MFW EX1850: Week Two

Starting out the second week of school with getting wisdom teeth removed was not the best planning on my part.  I spent the day in bed sleeping off the anesthesia as well as the Vicodin.  I haven't had to take many pain killers in my lifetime, and I'm pretty sure the side effects of this one was worse than the pain it was masking.  I stopped taking it the next afternoon, when I realized that the pain wasn't quite as bad as I thought it would be (I thought it would be really bad).  I think I was more nervous about getting my wisdom teeth out than I ever remember being about impending labor and childbirth.  (Of course, the memory of that pain fades so much anyways.  Plus, I was so uncomfortable leading up to it and that it seemed a relief.  And I got the bonus of a baby in my arms.)  Anyways, I figured it would be more painful than when I got my braces on as an adult, but the braces were much worse.  I really was pleasantly surprised with the level of pain I had this week.  I don't remember much from the first day, and I did take the Vicodin for about 36 hours and then kept a steady dose of Motrin in my body, so it really only hurt if I moved my mouth a lot, i.e. yawning or smiling.  I was even eating mostly regular food after a few days.

Meanwhile, my awesome husband took over schooling duties for the day so we didn't fall behind just six days into our school year.  While I was still a little loopy the next day, Chris had to go back to work and I resumed most of my teaching duties.

This week we mostly read about what was going on back in Europe at the time (early 1500s) and one of those things was King William of Orange coming to power in the Netherlands.  The kids decided to be silly and shorten it to King Orange when they drew on their notebook pages.

We also talked about Queen Mary of Scotland (who was later kicked out of Scotland and was then locked up for 18 years by her cousin Elizabeth I, Queen of England).  And since we were talking about Scotland, why not whip up a batch of a Scottish dessert, shortbread?

Not having gone to church all that often growing up, I don't know many traditional hymns.  I love that this school year we will be learning some.  Our first is "This Is My Father's World", one that we learned in the kindergarten curriculum from MFW.  My boys are not so enthusiastic about singing, but they still go along with it.

We started our memorization of the book of James this week also.  I'm memorizing it as well and we're all doing great.  I'm requiring it of my two older sons (nine and eleven), but Gabriel (six), who memorized his Awana book in just a few months last year, is picking up on it quite well also.

One of my favorite things that we do for school is our letter writing.  Every Friday the kids will write a letter to a different family member or friend and quite often they get a letter back.  I remember exchanging letters with my grandparents when I was their age, and I hope they will think this is special as they look back on it.  We are so far away from all of our family and I want them to feel like they have more of a connection with that other than visiting with them once or twice a year.

Everything is going pretty well other than that.  I hope you have a great week!