About twice a month, we experience a “negative tide” on the west coast, wherein the tide recedes well beyond its normal point and exposes a portion of the floor that typically lies underwater.

Even more rarely, that rare tide occurs durying the daytime on weekends when folks can go observe it.  Today, from 3-5 pm, we had the occasion to visit Moss Beach to check out marine life as a family and with friends.  It was really cool to see the rocks and sea life that one normally only gets to see at an aquarium.  Hermit crabs, anemones, and sea stars and other creatures were easily discovered by the thousands of people who were drawn by the same event to the area.  The weather was shockingly warm, and the sun shone brightly (great for people, tougher for photographers!).

Here are a few of the photos I snapped.  I didn’t get any particularly rare species (to my knowledge), but did capture a few very pretty shots of anemones up close.  I may even print & frame a couple of ‘em!

Call me easily excited or easily pleased, but no matter, I’m just so thrilled that I’ve finally found the best pencil sharpener ever!  Thanks to Kendra at Preschoolers and Peace who reviewed the product.  The pencil sharpener I speak of is the Classroom Pencil Sharpener at $19.95, free shipping included.  It’s sooooooooo worth the money.  I went through several electrical ones as well as some manual ones, and none and absolutely none, met the expectation of this pencil sharpener.  I’m in love!!!!!!!!  You see, I’m not that crazy.  We use a lot of pencils here in our homeschool and having a perfectly sharpened pencil is a necessity.  Now my dream and my children’s dreams of having a perfectly sharpened pencil every time are fulfilled.  When we first received the sharpener, I went and bought a box of pencils to test it out.  My kids and I took turn having fun sharpening each of the 50 pencils.  I’m happy to say that every single pencil resulted in a perfectly sharpened state.  After about two months of daily usage, the sharpener is still doing its job!  Yay!

The website offers videos of how this sharpener works as well as repairing it when a lead gets stuck inside the mechanism.  I’ve had to remove the lead several times and the video proved very helpful in getting the lead out.  I find that when I sharpen colored pencils, the lead tends to break off more easily, but it can be easily remedied.  Happy sharpening!

I couldn’t sleep last night for some reason and naturally it affected my morning.  I simply couldn’t get out of the bed, but fortunately for a wonderful husband and five lovely kids, they made me breakfast in bed.  After daddy set the kids to do some  school, he left for work.  The kids slowly, one by one, came to my room while I was still half comatose.  They had been playing a game and they explained that they now all have new names.  I was quite amused so I started calling them by their new names just for fun.  The boys are now known as Sharkie and Sparkie and the girls are Sarah, Clara, and Hope.  I have no idea where they got these names, but I have to admit that they’re quite creative.  I let them continue with their play while I still lie in bed.  This is one of those moments that makes me really appreciate homeschooling.  I don’t have to adhere to a schedule because life gets in the way.  We simply go with the flow and be flexible.  A little school in the morning, followed by lots of play, and because we’re flexible, we can make up later in the day or the following day.  It is indeed a blessing to be able to homeschool.  I’m also grateful for oodles of kids because they’re each other’s playmates and can keep themselves occupied without my constant attention.  That’s another wonderful blessing!

This week the boys had a fencing clinic along with some friends of ours.  It was a lot of fun for the kids as they learn the terms and techniques to fencing.

They started out with using fun noodles as foils or swords.  Now we’ll be purchasing some fun noodles for practices at home.

Now it’s time for the real thing, but they must put on their protective gear.

Let the bout begin!

And finally, a photo of a bout between brothers.  Yes, we’re promoting sibling rivalry, but in a pre-ordained fashion.  Looks like the younger brother won this round as his foil hit his older brother’s torso.

Today’s science lesson was on snakes and lizards.  For the record, I DO NOT LIKE SNAKES!!!  They creep me out!  I still recall the time when I had to take an animal biology class in college.  As soon as I purchased my textbook for the class, I went through all the pages with pictures of snakes and then carefully cover each one with a piece of paper just so I wouldn’t get freaked out when I read that page.  Apparently I did such a great job that a friend who borrowed my biology textbook the following quarter couldn’t understand what the book was saying when describing snakes.  She was so confused that she had to talk to me.  It was then I revealed to her that I had covered all the snake pictures.  She was no longer confused but I still have the snake phobic after all these years.

