December plans

Monday was more crazy than usual. Isabela woke up sick and threw up twice and Diego has figured out he doesn't want to be too far away from me. Top it off with all the plans I had to get back into homeschooling after the holidays and I just couldn't believe how the week was starting off. I called JP leaving him a crazed message of what was going on and how "the kids are going to just have to start going to school because they're not learning anything here." (I think I've done that at least twice since we started school this year.)
At some point, I relaxed...I realized if Isabela would have been in school, she'd have still missed the work...and I realized if she felt up to it later, we could still get things done. Joaquin, Diego, and I sat out of her doorway, and I read some of Hiawatha that the kids are fascinated with. I had checked one version out of the library, but also found an ancient version in the house that was my uncle's when he was a child. It is very captivating.
Our plans for this month center around Christmas, of course...we are learning about the Jesse Tree, which I just heard of this year...singing Christmas carols (we started with Silent Night...Isabela asked, "What's a virgin?" Good question, of course. I told her it is a young woman who's not married yet. What do you think about that answer?)...and learning about traditions and Christmas crafts from around the world. Our composer is Tchaikovsky and our artist is Degas. Speaking of Tchaikovsky, Isabela remembered that I told her I'd take her to the Nutcracker and, of course, Joaquin wants to go, too. I told him you have to sit for two hours and he said, "That's okay, I'll just bring a toy to play with, like my transformers." To which I replied, "I'm not paying $15 dollars so you can play with transformers.' Well... I hope I can get tickets for $15 dollars. Last year, I waited too long and there were no seats left in the inn.
We're making lots of crafts, also. Hopefully we'll get some keepers from ideas from all of these wonderfully creative people in the blog world. The others you may be receiving as a gift, so be forewarned.
A new thing we are trying this year is listening to an old radio program called the Cinnamon Bear...there is one episode per night until Christmas. I'm not sure how good it will be, but it's fun imagining a time when there was no t.v. You can hear it or other old radio programs at radiolovers.com.