Square dancing and Nate the great goalie

This morning we read the next chapter in little house in the big woods.  We then looked up learn how to square dance videos on YouTube and spent the rest of the morning square dancing.  Nathan was not really wanting to dance with his sister, but you can tell he enjoyed it by the smile on his face. 

This was pretty fun to call out moves and Nate and Gigi did it, too bad daddy wasn't here and we could have had two couples. 

Next up hockey

Nathan tried out being goalie today, he has been wanting to for a long time.  We had to mcguiver the equipment to make it work for him a little.  The catcher I had to tape into him so it would not fall off as he didn't have the finger strength to hold the catcher on.  It also weighed a lot so taping it to his jersey helped redistribute the weight a little.  I am sure he played with two dislocated shoulders though as the weight must have put them out right away.   Another problem I hadn't for seen was that nathan can not stand in one spot for long.  He ended up having to sit down on the ice when the play wasn't in his end.  He made some pretty great saves and let in a few goals too.  He knew before trying it out that he would not be the greatest goalie as that requires some practice.  He wants to go back at it and try goalie again next week so that's great.  Even though he has a lot of pain tonight and a pretty good headache to go with it.  Physio is tomorow so hopefully she can put him back together again.  

Friday November 21

Friday DIY fun!

Genevieve was invited to stay at DIY today and she had a great time.  Both Nate and Gigi enjoyed the guest speaker and learned a few things about owls they did not know before.  

After DIY we had lunch and then went on a play date.  

Saturday nathan had a soccer game, thankfully my dad came down to take nathan to the game as Gigi had soccer at the same time.  I think grandpa is enjoying taking nathan to his games as they really are getting quite fun to watch. It was another great game and the chilliwack tornados remain undefeated. 

When I dropped off Gigi at cheer the head coach wanted to talk to me, I was five minutes late dropping Gigi off, thought I might be in trouble.   But know she wanted to talk to me about how Genevieve was doing.  She said that they had wanted to put her on the level 2 youth team this year, but since she did not have her back handspring and they really needed the extra girls for the mini team, she decided to keep her on the mini team.  She asked me if she could now put Genevieve on the level 1 youth team right now though as the team was struggling a little and could really use Genevieve's strength's on the team.   She said Genevieve is a very quick to pick up new routines and she though she would be able to learn the routine quickly.  The team has been working together since September and has their routine already, so poor Gigi will have to really learn her part quickly.  She also told me that Genevieve would most definitely be on the youth level 2 team next year.  I am very happy for Genevieve to make the level 2 team.  Her tumbling skills are not what the other girls on the level 2 team have but all of her other skills are right up there.  The coach also believes Gigi is so close to achieving the tumbling skills required for a level 2 team.  You can only imagine the level of joy this brought to Genevieve!   It means she will be at cheer now, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and thankfully Saturday, both teams practice at the same time so no extra time for mommy, she will just be jumping back and forth.  

I can really get used to waking up to my bathroom being cleaned

They are still loving the checklist, I woke up to Nathan cleaning my bathroom, and when I went downstairs, Genevieve had already started a load of laundry.

We have been trying to look at our schedules at dinner time to discuss what we are doing the next day, and the kids are looking at them first thing in the morning and liking to get what they need to get done in the morning .

I started this morning by reading our chapter in little house in the big woods together, so after we finished reading and answering the discussion questions we could split up and one do math and the other do MBTP.  It was such a wonderful plan, but as I was getting Nathan set up, gigi was calling saying she needed help, I said just move on to the next question, but she then said, no mom the computer is not working.  Did I mention that we bought Genevieve a used computer for her birthday?  Well we ended up taking that computer back twice, getting a new one and finally taking that one back.  We ended up buying a brand new one from Costco, and now this 30 day old computer had a blue screen.  So I googled it and what shows up but blue screen of death, so what do I do but panic a little thinking that the computer was seriously dead!  Anyway after trying several things myself to fix the problem, I located my Costco bill and called the concierage, 5 minutes later my computer was fixed.  But I did not call them until after we were done homeschooling.  So no math was completed today.

thankfully not the blue screen of death

We were busy enough with what we did get accomplished.  I am always amazed at how long it takes us to do the MBTP stuff.  It seems like we never have enough time in the day.  We filled in the then and now pages, where we contrast how life is different in the book from how it is now.  They worked at a page hat they had to order the steps in making maple sugar that were told in the book.

