I just finished a GREAT book! Big surprise it is historical fiction, I LOVE historical fiction! I started reading this book because I was interested in James Town, and because I never get up to the "adult" section of our library so I read some of the "older" kid books I find downstairs! :) It is a Nutmeg Award Nominee for 2009 in the 4-6th grade category, so I figured it would be a bit too old for Riley, but after finishing it today I think he would really enjoy it! This is a book worthy of our home library by my definition, a family classic because I would read it again! So when there are lots of funds for books this will be one we get!
The author has a website where she has made available a study guide for the book, I would put the study guide closer to the 6th grade level than the 4th, but there are also some great links at the bottom that I think could be useful to many age groups!
So if you are looking for a great adventure, and a great story (and you visit the children's library more than the adult) then I would highly recommend Blood on the River James Town 1607.

Isn't Core Phase GREAT!

Well yesterday, being October 1st was the kick-off for the Book-it program. We decided to have a Book-it party!! I asked all the kids to pick out their favorite book, we wore book-it pins (thanks to ebay!), had balloons and jello!! What a party! :)
So with our favorite books I had each of the kids come up in turn and tell us the name of the book and then why it was their favorite book. I choose My Antonia, because it is a pioneer story and the author (Willa Cather) is so descriptive in her writing that I can see a perfect picture in my head. Riley chose the Color Kittens, because he liked learning about mixing colors to make other colors. Jake chose Dinosaurumpus because the T-rex is nice in the story (he always gets such a bad wrap)! And Fern chose The Gingerbread Man (illustrated by Richard Scarry) because she likes the fox who eats the gingerbread man! :)

We then made our own books, they were interesting, but Riley is not finished yet!

As a fun surprise I bought the #2 in the Magic Tree House series and we read 1 chapter before our cherry jello with cherries in it! :)

We also got our tracking sheets all ready and hung up!

They thought we did not have school time today just a party, little do they know just how much we did! :)

BOOK-IT!!! Yes I was in elementary school during the 80's, and I LOVED BOOK-IT! It is probably one of the very few good memories I have from school during that time. Mostly because I read so many books that I could regularly take my whole family out to the local Pizza Hut and feed everyone! :)

So when I snooped around the BOOK-IT site and found out that they include homeschoolers in the program I jumped! So I signed us up, Riley is the only one eligible this year, and today I got our information in the mail! I got a pamphlet with all the information and also a "Reader Roster", and then the "Reading Award Certificates"! I was a bit sad that there is no longer a "button" to wear, and am now racking my brain to figure out a way to get one, or make one. But what a great program and I am so excited to get to get Riley excited about reading! And it can grow with his ability's! You can set goals by how many pages, books or minutes a week!

Also fun they have free printables; logs, calendars, certificates, and what I think is really neat different ways for a child to "narrate" on paper! This sheet is what I think we will use this year, he can dray pictures and write a little!

There is also a program for Preschool kids that runs for 6 weeks in the Spring!

So what are you reading! :)

One very nice thing you can do when homeschooling... ...go to your first day of school with bare feet or slippers!

Here is my Kindergartner, preschooler, and 2nd grader today, our first day of school!

You know I use to do this all for fun when I was little, my Daddy was a public school teacher and would bring me home lots of "scrap paper". I would organize my school stuff and set up school in front of my big chalk board with Mr. Bear, mommy doll, baby beans, and a few other choice "friends". Too bad I did not find school so interesting or inspiring. Last year I organized all of my needed school papers into a 3 ring binder, I continued to add papers throughout the year. Not only was it my calender and book list but I also kept upcoming activities for Riley and Jake in there. This year I choose to take my plans for each of the kids, plus a calender, book lists, blank paper, and my weekly plans/next week pages (see below), put them all together and have them bound. It was only $2.00 at Staples and I even got a nice cover and backing to it! Isn't it pretty! :) I will keep any upcoming activity pages in a separate folder.
So this is the page I created to keep my mind in order a bit! :) So each week I can write in what our goals to get accomplished are plus anything I would like to do with the kids specifically (ie: go to the library, go apple picking, read Johnny Appleseed before going apple picking, etc).
On the back of the weekly page so that if you have the book opened it is on the left, I have created a space to keep my self ready for the up coming week. This way hopefully when I sit down with Fern & Jake to paint I do not find that we are out of purple or green, or if Riley and I are going out to observe the changing colors for our nature books, we have room in our books!

