Sheep Guarding Llama

Today is Wednesday, past the halfway point of my short week.  I decided that I am just going to take off this Friday rather than trying to figure out how to do a half day.  There is so much driving required to get into the office that doing a half day really is not worth it, I don’t think.  I could pull it off but it would be a waste.

Today was a long day for me, I stayed quite late in the evening, till about eight, to get some work done.  Knowing that I am taking Friday off completely made it make sense.  So I was in the office and then drove home not getting there until around nine.

So it was a very short night for us.  A little time with the girls and off to bed.

Pretty much just a normal day for me today. Got into work at a good time this morning. Looking forward to taking either a half day on Friday or maybe taking the whole day off. Will just be home with the girls. I am sure that they will make me play many hours of Wind Waker.

Got home this evening and at first the girls did not feel like going to the playground but after a few minutes they changed their minds and we went for a walk and actually spent a bit more time at the playground than we usually do. We had to change where we sit tonight as a really brave dragonfly decided to create a flight pattern that took it nearly into collisions with us over and over again. It seemed strangely aggressive. We had a nice time on the playground though and the girls have asked to be able to go swimming tomorrow. Hopefully they can.

Dominica was hungry tonight so made a vegan stir fry and we had that and watched a little 30 Rock. Luciana put herself to bed quite early. Liesl spent the entire evening on her school work – she absolutely loves her new reading “game” on Dominica’s Windows laptop and is making incredible reading progress. That was money very well spent already.

Dominica got Liesl ready for bed tonight as I had some work that had to be done before I could go to bed. So I was up till almost midnight getting things caught up.

A writing term with which I have often struggled is forgo and forego. Many dictionaries even list forego as an alternative spelling of forgo. However, upon some research, they are actually two different words.  Learning that they are two different works, one meaning to come before and the other meaning to do without, is really important.  No wonder I have always had so much trouble figuring out the spelling and understanding why the spelling was what it was.

Today it occurred to me that since DNA was first discovered in 1953 that means that I have been alive for quite a bit more than half of the total known history of DNA. DNA is so fundamental to our understanding of life and the universe yet it now is evident to me that it was a relatively new discovered still when I was young and that I am among the very oldest who grew up with knowledge of DNA and its role being obvious, accepted and simply taught as known science rather than as a new discovery! Of course, DNA being what it is, it is very unlikely that it would have been discovered very long ago. But that still doesn’t stop it from being really amazing that it was discovered so close to when I was born.

Dominica took the girls to the Peekskill Library today. They had fun and got some books to take home. Dominica has decided that regular library trips are going to be a regular part of the school experience for the girls. As they need so many books for their school stuff this will be a cost saving measure too. Liesl was a bit overwhelmed by all of the books and couldn’t figure out what to do. Luciana dove right in and found books for herself. They both had fun, though.

The electrician that Dominica called the other day came this evening to fix our broken electrical box outside that has been plaguing us for several weeks. I had to work late this evening, not leaving the office until seven so was not home to deal with him.  He was done by the time that I got home.  That electrical box has been hanging over our heads for a month or two.  The homeowner’s association has been on us to get it fixed but we did not know what to do to get it fixed.  What a pain that has been. And now it cost another surprise $140.  Argh.  There is always something.

Liesl and Luciana got a new reading video game tonight that Liesl is super excited about.  She played it for maybe four hours today!  Dominica said that her reading is really coming along too.  She has learned a lot of words and really just needs to build up her confidence now.

We watched a little 30 Rock tonight and Liesl played games through all of it.  Got the girls to bed at ten.  Luciana got a new iPad game called “Puppy Doctor” and the girls did a great job of playing that together in bed.

I had worked to do so sat up working in the bedroom office for a few hours until just after midnight.  Dominica brought her laptop up and used it in bed so that she could be in the room with me.

I am so excited that SGL is back on track and up to date again.  Things are so much easier to record as they happen and it is so much more useful to let people know what is happening at the same time.

I talked to dad today and he mentioned that the grocery store in Pavilion, the one that I used to go to all of the time with mom when I was very little, is gone.  I had heard when I was back home at my high school reunion that it had burned down.  Dad looked up the news, it was June 1st that it burned down.  It was just a tiny little place, right on route 63 in downtown Pavilion.  It was the cornerstone of that little village.  We used to go there all of the time and it was a really significant part of my childhood.  That’s where I learned what a grocery store was.  It is still the place that I picture when I picture a grocery store.

It hasn’t been the same place in decades.  It changed long ago.  But the building was at least there.  It was Reinhart’s when I was little.  No idea what it has been for the last twenty years.  I still know where everything was in there, though.

Many years ago I noticed that the similar little Wise grocery store that used to be in downtown Wyoming, just up the highway from Pavilion, was gone too.  All the little places are disappearing.  It just isn’t the same anymore.  They were so small that today they are more like convenience stores than groceries.

