Derby Days...

The Girl attended her first roller derby tournament over the last weekend! We spent two nights, two days, in Bakersfield. While they did not come home victorious, our girls played hard, and played clean games. They lost the first bout, won the second, and lost the third. While I did take some photos of my own, there were professional photographers on the scene too, so here are a few pictures of The Girl from day 1...

I wish there was a better picture of her from day 2, but at least she can be seen in this one...

The nice thing is that they get another chance -- next month they are playing the team from day 2, the Bakersfield Juniors, but at a home game.

It was a good weekend in many ways. First, the girls spent all their time together, so it helped the team bond a bit more. Secondly, The Girl has never been away from me for the night before, so spending two nights, plus travel time there and back, with her coaches and teammates was an interesting experience for her, one that I think helped cement that she's growing up. I also got that lovely thing I have so rarely... alone time. I read all of The Other Boleyn Girl in my hotel room! And now I'd like to see the film adaptation. And, I rode down and back with a longtime derby skater/derby mom, so I learned a lot more about the game, and the players and players' families, in the six hours each direction.

Other than that, what have we been up to?

Math -- The Girl is burning through Life of Fred Cats, and The Boy loves Life of Fred Prealgebra with Biology. They are enjoying it enough that they agreed to continue with the books over summer, just a lesson (The Boy) or two (The Girl) a day.

Writing -- The Boy is working on an essay outline, and spends some of his time working on his story plot. The Girl is practicing sentence structure and spelling. She learned to text over the long weekend.

Self-taught -- The Boy is working hard on computer coding. He regularly chats with a computer science major at fencing, who helps him figure out what codes to tackle. The Boy has also set a goal, with his coaches, of moving up to competitive level fencing by fall, starting with smaller, local tournaments, and going from there.

The Girl has the next derby game to get ready for. She's been working on her sewing skills lately, altering a stuffed animal into something resembling a cat version of L. Frank Baum's "Patchwork Girl" (of Oz). She also learned how to use my vintage sewing machine, and made a purse for one of her dolls.

We're getting back into our regular routine bit by bit this week, and should be back in the full swing of things by next week! Hope your week is going well!

Happy Earth Day!

Wishing you all a Happy Earth Day! 

image courtesy of plasticstoday.com

Even my apple tree is celebrating!

...Some ideas for the day...

Go for a walk out in nature

Collect some wildflowers for pressing

Make a nesting mobile

Plant something

Read a good [picture] book -- some of our old favorites include:

The Lorax

The Great Kapok Tree

The Giving Tree

The Curious Garden

The Tree Lady

On Meadowview Street

Miss Rumphius

And, not a picture book, but a handy one all the same: The New 50 Simple Things Kids Can Do to Save the Earth

Make some pine cone bird feeders

Write a letter to your representatives about an environmental issue that concerns you

Have a picnic at the park, or by candlelight at home

Ride a bike instead of driving

Current Interests....

The Boy, thanks to a game on his phone, has become deeply interested in the world of immunology... disease, pathogens, epidemics, pandemics... so he's decided to make a little study on the subject, and related topics.

He's starting with:

which certainly looks intriguing!

And, for a little more historical perspective:

 And then for fun, if he likes, he might also read:

This last is purely for fun, as he enjoys Asimov's writings.

And The Girl is wrapping up her study of animals for the year, as we are down to the last two chapters of her main book: 

She'll be looking through: 

and 

We also plan to finally dissect our owl pellets, and then frogs, as the grand finale to animal studies! 

She liked the textbook well enough that we are moving on to another from the series:

To which we will add a few "fun" titles:

and 

In the meantime, math is going well... The Boy is doing, on average, two lessons a day in Life of Fred Beginning Algebra. The Girl finished up LoF Butterflies and is starting Cats today. The Boy is talking about writing a story, from a first-person perspective, about a pandemic, while also working on his essay about Ford and Chevy. The Girl is still enjoying poetry, so we read and discuss it, and she's continuing her work in Writing Skills. We're continuing our journey through [local] California history -- about halfway through the book -- and both kids have requested medieval times (especially British) next, so we might read:

I'm not sure if we'll get to this before or after our summer break!

Monday Musings... April 13, 2015...

Outside My Window...
It is cool, overcast, and very gray right now, though I think we are supposed to have sunny afternoons this week, and by mid-late week, temperatures are supposed to be in the low eighties for a couple of days before dropping back down a tiny bit!

