Happy Birthday to M!

We are celebrating another birthday, the last of the five of us to have a birthday during this pandemic year. M asked for a pork shoulder so he could smoke it (nevermind the six inches of snow on the ground). The kids got him an analog synthesizer and a muscle massager. I got him a new knife. We are about to have a bbq feast with greens, mac n cheese, baked beans, texas toast style bread and of course, pulled pork. I baked a pumpkin ginger bundt cake with lots of extra spice. I'm going to attempt molasses whipped cream to top it. 

Laurel did a live chat for her Brave Writer class today, and she was very nervous. There is no video in this class, but the teacher opened up a discussion thread and the kids were all supposed to add comments and respond to each other for an hour today. I was impressed, and a little surprised, when we were able to talk about her anxiety before the class started. Talking about her feelings normally results in an explosion of feelings pouring out, which makes it then hard to move in to a new activity! But she is taking a class on stress and now knows about the physiological responses your body has to stressful situations. 

Marko did 2 columns of problems on a math page and read a myth about ursa minor that he found in a magazine. At one point while he was working on the math worksheet, he came to find me to tell me that he was just trying to lie on his bed and imagine the answers on the problem. Is that working? I asked him. He said not really, I think I'll go back to doing it on the paper the way you showed me. And off he went and he did finish the problems on paper much faster. 

Max spent most of the morning playing with M's new synthesizer. I sent him out to play in the snow in the afternoon. 

Tonight we'll video chat with M's parents and watch some more James Herriot.