Friday, May 18, 2012

Home Again


*1*
It was a week-end of partying. Graduations, birthdays and Mother's Day. Great presents (I'm hoping we hooked our newly turned 13yo niece onto the pleasures of Jane Austen : ),  good food and tons of laughs. Besides swimming the kids did a little shooting. Dead centers, baby. 

 


*2*
The 30 hour round trip gave us plenty of time to read. Cub soared through 3 Alex Rider books and finished Socrates Meets Jesus, Flower devoured the Lego Bible (incredible artwork, a little thin on Biblical accuracy), KB The Sweet Gum Knit Lit Society, and Lone Wolf, Feeche is almost done with a bio of Madeline L'Engle along with Dragons in the Waters and we all listened to Focus on the Family radio theater version of The Screwtape Letters; which was terrific.   I made my way through Lone Wolf, The Upper Zoo, Same Kind of Different as Me and Gaudy Night. Which by the way, is the best.book.evah. Sayers writing is exquisite, her character development divine (I'm in love with Lord Peter- sorry honey), and her dialog totally believable even if parts of it are in Latin and the rest in poetry long gone from the collective unconscious. Honestly, if you want to feel like our educational system has let you down, read a book by my friend Sayers. She's the woman with the mind I want to have. I'll be posting reviews tomorrow.

*3*
Driving in northern Iowa we hit a spot where the terrain switched from Midwest (you know, deciduous trees, humidity in the air) to the Great Plains. The moisture in the air dissipated (we've been slathering on the body lotion) and the trees thinned to practically nothing, like hair on the head of a balding man. Folks who call this here the Midwest need to drive east and get a feel for what it's really all about. I'm a  tree kinda gal. I miss it. And the winds been blowing since we got home. Not breezy wind. Gusty, great plains, wind. Change the terrain and intimidate tree growth wind. Home again, home again, jiggity jig.
*4*
Tuesday was a long drive day...long. We stopped and had breakfast with my uncle- which was great, but took us out of the way a bit.  Worth every minute.

*5*
Feeche and Cub have several weeks to finish First Form Latin so they cruised through another chapter. Feeche has been doing Science and Math everyday, along with as much writing as he can fit in. Feeche and Flower are doing Math worksheets and drill daily, along with reading. Ages of Empires has always been a fav around here, and Nucle Eil fanned the flames, but the deal is, 1 hour of reading to every 1/2 hour of computer, with a limit on comp time.

*6*

We're going to change the color of the upstairs bathroom to coordinate with the tile and grout this week-end, along with ordering the shower door- WOOT. We are getting it done! I'm thinking of stair ideas and this is the one I'm thinking going to the basement. I've got a whole board on Pinterest devoted to stairs. Thoughts, Ideas?

 
*7*
Summer, it's a coming.

Pinned Image


3 comments:

G said...

Very long trip, but it seems you made the most of it! I now need to find the Lego Bible (is it called the Brick Bible on Amazon?), and some of the others you mentioned. I have fond memories of Many Waters, along with every other L'Engle book. And I do hope your niece likes Austen!

And I love the stairs!

Mary said...

I love when a huge block of time opens up for devouring books!

Love the "EPIC" picture. Hilarious.

Chelli said...

I LOVE the stairs! Very creative.