Your Jewish Homeschool Curriculum Made Much Easier!

Hello Everyone!

I tried to write this post a while ago, but we have a new web hosting package and even though I was assured that I was not losing anything, I really am, and I was not able to write my post without my server resources being used up and having to wait and redo it all! So, I had to come up with another way of posting that will work until I get around to calling them and not having to spend $200 just so I can write text on my blog!

One of the big issues for Jewish homeschoolers has always been in creating a Judaic curriculum. After homeschooling for 12 years, I have finally put together a list of Judaic curriculum resources useful to Homeschoolers, and the grades they usually match up with. Most of the resources are free, and most can be found on chinuch.org. All I did was go through the resources to find the kinds of things that many homeschooling families are looking for – “What do Day Schools teach?” And then, the second question that most people do not get to for they don’t usually get the first question answered, but is in their minds – “How do I do it?” So, I went through tens of thousands of resources posted on chinuch.org and weeded out what I thought were the kinds of materials most appropriate in a homeschool setting. They are grouped by subject and then by grade range they are most suited for.

Firstly, please keep in mind that this is just a starting place! I have definitely included a lot that many people might be able to use my list to create a full curriculum for many years, however, please note that there will probably be some gaps that need filling in after a few years, so keep that in mind. There is still some information I want to include but is not on yet.

1. Most of what is posted are links to chinuch.org. Chinuch.org is part of Torah U’Mesorah. It is a teachers resource site where teachers can submit classroom ideas and worksheets for others to use. Teachers post their materials and someone at Torah U’Mesorah looks them over to make sure they are appropriate before making them available. Most of what is posted is supplementary material. Homeschooling parents are looking for complete programs or themes. I went through a huge portion of these materials to find complete “kits”. Bonus – Everything on chinuch.org is free. 🙂

2. There are other sites that I have listed. Many of those are not free but are definitely worth looking at if your budget allows.

How do you use my list? All you need to do is find the subject that you are interested in looking at, then go to the grade level (Elementary, Middle School, High School) and see if anything there fits your needs. I tried to find several options for each grade level, though I was not always successful. Just do this for each subject you are looking for.

Again, this was made as a STARTING place, and you might need to fill in the few gaps you may find. The link below will take you to a Google Document of my list. If you have any issues opening it up, please sent me a message. Extra bonus: My list is free, so please pass the link around to your friends who might need it!

Click here for the list

If you have a link that you think would be good, please let me know and I will take a look at it.

Hope you enjoy!

A Gut Moed! Remembering Our Year

KIMG1113I hope that everyone has had wonderful Yomim Tovim so far. We are getting near the end and I don’t want to think about that for I will miss all the ruchnius feelings. I hope to gather as much as I can to tie me over until the spring, which this year, is including a leap year so that means an extra month’s wait until the next Yom Tov. We do have a few little peaks in the dark with Chanukah and Purim, which is a good thing for it would be hard otherwise.

It has been a long time since I have written up something. I thought about it before Rosh Hashanah, before Yom Kippur, and yes, before Sukkos, but, alas, it never happened. But now I have a bit of a reprieve and I can sit down while the boys are busy and not getting into too much trouble. 😉 Over the weeks I have had many things that I could write down, if I had the time, but alas, they were not meant to be written down for I can’t remember most of them.

The one thing that I do remember thinking about is our last Shabbos we spent beforeIMG_20141006_083458 starting on our journey to the new chapter of our lives. It was a bitter sweet Shabbos Yom Kippur. Motzei Yom Kippur was the Hebrew birthday of Beautiful Boy #3 and after loading our Beverly Hillbillies van all the way to the hilt (minus the rocking chair – that got thrown out in the trash – and Granny – no chair so we couldn’t take her 😉  ), we had a wonderful Good Bye lunch at the delicious Sabra’s Grill with our wonderful friends and then off we went down the road. Down, down, down south. Across the country we went, seeing the sights as we passed, watching the scenery slowly change, seeing new vegetation and observing various cultures. Three wonderful days later, I will still remember that Hashem blessed us and we got within 500 feet of our hotel before running out of gas. It was Erev Sukkos, and the English birthday of our Beautiful Boy #3.

