And The Rain Keeps Coming Down...

image courtesy of littlefarminthebigd

It has been pouring for hours now. Our family room roof started leaking in two spots last night, which is very worrisome. On my way to work, city workers were getting ready to close off a couple of roads where the creeks had started to overflow their banks... thankfully there are multiple choices for roads to take back home! I do wish the rain would stop for a little while, so that things could dry back out a little. My backyard is a mud pit at the moment, and the chickens barely venture outside their hutch--when they do, it is halfway sad and halfway funny to see them apparently mystified by all the wetness! Poor things look so bedraggled when they've wandered out of the relative dryness of their hutch. We also miss our Friday park days :(

On to education...

With my more relaxed approach this week, school seems to blend more into life, which is lovely, and more or less how I idealize homeschooling. As a family, we played more Apples to Apples Junior, read about Ruth Law, Mark Twain, Lucy Maud Montgomery, and of course, more of Harry Potter and our Oz books! The kids played a lot of Hangman and Tic-Tac-Toe too.

The Boy spent a fair amount of time reading: Greek and Egyptian myths, The Famous Stanley Kidnapping Case, various books on codes and ciphers. He tried out IXL for math, and said "It's pretty good, but I like our books [Life of Fred, Zacarro] better." He wrote his letter to Santa (yes, we believe in Santa around here), and brought it to me for spelling/grammar corrections, then copied it out quite nicely. He worked on textures and light sources in his self-guided (with the help of you-tube tutorials) computer animation lessons. He's been drawing a lot too, playing around with math doodles primarily. He watched some Mythbusters and some Smash Lab, always fun! He checked up on his self-designed science project - so far nothing much has changed, except he noticed the shininess of one test piece is all gone. He made another couple of short films at my mom's house, spent some time snuggled up on the couch with Calvin & Hobbes... good times!

The Girl helped out with a lot this week--grocery shopping, cleaning (we're "deep" cleaning in preparation for Christmas), cooking. I am reminding myself regularly that she loves to be helpful. Okay, sometimes her helpfulness is a little on the unhelpful side, but she really tries! She read to me from Reading Pathways, helped write and then copied out beautifully her Santa letter, and played with math on Khan Academy. I am still trying to get the knack of that website! We read a few short stories together, and spent a lot of time looking through E is for Ethiopia, which has fascinating photographs, and a wealth of information! We're very much enjoying our relaxed "journey" through Africa so far.

 
We're also enjoying the stories in The Girl Who Married a Lion. I finally picked up Welcome to Kaya's World at the library yesterday, so we'll be delving into that now as well. Today she's going to try out the TV show Wild Africa.

Speaking of the library, we also picked up a good stack of holiday books, and other books recommended in A Picture Perfect Childhood. Over the next few weeks, we'll be learning about winter celebrations around the world (including Hanukkah and Kwanzaa), Sitting Bull, Pearl Harbor, Rosa Parks, moles, Saint Nicholas, and much more! I picked up another couple of books on Africa for The Girl, and The Boy got several books on the history of codes and ciphers. We're going to read a couple of versions of The Nutcracker--both the ones illustrated by Michael Hague and Maurice Sendak--in preparation for a trip to the ballet next week. We're taking a brief break from Percy Jackson's exciting adventures to listen to Jim Dale, one of our favorite narrators, read A Christmas Carol.

Other bits and pieces...

We made a trip to the feed store this week for chicken supplies. The kids love checking out all the chickens, pigeons, doves, rabbits, and ducks for sale while I load up on chicken feed...

I signed up for my spring classes. One is Advanced Shakespeare, and the other is Teaching Multilingual Writers. I may be taking a couple of units in directed writing instead of Teaching Multilingual Writers, but we'll see. It would be better for my schedule right now, but I have to get the professor's permission for the writing course, and am waiting to here from her as to whether she thinks I am a good fit for the class.

