This Week at Our House # 43 Just an Ordinary Week

The week was average. We did school and our other various activities that we are pursuing.

John continues to work on his various projects in hopes to bring in a lot more money.

I am still writing a lot. I have less hope, but it would be nice if I can turn it into helping with the family finances.

Ruth and Kate and Rachel and Adam and still working on illustrations for my writing. Anya reads to Adam and Rachel while they color their pictures, and I read to Ruth and Kate while they draw for me.

Johnny has all of his projects that he does, but I do not know much about it for the most part. Continual historical research and transcription has been ongoing and will continue to be with the 4 oldest kids.

The weather was nice, so Anya, Joseph, Joshua, Arwen, Susan, and Sam mostly played outside. Adam too the kids to play in the woods a lot and we have not seen any chickens.

Anya and Joseph and Adam built a homemade incubator. Now that we have an adult rooster, we can expect 50% to 80% of our eggs to be fertilized. We do not have any broody hens, so we thought we would see if we could hatch chicks ourselves.

Gideon has started to step around several times everyday. He has made it six to seven steps. He is taking bigger steps than he was, but he has not increased the number. I expect him to be walking soon. He is a determined little one.

I talked to my mom on the phone about Thanksgiving and Christmas. I can't believe that time is here

already.

These are some cute stories I collected through the week. We had a few funny moments this week.

Kate told Sam to put his clothes in the wash
she saw him next turning the knob on the dishwasher
Kate asked him what he was doing.
Sam said, "the wash".

"and that's why you never go against a guy with a unibrow"
said Adam
"that's a weird life lesson"
interpreted Kate
"or a guy with a mustache"
replied Adam
"unibrows and mustaches are the same thing no matter where they lie on the face." inserted Dad.

Joshua and Joseph were fighting over the ownership of a stick
Joseph broke Joshua's stick. Joshua was upset and crying.
Joseph said he did not know it was Joshua's stick.
John told Josh if he wanted people to recognize a stick as his, he should carve his name into his stick.
Josh then starting carving his name into every stick he could find, thereby claiming ownership.

Susan came to me crying saying that Sam had her penguin and wouldn't give it back. I asked Sam if he wanted a penguin for his birthday or a truck. Sam said truck and immediately gave the penguin back.

John was drawing with Arwen. He brought up a picture of a duckling for her draw from. Arwen very seriously said, "When I grow up and am old enough to do the drawing contest, I am going to draw this duck and win." John laughed hard at her seriousness, but then Arwen proceeded to draw duckling. She shaded her drawing and everything and created the best drawing any 7 year old in our home has ever made.

notice all the boys badly need haircuts

This Week at Our House # 42 My Birthday

My birthday was on Monday. I am 44. I think that makes me very, very middle aged. In my mind, I feel middle aged. Most people think I am younger. I think it has to do with all of my younger children. I don't fit the mold of the typical middle aged woman. I would hope its that I look younger, but I think that is only a hope.

The week went quite quickly. School went fine. The kids are doing well. Adam and Rachel continue to work very hard on illustrations for one of my children's poems to be made into a book. Kate is working on illustrations for two more and Ruth for another that I have not finished writing. I have one other good idea that I will get started on when these ones are complete.

Anya was my star student this week. She was very diligent everyday, and helped Adam and Rachel to stay caught up in history.

Arwen's reading has improved significantly since the beginning of the school year. She will be ready for more independent work next year.

John sent me this story about Arwen: "Today, Arwen came up to me and asked "Do you know that I am bad at tricking Joseph into thinking a rock is a chicken egg?"
and this one: Conversation with Arwen
"Dad, do you want to know which one is the scariest t-rex I ever made up?"
"Sure"

"It's not the stupidest one. And its not the smartest one. Its the one that sneaks up behind you and then gets you. It can hit you with its claws once and then 'Bam!', your dead"

Kate had these stories about Susan: "poking eyes is bad and stealing from people is bad", a minute later, "and pinching people is bad and biting people is bad."
Early today Susan was crying on the bed and dad asked her why she was so despairing, she replied whining, "Samw has been killing me!"

Gideon is already taking his first steps. He turned 9 months this week, so I think he will be walking young.

