Learning Notes - A Look At March 11-15

Monday

It's the first day of March Break for the public school kids and I didn't want my children to feel completely left out of the 'fun', even though they are not getting a 'break'.

We drove into a the city as a family (I read two chapters of A Child's History of the World aloud in the car) and saw the movie The Grinch, put out in 2018 I believe.  It was a good film and had different depths from previous grinch movies where the green guy is just crabby and then gets less crabby.  Then we all crowded in a photo booth for a crazy family picture, had lunch at a taco chain restaurant, tried all the free teas at a tea store, checked out (and did not buy) anything at the chain bookstore, and sprayed air fresheners all over a Bath and Body Works.  We also saw someone feeding masses and MASSES of ducks in the parking lot.  Maybe a hundred?  Crazy.

After this we went to the big public library in town, each kid got a free book at the library book store and we played mini-putt.  They read their books in the car home.  This is what the 8yo picked:

I love it!  It's so...odd!  Essentially arithmetic but with weird drawings of monsters or something and visual 'math webs'...it's hard to explain and I can't find a picture of the inside.  I think it just has to be a book your visual math kid loves, or doesn't.  We came home and finished the family puzzle we had started Sunday night.

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Tuesday

Started the day with math and spelling.  The 8yo finished 1/2 a math review lesson and almost all of a spelling lesson.  The 6yo finished two math lessons and 1 spelling lesson and then finished reading this:

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Everyone has been fascinated with Google Earth these days, especially since the oldest recently discovered that you can look into space, including the International Space Station.  When I managed to get them away from looking around the world on the computer we discussed what we're going to do for our upcoming science fair projects and started going through books bookmarking relevant passages.  We discussed our Lenten projects on the Fruit of the Spirit.

I had to go to the church so took the 8yo with me and he practiced the piano for 30 minutes.

Then all three went to the library with their father and checked out books, including this series which the librarian special ordered for them:

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When I got home from the church I took everyone on a nature walk to enjoy the sunshine and pick up as much flotsam as we could find to glue on our new diy birdhouse that I'm trying to get outside before the birds all decide where this year's nests are going to be.  We saw deer and rabbit tracks, I explained how hip joints work with a ball and socket design, we experimented to see what would happen to a snowball that is dropped in a puddle and there was a discussion as to why pine needles turn brown.  The 6yo informed me that the route we walked was a lowercase 'a', which prompted the 4yo to hand me a stick she found "shaped like an 'L'"!

We had a 15 minute quiet time once we got home.  The girls read books and the boy did puzzles until it was time to go to our neighbour's for supper.  I read the children a chapter of The Moffats before bed.

Wednesday

We woke up to a sleety day and worked on our new puzzle and read and looked at Google Earth.  Then we went out to breakfast at the diner and then walked up to the grocery store so it was almost 10am by the time we got home.  I pulled out some books on weather and we read about sleet and rain and then looked at snowflakes and discussed symmetry.  Here are the books we used:

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The girls decided to make houses out of cards while the boy set the stove timer and did his 30 minutes of silent reading.  Then the 6 yo did her silent reading.  Finally I sent them with their math, spelling and the Planet Earth dvds over to the church where their father was working so I could have the house to myself for a bit.  While they were there the 8yo finished the math and spelling lessons he had partially completed yesterday, and also started reading the bookmarked sections in his science research books re: his science project.  The 6yo did a full math and a full spelling lesson.  They all watched Planet Earth Ep. 1 - From Pole to Pole and then Ep. 11 - Ocean Deep.

After lunch we listened to Mozart's Magic Fantasy (sort of a children's retelling of Mozart's Magic Flute), worked on our next puzzle and then went for a walk.  We managed to pick up enough leaves and pinecones and such to be able to finish our birdhouse.

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 We finished our puzzle in the afternoon.  At supper the discussion was the whale sharks and vampire squid they saw in the Ocean Deep episode - apparently vampire squid have their bio luminescence located on areas that can withstand a bite by a predator.  Huh.  Who knew?  Before bed I read a chapter of The Moffats.

Thursday

Everyone wanted to play games on the computer this morning.  They used the website tvokids.com and took turns doing that for an hour or so.  It was raining fairly heavily off and on all day but that didn't stop them from rushing through breakfast and heading outside to burn off energy.

