The pace and the panic

It's 11pm already - ALREADY! Every day is whirling by, except for - you know - the "slow hours", and even those are pretty speedy these days. I am so tired, sooooo tired at the moment. A lot of it probably has to do with the fact that I'm 28 weeks pregnant and tiredness is normal around now, but also that I have six little ones to keep me on my toes at the same time! Nights are disturbed aplenty, always. It used to be just Elijah (14 months already!) waking me, but now I am waking more when he's still slumbering peacefully next to me than the few times a night he still wakes and wants to breastfeed. My leg will go into cramp, or I will need to go to the loo, you know all that normal 3rd trimester stuff. My restless leg syndrome bothers me once I wake up and makes it hard to sleep again, but mainly I have been having awful hayfever since March and I am wondering if (as August rolls around) it will ever go away?!?! I have never had it this bad before, but it seems like half the world is having the same trouble this year, so hopefully it will go eventually. I can't get back to sleep at night after I wake for any other reason, for my nose itching and sneezing and being like a solid brick, etc. I'm. so. tired.

Neil is working longer hours - or, well, he's not, but he is out of the house longer, because his car died and now he is taking the bus to work. He leaves by 7am and is home around 7.30pm on a good day, maybe up to an hour later if the buses are horrible. It has been three or four weeks now, and I think I am adjusting this past week. I was absolutely not managing to cope with the extra hours at all before and the boys were so late in bed every night, while I barely clung to my sanity! ;) But this week is better, so far, and the end of last week was too.

The only thing is the panic! The way the day starts off at a cracking pace at 7am - breakfast, more please Mummy, cleaning up spills, wiping the baby (who hates being wiped so so so much!), clean-up after breakfast, loading the dishwasher and starting it, stopping eleventy times to settle disputes and discipline/correct/warn or retrieve an overly adventurous toddler (I have two now!), shoving the wet washing into the tumble dryer, picking through the mountain of dirty clothes/sheets/towels/wipes, etc to prioritise and start the next load of washing, stopping a dozen times to discipline/correct/warn, and "could you please lift him off the school table and move that thing he keeps using to climb up there?!", sweeping the kitchen floor, surveying the somewhat-acceptable kitchen for a moment in semi-satisfaction, and then moving on to choose clean clothes for the boys, stopping half a dozen times to discipline/correct/warn and give out clothes, asking the recipients way too many times to "please put your clothes on... please put them on now... I said put your clothes on!.... Matthew! Clothes! Now!" Then the frenzy of nappy changes and dressing little ones who aren't yet old enough to do it themselves without some (or complete) help. On a good day it's 8.30am at this point. Then I am able to wash and dress myself, stopping, of course, a dozen times to discipline/correct/warn, and "Stop screaming at me please! I can't come and see because I haven't got any clothes on yet!", and sit down freshly washed but sweating profusely, on the sofa to complete the morning "necessaries" and snuggle my littlest two for a bit. Stories get read, nursing sometimes happens, and the ever necessary corrections and dispute-settling, amongst cuddles, construction and drawing appreciation, and hearing endlessly about whatever Arthur is fascinated by on that occasion (always something historical or nature/animal based lately).

Even though it's a packed "rest" time, it seems short-lived because within no time I have to haul my reluctant body up to put Elijah to bed (he naps mid-morning, sometimes as early as 9am if he woke before 6am - he doesn't have an afternoon nap this way though, and that means he's tired at bedtime!), and then sort out morning snack, mediate squabbles and clashes of interest, switch the laundry, fold all the dry stuff and put it away (completely out of breath, always now, from carrying it upstairs and putting it away in the drawers) while stopping now and then to stage-whisper down the stairs (so as not to wake Elijah) to "Let him have that toy", "No, we don't say "stupid" in this house", and "I will sort that out in a sec when I've finished this!"

Then I *believe* I interact with my children for a while, lol! I often forget this part of the day as it seems like a blur, but I'm not usually doing chores after switching the laundry, and Elijah is sleeping so I'm usually spending time with them, but it seems a very "on the go" sort of time, because before I can believe it, Elijah is waking and I need to make the lunch - we eat as soon after 12 noon as possible, usually. So, just like that, the morning has gone! I make lunch, Elijah hungry and usually screaming at the kitchen safety gate while I spread sandwiches at a frantic pace and call out for a big boy to please read him a story for just a moment. A loaf of bread and three knives dirtied with various spreads later, and, "Not yet!", "No, it's not ready!", "You'll know it's ready when I SAY it's ready!" and the boys pile into the kitchen and eat lunch. I want to lie down but I need to feed my body and my tiny unborn baby's body, so I eat a sandwich and some yoghurt, and probably a glass of milk, alongside "Sit down at the table", "Please eat nicely... no, that's NOT nice!", "I will get you more when I have finished my sandwich", "Right, that's it! Out of the kitchen for 5 minutes!", and wiping the baby (the one who hates being wiped so so so much), cleaning up that spilled milk, comforting the child whose dessert fell on the floor which I may as well have not swept earlier, and shooing giggling children out from underfoot after they have cleared their plates away, to wipe the table, bench and booster seat, and this time pretend to ignore the fact that the floor needs sweeping.

Switch the laundry, mediate/discipline, find a change of clothes for the baby who managed to evenly coat himself in yoghurt at lunchtime, and say yes to a request from two children to draw at the kitchen table, thankful that I just wiped it and don't have to say "Not yet darling, the lunch things are still on the table." Throw their supplies on the table, and set about the next round of nappy changes along with Elijah's clothing change. Stop to think, "Did I wee yet today?" No, so that's my next task. Or even if I did, it's pretty much necessary again anyway. Find a suspicious puddle in the bathroom and some wet toilet paper in the bath plughole, and call boys to order on it. Mediate over finger-pointing and not-too-pleasant reactions to my solution to the problem, discipline for said reactions, comfort that child who tripped over the Duplo evenly spread across the living room rug, and firmly motivate boys to tidy up. Turn drill-seargent as certain children do not react well to being told to tidy up, and supervise until it's done properly. Fetch a drink for the constantly-asking child. Admire the drawings in the kitchen, agree to afternoon snack, and stop to take a drink of water myself and think, "Did I DO that wee when I went up to the bathroom after lunch?!" No, so off I go for another attempt! More snuggles on the sofa when I return, and reading to little ones, appreciating nuggets of information from the big ones, answering seemingly endless questions from the middle ones (by way of explanation, they are ages 4 and 5!), probably breastfeeding at least one or two littles at some point, and kissing bumps and scrapes, sympathetically acknowledging every single tiny scab, red mark, and yellowing 3mm bruise on the two-year-old as he enjoys showing me such acquisitions!

Somehow in this blur of an afternoon, it's nearly 4pm and I have to think about dinner. Baby-meltdown approaches (it's a time-of-day thing for this little one as he gets tired and hungry all at once) so I need to be quick, but of course it's also the time for an increase in the need for mediation/discipline/warnings, etc. for the other children. On a good day, I am making dinner by 5pm and serving it shortly thereafter (an hour or more later on a not-so-good day), while Elijah screams at the gate and I puff about the kitchen sweating and calling for a big boy to "please bring him the keyboard and play him a tune, for just a moment!" There's just time to toss the dry washing from the tumble dryer up on top of the machine, and throw the wet load in and start it going, as I call the boys in for food. I feel too hot and tired to eat mine, but I tackle it anyway because I should feed my body and my baby's little body, alongside "Well, that's what we're having", "Don't be rude about my cooking please!", "Fine, go to bed hungry then", and "Please stop saying "bottom-poo" over and over like that, it's silly and annoying, and it's not nice at the table anyway!"

Dinner time is over just like that, before I've really finished eating, and children are misbehaving and needing correcting/disciplining/warning, and ultimately sending out of the kitchen to play, while I wipe the baby (that same one who really really hates to be wiped so so so much), get the squashed banana off the floor, clean up that spilled drink, tell the whining child that if he is still hungry he can eat the food that he has left on his plate (for the 4th time), call out to the pair of boys in the living room who are leaping about and screaming, to calm down, and launch straight into searching for pyjamas and night nappies, without really pausing to see that the day is almost gone, Neil is on his way home, and it's after 6pm (or a good bit later on a bad day!).

