in pursuit of wild things

This past week was mostly a quiet week with one really long day. On Tuesday we met with the specialist to discuss Sparkles’ illness. Now, I don’t know about the rest of you, but after filling out reams of paperwork the last words I want to hear from a doctor include; “So, why are your here?” Really?!?! Did you not read the file??! I didn’t say that but I wanted to. After a discussion Sparkles was sent for an x-ray and more tests.

The next day the nurse called to let us know that Sparkles would have to endure a “cleanse” (trust me you do not want to know). She also explained to me they were waiting on one test result. If the test result comes back normal then she just had a blockage and infection and once this clears up she will be just fine. If it comes back abnormal then she will have to be sedated for a scope for a proper diagnosis. Hopefully we will hear about the test results this week. The day of the cleanse started at about eight in the morning and went until about three in the morning. I think we are

all still recovering. Littlest stayed up with his sister for a long time and ended up napping the next day. At a certain point my husband sent me to bed and he finished out the really long day with Sparkles.

This week begins our soft start to the up coming school year. I plan to spend the next two weeks re-establishing our Morning Basket time. For now out Morning Basket time includes our read-alouds, character studies and poetry memorization. This year we are going to work through Mensa’s “Year of Living Poetically”.  After listening to Andrew Pudewa on the importance of poetry

memorization and language development I knew that I wanted to add this to our home education lifestyle but I did not want to purchase a curriculum. I was going to put together my own list of poems. However, once I stumbled upon Mensa’s free course I went with it. The kids will also begin keeping a “word journal” for collecting interesting phrases or quotes. On Friday they will have to share

three entries from their word journal. We’ll also continue the art journaling once a week. We hope to return to poetry tea time this week now that Sparkles can handle the occasional treat in her diet again.

I participated in a photo challenge on Instagram this month that I have enjoyed and plan to post my pictures later this week. Photography was our practice the engage in this month in a homeschool community I belong to. It was fun to have a project to work on even though I know nothing about photography…

Nike in hand on Athena

Lucky Lion Door at Parthenon

Nashville Parthenon

at Mayfield car show

breakfast at Hutchen’s BBQ

Parthenon roof detail

lunch at Macaroni Grill

Parthenon marker

molds taken from Greece

Middle Boy at Lego store

breakfast with Batman

Sparkles with doll at cruise-in

Littlest