Not for educational purposes...

I know I have been noticeably absent from the blog scene lately. It wasn't on purpose. It wasn't planned. Perhaps it wasn't even noticed...

Life has been kicking me around lately.

I can't really put my finger on it... except working way too much, going to way too many soccer games and practices, and trying to homeschool these hoodlums.

I promise to get better.

Since I have been such a slacker, I will leave you with a catchy anecdote that describes my life with a near 11 year old, who looks like an 8 year old and acts like a 5 year old...

On November the 5th, we were doing a special study of Guy Fawkes who attempted to blow up the Parliament building in England in 1605. The basis of the Gunpowder Plot was to rebel and achieve religious freedom from King James. The aim of the plot was to blow up Parliament while the Protestant nobility was inside. However, the Catholic nobility was also inside. Guy Fawkes was arrested hours before the plan was carried out.

A part of the famous poem we have memorized...

Remember, remember the fifth of November,
The gunpowder treason and plot,
I know of no reason
Why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.

English children celebrate this day by shooting off fireworks and burning an effigy of Fawkes.

So, I began by asking the kids if they knew what an effigy was.

For you non-vocab types, it is:
1. a representation or image, esp. sculptured, as on a monument.
2. a crude representation of someone disliked, used for purposes of ridicule.
3. in effigy, in public view in the form of an effigy: a leader hanged in effigy by the mob.

Jameson immediately said,

"oh oh oh, I know. A B C D E effigy..."

Seriously.

I kid you not.

I wouldn't lie to you.

I cried.