The boys are in high spirits at bedtime, and at their most selective when it comes to hearing my instructions, unfortunately! I change nappies, and dress little ones for bed, constantly stopping to separate boisterous children, insist on pyjamas being put on (for the dozenth time), and agreeing to that story being read after I've finished. I brush five sets of little white teeth - Arthur brushes his own. Some children really really don't like having their teeth brushed, which makes it a challenging task. Rush to fill a drink for the child about to die whining of thirst, fetch the baby down from where he shouldn't be again, and Neil arrives home, which sends the hyper-ness into orbit! At this point, maybe because finally it's not just me again, my body seems to crash and I feel totally exhausted, physically. I seem to have less tolerance for trouble from little boys, but I read a story and try to tell Neil this and that of importance about the boys' day so he can follow-up and chat to them about it as he helps me get them ready for bed.

Then, bedtime in a whirlwind. A mix of tired kiddies, hyper kiddies, disobedient squealing kiddies, and those reading a bedtime story. Elijah refuses to settle to sleep breastfeeding, so I take him back out to Neil and take over from him with the other boys in their room. I nurse Samuel to sleep, stopping regularly to ask Benjamin to please lie down and be quiet, and then the bigger boys are coming in way too noisily from their story time, to go to bed. Four sets of back-rubs, prayers, and individual stories (they all request birth stories, or occasionally our wedding or honeymoon holiday), and Neil is back from walking Elijah to sleep. Usually only Arthur is still awake, and I feel breathlessly tired and stagger downstairs at last to find that it's after 9pm somehow, and the day is over with.

The panic sets in - which I started off this post to write about, but got rather side-tracked, lol! - because it's 9.25pm or something, and I HAVE to do more than just what I "do" all day, with my children. But it's all a whirlwind of "my all" and that uses up the day in a blink, and suddenly it's mid-evening and the time I had planned to use for "planning" for the next day/week/month is half used up, and I am actually too tired to make my brain work properly in any case. I spend an hour or so pootling about on Pinterest scanning for ideas and trying to organise my thoughts, and having a moment of social sanity for my brain at Facebook. I look at photos I took of my boys that day (if any) and smile and feel mushy inside because I love them so much and I enjoy dwelling on them, even if they drove me crazy that day! ;) And my restless leg syndrome gets more and more bothersome until I have no choice but to call it a night.

Then, the night wakings, and the day begins again just like the one before. Tired evening follows and another occasion where I can't find time or energy to plan what I guiltily feel I SHOULD be doing with the boys. Like school! Notice that in our day, no formal schooling is taking place! We have become quite the unschooling family, but it's not my preference at all and I constantly feel anxious or guilty that I'm not exposing them to enough learning experiences to meet their needs.

Then tonight I read this blog post, which someone had posted at Facebook:

Hope When You Feel Like a Homeschool Failure at raisingrealmen.com.

And it's not the first thing I've "come across" in the past week or two. People seem to be randomly posting things that speak right to my heart about this issue, as if it's put there by God to comfort and reassure me, to remind me that there is more to homeschool than academics. And, for a perfect example, this post at finding joy, only 9 hours ago:

why being a mom is enough

Reassuring. I am sure God is trying to speak to my heart, and that in itself reassures me. I know the panic and guilt will creep back by tomorrow morning, and probably even by the time I put the laptop away and let my head hit the pillow tonight, but I wanted to blog about it this evening (despite the late hour and the tiredness) because it's something "solid" now that it's in writing and that means I can come and take hold of it whenever I need to. Maybe someone else can too.

My kids are learning more than I expected them to, without formal lessons, which is so encouraging and uplifting! But I would so like to get time sorted out somehow, so that I can do more of the type of schooling I really want to be doing - at least covering the 3 r's formally, would make me feel better, and I think Neil would prefer that too. They ARE learning the 3 r's without me doing that, bizarrely! ;) But yeah... I would like to do it a bit differently. I nearly typed "better", which is telling of my need to stop with this thing that general society has going on, where unschooling is weird and totally not going to work! ;) It's not better, it's just different. And different is okay. Isn't it? It IS okay to be different. That's one of life's harder lessons, and you have to battle it all. your. life. if it applies to you (which it always has anyway).

Anyway, I needed to write this tonight. I kind of like that I got side-tracked because now I have the memory of the frantic typical day written down! I know the day will come allll too soon when I forgot what that's like and long for it wistfully. I don't resent it, I love it, though it's draining and exasperating at times. I believe them when they say it passes all too quickly, and I am trying to cherish it while it's here! I still can't believe I'm 37. I know I'll be 47 before I can blink. That makes me want to CLING to NOW, and just BE in it, experience it, enjoy it, be thankful for it. And I really really am. I just need to somehow keep on swimming, at the same time... somehow.

Week in Review - week ending June 30th

Week in Review

In my life this week...

I've been ridiculously tired this week. My baby seems to be having a growth spurt, because my bump is growing very quickly at the moment, and her kicks seem bigger almost every day that passes! Heather was concerned about me at church last Sunday because she said I looked exhausted and pale, and thought maybe I wasn't getting enough iron. She suggested Floradix so I went and bought some, and have taken it as consistently as I remember to since Monday (two doses a day, sometimes I forget the evening one). I will be 24 weeks pregnant on Tuesday, so I'm excited about that milestone! :) Yay for viability for my little one! :)

Because I've been SO tired out physically, I haven't had much left emotionally and mentally either, so it's been hard to manage the boys this week. I had help on Thursday because Heather came over for the day to help out (she does this every Thursday, pretty much, mainly to do housework for me!). The boys have bickered and argued and melted down WAY more than usual this week, and it has been extreeeemely wearing, even if I didn't have the hormones and exhaustion to add to the mix. Benjamin and Samuel have inexplicably thrown many screaming-on-the-floor tantrums each day, which isn't really like them, and Elijah has been clingy and screechy when tired or hungry, as he usually is, and ohhh it has been a hard week! I think (?) maybe everyone is overtired. Some nights they had a later bedtime than they're used to, and didn't make up for it by sleeping in (they get up between 6 and 7am regardless), so maybe that didn't help? I have no idea! But I hope next week is better!

In our homeschool this week...

So many bits and pieces, which I'll try to note here as much as I can.

We read and worked through some more of Arthur's Apologia Science: Zoology 2 course. We are still working through all the activities in chapter one, and taking our time to do so, because there's plenty there to work on! The experiment this week was about the pressure exerted on our lungs in deep sea water, which involved a balloon inflated in a plastic bottle and then stamping on the bottle to see what happened to the balloon (or, the lungs!). All SIX boys were fascinated with this experiment, and Elijah and Samuel have played with the bottle and balloon (still in situ days later!) ever since!

Matthew has done some maths in the form of maths games online this week, and also has done a lot of writing letters on paper as part of play with his brothers. His letter formation is surprisingly good - at least I shouldn't say that (!) but I was surprised, as the times I have tried to get him to do handwriting lessons (which he dislikes intensely and has resisted!) his letter formation has been really poor and it seems like he's not aware of what letters he's even writing, just copying squiggles that mean nothing to him. This week he wrote nonsensical words like "pore" (with the 'e' back to front) and then asked me what it said - lots of words like that. His letters were all really clear, which was encouraging to me! :) We've done a lot of "chatty maths" with Matthew and Nathan, in a very casual way, again this week. Things like doubling numbers, adding, and so on. This has gone well, in terms of what they seem to understand of it (especially encouraging re. Matthew, much more so than Nathan).

Nathan has done a LOT of drawing again this week, and colouring. His pictures that he is drawing are becoming more complex and detailed this week, I have noticed. He has been building Lego and Duplo a lot as always, mostly machines and things like that, which are also becoming more complex lately. He has been working on his wipe clean book (covers maths, handwriting, telling the time, etc.), and asked me how to do the pages on telling the time. I gave him a quick explanation of how to read the clock to the hour, and that's it, he said, "Oh, okay." and completed all the questions and drew hands on clock faces, etc, within minutes. TOTALLY gets telling the time to the hour. So different from Matthew, which is both a relief and a concern - such a nice relief to be able to teach a child with such ease again, and reminds me of my concerns over Matthew...

