Peter's swim lesson-- Mr. Ali (his teacher): Peter! Go under the water! Peter: Did you know that water is actually a liquid? Has anyone ever seen this book?? We found it at a bookstore in Israel and the little boys LOVE it. It came with a cd that reads the book to you, so they can often be found listening to it in their room while creating lego masterpieces. Or listening to it as they drift off to sleep.
Well, last night, the book went a bit too far. Andrew woke up this morning proudly announcing that last night, he ate his first book. What??!? I thought he was kidding, but no, he literally ate a page out of a book. I asked him what we're going to do now that the page is missing, and he told me that by eating it, all the information went straight to his brain, so now he'll always remember it! When Devin heard, he said, "Andrew, that book is supposed to be fiction--not a true story or a textbook on how to properly eat books!" Andrew: "Oh." Ha ha ha ha! What is that dark spot in the pool?? It's my newest Fishy!! :) Peter started swim lessons for the first time last week, and he is LOVING it!! I've been pleasantly surprised how quickly he's catching on, and I finally don't feel super mega adrenaline rushes and mini heart attacks every time he gets into the pool! Hooray! :) Claire and Andrew are also taking lessons, and it's so fun to watch them learning all the strokes! Hooray for summer swimming...and the fact that this counts as PE!!! Bwahahaha! See? The learning never ends! :D |
Who Am I?
As a Stay At Home Mom of 4 wonderful children, I have the amazing opportunity not only to home school them, but to do so in many different places! I am married to the most amazingly wonderful (and handsome) man in the whole world! Together, we seek out, every day, that Joy in the Journey that makes life exciting! Archives
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Emily's books
by Dan Brown
I like that the plot twists and turns a lot...and it makes you think. However, I don't appreciate Dan Brown's endings in his books. I find the endings incongruent with the rest of his stories--why make it a romance for the last chapter...
by Shannon Hale
I loved this book. I'm a sucker for fairy tales/fantasy. This was so well written! I can't wait to read all the rest of her books!
by Shannon Hale
I'm reading this one again. I liked it the first time I read it. I'm still liking it for the second time around. I like all of Shannon Hales' books.
**Still lots of fun the second time around! I do like this book for a comfortable...
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