update

Since I last posted I feel I have been thrown for a loop!

This leg thing has been really hard on my routine.

Hence the delay of posts...

hence the lack of extra curriculars...

and hence the lack of our usual home school style.

Waldorf is more involved than a typical home school curriculum.

We make our own text books and readers!

We try to make our own everything :)

Sometimes, something happens and you really have to pair it down.

Really get down to the basics. This is what I feel I have had to do 

in the last month.  

We have resorted to....

bare bones homeschooling

Matthew is working on his mathematics through this 

Saxon math book.

Which I actually feel may have been a little bit of a blessing.

Through our Waldorf introduction to math thus far I have not 

introduced traditional terminology (IE. cumulative, addend, sum...)

Now that I had him going through the math book he has had an opportunity

to learn the sometimes complicated terms.  

With Wesley I have been spending the last month learning our 

written language through this book.  It has been 

recommended to me time and time again, but I have always been using 

my Waldorf approach and haven't found time to fit it in. He is picking up on it 

very quickly.  So, I think this is something I may stick with.

Everyday I read a story.

Sometimes it can be hard to find one that will work for all the 

age ranges.  I started out reading the Lion, the witch, and the wardrobe.

This particular story enveloped Matthew and Tillie,

but made Wesley hide in the other room!

So, we switched to Moonintroll.

This turned out to be AWESOME!!

They love these books!

we read the first one quickly and we are on to the next.

I think they were o.k. for Wesley because there is adventure

although there is no "bad guy"

So, this is what a "Bare Bones" 

home school looks like to me..

working on math and reading everyday

then reading a story aloud.

And... Making Christmas Cookies!!!!

We have spent weeks baking cookies 

and they are not pretty!

Matthew has been very involved in his hockey...

He took second in his first tournament of the year

And his violin

His violin teacher is very impressed with him and he loves it.

I never have to ask him to practice.  He walks around the house 

practicing for hours.

He had his first concert this last month

and his first solo!

Wesley has been very involved in his hockey also.

And everyone has been enjoying our home school co-op

this winter as well.

What I have taken away from this new experience

is I need better planning.

If I was more prepared nothing would shake it.

I would be able to carry on regardless of our situation.

 I have spent the last month or so preparing for Matthew's 

new year.  We are going to start with the Old Testament.

I believe very strongly in this foundation and yes, I am planning!

I want to wish everyone a very wonderful holiday 

I love you and hope see you all soon!

Until next time...

~blessings

Broken Bone

Here is the back story and 

update on Tillie's leg....

 

Always a very good helper in the kitchen.

Miss Tillie was helping me with 

dinner one night. 

   I had pulled a chair to the counter and 

she really wanted to chop the lettuce for 

the salad. 

I turned around from grabbing 

something and she had stepped back

off the chair.  Landing on the floor.

At first I thought she hurt her back or tailbone.

Then, she grabbed onto her shin and would 

not let go!!  I waited for Tom to come home

from work.  She had a really hard time 

settling down.  We decided to take her to the 

hospital.  Tom brought her in and sure enough...

 

 

 it is called a toddler fracture, you can 

see it is spiral shaped.

Apparently it is a very common break

and heals really well.

 She got to pick out her own cast colors

Pink and Purple (of course)

She been o.k. so far

Everyone has been so kind 

sending her crafts and coloring books

well wishes and prayers.

She has only complained one time

about "not wanting to have a broken leg."

She can still help me in the kitchen!!!

 She has been making beautiful crafts

and colorings

Next week she is getting a smaller cast that I 

believe she can walk on and is WATER PROOF!!!

These new casts are pretty cool compared to 

the ones I remember. :)

Until next time...

~blessings

Homeschool Co-op

I have wanted to post about our wonderful Homeschool Co-op.

We started the school year with this great group of about 15

families.  We get together once a week to learn and play.

For the first month or so we met at willow river state park.

one of my personal favorite parks and we played, read 

stories, and hiked the trails.  For all of October and now

November we are meeting at Camp St. Croix.

It is a beautiful YMCA camp on the St Croix river.

With them we have experienced some really fun opportunities.

The kids have gotten to play games

explore trails and ponds.

Matthew has gotten to climb walls and throw hatchets.

On this day I took pictures of the grounds and our 

Stone soup day.  It is so great to be a part of this larger

homeschooling community.

Till is chopping kale for our soup

We cooked over the fire and listened to a stone soup story.

 The kids ran around playing games.

This is my kind of recess.

