When is a duck not a duck?

Logan has recently taken quite an interest in drawing, in writing out letters, in spelling words, and in adding numbers. We have a preschool workbook that we sometime go through but the main impetus is his own (which I think is the best way!). He brought this first picture to me yesterday and told me that it was a bird that didn't use its wings because it didn't fly. So I said "oh, a flightless bird?" so he asked me how to spell that and labeled the picture accordingly. Then he drew a duck and asked how to spell duck. I was a little worried about how more formal homeschooling would fit into our daily routine but I'm starting to think it won't be as hard as I may have anticipated.

$0.99 worth of oranges

Last week James brought home a bunch of oranges from the reduced rack so we've had some fun in the kitchen using them in different ways. I am in the process of making candied orange peel (and am tempted to coat the peels in chocolate, of course) and from that have a couple jars of orange simple syrop. The boys really enjoyed the process of putting the oranges through the juicer (along with a few grapes just because) and have been enjoying the product almost as much. I'm thinking of a way to use the left-over pulp and, if I do, every last bit of those oranges will be used and enjoyed in some way. Of course, just eating the oranges and composting the peel (or using them as a natural air-freshener) uses the entire orange and is a lot less labour-intensive but it's nice to try something different and a little more ambitious every once in a while!