Trying...

Tuesday, the only thing we had on the agenda was a committee meeting for the 4-H Holiday Party. I have a few gripes about the meeting but I don't think I'll get into them here. I will let you in on a brag though - they were trying to figure how to solve the ultimate dilemma of too many desserts and no food at the potluck and Cameron came up with the solution. He suggested that everyone bring both a dessert and something healthy. Sure, there will still be a ton of sweets, but then it will at least be balanced with an equal number of other foods, regardless of how many people come. In previous years they've assigned people entree, salad, or desert based on their last name but then it ends up unbalanced when there are no-shows or rebels. So, even though the role of the kids at the meeting was less than I like to see, their suggestions were taken seriously (the meeting leaders just had to be reminded to actually ASK the children for their input).

After the meeting we had to go pick up our meat buying club meat. We've switched from a medium to a large order and got lots of roasts this time. I think I'm going to have to put a touch of effort into menu planning though so that I actually take things out to thaw. (Hmm, what is for dinner tonight? Nothing is thawed!) There should've been plenty of time to do other stuff too, but I somehow never got around to anything. I felt a bit achy, which progressed to my skin feeling like it was on fire during dinner, which progressed to chills and a 101 fever not long after that. A good night's sleep did wonders though and *knock on wood* I haven't had a fever since about 5:30 this morning.

Today we had nothing on the schedule at all for the first time in ages so that took all the pressure off the day. Cameron built a Tie Fighter out of Legos and I made Cassia turn off Sesame Street (her newest addiction) and read her a few fairy tales, including this version of Hansel and Gretel. I actually managed to get a few loads of laundry done AND once Grey went down for his nap around 3:30 we did schoolwork. Cameron read The Three Billy Goats Gruff from a book of tall tales we have for reading. He complained A TON about the writing being too small and it being too hard and everything else but once he finally did it, he realized that the language in the book was actually much easier for him to read than the DK Readers he's been struggling so much with! He even tried to give the troll a scary voice while he was reading. Next Cassia did a phonics lesson on "ck." She was pretty rusty at first, but ended up reading very well. Math was fun because the lesson was on estimating one liter and then checking yourself. The kids waaaaaaayyyyyyyyyy underestimated by saying a 5 gallon bucket would hold two liters, lol, but I think they really gained some conceptual knowledge from the process. We finished up with history and I read them the story of China's first Emperor, Qin Shi Huang, and his terracotta army. They were not the slightest bit enthused by it though Cameron did a good job of at least pretending to be interested. Cassia complained that history was boring since we never do the maps and coloring pages anymore. I agreed that if they'd stop complaining and procrastinating so much about the whole process that I'd make sure I found the time for the fun stuff too.

So, all in all, it's been a pretty productive day. I think I just got a big burst of motivation when I realized that I wasn't going to spend the whole day in the throes of fevered chills. Thank goodness! Now let's just hope that it was a minor 24-hr bug thing and that I'll be right as rain tomorrow. My dad is coming over this weekend and I have a lot of cleaning to do before then.