Riley is really chomping at the bit to start in to all the fun for the new school year but I have not been able to get the books we need to start, so we wait! :) Soon I hope we will be ready! :)

Ok so I have been planning and reading and now I have our year planned out primarily. So I thought I'd share my plan, because I am just that kind of girl! Please forgive my cheese way of sharing but I like things to be in order and I have not found a way to put a document here on blogger! :) If you have any questions please do ask, and please feel free to use these plans for your own children but please do not make money off of them, I'm not! :)

Here is Riley's year in a nut shell, I do not have all the books we will be using on here but if your interested I do have them! :)

Here is my Super Man - Jake's year! I am thinking about letting him choose the letter we study instead of going in order. He knows all his letters so it will be more about their sound and words that start with them. The books are just some good titles, we will be getting library books on top of them! :) Here is a site I am getting some of our "fun" ideas for in the last column!

And Miss Fern's! This is the same plan I wrote out for Riley when he was three, we used it in the little co-op we had in Calif. I just tweaked it a little, CT, instead of CA and the field trips of course. For January I had on there to go to the San Diego Wild Animal Park, but that is quite a trip in addition San Diego in January is a beautiful time to go, but I am doubting January in Connecticut as a good time to go to the zoo, we will see!

So there is it, it is nice to have a plan, now just to enjoy it! :)

Just a little book review for you all (or y'all if your in the South)! I requested this book back in January from another library in our system, I finally got it at the beginning of this month. January, June... they both start with J's at least! :)
Anyway, it is an awesome book! In quite a bit of my TJed reading the Hirsch's Core Knowledge Series is recommended often, but I found it not at all the speed, content or organization that I liked. But I still wanted a year by year idea of appropriate study. This is just my speed, with the content we are already enjoying and it is organized just as my mama brain desires! Each "chapter" is a grade level starting at preschool, then it is broken up into Math, Science, World History, American History, etc... So for American history for 1st grade it wound give highlights to cover within the period your studying, Columbus's voyage, Sir Walter Raleigh, Pocahontas, etc... So I found it well organized in that respect, with content it had great book ideas to go with different topics along with websites with free resources. I LOVE free!! :) It also included a heading for P.E. who does not love P.E.!! So for 1st grade it had throw and catch a ball, and skip with out falling as a couple recommendations. It is just nice to know developmentally what we should work on.
We keep it pretty mellow on the academics around here, but I do try to have a little something interesting to do together and this is a great resource! It is now high on my priorities list of books to get!!

On the school front, we have been on vacation and soon will be off to visit Grandma so our learning has been on the fly and O-SO-FUN!! What beats learning on an beach in the Caribbean!!

**A fun new site I found www.mywonderfulworld.org . They have some fun printables, including geography car games!!

Yea, Jake finally gets to do one of the planned books!!

This is one of our favorite books, enough that I bought it when Riley read it. Too bad it is completely MIA!! Thankfully a friend had requested it from another library and I was able to check it out before it was sent back. Here is the fun book, The Big Green Pocketbook, by Candice Ransom.
Today after reading the book we made a shape picture like the gal's shirt, here they are on the fridge (Fern did one too)! And then we went to the jewelers and looked at the pretty rings and got a new battery for my watch! Yea!!

All in all we had a fun day, and now we are off to go grocery shopping!

What did you do today??

Legos: one of the greatest learning tools ever made!!!

Last week out of A Child's History of the World we read Ch.21-All the Way Around the World in China. And then we also use the Usborne Ancient World, and they had a great picture of The Great Wall of China.

So.... Riley built the wall! And then took the picture all by himself!
Here is the Ancient World page about the great wall.

For his timeline picture for this lesson I think we will print out this picture of his Lego wall, I think he will really like that!!

~

On other fronts, I have to get going on figuring out what I am planning for Jake this next school year as he will officially be "Kindergarten Age"!! But he is still a young guy and so we will be taking it easy. But he LOVES letters and can not wait to read, so I am thinking we may end up diving into that later in the year. I have a couple GREAT sites for that, I will share later. But for today you get free sites about kindergarten! I was compiling this list for a friend who is just getting her feet wet in this crazy (but great) endeavor of homeschooling and thought it was a great list to share here. These are all sites I have had in my "schooling" bookmarks for a while, but they are all great! :) Hope they are helpful, and PLEASE if you have any other FREE kindergarten sites post them in the comments for all of us!!

ambleside online - scroll down and there is a list of great books (lots of them)!
Brightly Beaming - They have different curriculum's for different ages (scroll down to see them all).
LDS Home Education Association - Their philosophy.
Simply Charlotte Mason - Really neat compilation of information.
Trivium Pursuit - 10 things to do with your child before age 10.
Homeschool Share - Under unit studies they have a similar set up as the FIAR, and it is FREE!!
Higher Up & Further In - A GREAT mama who has written down all her curriculum and shares it for free. I used her 1st grade for Riley this year with minor tweaks! :)

*Here is another!!