Dominica did the first postings in the girls’ online educational blog today too.  We have decided that part of their education is going to be blogging and recording their entire school experience.  That way they will be able to go back and see, quite literally, everything that they have ever done.  We have nothing like that from our generation and I don’t know of any schools today doing anything like this.  Our plan is to attempt to record all of the stuff that they study, all of the projects that they do and all of the trips that they take.  In a way it will be like they are building a portfolio of their work.  But not a little portfolio, instead a massive, multimedia portfolio of the entirety of their educational experiences that they will be able to share in real time with their cousins and grandparents and families.  That way they can keep in closer connection with everyone and everyone can keep track of their progress.  It should be really interesting.

One of the reasons that I really wanted to try this is because as the girls get older they will lack things like speaking in front of a class or writing for a semi-anonymous teacher.  But instead when the girls write essays or do an art project, it is not just for their class but it is something that will be saved and shared.  This should bring a very different aspect to the experience.  Writing for real people, like I do when I am blogging here, causes you to approach the task very differently.  You know that things will be read, that people will respond.  It makes what you do so much more important.  And they will be able to reference things that they do later too which, I hope, is useful.

And because it is a blog they can do pictures, audio, video, text, graphs, charts, documents or just about anything that you can imagine.

We almost completely paid off one of the big credit cards tonight.  We would have easily paid it completely off had we not had to pay for those crazy attic repairs this month.  So frustrating how many massive surprise bills there always seem to be.

 

Liesl had a nightmare that the floor in her bedroom was dirt and an ant hill and formed in the middle of it and that enormous red fire ants were pouring into her room and one had gotten into her hair.  She woke up and ran to our room and jumped into bed with Dominica and me.  Luciana slept through the whole thing and did not get up until nine this morning.  Luciana is an oblivious sleeper, which is a good thing because Liesl is a bit of a spazz.

One of Liesl’s school projects today was to learn about ancient music. Dominica found her a program that allowed her to make her own music using ancient instruments on a web page.  Liesl and Luciana thought that that was great fun.  It is so great that they have been able to start studying history.  This is something that Liesl can really dig her teeth into.

I played a little Wind Waker this afternoon after much cajoling from die kinder.  Not a lot, maybe half an hour or one hour at the most.  Enough to move on to the next section of the game.  It is amazing to me how much they love watching me play.  Liesl also loves to constantly compare what I am doing to how Dominica did the same thing (since she is at least an hour ahead of me in the game.)

We had lunch and watched some 30 Rock, just a few episodes.  Dominica made homemade tilapia fish tacos to eat while we watched the show.

In the early evening we took the girls up to the pool.  It wasn’t too warm today, only about seventy five.  The water was nice, though.  There were very few people in the pool today, mostly adults just getting some exercise.  Clearly Sunday evening is not a popular time for the kids to hit the pool.  So that worked out perfectly.  The girls had a great time and could just swim and play without getting in anyone’s way and without out kids messing with them and harassing them as so often happens.  I swam too and got a little exercise.  I tried to swim laps but it is hard as I keep my glasses on so that I can watch the girls and Luciana insists on holding onto my feet when I do laps.

Both girls have gotten super comfortable in the pool.  They swim all over and don’t need anyone watching over them.  It is really amazing.  I was not like that at all even a bit older than them.

After coming back from the pool we watching Ella Enchanted which I have not seen in a very, very long time.  That is a really good movie with a great cast that gets totally forgotten about.  It is free on Netflix too.

After the movie we all went to bed.  It was only twenty after ten but if we don’t go to bed when the girls go to bed we end up never getting there.

Slept in until eight thirty.  Everyone was still asleep the girls having slept in our bed last night.  So I just went to my desk which is in our bedroom and worked there for a while.  I had an hour or two before Liesl woke up and she just wanted chocolate milk and she went down to the living room on her own with an iPad and disappeared for some time.

After everyone was awake, Liesl opted to spend the morning doing school.  So Dominica started their first history lesson.  Liesl really enjoyed it, they had a good time.  Liesl is studying ancient history now.  This is a subject that she is really getting into and already she has learned a lot.  Her knowledge of cultures and places is pretty amazing for a five year old.

Luciana spent a lot of the day either hanging out with me while I worked or doing things like painting on the easel down in the living room.

I did a ton of work on SGL today trying to finally get caught up after falling behind horribly.  I had lots of posts already written and ready to go but I had gaps that I had to go back and fill in so that I could post them.

Dominica spent several hours playing Super Paper Mario which is a Wii game that she got this week.  Liesl really likes watching her play it so that was their big entertainment all afternoon.

In the evening Dominica made two pizzas, one cheese and one fig, and we watched a little of 30 Rock until the girls went to bed.  Once Liesl was off to bed we put on Date Night which we bought on Amazon VOD and watched that before going to bed ourselves.  That is such a great movie, one of our favourites.  Extremely well done.