Nathan has also been writing letters a lot this week, and randomly wrote the word "me". I told him he wrote a real word and asked if he knew what it said. He looked pleased with himself but said no, he didn't. I reminded him of the sounds of the letters and he knew it said, "me". That sounds simple, but it's the first time he's allowed me to do anything involved with teaching him to read at ALL, which is lovely! :) He seemed really pleased and smiled about it for ages, so hopefully he'll be more open to these things from now? Our All About Reading curriculum arrived from the States this week - less than a week shipping time!! :) I spent a couple of hours putting it together and it looks great! :) The boys seemed excited when it arrived, so I'm hopeful about it. I need to make some time to prepare to teach it, and then we can get going (hopefully!).

Arthur went to Heather's house for a history lesson Wednesday. They did various crafts and activities related to more medieval British royal history, and then apparently Arthur started to seem bored and act silly, so Heather took her daughter and Arthur to their allotment as a change of pace! :) They did a lot there. Arthur learned to identify a lot of different vegetable plants, and did some weeding. They harvested rhubarb and Arthur brought a huge bag of it home! We have had rhubarb crumble twice this week, hehe! While Arthur was out all morning, the boys at home played with homemade playdough (big success!) and spent ages in the garden, and did drawing, etc.

Lots more strategic war games initiated by Arthur this week. He continues to read history reference books at least 2-3 hours per day, chatting his way through it as he is in his own little world while he reads and learns. He recreates much of it in play as he goes, or right after. He also is spending an hour at least each day reading animal/nature reference books, especially fish, reptiles, insects and dinosaurs at the moment. He casually chats about all sorts of things in history, starting, "Did you know that such-and-such happened when...." etc. which opens up into a conversation about why, and what happened next. He has a firm grasp on everything historical that he talks about and can answer questions on a tangent even.

On Friday it rained all day. Arthur read SIX books (two of them in part)! Four of them by 2pm! He started with Enid Blyton's 'Island of Adventure' book (requested more in the series - I have the rest of the set of 7 or 8 on the way thanks to a great deal at eBay), then started the Boxcar Children series - we have the box set with books 1-4. He had lost the first one so he started with the second, and then read the third. Then became desperate to find the first one, so searched the house for ages in a bit of a state (!), and finally found it and read it! :) He read part of Roald Dahl's Matilda, and book 4 of the Boxcar Children, and then part of one of the Enid Blyton Faraway Tree books, which he's read a zillion times so far. He has started a tradition of his own, reading a chapter of the first of those books (The Enchanted Wood) to Matthew and Nathan on the sofa at bedtime, while Neil and I take the younger three boys up to bed. He reads so well, and brings the story alive with his voice and the way he dramatises it, and they love it!

Also on that rainy Friday, both Arthur and Matthew had individual time on the laptop for what they call "map work", which is basically travelling the world via Google maps, usually with various atlas and reference books spread out all over the table. If I let them, they can spend HOURS doing this without getting bored! But I usually try to keep it between 1 and 2 hours depending on what else is going on in the day, or around that time. Sometimes it's only 15 minutes or so.

Benjamin was recognising some letters on Saturday - he wanted to know what the xylophone letters (notes) said, and I told him their phonics sounds. He picked them up pretty quickly. He has been playing the xylophone a lot since then, and not just to make noise, which is nice! :) He really otherwise shows no signs of any sort of academic readiness, so if he does, even slightly, then I'll make mention of it here! These are milestones, even if they're little ones! :)

Elijah's "work" this week has been to continue his exploring. He is still loving Peekaboo, and banging things as his favourite laughing games. He loves round and round the garden on his tiny hands, and initiates by putting the tip of his thumb to the palm of his other hand and murmering in a sing-song way, as though he's saying the rhyme himself. :) He sits and "reads" books for 30+ minutes at a time, either by himself or side-by-side with Samuel, who has been doing this activity since he was Elijah's age. They are not necessarily picture books, but they turn each page, and "read aloud" as they go. Sweetest sight ever when they're sitting in front of the bookshelves working their way through piles of books on the floor side-by-side! :)

Elijah doesn't have any words yet, as such, but he says, "Aaaaooow" carefully when he hurts me (he headbutts and bangs with his hands a LOT, and not being affected by "no" yet!) if I say, "Ow!", as part of understanding what he did, and then he shakes his head for no. He says "Daddy", "deh-deh" (for I want that), "dowww" (just once so far, said very carefully and slowly, for 'down' when he wanted to get off the bed after waking from his nap), and "deh-dee" (very similar to Daddy, for "drinky" when he is thirsty at bedtime/naptime as he sits up and reaches for the drink).

Elijah figured out climbing into the open bottom drawer in the living room to get to the surface of the merchant's chest where lots of things are piled! Also how to use a toy or sofa cushion to get onto the new chest (many times) and onto the window sill - scary!! He did this by climbing from the object onto the school table, and from the school table onto the window sill! Yikes! :S He is head-butting a lot (walls, doors, floor, people, etc!), either for fun in calmness, or when he's more agitated, in frustration - another child to be on the autistic spectrum maybe??... Been there, done that, so I have suspicions, along with the ones I already had from his early babyhood and colic, sensory preferences, intolerance of baths (he's temperature sensitive like Arthur), laughing at typically scarily loud noises, etc. Hmmm...

He enjoys putting things into things right now, and shaking them in containers, taking lids off and trying to put them on again (mucho frustration). He likes banging like crazy on the baby keyboard to get "music" out of it. He likes banging ANYTHING hard against anything hard and noisy (mirrors, radiators, doors, etc) - he does this with such intensity and vigor! Gritted teeth and shiny eyes, lol! He and Samuel enjoyed a metal baking tray full of uncooked macaroni pasta on Friday after dinner, with a couple of metal spoons each. The NOISE!! They loved it, but Samuel got tired of the noise quite quickly. Elijah couldn't get enough and I had to call it a night for him eventually - I think he would have carried on all night otherwise! ;)

Places we've been and people we've seen...

On Saturday (a week ago, not this past weekend), we all went to a midsummer fete with a traditional Victorian fairground and lots of stalls and things. The weather was dreadful (rain and wind!) but we had lots of fun all the same! Samuel was traumatised sitting with Neil on the carousel, but Benjamin loved it! This photo is the only one I got where Samuel wasn't screaming with his head back! Poor boy! I got one of Benjamin too, but he was sitting with Heather's daughter and I don't want to post any photos of her "face-on" on my blog in case Heather would not like it. Little 'Lijah waved his paper flag enthusiastically while he watched his brothers go round!

We ate hotdogs (real sausages, none of that carcinogenic stuff!), popcorn and cupcakes, and wore raincoats! ;) Here are the littlest boys begging Daddy for popcorn, and enjoying it! ;)

Heather makes crafty things and often sells them on stalls at such events, and she had a stall at this one. We helped them out by Neil taking our big vehicle to load up all her craft things and then transported them to the fete (and back again at the end of the day), and Arthur begged to go early to help set up. Neil left him there setting up with Heather and her family for two hours before the rest of us turned up for the start of the fete, and Arthur had a lovely time helping (and was apparently very helpful!). He discovered a pond with ducklings and baby coots, and was desperate to show his brothers when we were there. Before we came home, we spent a while at the pond watching these sweet little birds!

The next day at church, it was an all-age family service (no children's groups) which our church does once a month. This time it was something we hadn't experienced before - "Messy Church" with a nature/creation theme! Samuel went off with Heather and created with playdough, painted with vegetables, and built Duplo. Benjamin did playdough with me, and then chose to work on the collage/sticking with glue activity table. He also did some painting with vegetables and built Duplo. Nathan was mostly focused on building Duplo, unsurprisingly! He built an impressive ship, which all the kids played with afterwards! He did some playdough as well. Matthew didn't seem to gravitate towards any of the activities particularly, and seemed happy just building Duplo most of the time. Arthur spent some time with Matthew at the Duplo centre, and then took himself off to do some collage, cutting and sticking nature pictures - he was very focused on this for a long time. They're all a bit young for the creative writing stuff that was going on, and didn't seem interested in the oil pastels and still life artwork. It was a really fun morning though! :)

On Thursday, Heather came round for the day - she does this most Thursdays to help me with the housework and the boys (mostly housework, usually). She took Benjamin and Arthur to the shops to buy clothes pegs, and then later Matthew and Nathan to the high street for various things. They went to lots of shops, browsed for ages in the charity shop (bought toy cars), went to the cafe for milk and chocolate sticks (!), and then to the library where they looked at books for a while. The boys spent a lot of the day in the garden - I forgot to say, they used adjustable pliers to try fixing Neil's bike in the garden, turning it upside down and stabilising it, then trying to attach the wheels! They asked for a screwdriver but I didn't know where I had one, and didn't REALLY want them to use it - I reckon I should relax more and let them at it next time... Arthur made rhubarb crumble with Heather later, doing all the measuring and everything except stew the rhubarb, and rub the butter in (dirty fingernails no matter how he scrubbed them from garden play right beforehand!).