Best Homeschooling.org - A good comprehensive list of fun (& therefor learning) activities to do! :)

For not being readers it is sure hard to get them to put the books down! :)

This is what I had last night at bed time, each of them with a flashlight and a pile of books! It does not get much better than that!!

Other than that we are just going about our usual business. Riley is still enjoying his math pages, the other day Jake surprised me with Riley's math page. There were several rows of 7 "things" like 7 watermelons, mice, etc., then it would say you have 7, cross out 3 what do you have left? Riley went through and did them all, on the last one he did the problem by saying it out loud, as he got to the "what's left" part Jake said the CORRECT answer. With out counting! So I tried a few others, he would look at the pictures but was not counting and he knew all the answers! It was weird! :)

Jake has had the short end of the schooling stick so to say, we have not been able to get the book for BFIAR for almost 2 months, our library system just does not have them! This week I was excited because I owned the book we were to use, and then of course it is no where to be found! POOF disappeared! :) Oh well we read tons of books anyway, but we have been lagging on the fun art activities he enjoys. Things have just been crazy and the house too so it is hard for me to pull out mess, ya know!

Anyway enough of my rambling, I just loved the picture, I wish it had turned out a bit better, but oh well you get the idea! :)

Left to his own devices...

or what my airplane crazy kid did! Riley decided that he would invent an airplane engine, so here are his diagrams.
Lots of plans!
He poured over these for days!!
Then I gave him an empty cracker box and scissors! He made this model all by himself, he designed two different engines and so made a model of each that way we could all see! :)
He has been very proud of this work, and he should be! :)

When Dan got home from his trip he was dully impressed, then he and Riley went onto the Internet and found actual diagrams of a propeller, V8, and jet engines. Dan printed them up for Riley and he has had quite a treasured "book" of information! :)

Two completely airplane crazed boys in my house, I pray for Riley's future wife and I hope you are all praying for Dan's wife. I may go (completely) crazy yet!!

We started this book for our poetry study last week, it is GREAT! I love haiku's in general, but these are fun and beautiful plus the illustrations are wonderful! The kids are enjoying them quite a bit too, Riley thinks they are quite funny little poems! And so I HIGHLY recommend it!!Here's a sneak peek!!

A blade of grass

pushes through cement

Hello, world.

Riley is memorizing this one!

And here is our picture for the week by Friedrick Edwin Church, it is of course of Natural Bridge in Virginia. A place near and dear to our hearts of course!! :)

So there is your peek of our week! :)

Opera.

Well of course I love the opera... that I know; Evita, Le Miserables, Martin Guerre, the usual. But the word was still a bit scary. So when I put on the schedule to study opera for our music study the last six weeks I was a bit apprehensive and Dan thought I was down right insane! But have no fear just throw something in there that Dan DOES like, the German language! :)

So we have been listening to Mozart's The Magic Flute, and then this week I rented a stage production of the show from Netflix. We all sat down to watch it and everyone watched it (well Fern fell asleep it was long). And then the next morning the boys begged to watch it again! So we did, this mama knows when to say yes! :) The fun part was to see the boys recognizing some of the German words they knew! So it was a successful six weeks of music, we also read the book The Pet of the Met which was a ton of fun and talked a bit about The Magic Flute!

The version we rented was good, but what is up with the Egyptian thing?

P.E. at Home!!

So sorry this is sideways, I always seem to forget about that! :)

I can remember my Grandma M. Making these for my sister and I, I always loved them! So I thought I'd give it a try, so Grandpa M. mailed us a box of empty coffee cans and we had some fun. My rope was a bit too thin, but it worked. Riley has continued to practise "Like Leo the Lightning bug" and has gotten really good at it!

But here is Jake and Riley on their first attempts!

Well after reading Cherish's fun post on Children's Lit. I have been thinking of great books I have enjoyed, and then today we got an Amazon box & Barnes and Noble box!!! We got two books by Robert McCloskey one of our favorite authors, who can dispute Kippling's worth, and then a new one to try, I love Haikus!!

