The Sinister Scribe

Meet Mardi

One of the things that has kept us so busy lately is the upcoming parade for the True False Film Festival. Sam has been busy making a huge parade puppet with his Puppet Pals friends. We’re down to the wire. The parade is this Friday. I hear there will be a couple dozen of these ginormous puppets in the parade!

Pictured here is the puppet’s head. If you follow the link you’ll see more images of the process we used toget here. Sam did such a great job on this. Iam so proud!

But now the hard (and not as fun) part of making the body has begun. Told Sam that this was the fameous “last 10% of a job that takes 90% of the effort.” Though he is too young to really appreciate that saying yet.

Sam’s decided to name the puppet “Mardi” because he looks like he could be in a Mardi Gras parade. LOL!

Wish me luck in getting any science done next week. I’m up late doing my copy of the exercises for the next chapter in Discovering Earth’s Landforms & Surface Features (Great Science Adventures). It really helps me wrap my brain around what needs to be done (as well as finding any sticking points ahead of time) and it gives me an example to show them. And last time it seemed to give Jessie a bit of incentive to make one “just like Mom’s.” By hook and crook I will educate that child!

Ooh! Speaking of that, she read the word “off” in the car today… “Daddy why does the car say ‘off’?” She was reading the labels on the rear temp control dial in the minivan. Sigh. We’re  not in the car a lot by any standards, but both of them have started off their reading careers this way. It’s. just. weird. Good. But weird.

Before I’m off to bed I wanted to mention a great “tweet” from Khatzumoto of All Japanese All The Time

Perhaps instead of trying to become fluent in a language, we should try to make it impossible NOT to be fluent. Subtle but useful difference

I agree with this… but how to do just that on a limited budget (and time too) escapes me at the moment. In our particular instance we’re listening to podcasts, learning hiragana (to be followed by the other alphabets), we’ll have some children’s books in Japanese soon (thanks to Bookmooch), Sam listens to JPop. What else could we be doing? (that is free or very nearly that )

With that I am off to enjoy the warmth of my beloved before he must dash off again. Until April, we’ll be missing more than seeing each other with all the conferences he must attend. Thankfully he does not have to travel this much all the time!

… is sometimes difficult. Lots of things happening. Just not much time to stop and write about them.

More to come as soon as I can. Promise!

Over the weekend I’d been wracking my brains and Google trying to find some fun information or activities for our ancient history this week… Mongolia. Didn’t find much so I prepared to make do with the library books I found:

• Genghis Khan (World Leaders Past and Present)
  a dry read so we looked at the pictures and captions. I used a quote from him as today’s copywork assignment too.
• Mongolia (Vanishing Cultures)
  Sam read this one to us today.
• Mongolia by Rebecca Stefoff
  This was Sam’s required reading for the day. He almost finisted it and he narrated long and well.
• The Last Wild Horse: Return of the Takhi to Mongolia
  American Museum of Natural History website

Things started out today as ancient history (the khans and the size of the mongolian empire) but ended up as more of a geography and social studies lesson. That’s okay… right?

Then, of course, I found some great resources while the kids were reading and having quiet time. It always happens this way. So I spent the rest of the day trying to organize the new information on the run.

iTunes… I alternately curse and praise it for the same reason. It has been such a great resource! Here’s what I found there today:

• Silk Road Storytelling podcast
  FREE! Great stories told by people with ties to the culture the story came from.
• Asia and the Pacific Music Resources
  FREE! movies and pdf lesson plans from Smithsonian Global Sound iTunes U (link takes you to there shop in the iTunes store. If you just want their website, go here.
• The Silk Road: A Musical Caravan
  Download through iTunes unless you want to buy a physical CD, then order from SGS. If you buy through iTunes, be sure to go to the link above to download the liner notes for free. It has great information about each song and where it is from.

Some really amazing stuff. And that “throat singing.”  (YouTube video) Whoa! Human’s just shouldn’t be able to make those sounds.

I’d really like to get all the Silk Road songs but given the budget I may just have to make do with the songs from Mongolia right now since that is what we’re studying this week.

Forgot to ask Sam what he thought of today’s history lesson. He described our previous history lessons as “just work.” Gak! Hopefully this week will be more than that history wise. Jessie was mildly interested while we worked with the globe and maps (still a great improvement there). She happily colored a flag and coloring sheet.

Fingers crossed that this alternating weeks of science and history will make history feel less like “just work.” Maybe things won’t feel so rushed and we can take time to get more into (and out of) the subjects.

Man! this has been quite a week. Third quarter has begun too! The year is flying by with flying colors.

Monday and Tuesday I felt incredibly great… lots of energy, lots of ideas. Wednesday not so much, but I had lots of caffeine and was up later than usual. Baaad mommy! Yesterday I felt better.

The best part of this week is that the kids have been great. Earth science continues to be a big hit. Even Jessie is asking “Can we do earth science now?” We’re using “Great Science Adventures: Discovering Earth’s Landforms & Surface Features” by Dinah Zike and Susan Simpson. Can’t remember if I mentioned that before so forgive me if I’m repeating myself.

The earth science book has even inspired me to try to make history a little more exciting than “read x and write y”. So I checked out a scad of books from the library. And we just did science this week while I try to get ready. Nothing like changing direction mid stride, eh? Okay, not really changing direction just kinda changing plan of attack. I don’t think it will be as exciting as science around here but I hope it will be more memorable.

Jessie seems to have come out of her “i don’t want to participate” shell and we’ve been working on math concepts… playing go fish and using our number egg carton. She really seems like she’s more number minded than letter minded. (okay, I know I’m repeating myself there but it is just weird to me ‘coz I’m not that way)

Art history is still going great too. I really want to get all my plans laid out like Barb’s but when I sit down to try my brain just balks. Argh.

Draw Squad lessons are continuing. Sam has been practicing daily and I can see the influence. Oh! Jessie painted a self portrait and it is really amazing. Something about the proportions really caught my attention. Maybe it is just me but it just “feels” right to my eyeballs.

I feel like I’ve finally worked our mornings into something we all do together. We’re getting so much accomplished too! We’re gellin’ and I’m lovin’ it.

Jaaaaaaaaa… what else?

Japanese… I’ve lagged in keeping up with the iKnow vocabulary lessons. Want to get back to that. Had my first class at eduFire and enjoyed it immensely. I’ve signed up for another one (with the guy that runs Tofugu.com!) that starts after the kids are in bed. I hope that works out. Now, I just need to translate what I’m learning into something I can pass on to Jessie and Sam.

Monthly goals… I know I set a few… running, etsy, budget but I’ve not completely met any. Running hasn’t been the 15 miles I wanted, haven’t put anything on etsy (haven’t sold anything either) but I have set up a budget spreadsheet where I can see what is available for mad money.

Last week I did get in my 15 (but it was the only week) and I think that has a lot to do with how great I felt at the beginning of this week. I also was (briefly) down to 158 but I’m still not going over 160. Woot! So I’m counting that as progress anyway.

Oh! I’ve also managed to have the kitchen counters completely clear by bedtime. Sound silly, but I’m really proud of that. Especially since I’ve been cooking everything. We didn’t eat out once last month.

Allergies are still making their presence known. Gah. I’ve taken oats back out of my diet to see if that really is it. I hope not. Those oatmeal pancakes were great! But the itchies are back and the post workout hives are getting bigger. :\

OK… I’m off to the shower. Apologies for the ramble-yness and disorganized thoughts but if I wait to organize it, it won’t get done!