Along The Road

And now for a moment of honesty. It was about 2 weeks before Thanksgiving when the honeymoon period officially ended. It wasn't anything in particular, no straw that broke the camel's back, no tipping over the edge, just a sudden realization that all of our frustration levels were rising. For L it was the effort and motivation needed to practice reading, for the little one it was figuring out how to entertain herself, and for me it was trying to keep them both focused or occupied while my attention bounced back and forth between them. I just felt super on edge, which is apparently contagious, and the patience I had worked so hard to hone was out the window. Our Thanksgiving break came just in time! Unfortunately, it wasn't just a break we needed; I realized that when we picked right back up where we left off post-vacation. We needed an adjustment to our approach.  Confession: I'm a type-A kind of person. Systems, details, routines, schedules, calendars, organiza...

This month we completed level 1 of our reading curriculum, worked on money, time, tens & ones, addition and graphing in math, learned about European exploration, monarchs, and the history of Russia in social studies, and had lots more fun with astronomy in science. I'm still trying to get better at the whole taking pictures thing, so not much to share visually for November, but I did get some pics of our moon-related activities... This was a quick and easy experiment we did to illustrate why the moon goes through different phases. I taped a white circle onto the wall, pointed a flashlight (the sun) at it from across the room, and had L hold a ball (the Earth) in between the "sun" and the "moon" to cast a shadow.  We also practiced drawing the various phases of the moon with chalk on black construction paper... ...and strategically munched on oreos... This was a crowd-pleaser!  :) We also love all things Fall! We took a walk outside ...

October was arguably our busiest month of 2016. It was filled with library storytimes, a field trip to the farm, fun at CC (our co-op), Halloween & Fall festivities, and a Hurricane Matthew evacuation! Somehow I managed to not take any pictures trick or treating in our neighborhood, going to our church's Country Carnival, or trick or treating at the local nursing home. #badmom! But here are some of the pics I did manage to get! HANDS ON HISTORY This month we learned about the Renaissance Period and the Protestant Reformation... We "sculpted" a bar of soap, like all the great artists of the Renaissance, and gave it to Nana as a gift. Super simple activity - all that is needed is soap, plastic knife, and water. We also painted like Michelangelo. I got to bust out my Europe pictures to show them the Sistine Chapel.  After talking about Martin Luther, the Protestant Reformation, and the printing press that followed, we took a stab at making our own pap...

We kicked off September with a Labor Day trip to North Carolina. This picture was at the Grandfather Mountain suspension bridge. The little one got busted sniffing a dry-erase marker. When we studied Michelangelo and the Renaissance period, I got to pull out my Europe photo album (from 10 years ago!) and show L pictures of the Sistine Chapel .   To practice skip counting, we went out to the driveway. I wrote the 2s, 3s, 4s, and 5s with chalk, then L practiced by stepping or jumping from number to number. Science experiment on gas - vinegar and baking soda blew up our balloon. We talked a little bit about Robin Hood when we covered the Magna Carta, Richard the Lion-hearted and English King John. She also got to write her own Magna Carta for her room, and everyone had to obey for the day. Learning about native animals at the wildlife refuge - one of our favorite family field trips. 

Day 1: We've tried to really celebrate some of the freedoms and perks of homeschooling, so on day one everyone got to wear whatever they wanted. The girls both picked their fanciest dresses while I went straight to my mommy uniform - yoga pants and a t-shirt. We celebrated our first morning with pancakes and the "special day" plate. Collecting rocks to sort and count during math.  Sometimes you just need to dress like a princess... ...or a ballerina cat The girls loved their yarn dolls we made to go along with our reading of Little House in the Big Woods . Science experiment on evaporation. We had two mason jars filled with water - one had a lid, the other did not. We observed them everyday to see how the water level went down in the jar with no lid. Liliana drew pictures of it in her science journal. Our first day of Classical Conversations co-op. Playing on the playground with all our new friends after completing our firs...

When I needed a break from researching state homeschooling laws, curriculum choices, and co-op options, I turned to Pinterest. We decided to let the girls share a room and use our third bedroom as a classroom/playroom/craft room. By first world standards, the space I was working with wasn't very big, so I tailored my search of homeschool rooms specifically to small spaces. Here are some pictures of how it turned out. To create some extra space, I removed the closet door and added an additional shelf (behind the magic curtain.) The two shelves hold all craft supplies; the curtain hides the "visual noise." To the left of the bookshelf is our little reading nook. Not pictured is the push on light stuck to the inside wall.  Frequently used supplies are easily accessible on the back of the door. The hanging buckets are dry-erase markers, sharpies, and colored pencils - things the girls use only with supervision. The hanging chalkboard reminds us of everything we have...