I was telling another homeschooling mom yesterday that we
don’t have a strict daily routine that we stick to. Our day is usually quite
unpredictable and having four children who all take turns to add a different
twist or rhythm to the day makes sure that variety is the spice of our lives.
Having said that, our weekdays do have a rough pattern. Today has been totally
different to most weekdays!
We had breakfast just after 8am, as we usually do, after
which we all scatter and make our beds, get dressed for the day and brush our
teeth. Dieter has adopted the task of washing the breakfast dishes more
recently, but he asked Ryan to do that today as he and Oupa were going to do
some shopping in town and they left just after 8.30am. Ouma had to pop into
work to sign some forms and took Aimee with her for the short ride, giving the
boys and I some time to finish up some chores. Ryan and Jed took turns to sweep
various sections of the passages, kitchen and dining room, while I vacuumed the
carpets and rearranged the chairs as they went to make their task go quickly.
Once everything was more or less tidy and in place, Jed and
I started working on a batch of Chakalaka.
Chakalaka is a mixture of tomato, onions, chillis, carrots, cabbage,
green peppers (and I suppose any veggies you wanted to add really!) and even
baked beans. It can be eaten as a side-dish together with meats or as a meal
with some pap/sadza (maize meal) or rice. Jed helped to peel and grate the
carrots while I cut and prepared all the other veggies. (Grating the carrots is
hard work! Jed did well!) Ryan then got the mixture going in the pot while I
finished up cutting the last of the veggies. So, it was a real team effort. I
don’t think I made it spicy enough, but it sure tastes delicious! I bottled about
half the mixture to eat on our cheese sandwiches and we’ll have the other half
for dinner tomorrow night with rice. Ethan wanted to help too, but there really
wasn’t enough space in the kitchen for all of us to work, so when I’d finished
clearing up he peeled some potatoes for Ouma to put in the pea soup she had
started in the slow cooker. Jed cut the leftover carrot pieces into smaller
chunks and also diced the potatoes and added them to Ouma’s soup.
Once the kitchen was tidy I sat down with Ryan and Jed to
start the 5B section of our Singapore Math. The lesson on rounding off to 2
decimals was easy enough, and the first exercise was only a page long and quite
easy, but the 2nd exercise was very challenging and kept them busy
for a long, long time! While they worked on the 2nd exercise, I did
Ethan’s math lesson with him, in fact, we managed to get through two lessons
before we cuddled up together on the couch with Aimee and I read to them. Its
been such a different day, and quite relaxing!
While the older boys watched their daily dose of McGyver,
Ethan spent ages building with Dieter and Mauritz’s old Plastikant and I used
that hour to make a yummy bacon, broccoli and cheese pasta dish for lunch.
Tonight we’re going to have soup together with our lifegroup before continuing
to work through ‘Victory over the darkness’ by Neil T. Anderson. Dieter quickly
put a great onion and cheese beer-bread into the oven while I was cooking that
we will take with us tonight to eat with our soup.
Ethan’s just had a nap, and we’re heading from one side of
town to the other via the ‘main road’. Our purchases should include some smoked
Eisbein for Ouma’s pea soup, a pair of soccer boots to replace Ryan’s that have
ripped and some new library books for Dieter and the boys.
PS: We returned with everything except soccer boots for
Ryan, we’ll keep looking till we find exactly what we’re looking for.
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