We're into our second week of school after our 3 week Christmas/Sick Break.

It's really nice to be back in our routine, although I/we extremely enjoyed the time to just relax together with Kyle home. I was happy to work on sewing projects, get knee surgery, and catch up on things around the house. 

Towards the end of last semester, Dorien began asking for his own school work. He really wanted something to participate in that was really school.  A friend of mine recommended some fine motor skills things, so I have given him pages to cut (see above).  He has done remarkably well with these projects, and absolutely loves them.  He is so proud of himself, and he should be! It gives him a chance to learn how to develop those fine motor skills, follow directions, work on names of shapes and colors and get used to sitting still doing assignments.

You can see how much pride he takes in what he's done!

Wyeth has taken it upon himself to wreak as much havoc as he possibly can. 

This happens largely in the form of climbing everything, spilling untended glasses, repeatedly (and I do mean repeatedly) bringing me the toilet scrubbing brush or the toilet plunger (two of the grossest items IN the house), or just getting up to his elbows in the toilet (thankfully, empty and clean toilets), swiping papers or books off the coffee table, pulling all the canned goods out of the pantry and leaving them on the floor for me to trip over, or sneaking upstairs when no one is looking and dumping all of Brooklyn and August's Lego bins.

He's just at that age of exploration.

And he grins his irresistible grin and it's hard to really get mad about any of it. 

Brooklyn reads to us from the Children's Bible in the mornings.

August cheeses (and shows off his new haircut) while Brooklyn reads. 

Don't worry, he reads after she is finished. 

Another thing I have had Dorien do is trace things. Working on matching colors, doing things like loops, etc. In my mind, it seems logical that these are all good "pre-writing" movements. 

When Brooklyn and August realized what I was doing, they took it upon themselves to create their own projects for him. I loved it. It was so great! Brooklyn drew him pictures to color. August created matching games for him using colored teddy bear counters and color-coded shapes he'd drawn.  It thrilled Dorien (and me).

A bird's-eye view of the library while school is underway.

We do use our desks a ton for things like handwriting, language arts, creative writing and things that you need to be in a good position for handwriting, but we also sprawl all over the place. 

As you can see, Wyeth makes himself right at home by dumping all the bins and just going to town. 

Whatever works.

And sometimes, you just need to find a good crock and hide in it.

Dorien told me he was a Groundhog, getting ready to pop out of his hole.

I love that no matter how frustrating and exhausting being a mom can be, there are these unexpected things that happen that just make you laugh out loud. It makes it all worthwhile.