I hadn't slept well the previous night so I was dragging myself through the day.  In fact as the day progressed I just got floppier and tireder and was eventually just sitting in a chair waving my hands at the children.  Fortunately they all deal with instructions pretty well.  The 4yo coloured and practiced writing letters, the 8yo did a spelling lesson and then they both pulled out all the Lego and built stuff with it together.  The 6yo did two spelling lessons and finished Spelling Workout A.

And then they all went outside again and played for hours in the wet snow.

It wasn't an impressive, exciting or even particularly productive school day, but these sorts of days are one of the reasons I work on school year round, up to six days a week.  Because not all of those days do we manage to accomplish much.  It's important to remember that 1) Life is school, too and 2) We're playing the long game, here.

I read a chapter of The Moffats aloud before bed.

Friday

Usually Friday morning is the time I take the 4yo to a play group but today my husband had a meeting and then a doctor's appointment and wasn't going to get home until lunchtime.

Instead we made churros and then I took all three children up to the library where there was a children's St. Patrick's Day party going on.

After this we had errands to run all afternoon and into the evening.  I read a chapter of A Child's History of The World in the car while we were stopped at a store for my husband to run in.  We're up to Alexander the Great.

Saturday

The 6yo decided to sew this morning and made a little blanket for a doll's house bed on the sewing machine, which she is learning how to use this year.  The 8yo went to the church to practice the piano.  Then all three children went outside to work on their latest fort.  When they came in it was lunchtime.

After lunch we buckled down a bit more.  The 6yo played Uno with the 4yo to practice her colours and numbers.  She's got these down well, but constant repetition is key.  The 8yo did his math, which today involved adding the eleven times tables to his graph book.  This turned into a discussion about perfect squares, which turned into watching a Doodling In Math Class video about the Pythagorean Theorem.  Before we ran down too many rabbit trails I put him on a video call with a friend of mine who teaches high school math - she had agreed to explain the concept of area for him better than I could.  Both older children set the stove timer and did their 30 minutes of silent reading.

The 4yo's reading lessons had fallen by the wayside quite a bit this week, but when we sat down today to look them over she had remembered all of her sounds (s, t, m, a, e, r) and we did a lesson and a half in our reading book.

Then I heard the book narration from the 8yo about the book he got from the library on Tuesday.  He is on chapter 11 so far.

We had a family game night today with Skip-bo (I wanted to see how that number review had worked out earlier for the youngest), and then I read two chapters of The Moffats before bed.

Seven Quick Takes - March 15th

Seven Household Things That I Find Invaluable

1)  Full disclosure: I have no idea if this is the brand I purchased, but mine look like these, and they are awesome.  First off, they actually really do scrub pots clean, which a lot of scrubbie sort of kitcheny things claim to do and do not do.  In fact they are rough enough that I have scratched my hand on them when I got skin in the way of scrubbing, but they are soft and pliable when you aren't applying pressure.  Plus you can wash them.  And they don't wear out quickly at all; I bought two this summer and have used them constantly for multiple loads of dishes per day with no sign of wear besides the colours fading slightly.

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2)  This rectangular unglazed stonewear baking dish is my go-to casserole and I probably make something in it five nights of the week.  Mine was a wedding gift and is by the company Pampered Chef, but looking online I see you can buy them from the website and this model is $52.  I mean, it's a lot for a casserole dish, I agree, and I probably wouldn't have purchased it for myself, but it would be a great investment.  The stone turns a lovely burnished gold colour over time.  I also have a deep circular baking dish, a pie plate and a cookie sheet in the Pampered Chef stonewear line and they all are just as good.

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3)  By far the stupidest name for a cleaning product ever, but this powdered oxygen bleach works really, really well, is chlorine free, and you can buy it at the Dollar Tree.  It's as good as products much more expensive and if you can get past the fairly obnoxious marketing you will have a laundry booster that doesn't cost an arm and a leg.

