CARNIVAL!

The plan for the week next week is CARNIVAL!  Why?  Because the carnival is in town!  YAY!!!  The kids are very excited.  On Monday we plan to go to the library and find book about carnivals and fairs.  I am not sure what all we will find but I am sure there are some great books out there to cover the week.  We have coloring sheets printed and ready and several craft projects lined up.  Pictures will be sure to follow.  Have a blessed Easter tomorrow everyone!

Good Friday "Un"School Day

Today was our "Un"School Day.  I like to fit one in each week.  We do all kinds of "un"school things.  Today we painted eggs, colored eggs, stickered eggs, made cards and finished our bunny puppets.  During all of this we sang songs, talked about the colors we were using, counted eggs, you know - the school stuff in disguise!  I love days like this.  They are learning but have no clue that they are learning.  I also have found out that I am addicted to finding new things for us to do.  I have been reading TONS of great homeschooling blogs and I am so excited to really get started this fall.  I am starting my planning now, so come fall everything will be ready to go and we can get started.  Today I made a checklist of things to do, buy and read about.  I am a list person so this helps me feel better about what is coming up!!!  Ok, on to the fun stuff.  This is how our day went...
I forgot to take pics of the eggs as we dyed them.  Look in the background of the image below and you can see the results of that experiment.

S painting her egg.  Hers was the only one that didn't drip all together and turn one color.  I must say, I was very disappointed with this process.  The kids had fun though!  That is all that matters.

N painting his egg.

N again.  He really enjoyed painting the eggs with those little rollers.  The eggs were just a bit too hard for him to manage though.  

The project above is from a blog I found last night.  I wish I had the foresight to write it down so I could link back to it.  Basically I painted the kids palms white and then they "stamped" it on the paper and washed their hands.  Then I painted their fingers white and they stamped that and we allowed the "bunnies" to dry.

After drying we added pom pom noses and cheeks and googley eyes.  They then colored on the pink part for the ears and wiskers.  S's bunnies are above.

These are N's bunnies.  We also added "Some Bunny Loves You!!!" to the front.  These will be handed out over the weekend.

 

Above are the 2 dinosaurs we put together.  The kit had several in it but they were just not that practical and the kids couldn't put them together.  So hubby and I put 1 together and let the kids pick which eggs they wanted in which dinosaur.  They are cute!

After stickering the eggs we decided that they were just not colorful enough so we broke out the markers and drew on the.  N is above coloring his egg.  Below are some finished eggs and some we decided to just leave alone and eat! :)

I hope that everyone has had a great Good Friday.  Do not forget that today is much more than coloring eggs.  Today is the day that they hung My savior on a cross to die.  The ultimate sacrifice for my soul.  I cannot imagine how the Heavens wept.  Praise God for loving us so much. 

"John 3:16"

Lip Gloss

Today we made our very own lip gloss!!!  I was very excited when I found an app for my phone that is from Family Fun.  It has tons and tons of great and easy craft ideas.  The app allows you to sort through the crafts by age, time and season, should you choose to do so.  I should have taken pictures of S and N creating their lip gloss but I was so excited to get started I didn't even think about it.  I will remember next time!

On another note.  S has had a slight set back the past few days.  She has started writing her numbers (5,2,3) backwards.  I have decided that it would be best for her to start on some review work with her numbers.  She is currently working on her capital letters in some very fun books by Mead called Capital Letter Stories.  She loves their work books (and so do I) because they are fun and have a great "story" to tell with each lesson.  I find her moving forward without being prompted.  She is very excited to get started on it tomorrow along with her new, shiny, pink mechanical pencil!  Gotta love girls!

OUTSIDE!!!

I LOVE homeschooling for so many reasons.  But I recently found a new reason to love it.  When it is pretty we can move our classroom OUTSIDE!!!  My wonderful husband moved the picnic table under some great shade trees and we have had several class sessions outside.  Too bad today was very rainy and we couldn't do our work out there.  I am looking forward to our next sunny day just so we can be outside some more.  Praise God for the beautiful weather!

Note: Both kids are using their dry erase tablets from Mead.  They are great for going outside.  Just write on and wipe off.

Vowel Flash Cards

S has been doing some word completion with vowels but was having a hard time with the "e" and the "i". She created her own flash cards earlier so she could look at them and sound them out but it just wasn't cutting it.  This evening she and I sat down and created our own flash cards with images for her to look at and say to get the vowel sound.  I am going to attach them below.  If you would like to use them let me know and I will email them to you.

Up for a Challenge

S has been doing some PreK work for a while now and is getting very bored with it.  She wants a change of pace.  She wants a challenge but still something that isn't too advanced.  She is looking for fun and entertaining at the same time.  I am not sure what in the world we will get.  We have been doing some Mead work books and the Preschool Curriculum from Confessions of a Homeschooler.  I plan to do a google search for some things for us to work on.  I am just not sure what is best.  Yesterday was a great day and we flew through our assignments quickly.  Today, not so much!  S started her papers without me and was pumped for the first few bits and then she wasn't.  She said that things get too boring!  I will figure out what to do to make this more interesting and fun for her.
I also created a spreadsheet for our lesson plan for the week that includes attendance.  The kids are color coded and I think it will really help to organize me!  I need more organization for sure!

Getting Started

I must say, I am not much of a blogger but I am going to give it a try.  If you read my "About Me" section you know that I am a stay at home mom of 2 children and have been married for almost 8 years now.  I work from home creating graphic art for small business owners.  I love my family and my work but most of all I love my God!  I try to put each decision I make in his hands and let him guide me.  I say try because, well, I am human.  I like to have things when I want them.  Sadly, that is not how God works.  It has taken me years to realize that and get to where I am today.  Where am I, you ask?!  Good question!  I am at a great place in my life.  Forget that my husband is laid off, we live in his parents basement and we are in debt up to our eyeballs (really, this is over half the countries populations story right now, I am not saying anything new).  We have recently decided that we want to homeschool our children.  Why, you ask?!   Really we have several reasons but the biggest reason of all is that the social environment that public schools offer children is not the type of social environment I want for my children.  It seems that the classrooms are over-crowded and teachers are burnt out and underpaid.  But it isn't just from the classroom.  Parents today just don't want to fool with their children.  They leave them to their own devices and trust me, when children are left to their own devices they come up with some interesting (for lack of a better word) ideas.  With my children here, at home, I know where they are, who they are with and what they are doing 90% of the time.  Don't start freaking out on me just yet and go on about how they need interaction with other children.  I thought about that too!  Homeschoolers have a great option called co-ops.  It is where we can get together with other homeschool families and let our children take part in different classes while the moms volunteer to teach or help teach the classes.  This is great socialization for not only the children but the moms as well.  We are just now starting down this path so we have yet to go to a co-op but I really look forward to going to one.

Right now we are working on some catch up and PreK work with S and some basic PreK work with N.  We are preparing them (from now and over the summer) for the real school year.  We spend a couple of hours each day doing different activities together.  The kids LOVE it!  On the weekends they seem lost without the structure of the week before.  I love that!  See, I am not usually very organized.  Since we started homeschooling I have become a new person.  I feel as though I am a better wife, mother, friend and Christian.  I find myself wanting to read my Bible each day.  I want to play with my kids all of the time.  I am finding more and more time for my husband and for myself.  I can't say that all of this is because of the decision to homeschool but I can say that the decision to homeschool created a ripple effect that is shaping me into a person I am enjoying being.