Fluey Bluey

The tummy bug, stomach flu, gastroenteritis has hit our family. The kids and I were affected, to various degrees. Sarah has just been feeling under the weather and without too much appetite. Gabriel has loose stools once to twice a day. On Thursday, Ben and I were down, really down. It was then that I realised how much energy it takes to run the family during the daytime. I had a fever, though I didn't feel warm on the surface, so I did not think of taking a panadol til much later in the afternoon. It started at 4 am, Thursday morning, when Ben came into our room, whining. He had vomited in his bed. He proceeded to climb onto our bed and vomited there too. So we began the big clean up, new bed sheets. Ben, meanwhile had been bathed and changed, and sat in the bathroom near the toilet. I made him a Ribena drink, which he drank all but 2 mouthfulls. Then soon, he vomited onto the toilet floor, on the mat. So that went to the wash too, the floor had to be cleaned up as well. In the meantime, I myself had not been feeling too well. Nauseous from the night before, and very groggy all the while I was cleaning up. I started a load of laundry in the machine (the bedsheets), and went back to our newly made bed.

The sun rose, and I couldn't quite get up. The rest of the day passed in a blur. I had no strength to make breakfast. All I wanted to do was sleep. I gave Ben a dry cracker and some water. Ben had some of the dry cracker, Gabriel had some too with his milk. Sarah wanted soft boiled eggs *horror! I had no energy to do that for her!*. I managed to make an egg for Sarah, sleeping for 7 minutes while it 'cooked'. She did the rest herself (toast, butter etc). Ben vomited his cracker. I cleaned up. Slept again. Soon the kids came and slept on my bed with me. Then the runs hit me. From late morning, I was more or less living in the toilet. Sleeping between toilet visits. Sometimes the visits might be 5 minutes apart. I rehydrated when possible, but mostly I slept.

Soon, I felt I needed to fix lunch for Sarah and Gabriel, if not for Ben and myself. So I dragged myself out of bed and cooked a small amount of rice porridge with 'mui choy' (preserved silverbeet stewed with duck and pork). No, I didn't make that mui choy. It was providential that I had bought some from the market on Wednesday. So I just mixed it into the porridge.

Lunch time came, nobody ate. I forced myself to eat two tablespoons. Too tired to eat, I gave Ben and Gabriel instructions to finish their own meal and went back to bed. Sarah said she didn't want any.

When I next woke, Sarah had come to my bed, Ben had gone to his own bed and was fast asleep, and Gabriel had laid his head on the table and was fast asleep too. All their porridge had not been eaten.

Well, to cut a long story short, it was a day of more vomits.... sofa cushions, floor, clothes and finally at night, another bedsheet and pillowcase and lots of cloth diapers supposed to line said bedsheet and pillow. Some underwear. A new set of PJs. I just didn't have the energy to do anything at all. After I had taken the Panadol, I started sweating and feeling a tad better. Then i realised that I had had a fever all along. *duh*. Dinner was not much different. Gary bought fish porridge, which nobody really ate.

Today, it's Saturday, appetites are improving slightly. Friday's breakfast was good though. Kids demanded pancakes, and ate them. But today, everyone has been really tired. Me included, so off to bed I go now. Good night.

All Aboard!

Getting Ben on board our homeschooling journey has not been easy. He's a very contrary boy. When I'm busy with Sarah, he will keep badgering me to school him. When I've finished with Sarah, and it's finally his turn, he'll turn away and says he doesn't want to do school.

This past week, I've finally given him a 'big' desk of his own during school time. I've made lots of alphabet and number tracing sheets (from Christ Centered Curriculum) copies. When Sarah is schooling, Ben does tracing (or Chinese writing). That has helped keep him occupied and focused. Once Sarah's is done and perhaps busy with written work, Ben is more cooperative and will continue to sit for his lesson.

Only drawback is that with this new table open, Gabriel has bumped his eye and head into the corner a few times already. He's not used to it being there. I'm thinking of hanging some tassels from the table.

An affirmation of our homeschool programme has been Sarah's good results in her Chinese language tests conducted by her Chinese enrichment class. She even did very well in Oral!!

We're boosting the kids' oral now by giving them Bible verses in Chinese to memorize.

Hiiii! I'm Baaaaaaccck

From where? Nowhere, actually. Just a long (and lazy) hiatus. Heh heh.

I guess it's good to put my thoughts into words, only thing is, sometimes, I'm just too lazy to do so. Hence the hiatus. I really should find a regular time to do this. I thrive on schedules. *snigger*

Homeschooling has been great. We're progressing down the academic alley. Even Benjamin is starting to come on board more regularly.

I've recently started them on Training Hearts Teaching Minds, by Starr Meade (what a name!) a devotional based on the Westminster Shorter Catechism. This is supplemented by the WSC in songs which we play in the car. To their credit, the kids now know the first 28 Q and A of the WSC! We're still on Q1 in the devotional, though.

Our other subjects are progressing normally. Sarah's Chinese is improving, though we are still not successfully conversing regularly with her. She has now started to write 笔记 for each chapter, often with great pools of tears and frayed nerves. But then, it's nil sine labore, right?

She just took part in her first gymnastics competition, at IDP1. She's only be training at this level for 2 months. She only participated in the Vault. It was a good experience. Will post photos at a later time. Her team-mates did well enough for all of them to win overall team 1st. So she got a shiny gold medal in addition to her participation medal. Mummy learnt to tie her hair in the 'pineapple' style, and also not to assume that all notifications from the gym for her level are also meant for her, personally.