Around the House & Garden...
We're planning a series of home improvement projects over the next several months, all DIY of course. Among the tasks to be done:

1. Our biggest project (I think) is the kids' bathroom: we'll be ripping out the old cheap tile in the kids' bathroom. It is not attractive, and is worn, and in some places, a little stained. We're planning on simply relining the shower/tub area with acrylic liners (something like this) as it would be easy to install and easier to keep clean. And the walls (where there is currently some "decorative" tile) will simply be painted with a water-resistant paint. The floor is currently plywood, as the previous owners had it carpeted (???), so I am looking at using something like marine paint (and I love this color!) to refinish that.

2. Ripping out all the remaining carpeting in the house. It is who knows how old. I don't like carpeting. The only rooms that have it now are the living room, the family room, and my bedroom. I think my room has the same lovely hardwood I found in the kids' rooms, and the family room will have to have some sort of floor treatment done, as it is concrete under the carpeting--it used to be a large patio before the previous owners turned it into a full room. As for the living room, it is relatively small, low traffic, and the floor isn't great, though it is wood. We'll either refinish, or try out paper-bag flooring!

3. Setting up a gray-water system from our washing machine for backyard watering.

4. Finish the landscaping in the front and backyards. This, I am sure, will actually be an ongoing project, as we change up seasonal plantings, etc.!

5. Rebuild the chicken coop and run. I want to move it and make it a bit larger, with better winter drainage.

We're doing vegetables in containers this year, since we're in the fourth year of drought, and our soil is pretty awful. The apple tree is starting to bloom at long last, and the cherry tree is already dropping petals everywhere! We have baby fuzzy green peaches on the dwarf peach tree, and our grapevines are coming back nicely, though the raspberry vines don't look as great. I picked my first 4 artichokes over the weekend.

In Our Homeschooling...
More Fred this week for math! We wrote some haiku last week, and The Boy did some brainstorming for his writing project, so this week he'll work on narrowing down his ideas and an outline. The Girl and I are enjoying Pizza, Pigs, & Poetry, so we'll continue with that. Today's plans include another episode of The Amazing Race, and charting their travels on our wall map. We'll watch some more Big History this week; The Boy will work on some chemistry; and The Girl will learn more about cold-blooded creatures.

Reading...
We're chugging along in An Everyday History of Somewhere, as well as Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. We are trying to decide if we want to work through Literary Lessons from the Lord of the Rings as a family next year, or not. It would be the only topic we'd all be doing together! In the meantime, The Boy is reading Real Lives: Eleven Teenagers Who Don't Go to School Tell Their Own Stories; The Girl is enjoying Understood Betsy, along with a stack of frog and bat related titles (nonfiction); and I am just starting The Garden of Letters, by Alyson Richman. I really loved The Lost Wife, and am hoping this one is as good!


Cooking...
The Girl has requested "more vegetarian meals", so tonight will be a chickpea vegetable curry. Also on this week's menu: a homemade pizza night; veggie burgers and homemade sweet potato fries (I finally got the whole family hooked on these rather than regular homemade fries!); and some sort of soup made with stock from roast chicken leftovers.

Recently...
Going to a concert was definitely a highlight this week! We didn't really care about the magician, or the dancers, but any concert that begins with Night on Bald Mountain and finishes with music from Harry Potter is good! It also included music from Lord of the Rings, as well as In the Hall of the Mountain King (Edvard Greig) and The Sorcerer's Apprentice, and more, all beautifully performed. As The Boy said, even if you are really familiar with the pieces, hearing them performed live is a fantastic experience!

We've been biking...

And skipping stones...

And watching movies (such as Monty Python & the Search for the Holy Grail with the family, and I'll Follow You Down with M, the second of which makes me want to re-watch The Time Traveler's Wife, with M), playing cards, hanging out... just living each day!

And M has been named, after ONE month at his new job, Assistant Manager. There should be a raise coming soon, once he's past the probationary period!

And on the Agenda...
I am back to tutoring this week, after having last week off from one student, and two weeks off from the other! Plus I have volunteer hours at the teen crisis center. While I am enjoying the work, and I know it is valuable, I will be glad to get those evenings back soon. The kids and I are also doing volunteer work next weekend, setting up for a big event. And they are going with my sister's special ed class to a school show tomorrow at a local arts center.

Fencing and roller derby are on the agenda. The Girl is getting ready for her first full weekend tournament, many hours from home! So practices have been tough lately, but she's hanging in there, and learning a lot!

Have a good week!

Another Week Down... Nine to Go...

 

Sunset this week while out walking by a local lake

...The Boy's Week...

