PB and J

Paul took Nadia to the pet store on Saturday in conjunction with doing the grocery shopping for the week. They came home with a guinea pig whom Nadia named Peppa. Paul commented that our three guinea pigs first initials spell out PB and J. Buttercup purrs the most, but Peppa also purrs far more than Jenna. Peppa is the most adventurous of any of the four guinea pigs we've owned. Ian took Buttercup outside for the first time today. Jenna loves to eat grass when she's outside, but Buttercup didn't try eating any grass.

I pulled Oliver's loose tooth yesterday. It was the sixth tooth that he's lost. The dentist has pulled four, and I have pulled two. No copay or Novocain is needed when I pull teeth. Nadia enjoyed being the "tooth fairy" last night.

We listened to two sermons today - one by Tony Evans that was recorded in March and one livestream by Andy Stanley. Last night we listened to a livestream by Michael W Smith and others (including one song by Amy Grant).

The weather was nicer today. PTL! I walked with Oliver for the first time in over a week. Unfortunately he fell off his scooter once and scraped his knee and chin. He was wearing a helmet, but maybe this child needs bubble wrap? I had suggested he use his bike instead of the scooter. I think he'll take my advice next time. I also mowed the lawn. It felt heavenly to be outside. Hopefully I can take several walks this week.

I've been working on planning social studies for next year. We won't be doing much history at all. Our focus will be geography, culture, and economics. One chapter book we will be reading together is Whatever Happened to Penny Candy? We will be trying new recipes from around the world, enjoying chapter books that take place all around the world, reading a wide variety of folktales and fairy tales, doing multicultural art projects, learning the location of most countries of the world (as well as the provinces of Canada), and celebrating holidays from around the world.

I have included some library books in my plans. I assume the library has to reopen at some point during the year even if things might be done differently and we might need to wear masks to pick up our books and DVDs. Most of the writing assignments for the year will relate to social studies such as rewriting some fairy tales to change the setting to a different continent, writing poems about each continent, and writing five country reports over the course of the year. Nadia and Ian will each choose one country from North America, South America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. I'm also going to have them give weekly oral current event reports as if they were a reporter on TV about what is happening around the world. I think I'll have to add one stipulation that it has to be something unrelated to the coronavirus. I do enjoy lesson planning even though there are many unknowns at this point due to COVID-19. I have a lengthy list of audiobooks for us to enjoy together, and I'm working on lists of chapter books for Nadia and Ian to choose from for some of their independent reading.