I have officially finished almost all of my Christmas shopping! I have historically spent too much time right before the holidays rushing around like mad buying last minute odds and ends, and am trying very hard to get away from that this year. I also always end up spending the last couple of days before Christmas cleaning the house for company, so this year, and I kid you not, I wrote a cleaning schedule. Just a couple of (mostly) small tasks a day between now and December 17th, and I will have a clean, shiny, holiday-ready home! I'm taking vacation this year too... two whole weeks, one before and one after Christmas. The one before is time for baking cookies, making fudge (and I want to try this recipe), and, at long last, M dug up his family recipe for homemade taffy! I might have him work with us on this taffy recipe too--I have always loved Bit O' Honey candies, but they are hard to find these days!

Hope you all had a week as good as mine!

Wet Wednesday!

This was the lovely sunset on my way into class yesterday evening... if you ignore the vehicles, it is pretty!

And this is at work this morning...





This storm is supposed to last at least 5 days. While I will miss the sunshine, I can't really complain, having been through several years of California droughts in my lifetime. Plus, our yard is watered with well water, so this will help replenish that for the upcoming year!

Hope you're all warm and dry where you are!

Gods and Stories...

The Boy has started reading through his Greek myths for the National Mythology Exam. This has reawakened an interest in all things mythological to the degree that the first the first words out of his mouth this morning were about the Egyptian goddess Sekhmet... did I know, that among other things, she was the goddess of perfume?

I've been thinking of project ideas to help him remember everything as he goes, and besides the Waldorf-inspired Main Lesson book idea (which he loves), I think we might make a family tree for the Greek and Roman gods! He will also be studying the Norse gods for his subtest section, which is, I think, appropriate as his middle name is that of a Norse god.

The Girl and I, while waiting for her Kaya book(s) to arrive at the library, have been reading our way through a delightful book of African stories...

 She also watched two of the Families of the World dvds -- Egypt and Kenya. We always enjoy these videos! Each one profiles two children from that country, usually an urban child, and a rural one. They talk about customs, culture, food, holidays, house styles, schooling, and a lot more! I think I might have her check out Wild Africa (she loves animal shows), and/or National Geographic: Africa. Then there is also the series Lost Kingdoms of Africa that looks intriguing (not that my interest means she'll be interested)!

We're also gearing up for some Christmas/winter holiday reading. And we're looking very much forward to The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (my birthday treat this year). We decided to go ahead and read the book first, right after we finish our current Oz book, which we should finish up this week.

Now, the question is, do we want to see the digital (i.e. regular) version, or the 3D version?

Anyhow, hope you're all having a good week! I am finding, as I always do, that we seem to actually accomplish more when I relax about things. Now I just need to remember this when I get stressed out that I am ruining their education!

Just Nevermind...

Friday's post about scheduling, that is. We're going to wait until January to try this out. In the meantime, we have a detour...

THE BOY

Will be studying mythology, will be waiting on Story of Science. We're going to read this together for history over the next few weeks...

THE GIRL

Found the American Girl Welcome to ______'s World books at the library. She wants to "do them in order, please", so I found this timeline, and we decided to learn about Kaya! We'll read the story books too, and maybe add in some crafts--I own a lot of the craft/cookbooks for other dolls in the series, but this one doesn't appear to have those. I'm not sure if we'll do just the one, or a bunch of these, but since she is showing actual interest in something historical, I am not going to say no!

 

As for everything else, we'll hit the basics each day (reading, writing, math), 4-5 days a week. In science, I'm frankly not sure at the moment! The Boy does want to finally finish reading The Magic of Reality, so I'll do that with him, and maybe I can find animal and other American-Girl-related science topics for The Girl. I bet there are some ideas in the ______'s World books!

And for art, we're going to focus on making some nice pieces that I can scan, print, and turn into calendar gifts for family. We'll be doing some of the projects from this book for this, and some from other sources.

So we're more or less back to this idea. Wow, that scheduling thing sure lasted long, didn't it? As I said though, we'll revisit it in January... fresh year, fresh start. I think it is a good and workable schedule, but we're going to relax for now.

And It Is Friday...

I love that I have been off work 2.5 days already and still have 2.5 to go!