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4)  I know it's expensive, but this is the best hairbrush you will ever own, hands down.  I describe my hair as having the texture of a horse's mane - it's very thick and heavy but also the individual hairs are coarse and rough.  Nothing smooths out my hair to produce that shiny curtain you see on models!  And until this brush nothing could even easily brush my hair.  In fact I have broken multiple brushes while trying to get them through my hair.  This brush, however, will actually brush my hair.  And I've never broken one yet.  

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5)  I have a love/notlove relationship with food storage containers.  I keep trying to find ones that aren't plastic that I actually like and use, but the battle is uphill.  I chip the glass ones, I break the little seals on the snap lids, sigh...anyway.  THESE metal containers work really well.  They were recommended to me by a friend and I reach for them constantly.  They are snack size, but the company, U Konserve, does seem to have larger ones.  And they stack inside each other for easy storage.  I bought mine years ago and they still look brand new.

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6)  I love this company for their notebooks, and have for years, but every year my mother in law buys me a planner for Christmas and this year she got me a Moleskine brand one, and now I love them for their planners, too.  They are just so classic and clean and simple with nice, thicker paper that shows ink so well.  And those fonts, and the little crisp lines...sigh.  I'm just a Moleskine junkie.

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7)  This is my standard go-to all purpose cleaner that I use for everything I possibly can.  Now, I have linked to A.mazon, and I see they have it for some ridiculous price and please let me assure you that price is crazy.  Buy it at the grocery store.  Also I feel like I should mention that the EWG (Environmental Working Group) that helps customers choose eco-friendly cleaners, gives this one a terrible rating.  Also it smells really strongly of grapefruit.  I realize I'm not selling it well but this is my list of favourite house stuff so who cares!  I like the smell!  I'm happy with it!  It works great!

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Cleaning House - Schedules That Don't Work For Me, Things To Whine About, A Few Ideas That Have Worked.

Authentic image of someone who cares much more about ironing than I ever have, or will.

I'm at home all day with my three children, but I'm teaching, or reading, gardening, making stuff or cooking something.  Activities I enjoy doing, for the most part.  The part of staying home I'm not that fussy about is keeping my house clean and tidy.

I don't want to do it, but I like it having been done.

Also, I find that a clean, organized house is actually much easier to live in.  I know where everything is, for real, not like in my messy house when I SAY I know where everything is but who knows if I really do.  Also those things are much easier to access.  I can very easily walk over to the shelf with the book I need instead of plowing through a pile of Lego, moving a chair, shuffling a bunch of papers around, and THEN getting the book off the shelf.

I have tried a lot of ideas to keep the housework from getting me down, and for the most part none of them have really worked.  Partly this is because I can't commit to an actual system for more than a few days/weeks since my life isn't structured around housework.  Any schedule that says 'On Monday clean the bathroom' assumes that every Monday I'm waking up to a clean slate of time that begs to be filled with bathroom cleaning.  Some Mondays, sure, I clean the bathroom.  Some Mondays I have three dentist appointments scheduled in a row and our library books are overdue and I need to hit the grocery store and my husband is going out of town the next day.  I'm easily confused by these life events - what am I supposed to do?  Wake up at 5am to clean the bathroom?  Delay making supper to clean the bathroom?  Ask my eight year old to clean the bathroom?  

So cleaning schedules don't work for me.  Every day is just too different.  The only way I could guarantee to get any scheduled task done, I realized, is if it was so very small that it could be fit into any day.  Like 'make your bed'.  I could find time to make the bed every day even if the rest of the day was packed to the gills.  And that's great but it doesn't clean the bathroom, or mop the floor, or any of the other things.

The other problem is that housecleaning isn't something I enjoy, and it isn't something I prioritize. 

If I happen to have 30 minutes to myself I'm likely not going to fill it with sweeping.

Anyway, with that long, whiny explanation over, I have collected some ideas that DO work for me.  Mostly.  Somewhat.

1) No Unfilled Time.

A Youtube cleaning video taught me the idea of 'No Unfilled Time'.  You fill the little free moments of waiting (for a kettle to boil, a cup of tea to steep, an oven to preheat, the washer to finish the last 3 minutes of the cycle, someone to take you off hold on the phone, a child to find their other shoe...) with some task in your immediate vicinity.  Straighten the shelf of books beside you, wipe the counters, etc.  I keep reminding myself of this and when I implement it regularly it makes a difference.

