A Homeschool Journal

Homeschooling Whys and Hows: part 1

2012-02-10T23:46:00.000-06:00

I started homeschooling when my oldest child was in 4th grade. I had grown increasingly unhappy with his school and teachers each year.

He was placed into the gifted program in kindergarten and remained there throughout his school experience, but the gifted program was kind of a joke. It meant that he could go on special field trips and that was about it. There was no tailoring of the curriculum for the gifted kids, nothing to make school more interesting. My child entered kindergarten a curious boy who was eager to learn, and by fourth grade his interest was dulled and he was doing poorly in most subjects. He had checked out long before, but it took me awhile to realize that we had options.

All along, I had this bad feeling. I didn't like what went on in his classrooms. It seemed like he was always in trouble. I remember one parent-teacher conference when we asked why some of the consequences were what they were, and the teacher had no answer. It didn't make sense to us to discipline a little boy who had the wiggles, and yes, was being disruptive, by making him stay in during recess. It was that time for exercise and free play that he obviously desperately needed to get those wiggles out. But I felt held hostage, like we had no other options and it was just one of those things we had to put up with.

I was involved in a play group that I took my then 3 and 1 year olds to while my oldest was in school and there was a mom there who homeschooled her older children and brought them with her. I knew there was such a thing as homeschooling, but for some reason had never considered it as an option; meeting her made me realize that "regular" people homeschool.

I talked to my husband and we agreed that it was worth a try and withdrew our son from school. It's had its ups and downs, like anything in life, but homeschooling has definitely been a blessing for our family. Our other children have never been to school and we don't have any plans for them to go.

I Have Issues! And a 52 Books in 52 Weeks Post

2012-01-31T22:19:00.000-06:00

Seriously, it's been bothering me not to follow-up on 52 Books in 52 Weeks, so I am on this blog to post about books, I don't know where else to record it. Then, tonight my 7 year old was telling me with wide-eyed wonder about the book he was reading and how much he loves it, and I thought "I need to write these book titles down before I forget what books they loved." Well, my blog is where I write those things down.

So my long break, possible deletion of my blog, turned into a short break because it was enough to show me that I need to blog a lot more than I had realized. Even if it's sporadic, even if it's less than perfect, I like knowing that when they're all older and running off to do their own thing, I will remember things like what books they loved at 7 years old because I recorded them on this blog.

I've been feeling overwhelmed by all that I can't get done, so I felt like getting away from blogging would free up some time. But never mind me and my silly ideas.

I need a place to record my books!

So that I can stop feeling all bothered by not following-up with 52 books in 52 weeks, here is my quick catch-up list.

Week 2 The Latin-Centered Curriculum by Andrew Campbell and Love and Logic for Early Childhood by Jim and Charles Fay.

I thought maybe I'd find some inspiration in simplifying with The Latin-Centered Curriculum, but once I read this I found that this is the type of approach that would never work with my personality, and it's just not my style. Though I do love classical education.

Love and Logic was a reread because it's been a long time since I read it and I wanted to refresh myself with some tools for my toolbox as we approach having a 2 and 3 year old. I like the Love and Logic books and think they offer good, common-sense, and loving ideas for discipline and guidance.

Week 3 Confessions of a Prairie Bitch: How I Survived Nellie Oleson and Learned to Love Being Hated by Alison Arngrim

I don't normally read celebrity tell-all type books, but something about this one interested me. I had heard it was funny and I was in need of some fun reading, and I grew up reading and then watching Little House on the Prairie, my friends and I even played Little House on the Prairie on the playground at recess. This book turned out to be so much more than a tell-all book, it has a lot of heart. I wasn't expecting some things that are disclosed in the beginning about Alison's childhood and was so disturbed that I put the book down for a few days and almost didn't finish reading it. But I'm glad I picked it back up, because the primary message is about triumphing through hard times and always looking for the good in things. Mixed in with her salty sense of humor and down to earth assessments, it made for an entertaining read.

Week 4 What I Eat: Around the World in 80 Diets by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio

I happened to see this book in the library and was so excited, I own and love Hungry Planet and have read and reread it and couldn't wait to read a new book by the same authors. Hungry Planet shows families around the world with a week's worth of food; What I Eat shows people with a day's worth of food and the book is organized by how many calories each person eats. My kids and I have had so many good discussions because of this book. The foodie and photographer in me loves seeing the food and photographs, but it's also a great reminder of how blessed we are with abundance here in the U.S. and how divorced we are from our food source nowadays. Joel Salatin makes an appearance in What I Eat, and that right there made it worth a read. I will be buying this one to add to our bookshelves.

Blogging break

2012-01-25T15:07:00.000-06:00

I'm not very good at posting consistently anyway, but I am going to take a long break from this blog. I'm at a place right now where I need to start limiting internet time and photography wins out as the one gift I give myself time for, even if I have to shift things around. So I will still be at my 365 blog, or if I decide not to even blog that anymore, I'll be posting my photos on my Flickr page.

Thanks so much to those of you who took the time to read my ramblings, this last year has been so hard with a very high-needs baby, and it shows no sign of letting up anytime soon. I just want to simplify and focus on my kids and the little things for now.

I'm going to leave this blog here for now in case I change my mind or until I decide if there are any family/homeschooling memories on here I want to preserve. But I have a feeling I'll delete it after awhile because I'd love to blog again in a few years when life settles down, but start fresh and have a purpose for blogging and consistent features.

Note to Self

2012-01-10T21:16:00.000-06:00

I asked the kids to each name something they wish we could do in homeschool, without hesitation they each fired something off.

Bunny:
arts and crafts
creative writing assignments or book reports with due dates (she wants to be given the assignment and have a date she has to have it turned in by, so not how I operate but funny that she wishes for this; I will try to make it happen.)

RB:
take apart old electronics

Tiger:
dissect animals

52 Books in 52 Weeks: Week 1

2012-01-09T22:57:00.000-06:00

I read The Giver by Lois Lowry for week 1. Yes, I started off easy with a children's book, but I had no time to get to the library and had this on my shelf and needed to preread it for two of my kids, so it'll have to do!

This book will be a good introduction to dystopian fiction- it's not graphic or violent, though there is one event that the protagonist witnesses that led me to decide to wait another year or two to give this to my current, rather sensitive, 5th and 4th graders. I think this book will lead to some great discussions. Though in some ways it barely scratches the surface, it is a children's novel and will be a good introduction we can build on later when they're ready for deeper explorations.

The stuff of homeschooling- a rambling post

2012-01-07T01:27:00.000-06:00

I started off this week all enthusiastic about organizing our homeschool stuff. You know, that new year, new start feeling?

I cleaned out the school room closet which is always a problem because it's small and doesn't have a light in it, so things seem be perpetually lost in there.

Okay, I mostly cleaned out the closet. There are still odds and ends that need to go elsewhere, but I ran out of steam. And I'm still deciding what exactly to do with it. My kids have asked repeatedly to try workboxes again, they thought they were fun when we tried them briefly, and I think I need more help staying on track myself, but I'm afraid the baby will just dismantle them every day. So I was thinking of making all of those letter trays you see in the closet into workboxes, but I haven't quite worked that out yet.

Here is my secret, I have huge rubbermaid bins of toys and curriculum stored in another room.

My middle kids prefer sharing a room and wanted to turn a bedroom into a playroom now that so many toys have to be kept out of the baby's reach. This bedroom/playroom has their lego table and other small things, so it's strictly off limits for the baby and has become the kids' little getaway. They have a card table set up in a corner for games and a reading corner with bean bag chairs and a book case. It also has these ugly shelves near the ceiling that the house came with and I've never gotten around to doing anything about, because while ugly, they make a very good storage space.

I love strewing. I may have discussed this before. I think kids learn a lot on their own, with the right tools and experiences available, and I love having lots of hands-on learning things for them to choose from. Being that I have five kids, there were years of birthdays and Christmases where they received science kits, board games, microscopes, wooden toys, Lego, Playmobil, Lauri toys, and lots of other goodies. I've hung on to nearly everything since we're blessed with a lot of storage space in this house, and now I have the baby who will be able to reuse things as he gets older. All of this stuff is in those bins.

My bins are organized by number and I have a document on my computer that lists everything in each bin, that way it's easy to find what I want or to find similar themed things when rotating what we have out. It's not pretty or fancy, but it works.

When I cleaned out the closet, I decided to sort and categorize all of our curriculum into bins too and I was shocked (and a little dismayed) by how much we have. But I think I'm always afraid I'll get rid of something and then wish I still had it.

So I boxed up almost all of it and put it in the other room. I'm experimenting and seeing if having very little curriculum available simplifies things for us.

My awesome hubby tried to find me an over the door shoe organizer when he was out doing the grocery shopping alone with the kids while I had some alone time. It turned out to have mesh pockets, which won't work for the little things I want to keep in it in the school room. So I have to go find one with plastic pockets and then see if that helps with the constant mess of pencils, staplers, tape, and the flotsam and jetsam of homeschooling.

Not a terribly exciting post, but what I've been up to this week.

Organizing

2012-01-02T22:28:00.001-06:00

I started blogging my 365 project today at http://www.eyefreckles.blogspot.com

Tomorrow, I plan to reorganize a bunch of school stuff and blog about it. I have bins and bins of curriculum, messy bookshelves, a black hole of a closet in our learning room, and I'm tired of the kids not putting the staplers and supplies back on the art shelves. So I have some ideas and am going to try to get it all organized tomorrow. Organizing does not come naturally to me, it's something I have to think a lot about, search for ideas about (so happy Pinterest is here now for this), and implement and redo several times before I hit on something that works for us.

I feel energized and want to begin our next school term with everything in order. Wish me luck!

DPP: Day 30 and 31

2012-01-01T01:25:00.001-06:00

The last of 2011...

(I forgot to take any photo at all on day 29.)

Day 30

We have a shopping area near us that is beautifully decorated for Christmas. The lights everywhere are so pretty to look at so we go there at night and stroll around. There are musicians playing in the town square, with their guitar cases open for coins, and a horse-drawn carriage. People like to congregate in the square, and it just has a cozy and fun feeling. We went out to eat (Mexican- Baby loved it. Who knew?) and then strolled around for awhile afterward. They were filming a movie there, which was interesting. We went over to the book store and browsed around and bought a few books. (Bunny needed the next book after A Wrinkle in Time.) It was a nice evening.

Day 31

Baby loves when someone leaves the door to the study open because we keep the piano in there and he loves playing the piano. Here he is with one sock on and one sock off, doing one of his favorite things. For some reason he constantly takes one sock off. Just one.

Happy New Year!

DPP: Day 24, 25, 26, 27, and 28

2011-12-29T00:31:00.001-06:00

Do you think I could cram anymore days in there?!

My computer had conked out so I was posting on the kids' laptop in the meantime, and hadn't been able to update my photos for the December Photo Project. I will be starting a 365 project soon but it will be on a separate blog, so I promise no more bombarding with daily pictures on this blog once December is over!

Day 24
I did way too much Christmas baking on Christmas eve. These are chocolate chip peppermint crunch cookies. Very decadent and rich but different and good. The bit of sea salt sprinkled on top was a nice contrast to the chocolate and peppermint. Recipe here.

Day 25
I tortured my kids by insisting on a picture before they could open presents.

Day 26
The kids were completely thrilled to be at Best Buy on the day after Christmas. I felt how they look.

Day 27
Where's Waldo?

Day 28
Me and My Shadow

Baby really is her shadow. He loves his big sister.

Goals for 2012

2011-12-28T11:29:00.001-06:00

Anyone else making a list yet?

I'm a compulsive list maker; when I'm feeling overwhelmed, or worried, just making a list helps me feel more in control. I have notebooks full of lists and notes all over the place. And my new love is Google docs, I love keeping all of my lists and plans in there because I often misplace notebooks but I can always access Google docs.

So of course I have a list going for 2012. So far it has:

A 365 project. I am big on recording memories and this would be such a fabulous thing to look back on. I'm nervous though, since I've already found being consistent with the December Photo Project challenging.

52 books in 52 weeks challenge (read one book a week). Reading has always been practically like breathing for me. I just do it all the time. Food labels, shampoo bottles while in the shower, a magazine article or my current book while brushing my teeth, and I could not get to sleep for the longest time without reading in bed. Baby has changed this, I'm exhausted enough to fall asleep quickly most nights and I feel like I've had little mental power or time to read much this year. It hasn't been good for me. I need the escape and the mental stimulation, so I hope this reading challenge will help me to make reading a priority.

Continue to improve my photography. This has so many facets that I need to make a separate photography goal list. But I'm excited. I think we all have a need to create and it's been amazing to me how fulfilled and alive I've felt while learning the technical side, but especially, the art of photography.

Homeschooling- Could that be any more vague?

I have some thoughts about balance, but don't know how to find it yet. Learning needs to be part of life and it is. But there are other things that require intentional learning- I don't know how else to put that. But there are important skills that can't always just be picked up and require focused time and discipline.

And the one thing that always leads me away from unschooling, which makes a lot of sense to me in other ways, is that my kids don't always know they're interested in something until they're exposed to it. And I find it hard to have enough exposure just from living life. Sure, we go to museums, we go to the zoo, we go to the aquarium, we go to the science museum, we go to movies, we explore nature at the park, we talk with other people and learn from them, but there are many things we weren't exposed to until we covered it in our history curriculum or things my kids knew about but didn't realize how interesting they were until we went more in depth with our science studies.

It's like if I told them to go get something to eat, they'd likely just stick to what was familiar or just not be able to think of something new to make. But if I spread out a variety with some new choices they may discover something they didn't even know they liked. I have to spread the buffet, and I find that easier to do with some structure and a plan.

On the other hand, I feel like we've gone too far the other way these past couple of years. There is a bit too much rigidity, in sticking to the plan only, and not enough exploring rabbit trails and doing things that are good for the soul even if they aren't academically rigorous.

Where is the balance is what I'm working on. And how to mix life and homeschooling. We need time for other things too.

I suppose homeschooling goals needs its own list too!

And then there are the usual goals- eat right and exercise. With a high-needs baby in the house, I haven't exercised in way too long. It makes me feel so much better so I want to find a way to run for at least 30 minutes 3 or 4 times a week.

I'd like to work on more projects in our house too- painting, redesigning, and keeping things running more smoothly.

But I will have to get real and prioritize. I can get everything I listed here done this year with a baby on my hip as soon as I find my (non-existent) super woman cape!

DPP: Day 22 and 23

2011-12-24T13:35:00.001-06:00

I've been tempted to drop this project. December is such a busy month and on many days I find I forget to really think about a picture and I use whatever snap shots I have on my camera. The photos aren't up to my standards. But it's a good exercise for me in dealing with perfectionism and practicing perseverance and a great way to improve my photography skills. I'm still planning on doing a 366 project next year, as frustrated as I feel, it's good to be stretched and challenged.

Day 22: Jump

I should have photoshopped out the houses and things in the background but don't have time and honestly don't have many photoshop skills right now.

Day 23: Being Silly

They were having fun taking pics of each other with hubby's iphone.

DPP: Days 19-21

2011-12-21T17:45:00.000-06:00

I need to figure out how to fit in blogging and doing a photo project at the same time! I have lots of thought about homeschooling simmering away but I feel like I just rush all day lately.

Day 19: Kiss

The baby stayed with mom and dad while the big kids spent a few days with their grandparents. Baby was happy to see his siblings again and kept giving his big brother kisses.

Day 20: Want

Baby was trying to take his sister's necklace so she was signing want and then please to him.

Day 21: Vacuum

Baby is both afraid of and fascinated by the vacuum. Here he is with tongue sticking out, in intense and careful examination.

DPP- Catch up post!

2011-12-19T00:34:00.000-06:00

Day 15

The obligatory picture of Christmas bokeh and my experiment with shaped bokeh. I can't cut out a heart to save my life so these are ugly angular hearts. I need to get a punch that will cut the shapes out for me.

