Science at Home

We haven't been doing too much hands-on work at home lately.  Something I do regret.  We also have not been making as many trips to the local museums in the past few months.  The kids keep asking when we are going back so it is time to get back up on that horse, so to speak. 

Anyway, over the past few months we have had a few simple science projects in the works around here.  Liam played around with making glaciers and ice formations.  I don't even want to mention how many months he owned this science kit before we sat down with him to use it.  It is truly sad.

This past week Bryan did an experiment I remember doing in my Chemistry II class except we used acetone, permanent markers, and clothing to make tie dyed stuff.  He followed the same basic principles but used coffee filters and rubbing alcohol.  He also knew enough to take pictures himself.  Love that kid.

So now that I have let you in on a little secret (namely I have been entirely too lazy in giving the kids hands-on educational experiences and planning lately), hopefully I will use this as motivation to do better in the next few months.

Chinese New Year

Today we celebrated Chinese New Year. It is the year of the dragon this year.  (Just a note, I had elaborate plans for this day but life got in the way so we went a simple route.  I was picturing inviting friends over for a party at lunch, a movie, crafts, the works. Instead I have a bunch of sick kids and simplicity.  Maybe next time will work out as I envisioned.)

We celebrated with a dinner of sweet and sour chicken, oranges, egg rolls, and fortune cookies.  Some funky coconut based gluten free fortune cookies which looked odd and tasted funky because that is all that is left at the store when you wait until today to go shopping. The oranges are in some way supposed to be a traditional food for this feast but I was not able to figure out exactly why.  Maybe by next year I'll have figured it out.

I ordered these cheater chopsticks for our younger children because they seem to have a bit of trouble with regular ones.  I think they might also come in handy for the occasional guest who has trouble with regular ones as well.  Robert was rather  happy that he was able to use them properly.

Several of the kids also colored dragons print-outs today.  It was also national pie day but I just thought it would be weird to have a pie for dessert with Chinese food.  Maybe I'll make one for tomorrow instead.

Little Flowers

I finally remembered to take my camera to our Little Flowers meeting.  We had 15 girls today.  Wow.  Quite a few more than I was expecting this week but we were very happy to have everyone join us.  We learned about St. Felicity and self-control.  Then we made sacrifice beads to help practice the virtue of self-control.  I've been having the girls make scrapbook pages for each virtue thanks to some wonderful print-outs found here.  Nope, I'm not creative enough to come up with this stuff on my own.  Being able to pull ideas from someone who has been through the books before me makes life so much easier. 

Since we also had karate lessons after Little Flowers, all of the kids were with me this time.  This came in handy when it was time to work on the sacrifice beads.  Ellie hit her head and wanted no one but me so Bryan was able to help show the girls how to put the beads together.  He also took a few pictures for me. 

I think this is my favorite part of the meetings.  Coming into church to pray before the Blessed Sacrament.  One week we were unable to stop in to say hi to Jesus because the school was having a Christmas concert and all of the girls were upset.  I can't so we do anything fancy but just seeing so many young kids gathered together makes me happy.  We may not pray for anything fancy or grown-up (there are often requests to pray for pets and siblings and traveling Dads), but I like to think that the sincere prayers of little girls means quite a lot even in it's simplicity.

The Good and the Bad

This is one of those posts that I have debated sharing because I know there are those reading who will judge me for it.  Either because they think they know me or some other such thing.  But I have decided if you are going to judge me, there is nothing I can do either way.  At least it will be on reality or a small little version of it.

So the good and the bad of the following few days.

The Bad: Abby let Robert cut her hair.
The Good: It's only hair and it will grow back.  I took her in to get it fixed up a bit this morning so it looks less like a hack job but it is so darn short.  After years of having people mistake me for a boy and being left out of certain activities with friends because my hair was so short (kind of hard to participate in a hair-do party when your hair does nothing because it is so short), I said my girls would have longer hair when they were younger.  Robert apparently had other ideas.

