Learning By The Way » Children

Confusing Hebrew cartoon of the day

Theresa — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 04:33:39 +0000

So just the other day, Toby read Psalm 119 for his Bible time (yes, the whole thing). And it got him interested in the Hebrew alphabet. So while I was reading the prologue to the Canterbury Tales to the children(we are studying the middle ages), he was practicing writing the Hebrew alphabet.

The joy of having a well stocked library is being able to pull a beginning primer in Hebrew off the shelf and hand to it someone with an interest in learning. So I did. And Toby practiced block Hebrew letters, script Hebrew letters, and explained to me how vowels work in Hebrew.

And then from the delightfully different recesses of Toby’s brain, he drew this cartoon. Enjoy.

Happy New Year (and some news about the children) (James)

James — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 10:06:24 +0000

Yes, I know I don’t usually post here, but I’ve resolved ordinarily not to post more than once a day on the other blog, and I’ve been on a roll lately in posting about a particular topic that will likely go on for a bit. And this topic actually seemed to appeal just as much to my wife’s many faithful readers as it did to the fewer number who frequent my blog.

This week, as is our practice, we did our year end measurements of the children on the back of the pantry door. Margary of course grew the most, moving from just shy of two months old to just shy of fourteen months. Moriah, though, didn’t get beat by much in the growth category. She has shot up this year, growing several inches. Another year like this and she’ll be looking Aunt Raquel in the eye.

In a surprising move, Toby has overtaken Samuel as the tallest boy in the house. He’s only 3/8 of an inch taller, but a full few inches taller than Samuel (who is 13 months older) was this time last year. Samuel is still quite a bit taller than Moriah (16 months his senior) was last year, lest you think he’s going to be short. Moriah seems to be hitting that typical girl early growth spurt as she approaches her 12^th birthday, so it may be a few years before the boys actually pass her up.

Elsie shot up a bit this year as well, and next year she’ll start having a comparison to Moriah at the same age (Elsie is 7 now and the first year we measured Moriah was 8). I’ve always thought of Elsie as being short, but it appears that’s more subjective than real, because she is growing quicklyâ€”she just has taller siblings because they’re older. So with our third new year in this house we’re eagerly watching to see which girl is going to be the tallest of our three.

Peter is still fairly big for his age, and it’ll be another year before we can compare him to Toby at the same age. At this point my guess is that Samuel will be about the same height as his papa and Toby and Peter will be looking down at me in my old age, and both older girls will be looking down upon their mother. Growth is a funny thing, though, so we’re waiting to see what kind of frame God gives each of our six blessings in their adult lives, which are coming all too quickly.

I’m looking forward to it.

Writing Your Roots

Theresa — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 19:59:39 +0000

We started our new writing curriculum today. I am very excited about it. It is called Write Your Roots. Upon completion of the full year of curriculum, we will have a book filled with stories recording our family history.

In addition to questions to help us discover our writing styles, we had a writing assignment. Write a vignette (basically a piece of historical fiction) describing someone you know. Here is Samuel’s vignette about his baby sister.

Margary
by Samuel
Margary sees Einstein at the top of the steps. She gets excited and starts slapping the ground. Then she starts crawling up the steps, jabbering to herself in baby language. “Aba, ba, ba.” She keeps stopping to look up at Einstein. When she gets to the top, she keeps hitting him and pulling his hair, imitating the big children when they pet Einstein and scratch behind his ears.

Moriah’s first decade celebration and trip, part 1

Theresa — Sat, 25 Mar 2006 19:58:35 +0000

Moriah had her 10th birthday on Valentine’s Day. To celebrate her first decade of life, we took a trip to St. Louis, just the two of us. First stop was a teahouse, The Enchanted Rose, in Lebanon, IL. We had their Mom and Me tea with some yummy Apple Butter Chai Rooibos, and little tea sandwiches. We dressed up and had a wonderful time. I know, because Moriah said about a dozen times “I just LOVE this place!”

Moriah’s first decade celebration and trip, part 2

Theresa — Sat, 25 Mar 2006 19:58:35 +0000

From the tea room, we went to our hotel in Collinsville. We swam in the pool and stayed up way too late seeing if the wounded duck which was rescued on Animal Cops: Detroit lived. (She did). The next morning, we went to Cahokia Mounds Museum, where they have excavated several mounds. Then it was on to St. Louis, where we had lunch at Fitz’s and watched them bottle cream soda while we ate. (Of course, we did make a little detour at a bookstore on the way there- I bought a book about restoring old windows).

Moriah’s first decade celebration and trip, part 3

Theresa — Sat, 25 Mar 2006 19:58:36 +0000

After lunch, we went to the St. Louis Art Museum. It was grand. Now, I have to tell you, when we were planning where to go on this trip, Moriah wanted to go to Chicago to see Degas’ Little Dancer. After researching though, we discovered that the Little Dancer was in the Louvre. I told her that wasn’t an option! So we settled on St. Louis. Well, unbeknownst to us, the Art Museum there has a cast of the Little Dancer taken from Degas’ original work in 1920. Moriah was ecstatic. We saw Monets, Van Goghs, and made lots of new discoveries. The ancient Egypt section with its mummys and really, truly canopic jars was a special hit with Moriah as we had just been studying that.