Summer Winds Down

Today is the beginning of the end of summer around here.  Two more weeks of summer camp left  here at our house and then back to school for the bigger kids and daycare routine for the younger kids.  I have been getting Dakota's 4th grade work ready to go for the past few months, but I have made serious progress in the last week as the pressure to get it all organized sets in.  He is doing A History of Us this year and I am very excited about it.  I have gone through book one and there is an activity there for every day that I think he will enjoy.  He will start health with recognizing behavior patterns and how to control his behavior, something he desperately needs.  Claude Monet will be our artist to study.  Math is all set with the Abeka curriculum and there is the latest Magic Tree House book to read, although it's too easy for him at this point.  He loves those stories and there is a fact book with this one that we can use to build on it.

Today he and his friend that is here did some cartooning, played three games of Elimination, a dice game, and spent the better part of an hour making minecraft faces with perler beads.  They joined the little ones outside for awhile and laid on the blanket reading.  He's started reading Who Is Roald Dahl and I am hoping it catches his attention, since he has really enjoyed all the Roald Dahl books he has read.

This afternoon all is quiet as the kids either nap or watch a movie.  Marmaduke has them all engaged and 5 of the 6 little ones are napping while the last one valiantly fights with his eyelids to try and stay awake.