This Saturday (just gone), all six boys went to the park with Neil for the afternoon. I tried to rest up and clear my head a bit, which should have been blissful but I just didn't get anywhere and felt tired and deflated by the time they got home! :/ Oh well!

Yesterday (Sunday), we went to church, the boys went to their groups and had fun, and we spent the afternoon at the park in the glorious summery weather. I took a lot of photos, but haven't had chance to get them off the camera yet.

Things I'm working on...

Slot games for Elijah, which I've done in the past, but have been reminded of at Pinterest lately! Easy DIY stuff - hopefully I'll find time to prepare a few things for him soon! I want to prepare All About Reading, or at least figure out how I'm going to transition Matthew (see if he needs any pre-Level 1 help first). I also want to prepare science curriculum stuff ahead, including field trip ideas (rock pooling on the south coast is one of the things I want to do SOON).

I have started a written list of my morning routine with check boxes. It's just to keep me on track a bit better, because the morning has so many things that must be done, and if I'm having a tired or vague day, I come completely undone with the sheer juggling thing that has to be done, especially if the boys are being constantly troublesome with each other and I have to keep jumping off my train of thought to discipline or re-direct, or do the next thing that needs doing, before I've figured out what I even NEED to do next! Everything quickly gets overwhelming, and I want to cut through that. This was my first list on the fridge door, earlier in the week (and I had coloured in all but 3 boxes by 9.51am! Yay!):

It is really helping me keep on track so far! :)

What else? My grandfather's (Grandoug's) 88th birthday is this week, and the usual family get-together is on Saturday, which we're all looking forward to. I always make him a birthday cake, so I need to organise myself for that. Benjamin's 4th birthday is three days later on Tuesday next week, so I need to be organising myself for his cake and other birthday-related stuff too!

I'm cooking...

Apart from birthday cake?! ;) Some other food, probably, lol! Yep, still way too vague on that front, but c'est la vie right now! My children are getting fed, so it's okay! ;)

I'm grateful for...

Lovely weather! My little ones! Looking pregnant - I love it! Baby girl clothes arriving in the post! Church on Sunday evening - my turn yesterday to go, while Neil put the boys to bed. I found it sooooo refreshing this week, just some space to BE with God, to worship and pray, and to listen without distraction, to learn from the Bible. Loved it! :)

Elijah and Samuel cutting molars this week - Samuel working on all four 2-year-old molars coming through, and Elijah cut his first molar this week too - I'm so grateful that neither of them has had any particular symptoms! Some of my little ones have had a miserable time with molars and been quiet unwell, but these two boys are doing fine so far, for which I am really thankful! :)

I'm praying for...

Wisdom and direction re. our house move. We have to move, but we can't afford a thing in any useful area (as far as commuting and so on), and we don't know what to doooo. But meanwhile, we HAVE to move! And time is running out. Three and a half months to go until this sweet little baby arrives!

Something I have my eye on...

I can't think of anything right now! A good night's sleep?! ;)

I'll hopefully be "on time" next time - I know it's already a day into the new week and I'm only just now finishing my Week in Review post for last week. Ah well, at least I'm updating! It is taking me AGES to compile these posts though, more than I thought, so I am not sure if I can keep it up, and I'm terrible at making things more concise! ;)

Week in Review (well, fortnight!) - June 21st 2013

I forgot last weekend! So I'll try for a general review covering the past fortnight this time! :) I'm not sure if I'll be all that consistent, but I'll try - and thank you for the sweet comments on my first try at this, last time! :)

Week in Review

In my life this week (fortnight!)...

My pregnancy is going well! I'm 22 weeks now. I have had a growth spurt (or rather, the baby has!) and my bump is much bigger than before. I'm feeling well and it's SO nice to have my stamina back. I get tired and breathless fairly easily, but I have normal stamina now - I can stand to sing worship songs with a baby in my arms at church and not feel faint, lol! I have had the MOST joyful couple of weeks since we found out that we're having a baby girl, and I think it's sinking in properly now. :) I have already bought quite a few items of VERY cute girly clothing at eBay, and I'm trying to slow down a bit now because I know that Neil's sister and my brother (who each have a daughter) are passing on ALL their girly baby clothes to us in the coming months! Yay! :) It's so exciting!!!!

In our homeschool this week (fortnight!)...

Well, my memory is now completely hopeless, so I am not sure if I can even remember last week! Arthur had another history lesson with Rosanna (my doula's daughter) which he had a great time doing - he made another part of some medieval armour he's been working on - he has done the shield, and this time he made the breastplate. It's sized to him so he can wear it and have a lot of fun doing so! ;) He does a lot of writing and "book work" with his history lessons, as well as hands-on stuff and crafts, little plays, etc.  He really resists written work for me, so I'm glad he's doing SOME at least, elsewhere!

We've done some conversational maths with Matthew and Nathan this past couple of weeks, here and there - usually as they're getting dressed or ready for bed. They seem most open to it then, and take in more too. Nathan has no trouble understanding any concepts (so far). Matthew struggles with almost everything, in his head, but he seemed to take in and comprehend the addition stuff we were talking about in casual conversation. Hmmm...

I ordered 'All About Reading' Level 1 this week. We have 'Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons' which we used with success, I guess, with Arthur when he was 4-5 years old. He was bored by Lesson 70, and by then I wasn't sure if it would work for Matthew, so I researched and bought Rocket Phonics, which is GREAT! Arthur was away with reading by then and would have done well anyway, but following through with Rocket Phonics made a big difference. We got halfway through the 2nd (and final) textbook, but haven't done any more. There are some grammar tips in the remaining lessons which would be handy to do with him, but otherwise he is reading fluently at almost teenage level so I didn't think it was necessary. He reads for several hours each day (silently), but he likes to read things out to me that he's just discovered and which interests him (nearly everything, lol!), so I make sure I get to hear him read frequently and correct any mispronounciations. He still makes mistakes, but then he hasn't been formally taught some of the more complicated rules of reading the english language. I think I will look for a grammar curriculum at some point soon to fill in the gaps.

Anyway, I have been teaching Matthew with Rocket Phonics, and he loves it, and he IS progressing, but painfully slowly. He's not really reading, even though he can sound out the words and sentences at the stage of the book that he's at, just verrrrrrry slowly - and he retains almost nothing for the next lesson. I have had my eye on All About Reading for many months, coming across excellent reviews, and testimonies from people who have dyslexic children who are something like 9 years old and still not reading, etc. Also we use All About Spelling and it's FABULOUS, so I am already leaning with a bias towards trying All About Reading. I talked about it with Neil and he said YES, buy it and try it out. It's SO expensive, so it wasn't an easy decision! I was going to buy the pre-reader level for Nathan and eventually Benjamin and the others, and maybe to let Matthew fly through first for confidence, as well as Level 1. But the cost was too much, so I ended up going for Level 1 alone. I think he will be fine starting that without any pre-reader stuff. He doesn't know his alphabet thoroughly enough yet, though he has a pretty good grasp of his phonics alphabet - he just doesn't retain much so he may have forgotten half of it already! :/ I need to run over that with him first. And I feel confident doing an overview of the alphabet, uppercase and lowercase letters, and phonics sounds with Nathan before starting him on Level 1 straight off, as well. I have told them both that I've ordered it, and that it will be FUN! :) The bonus is that we're tracking it from Wisconsin (it's on a plane today!!!) and they are loving that each day! :)

Arthur has spent many hours this week (and last week, but more intensely so this week) following his history reference books through the wars and using whatever is at hand to recreate the strategic battle plans, and then acting them out with the pieces. He LOVES doing this right now, and he is learning a TON about the various historical wars. Mainly the First World War this week, but also wars worldwide from hundreds of years ago. He knows so much stuff that I don't know, now! I actually thought to take a couple of photos of him doing this around breakfast time this morning, so I could add it to my review post here! :) He chose to build simple army components out of Duplo this time, to re-enact some of the battles in the first world war.