Day 16

Baby loves the playhouse at the library.

Day 17

Baby was fascinated with the Christmas lights and lit up fountain at the town center.

Day 18

I have some nursing pictures with the other kids that dh took but none with Baby so far, so I asked dh to take some today.

DPP: Day 14

2011-12-14T20:37:00.001-06:00

A nap with Daddy.

DPP: Day 12 and Day 13

2011-12-13T23:15:00.002-06:00

Day 12: Escape Artist

I found my kids playing this game: Teen holds them in a lock and then they see how fast they can escape. They all find this hysterical and had giant grins on their faces the whole time. I have to admit their expressions as they tried to break free, and Teen's as he tried to hold on, were pretty funny. Here RB is being cheered on by his sister as he's just about to break free from his brother's grasp.

Day 13: Pet Portraits
We finally got our lights and ornaments on the tree today. I've been waiting to get our lights up so I could experiment with Christmas light bokeh but Baby had a very rough day, he's cutting three molars at once and he banged his head on the corner of the wall and has a huge goose egg and cut on his forehead, so I just wasn't able to put him down much today. When the kids were finally in bed I decided to experiment with the only models available. Teen and I were laughing our heads off, it's quite a project trying to get animals to sit where you want and stay there!

This is PJ, our 13 year old Chihuahua mix, and Blossom, our 6 year old Torti.

And here are Lucky, a 2 year old Maine Coon, and Puck, a 6 year old Tabby.

DPP: Day 11

2011-12-12T15:46:00.003-06:00

The Pictures I would have taken.

We left the house on Sunday for a day of errands and we were finally going to go get a Christmas tree after being delayed for weeks due to an illness that went through all the kids, rain that would have resulted in a soggy tree, and other things that popped up.

We arrived at the grocery store to find Santa sitting out front for picture opps, and I realized I had forgotten my camera. I take it everywhere, because being busy with my family means that the best way I can get in practice is by bringing it along everywhere and just taking photos of what we're already doing. Plus, I love capturing our everyday moments and prefer those to posed portraits.

But I somehow forgot my camera on Sunday and I have not one photo to share for DPP Day 11, due to the fact that we were gone all day.

So if I had remembered my camera, I would have taken snapshots of:

The kids with Santa

The kids eating cookies and drinking hot chocolate

A one year old sitting in a shopping cart holding first a green balloon, then another green balloon, and then finally, a red balloon. We would put the string around his wrist and then he'd somehow get it off and let it go anyway. But he was so thrilled when he had a balloon, and then so sad when it left, (he would point at the ceiling way above and make the monkey noises he makes when he wants something), that the kids would give him their balloon. And then Baby would let the new balloon go too.

Everyone trying lots of samples at the fun foodie grocery store

Waiting in the car for dad who ran into another store for us real quick, listening to Christmas music

Picking out the Christmas tree

Bringing in the Christmas tree and getting it straight in the stand

Baby's curiosity

Baby playing in the needles that fell on the floor, brushing his hands through them and throwing them around

Eating pizza and watching The Niightmare Before Christmas

Okay, so I was at home and had my camera for some of that, but sometimes you have to put down the camera and be fully present in the moments with your family too.

DPP 10: Windows

2011-12-10T21:34:00.001-06:00

Through the window at the Chick Fil A play area. Baby's first time in one of those play places and he was delighted.

December Photo Project: Day 8 and Day 9

2011-12-10T00:56:00.000-06:00

Day 8: Picture In a Picture

Day 9: Bath time

There's a First Time for Everything

2011-12-08T10:14:00.001-06:00

I don't normally do this on my blog but I feel the need to vent today. Two topics are on my mind this morning:

1) With seven people living here, there is no such thing as the laundry being done. Baby has discovered the joy of sippy cups and now he guzzles water all day, on top of his never-ending love of nursing, and so he's flooding his diapers. I'm constantly changing his clothes- even though I change his diaper every couple of hours, he leaks anyway. Then this morning he woke up drenched, and since we cosleep, this involves me changing the mattress pad and sheets on a king-size mattress. Plus, he wears cloth diapers which need to be washed frequently. And my other kids wear a lot of clothes. My laundry pile is currently a mountain.

2) I just made Baby's appointment for his 12 month check-up and only a nurse-practitioner we've never met was available. So I get to repeat for what feels like the zillionth time to the zillionth person not to retract his foreskin. Since Americans are generally uneducated about it, I have to educate medical professionals on the proper care of an intact penis so that they don't cause my baby unnecessary pain and trauma. I find this need for vigilance stressful and it irks me that nurses and doctors are so uninformed about this and have probably needlessly hurt other babies with intact foreskins. It loosens up over time, there is no need to retract it before it's ready, it's self-cleaning. When you force it it's like if you ripped your fingernails away from the nail bed. It hurts. And it causes adhesions to form and infection can then set in. You know all those horror stories about the uncircumcised boy who developed a horrible infection and needed to be circumcised later anyway, so you might as well do it when they're babies and won't remember? Yeah, that's an urban legend and never happens. Any infection I've heard about in an uncircumcised boy is due to retracting the foreskin before it's ready. Just leave it alone.

DPP: Day 7

2011-12-07T22:13:00.003-06:00

My son launched this red disc with something he'd made with his Snap Circuits. You can kind of see the red blur above the circuit thing he's holding. For the last several days, I've completely forgotten about taking any kind of a photo until evening. We are just so busy with homeschooling and a very demanding baby all day. Then It's so dim at night that my photos stink. Here, due to the lack of light, I had to set my shutter speed too slow to freeze the spinning of the red disc and it's just a blur. My ISO was all the way up so it's noisy, and my aperture was all the way open so my son, where I was focusing, is in focus, and the cat is not. I'm shooting with a Nikon D70 and absolutely can not wait until I can upgrade to something that does better in low light.

But I'll consider this a project about real life more than photography. I loved how the baby wheeled his car up to watch and the cat was watching too. We have a running joke that they're at the same mental stage right now because they're both very often interested in the same things. (Boxes, flying things, the ceiling fan going around, crinkly paper, and so on.)

DPP: Day 6

2011-12-06T17:23:00.000-06:00

A cold day whiled away in a cozy spot with a good book and cats for companions.

The December Photo Project: Day 4 and Day 5

2011-12-05T22:58:00.000-06:00

We have had a couple of off days of not feeling our best and Baby has been extra clingy. So I forgot to take photos both today and yesterday. I looked at my camera to see if there was anything at all on there for these two days and only had a few photos to choose from.

First, from yesterday, here is a picture I snapped because Baby is so into putting objects in and out of empty containers. Not very exciting, but it's real life in December. You can see Mrs. Claus looking on, so it's festive. Heh.

Next here is a very bad picture because it was already dark out and I have an old SLR that stinks in low light. Bunny wanted me to take a picture of the Christmas tree she decorated for her room.

I'll try to be more creative tomorrow. But hey, this reflects real life. It ain't always pretty or planned out.

The December Project: Day 3

2011-12-03T20:32:00.001-06:00

Decorating a gingerbread house at the library today. If you look closely you can see carolers in the background.

The December Project: Day 2

2011-12-02T19:01:00.000-06:00

I was out of some essentials, so we stopped at Target on the way home. My oldest is demonstrating the excess of Christmas stuff we encountered everywhere.

The December Project: Day 1

2011-12-02T01:41:00.002-06:00

Here in our corner of the world it doesn't get cold enough for winter jammies for quite awhile, so I take special delight in zipping Baby up into a cozy pair of footy pjs. I am so enamored with how sweet he looks in his pajamas, that I've taken to dressing him in them during the day when we're not planning on going anywhere.

The Order of Operations Parade

2011-11-30T21:53:00.001-06:00

Bunny is a very imaginative, creative type. We were reviewing the order of operations a few weeks ago and she created this drawing, which I've been meaning to post.

She says subtraction is dragging its feet and that's why it's last.

She's fun to homeschool because we have similar interests- we both love reading, art, and creating. But she's also hard to homeschool because it takes more time and effort sometimes to translate things into an approach that works for her. Tiger is a more traditional learner- he loves order and has an amazing memory so things like flashcards and timed drills worked fine for him and he has all his math facts down pat. But it seems like Bunny and I have been practicing math facts for a long time and she just can't seem to remember them. She is very strong in math, as far as conceptual things, and zooms through stuff like Singapore Math's Challenging Word Problems. But she is slowed down when it comes to simple computation due to not remembering her facts.

I liked that she drew out PEMDAS because I know that will help her remember. Now, it's time to apply this to her math facts too! I think we will try Times Tales and some creative projects. I'll post a follow-up later.

Such a Lucky Baby

2011-11-21T23:21:00.001-06:00

Sometimes the kids have to take a turn keeping Baby occupied while I'm working with someone else. Bunny is absolutely fabulous at this, she always has an idea that Baby loves.

Here she was showing him how to hold markers and draw. He had a great time.

Marker on himself as well as the paper, he knows how to seize the moment and live it up.

He also "helped" Bunny make a paper bag puppet and then enjoyed the show.

Birthday Boys

2011-11-19T16:53:00.002-06:00

Tiger and the baby have birthdays three days apart. Tiger turned 11 and Baby turned 1. It seems like Tiger was just turning 1 himself.

Baby Turns 1 Year Old!

2011-11-15T23:21:00.001-06:00

My baby boy will be 1 in a few hours. I am so emotional about it, I guess because he's most likely the last.

I took his picture every month on his exact birthday so I can't post his birthday pictures until I take them tomorrow on his birthday, but I did put together this storyboard of his year in cloth diapers.

Fluffy bums on a cute little one are so much fun!

Next Year

2011-11-06T23:01:00.001-06:00

I know I'm not the only homeschooler already thumbing through curriculum catalogs and thinking of next year. This year has just been so uninspiring that I don't have much homeschooling related to write about.

We do math. We do Writing With Ease, which we've used for years and will most likely use all the way through. (Thank you, Susan Wise Bauer). It's easy to use, and I'm all about ease with this many kids to school and a house to run. And it works- one of my kids has some auditory processing problems, and the dictations and narration in this progras has helped him so much! We do grammar. They read their Sonlight reader. I read the history and the read aloud to them. Sometimes we get to science. That's about it. That's a good day right now and I'm fine with that.

But I do miss crafts and projects and leisurely exploring rabbit trails, and I'm looking forward to when we can do that again. Baby is slowly improving, he has stopped putting every thing he sees in his mouth all day long. He no longer eats books. He is a tiny bit better about actually playing with toys. So I'm telling myself it can only get better from here.

Some things I'm thinking about for next year:

Sonlight is a great curriculum, we've used it since 2006 and the books are great. But I am finding the leap in reading aloud this year to be huge- reading all of the history and the very long chapters in the read alouds to the kids takes a long time. Now, I think reading aloud is important, and it's worth making the time for. But Bunny get so bored, she always wants to read to herself and feels held back by my read aloud pace. I can identify with her, as the kid who always read ahead during circle reading time in school. I could not stand waiting for the kid who was reading aloud to get to the next part. But then my auditory weak child needs me to read to him, and I just can't handle two different programs right now. So we move along together for now.

And, dare I say, I'm sick of reading aloud historical fiction every year. I'd like us to be able to follow our interests next year- too often the kids ask me to read a book and I don't have time, due to the heavy SL schedule.

Anyway, we need a break from Sonlight next year. We're considering Further Up and Further In, the Narnia unit study, and will revisit that idea next summer. But I think my child who doesn't like to read and struggles with auditory stuff would benefit from moving more slowly through a handful of books and taking our time to really discuss and explore them. I need to make reading fun again, somehow, with SL, it's become a chore for all of us.

On that note, I want to start emphasizing going to the library and finding fun books and reading to our heart's desire again. I want to have SSR (sustained silent reading) again daily, but make it fun with a special snack and tea or hot chocolate to ship while we read.

I realize we may face the same issue with Bunny with the Narnia study, where she'll get tired of going at our pace. But she's already read the Narnia books, so I'm hoping since she already knows what happens, she'll be content to listen and dig deeper with us and do some fun cooking and projects.

I plan to let Bunny loose and not tie her to a schedule with reading. Oh, she does plenty of free reading, which I don't interfere with, when we're doing Sonlight. But I feel like I throw cold water on her excitement when she loves an SL book and I don't want her to get too far ahead of us so I make her stop and save the rest for the next day. I plan to make a reading list for all three kids and let them read through it at their own pace.

I also really want to make the time for nature study and journaling, I just have a feeling all three would enjoy it and benefit from it, and it should be something we can do regularly since Baby loves going to the park and hiking in the woods.

The last thing I'm considering is trying Michael Clay Thompson language arts. I've been hearing so many positives about this for the last couple of years on a homeschooling forum, and I considered it, but decided we were doing too well with CLE LA. I didn't want to hop around. But we all need a break from CLE next year too. It doesn't change much from year to year and it is so repetitious. I feel like we need to find the joy in language again too, and MCT LA looks like it might be just the ticket.

I'm looking forward to a relaxed yet challenging school year next year. But first, we must get through what we have this year. I wish this year didn't feel like such a chore though. But there are ups and downs with homeschooling and with Baby getting older, I think things are going to be a lot more interesting again soon.

We got the playstands back out for Baby, and put them in the playroom because he loves the playhouse at the library and we were hoping the playstands would be an acceptable substitution for him, and keep him busy during school.

Our Favorite Picture Books

2011-10-24T22:10:00.001-05:00

I love picture books. There is something so timeless about a well-written children's story and it doesn't matter how old I get- I'll never get tired of looking at beautiful illustrations. Picture books are all about comfort and magic to me. I have happy memories of being read good stories as a child and happy memories of reading to my own children.

But, all too soon, they grow up. They page through old picture books now and then, but when they do, they just want to read them to themselves. They have discovered the delight of getting lost in their very own world of imagination.

I'm so happy I can go through the magical story book days one more time with the baby, and plan to enjoy it as much as I can. We have bookcases full of picture books, but I plan to add to our collection, and already have an ongoing list of books to get for Baby.

I looked up an old thread at a homeschooling forum, because I remembered posting what the kids favorites were at the time, and thought I would copy them here with my comments so I don't forget.

Where the Wild Things Are (My 3 yr old's favorite- but you need a daddy to read it with all kind of cool sound affects the way his does! )

On Market Street by Arnold and Anita Lobel (There are alphabet books that are prettier in my opinion, I personally like Alison Jay's book called ABC, but my kids have always loved this one the most.

Corduroy by Don Freeman I remember this from when I was a kid,( and as a matter of fact, the copy we have was dh's), and my kids love this too.

The Complete Adventures of Curious George This is the yellow and blue treasury of original stories, not the red one with the new stories.

Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus Okay, not a classic, but boy do toddlers and preschoolers love being in charge and saying no!

Richard Scarry's Cars and Trucks and Things that Go I get tired of this one, but they never do.

A Very Special House by Ruth Krauss The silly words and rhythm are fun.

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel This is another one that used to be dh's and is still well loved.

Most any of the Lois Ehlert books- Feathers for Lunch, Snowballs, Leaf Man, and Growing Vegetable Soup are our favorites.

For animal books, we love Horton Hears a Who and Horton Hatches the Egg,Harry the Dirty Dog, and Our Animal Friends at Maple Hill Farm.

A few more I'll add to that list:

Kitten's First Full Moon

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie

Sam the Firefly

The Poky Little Puppy

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

Strega Nona, Nana Upstairs and Downstairs, The Clown of God, and really any story by Tomi DePaola.

The Story of a Fierce Bad Rabbit by Beatrix Potter

Frog and Toad, Owl at Home, Small Pig, all of Arnold Lobel's books.