He started [a review of] prealgebra, with Life of Fred's Prealgebra 1 with Biology, going through 2-3 lessons a day, and he's really enjoying it! I am glad he's getting at least some biology in there, as that is one of the sciences he really isn't too interested in generally, though he seems to be fine with it in this context.

He did a brainstorming session for his writing project of the month. Next week, he'll work on narrowing it down, getting a thesis in place, and research.

He read through World War I: An Interactive History Adventure, and is charting how many different adventures he can choose within the confines of the book. When we were at the library on Wednesday, he suddenly remembered how much he liked these books when he was younger, so off he went to choose his adventures! He picked up a couple of other choose-you-own-adventure books as well, one set in the future, and the other regarding space travel. He says that when he's done with all the variations of the WWI title, he'll look at other historical ones.

He also took apart the driver's side door on the car, to see if he could fix the slight grating that occurs when I roll the window up. He was able to pinpoint the problem, but unable to fix it at the moment. I will say that I was very nervous about this project, especially when it came to him actually taking apart the window mechanism and having the window loose. It seems to all be back together quite well though!

He also studied some German, with German Made Simple; worked on some sketches; read some more about Henry Ford; did a fair amount of skyping and computer gaming with friends; got a 45 minute private lesson at fencing when he and one of the top rated fencers there were the only two fencing épée one night; and he cleaned the family room!

Next week, I'd like him to work a little more on science, but I think he's doing pretty well overall at balancing his learning activities. I would also like him to cut back down on computer time -- he seems to go through phases with it, and it's been on a bit too much of an upswing lately.

...The Girl's Week...

She finished flying through Apples and in two days is eight chapters into Butterflies in math. The review is seeming to be good for her -- her responses to number family questions are much faster, and we've been playing around a lot with the idea of empty sets. We also reviewed multiplication tables (i.e. skip counting) by tossing a ball back and forth.

She read aloud from her beloved Mother Goose book, and is memorizing poems like crazy. Her reading skills (especially aloud) have improved so much! We also started listening to some Shakespearian sonnets on youtube, and found them read aloud by Alan Rickman, Daniel Radcliffe, and David Tennant! She wrote in her journal almost every day this week, and has started a copybook of favorite poetry. We also started reading Pizza, Pigs, & Poetry, and I think she's about ready to try her hand at writing some of her own.

She's listening to Gilda Joyce: The Dead Drop on audiobook, and, after setting aside The Cats of Tanglewood Forest (she just couldn't really get into it... yet) picked up a copy of Understood Betsy to try.

She also is working with leash training one of our dogs, having spent her own money on a new leash, harness, and collar; made breakfast for her brother and herself a couple of times this week; worked on some more sculpture and stop motion photography; went walking with me around a local lake; read about frogs and bats in her collection of library books; had derby practice; and designed and sewed, by hand, a dress for an old Disney/Barbie doll.

Over the next week, I would like to see her settle on one book to read for a while, instead of skipping around quite so much, meaning that I am hoping she can actually read all of Understood Betsy before picking something else. I'd also like to read Girls Who Looked Under Rocks with her, something I've been planning/thinking about for a while.

...Together...

We re-watched episode one of The Amazing Race (season one) and marked the first legs of their journey on the large map I printed out from National Geographic, which is now taking up almost an entire wall in the dining room/area. We read about Victoria Falls (one of the sites they visited on the show).

We read about hunters and otters in our California [natural] history book, and started enjoying Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

We watched a couple more episodes of Lost, and several episodes of Friends (I know, super educational, right?). We then talked about going back to a weekly rotation of shows, such as Once Upon a Time, Eureka, etc., rather than getting stuck on the same couple of shows day in and day out.

We also played a few card games; listened to some more of The Last Olympian; laughed a lot; took extra vitamins/supplements because my mom, sister, and brother have all had the flu, which we very much do not want; played with the rabbits; and devoured some really good homemade tacos. 

...And My Week...

I found a new place right by work to take my daily break-time walks...

I love finding wildness right at hand!

I gave a presentation on animal therapy in my psychology class this week, part of which included a visit from a dog therapy team, which seemed to be a big hit!

I completed more of my service hour requirements, at a teen crisis shelter, for the same class.

I started re-reading Six of One. Rita Mae Brown always makes me laugh, and I love the honesty of her characters.

I exercised at least a bit every day this week. I'm trying to hit 10,000 steps everyday (hovering closer to 8,000 though), which includes any running I do, plus I do some weight training. I've got a long journey ahead of me in this aspect, but am enjoying it so far!

How was your week?

{linked up at Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers}