Homeschool Notes Week 22 - Christmas Break Continued

Saturday morning Makayla woke up with pink eye and we made a trip to the urgent care for eye drops. I'm hoping it doesn't spread between children. She called work and they told her to stay home, which was wonderful. We all needed a quiet day home as a family. Or mostly at home, as we had to pick up our online grocery order of course, and it was our family's turn to clean the church today. We got those things done and by the end of the cleaning I was having consistent contractions every few minutes. It's not time for this baby to arrive yet so we went home where I laid down, drank water to rehydrate, and then waited for contractions to settle down, which they did. Then I got up and packed my hospital bag a few days earlier than I had planned, just in case. I need to put a short list in the bag to remind me of things I need to grab last minute like a cell phone charger and phone.

Sunday found me with 4 hours of contractions, part of which was during our church service. It made for some really interesting reflections on the birth of Christ as I thought of Mary and Joseph welcoming Jesus. We had some extended family over for dinner, Christmas games, and gifts. It was a lot of fun and noise.

Monday was Christmas. We made cinnamon rolls and put them in to rise, then let the kids come downstairs to begin our morning and open gifts. This was our second year to open one gift at a time (before that we generally passed out a gift to each person and then everyone could open that gift at the same time). It went really well and Tobias did great waiting his turn and watching what each person opened.

The rest of the morning was spent building Lego sets, a giant train station, and just relaxing and playing together. Lunch was leftovers from Christmas Eve dinner - tacos - and Christmas breakfast - cinnamon rolls. In the late afternoon we watched episode 2 of Extinct (on BYU tv through our Roku) with the kids. It's fun to discover this show together. Most of the kids are interested, other than the littles who just played in the same room while we watched the show.

Tuesday we expected Daddy to be working (truck driver) but after showing up at the shop at 4am he was sent home, they were giving almost all the drivers today off too and he was one. So not too long before 5am he was back home and we made plans for a to-do list for the day. It had random things like taking a watch to the store to get links removed, picking up oil (we used the last of ours in waffles this morning), removing the a/c unit from our bedroom window (since the temps this week are staying below freezing even for the highs), grinding wheat, dropping the girls off at the movies, and doing a bit of organizing.

The day was uneventful and productive. Of course, it ended on a less than great note when Daniel started throwing up. The question being, is it just too much junk food in the last two days or is he sick and going to share? He did make it through the night without throwing up more, which was good.

Wednesday we kept to the calm and quiet routine. The plan for the day was to just rest, relax, and enjoy break. That is exactly what we did. There was no more throwing up. The oldest 3 kids had youth group together at church.

Thursday started with a checkup at my obstetrician's office. I shared that update in a separate post on the blog already, so here I'll just say things look good and baby Rebekah finally turned head down! After my appointment the kids relaxed and I did some January school planning.

Let's be clear - we started this school year on July 31st because I know what pregnancy and having a baby during the school year is like - all my babies but one have been born during a school year. My plan for January until baby is born is a relaxed form of school. We'll keep a core of lessons like math and then pick up a morning basket of riches to keep our weeks enjoyable. I'm also going to dive into a read aloud. We've taken a bit of a break on read alouds (other than listening to audio books in smaller groups or as individuals) and I miss it.

Friday morning some kids were up early while others slept in. We cooked breakfast and watched cartoons for a while. Then I got to work finalizing January morning basket plans, printing things, choosing a read aloud book, and so on.

We also got a phone call that Mason's new wheelchair should be ready in about 3 weeks. This is nothing short of miraculous. The process to order a new wheelchair when a child needs a bigger size is often 6-10 months long with insurance, and only after they have had their current chair for 5 years. Mason's paperwork got sent to insurance in early November and he's had his current chair almost 4.5 years but has completely outgrown it. The approval letter from insurance arrived last week and was dated Dec. 19th, just over a month after it was submitted. The vendor who will build his chair called us today to confirm what color he wants and let us know that it should be reading in 3ish weeks. If that is accurate the process will have taken just under 3 months.

We're ready for a family weekend enjoying the ending of 2017 and the start of 2018. Now to plan some games and snacks!