James Herriot's Treasury for Children

Olivia and the other Olivia books

Dragon Tales by Dave Pilkey

Cecily G. and the 9 Monkeys by H.A. Rey

Two Bad Ants, The Polar Express and Zathura by Chris Van Allsburg

Madeline

Harold and the Purple Crayon

When I was Young in the Mountains

Officer Buckle and Gloria

Stellaluna

The Kitten Who Thought He Was a Mouse

That was more than a few! Every book I listed brought back so many memories as I typed. Maybe I should have made it shorter and listed some of our favorite authors:

Robert McCloskey
Cynthia Rylant
Jan Brett
Arnold Lobel
Tomi DePaola
Lois Ehlert
Virginia Lee Burton
Mo Willems
Kevin Henkes
Dr. Seuss

You can never have too many picture books!

Living Life

2011-10-07T00:27:00.001-05:00

I'm striving for a balance between school and life. I want my kids to have a rigorous education but I also want them to have time for life, and learning as life. I don't think learning has to look like school in the way we, who went to traditional school, remember it. Baking, exploring in the fresh air at the park, running errands with Mom, meeting new people, those are all learning opportunities too.

Balance is what I'm struggling with. With four kids to homeschool plus a busy baby, a house to keep up, cooking and laundry to do, time for play and imagining and being alone with our thoughts, and all the other things we want to mix in, it just seems hard to get to it all. I know that, in reality, we can only do some of those things well some of the time, and other things well at other times, and it will get easier when the baby's a little older. Intellectually, I know this. But it's a recurring theme in my writing on this blog, because my heart still struggles with this. Am I preparing my kids well for the future? Are we making memories (besides Mom being crabby and tired because she was up a lot with the baby last night)? Am I nurturing their creativity and unique personalities and not getting overly caught up in checking boxes? On the other hand, are we staying on track enough and not missing too much of what we need to be doing? And on and on it goes...

Bits of what we've been enjoying this past week:

My funny children don't like boxed mac and cheese and similar types of kid food. But they consider this a real treat: California rolls, Honeycrisp apples, goat cheese, and organic raspberries.

A beautiful Sunday evening at the park.

He likes going down the slide, but he likes playing with the wood chips even more.

He is missing four, count 'em, four, teeth. We call him "fangs", which he considers a great compliment. It's a seven year old boy thing.

Enjoying the evening together.

These two have always been so close, despite a six and a half year age difference. They just understand each other.

He likes swinging but often he gets so relaxed that he's almost taking a nap.

Tiger has been asking for awhile to make Cheesy Snakes and Caterpillars from the Usborne Big Book of Things to Make and Do (a book that has been well-loved and worn out in this house). It was great practice with his fractions since we needed to double the recipe and I left the math up to him.

The finished result, not as perfect as the pictures, and we were out of raisins and couldn't make the eyes, but we had fun making them.

A pretty good week. Not perfect, but good. Since good is attainable, I'll take it.

One of My Best Friends is 77 Years Old

2011-09-25T21:51:00.001-05:00

I've known her for 34 years. She loves to tell the story of how we met: I was riding on the back of my dad's bike in a baby seat and I had a big white bonnet on. She held me and talked to me for a long time, until my dad made her give me back.

She lived in the same neighborhood and I'd stop by to see her frequently after school. She would so patiently listen to all my chattering and she made me feel so special. Sometimes she babysat me when there was a school holiday (both my parents worked outside the home) and I looked forward to our time together, chatting and playing card games.

We live in different states now but we still talk. Today she sent me a very nice email and I was thinking about how blessed I am to know her. Which also got me thinking about the way we separate kids by age in our culture and how artificial it is. I think that's a big thing I appreciate about homeschooling- that my kids interact with people of all ages every day.

Homeschooling in Ten Easy Questions

2011-09-21T21:50:00.001-05:00

I got this meme from Jimmie's blog.

1. One homeschooling book you have enjoyed.

Homeschooling for Excellence by David and Micki Colfax was very inspiring for me. There are so many that I'm glad I read and refer to often, that it's hard to choose just one, The Well-Trained Mind being the backbone of our homeschool.

2. One resource you wouldn’t be without.

A three-hole punch! I am constantly telling the kids to "file that in your binder." But maybe a three-hole punch should be classified as a tool, so I'll pick the computer as our biggest resource, for research purposes, math games, videos to illustrate a concept, and so much more.

3. One resource you wish you had never bought.

I can't think of anything. I like having a variety of tools, books, art supplies, and other resources around for inspiration for the kids, even if some haven't been used as much as others.

4. One resource you enjoyed last year.

Little Professor science kits.

5. One resource you will be using next year.

Art of Problem Solving's Beast Academy

6. One resource you would like to buy.

I would really like to try History Portfolio and the Nature Portfolio is tempting too.

7. One resource you wish existed.

A homeschool religion program kind of like Francis Collin's book The Language of God.

8. One homeschool catalog you enjoy reading.

I love to read and reread the Sonlight catalog when they have the book descriptions included. While not really homeschooling curriculum, I also like reading the Evan-Moor catalog.

9. What homeschool subject gives you the most frustration or anxiety?

Right now I'd have to say science. I find science experiments frustrating and time consuming, but my kids love them so we do them. Two things that have saved us at the elementary level: 1) Little Professor Science Kits, everything is in the box and the explanations are clear. 2) Sonlight science dvds. I can't stand TOPs science, I find the explanations do not mesh with my brain, but when I don't understand, we can watch how Justin does it on the dvd and follow along that way.

10. What is your greatest challenge in homeschooling right now?

Juggling four students and a baby who is in to everything and very active. It's been interesting with such a spread too: a senior who just needs a little guidance and input, a child who has just entered the logic stage and needs a lot of encouragement ramping things up a bit, and then the baby who puts everything in his mouth and destroys our science experiments. At least I have two students still at the fun, easy stage: math every day and read, read, read and we are doing great.

Sorry about the weird formatting, I can't seem to fix it.

10 Months Old

2011-09-16T22:36:00.001-05:00

Things to remember about Baby at 10 months:

Almost walking, he cruises around so easily hanging on to everything. He walks all around the house just lightly hanging on to the wall. He will take steps from the couch to me if he's real desperate for me- like when he wants to nurse and mama is mean enough to crouch down a little distance away and say "Come here!" He spends most of his time upright balancing himself against things. It seems like he could walk if he wanted to, but he hasn't found the motivation to really let go and give it a try yet. He'd rather play it safe and is content to just cruise.

He doesn't really care for toys. I found a new looking Leapfrog music table at the consignment shop recently but he only halfheartedly plays with it from time to time. I love wooden toys, especially Waldorf toys, but he doesn't pay any attention to any toys right now. He loves the (real) telephone, he loves to open the doors to the tv stand and throw the dvds on the floor (must put the latches on), he likes to play with anything he knows he's not supposed to have.

He likes getting out of the house and is big on people watching. Though he isn't fond of strangers. Today we were at Toys R Us and the manager came over to talk to us and was standing at the front of the cart by Baby. Baby sat there, not quite crying, but making this face he makes when he feels nervous around a stranger- he squishes his face up like he's about to cry. Funny little guy.

He loves his siblings, they can make him laugh so easily.

He loves climbing the stairs. (They are gated but sometimes when we're going upstairs I let him climb the stairs while I follow right behind him and he squeals with delight the whole way up).

Baby, we love you so much!

For Nemo

2011-09-15T00:26:00.001-05:00

I have always loved this passage from All Creatures Great and Small for personal reasons, but also just because it's beautiful.

"It's my dogs and cats, Mr. Herriot. I'm afraid I might never see them when I'm gone and it worries me so. You see, I know I'll be reunited with my parents and brothers but... but..."

"Well, why not with your animals?"

"That's just it." She rocked her head on the pillow and for the first time I saw tears on her cheeks. "They say animals have no souls."

"Who says?"

"Oh, I've read it, and I know a lot of religious people believe it."

"Well, I don't believe it." I patted the hand which still grasped mine. "If having a soul means being able to feel love and loyalty and gratitude, then animals are better off than a lot of humans. You've nothing to worry about there."

"Oh, I hope you're right. Sometimes I lie awake at night thinking about it."

"I know I'm right, Miss Stubbs, and don't you argue with me. They teach us vets all about animals' souls."

The tension left her face and she laughed with a return of her old spirit. "I'm sorry to bore you with this and I'm not going to talk about it again. But before you go, I want you to be absolutely honest with me. I don't want reassurance from you- just the truth. I know you are very young but please tell me- what are your beliefs? Will my animals go with me?"

She stared intently into my eyes. I shifted in my chair and swallowed once or twice.

"Miss Stubbs, I'm afraid I'm a bit foggy about all this," I said. "But I'm absolutely certain of one thing. Wherever you are going, they are going too."

She still stared at me but her face was calm again. "Thank you, Mr. Herriot, I know you are being honest with me. That is what you really believe, isn't it?"

"I do believe it," I said. "With all my heart I believe it."

Past, Present, and Future

2011-09-11T22:51:00.001-05:00

This morning as I turned on the news and watched a story about the children who were not yet born on September 11th, who never met their fathers, a baby boy sat at my feet chattering and playing with some puzzle pieces. He will turn ten months old this week.

Ten years ago on September 11th, another baby boy sat at my feet playing with a musical toy. He kept pushing the button to make the music start and would dance with abandon and joy. He too would be ten months old within the week. While I watched the terrible footage, called all of my friends and family to make sure they were safe, and wished my husband could come home and be with us, the innocence of my baby boy made me feel so scared and so hopeful at the same time. Scared for the kind of world he was growing up in, but so hopeful that there was still innocence in the world, and babies who could change the world when they grew up.

Now that baby is ten years old, and he has a baby brother he helps teach and nurture. And as cliched as it is, there is so much comfort in the fact that life goes on, that we pick up and keep going, that there is still so much hope and innocence in the world, still joy to be found in dancing to music or playing with a puzzle.

Here are my babies, the only two I had at the time, a few days after September 11th, wearing their flag shirts.

Weekly Report

2011-09-09T19:35:00.001-05:00

We took Labor Day off to spend with dh, who had the day off work, and yet it was a very loooong week. The Baby reached a new level of fuss this week, something is going on that I'm working on identifying- either he's having trouble adjusting to digesting new solid foods or he's working on a new tooth- but whatever it is, he would cry his head off whenever he was put down and would accept comfort from no one but me. It made for long homeschooling days.

So this week was not a stellar week, but just keep swimmin' and all that.

This week we completed:

Math every day. Switching curriculum was the right decision, I don't think we would have been able to get through something more teacher intensive this week.

Grammar every day. Well, I switched Tiger to the new Peacehill Press curriculum, Advanced Language Lessons, and that only needs to be done 3 days a week. Bunny did CLE LA every day and so did RB.

Reading every day.

WWE only one day.

No history or science or read alouds this week.

And I'm still pondering spelling and how to work Latin and religion in more consistently.

But it was a hard, hard week. And I'm just happy we kept plugging away and did what we could.

There was a lot to do and learn besides academics:

We all really exercised our patience muscles. It's not easy staying patient with each other when trying to explain and understand a new math concept, for example, while a baby is loudly crying in our ears.

The kids have really practiced helping each other and mom out when Baby is being a handful.

They have learned a lot about nurturing babies, being thoughtful about their needs, and being patient when Baby's needs must trump the things we'd like to do for a time.

We had beautiful temps in the 80s and enjoyed nature at the park and in the backyard.

We don't have any screen time during the week, so any time waiting on mom and not doing school, was spent doing free reading or engaging in imaginative play together. There are worse things!

And now, I'm off to make bacon and eggs and waffles for dinner, which Tiger talked me into, because "It's Friday night, Mom!"

Some pictures of my sweet Tiger after swimming last weekend:

And a few from the park the other day after school:

A Beautiful Day

2011-09-08T17:20:00.001-05:00

After what felt like endless 100+ days, we have had a cool spell with several days of 80s! We spent the whole day at the Botanic Gardens on Monday and took a picnic lunch along. It was so nice to be outside after being cooped up all summer.

My kids love jumping off of things while I take their picture.

Books We Read in August

2011-09-01T17:26:00.003-05:00

Me:
Gone Away Lake ( reading ahead in the kids' books for school- so whimsical and fun)
Return to Gone Away Lake (loved the first one so much I found the sequel in the library)
A Girl From Yamhill (A reread, I just love Beverly Cleary's autobiographies so much, she is an amazing lady.)
My Own Two Feet (reread)
The Hunger Games (Teen ds and I read this trilogy and discussed- haunting, and leaves a lasting impression; a dark commentary on the human condition but really good at the same time.)
Catching Fire
Mockingjay

I have a baby who wakes at night very frequently still, so I don't read anything that taxes my brain too much these days. I'm big on "comfort" reading right now. (Well, except for the Hunger Games trilogy- definitely not comforting).

Tiger:
By the Great Horn Spoon by Sid Fleischman- school (Exciting , mad-capped adventure!) Bunny and Tiger agree that this is the best school reader so far.
Sing Down the Moon- school
Freedom Train- school

Bunny:
Sing Down the Moon by Scott O'Dell- Correction, Bunny says this book is tied with By the Great Horn Spoon as her favorite school reader so far.
By the Great Horn Spoon (school)
Freedom Train (school)
The Borrowers Afield by Mary Norton
The Borrowers Afloat
The Borrowers Avenged
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
The Indian in the Cupboard series by Lynne Reid Banks
The Rescuers by Margery Sharp
Moonrise by Erin Hunter
Dawn by Erin Hunter
Midnight by Erin Hunter

RB:
Into the Wild (Bunny got RB to start the Warriors series and now they're both addicted)
The Whipping Boy- school
lots of non-fiction I didn't note and can't remember now, will try next month

Read Alouds:
Moccasin Trail
Charlotte's Web- I still cry when Charlotte dies. E.B. White's writing is so beautiful:

"Good-bye!" she whispered. Then she summoned all her strength and waved one of her front legs at him.

She never moved again. Next day, as the Ferris Wheel was being taken apart and the race horses were being loaded into vans and the entertainers were packing up their belongings and driving away in their trailers, Charlotte died. The Fair Grounds were soon deserted. The sheds and buildings were empty and forlorn. The infield was littered with bottles and trash. Nobody, of the hundreds of people who had visited the Fair, knew that a grey spider had played the most important part of all. No one was with her when she died.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

2011-08-30T23:33:00.001-05:00

I find the long summers here hard to take. I grew up in Michigan, cloudy days are frequent since it's a peninsula, so were summers cool enough to wear jeans, crisp fall days at the Cider Mill sipping hot cider and eating warm doughnuts. And playing outside on chilly days with our jackets on, cheeks red and noses running by the time we came inside. And it's green there, so lovely and cool and green.

I have lived in the South for 12 years now and I still miss living in the North. I still find summers to be one long trial of 100 degree days, relentless sunshine, walking through a parking lot and feeling like I'm being baked in an oven. Summers here are something to endure, and each day is the same.

Whenever the calendar, finally, blessedly, turns to September, I start planning and looking forward to fall. It may not officialy be Autumn until closer to the end of the month, it may still be in the 90s, and often even 100, here in September, but in my heart it's fall anyway. It goes back to starting school after labor day every year, once that time of year comes, it just triggers something in me.

I start thinking about new Crayolas with their waxy points and comforting crayon smell. Boxes full of neat rows of pencils. Scissors, markers, tape, notebooks; you name it. A major perk of homeschooling is being able to hit up all the clearance sales after the public schools start back and the stores want to unload the remaining school supplies. And I love school supplies!

I start planning my fall and winter menus because there is nothing so satisfying as serving up a hot, delicious meal on a chilly day. I enjoy cooking and eating so much more in cooler weather, when it's not just about the taste, but also the sheer comfort and warmth to be found in a bowl. (And it helps not to be sweating over the stove).

I start thinking of the books I want to read aloud to the kids and the books I want to read myself, for the pure joy of it. Little House in the Big Woods and Farmer Boy are so satisfying to read in the winter, and Anne of Green Gables is wonderful in any weather, but especially in winter. I think that's due to favorite memories I have tucked away, of spending winter afternoons after school curled up on my patchwork quilt, reading about Rebecca Dew and Dusty Miller.

There are so many other small fall and winter pleasures: fuzzy socks, steaming mugs of chai latte or English Breakfast tea, pumpkin bread hot out of the oven, playing outside when the air feels fresh and exhilarating, planning Halloween costumes (I love Halloween!), planning a special Christmas menu, baking, decorating, the smell of pine in the house.

My favorite months are coming!

I miss Maple trees.

Photo Credit

Cloth!

2011-08-29T21:26:00.001-05:00

Baby is back in his cloth diapers today. I needed to get caught up around the house so we took a week off school recently and I put Baby in disposables, then I did some long overdue deep cleaning. Sometimes that laundry pile just gets too big!

I don't know what it is about those fluffy, soft bottoms...

A Leisurely Saturday Library Day

2011-08-28T22:42:00.001-05:00

We spent Saturday at the big, downtown library.

They have a huge selection, and a big children's area. We left with loads of books and some Signing Times dvds (for the kids and I to learn more signs to teach Baby, he won't actually watch them himself since I'm pretty set against any screens for him for several years, but that's a whole other post).

RB had a good time showing Baby all of the fun things there were to do.

Baby explored. Teen headed downstairs to the adult books to find some computer programming books. Dd had her nose in a book most of the time, except for the time she spent making a craft. Tiger sat around complaining he was hungry. The usual events when we're at the library.

The only downer was that there were some grumpy librarians and a grumpy security guard in the children's section. I know that they must deal with unsupervised children regularly, which colors their attitude, and I don't have a problem with my kids being reminded about the rules. Telling them not to run is fine, but some of the things they were correcting the kids for were silly and nit-picky, and there seemed to be a general air of waiting for them to do something "bad." It's a real downer to me when adults assume the worst of children and forget that they aren't little adults, they are learning, they are practicing, they will make mistakes and gentle, cheerful, firm correction is welcome. But I fail to see the need to be mean, especially when the goal in a library, should be to encourage kids to come and enjoy the books and learning opportunities.

That said, it was the first time we'd experienced that kind of negativity there, and hopefully the last. Because we love the library and will be back.

Week In Review

2011-08-28T02:41:00.000-05:00

This week wasn't our first week of school since we school year round, but seeing everyone's weekly reports this week made me feel inspired to take that up again, it's always nice to look back on.

For the longest time we would get all of our work done in about 4 hours, have lunch and quiet time, and then be free for the rest of the day. But since Baby's arrival, we've had to change that up. Now we school for 2 or 3 hours in the morning/early afternoon, have lunch and quiet time, then school for 1 or 2 more hours in the late afternoon/early evening. This has actually worked out well for us, and it's good we transitioned to this since the kids are getting older and their days will be getting longer anyway.

This week, we have completed daily (for 5th, 4th, and 2nd grades):

Math: We have switched from RightStart math. I really loved their approach to foundational math and am glad we used it. But the last levels were getting too convoluted and with this year being hectic, we needed a paper curriculum.

Grammar: Nothing much to say here.

Writing: This consists of narration and dictation.

Reading: They read to themselves and aloud to me.

Read Alouds: We just finished Moccasin Trail and Charlotte's Web.

History and Geography: We have read about William Wilberforce, Simon Bolivar, Jan Matzeliger, and completed a unit on South America. Not all this week, this has been ongoing since July.

We did not do Science daily, but were able to get to it a couple of times this week. We are almost finished with a Little Professor science kit on rocks. Happily, our most recent issue of Kids Discover Magazine was also about rocks.

We were doing an experiment about sedimentary rock layers and had to fill a tube with different kinds of rocks and water, shake it up, and then leave it to settle for 10 minutes. So we started some other school work while we waited and became so involved in our read aloud that we didn't notice that Baby had climbed on a chair, then climbed on the table next to the chair, then decided to shake, shake, shake the tube of water until the cap flew off and rocks and water went everywhere. He was very happily splashing in the puddles he created, and did I rush to clean it up? No, I took pictures first, of course.

My favorite part of the week was listening to Wee Sing America. I loved music class in elementary school, our music teacher taught us so many great folk songs and standards and I still remember most of them today. Missing music class is the only thing I sometimes feel sad about my kids not experiencing. But the kids really liked following along in the Wee Sing book so we could all sing the lyrics, and it was fun singing together. We're geeks like that. It made me wish we could all gather around the piano in the evening for a sing-along, like on I Love Lucy when Lucy, Ricky, Fred, and Ethel would all gather around and sing after dinner.

Here are my attempts to get an annual "new school year" picture.

Mini Mom, "I'm innocent", Missing teeth- an awesome thing about being 7, Deer in the headlights, and "Must you take my picture?"

Same expression for everyone except Baby, who's sportin' his tough guy look.

A Day of Homeschooling With Baby Along

2011-08-23T23:47:00.002-05:00

I thought this would be a fun contrast to a homeschooling day before the baby. But it became quite a juggling act trying to take photos in the midst of homeschooling, when we already have so many interruptions chasing the baby. Here it is in all its unedited glory, with as many photos as I could manage to get while digging paper bits out of Baby's mouth and getting on the other kids for leaving scissors on the floor in his reach. (Yikes!)

Morning Routine: Wake up, go out to living room and sit and hold Baby for a few minutes (like his Mama, he is not a morning person and needs a few minutes to wake up), then breakfast, personal grooming, and chores for all.

Baby is happy, time to start school.

I am checking Tiger's math and discussing it with him, and then checking everyone's language arts while Bunny does her math with her dolls and RB does some reading.

Lucky joins us and takes a nap.

Teen is doing some work and Baby is thrilled because he has something forbidden.

I redirect Baby to one of his favorite books- touch and feel animals. He becomes busy making loud noises which I assume are his imitation of the animal noises we make when we read this book to him. But maybe he just felt like making noise.

RB is now doing his math and Baby is delighted at the loud noise he can make banging on the table leg with a steel dish from the pretend kitchen dishes. We try very hard to think, despite the racket, because it's good (and rare) when Baby is occupied with something not potentially dangerous or destructive.

I try to correct RB's math with him, but Baby is into something again. RB swoops in with a hug.

Tiger is working on a comic book of his own design while he waits for Mom to be done nursing the baby who just had a little meltdown.

We start this motorized toy that keeps Baby busy crawling after it in the hopes that I can read aloud to the other kids for awhile. This is really a cat toy.

Baby is into something again. Time for lunch.

After a much longer lunch than usual with Dad and Papa, a rare treat- they were home doing a repair today- the three youngest kids go to the library and to run some errands with Dad. This gives me some focused time with the two older boys.

Tiger reads to me and Teen and I go over his math.

We all get distracted playing with the cat and I call it a day. It's 5:30 and was a long day, our homeschooling days are much longer since Baby arrived, but we wouldn't have it any other way. He keeps things lively.

Feeding Baby

2011-08-21T13:25:00.001-05:00

Baby has been having lots of fun trying new foods, he is a great eater. I move on to finger foods pretty quick and Baby much prefers feeding himself as well. Here are some of his favorites.

Blueberries are his absolute favorites

Some Stupendous Students

2011-08-16T22:34:00.002-05:00

I'm late this year, but thought I would join in The Not Back to School Blog Hop and show off the kiddos I have the honor of learning with. I love looking back and seeing how they've grown and changed.

Here is my oldest who will be a senior this year. He's a great brother and young man and he has taught me a lot as a mom. I'm looking forward to witnessing his journey toward independence, with only a few tears. And then there is my 10 year old who will be in 5th grade this year, it seems like just yesterday that I was teaching him phonics and he loved the Handwriting Without Tears little chalkboards. Now, he loves Latin and has an amazing memory.

Then there are my 9 year old daughter and my 7 year old son. They are both passionate about science. I am trying to do more of it for them, since I don't think it's totally necessary in elementary school. But they love it, so we will try!

And finally, we have the baby, who is 9 months old today. He isn't officially homeschooled yet, but he does his best to keep up with his siblings and is extremely interested in anything they're doing.

Read more from other bloggers at the Not Back to School Blog Hop.

Dress-up Fun

2011-08-16T15:57:00.001-05:00

Bunny and i had fun taking Baby's 9 months pics today.

Plans for this School Year and Why Curriculum Doesn't Matter

2011-08-16T00:23:00.002-05:00

Really, we school year round, though typically we start new material in late summer, around the time most people are starting their school year.

We started our new stuff in early July and it has been slow going. We get in as much work as we can before Baby needs his nap and I have to lay down with him. So about 3-4 hours in the morning. Then after nap/quiet time we squeeze in another hour before we need to do some straightening of the house and I need to make dinner. I really need another 2 hours each day to fit in everything I need to do with all of the kids, but I figure it will get better with time.

I used to spend a lot of time reading about curriculum and researching options but I find I don't have any desire to do so anymore. The longer I homeschool, the more I realize that the curriculum doesn't really matter.

Don't get me wrong, it matters in that you and your kids need to be able to stand using it. It matters in that it has to meet your needs- everything planned if you have no time for that, or very open-ended if you love doing your own planning, etc. But as far as setting your kids up for academic success, I think that has to do with the teaching (in this case, the parent) than it has to do with whether you use math curriculum A or curriculum B. It comes from knowing your child, what helps them understand the material, what lights that spark and gets them making connections, what makes you feel confident and enthusiastic as a teacher, because nothing gets kids interested more than an interested teacher, and it comes from being consistent and mindful as you approach learning with your kids.

Now I try to make plans more along the lines of goals and less on what curriculum we will use. (Sure, I use curriculum but it's just a tool in getting to where we want to go, and I can tailor it to suit our needs).

Some goals for this year, for the 2nd, 4th, and 5th graders:

Read aloud as much as possible, because I truly believe that nothing accomplishes as much so simply. Stocking their minds with good language, exposing them to new vocabulary, new ideas, new cultures, new places, historical figures and events- all through good books.

Two are already voracious readers, but I have made it a focus this year to make sure that the one who isn't reads to himself a lot for school. I am hoping practice will make it more enjoyable for him. He is actually a strong reader, technically, but he lacks inferred comprehension and has some auditory processing issues. I am having him read aloud to me daily, as well as to himself, so that we can work on these skills together.

Work on getting math facts cemented. There is a lot more to math than facts and rote memorization. But I do think that it makes it easier to think about advanced concepts when one doesn't have to stop and count on their fingers or make an effort to recall simple arithmetic.

We will continue with the things we love- copywork, dictation, narration, Latin (for one particular child, this is a love), art and nature study for my creative ones as time permits.

Oh, and I know I'm crazy, since he is only 9 months old, but I do have one goal for Baby too:

To keep working on him sitting for longer periods listening to me read and to have several read aloud periods throughout each day, even if they are just a few minutes each.

He already does pretty well for an infant, he will sit through a board book like The Very Hungry Caterpillar most of the time, and he likes to look through his books a lot on his own. I just want to be consistent in reading to him each day. Hearing lots and lots of language (there is a lot more language in books than the average parents is going to speak each day), is a very good thing for a growing brain making lots of new connections.

The Circus

2011-08-11T13:34:00.001-05:00

No, I'm not speaking of my house, though that is often a circus too.

For years I said I would not go to a circus, and then that all changed when my kids did the library's summer reading program and the prize was a circus ticket. They were excited, eyes gleaming, dreaming circus dreams. How could I say no to that? They've been interested in the circus ever since we read about it in Pippi Longstocking.

I don't have much to share for pictures, the lighting was horrible in there and we were busy juggling Extreme Acrobat Baby. (He fit right in at the circus).

Baby loved it, and gave us quite a workout. He has been very mobile from an early age and he won't sit still for anything. So he spent the entire time climbing up our shoulders, flipping upside down, crawling along our laps, grabbing our faces, wiggling to get down, and standing on our laps.

His favorite part of the circus was the audience. He is a people watcher, (I apologize to the people sitting behind us who Baby stared holes through). One guy behind us even offered me cotton candy to give to Baby because Baby was so intently watching the guy and his family eat it. No, I don't think my baby needs cotton candy, but it was nice of the guy to offer. Maybe he thought Baby would stop staring at him if he offered. Maybe it was all part of Baby's plan. Every time the audience clapped, Baby got a huge grin on his face, because of course, the people were clapping for him. They all loved him, if you ask Baby.

I wanted to get a group shot in front of this circus poster but Baby did not want to stay put.

Lucky

2011-08-10T00:18:00.001-05:00

I love homeschooling. I like seeing the progress my kids are making, seeing them grow and change, being with them every day, and learning new things along with them.

It is so hard for me to keep all the balls in the air though. If we are being consistent with homeschooling, then the house is a mess and other things are falling by the wayside. I've had to learn to be content with cycles- several weeks of solid homeschooling, then a week or two off to attend to other projects and a thorough house cleaning. It will get easier when Baby is a bit older and we're not spending the day juggling our time around his needs (and demands).

In the meantime, I feel so inspired and have so many great ideas I can't fulfill. I keep endless notes and reminders, for when I can get to them someday. I dream of leisurely days of nature study, I think of photography ideas I want to try, I peruse home design blogs and itch to paint my living room. And while those things have to be filed away for now, I am constantly reminded of the joy of being present: of kids with big imaginations who let me remember happy times when I listen in on their pretending, and the delight of a baby who is utterly charming; that heady in love feeling when their personality is just shining through, and it's amazing how much this little person can make you laugh.

I feel lucky. I am blessed.

Fun at one of our favorite places

2011-07-26T12:54:00.000-05:00

Last Wednesday was the snake show at the library, part of the children's summer programs. Baby and I spent some time in the kids section of the libray while Tiger, Bunny, and RB went to the show in the meeting room and got to touch boa constrictors.

I spent most of the time following a crawling, furniture cruising little guy around- good exercise. He was also fascinated by another baby- 5 months old- who was there, he watched her a lot, and stole her toy, which we gave back. He mostly wanted to eat the board books, not listen to me read them, but here's a rare moment where he was sitting quietly and happily with one.

When Things Don't Go As Planned

2011-07-21T18:39:00.002-05:00

I'd like to change my blog name since this isn't really a homeschool only blog and I rarely post about homeschooling at all anymore.

I love homeschooling. But in all honesty, it's erratic around here anymore. Our baby is 8 months old now and he is a delight in so many ways, but he is also the worst sleeper I've ever had. I thought I knew about sleep deprivation, because a few of my other babies weren't exactly great sleepers. But they would at least sleep for a block of several hours before waking me, and we bed share so I didn't find their waking that disturbing, we'd just nurse and go right back to sleep.

Baby here wakes up several times an hour. Last night I was trying to pay more attention so I can start a log, (it's hard to really be aware in the middle of the night), and I realized that he is not even sleeping for long stretches- just fussing, nursing, latching and unlatching. I am currently looking into food allergies and reflux, because something just doesn't seem right.

In the meantime, I'm in survival mode and school is more about the kids reading a lot, playing together, and making lots of art and Lego creations. I wish it could involve lots of time outdoors too, but it's too hot out.

I am a perfectionist, which is not productive and I'm working on being content with the good. Good is enough. The chaos and unstructured days are hard. I miss our school routine. I have high hopes that Baby will be better once we figure out if there's an underlying problem and I'm going to commit to trying The No Cry Sleep Solution for one month.

So it's temporary and things will be normal again eventually. In the meantime, the kids and I are learning to make the best of things and be content with what we can do. Not a bad lesson to learn.

Here are two photos I love of Baby. Is there anything better than elbow dimples? I don't want to forget to treasure the tiny toes, elbow dimples, and contagious baby giggles in the midst of the hard times with trying to get some sleep.

Best Books According to Bunny

2011-07-06T23:10:00.000-05:00

My 9 year old daughter made a list during quiet time of her favorite books that I thought I would share. These encompass a wide reading range, many are favorite rereads from her younger years. Some have more literary value than others, but she loves reading and seems to find a good balance herself.

A Wrinkle In Time
Charlotte's Web
Roald Dahl's books- The BFG is her favorite
Pinky Pie
The Penderwicks
The Betsy-Tacy series
The Mrs.Piggle Wiggle books
The Time Warp Trio series
The Wayside School series
How to Train Your Dragon
The Harry Potter series
My Father's Dragon trilogy
The Narnia series
The Spiderwick Chronicles
The Fairy Realm series
Igraine the Brave
The Boxcar Children series
The Cat Warriors series
The Tarantula In my Purse
Garfield comics
Eight Cousins
The Janitor's Boy
The Willoughbys
Toys Go Out
The Family Under the Bridge
The American Girl series
Curious George (never to old to reread some Curious George)
The D'aulaires Book of Greek Myths
Robinson Crusoe
The Wizard of Oz books

Homeschooling During the Dog Days of Summer

2011-06-27T22:12:00.001-05:00

We school year round because it's so hot here in the summer that there aren't a lot of things to do out of the house anyway. And it also gives us some leeway for following rabbit trails or taking an extra long Christmas break.

So we started our new school year last week. There has definitely been a learning curve- the kids are getting older, one is now a 5th grader, so we are trying to ramp it up a little. I am also doing two Sonlight cores, which requires a lot of reading aloud.

I'm happy to report today that we managed to get the three Rs done and do both of our cores completely today. Just wanted to record it here for posterity. It was a really good day because the kids and I also got a lot of chores done and I just feel so much better in a neat house. This was all accomplished even with Baby's usual fussiness, I am becoming an expert juggler- I should be able to count changing a squirming baby's diaper while giving the 9 year old her dictation, and tuning out the 10 and 7 year old's chatter, as a skill on my resume, don't you think?

This photo is from a few weeks ago, before we moved all of those bins out that held school work because Baby kept getting into them. But I thought it was fitting- the baby swing there as part of our rotation of trying to keep Baby occupied, (buys us maybe 15 minutes), and a mess because Baby gets into everything and I'm just happy if homeschooling gets done.

Found in the Dryer

2011-06-20T22:55:00.001-05:00

Here's a bad photo of a glow-inthe-dark praying mantis and the cape to a Playmobil guy.

Why would I take a picture of this? Because I'm weird. Also because I was thinking about how fast little boys grow up, as I dropped my teen off at driving school to drive on the freeway today. The praying mantis and cape were in my 10 year old's pocket. He still plays with toys, he loves bugs and knows lots of cool facts about them, his Playmobil guys have names, and he thinks Garfield comics are hilarious. And I'm glad and I don't want to forget what was important to him at ten years old.

I've been trying to blog for days

2011-06-17T12:57:00.001-05:00

But it mostly looks like this around here lately:

Oh The Places You Will Go

2011-06-07T00:26:00.001-05:00

Dear R.B.,

At seven years old you know all about the magic that can be found in a book. You delight in a new story and excitedly share it: "Mom! This is so funny, I have to read this to you." You see a book about snakes at the library and check it out with your own library card, then read the entire thing during the car ride home. You find a book on the bookshelves that you haven't read in awhile and exclaim over your find, then contentedly curl up on the couch with it in hand.

You love your baby brother so much that you want nothing more than to extend this wonderful gift to him. So you read to him. You read to him even when he grabs your shirt, gets distracted by his toes, and tries to eat the book. When he crawls away, you knee-walk along with him, still reading. When he pulls up to standing at the couch, you stand beside him and you finish that story.

And sometimes you are rewarded by just a few moments of captivation- he notices a bright illustration, or he pauses at the interesting rhythm of your voice and those words you keep repeating.

R.B., someday when our baby is curled up reading happily in a cozy corner, we'll tell him all about how you taught him to stop and appreciate a book and all of the wonder that is found within it. You are igniting a spark that will only grow.

A Trip to the Science Museum

2011-06-05T02:20:00.001-05:00

A membership to the science museum is a great homeschooling resource. We went and saw an Imax movie about Lewis and Clark, which tied in nicely to our history studies. Then we spent a few hours exploring and playing.

A quote from Albert Einstein.

Baby Signs

2011-05-27T23:42:00.001-05:00

I've taught all of my babies the ASL sign for milk, they use it when they want to nurse. One of my favorite memories of Tiger, is him at around 12 months of age dragging his Boppy to me as he stumbled along, happy grin on his face, signing for "nursies" all along the way.

I started signing to Baby earlier than I had with the other kids, I figured it couldn't hurt. Baby surprised me by starting to sign already at 6 months. Of course, I was convinced this was a further sign of how exceptional my baby is. Don't all of us moms finds our babies exceptional?

But the funny thing is, Baby hasn't quite connected the context yet, that the milk sign is for when he wants to nurse. Instead he seems to have connected it with a happy feeling, and he makes it at anything he likes or wants. Teen brother lets him sit on his lap and play the piano, Baby pauses from banging on the keys and makes the nursies sign with a huge smile on his face. Or Baby sees something forbidden that he really wants and he releases a happy squeal of joy and then looks at us and makes the nursies sign.

I snapped a pic of Baby doing it the other day. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to adjust my camera settings so it was very underexposed and looks grainy. But, of course, when I adjusted my settings, Baby refused to do his sign anymore.

Signing "milk"

Just wants to be picked up, not interested in signing anymore, no matter how nicely Mom asks.

Little Miss Sunshine

2011-05-24T09:32:00.001-05:00

She has worn it out but she still puts it on even though it's a squeeze. We tell her she's our Little Miss Sunshine. And she is.

An Excellent Exercise Plan

2011-05-20T00:05:00.001-05:00

Not mine, my 6 year old's.

He came downstairs with a sheet of paper and asked me how to spell "push" and "jumping." My kids write a lot, so I figured he was writing a note to his sister or writing a comic book.

A few minutes later, he reappeared, looking very serious, with the kitchen timer in hand and asked not to be disturbed because he was exercising. He proceeded to do push-ups, lots of running in place, and some jumping jacks. I was happy that the baby was so entertained while watching his big brother do all of this, it allowed me a break and a chance to get some things done.

Later, I found this "daly" exercise plan sitting on the table. What a guy! He's far more organized and motivated than his mother!

Pretty, Happy, Funny, Real

2011-05-19T10:12:00.001-05:00

Pretty

Bunny spent a long time decorating her window in the school room for spring. I think it looks happy. I may not have the neatest house, there are smears of window crayon on the wall, but I have cheerful windows and creative children.

Happy

Going to the Renaissance Festival is an annual event for us. It's fun to pretend we've gone back in time. We love to watch the jousting, practice archery, pet the animals, ride horses, and see the shows. Most importantly, we love creating a family memory.

Funny

When I was taking Baby's picture the other day for his 6 month birthday, he made the funniest face that had us all in hysterics. RB, my six year old, called it "The squish eye."

Real

School. RB was trying to "fish" for this paper fish he'd cut out while I was working with someone else. Baby kept scooting over and grabbing RB's fish before he could try to catch it. Frustrating for RB that his game was being ruined, but he is so patient with his baby brother and smiled anyway, then turned it into a game for the two of them.

Join in over at Like Mother, Like Daughter.

6 months

2011-05-17T09:35:00.003-05:00

Six months of wide-eyed wonder, many firsts, giggles, crying, late nights, elbow dimples, seems like constant nursing, poopy diapers, cradle cap, sweet baby smell, soft baby skin, holding, cradling, protecting, nurturing, and delight. Half of his first year went by so fast, can't wait to see what the next six months hold.

A cute baby picture

2011-05-14T12:06:00.003-05:00

to test how wide I can size my photos now that I've widened my blog.

Here is Baby having a bath in the baby tub. He is now sitting up and grabbing everything, so that was probably his last bath in the infant tub.

I like the water droplets on his chest, which are hard to see here since after testing, I see I can't make my photos as large as I'd like. I won't bore you with the details, but I have spent far too much time fiddling with *&%!& blogger today and will leave it for another day.

Off to Ikea and a beautiful day with my family.

Keep On Keepin' On

2011-05-14T00:41:00.001-05:00

I feel like I've been through a long, hard winter and am finally emerging into warm, sunshiny days. Not that it's been that bad, but it's funny how when you're living in survival mode for awhile, you really appreciate the small things once you can breathe a little again.

Baby has been a lot more content since becoming mobile, and my sleep is more consistent. That has been enough to help me feel human again. And school is going so well, I'm feeling great about the environment of learning we have here. Such simple things- today we went for a walk, looking for nouns and adjectives and verbs, and we had a great time.

Bunny pauses to write down a noun.

We stopped at our small neighborhood park.

When fat forearms and cankles are cute.

Life is more fun when you have a brother to swing with.

My favorite park shots were these two:

This shot of Bunny and RB.

I love the bokeh and the soft warm light. I sure wish I had paid attention and repositioned Bunny so a pole wasn't coming out of her head though. This was an impromptu shot and I was in a hurry to get their picture while they were actually volunteering.

I also like it in black and white. I can't decide which one I like better.

This shot of RB is my other favorite of the day. I've been playing with sun flare and I kind of like the haze here, and the sun flare on the upper right side.

Daily Routines

2011-04-28T18:45:00.003-05:00

Jess got me thinking about what Baby's routine is. We've kind of fallen into things so I haven't given it a lot of thought, but it will be fun to record it and look back on it when Baby gets bigger so here is what he does each day:

We wake up around 9:00 or 9:30. Mama is not a morning person and does not go to bed as early as she should. Baby wakes so frequently, he usually doesn't wake up before 9:00. We cosleep, so the first thing I see in the morning is Baby's smiling face. He's always happy in the morning.

Happy Baby

We change him, and get him dressed for the day, and then we go eat breakfast with the other kids. Baby sits in his high chair and plays with toys. We all have some quick morning chores, except Baby, of course.

We go up to the school room and start school. We alternate Baby through different things while we do school. He'll play on the floor for quite awhile, he is starting to army crawl, (pull himself around by his arms), and will only be getting speedier so we have to work on baby proofing soon. Today he got a hold of teen ds's essay and he nearly destroyed my RightStart math manual- way too many things are within his reach!

When he gets bored with the floor, he'll sit in the Bumbo chair for awhile, or most often, the kids take turns holding him and playing with him while I'm working with someone else. I also spend a lot of time reading aloud or teaching someone a new math concept while he nurses. He will take a 30 minute nap in the swing or in my arms.

RB is especially good at keeping his baby brother entertained.

I sit on the loveseat in the playroom and nurse while I help the other kids with school.

We go downstairs for lunch and he'll sit in his Jumperoo. Then he has a nap (an hour or two) while the other kids have quiet time, which usually involves me laying down with him and nursing him to sleep. (Yeah, I know).

After his nap the kids come down and we listen to an audiobook, (currently, Johnny Tremain), while Baby plays either in his Jumperoo or on the floor with toys. Baby is usually very content during this time, I think he likes listening and I plan to get some classic children's stories on audio next time we're at the library, like Winnie the Pooh, to play for Baby when I'm trying to get chores done or dinner made. It's never too soon to fill his head with good language!

After this we nurse, then I try to find a new distraction for Baby while the other kids and I get our daily chores done. He likes the vacuum and will happily sit and watch me do that. If he is fussy, I wear him in the Babyhawk while doing chores. He'll often fall asleep in there. Sometimes the kids put on music and dance around while we do our chores and Baby will sit in his Bumbo and watch, fascinated.

Very curious and getting mobile.

Then the kids go outside and Baby is often fussiest when they aren't around, he's used to lots of activity. So him and I play for awhile and he'll nurse while I check my email and forums or whatever I have time for. Then I'll put him in his high chair in the kitchen and talk to him while I make dinner. Or if he's very fussy, the kids will take turns holding him and playing with him while I get that done.

Bunny was holding Baby and playing music for him on the iPod while I made dinner and he fell asleep.

Baby hangs out with the kids, or teen ds, whom Baby loves, will hold him for awhile while I take a shower. He does not get a daily bath since he has some skin issues that are worsened by too much bathing, and that whole idea went out the window a couple of kids ago. ;) When he does get one, I usually just take him in the shower with me.

We have stories and playtime until around 8:30, when we tuck the other kids in, and he is ready to settle in and nurse to sleep while I read stuff on the computer. He's down for the night by 9:30 or so.

Of course, some days Baby fusses all day and I hold him most of the day, or the cat pukes, the dog runs away, an older kid has a bad attitude and I have to focus most of my attention on that, and I am frazzled so none of that other stuff happens and we go with the flow.

Somedays we run away too, yesterday we ran away to the library and the park for most of the day and Baby slept in the Babyhawk while we browsed the books and played outside. On the weekend, we spend all of our time with Dad since he works a lot during the week and we try to go do fun family stuff. But whatever we're doing, Baby nurses a bazillion times each day and gets held a ton, that we can count on.

If you'd like to link up with your routine, you can at Jess's Blog.

What My Kids Do For Fun

2011-04-18T16:58:00.004-05:00

They have a board game they love called Would You Rather...? Tiger and Bunny were playing this the other day and one challenge was "Write geek on your forehead and hold your mouth open during an entire turn." Bunny ran to get the face crayons and her and Tiger erupted in giggles looking at her handiwork. Then Bunny turned to me and said "Mom, what's a geek?"

Cutest things Ever

2011-04-06T17:32:00.002-05:00

I'm in love with these sock monkey baby legs. They're so nice with the constantly changing weather we've been having, I can dress Baby in his diaper, t-shirt,socks, and baby legs and he is toasty all morning, then when it warms up 20 degrees by noon I can just take off the baby legs and socks and he's comfy and cool. I think baby legs will be great for when Baby starts crawling too, we have Berber carpet which leads to mega rug burn, but Baby's legs will be protected in his leg warmers. And they make for super easy diaper changes.

Now I need to get a few more.

You know you've taken your kids' picture one too many times...

2011-04-06T00:19:00.001-05:00

When the baby looks like this.

"Aww, C'mon Mom! Another picture?!"

Odds and Ends

2011-03-28T00:30:00.001-05:00

All the little odds and ends floating around in my brain right now...

I miss reading. As long as I can remember, reading has been like breathing for me. It's just something I need to do every day, like eating and sleeping. But I have barely managed one book a month since Baby's arrival. I can't read in bed before falling asleep at night anymore because we cosleep and my book light bothers him. And during the day I can't seem to find the time anymore.

I feel a bit guilty about that. I am a homeschooling mom. I am doing my kids a disservice by not keeping up with educating myself so that I in turn can educate them. I am doing myself a disservice by not keeping my brain challenged. I'm thinking a lot about this article by Susan Wise Bauer called Stop Cleaning the Kitchen and Read a Book.

Babies were always easy for me. Ha. I used to wonder when I would ever be able to say goodbye to having babies, I would hear from the experienced moms of many that "you just know when you're done." But I loved all of it so much and enjoy my kids so much. I now know what it's like when it's not easy. My husband works insanely long hours during the week and I am alone with five kids most of the week. This baby is very high-needs and I am exhausted and often just in survival mode.

I am trying to rest in the season I am in. To not expect things to be just as they were before, to take each day as it comes and find the joy in that day, even if all that gets done is a little bit of school and a lot of baby holding, nursing, and rocking. I should know how fast these days go by, and I do, so I'm trying to savor the baby giggles, fat thighs, toothless grins, the way he burrows into my shoulder and kicks his feet when he's happy, his blissful, milky sigh as he slips into sleep as he nurses; and trying to remember that the severe lack of sleep, the crying jags (his and mine), the feeling of my brain turning to mush, and the lack of any time for my interests is temporary.