Last year we did not have a sukkah. Last Sukkos we were in a temporary home (a hotel) – just like a sukkah. It was a very strange feeling. My Sukkos had so much more meaning to me. It has been quite a year with several temporary homes and lots of other changes, but Baruch Hashem, we finally found our home and this year we have a wonderful Sukkah. We were treated to a nice surprise when several Boy Scouts from our Troop came on Erev Yom Kippur and even though it was hot and the day before a fast, they put up our new sukkah. (Having both the Scout Master and the SPL live here helps!) So this year, we have a wonderful home with a wonderful large sukkah and as I type, we are hosting the Troop at our home and in our sukkah until tomorrow morning. This means I don’t have to make meals for 24 hours (2 breakfasts, a lunch and a supper, along with a party) and I was just handed a bowl of macaroni and cheese with a glass of cream soda.

It has been a trying year for us, but I think it was good. I am hoping for a more productive learning year for us. School schedules need to be adjusted, as they always do once I complete a week or so of learning at the beginning of the school year. In the meantime, I am trying to soak up as much as I can from this time of the year before all the Yomim Tovim are behind us and we will start up again then.

We did have a wonderful chemistry experiment that we managed to do last night. We experimented with how various ingredients work (and tasted) in chocolate chip cookies!KIMG1105 White flour vs whole wheat, butter vs oil, white sugar vs brown sugar, baking soda vs no baking soda, and even caramelized vs non (cookies were baked over 356 degrees F). Eating cookies in the sukkah and Skyping with Saba while he was at his sukkah party made for a nice evening.

Wishing everyone a wonderful Moed and hope you can soak up all the wonderful energy from the remaining days!

<3

Good Morning, Gut Moed

IMG_20141006_083458Well, it’s the last day of Sukkos, and it sure has been quite an adventure the last couple of weeks (well, the last several weeks really,) for we have moved. Not just any move, but all the way to sunny Dallas, TX. And we didn’t just move here, we DROVE here, across the continent, all the way from just a few miles south of the Canadian border, down, down, down, southwards, just about reaching the Gulf Coast. What an adventure, what a drive! A cross country drive with the boys was something we have wanted to do for a long time, and in case I did not feel it before, I sure felt like a homeschool family on the trip. 😀 Needless to say, most boys have not done official school work in several weeks – of of the many bonuses of homeschooling. Mr. Big Boy #1 has been working on his college classes – they keep going no matter what else is going on in your life.

On Rosh Hashanah, things were feeling pretty normal except for the fact that the 20141001_200938house was upside down as we were getting ready to move (I had been trying to thin things down in the house, rooms were moved around to paint, etc. so no, it was not “normal” but as long as I was out of the house I felt things were still pretty normal. The kiddush that Shabbos was sponsored by some most wonderful friends in our honor – all whom we are missing. Then, as everyone was preparing themselves during the Aseres Yemai Teshuva (the 10 days of Repentence – the days in between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur), I felt like I was Pesach cleaning  (oops, sorry for mentioning *the* word now,) both physically and spiritually. The movers came, packed, and then loaded (almost) all our precious (and not so precious) belongings onto a truck and drove off. They were a crew! At least they did not pack a pail of dirty diapers like the previous movers did (after I told them not to!) but they almost took our bikes that were chained up way 20141006_150809in the backyard that were chained up to make sure they did not take them. By Yom Kippur, our house went from being turned upside down, to a House of Maze, to just plain empty. It is amazing how quickly other people can pack your things for they are not emotionally attached to them in any way.

