Tues. June 9th

A quiet morning, finally. Church on Tuesday is at 9am, which gives us a few hours of quiet time in the morning before we have to run out the door. We took care of puppies and then spent an hour studying Chinese and having a leisurely breakfast. After church, Connor reviewed geography using Sheppard software. We met a woman yesterday (at the diamond mine) who was talking about a friend who adopted recently. The woman knew that her friend's adoption took place in Africa, but she couldn't remember the country. I called over Connor to see if he could name the various African countries to jog the woman's memory. Unfortunately, Connor could only remember a few of the countries, which made me decide that a geography review day was in order. We then did more vocab., read The Lord of the Rings, practiced guitar, went to Chinese class and practiced Tae Kwon Do. For almost an hour today Connor pestered the workers who are building the addition to our house. They were laying the tile, and Connor was interested in the tile cutter and the whole tile process. The tile-cutting machine is similar to the gemstone polishing/cutting machines we saw yesterday at the mine. The workers showed Connor the diamond that is the blade and answered his zillion questions. Diamonds are of the hardness scale 10, and they are the strongest cutting tool. Connor got out his new Herkimer diamonds (hardness 7.5) to show the workers. The difference between "real" diamonds and Herikmer diamonds is that real diamonds are made of Carbon, and Herkimer diamonds are sulfite. They both form naturally from the forces of nature, and they both have 18 facets and look exactly the same. When we got home from Chinese class at 5:30p, I dropped Connor off to go horseback riding with his friend. By the time I got home (I had to drive Austin to Civil Air Patrol) it was 9:30p and Connor was in bed already.