Even knowing all of that, it's hard to be patient. Having children really has taught me patience, whether I intended to learn or not. There are 101 things I'm dying to do and they'll just have to wait for awhile. The one indulgence I've allowed myself is learning more about photography. I can read photography books while Baby nurses because they're easier to stop and start up again later. I can take lots of photos and get in practice, because Baby is usually content when he has my attention and he's often my model, or I shoot a lot of photos when we're out at the park or botanic gardens or the zoo and other outings and so he's distracted by all the new places.

I am taken with the beautiful 365 projects I've watched unfold on other blogs, and would love such a record of my own kids and our days. I need a different format for my blog to display my photos though, and would like to redesign it but I have no time to do it and will have to file it under "not right now" with all the other things.

And that's okay because I'm getting into bed in a minute with a heavenly bundle of squish and dimples (his knees and elbows have dimples, sigh), and I will bury my nose in his silky hair and smell his sweet baby smell and all of those other worries and wishes will quietly fade away.

Maintenance Homeschooling

2011-03-10T15:04:00.000-06:00

Baby is very high-needs. I am lucky if I can get him to nap for more than 20 minutes at a time and he nurses frequently at night so I'm running on very little energy most days. It will get better as he gets older and he's only a baby once, so I want to hold him and be patient with this stage, but in the meantime, I need to get basic school done with the other kids. And I need to do that while also coping with the other things involved in running a house, while my husband is working long work hours and is not here to help much.

I started off as an unschooler and still believe that kids are naturally curious and learn a lot on their own, when given lots of opportunities and new experiences. But through trial and error and my own observations, I've also come to believe that certain skills require guidance and discipline, and frequent practice in order to maintain them. I'll write more about that on another day soon, but today I want to share some things that have helped us maintain skills while getting through a stressful and busy time.

First, I love RightStart math. I think it lays down a solid understanding of place value, which is integral to all math. But it's extremely teacher intensive and the reality of our lives right now is that I don't have the time to do it with three different kids.

So we tried Teaching Textbooks and we love it. The kids are able to get the computer out and get started on their own. Each lesson includes a lecture, practice problems, and graded problems. When they complete a lesson, they're required to let me know how many problems they missed and why, and how to do the missed problems correctly.

The other curriculum jewel we've found is Christian Light Language Arts. Each level is divided into 10 light units, or workbooks. These workbooks look very plain and old-fashioned. But there is so much more to them than it appears at first glance. They feel very much like a Charlotte Mason inspired curriculum. Each lesson is short and varied, covering grammar, spelling, and some writing and memory work. My kids have written letters, memorized poetry, and even illustrated their poems, due to a suggested enrichment activity that was right up Bunny's alley. Instructions are written to the student and they are able to do a lot of it on their own, it's easy for me to check over and to help them with when they're stuck.

We've also continued with Writing With Ease from Peacehill Press. It's so easy for me to use, even with limited brain power right now. The lessons are scripted and cover narration, copy work, and dictation. We've seen tremendous benefit and growth in the kids' writing skills by practicing those three things daily.

We add in books for the kids to read to themselves and books for me to read aloud to them, and we feel like we have well-rounded school days, even though we've put a lot aside until Baby gets easier.

The Best Teethers for Babies

2011-03-09T17:41:00.008-06:00

Baby has been chewing on anything he can get in his mouth for several weeks, he's almost 4 months and seems to be teething already. All of my kids get their first teeth by 6 months, and Baby has been very determined to find things to chomp on, whether it be our hands, his hands, or things I'd rather he not put in his mouth, like the tv remote control.

So I spent far too much time looking online for teethers he might like. I wanted them to be Phthalate and BPA free. I prefer to buy European toys and teethers for babies, since the standards for toys are stricter there.

Here are some teethers my other kids have tried, and some that Baby has been trying out today. The Amazon Mom program is free and you get free 2 day shipping for items in the baby store, so I purchased them there.

Sophie the Giraffe. I bought this for my 6 year old when he was a baby, I liked that it's made of natural rubber. But RB did not pay any attention to baby toys and didn't want to chomp on things the way Baby does, so she was put away in a box and rediscovered just in time for Baby to play with her. He really likes chewing on her hooves and ears. Sophie is made in France by Vulli.

We also still had this Haba toy. I love wooden toys, but none of my kids seem to like chewing on wooden toys, including Baby. Some Haba toys are now made in China, so you have to check, but this one is from Germany. Piro is made from maple wood and non-toxic water based paint.

Today Baby tried out some Vulli vanilla scented ring teethers and a Philips Avent front teeth classic teether, which is made in the UK.

When I showed them to him he spent some time gazing at them and then chose the elephant, the one we got is red. He dropped it quickly and picked up the Avent teether next, which he spent a lot of time chomping on. It's harder plastic with a rubbery surface and he seemed to prefer it to the softer vanilla teethers and Sophie. Its shape made it very easy for Baby to grasp and he made happy coos and squeals while chewing away and drooling all over himself.

We didn't buy these ones this time, but they look like good possibilities too:

Natursutten teething rings, made in Germany.

And Chan Pie Gnon, also made by Vulli.

Trying to Establish a Purpose for my Blog

2011-03-06T00:00:00.003-06:00

What can I say, I have issues about privacy and am afraid to put too much information on here, so I end up with little I feel comfortable saying. This blog is supposed to be a scrapbook of our homeschool, and just things I want to remember about my kids, but how interesting is that to other people? So I've thought about just making it private and writing for myself.

But then I remember one of my other reasons for blogging was accountability for homeschooling, it's good to share our accomplishments, and even our failings, as it encourages me to do better. I have hardly written about homeschooling this year since we haven't been having a great year, what with a long pregnancy and a very high-needs baby. We get the 3 Rs done and that's all for now. It's a season and we'll do better, but there's not much to write about in the meantime.

Here is a picture of baby, who is now 3 1/2 months old. I took this picture on his 3 month birthday. He loves his siblings and smiles a lot at them. For some reason, he giggles at Tiger all the time, when Tiger is just moving around going about his business. He will take comfort from Bunny, who everyone says looks just like me, so we call her "Mini Mom." He quiets for Mini Mom when she appears. He thrives on attention and demands it. He also never sleeps. Seriously. He will go the whole day and take a 15 minute nap in the morning and then a 10 minute nap in the afternoon and that's it. At least he's getting better about laying down in the bed at night after we get him to sleep and actually stays asleep. I can finally have a little bit of time to myself again.

Baby's First Big Outing

2011-01-11T23:32:00.001-06:00

Baby will be 8 weeks tomorrow, but I've been a bit paranoid about having a winter baby. With the heat blasting inside crowded stores, it's the perfect breeding ground for viruses and bacteria. And he's not vaccinated. And I'm concerned about Whooping Cough. Okay, I'm just paranoid.

So aside from going to the pediatrician's office, or the midwife's, or a few quick trips to the store, we've been staying inside a lot. I've been feeling a little down, being in the house so much, and it's been hard on the bigger kids, going out with just Dad, and not Mom and Baby too. We decided we all needed to do something fun, so we went to the bookstore and the Japanese Hibachi, where they put on a fun show while they make our dinner.

Turns out that this was the worst place ever to take a newborn, as far as stimulation goes. There were these sudden blasts of light from the flames when the onion "volcano" erupted while our food was being prepared, and then several birthdays, which involved loud singing and banging a gong repeatedly. Lucky for us, Baby dealt with being overstimulated by going to sleep in his carseat next to us, and the rest of us got to enjoy a fun meal together.

(Pics taken on an iPod Touch so they're not the greatest, but we worked with what we had).

Bittersweet

2011-01-07T20:39:00.001-06:00

Baby outgrew his newborn cloth diapers and I felt so sad while boxing them up.

In his "big baby" diapers, these should last him awhile.

Every day is a new day

2011-01-04T18:04:00.001-06:00

That's what I'm focusing on as we try to adjust to life with a newborn. It's been surprising to me how hard the adjustment has been this time- I guess it's hard to start over after a six year space.

Yesterday dh came home to a messy house and a wife in a very bad mood. There was a pile of clothes by the dresser in our bedroom- I had decided I was tired of rifling past clothes in my drawer that didn't fit and I was putting the small clothes away until "someday" when I could fit in them again. But baby woke up during this procedure, so they remained in a pile on the floor. I bought the Motivated Moms checklist for 2011 but didn't check anything off. The kids got their language arts done all by themselves and I checked that, but we couldn't find our Teaching Textbooks disc anywhere.

Every time I laid baby down, he woke back up, so I gave up and sat on the couch holding and nursing him for a good portion of the day. Wonderful teen son made scrambled eggs and smoked salmon for dinner. I sat looking at the never ending mountain of laundry that has accumulated since baby's arrival- who knew one little guy could wet through so many diapers and make so much laundry? I was feeling a but frustrated and weepy by the time dh got home.

But fast forward one day and I feel like we had a very productive day and I feel great. I woke up to breakfast all ready for me, teen son had cooked it. Baby had some tummy time on a blanket in the living room with the kids and was content while I ate and straightened up. Teen son had cleaned the kitchen already. All of the kids and I zoomed through our chore checklists from yesterday and today. I swept and vacuumed while wearing baby in the Asian baby carrier, which he loves. He fell asleep and I was able to lay him down while I put diaper laundry away and cleaned out my purse and the refrigerator. The little kids cleaned the bathroom mirrors, moved toasters and small appliances and wiped the kitchen counters, and dusted. Teen cleaned the bathroom sinks and toilets. The house feels neat and tidy, which has a big affect on my mood. Dinner is about to go in the oven.We even found Teaching Textbooks in the back of the playroom closet, and here I am blogging while baby naps!

Now if only I could remember to take pictures of our day so I'd have some to post, and get in some exercise time... Baby steps, right?

Baby Mooning

2010-12-29T16:38:00.003-06:00

I began composing a post all about why I am such a terrible blogger, but then decided that there's nothing more boring than reading a post from someone about why they haven't blogged, so I'll spare you, and just say that one of my goals for 2011 is to blog at least once a week.

As the mom of a 16 year old, 10 year old, 8 year old, and 6 year old, along with a brand new baby, I feel how bittersweet watching them grow up is, and I want to hold on to every memory we make. I've always been the sentimental type, I have trouble throwing away their drawings and scraps of paper that say "I love Mom", locks of hair from first hair cuts, and lost teeth. Keeping up with my blog more, as a personal scrapbook, at least adds less clutter!

Our new baby is 6 weeks old now, and it's been wonderful having a baby around again. This baby has been so alert and aware from birth. He was born at home, and was wide eyed from the moment he was placed on my chest. He is now smiling socially, gaining more control of his arms and legs, and he is so strong that he already stands on my lap. His siblings adored him and he is smothered in kisses and hugs every day.

For some reason, going from four kids to five has felt huge to me. I never felt like my family was large before, with four children, (despite what well-meaning strangers said), but now I do feel like there is a lot more to keep up with. That's surprising to me, since I once had a 3 1/2 year old, 2 year old, and an infant, along with my older son. You would think that would have felt more chaotic than just having one baby this time, but I'm finding this to be a bigger adjustment. Maybe because we've had a six year space between babies.

So I have a lot to learn about keeping up with the house, homeschooling, and caring for five kids. But I can't think of anything else I'd rather be doing. I'm sure that someday when I look back on my life, I'll have no regrets about spending so many years taking care of my family. And I'm thankful that I get to do this.

Baby at 10 days old.

Baby earlier today. Six weeks came and went fast!

Weekly Report, week 3

2010-09-10T17:09:00.001-05:00

We've completed three weeks of school! It's going so well. I think after years and years of homeschooling, I've finally learned not to sweat the small stuff and just enjoy what we can get done. For instance, I've intended to create a nature table for years. My kids love collecting interesting rocks, plants, leaves, and anything that catches their fancy when we're outside. We enjoy hiking around and exploring nature when it's not 100 degrees out. They tend to bring those things home, where they sit in a messy pile and eventually get thrown out. A nature table makes so much sense for us. But somehow, I never do it. And I'm smart enough (finally!) to recognize that this isn't the year to start either; with a new baby soon, I doubt we'll go on many nature walks until winter is over and we can take him out with us. So I will keep this in the back of my mind for next spring, and not even bother to feel guilty about it right now, like I normally would.

Instead, I will enjoy the feeling of accomplishment of what we are able to do.

This is what we have consistently accomplished every week so far, and what I intend to remain our focus this year. I think it's reasonable, even when the baby is here.

Science Guy (16) works independently in most subjects:

He does Chemistry and takes his notes and answers the questions.

He does SL Core 300 reading on his own, except for the occasional book we read together, which I enjoy. We're reading Heart of Darkness together right now, since it's a difficult book. I'm enjoying our book discussions.

Math he can follow on his own, and I just check his work and help him when he gets stuck.

IEW we do together.

He does Spanish and Study Skills on his own.

Tiger (9) has been doing this daily:

RightStart math with me. We both enjoy this.

Writing With Ease with me. Easy to use, short lessons, and it accomplishes a lot. I hope Susan Wise Bauer keeps writing more levels before we get there, because I'd love to use this all the way through the kids' schooling.

Christian Light Language Arts on his own. I just check it and have him make any needed corrections. Occasionally, there's something he needs more assistance with, such as the friendly letter I sat down with him and dd to do today.

MegaWords involves me more than I realized it would because of all the diagnostics and tracking of specific skills that goes on. But it's a very thorough program and it doesn't take us much time.

Rosetta Stone Spanish on his own. This is optional and just for exposure, I don't expect mastery. He chooses to do this often and enjoys it. Maybe he'll retain some vocab.

Latin for Children with me, but he is great about listening to the chants and practicing the memory work on his own. He has repeatedly stated over the last three weeks that this is his favorite part of school. I find LFC to be surprisingly fun too. I do sit down with him and dd to do the workbook pages.

History with me. We're keeping it light and fun this year. I have been so tempted to switch to Story of the World with the activity book. I want to do more narrations and start adding more writing for my 4th grader.
For now, I came to my senses and will stick with what we have since I don't think the year we have a new baby is the time to start something new. We are using what we have from Sonlight Core 3 and Winter Promise American Story 1, and not following the schedules very much. We read in blocks and read as much as we like, or don't read it if no one is interested, and move on to the next thing. The kids can do a lot of crafts on their own. We like WP the best right now, the books are a nice change of pace, and the reading load is more doable for us this year.

He does Teaching Textbooks math 5 a few times a week.

We need to get back to poetry memorization and start doing our Mark Kistler online drawing lessons more consistently. (We do these together and have a lot of fun). But I'm very happy with what we've been accomplishing each day.

Bunny (8) does the same things as Tiger, except she has a Spectrum phonics workbook instead of Megawords.

Robot Boy is 6, he does everything with me. RightStart math, All About Spelling, First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind (which we speed up and condense a bit, since he doesn't need quite so much repetition), and Writing With Ease. They are all short and thorough and he likes them, especially AAS.

All in all, it's been a great start to the new school year.

First Grade Fun

2010-09-07T16:40:00.002-05:00

I don't require my kids to do anything for school until first grade. They always want to do things anyway, but I'm not very structured about it.

This year, it's my little Robot Boy's turn to be a first grader, and he's been having a great time so far. On his daily schedule are RightStart math with lots of games, First Language Lessons, Writing With Ease, and All About Spelling. He chooses to listen to history and join in for crafts too. I love everything we're using, they are such a great blend of short, but thorough lessons, and fun and hands-on components.

He asked me to take lots of pictures of him doing things for school the last two weeks.

Here he is painting, which we do even outside of school, but he was looking forward to using some people shaped sponges and worked hard to get his math and language arts done so he could get to the painting.