Motzei Yom Kippur the boys were helping us out until 1 am or later (oops, did not realize what time it was and we really did need all their help,) and the Mom and Dad finally went to bed at 5:30 in the morning. The alarm was set for 7:30 am. Funny enough, we woke up before the alarm. Between packing what we needed for the next several months (or at least the minimal amount of things needed,) and finishing getting the house ready for us to 20141006_153549leave, and all boys going to shul, we finally made it out at about 5:30 pm. Happy Birthday 11th YY! Baruch Hashem for a place to eat out, bought lunch and supper and a little dessert for the birthday boy and we were off! Van packed to the hilt, 4 bikes on the back of the van, one INSIDE (1 had to be taken by the movers for there was just no room,) car top carrier filled, and so were laps, and we were off! We were missing one thing – our rocking chair on top with Granny. 😉

We left 5 hours later than we hoped to have left, but it was doable since we were driving. It was a long day. We finally made it to our destination in Columbus Ohio at about 1 am. We all crawled into bed. 6 am came too fast. Monday was our long day. Google maps said it was supposed to take 10 hours. It took 14 – and we only had one 20141006_152629big stop (1.5 hours worth)! We have spent our days looking out the windows, coloring, reading, listening to Lipa (and others) and of course listening to shiurim. Technology can be really amazing. Just 10 years ago, DH complained that he could not listen to shiurim in the car for the quality was just not good. Now, we can listen to recordings from the 1970’s for the technology has come a very long way.

Tuesday was the day we were excited about. We surprised the boys by making our Monday stop in Branson, MO. Branson has been a big tourist attraction spot for many, many years. Grandpa takes one boy each year there to have fun. When they 20141007_103503realized that is where we were going to stay, they just couldn’t stay in their seats as they pointed out the hotels they had stayed in and the other attractions they had been to. (One boy even recognized the driver of the Duck , an amphibious vehicle, as we passed by it – as well as making all the duck noises.) We decided to go see one attraction and we settled upon the Titanic. Afterall, we ARE a homeschooling family and we should make everything educational. 😉 The tickets were extremely reasonable in price and the museum was amazing! They had a lot of artifacts out for show, even some things for hands on experience (a glacier simulation, ship “deck” pieces at various angles to walk up to see what it was like as the ship was sinking, etc.) Each guest was handed a ticket with a name of a passenger and you could look at the list at the end of the museum to 20141007_175638see if you survived… or not… And yes, I was conscious when I walked into the money trap and purchased the photo of our family that was taken, as well as when I purchased other souvenirs . I figured I could spend a little bit of money – afterall, this was an amazing journey and we were all having fun! I did purchase a wonderful book of facts recommended by a worker. Apparently all new employees are given that book to learn the initial facts.

Tuesday night we arrived at our new home – the Homewood Suites Hotel. For the first 5 days the 6 of us spent the time in a 1 bedroom suite before moving in the luxurious 2 bedroom suite with 2 ensuites (yeah!) Sukkos started Wednesday night. We have made this our home and even have our little “bookshelf” all set up! (Yes, a homeschool family!) 20141013_140929Wednesday was spent trying to find our way around town and getting Texas inspection for the car, tags and the toll tag, and a PO Box,  as well as going to the store to get a ready made meal for the one meal we had to make for ourselves over Yom Tov. Baruch Hashem, the community is very nice and by the time we arrived in town, we had 5 meals set up for the Yom Tov/Shabbos! The past few days have been busy as well, though we were able to get out and take a nice walk/hike at Oak Point Park and Nature Preserve. The weather is wonderful. It was a bit warm the first days with 95+ degree weather and we made the downpour on Friday night, but it is supposed to be about 80 through Shabbos.

20141014_133730 (1)This Sukkos does feel a bit strange for we do not have our own Sukkah, and being in a hotel, we usually opt to make food that does not need to be eaten in the Sukkah.  What is special about a sukkah? It is considered an “easy” mitzvah to do for it is a “living” mitzvah – if you want to eat, eat in the sukkah, if you want to make a phone call, make it in the sukkah, etc, easy! We make the sukkah our home. Something we need anyways, just for 7 days a year we make our home in the sukkah. But what is it about the home? The home is the security of man. Even when we are out of the house, working, travelling, etc. when we have a home, we are secure. This really hit home this year and I can really relate. God willing, next year we will be in our own home and once again will have a Sukkah.

