A World without walls
everyday life while homeschooling overseas
Whew. What a CRAZY week! So, while I posted a pic of Claire at Root Canal Visit #1, I didn't tell anything about the rest of that day...or Wednesday...or yesterday... It's 8am Friday morning, my kids are still sleeping, and you know what? After the week they've had, I'm going to let them sleep! I think I should probably even take myself and my laptop upstairs where they can't hear the clicking of my keyboard...
There. That's better. Now I can sit in my chair overlooking the valley of La Paz...and turn on the heater in my room. Brrr... We had a big lightning/rain storm again last night/early this morning, and that always makes it even colder in the am. By this afternoon, it'll warm up nicely, but right now, it's dark and cozy. :) So, my weekly review...Tuesday was hysterical! Gah! We all got up early, finished up our school stuff so that Josh and I could head to the embassy again for his photography class that he's teaching...then Josh and I ran back to this area because we were supposed to meet up with a photographer guy who will be doing some workshops with us. Well, we had some miscommunications and missed him, so we set up to meet later that day. Josh and I ran home in time for me to get the boys ready to go to a primary activity and to meet up with Devin so we could take Claire to the dentist. Luckily, we have a lovely friend here who not only took the boys to the primary activity, but dropped Devin, Claire and me off a the dentist! Well, no surprise that at the dentist, Claire had some issues. She's been complaining of pain for quite a while now, and immediately the dentist said she'd need a root canal. Poor kiddo! Normally, for things like that, you'd want to get a second opinion...but this one actually was the second opinion. Before we left Sri Lanka, the dentist there said that she would need a root canal in that tooth in the near future. So, that future is now. They started, but didn't finish, so we'll be headed back there again next week. Good times. After the dentist, we dropped Claire off at seminary (Josh met us there, too), then Devin and I went over to the phone company to see if they had any phones available yet...and they did! Yay! So, we sat there for 2 hours signing up Claire's new phone. We started the process for Josh's, but it takes SO LONG that his didn't finish that evening. He was sad. BUT, after I finished with Claire's phone, I ran with Josh over to meet the photographer. He's AWESOME! We talked about Josh's upcoming workshop and what he'll be doing (WOW!!), and we talked about future trips that we can take as a group for school outings--so I have two people/groups that will do school workshops for my kids!!! And the stuff we talked about...holy cow--we need to stay in Bolivia for like the next 7 years. There's just so much to do!! After our LONG meeting, our new friend drove us home. We got there about the same time as Devin and Claire. Andrew and Peter ended up at the neighbor's house because we weren't home when they were done with their activity. Poor kids. We all reached home after 8pm. So tired!! But then came Wednesday! Once again, we had to blast through our morning school work so that Josh and I could leave around 10am--a friend was coming to drive us around and show us where we could find some local things for Josh's shop class. I know I can order it--but it just seems like you can really find pretty much everything here if you know where to look! I'd much rather buy local... Anyway, we found a carpenter shop, and we found a REALLY cool area that is full of 'Home Depot' stuff--a whole street full of people selling tools and paint and rope and who knows what! It was more of a search party type outing, because we didn't really have time to just meander and find what we wanted, but now I know where to go when I get a minute!! It was so helpful! We had to rush home by noon because then we were off to our co-op class! We started to walk there, but it started to rain, so we took a taxi. I think it would have been faster to walk. *eyeroll* The guy didn't listen to a thing I said...I KNOW I was speaking in Spanish!! He finally got us close, so we walked some more. Sheesh. We had a nice time at co-op. We chatted, the kids did a cooking class with Claire; the boys did a computer class; we learned some Christmas songs together, because we're thinking we'll make a little choir and sing carols at the embassy in December. The boys will be doing group cello together, hopefully starting next week. We're still working through the kinks of our co-op day, but it's a fun different thing to do. We got home about in time to send Josh and Claire over to seminary class. We did some astronomy, and then I sent them off on their way. I had to stay at home and clean