Some books I grew up loving were, Island of the Blue Dolphin by Scott O'Dell, The Castle in the Attic by Elizabeth Winthrop, Bridge to Terabithia by Kathrine Paterson, The Indian in the Cuboard by Lynne Reid Banks, Charlotte's Web by E.B. White, not to mention the Little House series or any Ramona books I could get! There are so many I could not possibly find them all unless I was back in Mrs. Cofferer's library!

Here is the inside cover of my copy of The Castle in the Attic, I won it (I think for reading so many books!) from Mrs. Coffer my Elementry school librarian who always wore slippers!

Here is what she wrote on the inside, it was like having a superstars autograph!!

If only every little one thought their librarian was a superstar!!

For our nature study this 6 weeks we are learning about rocks and minerals. I have always LOVED rocks, yea I am a bit weird, anyway I had quite a rock collection but I can not find it! I think I packed it in a box when I went away to college but I have not seen it since. Most of my boxes of that sort are stored at my dad's and since we are too far away to go just for a rock collection (although I do not need half so good a reason) we had to start from scratch.

So we went over to the Rolling Brook Nature Center and in the gift shop they had "grab bags" of rocks. I use to love to get grab bags of rocks from the rock guy at our weekly street fair growing up! So it was fun to share Riley's excitement and remember the sweetness of it! Riley and I have been working on identifying them, some I am familiar with but some are throwing me for a loop!! Here is what we have so far! :)

We are still tweaking and reassessing, but I thought I'd share a couple sites I have found recently and also a good article I just read yesterday!

Links: http://ayli.org/
http://www.livingmath.net
Article; The Nation Comes from the Nursery
I thought there was another, maybe I'll find it and edit it in later, or not! :)


And the good article I read yesterday, I even got Dan to read it and we got to chat a bit about it today!!

The Quick Fix Temptation
By Diann Jeppson
Thomas Jefferson Education is a set of principles. Principles take time and sacrifice
and faith to apply. The quick fix is so tempting, but there isn't a principle-based
quick fix. Especially for the idea of inspire, not require. I think of it as a chess
game. I have a certain set of moves that I can make. I can ignore. I can bribe. I
can threaten. I can beg, cajole and lay on the guilt trips. Or I can inspire. Each
has its consequences.
The big question is: What is the end result we want to achieve? For me, it is
to teach my children how to use freedom. This means I must accept the risks
associated with allowing them this privilege. It also means that relationship is king.
In an adversarial environment, TJEd will simply not work. But it is worth the
significant effort to get our relationships with our children square, so we can move
forward with our studies. It is surely not a destination, but a profoundly important
process and a daily practice.
Because you are reading this newsletter, I would venture to say that you are
experiencing a powerful desire to re-birth a new season in your family. Having
walked that path before, I offer you some caring mentorship. If you find yourself in
a place of significant pain in your relationships with your children, I want you to do
something that will likely be extremely difficult.
1. For a short season of time, stop trying to do academics with your children. For a
couple of months focus only on your relationships. Pray constantly for charity. Play
with them, hold them, listen to them, forgive them, pray about them and with them.
Sing, go places, do things they enjoy. Your job during the next couple of months is
to create an easy, open, relaxed feeling between you and them.
2. Give up the quick fix plan. If you decide to do TJEd, prepare to dig in and do it
with all of your heart. Don't do it as an experiment. Really do it. Forget yourself.
Forget what detractors say. Trust the process and let the process work in you. I
understand that it is hard to be patient when you are experiencing pain and anxiety.
You will gain confidence as you consistently move forward, so hang in there!
Your change will be from the inside out. You stand at the crossroads of new birth—
the birth of new lives, new hearts, new minds, new courage. Know that we care very
much about your success as you raise a generation of leaders in YOUR home!
Activity Review
1. Spend the next month or two concentrating on nurturing your relationships with
your children.


Reprinted from “The Inspirer Newsletter,” a free e-zine designed to inspire and reinspire
parent mentors engaging in Thomas Jefferson Education.
http://www.homefires.ws

What a Package!

Look at this fun assortment of homeschooling "stuff" put together by the editors of this fun new online magazine The Heart of the Matter. It is a care package to get through the post holiday blahs (is that a word?). I am hoping to be the ecstatic recipient of this, but seeing as there are a ton of HSing mamas having the blahs I will hold back my excitement until the drawing. But I have to say that the paint can with magnetic numbers is completely the coolest thing I have seen lately, that may even keep my little ragamuffins engaged long enough for me to get a math lesson in with my 1st grader!

I would also suggest you check out the premiere edition of the magazine, I am looking forward to
reading all the great articles!!