We are meeting a lot of new people, and visiting various shuls. And, I would say, the most important thing is that we met several other religious homeschooling families! My two oldest boys are the oldest, and we are the veteran homeschoolers, but it is so nice to have a nice group to20141014_115629 (1) do things with. Now, it’s erev Yom Tov again, and this time, we are making most of our own meals (with a stove top but without an oven!) and we are going for a walk before having to make one washing load and trying to figure out what we are going to eat for the next few days.

Wishing everyone a wonderful Yom Tov!

It’s Here Already?!?!?!

20140826_174130a Wow, is it really that time of year again? Wait, isn’t summer still here? I’m not ready. Usually I have a schedule ready 2-3 weeks before we start our learning again. Well, let me rephrase that for we are always learning; before we officially start our new school year. I tried to sit down and work on our schedule multiple times this past month, but something always took me away, including somehow being tagged as the parent who drove boys and friends to a nice creek that had a nice waterfall on an 80+ degree day last week. (Note to self: When you want to spend only an hour at the water in nice weather, don’t let boys go into water. Somehow they just won’t want to leave, and unless you actually go into the water to have them look at you, you can bet on them all of a sudden having selective hearing issues.) I finally wrote down what they are going to do, but it was not until last Thursday/Friday that I finally got to sit down and come up with a schedule. I don’t feel ready to start.

One thing I did keep in mind this year is that even though I love all of Ambleside Online’s schedule, we just will not go through all of the books. For example, there are always 3 bibliographies or similar kind of books a year, however, we usually only get through one. That was a hard thing to admit for it is hard to decide which books to leave out, they are all good sounding and I really would like to do them all. But, after doing this for 4 years now, I realize that we were not necessarily meant to complete ALL the books on the list, but it is a list of great stuff to choose from. My oldest was able to get through almost all the readings but some of the other boys are slower readers or the narrations just take a long time so it takes longer to do so the readings are split up sometimes into multiple weeks. (Yes, I know some people will split up each reading into multiple days, but we just don’t seem to have enough time to do that.)

This past week was busy. Other than finally finding time to make a schedule, Mr. Big has officially started school as a college student. (Yikes!)20140826_173235 Last Monday was his first day. Right now, all his classes have to be online for even though he might be mentally ready for the material (he did have to take a placement test to get in,) I am not letting him go to a physical class. He is still a child (at 13!) and is not ready for the college environment (at least that is what I say and I’m sticking to it.) It is a new experience for all of us. Us seasoned university graduates are trying to guide him in what he needs to be doing, and even though I did take an online course several years ago, it does seem to be very different than what us old folks experienced, though with being old comes wisdom and that makes up for all of it. 🙂 So his AO classes are limited and made up for with all the work he will be doing in his two classes.

For the other boys, we are almost set with our books. I would just like to get a different version of the King Arthur that they will be doing this year for I would like to get the version that has Librivox recordings to listen to. Librivox is a site that had free public domain audio books that are read by volunteers. Since many of the books used by AO are now out of copyright and in the public domain, there are many of the books we can listen to instead of having them read it or having me read to them. Last year we chose to listen to Robinson Crusoe. The reader was pretty good and the boys liked it. They followed along in their book and got to listen to someone other than their mother. It also gave me a break from having to read it for them (it is a very wordy book, something they are not quite used too yet and therefore harder for them to read on their own,) and I got to work with other brothers during that time.

Oh, I can’t forget the Big Mr. 5 Year Old. I have his schedule as well. He would not let me forget to make him one! Hebrew, phonics (Hooked on Phonics), math (Khan Academy, yes, they now have beginning math,) and one reading book a day of science, language arts or a free book of his choosing. When asked what phonics was, I told him it was learning to read. Oh my goodness, he was jumping out of the seat we were sharing with excitement! Before he would go to bed tonight I had to teach him to read. He wanted to read. I told him it was too much and he would not learn it in one day, but I did teach him a little of what we are going to learn tomorrow – A, “a”, apple. 😀