We had a good, relaxed Thanksgiving. Some good reading, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, plus the Charlie Brown version of the Mayflower journey/Pilgrims. Lots of good food!

And a chance to reflect, plan, and tinker.

Our schedule for now:

Sundays:
~ Read-aloud(s) from A Picture Perfect Childhood, mythologies, Harry Potter
~ Language Arts (PLL/ILL, spelling/phonics, reading)
~ Math (Life of Fred and/or Zacarro)
~ World history, with work in our Books of Centuries (Builders of the Old World, World in Ancient Times)
~ Introduction to our science topic of the week (BFSU) through a book or video
~ Art and/or Music
~ Geography with Richard Halliburton's Complete Book of Marvels

Mondays:
~ Read-aloud(s) from A Picture Perfect Childhood, mythologies, Harry Potter
~ Language Arts (Grammar with either Grammar-Land or The Sentence Family, spelling/phonics, reading)
~ Math (Life of Fred and/or Zacarro)
~ Reading and/or video for BFSU science topic
~ Independent work with The Boy on Story of Science, while The Girl watches a video on a country (we like the Families of the World series)

Tuesdays:
~ Read-aloud(s) from A Picture Perfect Childhood, mythologies, Harry Potter
~ Language Arts (PLL/ILL, spelling/phonics, reading)
~ Math (Life of Fred and/or Zacarro)

Wednesdays:
~ Read-aloud(s) from A Picture Perfect Childhood, mythologies, Harry Potter
~ Language Arts (word families work for The Girl, free writing with Unjournaling for The Boy, spelling/phonics, reading)
~ Math (Life of Fred and/or Zacarro)
~ American history, and Books of Centuries (Rainbow Book of American History)
~ The Boy will work on his Main Lesson Book of Greek myths, while I read a story or two, along with an excerpt from Just Like Me, to The Girl for her world cultures studies

Thursdays:
~ Read-aloud(s) from A Picture Perfect Childhood, mythologies, Harry Potter
~ Language Arts (PLL/ILL, spelling/phonics (spelling tests), reading)
~ Math (Life of Fred and/or Zacarro)
~ Hands-on day for our science topic
~ Nature journaling/Outdoor Hour challenges

Wishing You All a Very...

I hope everyone has a safe, peaceful, and enjoyable day!

We'll be eating a smallish dinner here at home (plans changed a little!), and, since the weather looks iffy, we'll be watching a movie we haven't yet seen instead of heading to the coast...

I've heard it is really good, so we're looking forward to it!


And of course, we'll be watching this...

See you all after the holidays!

Has It Really Been That Long?

Seventeen years already! And some people said it would never last (we married less than 3 months after we met)! So a Happy Anniversary to my sweetie, and here's to many more years!

It was a good weekend. I made homemade playdough, scented this time with pine oil, and that kept the kids occupied during downpours. We also made bubble soap for between downpours. We discovered Vi Hart's Math Doodles, which both kids, especially The Boy, found quite inspirational. We ate a delicious, and very easy, chicken dish that the whole family begged me to add to our regular repertoire.We played several rounds of Apples to Apples Junior, which is always a blast!

In homeschooling yesterday, we:
~ Read about homo habilis and tool making
~ Visited the Mayan temples of Chichen Itza with Richard Halliburton
~ Completed 2 chapters in Life of Fred Apples (The Girl), and one in Life of Fred Fractions (The Boy)
~ Completed some copywork in Primary Language Lessons (The Girl) and a brief story paragraph in Intermediate Language Lessons (The Boy)
~ Both kids took spelling tests, and aced them!
~ The Girl read a long vowel story from Reading Pathways aloud
~ We read two chapters of Harry Potter & The Sorcerer's Stone
~ There was painting, playdough sculpting, and math doodles all mixed in there too! My kids love to work on crafts, etc. while I read
~ And at bedtime, we read another chapter of Dorothy & the Wizard In Oz, with our old friend the Wizard just arriving on the scene.