Arthur has various BIG history reference books that he reads for pleasure, but this one he's using is The Usborne History of Britain. It's HUGE, and absolutely fantastic. My mum bought it for him, for his 8th birthday (if memory serves!), and he has read it cover-to-cover more times than I can count since then, and dips into it daily for his latest points of interest. It covers history from prehistoric times to modern day, and is full of photos and charts and so on, and the text flows really easily for kids to read, from what I have seen. When Arthur reads with interest, he retains pretty much everything, so he has the most amazing grasp of British history now! The things he comes out with when other adults randomly include him in conversation about something in British history from 1000 years ago or something, usually makes them lost for words for a moment, before thinking what to say next. They usually catch up with me at another time when he's not around to express their awe at his knowledge and compliment me (ME! Haha!) on the homeschooling progress! ;)

We've started the Apologia Science curriculum (Zoology 2) on sea creatures! Arthur has decorated a blank workbook by cutting out pictures of various sea creatures, and we've started work on the reading (we take turns reading aloud, but he read today's in his head and told me he remembered what had been read MUCH better that way, so I guess we'll go on like that then!). He is so excited with the material and can't wait to do all the experiments. So far we've done the first little one, creating gyres (circular ocean currents) with Cheerios and a hair dryer (and a brother blowing, since we only have one hair dryer, lol!):

 

 

He is doing some writing and drawing to fill in the various worksheet options (he isn't interested in all of them, but that's fine), and they're being glued into his workbook, along with photos like the one above, to show experiments. Right now we're trying to drink down a 2 litre bottle of cloudy lemonade as fast as we can, haha! We need it for the next experiment with a balloon, to demonstrate deep sea underwater pressure. I am really excited about this new curriculum! It gives tons of ways to stretch their "muscles" learning-wise, and it's FUN! We can record it, that's another plus, because Neil is really keen to have things recorded in case we are called upon to show what we've done at any point (which I know we have every right to refuse, in the UK, but anyway). I really like that aspect!

Arthur's interests spill over onto his brothers constantly. He draws them in with such enthusiasm, into his battle strategy games, sea creatures stuff, archaeology, dinosaurs, weather - any of his interests which flare up at any given moment. He CAN'T be ignored, such is his infectious excitement about these things, and they just get carried along and end up learning along with him, which is wonderful!

I have tried working on colours with Samuel this week - he is exactly two-and-a-half today! Halfway to another birthday already! Yikes! I have a sneaking suspicion that he is colour blind. Arthur and Benjamin are not. Matthew and Nathan are. Arthur and Benjamin knew a dozen colours with EASE (I told them once what a colour was, and therefore they knew that colour from then on) at 19 months old or thereabouts. Matthew and Nathan didn't know their colours, even the basic ones, consistently until somewhere between 2 and 3 (nearer 3), and even then it wasn't a dozen of them until more like 3.5. I only worked on blue, yellow and red with Samuel, and he didn't retain it at ALL, and couldn't tell me which was which afterwards. Soooo.... I know that's very little to go by, but a mama of many boys, some colour-blind, some not, KNOWS! ;) Or probably does. Now for Elijah - it'll be a while before we have any clues with him yet. And our baby girl will NOT be colour blind, but I'm hoping very much that she doesn't carry it (like I did, and which she has a 50% chance of doing).

Samuel has been doing lots of spontaneous practical skills this week, things like pouring water. He likes to go round after everyone has left the table and pour what's left of each glass of water into one empty glass. He is learning the limit and what will make it overflow, and I've noticed his ability to pour carefully without spilling is really good for his age. He likes Montessori activities and gravitates to them constantly, so I think it would be good to set up some of the many Montessori activities I've pinned to Pinterest, for him to do.

Elijah is climbing, being strategic about placing toys, boxes or sofa cushions in specific places to enable him to climb somewhere he wants to be, opening and emptying cupboards, and has finally mastered taking magnetic letters and pictures off the fridge, and having them facing the right way to stick them back on properly again! He spends ages doing this over and over at the moment:

 

The main thing Nathan wants to do right now is draw. He wasn't well last week and the thing that seemed to cheer him up and improve him the most was when I let him have his dot-to-dot colouring book and some paper, pencils and crayons in bed for a while. He builds and creates a LOT, always more imaginative and complicated things than his bigger brothers, and he spends a lot of time and energy doing so. He gets very upset when things are damaged by careless brothers, poor love! I hope he'll be receptive to the reading curriculum, because I'd LOVE to teach him to read now. He wasn't interested in learning to read yet, last I knew - which was some months ago now.

Benjamin plays, draws, (he still scribbles, like his brothers at his age - he'll be 4 in a few weeks, so if he's like they are, he will suddenly start drawing recognisable things overnight pretty soon), builds things, enjoys fine motor activities, spends hours with playdough, etc. Nothing "academic" yet at all - he ISN'T ready in the least, and it astounds me to think that despite being 3 (and NOT READY!!) he would be donning a school uniform and heading off to proper school in just over 2 months if he wasn't joining his homeschooled brothers! Some kids MIGHT be ready, but unsurprisingly most are not, and my summer baby certainly isn't. I have no plans to do anything academic with him this year, and maybe not for the first part of next year, depending on how he naturally progresses over that time. We'll see. NOT on my radar yet.

So much for a quick review post!! :/ I just can't do "quick"!!

Places we've been and people we've seen...

We've been to our old church twice in the past fortnight, with our usual church the middle weekend. Both were special occasions, and the boys have LOVED seeing their old friends and doing fun activities. There were games and fun stuff, and a bouncy castle, etc.

Matthew's birthday was last Friday and now he is SEVEN!!! Nathan came down with a temperature of 100 the night before, and a sore throat, but he seemed fine the next day, thankfully! Rosanna came round and Matthew requested some party games that are for littler children than he is, but he just wanted them so we did them. He wanted pass-the-parcel, pin the nose on the clown, and musical bumps, balloon bobbing, etc. They had so much fun! He didn't want a party with a bunch of kids (which would overwhelm him anyway, even if he was excited - his autistic-type tendencies mean he doesn't deal well with party-type situations in general), but we have almost enough children for a proper party anyway, so it works! ;) He got a kite for his birthday and wanted to go out to a big field (dog-free for Arthur) in the afternoon, and we had PERFECT kite-flying weather so we went! Rosanna came too. I have a ton of photos, which I desperately want to find time to post as a separate post here, for memory's sake, but I know that I've not managed to do that for MANY birthdays now, despite really wanting to. :( So I'm not sure if I will, but I will try!

Nathan was fine over the weekend and then on Monday he was crying with tiredness by 10am and slept until noon. When he woke he was dizzy and nauseated for 3 hours! :( Poor boy was so miserable! He recovered gradually and then was FINE, running about in the garden with his brothers and eating normally again. Weird virus! Then on Tuesday evening Benjamin was flopping about exhausted before he's usually tired, and when I took his temperature it was nearly 101 and he had a sore throat. :( He had chills and aches and nausea overnight and was pretty miserable, but FINE the next day like Nathan had been. A bit more tired than usual, but that's all. Thursday night (last night) he had a temperature of 100 at bedtime, but wasn't distressed with it, and he's been complaining of a poorly tummy (he couldn't define it as nausea or pain so I'm not sure exactly how he felt) on and off in between. It hasn't affected his energy or appetite, so I don't know what to make of it! I'm wondering if tomorrow will be the day he has dizziness and nausea like Nathan did? And if anyone else will come down with it - it seems to have at least a 4 day incubation period before symptoms start, but overall it's just SO WEIRD!!! :/ We haven't seen people because of not being sure of our germy status, these past couple of weeks, so we'll see how we go over the next week.

The boys have been out in the garden a lot because the weather has been gorgeous and warm. The last couple of days have been colder and with heavy rain showers. The boys had water play, chalks and paintbrushes, etc. on the good weather days, and had a huge mud/water fight which necessitated immediate baths upon entering the house, hehe! Fun times! :)

Things I'm working on...