Have a great day!

Don't you just love getting books in the mail!! Here are a couple new things we got for Term 2!!

We have actually had quite a blissful first two days of our term. I have been striving to not make it "school" at home. I have seeked out advice from mamas I look up to and I have been rereading some of my Thomas Jefferson Education publications. There are also a few new articles on the TJed.org site and I found an yahoo group with some great experience being shared!
Today we read our world history chapter, it was on Greek gods. We found Greece on the map, talked about the things Dad saw when he was there this summer, and also made some popsical stick Greek gods. I found some good illustrations for the 12 members who live on Mt. Olympus, I'd be happy to share if you want it, but I will have to email them to you so just ask!! Even Jake enjoyed part of our lesson!
We also read our new book Pet of the Met, it was great! Everyone enjoyed it and we are now wishing that we could go to a children's matinee of the Magic Flute! We listened to our new CD's of Mozart's opera Die Zauberflote (yes the o should have umlauts over it, just imagine them). We decided to buy The Magic Flute in its original German since it is the language we are working on.
I know I am looking forward to Friday when we get to start The Tree in the Trail, it is about the Santa Fe Trail!

How is the New Year going in your homeschool?

For a little mind exercise for the mamas!!

A new article over at the Common Room may make you say "wow", but not the good kind!

First Term Exams are done!!!

Yea, now to get ready for the new term. My poor black ink cartridge is just not up to it, I am hoping a little $$ is magically found in our budget through divine means so that I can wear out my printer some more!! (I would use my budget but I have already spent some of my food money on books!!) We may be eating beans and rice but we will be enlightened!! :) Ha Ha!

Riley did well on his exams, it sounds like my poor little 6 year old was whittling through pencils for hours on end doesn't it?! No worries, they were mostly all oral, he put the timeline pictures he has drawn throughout the term in order, told me a couple of Aesop's Fables, found the Tigress and Euphrates rivers on our world map, recited Robert Lewis Stevenson's poem; Time to rise, and did well on word problems in math. Over all he did well, we have been able to realize we need to concentrate on certain things when we study geography and world history, and that swords, ships, and Indians make all the details not so memorable in American History! :)
The picture up top is the first stanza in Riley's poem, (his is the 2nd, & 4th lines) He can write very nicely when he tries, he is even getting down the space between words most of the time!
Over all we are happy with the curriculum we have gleaned and tweaked from Lindafay, what a blessing to have experienced mama's willing to share and mentor! We have lost that too much these days in our society. Now to start in again with zeal, as we have no trips or major holidays coming up, although we will have to plan a little break for February when Grandpa comes to visit!! :) I am hoping to find a way to integrate it all into our lives more, to really enjoy and learn from it.
Any ideas are welcome and very much appreciated! Have a great New Year!

Math & Science all in one lesson!!

Wow, did you think you were at the wrong blog?? I know it is completely different, but I like it! :)

On a non-school-day note, I have also added a little banner over on the side for Ron Paul, I find his Homeschooling philosophy engaging, along with his desire to uphold the constitution. I hope you will take a minuet and read his views on homeschooling and really consider who you are voting for and what it means for our children, now and in the times to come.

AAAAAAA, term 1 is ending, term 1 is ending!!!!!

This was me yesterday when I realized in the short fundage of getting school supplies last summer I only finished shopping for term 1, SO I am now going through list and finding what more I need! :)

Things are going pretty well, we are learning that the routine we started with needs a little tweaking. So I have been searching out other families routines, one of our big problems is that we don't get all the family subjects done first. So when there is something left to do it gets done with who ever is available instead of everyone! So that is one tweak. Also I just don't think we are enjoying the "lifestyle" the way we should, most days Riley's question is "am I done yet", Jake is another story, he loves getting the extra time and reading good books! :) We are also now getting into the horrid stage where there are some days when Fern does not take a nap, so leaving some school activities for "nap time" just does not work! Another tweak is the need to make more of an effort to have quiet time. And on my own personal tweaking, I NEED to put a renewed effort into getting up before my kids. It is hard with an early bird who has been known to get up for the day a 6am, I could get up at 6am but I would need a little time before I could nicely deal with a morning person!! :)

How does your family's routine work?

As our term is winding down, and Christmas is quickly upon us I will be around a little less! But I look forward to starting the New Year, the new term, and making new friends!!