Showing off the pirate ship he made. We have a Lakeshore writing center I just leave out, and the kids love it. The pirate ship is from there. And he's also showing off his log cabin which is from a colonial crafts book that is part of the Winter Promise American Story 1 program.

Here is the inside of his log cabin.

He wanted me to document the pattern he made with a geoboard here.

And finally, here he is playing "the Handshake Game" from RightStart math. All of the kids have loved this game, and RB was no exception. He thoroughly enjoyed it, even though he had to borrow some stuffed animals from his sister, since he's not as hugely into them as she is, and we needed ten for the game.

The rubber snake and gecko are his- he even sleeps with that snake, whose name is "Fangs". A memory to treasure.

I am confident in saying that RB considers his first two weeks of first grade to be a success!

First Day of School

2010-08-23T13:47:00.006-05:00

We normally school year round but we took a longer break this summer- July and most of August. I don't think we'll take such a long break next year, since the transition back seemed harder today than it did in past years. Good thing I had planned for a short day, we will slowly introduce all of our subjects over the next two weeks.

Tiger asked if we could start with Latin, he has really been looking forward to it, so I said yes. After today, I think we'll move this back to later in the day. It was very frustrating for Bunny, I think a lot of it was just the transition back to school and the earlier wake time. But the dvd does go fast and we couldn't understand what they were saying in parts. We just rewound over and over until we felt we had it down. And I wrote the current vocab on the whiteboard in the learning room and even hung it in the kitchen. Seeing it a lot should help all of us.

Here is Tiger and Bunny with their Latin primers. We were reading the introduction together and they were excited.

(My camera ran out of battery power so I had to use the kids' point and shoot, excuse the foggy look as I don't know how to use the settings). Tiger's spider joined us. (That's the hairy black thing on the table).

After we soothed some frustrations and tears, we moved on to something lighter- our "About Me" worksheets. The kids filled in their favorite things and a description of themselves. It was fun to compare to last year's sheets- how much they've grown and how their preferences have changed. And Bunny very proudly noted that her handwriting and spelling have improved a lot since last year's worksheets.

Next, Tiger asked if he could use our new Rosetta Stone Spanish program. Languages seem to be his thing and he enjoyed using this. Bunny and I worked on her language arts together during this time. And teen ds helped the littlest make a balloon rocket that he'd been asking someone to help him with.

Bunny also tried Spanish and liked it and Tiger completed his first Megawords lesson. Robot Boy, the youngest, picked Horizons math to work on today. That gigantic cat sitting with him was the tiny kitten dh rescued last year around this time.

Teen ds worked on Spanish and finished up the last lesson of Biology so he can start Chemistry this year.

And that was our school day. Everyone was getting cranky at this point, getting up earlier will take some adjustment. So we called it a day and had a theme lunch- Dippin' Day where everything was finger food and had lots of dipping choices. Tomorrow will be orange lunch day. Just something fun to look forward to each day while we adjust to new routines.

Read about more homeschool days at The Not Back to School Blog Hop by clicking here.

Not Back to School Blog Hop: Student Photo Week

2010-08-18T18:28:00.002-05:00

I've been trying to readjust my sleep schedule before we start school. I've had a lot of trouble sleeping this pregnancy, so I've allowed myself to get into the habit of sleeping late. A perk with having older kids, is that they can get up and get their own breakfast and go play quietly and let me sleep longer.

But some of my kids function a lot better if we start school bright and early. Everyone kind of loses steam after lunch and they're ready for quiet time then. So I'm really trying to get used to getting up early again this week. As a result, my brain is absolute mush and it's taken me awhile to even have the energy to take some pics or dig up existing ones.

Without further ado, here are our current homeschooled kids.

This is my teen. He is such a wonderful kid that I often wonder what I did to deserve him. He has a huge heart, he's creative, he loves his family, and he has a strong sense of who he is. He's definitely going places!

Next is my 9 year old. He has a gigantic imagination, and he astounds me with his amazing memory. He is a joy to homeschool- interested in everything, and he thrives on mastering new skills. When our new school stuff came in the mail, he was so excited that I got a kiss and a thank you, for ordering Latin. He is a sweet soul. His tiger shirt is still his favorite! Here he is on a hot day at the Renaissance Festival.

Here is my beautiful girl, she's our treasure. She's spunky and she makes us laugh all the time. She's a huge reader. Here she is with her completed reading log for the library reading program.

And finally, we have the youngest (for now). He's 6 and lots of fun to be around, he has an insatiable curiosity and is not afraid to ask and find out what he wants to know. He has a lot of love inside his little heart, and is always giving out hugs and kisses.

Thanks for visiting!

Visit other homeschoolers at the blog hop by clicking here.

Our Learning Room

2010-08-08T22:46:00.000-05:00

It hasn't changed that much from last year's post. We've rearranged, moved out toys that we don't need there anymore, and added some things for older learners.

Of course, learning happens everywhere. Since I started off as an unschooler, and have slowly become more and more structured because it turns out that it works better for us to have some structure, I have never had to reset my mindset about learning and what it should look like. I have no problem with our schooling looking nothing like my schooling did back in public school. We love having a dedictated school, or learning, space but we're not married to specific times or places for learning.

This space is probably most helpful to me, since we (okay, it's really me) seem to stay free from distractions such as the phone and chores while we're in there.

We now have three small tables against this wall. I bought an Expedit bookcase to store things for "centers". It goes with my love of strewing- to have a lot of fun things out for the kids to investigate, and to rotate them now and then to keep it fresh. I thought they could take their center to their table, and that their own table space would allow them to sit and focus on the center they were using. Kind of Montessori influenced.

But my three youngest kids decided instead to each claim a table as their own work space where they like to sit and do their independent work. They have Ikea toy bins next to their tables which work well for storing their books and supplies and "work in progress."

Here is the Expedit case, which is in between some of the tables.

Each box is labeled with a category: science, math, history, and so on. Here's an example of what's in the math box: a FlashMaster for practicing math facts, attribute blocks, geo boards, math windows, pattern blocks, math card games, small calculators, dice, and mind benders. I try to change the contents periodically, and I try to include things my youngest child can use, as well as the middle two.

We still love our rain gutter bookshelves. And I still keep a small kid sized table there because my six year old is more comfortable there when we work together. I can't tell you how excited I am that we're expecting a new baby so I'll have a preschooler again eventually- preschool is probably my favorite age. I love how much they delight in exploring and interacting, I can't wait to get out our Lauri toys and our rice box and lots of other fun manipulatives and games. So that table will be getting a lot of use for many years to come.

This wall now has a big table for projects or for when we all want to sit together, shelves for our arts and crafts supplies, and another table that was supposed to be the art table, but my teen likes to sit there so it's his for now. I finally gave in and put up a white board and a bulletin board, (those did seem rather schooly to me), because my kids are highly visual and I think there's a lot of value in memory work- it's amazing how quickly they can memorize a poem or spelling rule when it's written where they can see it all the time. And they are very arty and love having the bulletin board to display their creations.

Below is a closer picture of our art shelves. Top shelf: bulky craft items, like egg cartons, a box of Plaster of Paris, and contact paper. Next shelf: jars of scissors, colored pencils, markers, paints, and smocks. On the next shelf: bins that hold craft supplies (yarn, pipe cleaners, craft sticks, glitter, etc.), lapbooking supplies (glue tape, brads, small pieces of cardstock for mini books, etc.), and various school supplies (pencils, staples, erasers, etc.) The shelf under that has letter trays that hold construction paper. The bottom shelf: baskets that hold paint brushes and tools, water color, origami, and tracing paper, and various colors of cardstock, and ink pads and stampers.

This wall has our reading tree and loveseat.

I like bright colors, and we all just seem to feel happy and content in this room, working on our projects and daily school work.

Thanks for visiting and touring our learning room!

Visit other school rooms at the Not Back to School Blog Hop.

Not Back to School Blog Hop- Curriculum Week

2010-08-04T01:50:00.001-05:00

Confession: I've been hiding from my own blog and avoiding writing anything because this past school year didn't go very well. It was just one of those years where nothing comes together right, and we mostly just managed to cover the basics. Of course, they explored and learned a lot in our neighborhood and during our family activities too. (Zoo, aquarium, and science museum memberships more than pay for themselves!)

I figured the Not Back to School Blog Hop's Curriculum Week would be a great time to list our curriculum and goals for this new school year. We're actually year round homeschoolers but I'm pregnant and slug-like and did not stay consistent this summer. So we took a break and we're ready to start fresh in a few weeks. It's a whole new school year with fresh and exciting possibilities, right?

So here is the plan, and we will also have a brand new baby in late fall. Lots of learning opportunities there! We can't wait to see our new squishy.

16 year old son:
Sonlight Core 300
Finish Analytical Grammar
Institute for Excellence in Writing
Life of Fred
Teaching Co Chem + additional resources
Rosetta Stone Spanish
Lots of other things outside of school- he runs his own radio station and engages in lots of real life learning experiences.

9 year old son:
Sonlight Core 3 with some WP AS 1 stuff- lots of readers and read alouds.
Christian Light language arts
Writing With Ease
Megawords
poem memorization
RightStart math
Teaching Textbooks math (only because he loves to do it on his own time)
Latin for Children
Various science kits they can play with on their own, but they read a lot of science and I'm not doing it formally this year.
Art informally- we strew tons of artsy craftsy things around. I'm being realistic about what we can accomplish with new baby here this year.

8 year old daughter:
Same as above except she won't be doing Megawords

6 year old son:
Tag along for history
All About Spelling
First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind
Writing With Ease
RightStart math

You can read more curriculum plans and add yours at the Not Back to School Blog Hop.

Fun with Fables

2010-01-29T16:19:00.015-06:00

We've been on a kick with Aesop's Fables, the kids like reading the story and finding out what the moral is. We've been reading several different versions, this classic edition of Aesop's Fables, illustrated by Milo Winter, is pretty but the kids weren't as attracted to it.

So I put out a more kid friendly version we had around, illustrated by Jack Kent, and found them reading it all the time after that. They even put on some adorable skits (not that I'm biased or anything) that they had worked out together, based on various fables.

Our favorite by far turned out to be this very silly version of fables, not exactly Aesop's. Our favorite story is Straw and Matches, if you have this book at your library, definitely read that one.

Then the kids were inspired to write their own fables. Here is one that Tiger wrote that just tickled me, since he is very careful with his money.

The Frog and His Lunch

by Tiger

One day, a frog didn't have anything to eat for lunch, so he ordered it.

"Hello, what would you like to order from The Frog Café?" "Oh yes," answered Frog, "I'd like to order a hamburger with extra flies and some french flies." "Okay, it will be there in twenty minutes."

Frog waited for twenty minutes. Then it finally came. When Frog saw the meal, he jumped up and ate it all. "Tip?" said the delivery frog. Frog checked his pockets and his wallet. "Oh no!" said Frog. "I don't have enough money!"

Moral: Check your budget first.

We had these books laying around, because I collect books and like to strew a variety around all over the house. When the kids were putting on skits and having so much fun with fables, I just gathered what we had and put the books on the rain gutter shelves in the school room where they would be sure to see them. They took it from there and it turned into a fun and creative unit on fables. Isn't it great when that happens?

Our Reading Tree

2010-01-04T16:36:00.021-06:00

We made a tree for our schoolroom. I'd like to eventually paint a tree but wanted to test it out without creating something permanent. The kids have really enjoyed writing down the books they've read on the leaves- each of them has a different color leaf, and read alouds are another color. It's a fun way of remembering what we've read and has brought back memories of favorite books we've shared, and it's created a feeling of accomplishment as each child finishes a book and then gets to record it. It's also fun sitting under the tree while reading.

New Year's Giveaway at Branch of Wisdom!

2009-12-31T11:27:00.002-06:00

Tamara is hosting a New Year's giveaway at her blog, which has great arts and crafts ideas, so take a look while you're there. The button below will take you to her Happy New Year! giveaway.

Lucky, the lucky cat, goes to school and other adventures.

2009-11-04T15:50:00.016-06:00

The kids inherited the animal loving gene from me so of course they've all been thrilled about our new kitten. I thought dd was going to claim him as hers, but I have been surprised by how much 5 year old Robot Boy and 9 year old Tiger love him and nurture him. Robot Boy is always rocking the kitten, holding the kitten, making a special bed for the kitten, and playing with the kitten. Tiger faithfully remembers if the kitten is hungry and makes up games for him. It's been good for both little boys who have really taken responsibilty for making sure he has fresh water, food, and attention.

Tiger even let Lucky appropriate his Build a Bear doghouse and now Lucky considers it his napping spot.

The kids christened him "Lucky", since he was lucky that dh noticed him on the side of the road in the rain. He is very rambunctious and I'm wondering if "Trouble" wouldn't have been a more appropriate name for him. He climbs the Christmas tree, which is rather devoid of ornaments at the moment, since he knocked them all off. And he jumps on the other cats and bites them. My adult cats are very sweet natured and not thrilled with this, they don't want to wrestle.

The kids love it when Lucky goes to school with us. (Which is all the time).

He is also talented at finding a warm child to sleep with at night.

RB was asleep in that photo, but was happy that Lucky had chosen him to snuggle with when I showed him the picture the next day.

I think Tiger sums up how smitten the kids are, I just overheard him talking to Lucky, saying "I just love your fluffy, cute belly, and your nose, and your whiskers, and your ears..."

Robot Math

2009-10-01T17:08:00.004-05:00

We started things off on the wrong foot today. Tiger was teary-eyed and frustrated and I was getting there.

So I decided to change the tone. I started talking in a robot voice and told ds we were super robots and it was time for us to do our robot math. I had him run around the room a few times to recharge his robot battery, then we'd go through each problem with me coaching him through in a robot voice, using words like "reset, calculate, process." He had to stop to sip water frequently to oil his robot parts and eat a goldfish cracker when he needed a new battery.

This turned everything around and we ended up having a great time, so much so that ds wanted to keep going and did two math lessons. Then everyone had to do Robot Math and we ended up taking an hour and a half just for math. But we had fun and we really dug into a new math concept so I'll consider it a success.

Kitten School

2009-09-14T16:00:00.004-05:00

We were up and ready for school this morning when my sweet hubby called to say that he had a kitten in the car with him. Dh was on his way to work and saw it sitting at a busy intersection shivering in the rain and went into a nearby Subway to ask for a box and paper towels, and then turned back and picked the kitten up. He ended up taking the kitten straight to the vet. The kids were on pins and needles waiting for the kitten to come home so there wasn't much accomplished in the way of school.

The kitty weighed in at 1 pound 1 ounce and is about 6 weeks old according to the vet. He has a limp and is favoring one of his rear legs but an x-ray didn't show any fractures so we're hoping his leg will heal with rest. He's on pain medication and Revolution for his fleas. We're hoping our dog and 2 adult cats will get along with him.

Weekly Homeschool Chronicles

2009-09-12T11:23:00.008-05:00

We're joining a new weekly check-in called Weekly Homeschool Chronicles. We hope you'll click on the link and join us too.

Our weekly wrap-up:

We've completed our third week of school. We're still tweaking some things but we're enjoying our studies. Here's what we did this week:

Science Guy is working on Sonlight Core 100. We meet once a week for discussion. Once a week I look at his vocabulary and logic work. Daily we meet for grammar and writing. I've realized this week that we need to start meeting daily for Spanish and Biology also. My goal is to do the Spanish lessons along with him and we'll both keep a Spanish vocab notebook and review with each other.

The other kids are combined together for our geography/cultures program and science. Tiger and Bunny also do the same things for language arts, but they use different math programs.

Here's what we worked on together:

Children Around the World. This week we learned about England and read various books, including Material World and Hungry Planet. We also read St. George and the Dragon, played with a "Build your own Stonehenge" model, watched Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego?
which coincidentally included an episode where they visited Stonehenge, and made homemade scones and had afternoon tea. We listened to Wee Sing Around the World a lot, which Robot Boy especially loves.