Next they worked on a vocabulary minibook.  We didn't even do all of the pages in the book yet, and it took us forever, I even printed for Nathan.  For each word they had to locate it in the book, a page number was given to find it on.  Next they had to record the definition, write a sentence of their own and then draw a picture.  There were 9 cards.

this was a lot of work, but Nathan even had a couple of words he did not know, I think he was excited about that

whetstone was one of the words Nathan did not know, sumac was the other

Next up was science and the science of Dirt and Plants.  We discussed herbaceous and woody plants, on the way out the door to hockey we stopped to look in our garden to see if we could see what plants were woody or herbaceous.  They completed a worksheet on what plants need to survive.  

Hockey- 2 hrs, Gigi had a fantastic game, and stopped many shots from going in, also had many people come up and say wow is that your girl :)

cheer - 1.5 hrs

Tuesday

Schedule is definitely working out nicely, I woke up to the washing machine going, as Nathan had brought down laundry and put in a load of laundry before I even woke up! 

Tuesday morning we started school about 9:30 as Nathan and Genevieve were excited to get their chores done, and I also made a big breakfast.   We started off reading chapter 11 in story of the world.  This chapter was about ancient Africa, and it discussed how the Sahara dessert was not always a desert and how archeologists know this.  We also read a couple of stories of anansi the spider.  As we were reading the beginning of the chapter, it was recapping where all the ancient civilizations were that we have read about so far.  We looked on our maps in the book, as well as our dry erase poster map.  After we were finished reading we did the discussion questions, and then we got out the dry erase world maps and I circled where the different continents were and we labeled the different continents.  You just asked Gigi about this on Monday Rebecca, and it was funny that continents were brought up in the book today, so I though it was a good idea to discuss continents.

hmm practicing flexibility at the same time as learning the continents

Nathans flexible enough

We then did moving beyond the page and math, I had them switch off.  This worked out quite well.  We managed to get most of what I wanted accomplished this morning and then we had a quick lunch and off to piano and voice lessons.

For moving beyond the page, they worked on some bear research, they had to do an internet search and find out information on bears.  They also wrote a 5 senses poem on their least favourite day of the week.  I agree Rebecca these poems are kinda neat, the kids found them so easy to write.

genevieves bear research

nathans bear research

genevieves poem, hmm wasn't I saying to you that gigis spelling was getting better...  I think she forgot here

looks like Nathan was trying to write as few words as possible

parts of a plant genevieve

parts of a plant Nathan

Math quiz 1 nathan

new schedules!

I was inspired by a kickstarter for planners to try and make us up some weekly planners.  At first I thought I could use the free one offered on the kickstarter, but I am sooo picky and I want it exactly how I want it.  So I made I myself instead.  The day is listed out in 1/2 hour blocks of time, and I have the timeslots colour coded for what we are doing at the time, just like our weekly schedule I did in September, I even tried to use the same colours.  I printed it out on legal sized paper so it is really big, so easier to write in.  The bottom part of the page, has a list of daily personal things for the kids to checklist off that they are required to do everyday that they can sometimes forget.  We also added a spot for chores.  We sat down Sunday evening and discussed the calendar, and that every Sunday we would sit down and pick our chores for the following week.  They are allowed to pick any two chores they like.  Nathan does not like change of course so this was initially hard for him to do, I showed the schedule I was making for him on Friday, again on Saturday, and asked him if he wanted to add or change anything on Sunday, so he was a little prepared and I did not just spring it on him.  We also discussed on Sunday what we were doing the next day and what was expected of them.

Monday morning rolled along and they were both excited to check off their checklist!  We drove jeff to the airport in the morning and then had to head right back home to meet up with Rebecca for our semester meeting.   One of Genevieves chore on Monday was to make lunch, so she made us all grilled cheese sandwiches including making one for Rebecca.  Oh that reminds me Rebecca in one of those captain books gigi read about the Earl of sandwich.  She thought that it was pretty funny that sandwich was actually someones name!  Nathan sharpened pencils, and Nathan's perfectionist personality it took him almost 2 hrs to sharpen the pencils.  Both Nathan and Genevieve managed to get their school work assigned to them completed on Monday.  I had shown them they had work in a folder to do, while we had teacher meeting, they had to work independently.

After meeting with Rebecca, I was ready to just have a relaxing afternoon, and Nathan was looking at his schedule and says to me, mom what time is it?  I said 1:30, he says well doesn't that mean we have to be getting ready for horse?  How could I forget we had horse riding on Monday?  And just as I was yelling at the kids to hurry up and get in the car, my parents show up.   So then I was trying to hurry and rush everyone out the door and get to horse about 20 minutes late....ooops.  I was glad my parents came, Nathan was a little more tired today during horse and did not get to show my parents his loping skills, but Nathan I could tell was happy that they saw him on his horse.

Daddy's home week, I know we did something!

Last week I know we did more school, we did do school everyday, but it was still lighter, than pre Nathan episode.  We did work on math everyday, and I think we worked on essay writing everyday.

We ended up with a completed essay from both Nathan and Genevieve! 

page 1

page 2

page 3

page 4 the end

nathans essay
 

Friday we worked on Canadian natives.  I got Genevieve and Nathan to work on a page of the pacific north west natives, and more specifically do a few pages for the Sto:lo people.  We discussed that they share many of the same cultures and traditions of the pacific north west but that they are distinct.  I asked Nathan and Genevieve to write a little on how the sto:lo are distinct from other cultures of the pacific north west.

Daddy's home week and I did not blog!

Well last week, we did get some work accomplished, not sure if I will remember it all but here goes...

Monday- science club

This months topic was trees.   Today's class was all over the map in what we actually did though.  The kids started out by going on a leaf hunt to get different coloured leaves.  They then crushed up these leaves to place in a specimen jar of ethol alchohol.  The teacher explained that they were going to draw out the different colours.  He explained why we would see different colours depending on the colour of the leaves.  He talked about that depending on the colour of the leaf it meant it had a certain chemicals in it to make it change colour, I think he mentioned chlorophyll and carotenes.  He explained this well, but I am the organizer of this event and I was organizing when this occurred so I didn't quite hear it all.  I think I need to research this some more as it sounded interesting.  So each group had a jar, we divided in groups of 3.  Each child had a piece of paper that they would write their name in that they stuck in the jar to see the chromatography.  They also had to label their jar with the date, name of experiment and student initials.  I thought this was great experience for the scientific method.   I don't think it was really important for them to label, but great to learn!  So the students then had to wait for the chromatography to happen, this was about 1/2 an hour.

dipping his paper for chromatography

whats funny about chromatography Gigi?

During the time waiting we had the students gather for another talk.  He then talked about nests and how birds build nests, where they build nest etc.  Students then divided up into their same groups and they had a bunch of random things to make a bird nest from, with one major hitch, they had to use a clothes pin to assemble the nests, to demonstrate how a bird would use its beak.  

our teacher today, I found him quite interesting

bird beak nest making

these boys are just too cute!

After building nests it was time to look at our chromatography.  We then jumped into groups again, for about 1/2 hour playing with electricity and circuits.  The groups had to build circuits and see which materials would be conductors or insulators.  They all seemed to have fun playing around with the batteries alligator clamps and light bulb.

these boys were definitely into electronic circuits, I think we will have to have a playdate with circuits

Yes I helped mom

Sto:lo field trip

We had another wonderful field trip on Friday.  We had a visit to the Sto:lo here in Chilliwack. 

 

This was such a wonderful field trip.  It started with an introduction which included a welcome drumming.  They also filled our bellies with bannock, so yummy.

 

We had about 45 mintues of questions and answers, about all kinds of culture traditons, and language.  We followed this by going on a guided tour of the interpretive centre.  Here we got to see how they fished both previously and how they fish now.  We say a 100 year old canoe.  We also sow more modern canoes. 

fish drying rack

 

Our guide showed us how to make a cedar bark bracelet, so we could understand and see how they made rope.

Nathan and his cedar bracelet, beside a modern made bullnose canoe

Genevieves finished bracelet

Tyler, Cody, Nathan, and Genevieve standing by the 100 year old canoe, and showing their finished bracelets!

We went inside the longhouse, next, and got to ask so many questions about what it was used for now and in the past.  How building of the longhouses has changed from previous generations.  We really enjoyed being able to ask so many questions.  They had two gas fires in the centre of the longhouse, we stood around and warmed up after, and it was wonderful as we had the guide to ourself during this time and were able to ask even more questions, and the kids don't seem to be as shy when asking questions in a small group.

 

Next we got to go on a nature walk with another guide.  She showed us how they respect plants, they ask permission before the use, and they have guidelines for using the plants, so they will not overharvest.  We found the best leaves to use in an emergency toilet paper need.  You can also use them to wrap up berries and crush them up and burry them. 

We then headed back into the main building for our goodbyes.  Annother drumming, and a gift is always given, we received a bookmark.   Simmone and I stayed and ate our lunch, we then showed the kids the display that showed the residential schools and explained about them.  The kids could not imagine a life where they were taken away from their parents. 

 

we wondered around by ourselves into the archives room.  Nathan and genevieve saw a picture explaining the ancestor rock, and said that it was the same rock in the front hall, I didn't believe them of course.  But the kids were right it was the rock, I thought it was a replica, and I did ask if it was okay the kids touch the rock.

 

I think both Genevieve and Nathan found this to be a really fantastic cultural experience, they were really quite into this.  They were very respectful about their beliefs and culture.  When I think about learning about cultures I rarely thing about learning about our own first Nations culture I mostly think it must be something far away to be interesting.  This tour has definitely sparked my interest and I am looking forward to learning more with the children as time goes on, I think a trip this summer up to Haida territory is definitely in order!  I think another important thing that was taught at this event was that all the different First Nations, are very distinct and had their own culture and languages.

 

 

 

Nathan trying out the drum, It was hand painted by the owner

Gigi drumming.  I tried it out as well, if felt really cool, I was not expecting the skin to be so hard.

this is the rock they believe to be their ancestor, they just got it back!

Nathan trying to pose like the picture above him

On another note, Nathan is not quite himself yet...  He did have another strange episode on Halloween, where the pathway to a house was lit up in front of him, and it was all white.  He says he did not feel in control of his body, and it felt like he was forced to spin around in a circle, when he was back looking at the house it was all normal.  He says he felt weird and confusion again.  He says he waited at the house a few minutes as he thought maybe it was some kind of Halloween trick but the hosue was not decorated, and the strange light tricks did not reappear:)   Nathan has his own Halloween magic tricks going on in his brain.  He also reports just feeling off since the episode 10 days ago, he just doesn't feel right, he thinks it has affected his memory as he says he has trouble recalling things, such as if he fed ginger or not.  He is also really tired, he seems fine and then all of a sudden hits a wall and is tired.  He seems to be doing fine emotionally with these latest episodes.  He even reports that he went headache free for 4 days after the initial hallucination day.  He was surprised by this as he says he gets a headache at some point everyday.  They just are not always that severe, or last that long.  He only ever reports the headaches that are quite severe, or the ones that he feels like he would prefer a head amputation with :)

Teaching textboks

We recieved the disks for teaching textbooks.   Gigi is liking doing math again for now.   She was getting a little bored for the last 2 weeks and not working as diligently.   

Nathan tried Gigi's math yesterday and liked it, he did it again this morning, and begged to do it this evening before bed.  I think he just finished unit 6.  It is a little below nathan as it is grade 4 teaching textbooks.  But I am okay with him doing it as I think it is good for his confidence.  

Today was somewhat productive, good start since we haven't done as much recently.  Genevieve worked a lot on her music, but gasp she was in a bad mood! Not sure what's up with her but that is twice this week.  I had asked her to write a paragraph, and she was quite upset.  Nathan was doing teaching textbooks, so I thought it would be a good time to work with her 1:1 on writting.  I didn't push her as she is usually pretty easy going, I figured she must be tired or something.  

Nathan finished a few lessons in Teaching textbook.  He then practiced piano and I got a paragraph out of him!  He did not want to do it and was grumpy of course. We then had a good discussion on the importance of writing.  We also talked about his oration skills.  We talked about the fact that he is a good storyteller, and when nathan does tell a story people listen.  He is not a boring storyteller.  We talked a lot about the purpose of writing and that we need to convey something to the reader.  We need to think about our reader etc.  he said he did not have an audience, that the essay I wanted him to write served no purpose.  Oh why mother did you hope I would have a child just like me!!!  Thanks for the payback mom!   So Rachel, you are our audience and I told nathan it would be interesting to read if he made it interesting, if he made it his own.  He thought you would not like reading it rachel and only skim it and read it because you have to.  Why does he have to be so intelligent!   We discussed that he knows how to judge good reading, we talked about that he enjoys reading and good writing is when he has to call me over to share part of his story with me because he finds it funny or interesting.  So after a 45 minute talk, he completed a paragraph!   I enjoyed reading it, as I think it is a true reflection of nathan, I can see his humour in the writting, and even his descriptions are pretty good.  When nathan speaks he has a great, and complex vocabulary, but when he writes, it is sometimes hard to see that.  

So after writing was lunch, and the kids got ready for hockey.  I am seeing a lot of maturity in nathan recently, he is wanting to help me out more and more.  They both helped me put food away and tidy the kitchen before we left.  Nathan also went and got his hockey gear ready and put it into the car.  After we got back from hockey he went and hung up his equipment by himself, and then had a shower.  

Nathan had a pretty good headache this evening, but he seemed to manage it quite well.  Nathan told me the other day that he gets headaches everyday.   He says everyday he has a headache at some point but it's not massive ones everyday.  Genevieve has never had a headache in her life, and wonders what it feels like.  How do you describe a headache to someone who does not experience them.  Genevieve is very compassionate and understanding, she is the one when I have a bad headache, to make sure they are quite and leave me alone for a bit to get over it, she even brings me tea sometimes.  

So after hockey was cheerleading!

Military museum

 

This first picture was Genevieve at Costco.  I lost Gigi in Costco, I had last seen her with my mom, and then I met up with both my mom and dad and she was not there...  Well  I sent Nathan off looking for her as well as myself.  Nathan found her first, he heard her playing the piano.  She was playing Christmas carols for everyone to enjoy.  It was hard to get her to leave.  She said mom I was working up quite a crowd.  She loved playing for everyone ha ha! 

 

 

 

My little performer!

I know I said that we would be back to the grind of school, but sunday I could see Nate was exhausted, and a spot opened up on a Chilliwack military museum tour, so I decided that that would be our schooling on Monday.  I had really wanted to go to this when it was first posted, but I thought we have so many other obligations, I did not want to overbook us.  Nathan has been asking to go to this museum for about 5 years, it is only open 2 days a week, and I guess I have not put much effort into going.  I am so happy that we were able to participate in this field trip!  The mom who organized this trip is the wife of an army officer.  She organized to not only have the military museum volunteers, but she brought in real army men.  They all had varying experiences, including afganastan, a landmine disabler, and a disaster relief. 

 

The morning started out by listening to Rollie Kieth.  He is a wonderful speaker, and had a lot of information to share with all of us.  A basic overview of history of the last 100 years :)  We then divided up into groups and went in different areas of the museum, we were guided by the different volunteers and servicemen.  It was so great to talk to these people  and get a really hands on museum experience.  Rollie was a tank commander, and it was a neat experience talking to him about all he knew of tanks.  Nathan has been reading a lot of Usborne books on war, and it was neat to see him be able to use that information today.  I didn't tell the kids where we were going today, and just said that Nathan had always wanted to go, he said are we doing physics?  I told him there may be physics involved.  When discussing the mortars used by the tanks, physics was definitely involved.  Love how excited Nathan gets when physics is involved, and how easily he can get the overall understanding of what someone is talking about. 

 

After the tanks we talked to the army officer who has been stationed in Afghanistan.  The kids got to try on all of his packs, armour and equipment.  What kid doesn't want to try on real army stuff.  I was a little disappointed in how non hitech the army gear was!  I can guarantee, my backpacking stuff is way more hitech.   We talked to him about how he dealt with the heat of the desert, it got up to 60 degrees, we quickly ascertained this would not be a job for Nathan.  His clothing would stand up straight after a day of work from all of the salt, Nathan had experience with that later in the day with his horse ziggy.  Ziggy, was upset that he was alone, and worked himself into a lather, Nathan had to brush him after and his hair was stiff from the salts coming out.

Gigi got a few laughs as she posed like this :)

I like how his hands stayed where they were, just incase he needed to get it off quick!

After trying on army gear, we went and looked at landmines.  It was interesting to learn how they decommission land mines.  We talked about where in the world there are lots of landmines.  Canada still uses anti-tank landmines, but if they lay them, they have to know exactly where they are and they must be removed, Canada does not ever leave any behind.  It was interesting to note that many countries do not have this policy, including our neighbor to the south. 

 

Up next was a little trip outside.  They got to get in a climb around on a few vehicles, a world war II dump truck, and the most exciting a plain, we asked what the plane was used for and I have forgotten.  Nathan stayed in here for a good 1/2 hour.  They then headed over to the soviet cold war era tank.

You can see gigi waving

We then headed back inside for some free time to explore around and discover things on our own.  We were at the museum for at least 2 hours, and I think we could have explored longer.  There was a lot to see, and it was wonderful having so many people around who could answer our questions.  We met up with Rolly Kieth again, who showed us his Canadian airborne uniform, for Northern jumps.  He was able to explain to us exactly what all the bits were for, and what he had to do in order to jump out of the plane, a couple of parachutes were there as well, and he was able to show us how those got deployed.  So fascinating!  Rollie Kieth was over during the suez canal crisis, and I was able to discuss with Nathan and Genevieve that their own great grandpa had been there as well.  They wanted to know if Rollie new my grandpa :)


So busy morning all Nathan wanted to do was go home, but we had horse to go to, Nathan did not want to go, but I knew he needed to go and would feel better if he did go.  He started to feel better on the car ride there, when he started to think about loping.  He was able to lope quite a bit by himself this lesson, and he just keeps on improving, you could see he is enjoying it and is proud of himself.

halloween week

Well it has been a difficult week since Nathans "episode" on Tuesday.  He did not get back to feeling himself until Friday.  Wednesday he was really tired, we managed to make it to hockey and he was able to play well.  We had a relaxing morning though.  I needed that after waking up at 2 am, from the dog waking us up.  And of course me thinking there must be something wrong with Nathan for Ginger to be acting weird again.   I did not get much sleep.  I thought on Tuesday that I was dealing well with Nathans unexplained events, but I realized as I tried to sleep Tuesday night, I was having a lot of anxiety about this.  His pediatrician does not know what to think of his latest developments, except that it is significant.  It does not help point us in a clear diagnosis.  And if the specialized pediatric neurologists have no clue and the pediatrician, who is a genius has no clue, it does not really help me trying to figure out what is going on :)  If they cant figure it out, me trying to think and remember anything that I have read and trying to think of pathways that can be the cause, I am sure they must already have thought of all of these.  It is Sunday now, and I can say that I am back to normal and not worrying every moment about Nathan!  Right now he is at a sleep over at my parents house.

Thursday we went to the Britania Mine Museum.  I did not do any research ahead of time, so we did not know that it was a copper mine.  Our guide was interesting and very enthusiastic.  We had been to a coal mine near drumheller, just over a year ago, so it was great to see the differences in the two mines, and see how similar they were as well.  The morning we had a tour of the underground part of the tunnel of the mine.  We got to see the tools that they used and how they mined.  We saw how the tools have changed over time.  Next we saw the processing plant.  It was an impressive plant built by hand in a mere 18 months.  It was interesting to learn that the process of extracting copper is the same today a it was 100 years ago.  We then had lunch.  Up next was a lecture mostly about the environmental impact of mining.  reduce, reuse, recycle.   Nathan woke up today, extremely grumpy, nothing was going right for him today, thankfully we went on a field trip today, and tyler and cody came in the car with us, I can only imagine the fights in the car if they hadn't!  But even on the way back, Nathan just sat in his car seat, feeling sick, and not talking at all.  Poor guy...


Friday - Halloween ,this was the first day Nathan woke up and he seemed like himself again, he was happy and seemed well rested.  We didn't do any school work today either!  We needed to get ready for Halloween.  Nathan picked out what he was wearing, with gigis help.  And geneveive and I decided to quickly sew her a costume.  It was fun picking out the fabrics from my stash and trying to figure out how we would get all the pattern pieces to work with the fabric, since we didn't have big pieces of fabric.  Genevieve cut out all the pattern pieces for me, and helped cut out the fabric as well.  I would have let her help me sew, but it was knit fabric, and that would be torture to try and learn to sew with that type of fabric.  Grandma and grandpa also came for a visit.  Next we carved up some pumpkins.  Nathan and gigi drew out what they wanted carved and I used the jigsaw to carve it out.   We had two families over to join us trick or treating, this has been a tradition in our house, since Nathan was in kindergarten. 

Saturday soccer was rained out, so we skipped cheer too!  And then after supper nate and gigi headed to grandma and grandpas for a sleep over.  Ginger joined them too.  My dad said, well how can we possibly take one without the other.  Poor ginger would have whined all night not having Nathan with him. 

Well lets aim for some schoolwork taking place next week!  I am over the school of life, time to move onto some academics :)

Monday and Tuesday

Saturday nathan played a soccer game in aldergrove, we had to be there for 8:30 am!  It was a wonderful game and Nathan's team did very well passing and playing together.  They are undefeated so far this year.  Nathan's nickname is the wall as he likes to play the last defender and he does not let much get past him.

Gigi had an extended cheer practice on Saturday, to get their routine down. 

Sunday we all went as a family to stick and puck.  I had a great time but my back is pretty sore now.  Playing hockey for 1.5 hrs is hard when your not the greatest skater.  It was fun to play hockey as a family though.  

Monday kids woke up early and played with daddy all morning, playing games and snuggling and enjoying a nice leisurely breakfast.  Jeff had a later fight today and we all really enjoyed the extra 3 hrs today, felt like an extra day. 

We then had to take him to the airport and rush back to get nathan a pair of cowboy boots.  We went to the pumpkin patch/corn maze on Friday.  The corn maze was a mudpit.  10 minutes in the stick mud, lifted up Nathan's sole.  20 minutes in his whole sole came off.  By 30 minutes he was pretty much in his socks walking through the mud!   So new boots we needed.   

In horse riding lessons nathan loped for the first time, he broke into song saying I believe I can fly...  He said it felt like he was flying!  His face was awesome to see!

Tuesday morning and we woke up to this on nathan 

It does not hurt, but it hurts to open his eye as it's sensitive to light.  He is extremely tired despite having 12 hrs of sleep last night.  He is laying on the couch not able to do much.  We are going to try and go to piano but I think that is all we will accomplish today.   TIA, Occular migraine, Vascular migraine???  Who knows. 

This is what nathan did today...

It is now 5 pm and what a weird day it has been!  Nathan has had his first complex visual hallucination!

So while we were at piano, Nathan and I were sitting and playing a math game, he was not really with it, kinda confused like.  I mentioned to him that if he feels weird while with his teacher he is to let the teacher know, as I would like to know if he feels anything.  I told him that becuause he woke up with a blood shot eye, I was expecting him to have some weird things to happen.  He then remembered he went blind earlier in the day, he said he forgot.  So right after I took the picture of him lying on the floor I had said no school for today as I did not think Nathan was feeling well enough so he went to his bedroom.  He got something off of his dresser and he lost vision, he thought maybe it was his left eye or maybe even both eyes, it was a curtain coming down.  He had the queezy stomach and had to sit down as this happened.  He then said he felt confused and forgot to tell me...

So I let his piano teacher know that he was having a weird day and if she noticed anything to let me know.  I told marlene I was in the building and where I was.  So I lost track of time and was 5 minutes late getting back so I did not see his teacher but our very good friend has piano lessons at the same time, and my friend was sitting with him.  So I said how was it, good good.  And the all of a sudden he says, well I kinda felt like I disappeared when I was at piano, like I could hear and then I couldn't.  He didn't say much more, even though I had asked him a few questions, and then 5 minutes later, he remembered what happened.  He says his teachers voice slowly faded away, and everything went black, He said this felt peaceful, and then he saw stairs being raised, one at a time, he said it was really cool, the stairs were black too, and then a door formed and a handle.  The door then opened and everything was white, and he say his teacher but she looked like a cutout and was completely black.  And then he heard his teacher ask Nathan are you okay, he said he woke up and said yes I'm fine.  I asked him why he did not tell his teacher, he said at the moment he totally forgot what happened and he thought he was fine.  It was not until he was telling me what happened that he knew something happened.

Nathan is doing okay and is not scared or concerned, he joked about it and said well its normal for me.  I told him I sent a message to DR pleydell pearce.  I did talk to Nathan and tell him that sometimes people can get hallucinations that are sometimes scarry, he did not like this idea so much.  I said well did it seem real when it was happening and he said yup it seemed really real.  I thought I should warn him just to prepare him, as I have read complex visual hallucinations can be scary too.

A side not Ginger has been acting weird all day, she has been whining even with Nathan right there beside her.  Maybe she senses something is off with Nathan.

Monday and Tuesday

Saturday nathan played a soccer game in aldergrove, we had to be there for 8:30 am!  It was a wonderful game and Nathan's team did very well passing and playing together.  They are undefeated so far this year.  Nathan's nickname is the wall as he likes to play the last defender and he does not let much get past him.  

Gigi had an extended cheer practice on Saturday, to get their routine down. 

Sunday we all went as a family to stick and puck.  I had a great time but my back is pretty sore now.  Playing hockey for 1.5 hrs is hard when your not the greatest skater.  It was fun to play hockey as a family though.  

Monday kids woke up early and played with daddy all morning, playing games and snuggling and enjoying a nice leisurely breakfast.  Jeff had a later fight today and we all really enjoyed the extra 3 hrs today, felt like an extra day. 

We then had to take him to the airport and rush back to get nathan a pair of cowboy boots.  We went to the pumpkin patch/corn maze on Friday.  The corn maze was a mudpit.  10 minutes in the stick mud, lifted up Nathan's sole.  20 minutes in his whole sole came off.  By 30 minutes he was pretty much in his socks walking through the mud!   So new boots we needed.   

In horse riding lessons nathan loped for the first time, he broke into song saying I believe I can fly...  He said it felt like he was flying!  His face was awesome to see!

Tuesday morning and we woke up to this on nathan 

It does not hurt, but it hurts to open his eye as it's sensitive to light.  He is extremely tired despite having 12 hrs of sleep last night.  He is laying on the couch not able to do much.  We are going to try and go to piano but I think that is all we will accomplish today.   TIA, Occular migraine, Vascular migraine???  Who knows. 

Soil analysis

Today we had a day out in the woods by our house, dad came to help us dig our hole.  We we observing the different layers of soil.  It was nest to see how the soil changes and the different colours.  The hummus layer on top was the smallest layer.  The topsoil was dark and rich.  The subsoil was brown and like clay.  We did not dig down far enough to get to the parent soil, but we talked about what it would look like and how when we buried Anna and we got to all the rocks that was the parent soil.  

A decomposer in the topsoil

We had books we recorded our observations in including depth of the different soils.  I will take a picture of this soon...

Hockey was up next