Keeping up better with the housework. I have energy and a slightly less foggy brain again, so I'm trying to tackle kitchen chores at the start of the day and it makes a big difference. I clean up breakfast, start the dishwasher, put the night load of wet washing in the tumble dryer, and start a new load of laundry in the washing machine. On a good day I will sweep the floor! ;) I change nappies and dress little ones, then get myself washed and dressed, and then it's time for Elijah to nap, usually, as all of the above takes half the morning! Once Elijah's napping, the boys have usually been too noisy while I put him to bed, and their well-known consequence for this is 10 minutes of silence (nothing whatsoever to do/read) sitting on the living room floor when I get downstairs. Right after that I read aloud a chapter from Wind in the Willows, which they love, even if the littles don't understand all of the language. Then there is an opportunity for school type activities, and then 'Lijah wakes and it's time to make lunch. Elijah is clingy and screechy if I'm not holding him or RIGHT THERE within sight lately (well, the last couple of months really), which is tedious during times of pressure like getting a meal ready on time! I need to enlist the kids to help with chores and meals and so on. They are really resistant and it's hard work with the Asperger's Syndrome reactions. I need to work on a new way to tackle this. They do entertain Elijah for me as best they can, and often very successfully, while I start lunch. The afternoon is free-flow. I need a bit more structure, maybe. I am working on thoughts anyway. I also want to work on getting back to more focus on God in our days.

I'm cooking...

Who knows!! lol! It's been one of those weeks where I have no idea whether I'm coming or going when it comes to meal planning! Three times I had no idea what to give the kids for dinner (when it was already half an hour late) - they did get fed, by the way! ;) Neil and I have had a takeaway twice after the boys were in bed asleep. I had to throw out two packs of minced beef which I'd planned to make into spaghetti bolonese, because it has been "one of those weeks" and I forgot/didn't think in time before they went past their dates. :( I HAVE baked banana cake twice, and chocolate chip cookies today though! And a chocolate "house" birthday cake, as requested by Matthew, of course! :)

I'm grateful for...

Healthy children. And that this virus seems very mild. And that it's not Lyme Disease - Nathan was bitten by a tick about 21 days before he started being unwell and I was beginning to get worried about that, with how weird the symptoms were. Then Benjamin caught it from him, so yeah - phew! ;)

Kicks from my baby girl! :)

Summer time!

I'm praying for...

Wisdom and patience in parenting my more difficult children.

This virus to go away! We have our annual family gathering for my grandfather's 88th (!!) birthday on July 6th and CAN'T go if we have any sort of virus lurking about, given how old and increasingly frail my grandparents are. I couldn't BEAR that! :(

Something I have my eye on...

Still baby girl clothes, lol! ;)

Shoes that are small enough for my tiny walker (he's a proper toddler this week! Hardly any crawling and steady, faster toddling EVERYWHERE!) - I found two pairs of shoes in size 2F (!!!!) and 2.5F on eBay, so hopefully he'll fit one of those (probably the smaller pair right now) and can actually have some protection to his feet outside now!

That is a CRAZY long Week in Review post!!! Have a good weekend and week ahead, everyone! :)

Week in Review - first try! :)

So I notice that:

a) I never update any more!
b) Some of my bloggy friends (the homeschooling ones) write regular Week in Review posts.
c) It might be a good idea to give it a try, because it's quick and easy-looking, and I would actually BLOG and keep track of things again! Maybe!

A blog that I read with faithfully regular Week in Review posts is Tristan's (Our Busy Homeschool), and today's blog post of hers finally provoked me to write my own, copying her format to try it out for myself. I am BAD at consistency (I know you know this already!) but here goes nothing! :) Even if it's just occasional, it will be stuff that I long to keep recorded, ACTUALLY RECORDED!

Week in Review

In my life this week...

I am 20 weeks pregnant! I had "The Big Scan" on Friday, and would you believe it?! After six precious sons in a row, the gift from God I am carrying is a baby GIRL!!!!! My first daughter! I actually still can't comprehend it, and I expect it will take a while to sink in. We are all (big brothers included) absolutely thrilled and so joyful to be expecting a baby girl! :)

Matthew's appointment came through for his assessment. Another thing that's NEW news if you are a reader who only knows me at this blog, as I haven't updated for a long time about anything in-depth. Arthur has been through assessment this year for Autistic Spectrum Disorder (specifically the child psychiatrist (who he saw once for a phobia of dogs, which he's doing better with now) suspected Asperger's Syndrome). He was just diagnosed last month with Asperger's Syndrome - not a big surprise to us, but it has meant the last year has been much more challenging than the one before it, and so on. His behaviour is HARD to manage, and his mannerisms are "different" to other children. He is very bright and chatty and lovely! He is pretty "classic" Asperger's though, apparently. Matthew's behaviour is different to Arthur's but almost more difficult to manage. I have no idea, I'm no expert, and I understand Arthur better than I understand Matthew, but my gut feeling is that Matthew is also on the autistic spectrum (not necessarily Asperger's though), and has sensory processing disorder, ADHD, and speech issues (he is now on the waiting list for speech therapy as well), as well as possibly dyslexia and dyscalcula. He has learning difficulties that are more problematic than I first thought when I started homeschooling him. He isn't making progress with reading, writing, or maths, and can't concentrate for any length of time, and rapidly progresses to crazy wild behaviour where he's beyond-reach as far as verbal reasoning goes, and disrupts any effort to teach him anything. I can't tell you how hard it's been this past year, with everything else going on (which I can't remember if I mentioned here, and have no particular desire to right this minute). Which leads me neatly to...!

In our homeschool this week...

Ah, now this will probably necessitate some lengthy explaining, since I haven't updated my blog in so long... Not sure I want to get into that right now, but hmmm. Suffice to say that we are currently pretty much unschooling. This means no formal education (curriculum work, etc.) but everything is child-led, and various things are available for them to choose from. This is NOT a preferred choice for me, it makes me fidgetty, lol! But right now it's where we are at, for various reasons which it would take too long to go into tonight. It is also NOT a permanent situation. I am hoping it's temporary, and even this week we've been discussing how to ease some curriculum subjects back in, for one or two of the boys. This week, Arthur has been out to Heather's house (my doula, who homeschools her 15-year-old daughter), to do a history lesson with her daughter, for a full morning on Wednesday. This isn't every week, but it did happen this week. Arthur loves it! He has a workbook that is rapidly filling with all sorts of very creative activities on medieval British history that Heather's daughter has prepared herself, and photos of him in costume, etc! So fun! Arthur is hugely into sea creatures at the moment, and we have just bought the Apologia Science: Zoology 2 curriculum, which is all about sea creatures and oceanography. He is so excited and can't wait to start it tomorrow! I intended him to work through much of it independently as that's how he works best, but I think that I will have him read it aloud to me (or I'll read some of it, whichever he prefers), and I'll oversee the written activities, and obviously do the science experiments with him. I expect Matthew and probably Nathan will also be intrigued and want to join in when it comes to it, as well. Otherwise we've had beautiful weather this week and most of the boys' time has been spent in the garden, or we've been out to a big "beach" (complete with water fountain for water play!) at the park one day this week, and we spent another day visiting a homeschooling family we know fairly locally who have six children as well. The children all get on so well together, it's lovely how excited they all get about our visits! Matthew and Nathan have drawn a lot this week, and written letters and such as they've wanted to. Matthew has been tracing sea mammals and dinosaurs from reference books. They've done puzzles, built Lego, and played strategic games. Arthur has created maps with alternate battle plans for armies in the 2nd World War this week, for some random reason! He was very focused on it for a long time, and eager to show and explain it all. He has (as usual) spent hours each day this week reading mainly reference books (British History, World History, and the enormous Complete History of the World book on the shelf that he can barely lift off! Amongst many many other non-history books). He hasn't done much fiction reading this week.

Helpful homeschool hints or advice to share...

I am the opposite of the fount-of-all-wisdom at this stage, lol! I NEED advice from homeschooling mothers, or mothers of children on the autistic spectrum, or mothers of eleventy little children, that sort of thing. But I don't think I have any to give out! The only advice I would give is to PRAY in all things, including homeschool. I do not know what I would do without God, in all this. Talk about anchor in the storm! :)

Places we've been and people we've seen...