When I did the school prep for this particular lesson, I told my husband that our children will have a biased view of this lesson.  I didn’t flash any snake pictures on our big screen.  Turns out that my children didn’t get a biased view of snakes despite my phobia.  They knew all about snakes.  When I started explaining how snakes move despite having no legs, the children already knew that it was because snakes had scutes or scales under their bellies that enable them to move.  They got so into the lesson that all of them decided they would be snakes and scoot on their bellies.  They even had a race!  Now, that’s as hands-on as we’ll ever get on learning about snakes.

Here are the kids scooting on their bellies on their snake race.  Notice the cute moo moo cow diaper my 2-year-old is wearing?  I love it.  So Adorable.  I get distracted easily.  I know.

The boys decided that they’d have a private race just between the two of them.

Now, I can handle these types of “snakes.”  I can even hug them, kiss them, and cuddle with them.  That’s my kind of “snakes.”

We recently finished Mystery of History Volume I.  Here are the children proudly displaying our time line.  It has been a very fun, enjoyable, and informative year with this curriculum as we studied from the beginning of time to the resurrection of Christ.  We especially enjoyed tracing the lineage of Jesus from Adam, which can be seen in the thread of yarn on our time line.  We have learned so much and we look forward to studying the second volume.

When you have children, “interruptions” defines your life.  Whether you’re engaging in a meaningful or trivial task, interruptions from the children will ALWAYS happen.

This morning right after I set up the screen for school, one child yelped in pain.  One of the siblings decided to leap on him.  So, before we could even start, we had an interruption.  Not a great start in the day. After some talking, apologizing, and relationship-mending, we are ready.

Half way through the lesson, the same child cried because he had a bloody nose.

Another interruption.

Nurse Mommy came to the rescue and took care of the bleeding nose.  Then, we discovered the the blood on the child’s shirt as well as on the couch!  There’s more work to be done.  So, we proceeded to take off the shirt and the couch cover off  to get the blood stain out.  (Can I just say that I’m thankful for these removable covers from Ikea?)

After removing the cushions, another discovery was found.  There was a lot, and I mean a lot of fish food pellets between all the cushions.  Apparently, the youngest culprit dumped out the fish food a while ago without our knowledge. I took the vacuum cleaner out and cleared out all the fish pellets.

Where were we again?  Ah, let’s see, somewhere in the lesson.  But, we managed to pick it up and finished the lesson.

We transitioned to a different subject.  While the boys worked alongside me, the youngest one came down, needing a diaper change.

Another interruption.

Before I went off, I reminded the boys to keep on working even though I’m not physically there.  Five minutes later when I returned, I found the boys had stopped working while I was away.  Their disobedience needed to be addressed so I took the time to talk to them, which resulted in . . . .

Another interruption.

We worked on the lesson for some more until the kids started to get hungry.  I left for a while to heat up some leftovers for lunch, which of course translated into. . . .

Another interruption.

Today’s interruptions were par for the course: a very typical day.  I always set out to do what we need to accomplish, but it doesn’t always happen the way it ought to.  It’s frustrating because a task takes twice or three times as long to accomplish.  “Can’t we just get on without any more interruptions?!!!”  That’s an impossible feat, I’ve learned, when you have children.

When we are inflexible with the schedule or are under the pressure to complete a lesson or task within a given day, any interruption is frowned upon, let alone the mass of interruptions that I typically experience.  However, I’m learning to accept the fact that interruptions are a normal course of life and that they offer teaching opportunities.  Remembering to keep this perspective in mind isn’t easy.  In many ways we are driven by our goals and deadlines so that we forget that it is through interruptions that teachable moments arise.  What’s amazing is that interruptions provide teachable moments for both the parents and the children.  So, the next time when you’re ready to complain about the umpteenth interruption you’ve already had, rest in the idea that you can use unwelcomed interruptions as a valuable lesson.