Weekly Wrap UP 1-8-16

We had an interesting Christmas break and now are fully back into our crazy homeschooling schedule! We had a little bit of excitement when a beautiful Cardinal flew into our garage....

It appeared he didn't know how to get out!  I opened both garage doors and put out a little bread on the ground and after about 30 minutes the finally flew outside.  

Also our little town experienced major flooding just a couple of days after Christmas.  Here of some pictures of what our town looked like.  I have never seen anything like this before.  As fast as the water rose it also fell but not before causing major damages to businesses and family homes.  We got out to take pictures and to help with the sand bagging.

This is the sports field and the building at the local high school.  The water did flood the major school building but it wasn't nearly as bad as the sport fields.  

Here we watched as a local businessman who was trapped in his truck with the rising flood waters.  The fire department was able to rescue him and his truck

We also witness a family being evacuated from their home as the water rose 

Several communities in our area were literally trapped as the road into and out of their communities were flooded.  Several Fire departments sent in fire trucks  and personnel into the areas to remain in the community in case of emergencies during the flood.  

Our small but thriving business district was ruined.  It was heartbreaking to see all the business that were flooded, including our favorite restaurant that has just expanded:( To give you a better feel for the depth of the water we saw a large dumpster floating down the main street at one point.

We watched a newscaster broadcast our plight on the national news 

News crew reported that had to move further up the street to avoid flood water at least 3 times in the time they were there 

A emergency call out was sent to the local residents to help with sand bagging.  My husband and I went up to see what we could do.  

Those sand bags are heavier than you think so after only lifting a few I was reassigned to just tying the bags.

My husband shoveled and loaded bags almost non stop for two hours.  He was really sore for several days after this.  It was nice to see the community pull together to help out homes and business trying to avoid flood waters.

Another local mall that was flooded this was at full flood levels 

This is the same shopping center the very next day and already the water levels were going down

Our area was completely closed off from all majors highways so we were pretty much housebound during the Christmas holiday.  We took the kids out the following day so they could see the damage, already the water levels were significantly decreased.

While on a break I started working downstairs in my glass studio.  I have several projects I wanted to complete.  I will have to find some free weekend to complete them but I should only need to put in a few more hours and both will be done this month.

I am making a flat panel lamp for my daughter birthday that is coming up this month

Just have to put the base cap on and patina it and it should be done.  My daughter chose the colors.  Now my husband wants one for his office:)

I also started working on another larger panel to hang in the second large living room window.  One window already has a viking ship that I did over the summer.  I have already picked out a project to put in my master bathroom window., not sure when I will be able to start that project:)  I do enjoy working on my projects again.

 MarioFan has completed his unit study on electricity here is is working on finishing our Alexander Graham Bell  project making intercoms similar to the earlier phones.

He was very happy when it worked and had great fun with it!

In our history lessons:

We also finished up our study on immigration, living and working conditions of the newcomers as well as child labour laws.  I had the kids complete a Mock Citizen test and then we took a look at sample questions from the real test we found here 

While I told myself I would do no school planning over the break I did plan out our history and science lessons for the upcoming months.  I will post more about those next week.  Looking at my schedule book the kids have already reached their 100 days for this year.  My state requires 1000 hours and we are already over half way done.  Soon I will do a post for our half year wrap up which helps me stay accountable to what we have accomplished:)