Today will be another relaxed day of learning. I have science, language arts, math, a couple of books from A Picture Perfect Childhood, and literature on the agenda, and we'll see how that goes. I am trying to be more flexible these days in my approach, mainly setting general goals for the week, such as 4 math lessons each, coverage of a topic from Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding, a chapter or two in history, and so forth. Then, when and how we get to it is determined by how our days are going! I find too that logging what we have done works much better for me than writing up a plan each week, as I get very frustrated when we don't follow said plan!

Then maybe a nice dinner, and a family movie. The Girl has agreed to miss roller derby training tonight so we can enjoy our anniversary evening at home.



We also changed up our Thanksgiving plans. I'm taking the kids to my mom's house on Wednesday, then on Thursday, it will be this:






and, weather permitting, this.




Something a little different this year! So no cooking for me, except a apple-quince-mince pie for my mom's house, and a pumpkin pie at home, at The Girl's particular request.

Hope you are all off to a good start with your week!

It's Raining...

image courtesy of itsmeithink

It's pouring...

Well, not really pouring, but definitely wet out! And it is supposed to rain the next five days running. I'm kind of glad -- yes, that means the kids won't get to play outside as much, but at the same time, we need the rain! And I love cozy days inside, the fire crackling in the fireplace, soup simmering on the stove... good days and evenings for board games, stories, family movie time with popcorn... my kids like their (air-popped) popcorn with nutritional yeast sprinkled on it, along with smoked black pepper.

How do you/your kids like your/their popcorn?

I think in place of today's park day, we'll catch up on a little homeschooling I wanted to get done this week, and then we'll watch Shrek Forever After, since we recently finished up the first three in the series. That does mean a trip to the library, where I have it waiting for me, but then we don't have to go tomorrow! And it means I can pick up the book for my 12-14 page seminar paper due in mid-December. I'm thinking of getting this Kindle edition as well - the annotations could prove to be very helpful! Maybe the library will have my science materials on hand as well... our first BFSU topic will be gravity, so I have a few books and a video (Disney Imagineering) picked out.

Speaking of books, I'm throwing together a Harry Potter lit study, at the impassioned request of the kids. We did listen to books 1-3 on audiobook a couple of years ago, but they would like the whole series, and somehow they are just not excited, right now at least, about the Narnia lit study. I love all things Harry Potter, so I am not complaining! I am sure too that I will be able to find plenty of resources, starting with The Sorcerer's Companion and The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter. I think I'll change up my Narnia Lit Page and turn it into a general book list page. I really don't know quite yet if we'll do this as a full-blown lit study, or something more casual...

A Brief Run-down of This Week

The Girl: We worked through 4 chapters in Life of Fred Apples. When your kids giggle all the way through math, it is a very good thing! (At least it is when they get the answers right) I'm going to have to sell this one soon, and get the second book! She also read several stories from Reading Pathways; worked in Explode the Code; painted a few pictures; helped with baking and cooking; listened to some stories from a lovely library book she picked up... I am glad there is a pronunciation guide in the back, as Irish names are not my forte.

image courtesy of suite101

The Boy: He worked through another lesson in Primary Challenge Math, as well as a lesson in Life of Fred Fractions. He also completed another spelling lesson; did a free write; worked on computer animation/modeling (he taught himself to animate hair this week!); finished reading The Headless Cupid, and started reading The Famous Stanley Kidnapping Case; and started a science experiment that involves vinegar, rubber, and plastic. I made a lab sheet for him, and he's recording all his data on it. Basically, the idea is to see if vinegar can break down either the rubber (model car tire), or the plastic (small plastic toy). He weighed the objects before submerging them, and will be re-weighing them daily for a week, as well as making note of any changes. He conceived this project himself, and I am happy to support him in it!

With Both Kids:

We finally finished The Lightning Thief (audiobook) and are ready to start The Sea of Monsters. I have been pleasantly surprised at how rich and in depth the book is in comparison to the movie! We also finished The Graveyard Book, and are happily back in Oz with Dorothy and the Wizard In Oz (book 4). We read about Austrolopithicus afarensis and, specifically, Lucy this week for history, as well as The Wall, which is a story about the Memorial Wall, in honor of Veteran's Day. We watched Disney Imagineering's video on fluids, which was pretty interesting! Then there was housework, yard work, lots of Frisbee playing, some art, and so forth.

