Lame LaJoy News

Winter has firmly settled in around us, though currently there is no snow on the ground.  The air is frigid, activities abound, and lots of little projects were completed around the house.  I even had a "Martha Stewart" moment, myself!  And as I finished this post I came back up to report that this is pretty much a Kenny-less and Olesya-less post!  No pics of them, really!  Olesya is a bit camera shy so it is harder to get her to let me take pics, and Kenny just wasn't involved in any of these projects this time around.  I'll have to remedy that and focus on some pics of just the two of them and create a Matthew-less, Joshua-less, Angela-less post soon!  Haha!

We are off kilter versus traditional brick and mortar schools, as we school year round with breaks here and there as we feel like it.  It takes the pressure off, and offers us all a more relaxed way to approach our learning.  We finally finished our 2 1/2 year study of US History, and the kids are working diligently on their final projects, which I will share when complete.  They will be creating a timeline of all of American history (Matt already reported having over 300 events to include!), and writing two longer essays to close out their studies.  We will begin what will likely be 2 years of World History in January.  

We are continuing with our Entrepreneurship year long course which will move into year two with a particular project we have in mind, if we can pull it off.  Matthew completed his Udemy course of Engineering and 3D Printing.  The girls are still taking Russian 2 evenings a week.  Kenny and Josh are going to try out playing basketball, and have already stared practices.  Thankfully, neither of them have high expectations around becoming jocks (thank goodness!) so they are doing it just for the fun of being around other kids, and learning something new.  I have already been informed by both of them with great laughter not to plan on seeing them play much in games.  Josh just completed his Photography course and they had a small show where he displayed two of his images:

Ansel Adams...uh..I mean Josh LaJoy

His portrait of Sunny

Joshie has always been a sucker for a good sunset pic.

Angela is preparing to begin a distance learning year long course for Interior Decorating.  She has been so excited about this, and can't wait until her materials arrive!:

She's also been busy helping Dominick, learning new skills:

Taking a tire off the car

Cleaning behind the stove

Then, before Thanksgiving, because our new friend Billy was coming, it was decided that Joshua wanted to build a new gaming computer like Matt did a couple years ago.  They all wanted to be prepared to have a Major Gamefest, so Matt also decided to crawl under the house to run a new LAN cable to their bedroom, which Josh also helped with.  It was so sweet to watch Matthew instruct Josh and teach him about all the parts necessary for the computer build, and then work with him on soldering and explaining every connection needed.  I must say, he was a good instructor, and Josh came away feeling confident he could do it all by himself next time.  Josh saved all the money for the parts himself, and sat down to talk to me and inquired if I thought it was a good investment or not, and then shopped carefully with that hard earned cash.  It was a terrific project!

Examining the partial build

Instructor Matt!

Some part...don't ask me what it was.  The entire project was without adult involvement, even the "under the house run the LAN cable" portion.  

I have to laugh over this picture, as I recall when Matt was maybe 2 years old and Dominick had to go under the house, Matthew stood there and when he disappeared he SCREAMED because Daddy was suddenly missing!  It was really pretty funny, and we teased him about it many years later.  Guess he is no longer afraid :-)

Josh waiting for Matthew under the house to drill through and run the cable up.

Taaa Daaa!  Finished product, up and running!

Stellar cool pink headphones and all!

These two dudes were busy, as the very same day, they fixed the refrigerator door with the part that Dominick ordered.  The store has kept Dominick quite busy, and it is super nice to have a couple of handy men around to help out with such tasks and give Dominick a break when he gets home.  Even better is how cheerfully they all help with any task.

Dominick sent me this photo, taken sometime this summer, and I just liked it!

And here the trio are making lunch for themselves.  The girls usually let them in the kitchen first then do their thing after they clear out.

OK...now...drum roll, please:  :::::::::BRRBRBRBRBRBRBBRBR::::::::::

My Martha Moment!!!

Please don't laugh, it's not a total Pinterest Fail!!

I wanted to put more current photos up in the wall, as we had only a very few of the girls.  Yea, I know, they've been home six years...so sue me, I've been a wee bit busy!!  Anyway, we had also had a couple of the heavier collage frames fall and break so it was time.  I looked at Pinterest (Yes, I really did!!  Blew you away with that one, eh?) and saw a lot of expensive ideas, or ones I knew might be inexpensive but which would be total busts with my lack of talent, and then I saw one that I though we might be able to do.  I would have loved a few of those lovely canvas prints, but that is so far out of reach budget wise I just can't go there.  So here was the empty hall with the old photos taken down:

Dollar Store clipboards

$2 craft paint and $3 wooden words

And free labor for painting them!

And with the help of $4 collage prints from Walgreens, we have a wall of photos displayed!

I made on mistake, and that was to print far too many images on each page.  However, we have so few of 3 of the kids that I wanted them to have as many as we could put up for the world to see, for their history matters just as much as Josh and Matt's, despite us not having as many memories recorded.

And there you have it, all caught up with Lame LaJoy News!  Wasn't this worth your time reading?!?!  NOT!!! Haha!!