It’s been fairly quiet around here lately, thankfully, but also not super exciting, so I haven’t been sure what to write about on Saturdays. I don’t have much to catch anyone up on.

Anything that has been happening has been fairly depressing or stressful, but it hasn’t been happening directly to me so I haven’t wanted to write about it.

This past week we got more into the swing of school. Little Miss and I did anyhow. The Boy and I are still floundering while we start Beowulf and study for his permit and choose a class to meet his Arts and Humanities requirements.

Little Miss and I are reading Johnny Tremain for our history class and on Thursday Little Miss was talking to a friend on video chat when I told her it was time to read our chapters for history. She said she would keep her friend on call, but her friend would mute herself. Her friend is also homeschooled but had finished her work earlier in the day. So I read the chapters we had for the day (not very long ones) and when we were done the other little girl said, “Huh. I actually enjoyed that.”

Yesterday her mom asked me for the name of the book.

I think I’ll invite the little girl to listen in when we do history until we finish this book and then her mom can count it toward her history each week.

This brings up something interesting someone said this week on a blog post, which was that there are many children who have never had anyone read a book to them and how reading aloud can help children develop in so many different ways, including learning words and about language. Having a book read to us, no matter the age is also very calming (unless it is a horror book) and allows us to share an experience with the person reading the book to us.

Some people process information better when hearing it rather than reading it. My son seems to process better this way and prefers listening to books instead of reading them. That’s why a couple of years ago I stopped making him read books and instead found them in audio form so he could listen to them. We accomplished a lot more that way and were able to get through books he probably wouldn’t have read otherwise.

My only concern with my kids listening to books is that they won’t recognize words if they have to read them out loud later. What I like them to do is read along while they listen to the books so they can recognize some of the bigger words.

As long as they are listening to some classic literature in with the fun stuff, I am good with it. I enjoy audiobooks as well and find that I can process the classic books better when I am listening to them with a good narrator.

I talk about the weather a lot in these weekly updates. I guess that means I’m officially old now but a lot of my readers are old too so I guess that’s okay.

We’ve been having warmer than normal temps for this time of year, but nothing crazy. We are supposed to continue to have temps close to 80 or in the 80s this week but the nights are cool so I’ll take it. We will hopefully have some cooler temps for the rest of the month, but if not, I am just going to hope the nights are still cool. I sleep so much better when it is cool than when it is sticky and warm.

Our leaves are slowly changing and I think we are going to have a lot of brilliant reds this year. Yesterday when we traveled to pick up groceries I was surprised to see some insanely bright red on trees and I am  hoping the entire tree will change that color. I think some of the red we are seeing are vines and not the trees themselves, though.

I read that forecasters expect the peak of the foliage to be in mid-October this year. The hills should look amazing at that time.

This week looks to be another fairly calm week, although I hate to say that and jinx it. Thursday is my birthday and The Husband has planned a family day but hasn’t told me where we are going. From what I understand from the hints he is dropping, we are going somewhere nice for dinner and maybe to a bookstore. I’ll update you next week.

How was your week last week? Do anything interesting or exciting? Let me know in the comments.