I think as long as we hit the basic at least 4 times a week, I'm pretty comfortable with what we are doing. History, art, science... all important yes, but I consider them "gravy", and as often as not, even if I don't actually schedule them, we get everything in those areas worked in somewhere!

Hope you all had a good week as well! Happy Friday!

Homeschool Boot Camp Update & Ramblings...

So this week I signed up, a wee bit late, for the:

Now, you might ask, how am I doing with this challenge? I'd say mixed results... so far. Yes, we have "hit the books" a bit more this week, but again, we should be doing it a little more.

I did have parent-teacher-student conferences this week! And I have reinstituted my checklist, although I updated it to include weekends, and a place for "notes". I do have goals - math 4 times a week, writing at least twice, history at least once, etc., but we don't do well with actual schedules. Sometimes, we'll get really excited about a topic, and we'll want to spend more time on it. Other times, it is not interesting, and we hurry through, or set it aside for something else, so no, scheduling doesn't work for me.

Overall, we're doing better this week, and I hope we continue to improve.

Thinking about homeschooling has gotten me reconsidering our goals, and whether we are working toward them. What do I really want for my kids in homeschooling? Earlier this year, there was a big thread (many pages) on a homeschooling message board I frequent about pursuing truth and beauty in homeschooling. Then there was a resulting spin-off Yahoo group on pursuing a classical, liberal arts education, and while the others in the group are far more religiously minded than I am, I still benefit from the depth of connections and ideas they share. My BA is in Liberal Studies, and I feel very fortunate that it was through the Hutchins School of Liberal Studies. We were encouraged to explore topics more deeply, to build and foster connections, and to discuss our ideas and thoughts. Ideally, that is my aim with homeschooling - deeper exploration, building connections, pursuing truth and beauty, fostering discussion. Are we reaching those goals, those ideals? Sometimes, when we get into the whole workbook-do-the-next-thing rut, I feel very far away from it. Other days, when we have a good history lesson, great literature, art, and living math, I feel as if we are stretching in the right direction.

I've gone from a mental image of at-the-table homeschooling... the kids answering questions, filling in the blanks, to an image of cuddling up on the couch or under the apple tree, perhaps sipping tea or lemonade, and discussing whatever book we are reading. I want our homeschool filled with good books, fine art, lovely music, a sense of the flow of history, and an appreciation for the scientific wonders of the world.

Now, how do we get there?

In other news, I decided I needed a better goal for myself in fitness. So (very late to the game), I am challenging myself to....  

I know, super geeky, aren't I? While I doubt I'll participate in any online forums, etc. with this, I do plan to track my journey with a Middle Earth map. I'll keep track in my sidebar too. It'll take a while!

Odds and Ends...

I updated and adjusted my curriculum page: Plans 2012-2013. I did this after individual conferences with the kids, since even I was feeling overwhelmed looking at all we were "supposed" to be using!

image courtesy of wordywoman

First I met with The Boy. We pulled out all his books - a rather big stack - and went through them. I allowed him to eliminate a few... Writing Skills (which he feels is boring), Math Mammoth (as he prefers Life of Fred and Zacarro's Primary Challenge Math), and Word Roots (which he simply never got around to). Then, we went through other resources I had set aside. He was very excited by The Story of Science: Aristotle Leads the Way... he even liked the Student Quest Guide! He also really, really wants to take the National Mythology Exam this year, so I pulled out our copy of the D'Aulaires Greek Myths, and am coming up with a rough "suggested course of study" for him. I think I'll have him approach this in a more Waldorf inspired way, with a Main Lesson Book to record notes.

Then I met with The Girl. While she doesn't really like Reading Pathways, she can see that it is helping. She is fine with Explode the Code, and loves Primary Language Lessons! She's not sure on the math programs right now other than that she enjoys Life of Fred! She says the Challenge math is "too hard", so maybe I will try just level one with that for now. She does still like Math Mammoth though, so I may work in some of that too. Then we talked about individualized studies, and she would still really like to learn more about world cultures, so we'll study that while The Boy is studying mythology--again, I think we might do a Main Lesson Book on this.