Joshua and Joseph like to sit Sam and Gideon on blankets and pull them across the wood floor. They love it. Joseph likes to carry Gideon around bouncing him up and down.

Johnny works a lot, so I don't see him as much, but this week he seemed to be there whenever something needed fixing. He's a good son.

Ruth had a college roommate visit with her parents. Then they went to the beach. I took the rest of the kids about an hour later. The water is still warm, but the air felt cool, so we did not stay long.

Sam brings me a pile of books to read to him every morning before school starts. Books are his new favorite thing.

This Week at Our House # 41 Another Birthday

John had his birthday on Monday. He is 48 now and for the first time feeling annoyed with the ticking clock. He carefully spent some time with each member of the family on his birthday. All of the kids love and adore him, more than me really. It surprises me that people would accuse him of abusing his own family because that is very far from the truth. We all love and adore him.

I taught school, and did a lot of writing, and a lot of chores and laundry and dishes. It was an ordinary week. The weather finally cooled and that has been a big relief.

Kate is working on some illustrations for two children's books for me. Rachel and Adam are working on illustrations for another children's book for me. Rachel drew all of the pictures and Adam is helping her learn the program to color them. They spent half their week of school and will probably spend the whole next week of school getting that finished.

I have another story that Anya started the illustrations for. Ruth has started illustrations for a Christmas Story in Rhyme book that I have started writing but have not quite finished.

To keep Adam and Rachel up with their other reading and work, Anya has been reading history and science to them while they work on illustrating. It was a good week of school. Adam and Rachel enjoyed the art and illustration, and I loved how Anya and Joseph helped to keep them up on their other work.

Kate finally took some time on her book that she has both illustrated and wrote. I suspect we will put it up when we get my first one up.

I have enough poems now I can put them in a book. I will need some simple illustrations. I am thinking I will stick to plants and do them myself. I am not as good as an artist as my kids.

I grabbedTom Sawyer off the shelf for Joseph to read and he is loving it and probably getting some ideas from it too.

Josh wrote a little rhyming poem and said that it's like rhyming with sentences.

Arwen's hair is very very long now and she is patient about getting it brushed. It's looking very pretty and she is finally not complaining that her hair is neither blond nor curly. She did have curly baby hair, though.

Suzy is doing well with kindergarten. I am still taking it slow and stopping when she gets tired out. On Wednesday and Thursday I read Ramona books to her. She is enjoying that and talks about the story, so I know she is paying attention.

Samuel walks around with 3 to 4 pacifiers hooked to his shirt. I was watching him play a bit during the Sacrament meeting at church today and thought it may be getting time to take those off, at least when we go to church. I wonder if he will do it.

We did not stay the second hour in church because when we got there and took Gideon out of his carseat we noticed that he had a leaky poopy diaper. I changed him, but had no clothes to put him in, so we went home early. Gideon then had 3 more leaky poopy diapers through the day.

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This Week at Our House #40

I am soooo tired. This is going to be short.
We schooled. We've now finished 9 weeks of the first semester. We are closer to vacation than not.
We spent a lot of time drawing and writing.
Anya and Joseph. Joshua and Arwen have been making the cutest minihouses. They call them ''little people houses".
About the story of the good Samaritan, Susan said: "So everybody helped the man that died, the man that was killed by the bad guys."
I have two poems ready to be illustrated and published as children's books. Rachel has pencil

drawings ready and is going to spend school this week outlining them and coloring them using a computer program.
In the summer, John wrote a computer program that makes pencil lines darker and white backgrounds whiter. It is exactly what we need to get good pictures from hand drawings.
Gideon can stand himself up without holding onto anything. He can stand without holding on for quite a while, and he is attempting to take steps.
I have been reading more to the youngest kids during school and I like that a lot more.
Sam has a few words that he has made up on his own. One is "cocoa pack" in place of chocolate milk. I have said to him, "Say chocolate", and he says chocolate; "say milk" and he says milk; "say chocolate milk" and he says cocoa pack.
Friday, I ran the errands. Kate and the youngest 4 kids came. The other kids cleaned up.
Saturday and Sunday, we watched General Conference!

little people houses