2) Trash First.  

One blog I used to read a lot suggested the idea of doing a first sweep through any area to be cleaned with a trash bag in hand.  I do this all the time.  Even if I'm absolutely certain I have nothing to throw out I always, ALWAYS have something to throw out.  The old teabag sitting on a plate, a child's crumpled tissue... a broken crayon...what is that on the floor?  Toss. Toss. Toss.

3) Clean As You Cook.

My father liked to say that you should clean as you cook.  I try to do this. I've sauteed the onions and now, rather than moving immediately to the next thing, I wash the saute pan.  Takes a minute.  One less pan after supper to wash.  Cough.  Like I'm washing the dishes right after supper.  Cough.

4) Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.  

A Clorox wipe over the toilet and a squirt of shampoo in the toilet bowl, swish, scrub, flush.  Done.  You know what that's better than?  It's better than nothing.

5) Use one tool for as much as humanly possible.  

One cleaning product, preferably in a spray bottle, to clean as much as you can.  One vacuum to do the rug in the livingroom, to run over the shelves as 'dusting', to vacuum up things around the edge of the kitchen, to run over the sofa cushions.  Just one.  Complexity will make me throw my hands up in the air.

I've stretched this to other areas as well when decision making fatigue has taken over in my life.  One meal plan (Cook meat in the oven, defrost a frozen vegetable in the microwave, serve store-bought, seedy whole wheat bread.  Every evening meal.  Until the stress goes away.)  I buy one kind of bread, one kind of milk, one kind of snack, one kind of apple.  If I can manage the decisions, then that week you'll get the fancy mangoes and the weird leafy green we're going to try for the first time.  If I can't, you get what you get and you don't get upset.

6) Figure out the blockage.  

There is always a point in a chore where you hit a wall, and although you may not have thought about why that wall exists, it's there for a reason.  This was the case for me and laundry.  I was happy as a clam to toss a load in the washing machine, switch it to the dryer, and then put it in a basket.  But that's where my blockage was - I simply couldn't seem to manage to fold and put away the clothes.  I tried folding from the dryer, and that drove me crazy and just moved the blockage earlier into taking things out of the dryer.  Now laundry got backed up earlier in the system.  I tried getting the kids to sort the clean laundry into piles for me so at least I didn't have to sort, but that didn't work either.  Trust me when I say I tried all the techniques I could find to just get myself to FOLD THE LAUNDRY AND PUT IT AWAY WITHOUT A GIANT FUSS.  And they didn't work.

You know what worked?  Figuring out why the blockage was there.  What specifically did I detest about sorting, folding, and putting the clothes away?  It was the process.  I didn't like all the bits and pieces of the process.  I found it all very frustrating and overwhelming and annoying and I delayed having to do it because of that.  So I thought "how can I remove the whole blockage from the laundry system?"  And I realized if I sorted the clothing before I even washed it, according to type, then the end product would require zero decision power.  Now I wash according to the following groups:

Stuff for the boy
Stuff for the girls that gets hung up
Stuff for the girls that doesn't get hung up
Stuff for the parents that gets hung up
Stuff for the parents that doesn't get hung up
Sheets and bedding according to the bed
Kitchen
Cleaning rags
Other categories as necessary

I don't sort according to colour or fabric.  I don't wait to have a full load.  These things are sacrifices because I would prefer to do them but I have to remind myself of  #4 - Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.  Better to wash this 1/4 load worth of kitchen towels and dishcloths than wait until I have a full load but no towels and am all stressed out.  Do it imperfectly, but at least do it.

7) Something In Every Room.

When I leave a room, or enter a room, I try to do one small thing.  I don't want to have my hands empty as I walk.  If I'm going into the bathroom, I'll take the thirty seconds to tie up the bathroom trash and carry it with me to the kitchen when I leave the room.  Now I'm in the kitchen and I can put that cup into the sink from off the table.  And as I head back into the living room where I was to start with, I can put the dvd into it's case and tuck it in the cupboard before sitting down to hear lessons.  I was going into the rooms anyway, and three more little things got done.

8)  Keep A Spot For Donations.