Image courtesy of combat-diaries

Finally, we all met as a group, to go over group resources. They love history (though we need to catch up on the Books of Centuries work!), so we'll continue with that. They feel that we are not doing enough science or art. And I agree. So we looked at the topics covered in BFSU, and they liked what they saw. I am finding there are good topical books to supplement this--while the author makes many recommendations, we need "higher level" books, and I think I'm finding some good ones! We're going to give it a good try anyway. They also love geography--I can't recommend Richard Halliburton's work enough!

As for art, well, I will work that in!

In other news... wow, next week I will have been married for SEVENTEEN years! And next week we have Thanksgiving, so I need to start preparing for that. It will just be us this year, which makes it easy. We'll read a few appropriate books over the next week, cook a nice big dinner (I love leftovers!), maybe go for a walk in the woods...

I'm also trying to decide on classes for spring. I do know I plan to take the Advanced Shakespeare class - I've had a few classes with the professor offering this course (he was a substitute for one of my professors a few times this semester), and he is fantastic, plus Shakespeare is his specialty, so I am really looking forward to this experience! I'm not sure yet what else I will take.

Do you have big plans for Thanksgiving?

A Little Late to the Game...

But better late than never, right? So I am joining in on

From Pam's blog, "Over the next two weeks we will be laying out some of our biggest trouble areas, attempting to make some changes, and reporting back on how things are going."

Here goes nothing!

My area to change first is consistency. We're inconsistent with homeschooling (and housework). So, my goal is to sit down and hit the books at least 4 days each week, and spend part of my afternoon time on housework, with the kids pitching in each day, starting today, and staying on target for at least the next two weeks.

Normally today would be about prepping for the week ahead. Instead, today I am focused on writing my rhetorical précis for class, and then the above. Nice to occasionally have a three day weekend!

I also have olives to brine/cure, since we picked many of the ripe ones yesterday. This batch will be done with a traditional liquid cure, while the next batch will be a more experimental dry salt cure. This picture represents maybe a third of the olives on our tree... there are a lot of still unripe ones to be picked soon!



On today's agenda:
~ Work on my paper
~ Homeschooling: Math; spelling/phonics; Primary/Intermediate Language Lessons; geography; science; a history documentary; and reading: The Wall, and The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe.
~ Get the olives curing
~ Dishes and laundry!!!
~ Cooking dinner--tonight we're having roast beef with carrots, parsnips, onion, and brussels sprouts... yum!
~ Watching Shrek the Third! We watched the first one Friday night, and the second one last night. It's fun to re-watch movies we haven't seen in a while. Next on the agenda, Shrek Forever After.

I do have a little accomplishment to sort of brag about... I had written that I wanted to reorganize my BFSU flow charts, and figure out how to implement it in our homeschooling. Instead, I looked at the flow charts I had already developed, and researched higher level supplemental reading to go with it. And I lined up some videos, mostly Bill Nye and How Things Work, along with the Disney Imagineering series. It'll be another week before we can actually use my new plans, since I have to wait on some library books, but I am really very excited about this! I adore BFSU, all three books, and if we actually use them, I think my kids will be very well prepared for higher level science.

I'll finish this up with a photo that I think is appropriate for today...

It's Friday!!!

Photo courtesy of inspiredbycharm.com

I am glad the weekend is almost here, although it promises to be a busy one--I have papers to grade and a three-four page paper to finish writing. Add that to housework, cooking, grocery shopping, etc., and yes, I will be well occupied over the next few days.