up the huge mess our kitchen had become from a few days of neglect. Devin met the kids and finished getting Josh's phone. Claire stayed at the church, since YW started in a bit. Josh came home to finish a photography project, then he and Andrew left to go to Young Men's activity. The three older kids were at the activity until 10:30pm! Sheesh! Peter wanted to stay up until they got home...silly kid! He didn't, but he sure tried! It was a LATE night! However, not as late as last night! So yesterday, again, we had to stagger our schooling, since we met with the principal of the music place where we're arranging group cello/voice lessons for Andrew and Claire at 9am. Then Peter had a class at 9:30. Then Claire had flute lessons at 10:30. Then after all those classes and math and spelling (etc) were finished, all the kids (except Josh) and I went to the grocery store to do our weekly grocery shopping. That's always fun. :D We got home, at lunch, did some history, then at 3pm, the boys and I had to leave to go to the library. We were also meeting Sergio to pay him for Josh's upcoming workshop. Claire had to stay behind because she had a class at 4pm. So, the boys and I caught a taxi and headed down to the library. We met Sergio and paid him. We returned, renewed, and checked out books. We went to the weight room and worked out for a bit. Then we walked a few blocks to the main street and caught a mini bus back toward home. Josh jumped out at the church because he had afternoon seminary that day, and the boys and I continued on to our house. We're learning the mini bus routes here, and it's AWESOME!!! There are these vans that drive specific routes all over the city--they have the names of the destinations on the windows--and you can just flag it down and pile in, and they take you along the route, and you can get out anywhere you want! AND it's SUPER cheap!! AND they don't mind that I'm piling in with my 3-4 kids! It's so great! I'll get a picture soon...they're everywhere! After dropping Josh off, I came home and made dinner and cleaned things up, while Claire finished all of her afternoon classes. Devin and Josh got home around 6:30, we ate dinner, then Josh and Devin left at about 7:45 to go to the church, since we all had interviews with the bishop. I had to wait for Claire to finish her last class at 8, then we headed over, too. Our bishop is really great, and all of our interviews lasted about 30 minutes each!! Ha! After my interview, I left with Josh and Claire to go home and put the boys to bed--we left at almost 10pm! We caught a mini bus and made it home ok. The five of us sat in the boys' room and chatted happily...waiting for Devin to come home so we could have scriptures and prayer together...except that we had a little accident... Josh was leaning against the wall, and his shoulder pushed the emergency panic button!! DOH! The alarm was SO LOUD blasting out of the front of the house! I felt so bad for the neighbors, since it was almost 11pm. The biggest issue was the fact that we had NO IDEA how to turn the darn thing off! Usually, when you arrive at post, they give you the low-down on the alarm system: how to turn it on, how to turn it off, etc. Well, they never did that for us. So our alarm was just blaring, and we had no idea what to do! Devin wasn't home yet, either! I called the marines at the embassy, and they notified the local guard. The local guard called and the roving patrol came and they were able to come in a disarm our alarm. Sheesh. After all of that excitement, it was 11pm, and the kids were all WIRED--well, to be honest, so was I! Ha! By 11:30, they were mostly settled back in their beds. I had a terrible time trying to go to sleep! I was just thinking about so many things and planning things in my head. Usually, I read a book and that calms my brain down, but it was a really fun book, so it wasn't working properly! Ha! I didn't fall asleep until after 1am...and when my alarm went off at 5:30, I thought, Wow! It's a good thing I'm so awake! Then I promptly fell back to sleep. Oops! The kids missed early morning seminary and Devin left late for work. Ugh. I felt so bad! We had a REALLY great lightning storm this morning at about 4am! I feel REALLY good this morning. No--really! I've had a throbbing headache all week, because I've been so tired! Now that I got almost no sleep, I feel FANTASTIC! HA! The headache is gone, and I'm ready to go get my day started! I know it's almost 9am, but I hear people downstairs, so I think some of them are up now. Time to get our Friday morning schoolwork done, and have art class, and see what else this day will bring! :O
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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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