I keep a cardboard box on top of my chest freezer and throughout the day I put things there as I find them to donate.  It's a box I will also donate, so I don't have to worry about changing out the container when it's time for it to go.  Also it is not too big, or bulky, just a plain cardboard box.  I only put in items that are already clean and ready to go so that there isn't another layer of 'I have to remember to wash those hats first and make sure the books don't have bookmarks still in them before I send off the box."  When the box is full, I put it in the car.  And put out another box.  Books and media to the public library donations spot, clothing and household goods to the thrift store.  Period.  No deviations from the system.

9)  I Am Not Responsible For The Emotional Well Being Of My Things.

Continuing from #8 - my stuff is stuff.  I look at the options for how to get it out of my life, I pick a good choice, I stop thinking about it.  Again, #4 - Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good!  Maybe there is a needier charity, a more environmentally conscious recycler, a generally worthier place to give my things.  Maybe.  But I have made a choice, and I don't spend MORE valuable time and energy researching better choices.  The thrift store I donate to is not a charity, it's a business.  They are going to sell my used stuff to customers.  But it's better than the landfill, it's right on the route to a lot of my shopping, and they'll give me a 20% off coupon if I donate a box of things.  Decision made.  No more thinking.

10)  Find A Way To Include Others That Isn't Horribly Dull

My suggestion here is the powerful weapon of The 10-Minute Tidy.  Gather the peoples.  Explain that for 10 minutes we will race around as fast as possible and clean up.  When the timer goes off we will stop.  It helps to give newbies to this process a few hints and ideas of what they might do so you don't end up with someone playing with dolls and whining "I don't knoooooow what to dooooooo!"  Then set the stove timer and work as fast as you can.  Upbeat music helps.  Lots of yelling and shrieking and encouragement helps.  Frantic, comical running around like a crazy person helps.  There are five people in this house and that equals 50 minutes worth of high energy tidying.  If everyone is focused it's enough to tidy my whole house.

Image of ironing lady is from here.

Homeschooling Update - March, 2019

Here was my update from the end of the first semester.

I'm using this post to record what the children have done for the two months of 'no man's land' between the end of December, and the beginning of March.

I haven't been homeschooling for very long but I have learned that this two month period is, essentially, a complete write off in terms of school.  As March is starting to show us slightly better weather, we're getting back into school more and more.  I feel as though I should record this sort of thing so that the next school year, when it happens again and I find myself in February wanting to cry because my children all insist they can't spell, tell time, complete basic arithmetic or sit still for more than a few minutes, I won't think it's something new.  It isn't new.  It has always been thus.  

The 8 Year Old

Math

We have continued working very slowly through the Kumon workbooks I purchased in the fall, and are picking up speed on those again.  I am still trying and not succeeding at implementing Saxon Math 5/4, which is approximately his level but so far away from his interest.  Our main focus for the past two months has been to memorize the multiplication tables and to that end we are fairly steady up until the 10 times.  We took this book out of the library as well:

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Which introduced the idea of prime numbers, which led to us practicing the Sieve of Eratosthenes, which turned into a rabbit hole of discussing patterns.

Spelling

The 8yo finished Spelling Workout B and started Spelling Workout C.  Printing is smaller and clearer.  We are working on cursive handwriting.

Reading

In terms of reading lessons, we have completely failed in the past two months with that.  However winter always brings on a big upswing in free reading and so far he has 35 titles on his list of Books Independently Read This School Year.  We are entering another reading stage change where he is moving beyond simple chapter books and into longer chapter books, but is still fluctuating between the two levels.  If this goes as his change between advanced readers and early chapter levels went I imagine he will be firmly into longer chapter books by the end of the year.

Music and Physical Education

Swimming lessons were on hold for these two months and have just started up again.  Physical education was mostly the occasional trip to go tobogganing, or else playtime outside with siblings, but not structured.  We need our weekly structured P.E. and I need to remember this in future years.

Music lessons continued but his teacher feels like he is now beginning to reach the end of her teaching ability so I'm researching music schools/teachers to move him to.

History

Still reading A Child's History of the World.  I keep it in the car to read and we rarely go anywhere in the winter.  Sigh.  So we're not too far along at this point.  Really would like to finish it up this Spring and start our next history book.