So lately M has been feeding an addiction, literally. He cannot stop eating Bush's Baked Beans, which I swear must be some of the priciest beans out there. In interest of keeping on budget, I am attempting to replicate (or better) those beans in the crockpot today. I googled recipes, and found a couple that claimed to be "better than Bush's", amalgamated those recipes, and now they are simmering away. Wish me luck! If this turns out well, I can get an entire big pot of beans cooked up for nearly the same price as one 28-ounce can. And mine are organic! With M unemployed, we are having to be careful with our grocery dollars. I am finding that it is true - the more you cook from scratch, the more you can save, and the better your food can be. For example, I bought a 4 pound chicken last week. We had roasted chicken and veggies one night, then pesto-drenched pasta with chicken and veggies (I made mine with spaghetti squash and it was delicious!), and finally I made a big pot of chicken-barley-veggie soup that lasted through one dinner, and several lunches. Not bad!

A Few Homeschooling Highlights From the Week

Zaccaro Primary Challenge Math is fantastic! You can read more about this week's experience with it here.

We had fun watching Fantasia and talking about music... I was [pleasantly] surprised that The Girl could identify which Nutcracker Suite pieces were used in the film! We also discussed animation methods, as that greatly interests The Boy. He was impressed at the quality of animation pre-digital age, and we talked about inks, paints, transparent layering, and more. He then spent a lot of time drawing this week.

Speaking of The Boy, my once-scared-of-writing boy asked if he could have a prompt from Unjournaling this week! I think by next year he'll be ready for NaNoWriMo!

Other highlights include: The Girl's work on long vowels; plenty of good reading from A Picture Perfect Childhood and The Graveyard Book; playing with Emily (The Girl's mouse) and Athena (The Boy's water dragon); and The Boy's as always silly sentences in Writing Skills.

And of course there was plenty of political talk--we discussed previous presidents and the current candidates (please note that while I did not care for one of the candidates, I was very careful to not speak negatively of him in front of the kids). We also talked about the electoral college, the popular vote, amendments, and propositions.

We also "traveled", through the words of travel writer Richard Halliburton, to Fort Jefferson, reading the unfortunate story of Dr. Samuel Mudd.Was he innocent or guilty of conspiring with John Wlkes Booth? I suppose we'll never really know. Anyhow, we enjoyed reading about the fort, and as always the plethora of [black and white] photographs really added to the story, as did the letter published in the book. It was written to Mr. Halliburton by an elderly woman who as a child had actually lived at the fort with her soldier father!

Where We Could Improve for Next Week

Getting around to schoolwork! I had plans aplenty for this week, which didn't happen. One afternoon it was because I spent a lot of time dealing with car repairs... again. Another afternoon my mother-in-law showed up four hours early for dinner. Yes, FOUR hours. All of the time I had planned for homeschooling.

I was re-reading Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding. I think if I rearrange my flow charts a little, I could totally make this work for us in conjunction with the fabulous Reader's Digest How _____ Works books and Janice VanCleave's _______ For Every Kid series. Add in some Bill Nye videos, and I'll have two happy science-y kids! I do really want this program to work for us, as with all three volumes it is one of the most thorough science programs I have ever come across.

Plans For Upcoming Bits and Pieces

I plan to read about Veteran's Day to the kids this weekend. I'll be picking up this library book on the way home from work today...

This weekend, I also hope to tackle art with The National Gallery of Art: Activity Book. And we'll finish watching NOVA's Becoming Human. The Boy has expressed interest in watching documentaries related to the universe/astronomy, so we'll watch one of those too.

Other homeschooling goals for the upcoming week:
~ get through chapter two in The Magic of Reality
~ read a few chapters in The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe
~ read another 2-4 chapters in The Early Human World and add to the Books of Centuries we're working on
~ finish listening to The Lightning Thief and start book 2 in the Percy Jackson series
~ 2 lessons from each Life of Fred and Primary Challenge Math
~ A couple of lessons each from Primary and Intermediate Language Lessons
~ Getting around to the science project that M gathered all the supplies for, and that we didn't do (thank you MIL!)

Finally, personal goals for the upcoming week:
~ more exercise!
~ planning next week's menu and shopping appropriately
~ getting through at least a few chapters from one of the book's I am writing my long (seminar) paper on this semester
~ getting caught up, again, on laundry!

Hope you all have a good weekend!

