Weekly Wrap- Up: The Week We Painted Ian's Room

We had a busy and productive week!  We painted and organized a bedroom, had a fun day with our friends and visited with family.  We managed to get lots of schoolwork done and the boys are really looking forward to finishing up all of their books within the next month.

We had such a busy day on Friday.  While the younger boys started their day playing some video games, Ian and I started dismantling his room.  He wanted to paint his room and add a few organizational touches to it in place of a birthday gift or party this year.  We began pulling his furniture away from the room and piled most everything into the middle of the room.  We spackled holes, taped off the trim and outlets and got everything ready.

We all sat down to breakfast and I read a few chapters in The Dead of Night.  We also learned a bit of Swahili reading Jambo Means Hello.  After I finished reading, Evan worked on two pages each in his math book and his word family book.  He also completed a page in his cursive book learning the letter "g".  Alec worked in his math workbook and his grammar book.  Ian worked on two pages in his math book and then a page in his cursive book.  Evan and I read another half- chapter in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone while Alec sat down and proceeded to read Hotel Valhalla.

We headed out to pick up the paint and a few supplies... everything seemed to be running against me though and all our errands took longer than planned.  By the time we arrived home at 12:45 (with Subway sandwiches) I was pretty panicked that there was no way we were getting two coats on all of Ian's walls.  I did sit to each lunch though and offered to read one chapter in The Candymakers while I did.  As soon as lunch was over Ian and I headed up to paint... the ceiling needed touching up and I started with that.  Then noticed that flat white paint is not always the same shade of white!  With not enough paint for two coats or any way to fix it we decided to just leave it for now and move on.  We started in with the yellow and discovered that two coats later... we really needed at least three coats.  But we were out of paint and time so I packed it in and tried to ignore that my day felt like one long failure with nothing going quite as I had planned.  After dinner we headed back to the paint store and picked up more wall and ceiling paint. We also had to head to the store to pick up the pegboard and hooks for Ian's Nerf gun wall.  Since Ian room was still a mess he slept at his grandfather's house.

The color we started with 

After the second coat 

Putting on the second coat 

Saturday, Ian headed off to work with his grandfather and I finished painting his whole room.  The younger boys were introduced to some new video games and downloaded them at the end of the week so they spent some time playing Doodle God, Hearthstone, and Smite Battleground of the Gods.  Then I kicked them outside for some fresh air. After lunch Alec started making chocolate cupcakes for his grandfather's birthday party/ gift.  My husband and I made the peg boards for Ian's Nerf gun wall and Ian helped install it then arranged his room just the way he likes it.

Our day began very early Sunday morning when Evan woke with minor stomach pains.  Luckily they went away within 15 minutes and then he was raring to go and woke up his brothers for an indoor egg hunt and a mad dash to the Easter baskets.  They ate plenty of candy and then my husband and Ian headed off to the movies to see the latest Fast and Furious movie while Alec made some peanut butter frosting for his chocolate cupcakes (recipe is on it's way tomorrow!).   It was 85! ... In New England in April that is practically unheard of so we enjoyed an afternoon outside.  We re-potted some household plants and started planting our seeds.  Ian helped his father repair our broken canoe using a rivet gun and some calk while the younger boys played outside in the water and on the climber. We headed out to see family and celebrate a birthday. The boys spent some time at the park playing and we had a very nice visit.  Once back home Ian headed out on his four wheeler and rode around for a bit.  It was a perfectly relaxing day.

Monday we hit the books hard not knowing what our week would end up being like.  The boys all settled down to school pretty early.  They each worked in their spelling books, completed two pages in their math workbooks, and did some reading.  Evan and I finished another chapter in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.  Alec read the lore on the various gods in the game Smite on our x-box-- it took some convincing on his part for me to see and recognize it as schoolwork but I finally did.  Evan worked on another page in his word family book while the two older boys worked on another page in their grammar books.  We looked up Burundi on the Africa map and the boys colored in the country while I read Tracking Wild Chimpanzees In Kibira National Park .  We went outside for art drawing "en plein air" using colored pencils and watercolors to capture what we found.  Ian worked on putting a puzzle together that he got for Easter.  We read two more chapters in The Dead of Night and The Candymakers and the Great Chocolate Chase.  After dinner Ian and I played a few card games and ended our night with a Rummikub battle; he won.   Evan has downloaded Trivia Crack onto his Kindle and we've been playing back and forth with one another.  He is gaining so much confidence with each right answer and he's totally kicking my butt in a few games we have going.

By the time I got downstairs on Tuesday (6:15 or so), Alec was all dressed for karate and had more than half his schoolwork done!  All three boys did great getting ready nice and early and starting right in on their schooling. They all worked on one page in their spelling and two pages in their math books.  Evan worked in his word family book  while Ian chose a page in his cursive book and Alec worked in his grammar book.  Evan and I read another chapter in Harry Potter while Alec read a good half of his Crystal Keepers book.  The younger boys went to karate and I did grocery shopping.  Once we arrived home we made lunches and read together.  We read two chapters in The Dead of Night, a chapter in The Candymakers and the Great Chocolate Chase and then Alec read The Mangrove Tree.  We learned a bit bout the country of Eritrea and the boys found it on the map and colored it in on  their Africa map.  We headed outside and the boys played Uno and then had a sandcastle building contest.  We went for a walk and enjoyed the beautiful weather and all the pretty blooms showing up.

Wednesday we had friends coming over so we kept our schoolwork to the bare minimum of just math, spelling and reading.  Ian started his unit test in math while the younger boys just picked two pages to work on.  Evan read some more Harry Potter to me while Alec read almost half of his Crystal Keepers book.  Ian started reading The Talking T-Rex.  They each finished a page in their spelling books and then Evan pulled out his word family book while the older two boys worked on another page in their grammar books.  Once we were done our schoolwork we did a bit of cleaning and packed up Ian's puzzle that he finished.  Ian headed outside to work on his sandcastle.   The boys had fun playing with video games, Nerf guns and toy weapons for the rest of the day once our company arrived.

I tried to rush the boys through school on Thursday since I had to rearrange a few rooms upstairs and I really wanted to get going on moving furniture.  Ian finished up his unit test and will take a break from math until Monday.  The younger two boys worked on two more pages in their books and we realized Alec only had two pages left for Friday!  All three boys finished one more page in their spelling books and prepared for tomorrow's test.  Evan worked on two pages in this word family book while the older two boys worked on an assignment for persuasive writing; Ian tried to convince us to buy the family a new Polaris Ranger while Alec tried to convince us we should go on vacation to Myrtle Beach again this year.  Both did a great job with supporting arguments and I hardly got any complaints about the writing assignment!  They all did some reading on their own.  Together we read two chapters in The Dead of Night and The Candymakers.  We also learned about the country of Ethiopia reading E is for Ethiopia and The Perfect Orange.  Ian spent his afternoon watching two educational movies: Sarafina and Dances with Wolves.