And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Can you tell I am a visual learner? I love the written word, but I usually "get it" better if I have never seen it by seeing it first! :) So I have a slew of pictures from our school fun last week, and a special video from today! Last week Jake and I were reading Katy-No-Pocket. It is a great book for learning about different animals. This is a picture of Jake the Kangaroo, with his pockets full of animal friends!

Here is Kangaroo Jake hopping around the house, sorry it is sideways, It is just going to have to stay that way!!
Here is a handicraft we did last week together. We made Fleece scarves! Very useful because the boys did not have one and fun because we made them. I got the idea from Me and My Girl, I had to simplify a little bit for our babes, but they LOVED it! Here they are wearing theirs and showing the gigantic one they made for Dad. They also made one for a friend who's birthday was last Fri. and they were quite happy to give him a gift they made even with all the other light it up, making noise kind of toys that he received!
They were Oh so excited to have camo fleece, and I was oh so happy it was on the clearance table!!

Now we have been in this school year for 7 weeks, and every time I told Riley we were going to learn to read he would turn off. If I even touched the book "Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons" he would grone. It was awful!

So I thankfully decided to try another way. And I offered Riley 2 options, learn to read with a few short words and then work on a Little Bear book off my shelf, or learn a few words and read from the Book of Mormon. He choose Little Bear, so we did two of Lindafay's lessons today.. a MIRACLE!!!!! Watch!

Well today we started our Composer Study for the next 6 weeks, The Ballet! Now this was not a foreign concept to my children. The Orchestra was more so. They have been indoctrinated from the beginning, ballet is... life. You see long before I was their Mama, I was a dancer. I breathed dancing, I danced when I was not dancing! So this is great to share with my kids!

~

My kids know what the Nutcracker is, I first saw it when my mom took me when I was 5, and that is when I started collecting nutcrackers. But this year I will share it with them. This is the CD we have, it is the COMPLETE Nutcracker, not the "best of" that is most available. I would rather they make their very own best of!

But before we started listening to it this morning I introduced them to ballet the dance by showing them a dancer EVERY little boy should see, Mikhail Baryshnikov! There are no other words to add, all you have to say is Baryshnikov... that is it! I highly suggest going to youtube and watching any of the Baryshnikov clips you can! I could spend hours doing this and still want more.

Then I thought it would be great for them to have an object to hold to better understand, so I pulled out my old toe shoes from my days on pointe. They were so excited and interested, and by the end they had talked me into them, literally! They were impressed I was taller than Daddy when up on toe! :) And Jake has spent the rest of the day asking me to put them back on and dance for him. Maybe I will have my own little Baryshnikov!
Don't look too closely, I did not tie them correctly, and my feet are not as pretty as they were before years of dancing! :) And my back foot is not turned out! But it was a great object lesson and I hope they enjoy it as much as they enjoyed Peter and the Wolf!

Now if you will please excuse me as I Pirouette my way to bed!

Oh my where have I been, well we took a fall break for our trim to Calif. and then we got home and fought the stomach flu for almost a whole week, so finally today we are getting back into the swing of school. I was sad to abruptly stop the nice rhythm we had started and now we are tiring to jump back in!

For Jake we are working on Katy-No-Pocket still, we just never got to start it, let alone finish it! :) We are also doing the letters K and W.

With Riley we are in our 7th week of term 1. We are on lessons 17,18, & 19 in our Abeka Math, Ch. 7 in A Child's History of the World & Ancient World p. 12-13, Ch 5 in This Country of Ours, Ch. 15-16 in Paddle to the Sea, We are reading As You Like It for our Shakespeare study, Our new Artist for this 6 weeks is Rembrandt, our composer study is learning about the ballet, we will be listening to the Nutcracker and I am hoping to find a performance to go to as the holidays approach, plus the various stories, fables, poems, and such. Oh and for our Nature Study we are concentrating on the Heavens for this next 6 weeks.

The scripture we are working on memorizing as a family is Moses7:18 "And the lord called his people Zion,because they were of one heart and one mind, and dwelt in righteousness; and there was no poor among them."

Yesterday just for fun we read a book I remembered as a kid, that I found in the library. Stone Soup by Marcia Brown

This of course lead the boys to wanting stone soup for dinner! So we got out our soup stone and made soup. It was a lentil and wild rice soup, but the kids ate 3 bowls each! Riley kept telling me how magical the stone must be to make such good soup. I wonder if I could put the stone in every dinner? Maybe I could put it in Borscht and then Dan would eat it!! (He gages just at the word) So here is our fun read book recommendation for the day!! If you read it with your kids please let us know how you liked it and how your soup turned out!