Okay so I've answered this already, for the most part! Monday we went to Vicki's to visit and play with her six little ones. Wednesday was Arthur's history lesson and Heather's daughter brought him home and then helped me take the boys to the "beach" park in the beautiful weather, for the afternoon. They made a ton of friends (Arthur especially, in his element organising and leading the children who were there in strategic water-channelling-through-sand battle games!) and had a blast. On Friday, Heather came over to spend time playing with the boys while Neil and I went to have our scan, and find out that we have a daughter! Saturday I went to the women's breakfast at church (VERY inspirational talk), and then Neil took all the boys to the park to play ball games and build forts (and crawl in the grass, depending on which child we're talking about, lol!), while I rested off a bout of IBS at home. :S Sunday (today) we went to church as a family, the boys enjoyed their groups and playing with the kids afterwards for an hour or so, and then this evening I went to the evening service on my own (we alternate).

Things I'm working on...

Ideas for school this coming week. I bought a Kumon workbook for Matthew on telling the time, as he just can't grasp it, no matter the fabulousness of the Right Start Mathematics curriculum in its clear explanation and games to teach him. He just. doesn't. get it. I can't break it down any simpler, so I'm hoping if he has a workbook all his own, to fill in any time he fancies and get a certificate at the end, he might get somewhere with it over time. I will help him if he lets me. I also got a wipe-clean book for Nathan and some dry-erase pens to go with it, with loads of activities to do inside it, including writing, numbers, dot-to-dot and matching activities, drawing activities, and telling the time. He seems eager to test it out, and I'll leave him to do that as he wants to, and supervise him when he does. He prefers things that way.

Matthew's 7th birthday is on Friday this coming week! Definitely included in my list of things I'm working on! ;) I have all his presents and wrapping paper ready to wrap them, but he can't decide on a cake design (he has suggested 7 different ideas so far!) yet. I will hurry him so that I can prepare now!

I'm sure I'm working on other things (I always have a million things in my head that I can't keep track of, but which are all very important or relevant to be working on RIGHT NOW! ;) I feel so scatty these past few years, with so much to be responsible for all the time! But I do love what I do!) - but I can't remember any of them right now.

I'm cooking...

I'm way too disorganised for meal planning right now, though I would love to change that. All I know this week is that I have chicken thighs to make into chicken in white wine, lemon and rosemary, for Neil and I one evening. I am hoping to do some sweet baking this week, as I seem to have urges to bake things lately. Banana cake if the boys don't eat all the bananas (they usually do, though we buy 5 bunches per week, and even then those only last half the week, lol!), brownies or cookies maybe. We'll see! :) Also I want to make pizza for dinner one day this week, and a pot roast leg of lamb another night.

I'm grateful for...

God in my every day life, my weaknesses and my desperate moments, especially. Lots of those lately.

Church. My heart was heavy tonight (no time to explain, but a good reason unfortunately), and I went to church, totally felt God's presence during the worship time, listened to a sermon that was really relevant to me right now, and then went forward to be prayed for at the end of the service, where God was gracious to me and gently pushed me waaaaaaay outside my comfort zone (where I needed to be) to crying with actual people (gasp!) and thus receiving the kind of prayer and comfort I actually needed. So grateful for my family in Christ! :)

My children! My many blessings from God, and my much-longed-for baby girl after all these years of bearing children! :)

I'm praying for...

Help from God to manage the week ahead. Patience, self-control, and wisdom, specifically. And I am praying for help in consistently training up Samuel, who is 2, over the usual two-year-old behaviours. He's a darling sweetie-pie, happy and cute as anything! But you know two-year-olds! ;) I need to work with him on learning to obey Mummy and not touch/climb/tip those things he knows he's not meant to. I'm praying for wisdom and patience in understanding and dealing with the behaviour from Matthew (especially), Arthur, and Benjamin. Benjamin is nearly 4 and has some autistic tendencies that I'm suspicious about, but he's not quite like Arthur or Matthew, so I don't know. He has bouts of odd behaviours, on and off. This past week he has been doing his thing again where he does weird shouting and twists his cheeks aggressively in his fingers at the same time, compulsively. He can be a bit volatile and aggressive/melt-down-ish when he has these "bouts", and there's obviously a trigger but I have no idea what it is. It gets wearing after a while so I am praying for patience and wisdom with Benji. Also praying for general guidance in terms of "the next thing", schooling, and moving - we sold our house months ago and still have our buyers, but have looked at SO many houses in so many different locations now, and STILL don't know where we are meant to move to! We want to stay HERE but in no way can we afford a bigger house here, so...

Something I have my eye on...

Baby girl clothes!!! Oh my goodness! So much fun!!!! :) I have been out to local shops looking at baby clothes this weekend, but they're not great shops so I didn't see anything I like. I will hit some nicer shops soon! :) Meanwhile I'm "window shopping" online, and browsing through eBay, where I am having to suppress actual squealing a lot of the time, haha! I can't believe I actually get to look at little dresses and pink butterfly sleepsuits without it being a wistful thing - I am growing an actual baby to buy them for!! :D I am even looking at newborn cloth nappies - we haven't used any cloth nappies with Elijah or Samuel - well, I think we put Samuel in a kissaluv size 0 for his very first nappy after birth, but not at all for Elijah. Benjamin had newborn nappies for a couple of weeks, until he outgrew them (quickly!), and then no more. We used cloth full-time for Arthur and Matthew all the way through, and Nathan for 6 weeks maybe? Or a bit longer. It got too much, with so many in nappies and the laundry piling up with so many little ones as well, never mind nappies to wash as well! I still have them in the loft, but no desire to use them in such an intense season - not willing to part with them though! ;) BUT, I wonder about the chance to buy some ultra cute girly print nappies for my newborn baby girl. I can handle newborn cloth, but beyond that probably not for now. So I am looking at newborn sized nappies for the early weeks/months, and that is a TON of fun! :)

Wow, that wasn't particularly quick or easy! But fun, and I'm glad to have it written down. After this one, hopefully any Week in Review posts I make will be shorter and less detailed, because I have had to do some explaining here and there in this post, because of not having said about certain things in recent months, that relate to the week's "stuff".

I hope anyone reading this has a good week! :)

Benjaminny, and a few other bits and pieces

I can't believe he will be 3 in July! Of course July feels like ages away, because it's still like WINTER outside this week (tsk!) and there's the whole add-a-new-member-of-the-family thing between now and then. But it's only 3 months! My little manny is somehow two and three-quarters! I have about 5,000 paragraphs of sweetness that I could happily sit and write about Benjamin this morning. But whatever I type has to last the length of a cup of tea, while the boys build a Winnie the Pooh fort of some kind in the living room, and then I need to take sweet Samley to bed. I really should write an update on just random stuff about Samuel too, because I know I haven't done that when typing "Samley" is a new thing, even though that's what I call him about as often as "Samuel". I wish I had more tiiiiime to write these special memories down!

He's so giggly and assertive and chunky around the chest (since he was born - he has some really defined chest muscles, this boy!) and snuggly. He is usually being a little "cweature" who squeaks and makes cute faces and wants his mummy! He snuggles such a lot, and still breastfeeds in the day time. If he has a nightmare (rare) I will nurse him at night on occasion too. He is SO PRECIOUS!!!!! I love my little Benjamoo.

I just planned to post two things about Benjamin today, so I'll get on with it! A couple of weeks ago, Benjamin and I made brownies - actually Nathan did as well, but Samuel was napping and the older two boys were experiencing the consequences of poor behaviour choices by sitting in corners, so they missed out unfortunately! Nathan did not want to taste the batter, when the brownies were in the oven, so he went out of the kitchen, and Benjamin gladly took on the whole responsibility of cleaning the bowl! ;) He LOVES anything sweet and was very pleased with the batter! He made me laugh because the more he tasted, the more giggly and silly he got! It was almost as though it went to his head or something, lol! I took some photos of my sweet silly boy tasting brownie batter. He was showing me his "taste" on his finger and then eating it while giggling like crazy around his finger! ;) He eventually gave up on the slow scooping method, and started licking the bowl, hehehe! He got brownie batter in his hair big time. Sweet in even more ways! :)











The other night I got into his bed to breastfeed him. He sleeps on a shorty mattress on the floor underneath Matthew's cabin bed. We decided on that when he moved out of his cot, as a makeshift "bunk bed" that would be safe for him with nowhere to fall out of bed. It's a full sized cabin bed width-ways but shorter by about 6 inches (or is 9?). Anyway, we found it on eBay. Did I ever post pics? The big bunk bed is still there and the cabin bed matches it exactly - it was a great find! :) They've been happily installed there since May 2011. Arthur is on the top of the main bunk bed, Nathan below him, Matthew on the top of the cabin bed, and Benjamin below. I found the photos that I took in May, but Blogger is being extremely annoying and refusing to let me open any picture files to upload right now! >:-/ So I can't do that, but I will try to find time to update on the bedroom changes, since I can't find any evidence of having posted about it here before now!

