Fun Week Ahead

This is one of our busiest weeks yet! We went to visit my mother in Dublin, GA and on our way back home we stopped off at the Tubman Museum and the Georgia Music Hall of Fame Museum in Macon. The Tubman Museum was informative and a great little find full of rich history and facts as well as beautiful artwork. The Hall of Fame was a lot of fun. The girls really enjoyed it and I learned that the B52s and R.E.M two of my favorite groups from the 90s are from GA and both inductees into the GA Hall of Fame.

Today we got to experience a real live Symphony from the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. I was talking with a friend and we both realized that we never experienced a symphony and we're both over 30. Seems so crazy...the girls enjoyed it though and we learned about different types of instruments. Natasha said she wants to learn about Tubas but there were no books checked in the library.

We have another trip planted to see Charlotte Web in Atlanta courtesy of the Lexington Children's Traveling Theatre. Charlotte's Web is my all time favorite childrens book and thankfully my girls enjoy it as well.

I also got the girls into some activities. Nala is taking sewing and gymnastics and the other two are taking gymnastics and spanish. I'm so excited for them and can't wait for them to really see improvement.

I'm just glad to be getting out and about this week and push the books to the side for just a few days.

Time for Learning

I've been invited to try Time4Learning for one month in exchange for a candid review. My opinion will be entirely my own, so be sure to come back and read about my experience. Time4Learning is an online educational program that can be used in many ways including as a homeschooling curriculum or afterschool tutorial. Find out how to write your own curriculum review for Time4Learning.

Sometimes I really think I'm crazy

I felt crazy yesterday. Crazy for taking 2 kids out of public school, who liked their teacher, their class, and school in general. They watch spanish videos in the morning after breakfast, run around the house fighting, yelling, playing, and whatever else they can do without hurting one another, Computer games for a bit, lunch, quiet time of reading, workbooks, drawing, nap (yeah well I try), and TV all evening. My oldest Nala, 9 years old, does more book work. She chose to stay in GCA and finish out the year but she has a lot of work to catch up on. She asked me why we don't do anything fun like the stuff they did in school. The mindless activities that I thought were not important, anything having to do with candy and contests, . I thought about what she said and tried to figure out a way to be creative at home with the limited resources. I have a few trips set up, once a week at least so far. I will implement Edible Art days and Awards for them since I see they liked that aspect of school.

Today was a good day, I thought. No book work, a play in the morning at the Aurora Theatre. Gary Grinkle's Battles with Wrinkles and Other Troubles in Mudgeville was a very cute play which 2 of my girls liked. Nina, Ms Everything is Boring, didn't like it she says...even though I saw her crack a smile a number of times.

I did get a Science Experiment book. It was recommended by a good friend of mine from NY who homeschools her 6 yr old and 3 yr old.

I hope I feel normal tomorrow.

2 Days of Traffic Hell..

Well my bad, I drove out to the city. In my defense I was running late as I always am and if I took the train all the way out there I would have missed the show. On Thursday, my friend got us tickets last minute to see The Ohmies. It says for kids 8 and under, but my 9 year old really enjoyed some parts of it. I missed most of it because since I drove out there I had to go feed the meter. When I first went out, I remembered the street I parked out but I felt totally lost all of a sudden and I forgot where I parked. If someone saw my face and saw me walking half way down the street then back the other way, then back the opposite direction again they probably would have thought something was wrong with me. I finally found it but jeez, I felt so silly. As soon as it was over I rushed out to get to the car. My step father lived up in Harlem so I called him and we made a quick stop over to see him. I didn't get to see him when we came up in August so it was a nice visit. We left around 4p, and finally after all the traffic we got home around 630p. I could not believe it took so long.

Then fast forward to today. I had a plan to get out around 11am to get to Sony Wonder Technology Lab for our scheduled reservation of 1230pm. I did the laundry as soon as I got off of work at 730a and although the kids were actually ready on time, before I knew it, the time said 1120a and there was no way we were gonna make it to the city by 1230p. So I decided to drive part way. I parked over in Long Island City which is a hop, skip, and a jump from Manhattan. We took the train 3 stops to midtown and even though we missed our reservation at 1230p, most likely due to the cold, there was no line and we were able to walk right in. It was such a fun, cool, place that the kids really enjoyed. There were a lot of goofy teeny bobbers hanging around but not too bad. We had 5 minutes of "doing the news"and reading from a tele prompter and reporting about polar bears, video games, making movies, and programming a robot. On our way to the train I realized we were walking past FAO Schwartz.

I have never been so I had to take the kids to look even if I couldn't buy anything. Much to my surprise there were quite a few under $20 items, and plenty of ridiculously priced items such as the huge stuffed dog for $100 and the $250,000 Big Piano from the movie "Big", a Barbie Foosball table for $25,000 (only 10 were made) and a Barbie collectible Gold Label doll for $150.

We headed back around 430p. The traffic was a little better than yesterday, we made it home by 6p but the kids were upset it was too dark to go outside and play in the snow again. Well there is talk about yet more snow this weekend. I really hope we make it out of here on Monday. I will always love NY but I can't wait to get back to my home in GA.

Finally we get out...

I wanted to make it out somewhere before the snow came on Wednesday. So we didn't get to Rockefeller Center for iceskating. I was really disappointed for that but we'll do it one of these days We went to Queens World Ice at Flushing Meadow Park for Ice Skating and we had a ball. I haven't been ice skating since I was about 7 or so. My girls were scared they wouldn't know how to skate but I reassured them that they would be really good at it. They can roller skate and are generally active kids so i had no doubts they would be skating all over by themselves. It took them a little bit to get warmed up but once they did no one wanted to hold hands or the sides anymore. I wish I got better pictures. We weren't allowed to take pictures, so the ones I got were all of them hanging out on the sides...and then later we were having so much skating forgot to try again. We went with a friend of mine and her two girls. Despite all the screaming teeny boppers hanging out, I didn't hear any foul language and the music was clean yet popular. The girls thoroughly enjoyed themselves and I was happy I could get them out for some fun. Later we went to visit a the old neighborhood...just for a little. It was late so we didn't spend too much time but I wanted to see them just in case the snow kept us in the rest of our stay here.

I borrowed my friend's

Moby wrap thinking, oh I can use this

when I take the kids ice skating but

thankfully hubby didn't have to work and

he stayed with Lil Man.

A New Year

Everyone will be officially homeschooled starting NOW. I need to file my letter of intent while I'm here so the school will stop sending letters about the kids missing more than the acceptable amount of days.



On another note: It's a new year and we're in New York, snow on the ground, just made it in after a snowstorm. I want to try to make it to the following museums that we missed in 2008 before we left: Sony Wonder Technology Lab, Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art, and Children's Museum of Manhattan, All Free! I love NY, really!

Indecisive

The 2 girls who are in public school were home this week for thanksgiving vacation. We didn't do much and did not do any "school". We did read every day so at least like I felt like we did something. I did work with Nala on math. Hubby and I were trying to decide if we should officially bring the girls home now instead of waiting for january. I don't know what to do with everyone all day right now. We don't have money for any sports or classes now, I feel like the girls will be bored watching tv, which is not what I want either. I want their days to be filled with interesting and fun moments, the kinds of things that capture their attention at school. I just don't know how I can compete.