So, are we actually going to start our new school year tomorrow? I’m not mentally prepared to start school, and I don’t think the 2 middle ones are either, especially since one boy ended up today with 6 staples on his head from an accident, and the other came to me as he was headed to bed and asked if we were starting school tomorrow for he just didn’t know. We spent the entire weekend painting the house and not thinking about much else. So, other than helping one boy with his online Spanish and the math and biology we are doing, and teaching the ABC’s to another, I think we will start the learning with play-dough. Someone posted a great site that teaches about the chemistry of how play-dough works. There are a few chemistry words with definitions and good graphics to go along with it all. We can end the lesson with testing out how starch reacts to the different temperature of waters. I think they will all like it. I also saw a great site that goes into the science of chocolate chip cookies. I really want to do that one as well, though I think I will save it for something fun to do over Chol HaMoed Sukkos…I won’t feel too bad about having the hard part of testing out all the variations then!

Or, I can just take them all back to the creek with the waterfalls. 😀 I’m so glad we can homeschool!

Gut Moed!

20130922_222440Gut Moed everyone! It has been beautiful over here. The boys have all been able to sleep in the sukkah several nights now, and it looks like they will be able to continue to sleep in it through Yom Tov. Unfortunately, I have not been able to sleep in it for one reason: There is no bed or space for a bed for me! It would have been nice, the fresh air is always so refreshing to wake up too. Perhaps next year. Just one note of caution: Do NOT place a pillow anywhere near a heater that is turned on. You just might find the pillow slipped off the bed and is laying on top of the heater creating a fire. Not a good thing. Just saying. Baruch Hashem, the boy who found it turned the heater off and it just melted the pillow. Life lesson learned – keep heaters FAR away from anything in the sukkah. I told the boys this morning that Hashem was really kind to us for it was just a pillow that melted and had to be thrown out. He was giving us a second chance and we need to learn from it. I do not think we really need the heater at night anyways, not with all the sleeping bags and blankets they use.

The first days were wonderful. Busy, but wonderful. We had guests for many of the meals and went out for a couple. It was decided that instead of finishing up the second sefer of Rambam this weekend, they were going to skip to the sefer on Sukkos. It definitely has been a lot of fun learning about the halachos20130922_140417 of the holiday during the holiday. It was also exciting when we took our old lulav from last year we were able to open it up and understand what the Rambam was talking about. For those that have not looked, if you take a look at the lulav (palm branch), each part of the leaf is actually doubled over and is twice as wide as it looks. Quite interesting. Science learning as part of halacha. 🙂 They even learned that you can have a sukkah on a boat. So, we took them to a sukkah on a boat this year. With chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast, building of cookie sukkahs and boys only (with Daddy) pool time, it was a good day and lots of fun.

We usually just do Judaics during Chol Hamoed (the middle days of Sukkos and Pesach/Passover), for it is really still like a Yom Tov, though the boys are sifting through their lego pile now to find all the pieces for Lego Club at Currclick.com. The Lego Club is a free monthly club that the boys can sign up for. They did it a few times at the end of the previous school year, but we have not done it in a few months. Not sure what we are going to do (if anything else) tomorrow, perhaps we will go apple picking. We’ll see.

20130922_141858In the meantime, one boy is making lunch, one boy is cleaning the living room, and one is cleaning the table. Then, I need to go grocery shopping and get a menu ready for the last days! I am going to miss all the Yomim Tovim. There are no more Yomim Tovim until Pesach (not including Chanukah and Purim, which are not real Yomim Tovim for they happened after the Torah). I once heard that all these Yomim Tovim now are supposed to give us the spiritual light to tie us through the dark of the winter months when we get re-jew-venated with Pesach and then Shavuos. I have to20130922_141709 remember to add pretzels and fruit rollups to make edible Torahs for Simchas Torah – both ingredients that I do not usually purchase, but I do occasionally make exceptions. 🙂

Wishing everyone a happy and energizing Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah!

Isrug Chag – The Day After and Our New Elective

I hope everyone had a wonderful Yom Tov.   We ended our Chol Hamoed with a mini birthday party for the now 9 year old (at a friend’s house!) and the two Big Boys had fun contacting more people on the radio together.  It was actually a very busy day on the radio and they just flipped from one frequency to another to another making contacts!