This is the 6th week of our school year, we are finishing up our first artist; John William Waterhouse, at the end of our study of the orchestra, and mammals! I need to get on the ball and get the last bit of fun in! We are going to go see a friends horse and learn about what they do to take care of it, a large mammal we do not get to be around often!

With Jake we got a little ahead and I am trying to pull back a bit, so he has had a less structured week. The next two weeks will be short on school time as we are having a small hiatus for a family wedding and fun!

I am hoping to start on Jake's new book Katy-no-pocket before we leave so that hopefully we can go to the Zoo and see some of the animals we have been learning about! I think we will take his animal classification cards and see who we can find! :)

Riley is still enjoying his math the most, but has developed quite a delight in the Aesop Fables, he even did our Family Home Evening using one of the stories from last week. It was about a family of boys who quarreled constantly, the father then took a bundle of sticks and asked them to break them, they could not, but when he asked them to break it one stick at a time they could he then told them that alone their enemies would overcome them, but if the we're united they would be strong. So Riley found many sticks in the back yard and we broke sticks. It was fun!

Hopefully as we get back from our trip and the weather drives us inside for the majority of our day we will be able to get more into our studies and I pray constantly that they will engage Riley!

What have you been up to this week?

Our fun field trip last week was a day spent at the Roaring Brook Nature Center. After all the WONDERFUL post during the Charlotte Mason Blog Carnival (see previous post), we just felt like being outside! They had a nice little 2 room exhibit to walk through, it is so interesting seeing all the different animals that I didn't grow up seeing or that the boys have been around ether. We also got to go on a great walk/hike on their trails. We ended up near the brook, and had two boys thoroughly enjoying tiring not to get wet, they were quite unsuccessful! :) We also scored some great photos of plants, bugs, and animals to put up on our new nature blog, Never be within doors...

We just finished our third week of "school", Riley is doing ok, he loves his math and is very good at it, he is now writing addition equations. He does not enjoy writing, and has some interesting excuses. He is enjoying quite a bit of our readings, especially Paddle to the Sea.

Jake is ahead of schedule because he is always wanting MORE! :) Plus he is quite observant, so as we are working on recognizing the alphabet, I am finding out that he basically knows all of them. We were at a ball field today and with a stick in the dirt he was writing T's and telling us that it is a T, we have not even covered T's and I have not had him writing at all! It is just weird to change gears, I never imagined there could be so much difference in 3 (almost4) year old knowledge.

And Fern well, she is enjoying getting up on the table and sitting or laying on whatever it is that we are working on, I think she is related to my recently late cat Angel! :)

Jacci over at The Educational Life has risen to the task of starting a Charlotte Mason Blog Carnival. So as this is the first, with the topic of "The Great Outdoors", I thought I would try my hand and hope that maybe someone could glean from me a bit of help, as I have gleaned from other Mama's who have so generously shared their knowledge and experiences. So here we go!

One of our families favorite ways to make a normal day a bit more exciting is to eat meals outside. Before our move from Southern California last year it was a year around activity. Now we have had to curb it during part of the year. :) Of all the "investments" we have made none have been so thoroughly enjoyable as our picnic table. We have enjoyed our family, friends, good food, and great memories there.

In Vol. 1 of the Charlotte Mason Home Educating series it says, " Never be within doors when you can rightly be without." I think I may hang this over our door! She continues, " Besides the gain of an hour or two in the open air, there is this to be considered: meals taken al fresco are usually joyous..." I know ours are, it is just hard to be grumpy when enjoying a simple meal in the open air!

Being outdoors throughout the day leads to deeper reflection, Charlotte continues, "... here is the mother's opportunity to train the seeing eye, the hearing ear, and to drop seeds of truth into the open soul of the child, which shall germinate, blossom, and bear fruit... there is much to be got by perching in a tree or nesting in heather..." I know that in all the "education" I received there was none so sweet and so imprinted on my mind as the solitary hours spent throughout our yard, but especially in my tree.

But why? Why should we enjoy the open air? Why did our Creator create it for us? "And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good." Genesis 1:31 KJV. For us to enjoy, learn, and see His hand in it all.

I am not saying this is the easiest thing for me, even with my love of the outdoors, but it is wonderful to hear from another that a day spent entirely out of doors is no more wasted than a day spent deep in a great library!

