Homeschooling adventures, starting an allowance, and visit to Grandma's!

Wow, it's been almost a whole month since I last posted! I think the thing that I've been saying the most as I've attempted homeschooling with a small baby is: "I just can't keep up!" It's hard balancing nursing, teaching, and making sure everyone is feeling nurtured.  I have definitely realized that I need to start delegating more responsibility to my older children.  Since we've moved here, these are the things I've attempted to train them to do:

• Dottie gets Lena from her nap, changes her diapers, changes her sheets and her clothes. She pretty much loves to do it all for Lena, with the exception of nursing.  I am careful, though, to make sure she's getting her school work done, as much as she would love to hold baby all day!
• Unloading the dishwasher.  Elliot and Ruby do the silverware and the plastic kid plates.  I got smart this move and put all of their dishes in an easy to reach spot for them. Dottie can unload all of the dishes on her own.
• Doing the dishes. We've only tried this a few times, but Dottie and Elliot make a good partnership. Dottie rinses, Elliot puts the dishes in the dishwasher. 
• Cooking and Baking.  Of course, Ruby and Elliot love to "help," but I've actually had success with Dottie making pizza dough completely on her own.  Wow!
• Vacuuming.  This is the latest.  Dottie vacuumed the entire car on her own after we got back from my parents'. 
• Tidying up.  Of course, ideally, this is something they should all do naturally.  But they don't.  We've gotten better, and Dottie is trying hard to help train Ruby. 
• Taking out the trash.  Dottie has started doing this all on her own.
• Next goal: cleaning the bathrooms!

So I've started an allowance in conjunction with these new jobs.  The allowance isn't just for the jobs, it's for behavior as well.  So, we sat down, made a list of what rules they wanted (i.e. listen to mom the first time) and they signed the rule list.  They start out with $3 at the beginning of the week . Each time they break a rule, they lose 10 cents.  The first week, they lost all of their money.  But over time, they're keeping it:) I also do the money virtually, so they won't blow it or lose it.  They have some toys on Amazon picked out that they are earning towards.  We've been doing this for about 3 weeks now. So far, so good.

Now for the pictures.  Living in DC is awesome. And overwhelming.  But mostly awesome.  Saturday mornings, the National Theater has a free show for kids.  We took the kids to one before General Conference the first Saturday in October. It was Snow White.  It was really cute for a free play!

 

Then, the next weekend, we went to Mt Vernon (again...we got a pass.  Plus, we love it), and rode a cruise ship on the Potomac for free with my friend Jessie and her kids.  Good times.

And here we are, homeschooling in action.  Ruby got a school book to practice cutting, as if she needs to practice...she doesn't really get the concept yet.  So it's turned into me cutting and her gluing.  But at least she feels like she's participating in school.

This was another attempt to involve Ruby in school.  We made an A alligator to help her learn her letters.  The older kids surprisingly also really loved the craft.

 And here's the Baby Mama, Dottie.

 This was pretty adorable.  Ruby lined up Lena with her "Braves" (her name for her two Merida dolls). Which one is the baby?

 I made my friend Jessie a pretty decadent cake for her birthday.  In fact, I'm entering this cake into a baking contest on Monday.  Yum!

 We went to Ihop with our kids for her birthday.

 Then, that same night, we had a fun surprise visit from Bry and Kelly. They went to the temple and we enjoyed time with Gracey at the playground!

 Then a few days later, we made an impromptu visit to Grandma and Grandpa Weed's house in Pennsylvania.  I was pretty thrilled to get to see the fall there and do all of the fun activities of my childhood.  

 I had Dottie do a leaf collection when I was there, inspired by Mrs. Wolfe, my marvelous 3rd grade teacher. Here we are in front of a Burning Bush. So beautiful! We really loved learning so much about leaves, especially from our friend, Bob the Forester.

 My wild Lena and Grandpa at the ward trunk-or-treat.

 We went to the Pumpkin Farm with our great friends, The Burnetts.  So fun!

 We studied The Civil War for a few weeks. While we were at my parents', Steve Hall, a Civil War Reenactor, came and talked to Dottie about the Civil War.  He dressed up and even shot his gun. It was fascinating!

 To continue with the Civil War, we went to Gettysburg.  Here's some Civil War era brass used to rally troups.

 Then, there was a Cyclorama, a giant painting of the battle.  It made the history really come to life!

 And here's the kids with good ol' Abe.

 When we got home, the girls helped me make homemade applesauce from all of the apples we picked from the orchard in Canton with Grandma.

 We made this Pizza Margherita to celebrate Queen Margherita, the first Queen of Italy that we just learned about prior to our Civil War unit.

 And to wrap up October, here's our little Trick-or-Treaters with the Curtis kids! Dottie was Tiana, Elliot was Thor, Ruby was Sofia the First, and Lena was Tinkerbell. We got so much candy.  Too much candy.