The last Yom Tov day was the busiest I think of them all.  I got the little one all pumped up on Sunday for dancing with the Torahs that after our “lesson,” he went around and collected most of our stuffed Torah collection.  I did not realize we had so many, Baruch Hashem, and I do believe he missed quite a few.  I am not sure where they all came from, for I only remember buying 4!  He came up to me and announced that he was going to take ALL the Torahs to shul to dance with.  I had to burst his bubble and tell him only 1.  He was amazingly okay with that.  And yes, he was sure to take the Torah of his choice (the BIGGEST one of course, and oh, it was red, just in case you were wondering,) both during the night and then again in the day.  Everyone had fun, we did not get home until 4pm!  I even let them bring over a friend after shul.

After all the treats, excitement and lack of sleep for boys, I have decided to put them to work immediately with school work.  We did not quite get a complete day in, but it was off to a good start and I think tomorrow will be even better.  We did, however, start a new course.  They will get the benefit of the great outdoors, exercise, comradeship and home caring all rolled into one.  In school, there are the required themes they have to cover, and then there are the electives that the teachers get to choose from to fill up the extra time.  My boys also have electives.

They have started the elective course on Foliage Raking. This is going to be an ongoing course, probably done several times a week for the next two months.  After that, I think there will be a course on Crystalline Ice Water.  This course will involve the gathering of the crystalline ice water with the use of hands, shovels and even the tongue.  We will also experiment with various uses of the crystalline ice water such as fort building and fort defending.  Perhaps even the use of it for house construction. This course will last at least 4 months and classes will be held several times a week at least, if not more.  Bet you cannot find these electives in a school!  To view some more great homeschool elective ideas, watch this video.

Aside from our new elective, we also had a huge case of Post Wonderful Yom Tov’d Ness.  In other words, children who have been on totally different cycles in eating, playing, and sleeping, and it finally caught up with them.  I knew that at least one boy was going to have a difficult day.  He crashed for a nap for several hours on Monday afternoon.  It did not help that he forced himself awake last night, after Yom Tov, to read in his room until after midnight. I knew last night I was going to have my day set out for me today, and that I was going to have to wake him up early to start him on a normal routine as quickly as possible.  If he was up early, he would actually sleep tonight and hopefully be almost his normal self for tomorrow.  Yes, it was a difficult day for him.  Everything set him off.  Unfortunately, I did quite a bit of practicing of my voice raising on him today.  Would have preferred voice training oppose to voice raising, but perhaps next time.

There is always good that comes out of everything.  His off attitude was just a heightened manifestation of where his attitude has been going over the last month.  Both Daddy and I have tried to check it and get it under control, but to no avail.  Today, after the voice raising, and his being upset at what he considered his harsh Mother, I stopped and had a little talk with him.  I have to admit, it is hard being a child, especially when you perceive yourself a lot more mature than your younger brothers.  One brother can get annoying and you just want him off your back.  You’re exhausted because you are reading a breathtaking book way too late and nothing seems to go your way.  Mommy seems to boss you around, and your brothers seem to always get away with things (in your eyes.)  *Sigh*  Yes, it is hard being the oldest.

I would like to think that my advice to him helped, just a little, for it did calm down a bit the rest of the afternoon and evening.  They all were warned they were going to bed early…. Well, I tried, however, they were all in bed at the regular bedtime, and yes, IN BED.  Now, I did not say asleep, and I did not say they stayed in bed.  Did have the little one come out because he was thirsty…. took several long gulps on multiple occasions before he finally went to bed and stayed there.  It really did not take that long for them to go to sleep.  I insisted that everyone was to be in their own bed.

Several loads of laundry have been done today (thanks in part to chores a poor boy racked up with his tantrums… I did fold all of the clothes for him,) the kitchen has been mostly cleaned up from some busy boys today by those busy boys (amazingly!) and now I’ll finish the kitchen, put another load of laundry on and do some exercising.  I think there might be some leftover time to veg and perhaps do some reading before my wonderful husband comes home from learning.

Wishing you all an easy transition back to your non-Yom Tov schedule!

Gut Moed!