As my children are still mostly in the wonderful "quiet growing time" we are just now dabbling in the enjoyment of Nature Studies, my Riley (6) and I have started nature journals during the last month. In vol. 1 we read, " As soon as he is able to keep it himself, a nature-diary is a source of delight to a child." I started one to help set the example, I could not have guessed how much enjoyment I myself would reap. Riley still struggles with putting much effort into it, but he is happy with his journal so what more can I ask (for now) ! :)

A page of mine on the left, Riley's on the right.

As we dive further into the wonderful out of doors I hope Riley, and eventually Jake and Fern will learn as much about themselves as they learn about the world around them.

So this week we started Blueberries For Sal, Jake has enjoyed this book. It really became cool when he got to go "blueberry picking" the other day. It was raining all day so we did it indoors. Since I had planned out books out I knew this one would come just after blueberries were gone, so a few weeks ago we bought some at the farmers market and froze them!Here is our blueberry bush waiting to be found! Jake was so excited to "pick" the blueberries! I had to hold Fern and shoo Riley away! But Jake did share a few. What a nice boy!
Jake was so proud of his blueberries and he LOVED the little bucket! :)

Today we worked on a bit of botany, but Jake didn't know it! I photo copied a page out of the book (they are great illustrations!) that had both blueberry bushes and a few pine trees in it. So we went outside and looked at our blueberry bush and the pine tree that hangs into our yard from the neighbors. We talked about them and then pasted a blueberry leaf and a sprig of pine onto the picture. Jake really enjoyed the glue!

I enjoyed BFIAR with Riley and again it is a tone of fun with Jake. Jake enjoys it even more than Riley did I think, plus I enjoy the time I get to spend with Jake. I would recommend this program to anyone!

We had a great American History field trip yesterday!!

The Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island were amazing! And all the better to get to share it with our kids!

We made it through our first week of school!! And we are all still smiling and looking forward to next week, I consider that a great miracle! We have been truly blessed!!

As wonders never cease, Riley is truly Grandpa M.'s grandson! When given the option of reading a story or doing a math lesson first he consistently chose the math! American History was his toughest this week, it was a long reading, but it ended well after a few animal crackers! Geography also went over well, it is a fun story that grabs Riley's adventurer side! Fables, and scripture stories did well also. It took Riley a bit to warm up to scripture memory, but today he read it with me. All in all it was good.

We have found that life in general and school in particular is harder when Riley has been playing with neighborhood friends. I think I have com to the conclusion that Riley is too young, and that our friends need to be chosen more wisely, But it is hard when they are playing outside to avoid the problems. I have been praying fervently over this and hope for some good vibes on the matter.

Jake has had a great time with Jesse Bear this week, I think he will be sad at first next week to move on to another book, but it is a good one, Blueberries for Sal. One of my favorites! I think Jake's favorite this week was the Jesse Bear paper doll I made. Every day since I pulled it out he has talked about it to Dad when he calls! Today he and I made two new outfits, a snow suit and a rain outfit. Jake loved dressing Jesse Bear in his new outfits! Our letters for the week were A & J, he loved the big A out of green paper that he then got to put apple stickers all over, and the jet plane coloring page went over well!

Jake asked most mornings if it was time for his school yet! Too cute! I am glad he is growing and learning, but I do miss my little cuddle bunny. But tonight I am just wishing he would go to bed, I am tired!! :)

I hope you enjoyed our first week review!!

YEA! The First Day of School!!Here are the boys on the door step after we had put the flag out and said the Pledge of Allegiance. They were a little bummed to go back inside after. :)
Fern needed to be apart too!

School went well, we kept it light for the first day. Riley and I did his world history lesson, introduced our first picture for our artist study, it is John Waterhouse's The Orange Gatherers, Then we put our calender up, did our weather log, and worked on our first scripture to memorize.

With Jake we read our book for the week, Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear? and then Jake colored an alligator picture. Our letters for the week are A & J.

We were lucky today, Dad was around to keep Fern occupied a bit, but he has left tonight, so we will see how the rest of our week goes, we may have to move school time to Fern's nap time, we will see! :)

Here we are the Saturday before the first day of school!! Our first official day of preschool & first grade is Tuesday the 4th! Yesterday I went to the library and checked out a book I needed for Riley and found out the one I wanted for Jake is out of print and our library system does not have it. :( There are a couple things I am still missing, but for the most part we are set to go! I hope Riley jumps in, that he does not get the attitude he is prone to get. I guess on;y time will tell, but I have been saying my fair share of prayers each day that it will be good. That and I have quite a bit of faith in the new school year blessings Dan will give Monday night at FHE. So until an update on our first days of school I bit you adue!