Anyway, so the routine at bedtime is still that I get into Benjamin's bed and breastfeed him. He nearly always falls asleep nursing, which is precious, and I cherish it because I know it won't last much longer! He loves his milky. After he's asleep, I go to Nathan who has usually already fallen asleep, and kiss him goodnight. If he's still awake I get in with him to snuggle him and give him "back-a-rubs" as he calls them! :) Then Matthew, then Arthur, except now that I'm huge and pregnant, the boys who are up ladders have to come down onto the futon bed on the floor (where Neil sleeps for ease of dealing with night-wakings and less disturbance to his sleep than if he was co-sleeping with Samuel and me) for their snuggles. I pray for each boy as I do their snuggles and back-rubs.

Anyway, the other night I got into Benjamin's bed with him as usual, and he didn't go straight to breastfeed, which surprised me. He was just looking at me with a little smile in the semi-darkness, big round eyes all shiny. He looked so happy and secure, and it was wonderful to see him look at me that way. I waited and he didn't do anything different for a few moments, and then in a soft little voice, he patted me and then himself, saying, "Das you, an' das me!" I said, "Yes, that's right." and he said it again, almost to himself, "Das you... an' das me", did a big happy sigh, and lay down to nurse. Typing it out, it doesn't seem so special as it was, but I HAD to record it somewhere because to me that was an absolute Memory Treasure. It was an example of Benjamin expressing his security in our sitation. Him and Mummy. He looked so happy with the world around him, and his voice was so soft and.... something, I can't put my finger on. It was a lovely moment and I don't want to forget it.

He has so very many cute little sayings and ways of pronouncing things, and I SO want to make note of them all! I haven't got time now, but my current favourite is, "I 'pose so, Mummy..." when considering something I've suggested, usually when it's not what he originally agreed with. I love his use of the phrase, "I suppose so" and his way of pronouncing it. He uses such a grown-up, serious expression when he says it, and it's a moment to support him in his seriousness, but I have to work hard to fight the urge to sweep him up off his feet and smoosh his soft little cheeks with kisses for 5 straight minutes! ;) He's such a cutie pea pie and I love him so much!

He has a strong and assertive personality, most similar to Arthur's (out of all the boys) but without the tendency to be anxious and fretty and fidgetty that Arthur has. He is very confident and takes charge easily amongst his brothers. I could see that in him even when he was a baby, well before he was old enough to act on that potential with them! ;) He DOES have typical shyness of new people though, but warms up quite quickly now - much quicker than he used to. He is TERRIFIED of dogs. Shaking, sweating, screaming, TERRIFIED. Of even the tiniest dog in the distance. He even gets like that on occasion when he sees a dog on the TV, so it's more than the anxiety one or two of the boys have had over dogs at the park. Dogs do bound up to them and act playful at the park, and Benji has had a few experiences where he was totally taken by surprise, and once a dog bigger than him pushed him down and even with Neil there shooing it, it would not go away until the owner (SLOWLY) sauntered over and took it. He is so very scared of them now, poor lovey. We have been considering getting a dog to help him with his fear, but the thought of adding a pet with lots of care needs to a large bunch of very young children plus homeschooling is overwhelming right now. Also we need to ascertain if anyone in our household is allergic to dogs before we do that. Neil is allergic to cats (since we met actually, he wasn't when we first met) and has various other triggers to his asthma and hayfever that we don't even know the source of, so it's possible I guess. We've never been in a home where there's a dog, or spent any time with a dog, so I suppose we don't know if any of the boys might be allergic either. But the general thought amongst us all is that we will probably get a dog at some point in the future. The boys actually think it's a great idea, even though all of them are nervous to varying degrees about dogs.

With his assertive personality, Benjamin also tends to be pretty in-our-faces with grumpiness or defiance when he disobeys us. He has phrases like, "I not listnin'!!" with his hands covering his ears and his best frown on. He has been saying, "Stupid Mummy!" a lot in recent months, when he's cross with me, but I've noticed he hasn't said that much these past few weeks, since I have been RIGHT on him to discipline every time he does it. He is sweet-natured in general and loving and kind towards his brothers. He is very concerned when somebody is sad or hurt, and tries to make them better, as all of them do.

I love his little chipmunky voice and the little quirks and mannerisms of his speech, different from all the others because they are unique to him. I can't even get those across in type, so I will have to try to take some video of him to record it for prosperity. Our "video" is a fairly basic point-and-shoot camera and the audio is really poor. Even right up close, the sound is distant and fuzzy, which is such a shame. Our really old point-and-shoot camera that finally died when Nathan was born, had a MUCH better microphone and their little voices were crisp and clear when recorded with that. Oh well.

Benjamin knows his numbers but not letters, though he holds up our fridge magnet letters on a daily basis at the moment and asks me, "What this one?" over and over, and I tell him. I don't know if he's retaining any though - I guess he must be to some degree? He's only 2, and my 2, 3 and 4 year olds learn through osmosis generally, now that I have two homeschooling at school age. I don't task myself at ALL with teaching the littler ones anything at all. I provide activities that they might learn from but they are meant to be independent activities for the most part. They're fine. Nathan learned his numbers and some phonics sounds without any attention on it from me, as Matthew began his school lessons last year. But I have no concerns with a 5-year-old knowing absolutely NOTHING of numbers or phonics or letters when they start school. The curricula we have are excellent and they'll pick it up in no time when they're old enough to actually do school work. Before that, it's play play play and stimulating activities. If they learn as they go, great! If not, no big deal. They are learning though! :)

One thing we do as a group is Bible time at the beginning of school every day. It's first because God is first. We are in Romans now - a chapter a day straight from the Bible. We started with Matthew's gospel at the beginning of the New Testament. After the chapter, we do Bible Memory Verses. We have a system, which I think I mentioned before but have no time to check/link right now. They have learned a lot of verses. We never do a verse or two. They learn whole passages, and with ease too. People usually assume little children (or even older ones) are only up to the task of a single line to memorise as far as Bible verses go, and think it's amazing when they do! They can learn SO MUCH MORE. I have taken a few videos of Arthur and Matthew reciting their memory verses, quite a while ago so I haven't got record of their more recent ones, and again - no time to find and post right now! What I really want to do is get Benjamin on video, but it's hard to clearly understand his pronunciation and he sometimes just acts silly when he's being videoed! ;)

He has learned the whole of Psalm 1 - probably about 8 months ago, just after turning two, and since our system means we go over ones we've already learned regularly, I have him repeat that quite often. He knows it well, but mumbles a lot of the words together. If I can help him say the words clearer then perhaps I'll video him doing it. He LOVES saying it! Nathan won't join in at all, though he sits with us, but Benjamin has been eager for his turn since he was tiny and not really able to say stuff yet!

Arthur and Matthew can recite Psalm 23, Psalm 121, Psalm 1, Psalm 100, Psalm 9:1-2, and then shorter ones that we started with at the beginning - Romans 8:28, Philippeans 2:14 and Ephesians 6:1-3. We are about to start Philippeans 4:4-9 because it's such a useful passage to have in your head when you need it, about anxiety and worry. Arthur knows some of it already because I use it to help him when he is having trouble with panic or anxiety. He has some issues - I haven't had chance to write about it, but yeah. He's very like me, unfortunately! Poor boy with his genes! He's phobic about vomiting and has many many other frets and worries. It's a personality thing, and my mum and I are the same way. Overcoming it is such a HUGE battle, and it's the single most complicating factor in my entire life, not easy to live with. I don't want that for Arthur! :( But I am praying for him and trying to help him, and at least I understand him.

Anyway, getting off-topic and taking too much time on the computer now, so I will stop! Must get my little tiny to bed - he is stumping around on his sweet little toddly leggies right now, with a pirate hat on his head that is way too big, saying, "Maowwww? Maowww?" because when I say the word "cat" he says "maowww?" in such a cute little high-pitched baby voice, associating cat with meowing. He hasn't cottoned on yet that hat isn't the same as cat! ;) It sounds the same, I can see his reasoning! Cute little beep! Going to snatch him up and try not to eat him on the way to bed now :)