***Please have Raphael Gavriel Simcha Chaim ben Shulamis in your prayers – (Note name addition, things are very serious. )he is a young man (early 20’s) who has a brain tumor.  It was mostly removed several months ago, but it has grown back.  He has remained in the hospital.***

We’re half way done the first half of the last set of Yomim Tovim, in other words – the middle of Sukkos. 🙂  The weather is beautiful, with just one meal being rained out on us.  It is definitely getting cooler, but still warm and I still do not need to wear a jacket – and that is coming from someone who wears jackets because she gets cold easily.  Yesterday I went for a bike ride, and I got in not just one, but two nice bike rides today.  I really enjoy looking at all the wonderful colors.

The little one has his own lulav and esrog and is very proud of it.  I even found last year’s lulav holder for him as well as a nice box to put the esrog.  When we got to shul, he was very excited to show it to his friend and share it with her.  The second day I made a point to get to shul earlier than we usually go so that he could make it for Hallel where they walk around the bima with their lulavim and esrogim.  We got there on the last circuit, just enough for a 3 year old to have fun and not get bored. 🙂

Yesterday started off nice with a bris (Yom Kippur baby!), buying a very excited 3 year old new Shabbos shoes for his got ruined and then a wonderful Room613 Virutual Sukkos party.  For those who are not sure what a virtual party can include, there were stories, songs, fun Sukkos riddles and a talent show.  Yes, a talent show!  There was a comedian telling riddles and jokes, bike tricks, karate tricks and a wonderful pianist.  Modern technology is amazing, with a laptop and a video camera, we were able to walk outside one of the homes of the boys and watch him ride his bike outside and do some tricks.  It was not perfect, the video cameras have a bit more to be desired sometimes for they did occasionally freeze up for the audience.  Aside from that, it was a lot of fun.  I have to put a nice plug in for homeschooling – it’s hard to watch bike riding tricks in a school, but it was so easy to do in a homeschool setting!

I had wanted to do some learning about the rest of the holidays.  I figured I have three days before Shabbos, and perhaps something (most likely  not) on Sunday before Yom Tov.  That was my plan.  As I mentioned in the last post, I love all the Yomim Tovim, however, it is hard to find all the time I would like to take to teach about every Yom Tov – before the Yom Tov.  We only had a couple of days after Yom Kippur before Sukkos, and so I figured it would be great to learn the rest during Chol Hamoed figuring it was a great way to increase Torah learning a little bit and not have a free for all holiday.  So I planned.

After the bris yesterday, I had one boy make a spontaneous play date (which turned into a sleep over) and another boy had the brother over to our house for his spontaneous play date.  Boy number 3 was happy as a clam to turn the radio on and call “CQ” in hopes to reach people in other parts of the world, which he did. (Amateur Radio aka Ham Radio.)  He also spent some time learning so he can upgrade his radio license from Technician to General so he can use more frequency bands.

After lunch today I had three boys come to the house (one was mine and the other two were the brothers from the spontaneous play dates).  One brother stayed to play with one of my boys and the other brother went with one of my other boys to yet another house for several hours!  My oldest, was still happy as a clam learning outside in the sukkah for his general class and talking to people on the radio. I do not really mind.  It is hard to play with friends who are at school during the day (imagine that!)  We also had a wonderful sukkah party for the Cub and Boy Scouts in our sukkah and a Mazal Tov to my oldest for earning his Second Class rank for Boy Scouts tonight! 😀

We did not get to sleep in the sukkah the first few nights for it did rain and drizzle on and off, however, last night and tonight the boys took advantage of the wonderful weather.  Unfortunately Mommy and Daddy are not out there for Daddy is a bit sick and does not want to get sicker.  I really enjoy the fresh air – it is not too hot nor too cold, just nice and cool and fresh and I wake up really refreshed in the morning when I do get to sleep outside.

I still have my plans… Baruch Hashem we still have tomorrow!  I am determined to get some learning done (will have to say no to play dates….. 🙁  )

It is late, and I’m off to finish making challah, so hope everyone has a wonderful Moed, Shabbos and Yom Tov!