Math Fun and More...

I recently bought this "used" from another homeschooler, as well as the second book in the series, Challenge Math for the Elementary and Middle School Student, from yet another homeschooler. And WOW! We did lesson one yesterday, with The Girl working at levels 1-2, and The Boy working at levels 3 and Einstein. First off, let me say I love doing ONE math lesson with both kids, and having it be challenging enough for both! can go back through this book later and do the higher levels that The Boy is currently completing. The Girl worked on patterns in numbers, adding and subtracting, while The Boy worked on more advanced patterns that included fractions and negative numbers. We'll probably use this math book twice a week, and when we're done, I'll just bump The Girl up a level, and move The Boy right into the second book. The text is lighthearted and appealing, with just enough humor to keep the kids really interested.

After that, we were having so much fun with math that we went ahead and read two chapters in Life of Fred Apples!

We also read a couple of short books (from the ever-awesome lists in A Picture Perfect Childhood)...

The book on Molly Bannaky led to a great discussion about slavery, indentured servants, and bravery, as we thought Molly was one very brave young woman! In case you are not familiar with her, she was a dairymaid in England, accused of "stealing" milk from her master (when it spilled). She was sentenced to exile rather than death on the mere technicality that she could read the Bible, a nice little legal loophole. She served 7 years as an indentured servant in the New World, then started her own farm, bought a slave, freed him, then fell in love with him. They married--fortunately none of her neighbors called the law down on her for this--and had 4 daughters, one of which became in turn the mother to Benjamin Bannaker. I think we should follow this reading up with a book like Dear Benjamin Bannaker.

The second book was a lovely little story about Cambodian dancers gong on a trip to Paris, and meeting Monsieur Auguste Rodin, which was an actual event in the early 1900's. We liked the action in the sketches Rodin made of the Cambodian dancers, and thanks to movies, my kids were able to connect Rodin with The Thinker. I think we have a field trip we need to schedule soon, to go here! We also had to look up Cambodia on the map, and I need to find a video source of Cambodian dancing to show The Girl.




Other than that, we've been discussing Norse mythology, reading about prehistoric peoples, and getting supplies laid aside for a venture into chemistry and physics. The Boy and I read a bit more of The Magic of Reality--when we're finished with that, I think we'll get into The Story of Science: Aristotle Leads the Way.

Hope you're all having a good week!

The Good and the Bad...

Normally, I don't discuss politics on my blog. But, I must say, I am SO relieved this morning! Last night's race was just too close for comfort until the end, when the man I am proud to say I voted for clinched a second term!!!

I am also sorry to say I am not surprised, with all his arrogance that, according to several news sources, Romney didn't even bother to write a concession speech (Obama on the other hand had one ready, just in case). Regardless, I am thankful that America made the choice they did. (And by the way, how about Clinton in 2016?)

Now the bad... I am very disappointed in Californians (of which I am one). Proposition 37, a measure near and dear to my heart, failed. I realize that there were likely flaws in the proposition, but I thought it was such a huge step forward for consumers. In case you are not from our sunny state (which is at the moment totally overcast and damp, at least in the northern part), that was the measure that would have forced the food industry to label products that contain GMO's.

Discussing it briefly with my husband this morning, I came to the realization though that while I very much wanted this measure to pass, it actually doesn't affect us that much. It just means we will keep going the way we do, with more of this...

 

 And shopping like this...

And of course, next to none of this...

I say "next to none" because we aren't perfect. There's the occasional soda, or box of [non-organic] crackers, or -- dare I say it? -- yes, even the occasional fast food burger, although even that is getting fewer and farther between. Homemade just tastes better! And it's cheaper to eat at home. Looking at the picture above, I don't think I've ever even bought half the junk in that cart.

If you're ever looking for a really good blog that outlines eating, cooking, etc., in a simple, straightforward and healthy way, take a look at 100 Days of Real Food. I head over there frequently for inspiration.

Okay, I am done with my political ranting and raving. I'll just leave you with one of my favorite images from this morning...

Happy Post-Election Day!