Maybe we should've watched "Thor"

This was one of those weeks where I would’ve like to have stayed home every day. (And by “one of those weeks,” I mean it was a regular week. I have hermit-istic tendencies.) Alas, the children have activities every day but today. I think all the running around on the other days makes today all the sweeter, though, especially since it’s 20-something degrees and icy outside and I don’t have to leave the house at all.

History

Viking Longship — This is the best Viking ship I’ve ever had a hand in building.

I found the Vikings fascinating when I was a kid (still do), but they didn’t seem to capture Poppy’s imagination all that much. The only thing she was really enthusiastic about in history this week was building our Viking longboat, which we did this afternoon following the instructions from LooLeDo.com. They also have a nice video about the process:

You can read Poppy’s take on Vikings on her blog, which we remember to update periodically.

Handwriting

Pete has been asking for awhile now if I’d order a handwriting curriculum for him, so I finally got McRuffy’s Kindergarten Handwriting. And he hated it almost immediately. I’m not sure what he was expecting, but I’m pretty sure he didn’t think I’d make him redo his work if he rushed through it.

Reading

It’s looking like Poppy might not get to her 1,000-page goal for the BookIt program this month, even though she finished two Magic Tree House books this week. She didn’t want to read anything that wasn’t one of the MTH books she had on hold at the library, and she had to wait about a week for them. So she’s fallen behind quite a bit. Maybe next time she’ll just read something else in the meantime!

Pete hasn’t quite mastered this week’s Bob book, so we’ll keep at it next week. He’s picking out words here and there on signs, etc. We’re making progress.

Extracurricular

Pete practiced dribbling in the garage earlier this week, and Rockford reports that he had a very good basketball practice. His first game, last weekend, went well. He passed the ball both times it was in his possession, and his team did pretty well. They don’t keep score at this level, so I can’t tell you for certain whether or not they won.

The heat at the ballet studio went out moments before Poppy’s ballet class this week, so she had a very chilly 45 minutes. Picture eight little parka-clad girls leaping around the studio.

Poppy completed the requirements for her first American Heritage Girls badge this week. It was the “Internet Adventurer” badge, and it took her about half an hour to complete. She read most of the handbook this week and has decided that she wants to earn almost every badge.