We've also been quite under the weather for the past month or two. Flu here, skin infections and impetigo, cough, cold, then I've just completed a course of antibiotics for tonsillitis and sinusitis. Feb 8th, I had surgery to excise an enlarged axilliary lymph node for biopsy. Thank God, it went well, and the results were as expected : dermopathic lymphadenitis. That's a good result despite it's long name. Better than Lymphoma or something to that effect. Anyway, there's still the Mondor's cords here to remind me of the surgery. Sarah is now down with a bad throat again. *sigh* when is it going to end?

Right here. Til next time.

Things to do

Need to re-plan social studies/National Education curriculum from scratch.

Need to look into making a list of mini-book ideas for lapbooking.

So that's what I'm currently into.

1st post of the New Year

OK OK.... I promised to blog weekly. So this is my first for 2011. Been too busy otherwise.

We're officially homeschooling this year. So far, the core subjects have been going pretty well. The time table needs some adjustment, but we're getting used to the routine, and learning what can and cannot be done in the time we have. Here's a run down for Sarah's curriculum:

English/Phonics

Rod and Staff is really easy to follow. It seems to be clear in explanation, and has an adequate amount of drill which can be done both orally and as written work.

We still do Christ Centered Curriculum Phonics, once a week. Sarah enjoys that and continues to learn a lot from that programme.

To supplement it all, she does some Cloze Passage exercises every now and then. (Must keep up with the Singapore curriculum, after all).

Maths

We are continuing with Right Start Math B. It's fun for Sarah, with a mix of arithmetic and geometry. She is very serious about Maths, which is great.

She also does some exercises from a local 'Assessment Book' to keep her up to date with the local stuff.

Chinese

She's on Book 1B already because we started 1A last year. She seems to be enjoying her Chinese, especially as she can learn the textbook material online. We're really trying so hard to speak to her in Chinese every night, but sometimes we forget.

I confess that I don't have much time for her to review what she learns at her enrichment classes apart from doing the 听写 (spelling) with her. Her Chinese is improving and she can actually speak in sentences now.

She also does pages from a revision book every week or so.

Science

Building Foundations for Scientific Understanding (BFSU) is really great! Fun, and simple, yet covering the basic concepts.

Apologia is going slower though, because the timeslot alloted to it has been constantly missed. I must re-adjust this, so that she can still read her Apologia Science.

Art

Sarah's art has never been her forte. With our Artistic Pursuits art programme, she has been enjoying doing art, and getting the idea of how to do art. So I would say it's quite successful. She looks forward to her art lessons every Monday afternoon.

Social Studies & Latin

Social Studies has been quite a disappointment. The Primary 1 textbook and workbook are so simplistic, it's a laugh! I think I have to plan my own curriculum when I have the time to.

We're on Lesson 3 for Latin. Sarah has a vocabulary of about 20 words, and has learnt about verbs, vowels, consonants, diphthongs. She can also recite the Sanctus.

Gymnastics

8 hours a week, 3x per week. New competition leotard cost $100. Mummy had to learn how to do her ultra-short hair neatly. Need I say more?

That's all for now.

Certified!

Yes!! We've got our COE! To a Singaporean - the COE is the Certificate of Entitlement to buy a new car. But that's not the COE we managed to get. We got a Certificate of Exemption from Compulsory Education. So now it's time to get down to the schemes of work and scheduling.

Last week, Sarah was conferred the title of "Gymnast of the Year" for her class in Prime Gymnastics Club. It was a surprise to us. She was elated, and couldn't stop talking about it for a few days. Well, I hope she'll be able to get "homeschooler of the year" from us in the coming year.

Holidays! Milestones

It's holidays again. Til the end of the year. We've started our homeschool holidays 2 weeks early because the kids have been signed up for some intensive Chinese classes every day for the next 3 weeks. Ben is going for Speech and Drama, and Sarah for Oral and Comprehension.

I hope to do tidying up and spring cleaning of the WHOLE house, but bit by bit of course. Send kids for class, come home and tidy up for 1 hour before fetching them. Don't know if it'll work, because alas, I realise I must also prepare lunch! Gymnastics is still ongoing 3x a week.

Milestones

Yesterday, at Mama and GongGong's place, Sarah finally hopped onto a two-wheeler all by herself, pushed herself off, and rode down the road. She then turned and rode back. I was so proud of her accomplishment. We had been running with her wobbling about for ages, so this was really a proud moment.

Sunday School - Sarah is now in the bigger kids class, P1-P3. With Aunty Mei as teacher. They have just begun a new series called Children Desiring God by John Piper. Sarah remarked that she liked Aunty Mei's class, and went up to Aunty Mei to tell her. An encouraging moment for Aunty Mei indeed.

Ben is now without his sister in his Kindergarten Sunday School class At first he refused to attend, I had to take him in and sit him on my lap. But once he saw what the others were doing, he joined in, and everything was OK from there.

Gabriel now feeds himself rice at mealtime. He must have his white rice alone first before he'll eat any other protein or vege. Strange behaviour. He has also begun to tell us when he needs to poo. Great! He talks in sentences, but most of the time, I cannot decipher what he is saying.

Today's sermon was a summary of Ephesians. The main thrust was the grace and peace of God bestowed upon us in Jesus Christ. Wonderful Grace of Jesus. And the deep deep love of the Lord in electing, calling and justifying us. May we meditate on this and find this love and peace in our hearts so that we too can share this love and peace with others.