This is D’s second performance with the AZ Homeschool Theatre; C and B’s first. Other than the director, the entire theater company is comprised of homeschoolers – from the script writer to the stage manager, the assistant director to lights and sound board, and all the actors. The crew ranges from 6 – 18, with the younger kids in most the acting rolls for this production. It’ll be back to big guys in the fall, usually something Shakespearean.

So this evening we’ll get facepaint and costumes on and go have a lot of fun.

Home for what was supposed to be naps, since they went to bed about midnight the night before, but turned into a Phineas and Ferb marathon instead. Once their friend arrived it was Pokemon craziness – ds games, cards and movie.

Sunday started late after two late nights. Playing continued with dad made pancakes. Since dad had gotten up with them, he napped and I read some books off the 1001 Children’s Books challenge. The Boy Who Grew Flowers by Jen Wojtowicz, Math Curse by Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith, Skippyjon Jones by Judy Schachner, and Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson. Then they all headed outside to ride their scooters for a while. Once they came back inside, C took a turn trying to make a lego stop motion movie. The very long weekend ended with everyone taking turns picking a tv show to watch.

Since we only had a little bit of time before geography and before it was too hot to wander, we decided to go see the animals each of the kids will be in the Jungle Book. The zoo doesn’t have any Indian wolves, but does have Mexican wolves. So we wandered through the reptiles and up the Arizona trail. After, well not quite spotting the wolves because they were hiding in the shade, we went over to see the elephants. There was one elephant out but she was just standing next to the building and we decided it might be a bit late and all the animals were heading toward shade. The orangutans too were laying under their play structures in the shade. Not much animal seeing went on but we had a good time wandering. We hit the splash pad last and got cooled off it before heading home.

After a quick lunch, we headed over to geography co-op where we were working on reading maps. The kids answer to how to get anywhere was pretty much check gps so this may take a bit of work ;) We found everyone’s homes that were there on a group map. On family maps we looked for places we frequented; we looked for the Arizona Science Center, the Phoenix Zoo, the Arizona Museum of Natural History, the school where their enrichment program is held, play practice and traced the route to friends’ houses.

We ended the night with a trip to the Gilbert Riparian preserve for a birthday bonfire.  The kids had a great time eating smores and running with with glow sticks around the camp site.  One of the craziest things about our homeschool group is the range of ages – there were kids from about 6 to 18 hanging out. About 40 kids played tag in the dark.  We never seem to make it to the scary ghost story part of the night, but it was the perfect setting for it.  Finally meandered home about 11 and crawled in to bed. It was definitely a full day.

Thursday. Kids went to their enrichment program. B had a field trip to the Children’s Museum of Phoenix; she said it was very fun. Afterward we met some friends at a nearby park. We’re hanging on to about 90 and there was a breeze, which is great for us. This is the getting to be the end of playing outside before we hibernate for summer.

We got home from the park just in time for dinner. D worked on a stop action lego movie he’s trying to make while the other two played. Then we read two more books from our 1001 Children’s Books You Must Read Before You Grow Up reading challenge (you can also find the list on Goodreads). We read The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter; Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile by Bernard Waber; and, A Pocket for Corduroy by Don Freeman.

So the kids read. B is reading the stories in Frog and Toad Are Friends; C is reading The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe; D is reading The Ranger’s Apprentice. Then the little two watched Word Girl (yay for Netflix).

Then we had a tea tasting. Why? Well because two wanted tea, but disagreed about the type, and the other has never found one he likes. So we dug out all the tea pots and made green, Irish breakfast (black), peppermint and chamomile – we ran out of teapots before we go to any of my white teas ;) – and did a taste test. D still likes peppermint, B likes everything but green, and C liked green best but could do without any of them.

All three sat down to do some Khan Academy math next. The minute they brought the page up, our internet went down. Next idea? Board games. So they played Sum Swamp and Monopoly.

I realized we hadn’t read anything specifically on our homemade 1001 Books Challenge lately. So I perused the shelves while they played Monopoly to see what I could find. We own a startling number of the books, but we’re in the middle of switching rooms around and painting while much of the furniture is in disarray so owning and finding are two different things. I did manage to find several though.

Freight Train by Donald Crews
The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle
The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf
Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! by Mo Willems
The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
Leo the Late Bloomer by Robert Kraus

Then we all played Lego Minotaur together. For every six steps forward, it’s being eaten by the Minotaur (complete with nomnom sound affects) or a hedge gets thrown up in your way. That one got to be a little long. But in the end I prevailed…and was just glad it was done.

Then back to some reading. We got through a few before daddy got home from work.

The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch
The House That Jack Built by Diana Mayo (different version than they list, but pretty standard)
Stone Soup by Marcia Brown (again, a different author than the list, but a start story – we have at least two versions on our shelves)

Once dad was home, we decided to try our luck at Joe’s Real BBQ’s annual customer appreciation day. The actually give out a free meal once a year. We tend to forget or decide the lines will probably be too long but this year we headed down. We spent 40 minutes in line passing our phones back and forth playing DrawSomething. But we finally got in for dinner. We met some friends coming in as we were heading out a talked a bit while they waited in line.

By the time we got home it was late, but I had a request for some books before bed so I read two more.

I Will Not Ever Never Eat a Tomato by Lauren Child
You’re All My Favorite by Sam McBratney

And since You’re All My Favorite seemed a perfect way to end a day began in bickering, that wrapped it up.