Everything is so relaxed and the kids have so much fun.

The really big news is my baby girl broke her leg!!!!!

Everything has sort of been on hold for the time being.

Now we have resorted to watching TV!

and eating whipped cream most days

Recovery doesn't seem like it will take too

long she has a "nice" break.  She has been a real

trooper.  My house of 3 boys and 1 girl and only

she has had the stitches and now a broken leg!

I will keep posting on her progress.

until next time...

~blessings

Updates

It has been a long while since I have posted

and I want to make sure I'm not missing any of 

our happenings.  Here is how my memory serves me...

(not well most of the time :) )

Dad and the kids created a radio from 

wiring, foil, and cardboard tubing.

Matthew's very favorite thing is to 

create these science projects.  He asks

weekly when he can make more.

So far they have made a robot, a telegraph,

a spinning wheel, and multiple volcanoes.

for read aloud we fished all three Pippi Longstocking

books.  Wesley proclaimed he LOVES everything about Pippi.

They were a hit all around.

Wesley's snail art

We took a field trip to my favorite local greenhouse/petting zoo.

We picked out our pumpkins for Halloween

and ran around the corn maze.

Wesley has been working hard with learning to 

read.  We have gone through the whole 

alphabet phonetically.  Now we are working on

consonant blends and word families.

This year everyone was vomiting on Halloween.

This picture was taken before 

Wesley decided to get the flu too.

  We celebrated Matthew's 9th Birthday

We went to Marine on the St. Croix

Went down to the river and dinner at the Brookside

Until next time...

~blessings

Renaissance

We created a whole main lesson on King Arthur and 

the knights of the round table.  We used stories from

Linda Proud's book, The Knights of the Grail

We followed Mrs M's curriculum to build upon these 

stories.  Here is some examples of his work...

He did copy work of Alfred Lord Tennyson's poetry

Sword in the stone

We finished just in time to partake in Home School day at 

the Renaissance festival.

It fit just perfectly into our theme!

 Climbing walls

and horseback riding

Jousting

Archery

Knighthood

Fairies

This is by far their favorite place!!

 

 

 

until next time..

~blessings

Harvest

We spent a few weeks harvesting the last of our garden.

Its amazing how much "hands on" science we get 

from simply having a modest garden.  Of course there is the

obvious things like the life cycle of plants and practical life

skills of growing your own food.  

More than that we learn about different animal

life cycles and weather.

Wesley discovered a tree frog on our tomatoes

 And while digging up the carrots we found painter turtle eggs.

 The garden has given the kids many up close opportunities.

Although, I love the garden it is an annual challenge for me.

I am reminded of the quote by Thomas Jefferson...

"But though an old man, I am but a young gardener." 1814 July 5. (to John Adams).."

Until...next year I suppose we will try again. :)

 Another interesting thing we discovered was a new to us species of moth.

We found a Hummingbird hawk moth feasting at our window boxes.

It was delightful.  We researched the moth, told stories, and drew pictures of him.

It was sort of my unschooling moment I occasionally have.

Not only do I have a house of scientists, but

we have two budding artists as well...

Tillie modeling clay

Taggert sketching a masterpiece

Just like their Big Brothers.

until next time

...blessings

New school Year

This first week of school we have spent our time
establishing our rhythm for the year.
We always start getting our groove back by implementing a
few classics.
We get out and explore the world around us.
We  have done this in different ways.
I brought the kids
to a natural spring to find fresh clean water
flowing right from the ground.
They were very impressed and we love the water.
We found our spring on Find a spring.com

We had a beach day to explore all of the
forms in nature.
This was used to inspire our form drawings.
With Wesley I introduced lines and curves

The kids wanted to look like real artists

while we did our drawings at the beach

We have also been involved in a  new home school

co-op.  It is really fun and we have been taking 

 hikes with the group.

Our garden has also kept us busy recently

With the boys I have started with form drawing.
With Wesley I have started introducing the letters.
So far he has worked on M, V, and S.
I switched to a different curriculum for varieties sake.

With Matthew I have had him practice his reading everyday.
We checked out some readers from the library and he is enjoying
Nate the Great stories right now.  I have also had him writing out
the vowel sounds in spelling.  He often confuses a and o, so this he
will need a lot more work on.

Matthew has also began a violin lesson.
This is something he is very much excited about.
So far so good.  Hopefully he really sticks with it.
I just love the music that instrument can create.

I am trying to plug away, although I believe I need to
find my place.  It has been a little more hectic this year so far.


until next time...
~blessings