The 6 Year Old

Math

The 6 yo has plodded faithfully through math and is now 30ish lessons from finishing her year's work. 

Spelling

Problem, she's also four lessons from finishing her year's spelling book.  I started implementing spelling tests to see if she was just floating through the work but she's getting, on average, only one word per list incorrect.  So, I've ordered Spelling Workout B for her and she can do that in the next week or so once she's finished Spelling Workout A.

Reading

This is the reading-est child.  She's reading on level with her older sibling and is set to pass him very soon.  This is her latest book:

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My plan is just to keep shoveling literature at her.  Suggestions for a six year old who reads like a twelve year old are welcome.

Music and Physical Education

The 6 year old is set to take the 8 year old's space in piano lessons when he moves on to a new teacher.  This hasn't happened yet.  

The 4 Year Old

At the 4 year old's insistence, we are 'learning to read'.  In our house this means the well-worn copy of Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons.  We're on lesson 9.  She's a trouper.

Seven Quick Takes - March 1st

Seven Things I Would Totally Buy If Money Were No Object

Right-o!  Onward to the capitalist extravagance!

1)  I think it goes without saying that if you can request a swatch before buying your custom made sheets, we're talking serious bedding.  That's not the price per sheet SET, either, we're talking per sheet.

2)  First read this article, then tell me you don't ALSO want to own Anthony Bourdain's favourite chef's knife.

3)  Now, I've never eaten out at a restaurant specializing in molecular gastronomy, but you had better believe I could.  Alinea, in Chicago, would be my choice.  A cool $395 per person for a set dinner menu.  Minus tips, of course.

4)  For the price of a decent used car, or a year's worth of groceries, I could take a zero gravity flight and oh my goodness I would totally do this.  Do normal people do this sort of thing?!

5)  I have wanted to stay at Hazlitt's Hotel in London for years now.  I will likely never do this in the real world but imaginary wealthy me would go here yearly.

6)  All the books, of course, but especially all of the books from The Folio Society.

7) I can't even think.  A unicorn?  A giant bedazzled unicorn?  That does dishes?

Picture books

Here are some of the picture books we've been looking at these days.

Seven Quick Takes - February 22

1)  Here's an NPR article about 'champing' (camping overnight in churches), the brainchild of the Churches' Conservation Trust.

There seems to be a little fluttering about this.  And I can understand because...camping in churches?  Is this something we should be encouraging?

On the other hand, and just to offer another side of it, churches throughout the centuries have rarely been JUST places of worship.  They've been all sorts of things.  Schools, hospitals, hiding places, places to crown monarchs, places to learn how to play the piano, places to sleep (we've had people sleep in our church before, when they've needed a warm place to lay their head).  The Churches' Conservation Trust does state in its FAQ section that: "The church building has passed to the care of the Churches Conservation Trust"  So these churches aren't 'working' churches anymore, which I think changes the conversation quite a bit.  The CCT does call the churches "consecrated" but I have a feeling they don't fully understand, or at least differentiate, what that means from "commissioned".  Because no denomination I've ever heard of, once finished with a building, leaves it as a fully commissioned/consecrated holy place and turns it over to a church trust for camping.  I think it's probably safe to assume these churches are decommissioned buildings.  It's actually quite a nice thought to me that these beautiful old places of worship will remain standing and cared for for future generations, and be used in a respectful way.  It's better than turning them into houses.

2)  Here is an article about an Icelandic scholar who came to Lincoln in the 12th century to study at the cathedral.  I'm always surprised at how cosmopolitan the Medieval world was.

3)  Something very true that came across my desk recently.

4)  Look at the cross stitched stockings this woman made for her family!  That's just stunning.

5)  I don't need to make this cake.  But I want to.

6)  I bought two pairs of these leggings because the sales clerk informed me that they were this year's version of the leggings I fell in love with last year.  They are not.  Three washes in and they are already pilling.  I'm disappointed.  Thick, sturdy, winter leggings that are more slim pant than skin tight polyester are not the easiest to find.  Especially if you aren't a size 2.

7)  I just bought a new swimsuit for the summer but now that I've seen this one I want it as well.

There's your weekly glimpse into my mind.