Catching up

Where have I been?  Boring, mundane, everyday life.  Although, as some of you have reminded me, our "mundane" is not so mundane to many of you.  We have lots of people coming and going constantly and our guest room rarely goes a week without being occupied (actually, I don't know that it has ever gone a week without being occupied).  Now that we are homeschooling the result is constant chaos...rather, let's call it constant controlled chaos.  Yes, controlled...in theory.  

I'm still trying to figure out exactly how we want to go about homeschooling.  It is difficult to keep any kind of schedule here because the exception is the rule.  Every day is an exception.  I've also struggled with deciding which grade level to teach them at.  The grades they would be in here differ from what they were in in America.  For now I'm just teaching each subject for each kid at the level of their knowledge/ability.  Imagine that!  Finding the limit of their knowledge and expanding it!  That is one decided advantage of teaching at home.  So...Rosie is in 6th grade spelling, 3rd grade grammar, 2nd grade maths (in fairness to her, the math I've chosen is rather more difficult/advanced than the one she was doing in America and probably matches up to 3rd/4th grade).  Charlotte is doing 1st grade grammar, 2nd grade spelling, and 1st grade maths.  Liam is nearly done with what I am going to call Kindergarten or Reception.  He's starting to read well and his handwriting is improving even though we haven't started a handwriting program.  He's also doing grade 1 maths.  (a note here: in South Africa the subject is called Maths and not Math.  The kids picked up on the difference while in school and we've kept the "s" in our daily usage.  Saying "math" sounds funny to people here and a little childish...which is, of course, how "maths" sounds to Americans).  

All of the children are learning Latin, Afrikaans, and Venda, though we're not requiring written work yet.  Most people here are bi- or trilingual and it has given me the confidence to say "why not?" about the languages.  It is truly amazing to watch children here switch from one language to the other seamlessly.  It is quite common to see an adult carrying on a conversation with 2 different people in two different languages simultaneously.  Several friends have been surprised to know that most Americans speak only one language ("That's so weird!").  Our kids haven't gotten good at separating the languages  yet so we end up with some funny phrases like, "Dankie mater."  

But enough of the homeschooling news...I'm sure I've bored the non-homeschooling readers to tears.  Pictures?  But I am going to be that way and start with pictures of our homeschool on a "typical" day (meaning today).  Actually, the very first picture isn't from today.  It's from a mythical day of ages past when the house was perfectly clean.  I thought it would be nice to give perspective on what the room looks like as a whole.  

The girls doing their maths lessons.  I was eating my breakfast...and taking pictures.

When they have work to complete on their own they take it to their desks.  Here's Rosie working on handwriting this morning.  

Lunch time!  Henry was being extra cute.  Ok, ok, he's always extra cute.

The middle of our day is usually quiet reading time.  Henry falls asleep most days and the girls read in their room.  Liam...well...in theory he reads books on his bed.  Now that he can read more I think the reality will catch up to the theory.  

This afternoon the kids decided to make a restaurant in the side garden behind the koi pond (no koi...really more of a mosquito breeding pond but we do try to keep it drained)

Charlotte sweeping the ground in the rockery.  Yes, this house has a rockery.  Just go with it. 

Perspective.  I was standing in the rockery and looking toward the front gate when I took this picture.  The front door is to the left.

Welcome to the Magical Restaurant!  Perry is your maitre d.  

On staff we have one of the finest African chefs of our time.  He spent his early years studying in America at the famous "Midnight Cafe" near Nashville.  

The chef discusses the menu with another satisfied customer.

On the other side of the garden the girls were digging a hole.  

And now it's 6:15pm and dinner is cooking and the kids are playing outside with torches.  Winter is coming, so it gets dark just before 6 now.  James will be home late so we'll be having a late dinner and late bed time.