Animals. We're loosely following Winter Promise Animals and their Worlds since we already owned it but have never really gotten to it. We've been learning about woodland animals and visiting our local park to study the trees, flowers, squirrels, and ducks. We don't have a lot of choice for nature study in our suburban area but our park is wooded and pretty.

Language Arts. We strongly believe in the methods of copywork and dictation so that's our primary focus each week. We are just transitioning to dictation this year. I felt that Writing With Ease was too regimented last year and was not going to use it, but Bunny surprised me, as they so often do, by declaring that she missed that program. So we'll continue on, adding in weekly creative writing or free writes from SL LA since she loves it. Tiger is doing the copywork and dictation but the narration portions truly frustrate him, I'll probably experiment with my own, CM inspired, methods for him. We also read a Ruth Heller book this week on collective nouns and drew a picture of our own collective nouns. We'll put each page we make together when we're done and have a book.

Highlights for each of them:

Tiger- Tiger is taken with cursive handwriting. He does several pages a day and practices writing his cursive letters all day long.

Bunny- I think the highlight of her week was making a raccoon mask from a book that came with our animal worlds program. She loves to make things and is highly creative. The mask inspired her to make a striped raccoon tail also and she has decided she's going to get a black sweat suit and black gloves and wear this as her Halloween costume. I told her homemade costumes are the best and I think it's a great idea.

She is also thrilled with Singapore Challenging Word Problems, which I got out for her this year. She thinks figuring out the word problems is like a puzzle. I am amazed when I look through her work later at the problems, at what she's figured out on her own, she doesn't want to wait for me.

Robot Boy- He is mostly playing and tagging along. He enjoys our geography and science activities. I want to work on phonics with him, as he taught himself to read, and never really got much of a phonics base. But I'm stumped on what to use for a child who is reading chapter books to himself and reads constantly.

Deep Thoughts by Robot Boy

2009-09-07T11:22:00.005-05:00

"Who made God?"

"Numbers are infinity, letters are not."

"How did we know about God, way back in the beginning, before the Bible?"

This was over breakfast. I was ready to zone out and read while I ate but RB had some big thoughts to share.

Thoughts on Writing.

2009-09-02T15:07:00.004-05:00

Last year was a very heavy Language Arts year for us. My kids did Writing With Ease, First Language Lessons, Sonlight readers, and All About Spelling every school day. Plus a lot of memory work (poetry and grammar terms) and narration and notebooking of history and science. Occasionally we did some creative writing, because they like it, with Evan-Moor Making Books with Children.

My kids have always been writers. As 2 and 3 year olds they had little notebooks and would ask me how to write a letter and then copy it over and over, or just scribble in it, or draw pictures in it. At 4 and 5, they liked to make up stories that I would type for them and they would ask me for help making signs for their pretend store or other games, and carefully copy what I wrote down for them. They still always had their own notebook, and at 5 and 6 they were writing down their own little stories and riddles. My youngest would spend an hour drawing a "mouse playground" and labeling it.

But last year, at 6 and 7, I hardly ever saw them with their notebooks anymore. They were not very interested in writing stories, except when I would suggest it, but even then, they didn't seem as enthusiastic.

So far this year, all we're using is copywork, dictation, and a sprinkling of Sonlight Language Arts, which is very relaxed and has little grammar. Also, HWT cursive (per ds's request) and Sonlight 2 advanced readers. I haven't even gotten to spelling yet, which is another post. I have constant episodes of panic that I'm failing them and not doing enough Language Arts with them. I am a Language Arts person, I like grammar and love writing. I've had to continually fight off the urge to order a grammar program. Seriously. Instead, we're reading stories about grammar (Ruth Heller, Brian Cleary) and discussing them. We're going to start writing in a blank book soon, drawing pictures of action verbs or whatever else we've read about. I got this idea from Serendipity's Lively Language Lessons. We play grammar games, they like one we got from Lakeshore.

And best of all, they are writing stories. Bunny wrote one during quiet time that was several pages long, about a Beaver's adventures. Tiger is working on one now too. And he just came up to me a few minutes ago to show me the letter he's been working on during quiet time. I gave Bunny and Robot Boy some cardstock today and had them write a thank you note to their great-grandparents, who sent them all a "thinking of you" card and $5 each, just for fun recently. I gave the kids glitter and stickers and markers to decorate and had them write what they wanted, which was "Thank you" and "I Love You", which was plenty. Tiger said he would write his during quiet time, and proceeded to write a long, (10 sentences or so) thoughtful letter. I am so impressed.

I can't say if this change is due to our relaxed LA approach this year, we're not far into the school year. But they did have about a 6 week break this summer, and I do think the time away from such regimented LA helped. They seem excited about writing again and I do think what we're doing now is feeding their souls and imaginations so much more than what we were doing before.

Siblings who are Homeschooled are Closer

2009-08-28T16:30:00.003-05:00

At least, that's my view. My brothers and I went off in our separate directions each day and did not spend much time together. My kids are together most of every day.

My boys were standing here just now chatting with me. They both looked so cute and little boyish eating their afternoon snack. I said "You guys are cool, I love you guys." And Tiger says "Thanks!" Then Robot Boy pipes up with "I think Bunny is pretty!" I smiled inside and said "I think so too." Bunny was upstairs at the time and I guess RB wanted to include her in the compliments too.

Animal Classification and Passports

2009-08-26T18:47:00.004-05:00

We're continuing our animal classification unit and enjoying ourselves. I gave the kids a pile of laminated animal cards to sort and we came up with these groups from the animals we had:

Vertebrates-
Mammals
Birds
Reptiles
Amphibians
Fish

Invertebrates-
Annelids
Insects
Mollusks (We were surprised that an octopus and a snail belong in the same category).
Arachnids (Arachnids are really a type of Arthropod but I'm trying not to ruin the fun since they're only 5, 7, and 8 by getting too specific with categories. They knew spiders and scorpions are arachnids so that's how we labeled them).

I thought about just posting this picture of the passports the kids made for our Children Around the World study.

But decided to show a real homeschooling moment and post this photo of dd feeling very unhappy with things. It's not all sunshine and rainbows. But we'll take the good and the bad.

A Day In The Life

2009-08-24T15:14:00.008-05:00

7:15 am- Not. a. morning. person.

But our school day goes a lot more smoothly if we get started early, so I'm making myself get up.

In the living room- no one is here except my 5 year old. Am astonished that my super early-rising 8 year old is not yet up. Ds5 and I cuddle on the couch and read a story. Hesitate to wake sleeping children and will give them a bit longer.

8:00- Time for a "first day of school" special breakfast. Breakfast pizza and Pink Flamingos. Yep, it's as junky as it sounds. But the pink flamingos are just pineapple juice, strawberries, and bananas, so maybe that redeems me a little. The kids are excited and have all gotten up except the teenager.

8:30- Kids get dressed, brush teeth, make beds. Argue with dd over her hair- it's always in her eyes and I insist she go get a barette so I can pull it back. Just as I wonder to myself why I'm picking this unimportant battle, Dd impresses me by coming up with a compromise all on her own-she comes out wearing a purple headband that matches her shirt, she says headbands don't hurt her head.

Ds8 comes to find me, he's teary-eyed because he has been up in the schoolroom and I've moved the Lego table. I knew he wouldn't like that but it was way too distracting during school last year. Ever try to tear an 8 year old boy away from the lego spaceship he just built to sit and listen to you read about Ancient Greece?

I start some laundry and then head to the school room.

9:00-First Day of School picture.

Everyone actually sat down and looked at the camera- success! Ds8 happy because his plastic dragonfly is in the picture too. (In his cupped hands).

Ds15 gets out his work and can go do it wherever and in whatever way he wants, as long as it gets done.

9:15- Trying workboxes this year. I show them to the three younger kids and explain the whole procedure, though I call them "mailboxes." Kids love mail- work, not so much.

9:20- Doing RightStart math with ds8. Dd is doing her workboxes- copywork, a geography workbook, and Miquon math. Ds5 loves to draw so he is doing a Draw Write Now page and getting frustrated because his duck doesn't look exactly like the book.

9:40- Still playing RightStart games with ds8, as a review of concepts he's already learned but needs to refresh after our break.

Ds8 wants to know when snack time is.

Dd burned through a lot of workboxes and is now playing with pattern blocks and making an intricate design. Need to tweak what's in there for her a little but she does pretty well at finding things to do when I'm busy.

Dd is now tracing her foot.

(I put little "About Me" worksheets in their workboxes, knowing they would enjoy writing down their favorite things and personal info, and it'll be nice to have to look back on. One worksheet was how big their feet are.)

9:50- Ds5 strongly offended if he feels left out, so it's his turn for RightStart.

We play with fake money and discuss the differences between various coins, which leads to a spur of the moment game. We read the book Follow My Leader about a young boy who becomes blind after an accident when we did Sonlight Core 1, and now ds wants to close his eyes so he can feel the coin and see if he can guess which one it is. Then he wants to close his eyes and guess the total of several coins when I put them in his hand.

10:10- Ds8 was working on his copywork, "About Me" sheets, and geography, interrupting me with questions while I continually repeated my new mantra "Just go on to the next box until I'm not busy." Now I'm helping him with the parts he was stuck on. Dd is reading More Stories from Grandma's Attic under a table. Ds5 is playing with centers.

10:20- Ds5 and Dd have a few geography questions too, so we all discuss. Ds5 actually helps dd with a part she didn't understand, I love it when they work together.

10:30- We're using a modified Winter Promise Animals and their Worlds as science. Dd has requested an animal study many times so we're doing one. I'm adding a little unit about animal classification today. Snack time while we read about classification in the DK Animal Encyclopedia and then we read Benny's Animals and How He Put Them in Order. It's old and out of print but a really great book. Then I tell them to get their stuffed animals and bring them into the schoolroom so we can sort them. Fun times, except I forgot how very, very many stuffed animals they have. Next we start our animal classification lapbook. I have them each pick a mini book they want to work on- dd chooses mammals, ds8 picks arthropods, and ds5 picks reptiles.

11:05- Time for WP Children Around the World. Ds8 says he's been waiting for this! We read Material World, Kingfisher People Around the World, Children from Many Lands, and look at our map. Short today.

11:15- Ds8 wants to know when lunch is.

Ds5 picks a book about cheetahs to read to me. The other kids do centers. Ds8 wants to use the microscope from our science center, and ds15 helps him set it up. He's a good brother.

11:25- Ds8 reads a chapter of Viking Adventure to me, he prefers reading aloud to me.

11:30- Ds5 sits in my lap and does 3 pages of Explode the Code.

11:40- Kids sit on the loveseat with me and we read Leading Little Ones to God.

11:50- Planned a light day so we can ease back into things and we're done. Time for a walk outside in the sunshine, then lunch and quiet time when I'll meet with ds15 for any help or discussion he needs. Then I'll refill workboxes and get things ready for tomorrow.

See other homeschooling days as part of the Not- Back- to- School Blog Hop here.

The Kids who are Homeschooled

2009-08-17T15:25:00.009-05:00

This post is about the kiddos who are homeschooled here. They put up with my crazy ideas.

Science Guy is 15 and just a really good kid. He's not too cool to take the time to help his younger siblings and likes to spend time with them. He's also not afraid to try new things or to be different.

Tiger is nearly 9. He is highly imaginative and is a boy of many interests- chess and bugs and U.S presidents and penguins, and recently he confided that he rather likes dragons.

Bunny is 7. I always loved playing with my dolls and dreamed of my own little girl someday and 7 years later, I'm still delighted that I have one. She's funny and smart and artsy, and she likes to read as much as her mama. Yesterday the "boys" went out and Bunny and I watched Anne of Green Gables and ate chocolate together. We both agreed it was a perfect afternoon.

Robot Boy is 5 and loves science experiments, reading, and Garfield comics. He told me he was proud of me the other day after I cleaned out the pantry- he notices and takes the time to express his appreciation of a lot of things my other kids wouldn't have noticed as 5 year olds.

I can't think of anyone I'd rather spend my day with than these guys.

A Review of The Well-Planned Day

2009-08-17T12:53:00.004-05:00

I received this planner a couple of weeks ago and have been entering things into it and attempting to be organized this year. (Big for us organizationally impaired people.) I wanted to keep track of what I liked and what I felt was lacking so that I could look for a planner more closely matching my needs next year, or create my own. Here is my list:

Pros:

I like the pages in the beginning of the planner that are for recording your children's age, height, weight, goals, and other personal information. I'm not good at keeping track of these things, other than pencil marks on the back of the pantry door to mark their changing height when I think of it. I think this will be nice to have to look back at how they change each year.

The pages devoted to keeping track of curriculum purchases and costs will be useful in seeing how much I spend over the year and if that changes as my younger kids are able to reuse their older siblings' curriculum.

Space for semester goals helps me to break down our yearly goals into more reasonable portions. It will help me simplify as we start each semester, to focus on what we need to accomplish and tune out the rest of the "should dos" and white noise in my head.

Space for semester accomplishments. Sometimes we accomplish more than we realize and it will be good to look back and think about what we've done and experienced.

The daily time schedules help me to really think and plan the best way to set us up for a smooth day.

The monthly calendar is helpful for jotting down appointments, other events, library due dates, and birthdays, but I already do that on our household calendar which hangs on the wall.

Spaces for weekly lesson planning with a space for weekly priorities and a weekly dinner menu.

For those of us who have high school students, there are pages for transcript planning and recording.

There is a space each month to record memorable moments so I can write down those cute things they say, accomplishments, and other good things I forget to keep track of. The space is too small though.

The articles? I've read two of them so far. I'm not sure if they're particularly motivating in my case, but that would be very personal. I think I would have rather have had the space for other things but am reserving judgment until I read all of them.

Grades and attendance pages will help me keep track of credit hours earned by my high schooler, but are otherwise unneeded by me. So these are both a pro and a con for me. I didn't need so much space devoted to it.

Cons:

A monthly menu space would have been more useful for me. I don't plan by week, but do appreciate that there is at least the weekly space, so I can plan my monthly menu on a piece of paper and then record each week's menu as a reminder when I look through my planner.

I would have gotten a lot of use out of a breakfast and lunch menu space as well.

There are pages for attendance and grades, which are probably useful to many people, but I don't live in a state where I need to keep track of these things and I don't give grades until high school. So I could have used less pages devoted to this.

There are report cards in the back, I won't need those.

There is no space for miscellaneous notes. I am a chronic note taker/list maker. I carry spiral notebooks around and jot whatever is in my head down continually. I was hoping that this planner would help me do that in a more organized fashion, since I'm always searching through my notebooks for my menu ideas, mixed in with my list of needed art supplies, mixed in with a list of ideas for read alouds, etc. There is no space in this planner for lists like that. There is space for grocery lists but they're too small to serve my purposes.

There is no space for recording household information, such as window measurements, gift ideas for family members, or other information I might want to have available "just in case." There is a small space for monthly expenses and bills, but we use a computer spreadsheet for that and so this is an unnecessary space for me.

This planner has been helpful in just getting me thinking about how I could organize things better, it just doesn't come naturally to me, and an unorganized homeschooling mom is not a good thing. ;) But I need a lot more space for lists and personal thoughts and may design my own planner next year. Donna Young's website may be a good option for that.

A Few of my Favorite Things...

2009-08-13T15:22:00.005-05:00

Happiness is:

A shiny new laminating machine.

My newest discovery is Staples glue tape. Great for lapbooking and a million other little uses.

A rainbow of fine-point, clickable Sharpies.

And an even bigger rainbow of gel pens. Some are even metallic and some are glittery- enough said!

Hope

2009-08-12T11:20:00.001-05:00

I just read this article by Elizabeth Foss that I found heartening and I wanted to share it here.

A New Year and the Promise of Hope