A Day at the Zoo

Our curriculum suggested we go to the zoo today and work on our map skills there, so we took them up on the offer! Each one took a turn looking at the map and leading us to a different location. We started at the flamingos...

Then we went to see the monkeys....

Then on to the bears....

And to the rainforest. And we still came home and got all our school done for the day! Then we had a great Family Fun Night! We watched "Homeward Bound" (The Incredible Journey) since we are reading that book right now. We will be watching Homeward Bound II on Sunday night. We had homemade french bread pizza for dinner and then ice cream with all the toppings, lemonade and popcorn with our movie since everyone earned all their rewards this week!

We have 4 football games tomorrow, yes count them 4!!! J has 2 and so does Z. We will be at the field from 8:45 to 1:00. Then hubby is taking K out car shopping for a vehicle that guzzles less gas. Then we have a date with friends tomorrow night at 6:30. Full day!

Zachary's lego creation

What a way to multitask!

The kids had fun in the sprinkler!

The joy of homeschooling!

We are just having way too much fun! I never had this much fun in school! Last night, the kids played in the sprinkler while they were swinging-who taught them to be such good multitaskers??

Then after dinner we made our continent cake for school. School never tasted so good! Hannah drew the continents and iced the cake with Africa and Asia. I did the one with North America and South America. Oh, you can't tell those are supposed to be continents??? Well, just pretend you can!!! I was actually surprised they turned out this well! Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a cake decorator! I use Wal-mart for that!

More School Fun!

Today has been pretty good, I must say! Everyone had good attitudes while doing chores and schoolwork, therefore we were done with school before lunch! It's amazing how much time can be wasted on attitude adjustments! We started a new incentive..maybe you could call it bribery, I'm not sure. Each day of the week they can earn something. On Monday they earn the movie for movie night on Friday. On Tuesday they earn popcorn for the movie. On Wednesday they earn lemonade (if not they have to drink water). On Thursday they earn ice cream for Friday and on Friday they earn the toppings. On Friday night we have Family Fun Night and if everyone has done their chores and schoolwork with good attitudes, well they get to have a blast! It's going well so far...

We finished our celery experiment today and luckily it turned out as it was supposed to. I can't tell you how many times we have done experiments that didn't! I hold my breath every time now! We also did a nature walk in our own backyard which is amazing! We collected leaves from all our tress and pressed them in a "nature notebook". Then we had books that we had checked out from the library on trees and tried to identify all of them. We got quite a few and we'll work more on it another day. It was fun!

Science Experiments and Art Projects

Okay, so we recovered from the crazy weekend and got back to work! Hannah is in an American Girl Club and we went to the first meeting of the year this morning. The girls watched the Samantha movie while the mom's planned out the year. It looks like it's going to be a fun year! The boys spent time with Grandma and my brother's little boy since I figured that would be more fun than hanging out with a bunch of little girls.

After lunch we had fun doing some projects for science and art. We are doing an experiment with celery to show how water and minerals travel through the plant and keep it alive. There are three different stalks of celery in the experiment. One is sitting in an empty cup (no water). One is sitting in water and the other we pulled all the xylem (the tubes that carry water to the rest of the plant) out and it is also sitting in water. We will report on the results tomorrow.

We did an art project about all the different people around the world by making "paper dolls" that they colored. This project sounds easier than it was-at least it did to me. How hard can folding and cutting some newspaper be? Well, for me it wasn't easy! I guess I kept cutting in the wrong spot and ended up with lots of seperate people that Jacob enjoyed playing with. We finally got their hands and feet to stay connected!

Not such a great day!

Well everyday can't be great, can it?

Lessons I've learned:

1. Never try to do 2 days of homeschool lessons in one! It was stressful and not so much fun at all!
2. When you see the floorboards of your kitchen looking funny, don't dismiss it! It could be your dishwasher leaking and ruining all the flooring, and leaking through the ceiling.....!!!

3. God is in control! I told Him, even though I loved the flooring in our kitchen that it is His kitchen and His flooring and so if He doesn't like it or would like new flooring, that's His business!

So, I have learned many wonderful lessons and now we are on our way to Home Depot to buy a new dishwasher. Then we will come back here, have the plummer fix the leak, put our new dishwasher in, tear up the flooring and pray we know what to do from there!!!

I don't think you want to see any pictures of this part of our life......

But God is in control.....

School pictures

Cool moth we found on our back deck!

We had another great day today homeschooling! I wanted to post some pictures of our day. We have a school room for the first time this year and though it is very small, we are enjoying the space devoted to school. I'm hoping to come up with some unique storage solutions because I don't think what we have is going to work very long. We are extremely cramped and tripping over each other! My husband and I are brainstorming and will hopefully start implementing some ideas soon so stay tuned for improvements!!

Today we drew a map on an orange and then peeled the orange and laid it flat to simulate a mapmaker making a round world fit onto a flat page. We learned how that changes the shape and sizes of things. We also made a poster with pictures of people all over the world from National Geographic magazines. We are learning that though we are all different and from all parts of the world, speaking all different languages, one God created and loves us all.

We of course also did our math, language, spelling, handwriting, math drill, science and bible. We also went to the library to pick up books that I had on hold to go along with our studies and so the kids could get more mountains of books for them to read. They are voracious readers!!! All in all it was a wonderful day!

First day of school

We had a great day of school today! There were a few attitude issues (which is normal here) but other than those moments everything went very smooth! We love what we are studying right now and are looking forward to a fantastic year. I think I love this more than the kids do! Who knew that God would use someone who hates teaching to teach her own kids and do it with such joy??!! I am still working out the kinks and probably will for a week or two. I made new chore charts for the kids and laminated them so they can mark off their chores as they go. They are not thrilled with the work load! Believe me, I could give them waaay more but they already think they're going to die! Again, we are working with attitude issues but I see those clearing up fairly quickly when they realize the consequences are not worth it!

Tomorrow we are using an orange to understand the difference between a globe and a flat map-how the continents look a little different and why. It should be interesting. Like I said, I think I'm learning as much as the kids are! I will take pictures and hopefully get those posted. We are having a blast!!!

School begins!

I am so excited to get back to homeschooling my kids! We start tomorrow and the kids and I are so ready! We are doing My Father's World curriculum and we love it. I learn more now teaching my kids than I ever learned in school myself! This year we are learning about countries and cultures with a ton of geography thrown in. That scares me a little since that is my weak spot! I am what you might call "directionally challenged" ;) Oh well, I'm sure I will have fun learning with the kids!! We do a ton of crafts and hands on activities as well as field trips that go along with what we are learning so I can't wait to post pictures!

Kansas City Trip

We just got back from a trip to Kansas City. We had a blast! We went with our homeschool group and it was great getting to know everyone better. We went to a great museum called the Steamboat Arabia which was amazing. The items they saved from a sunken steamboat on the Missouri river are like an intricate photograph of 1856. Everything from shoes to dishes and even jars of pickles that they have preserved and put on display to share with the public. Then we went to Science City which the kids always enjoy. I think the highlight for the kids was swimming in the hotel pool though!! The next day we went to Crown Center and paid a visit to Hallmark Visitor's Center. That was a very interesting look at Hallmark's history. Then we went to the Emporia Zoo and headed home. It was an action packed 2 days that we thoroughly enjoyed!

Colorado Trip

We went to Colorado to visit Kevin's sister and had a great time. I wanted to post some pictures to show everyone.

Beth and me at the park

We had a blast at Seven Falls!

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

Garden of the Gods