This was more of a home week for us and I was relieved to have it that way. We are all adjusting the addition of my mother-in-law into the house. I never thought Ava was going to easily settle down for bed again! It seems she really likes it when Jayden reads her a bedtime story, and she does better if he is not in the room until she is asleep. We are really sticking to our 3 night a week track run as well. The exercise is good for the mind and body. Seeing as I have not had time to type any Simple Woman’s Daybook posts recently, and I have been on a quote kick, I decided to post one of my mantras for this week here:
 

Well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech.

 
Monday: Martin Luther King Day:
For the 4th year in a row we have organized a Neighborhood Food Drive on Martin Luther King day. Joey is off from work so it is a good day to do it. Last week we put fliers out to 250 houses asking for donations. Then today we loaded into the truck and drove the neighborhood to pick up any food that was left out for us. The photo below was a house from a new section that we added this year, and we just loved their sign on the door to make it so we would not miss it. In our fliers I had asked that it be visible from the road, and this certainly was! So cool!
 

 
Tuesday:
In continuing with our World’s Greatest Artist Study, we worked more on our Picasso projects. Ava decided she wanted to do one too! She chose Girl Before A Mirror, from 1932. I had her trace the picture first and then begin painting it. I am so thrilled at the way each one of the kids paintings is coming along. They are taking longer than expected and probably won’t be done until next week, but they will be totally worth it!
 

 
Wednesday & Thursday:
Both of these days were heavy weighted work days for us. One of the highlights of the week for me though is snuggling up with Jayden to read Harry Potter together. Since all of my children have been early readers, and like the independence of reading themselves, I have not done as much reading to them as other parents seem to with their children. It has been a way for me to make sure that Jayden is reading and understanding what he is reading, as well as a way to make sure that I am keeping up with the reading as well. Both kids are looking forward to finishing Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone so that we can then watch the movie.
 
On Wednesday we finally saved up enough money to buy a used Kindle for the kids to share. I have an iPad and have much appreciate being able to easily have multiple books with me at a time (as well as many other features which I love about the iPad). Now that we are doing more formal reading it means Chloe is having to read one book for her Mother-Daughter Book Club, as well as the new NHBA Book Club we are trying out this month, plus Harry Potter, whatever she is reading for Lightning Lit at the time, and her just for fun books. That is a lot of books to be toting around! With the Kindle, many of them can be on at one time which means always having access to multiple books without having to lug them around. Likewise Jayden is reading the Harry Potter, the NHBA Book Club book, and then a book for fun. Typically the books for fun are print books from the library which they read at night, but the other shared books are great to have in ebook format for all of us to have access to at any given time.

 
Friday:
Jayden now has Chess Club on Friday mornings so we don’t plan too much in the way of written work. While Chloe, Poppy, and Jayden headed out to take Jayden to Chess Club and then out to lunch, Ava, Grandma, and I headed to Foodlink to deliver our donations. It was a little tough figuring out where exactly to take the food, but we managed.