New Year's Eve

I realized it had been awhile since I had written. We are now in a new year according to the "pagan" calendar. In line with God's keeping of time we are in the 10th month and the 18th day. But we live in this world and have to keep its time as well.

We looked forward to company coming here for New Year's Eve. I had prepared all kinds of food which we are still eating. Once a year my friend Renee and I like to get together and make egg rolls. I had all the filling ready and had good help with the rolling. At first we wondered if we had enough wrappers. Then later we laughed that we thought that as we had so many left. I froze them and they are good warmed in the oven.

After supper we decided we should play a game. I said I would play anything but didn't want to read the directions. Renee picked out Cranium which we had never played. It didn't take long to figure it out and we had a great time playing. We had three teams of two. Whitney and Ryan, Tim and Dave, and Renee and I were the teams. Shirley didn't want to play.




We had to get Leah's play dough as the molding clay for the game was spoiled. Here Shirley made a cute bird nest and bird for Leah. It looks like Leah didn't want Daniel to touch it. Tim was molding something for Dave to guess. Whitney found it funny.



There were four different categories. The color you rolled decided the category. If your team got the answer correct before the time ran out you could advance to that color on the board.

The game was fun and I would play it again. Here's my teammate. All played a good game but we were the winners.

This week we are back to school for the whole week. Daniel was thinking we would have a three day week again! We are in ECC Week 17. After this week we will be halfway through ECC. Since we are in Germany we have been studying castles. Yesterday while Leah was napping Daniel and I made this castle. Both of us didn't want to get too elaborate and just keep it fun. Daniel's one requirement was that it needed to have a drawbridge. It was fun and easy to make. Later he made some siege works out of Legos.

In science we have been studying lakes and rivers and the wildlife that lives in and around them. We did a couple experiments to show that water has a film that allows insects to walk on water.

Last night I went online to our library's website to look for books for our next continent, Africa, study. I found 53 books, music Cd's, and movies. It's nice to print out a list of the books. When I get to the library it won't take me long to find them. I probably won't choose all of them but will get most. These books go into "book basket" for the children to look at during that time of the day. Some we will read out loud. Mainly they are there for pleasure.

Over Christmas vacation our library got a new computer system. They were closed for a week while it was installed and the employees learned how to use it. It is different and took longer for me to save the books I wanted to a list. I think there must be an easier way to do it. If the librarian isn't busy on Wednesday I will ask her about that. The program is nicer as it gives more information about each book and I can look for only children's books in my search which saves me time. Think how much computer technology has advanced in just a few years!

I remember when we first were home schooling our older three. We used a curriculum called KONOS. Each week I would go to the library and look through the card catalog. You remember the kind that was in little drawers. It took so much time. And it was frustrating as most of the books listed in my manual were not at my local library. I could order them inter library loan and some I did. It is so much more efficient and quicker to do this on my own computer when I have time at home.

Speaking of time, it is quickly getting away from me and I need to get my little students fed and up to the school room.

Happy New Year everyone!