The Bad: While I was out taking Abby to get a haircut, the older boys had to call poison control because Gabe decided to eat the dishwashing detergent.
The Good: They knew what to do, took appropriate action, and Gabe is fine.

The Bad: Ellie has decided that she absolutely will not sleep unless she is in direct contact with me which means my plans to do things once the kids are in bed have totally not come to fruition and the laundry is threatening to take over the upstairs.
The Good: She is cute and adorable and tends to wake up, look at me, smile, and say Mom.  The laundry will wait and life will go on since she will only be this little and snuggable for a short time.  Besides, I know I sleep better when I'm not alone. I imagine she feels the same way.

The Bad: The pizza dough for lunch has not defrosted properly and is not rising at all so we'll have to scrap lunch plans for something else.
The Good: We have plenty of food in the house so it's not a crisis, just an inconvenience.

Yup, it's been one of those business trips.  Washing machine threatens to quit, pipes in the bathroom start leaking (but I know how to shut the water off to individual locations so it's not a big deal), the toilet keeps getting clogged (multiple times a day), one of the boys did not set the security alarm properly when we left so ADT called Alan to ask if they should send out police, the garage door opener has broken again so I cannot park the van in the garage since we need the gears to pull the door up those last few inches to get the van inside. All minor issues but I think I will need a small break when Alan gets home.  Just maybe.

Ellie and the Ergo Love

Little Miss Ellie spends a decent amount of her time like this:

So when Katie put Ellie's doll in the newest carrier in the house and strapped it to Ellie's back, there were lots and lots of smiles.

The Cleaning of the LEGO Area

Yes, we have a "LEGO area" in the house. It is our sad attempt to keep from stepping on these plastic toys and finding them in the mouths of small children.  The area is contained in the hall in the basement between the older boys' bedroom and the school room.  Today the older children were sent downstairs to clean this area because, well, we no longer had a rug in the hallway. We had a LEGO floor.  While they were cleaning, they were singing these two songs.  The combo just cracked me up.  Their father would be proud.

Catholic Update Guide to Confession

This small little book has been sitting in my "to be read" pile for a while.  Ok, not always sitting in the pile.  Sometimes buried under paperwork or hidden on a bookshelf or hiding who knows where in my attempts to avoid reading it.  Yes, I was avoiding this harmless little book because I was not in the mood to be lectured to because I manage to do enough of that on my own and don't need a book to do it for me.  But I finally decided it was time to pick it up and dust it off and actually read it.

The book Catholic Update Guide to Confession is a super quick read.  It is not preachy and does not lecture you.  In this book you won't find someone standing over you saying "You must go to confession weekly/monthly/whatever or you are not living a proper spiritual life."  You also won't find justification for the myriad of reasons we often come up with to avoid confession. I'll admit I can't quite understand why my kids have no problem going to confession but both of their parents avoid it at all costs.  Who taught them to not be afraid?  Whoever managed to do that needs to come have a talk with me.

Anyway, this book is short, simple, and to the point. It walks you through the ritual of confession both in an individual and a communal form.  It teaches you in simple language why we each have a need for confession and reminds you that it is not such a mean, scary thing.  The book gives you 10 tips to help you gain the most from confession and gives you the gentle reminder that the most important thing about the sacrament is "what Jesus does" and not anything we ourselves do.

This book provides a wonderful shot in the arm for those of us who have been avoiding the confession line and a great explanation for those who just never understood the sacrament to begin with.  I can honestly say that I plan on reading it again and hope to do my best to follow the advice in the book to take the time to seek out that ever elusive "wise and welcoming priest" we all need to help guide us through this sacrament.  And it just might be added to the pile of books the older children are required to read or risk the loss of movie night.  Just maybe.

This review was written as part of the Catholic book reviewer program from The Catholic Company. Visit The Catholic Company to find more information on Catholic Update Guide to Confession . They are also a great source for a Catechism of the Catholic Church or a Catholic Bible.