St. Francis Academy

The Loft

Well, I have the photos on the computer now, so I will upload the series of photos showing the progress of the loft Matt built in the girls' room on Sunday.   When all was said and done, I think it probably took him roughly 5 hours to complete, though I'm not sure.  There were a few trips to Home Depot.  The table saw's motor kept tripping the breaker, so he couldn't use it.  So, Matt had the bigger pieces cut to size at HD and did the smaller ones with the chop saw.  We used the ideas at this website as our guide, with some input from an old dude at HD.

The project started out with Matt anchoring a 10.5' 2x6 to the studs with lag screws along the entire width of the room as well as 4' pieces along the two side walls.  Then a 2x2 cleat was secured all along the bottom of these boards.  The front piece was then secured to the two side pieces, the cleat was added, and slats were secured to the cleats.

Since the loft is long, Matt wanted to add a 4x4 post in the middle to have extra support.  Then he added plywood over the slats.

A normal family would then sand and finish the loft.  However, it was a long day and beds still needed to be moved, so we were essentially done.  The wood along the front will be painted blue and the underside might be covered with fabric for a more appealing finish for the two older girls who sleep below.  We also need a rail and a ladder.

Here's the almost finished project.  Cate has about 4 feet of play space up top for toys.  The dressers (3 matching wood) will eventually be painted.  I might even install curtains under the loft that can be tied back during the day.  Don't you just love the ladder??? :-)

 

Snippets From My Life

I doubt I have my head together much for a normal post that would be coherent, so I'll just post snippets of what has been going on lately:

1. Basketball...and more basketball.  The season is coming to an end and I'm amazed at the impression a good coach can make on a player.  John has developed so much under this year's coach and has really enjoyed playing for our district's 6th grade 'A' team.   Tournaments start this week (two different leagues) and should wrap up by the time John's baseball team heads south for their first tournament of the season.  I'm soooo ready for baseball!

2.  As a result of playing for this year's 'A' team, John has asked to go to school!  After much hashing out of the how's and why's, we concluded that it was because he wishes to play basketball for our district's 7th grade team.  Typically many of the boys from the 6th grade 'A' team make the 7th grade team.  Fortunately, our district also recently introduced partial enrollment for homeschoolers.  He can take a couple of classes and will be eligible to compete as per state guidelines, yet he will still benefit from the extra attention he gets at home for other subjects.

3. And because his nibs is approaching 13 with all its testosterone-laden surliness and unpredictability, we concluded it would be best that he have a more private space.  Thus, we re-arranged the bedrooms to accommodate this.

4.  In two days, we painted a room, built a loft bed (look for a post on that in the near future), and moved several beds, dressers, and closet contents.  The three girls now share the room with the loft, the two little boys share a room, and John gets his own room for the first time in about 7 years.  Once young Aidan (13 months) is night-weaned, he will be joining his oldest brother.  Less confrontation with this arrangement, I hope.

5.  I have a dentist appointment I am dreading tomorrow (Mon. 2/23), but I know it will be all lovely in the long-run.  The endodontist will be performing some oral surgery to determine the cause of a lingering issue with my "evil tooth" (it has been evil since 7th grade).  It could be as simple as an apicoectomy (which was done once before, I'm guessing...improperly?) or as complicated as a cracked root indicating extraction.  I'm praying for the former, as I really, really want to keep my tooth.  If all is well with the tooth, then it's full-steam ahead to finally have some cosmetic work done so my front teeth can match color!  (Blasted root canals!)  It will be nice to have a pretty smile again.

6. DH is doing lots of traveling to become established in his new territory, we all are finally over a stupid lingering cold (or was it a mild case of the flu???  who knows?), and, well, all of the points above have led to less-than-regular schooling.  That's life, though, isn't it?  I'm ultra-excited about our oldest daughter getting into high school level stuff, and even more excited that we're returning to study American History in depth for a couple of years.  Each year we've homeschooled has allowed me to further my own education, which is pretty cool.

7. And, oh my goodness, can you believe that Lent is almost here?!?!?!?  Ash Wednesday is this Wednesday (2/25).  I am sooo not ready.

8.  And in case I didn't mention it already, I turned 40 on the 2nd.  Matt and I celebrated a couple of weeks late on Valentine's Day, with dinner and a fundraising party for a local select ball club.  It was a fun night and made me think how we should try to have a date at least once a month.  Next month is our 15th wedding anniversary (though Valentine's Day actually marks the 16th anniversary of our first date)!

Geography for little ones

We've had several poster-sized laminated world and US maps over the years.  While they tend to hold up a bit better than just plain paper, they do still tear where the pushpins keep them tacked up to the walls.  After getting frustrated with hanging and re-hanging them in the kids' bonus room upstairs and their general state of unsightly, frayed, hole-filled corners, I finally decided to just keep them down.  And so they sat, rolled up behind the 3-bin laundry caddy in the laundry room.  When I came across them yesterday, after successfully avoiding them for a year, I was inspired to hang them elsewhere...perhaps someplace where they would not see as much basketball action.  But where???

My answer was the dining room (of course).  The dining room has become the over-flow room that houses some of our homeschool materials.  There is a shelf that holds primarily math materials (not just Montessori trays, but also our Math-U-See collection).  Then there is a 4-hole cubby that houses the older kids' notebooks, workbooks, and any other currently assigned materials.  Next to that is a small table holding more Montessori-type materials.  Lastly there is the table by the window that sometimes acts as a setting for liturgical items, nature items, or whatever.  The only two items that actually are "dining room" type items are a metal relief of Da Vinci's "Last Supper" and a corner china cabinet.

So, I set myself to task.  My priority for the world map was to trim it of the unsightly corners.  Fortunately, they were mostly contained in the white border around the map, so I cut off the border.  Also, so the map could fit in the space below the Last Supper and above the shelf, I needed to trim the portion with the world's flags. 

By this time, Cate, Drew, Connor and Lizy were becoming interested in what I was doing.  They spread the US map out on the dining room floor and took turns announcing which state they had found and asked me where others were.  They'd name countries and continents and ask where, on the US map, they were located.  I'd explain they were on the other map, so they would go to the wall and look at the world map and announce "I found China!" "I found Africa!" and then ask, "Where's Ohio on this map, mom?"  By this time I had the US map hung up on the wall by my desk in the den, so they'd run in and locate Ohio, then run back to the world map to try to find Cincinnati: "It's right around here, guys!" someone would yell.  It was quite fun.

Since it's February, it's time to switch things around a bit in how I have materials set up.  I've moved the grammar materials that were in the dining room to the shelf in the den with the rest of the Montessori language materials.  I also moved the Montessori geography materials to the shelf below the world map (see photo above).  I'm hoping this will inspire more use by the younger kids.  I have a small plastic globe that was part of an earth and moon model kit, but I'm seriously thinking of making it a land and water globe by "painting" sand onto the continents.  We now have a puzzle map of Europe, plus a continent box for Europe, which is color-coded red and decorated with scrapbooking stickers.  Inside, it has cards of landmarks, people, and animals, as well as several small puzzles from Top Secret Adventures.