Nuts!

Yesterday was a good homeschooling day. It's been a week now and six out of seven of the days have been good.
Yesterday we met some friends at the playground. The kids played hard. For snack I handed out one serving of trail mix. Sometime when we eat a snack we'll talk about its nutritional value. We also, I have to say, have a deal that if Kaeley decides not to have lunch she will have to take a nap and not do school, because brains just don't work right when they're hungry and I just don't want to deal with the frustration.
Anyway, back to the story, we had the trail mix and I was telling Kaeley that nuts in general have good fats in them that are good for the brain. After she was done with her baggie she gave it back and made sure that I knew we were on for schooling.
After the babies when to bed Kaeley and I went had a few M&Ms. I was working on the computer for a few minutes before starting the big hoorah when Kaeley said, "I wonder how M&Ms are made." I searched the Internet and while I couldn't find a video clip of exactly what I was looking for, I did find a brief explanation, and I read that aloud. Kaeley sat on my lap as we did "science" by watching a few clips the Food Network Unwrapped Internet site. We learned how candy canes were made and a few others.
After science I showed her a little computer game that helps drill counting 1 to 100. It was tough for Kaeley, but she worked through it. I could almost see smoke coming out of her ears! It was so precious watching that concentration and working through problems. It was priceless. When she was more than half way done with the chart she looked up at me with the brightest face and exclaimed, "See, Mommy?" Then she pointed to her head and said, "The nuts are working!"
After that we did a worksheet from her math book, read a book about fractions, listened to Mozart, looked at a book of NC Wyeth art work, she painted while I read aloud from our book, and then we finished it off with some phonics.
It was a busy day for Kaeley. It was so busy, actually, that she was sent to her room as a disciplinary action later in the afternoon. She had lied about something and I answered, "I don't like to be around liars, so you go ahead and play in your bedroom until Grannie comes over." She seemed to skip all the way to the bedroom! I left her alone. I don't know how long it took her, but she was in a deep sleep when I went to check on her!
I was very proud of her. The world is opening up to her as she learns sounds of letters, how to count to one hundred, and who knows what else is out there beyond the walls of her sand box.