I-IV

In school, we are letting the letters sleep for a little bit while we move onto a two week math block. In our container story, Katie has learned all the consonants and it is now time for her to meet the Wise Sophia. Before Sophia will give her the keys to knowledge (the vowels which will unlock the ability to read) she first must answer ten riddles given to her by the gnome king, King Equals. Each of his riddles has to do with the numbers 1-10. We are talking about the quality of each number, as well as learning the Roman Numerals. In our drawings that follow, the picture represents the answer to each riddle. This week we talked about the numbers 1-4.

Mom's and Grant's Sun and the number I:

Mom's and Grant's eyes and the number II:

Our Family (I drew Grant, Cory and I. Grant drew himself, Johanna and Julia) and the number III:

The four elements and the number IV:

Grant enjoyed this change and getting into math.

We also had co-op on Friday. I taught the nervous system in my class. There is a lot to fit into seventy minutes! The kids really enjoyed looking at the spine model that Cory let me borrow from his office, and they commented on "how old" the School House Rocks cartoon was that I showed them on the nervous system. I told them I watched it when I was a kid, and behind me a heard a "whoa". Jeez, I'm not that old! I suppose it is all relevant.

Almost Photo Contest Pictures

These were the photos I was going to enter for the Beautiful Baby contest put on by the Regis and Kelly Show and Gerber, but for some reason the photos would not upload to their website. I don't know why. I tried three or four times with each photo, but it didn't work. The deadline was that day, so there wasn't time to mail them. I was a little bummed, especially since I had been trying to get good photos of them for the past two weeks. Oh well, that's life I guess.

Eagle Watching

Today we drove up to Clarksville, Missouri to watch bald eagles on the river. First, we listened to a presentation about eagles done by the Wild Bird Sanctuary, and got to see two eagles up close. Then we drove to the river's edge to watch them. The kids were quickly bored, but Cory and I enjoyed watching them. We saw at least 30 eagles either flying and diving for fish, or sitting in the trees on the river bank. After that we had a yummy lunch at a local restaurant (awesome Reuben). After lunch, we drove to the local conservation reserve and were able to use our binoculars to see two eagle nests. They were much larger than the ones we see around our house! They can get up to 10 feet across. The largest one ever found could fit a VW bug inside.

While we were watching the eagles at the river, Julia sat in the car chewing on her mitten, and she was perfectly happy.

X, Y and Z

Last week we finished the consonants by learning X, Y, and X. The chalkboard drawing came from our "container story" (which is a story that has taken us through all the consonants as the main character Katie has been learning the alphabet in her quest for knowledge). In the story (and the drawing) Katie and her brother are walking through a field of flaX. All three letters are somewhere in the drawing. I also told Grant the Grimm's fairytale, The Spindle, Shuttle and Needle.

On Monday we practiced drawing this weeks form, the letters x,y and z, and then we drew the chalkboard pictures in our main lesson books.

Mom's Flax Field Drawing:

Grant's Flax Field Drawing:

During the rest of the week, Grant did some copy work, and we reviewed all the consonants. As part of our review, Grant used the pumpkin spice play dough I made in the Fall to make his name. Johanna enjoyed the smell of it!

Julia also enjoyed putting on a puppet show for us. In her version, the poor alligator does not seem to have a very happy ending.

Our Second Baby

Johanna has been pretending now for a couple weeks that she is a baby. It is not all the time but it does include talking like Julia, trying to be especially messy when eating, dropping food on the floor like Julia, wearing bibs and baby bonnets, she already has the crying covered, and her and Grant managed to dig one of her old binkies out of a drawer in Julia's dresser. She walked around with that in for a day, and then it mysteriously disappeared. He name is baby Oshkosh. I tell her I like Johanna better, but she insists on being a baby. I don't know. Do you think she feels like she's not getting enough attention?

The Zabe

Julia, aka Baby Zaby, Zabey, or Zabe now has a fascination with spoons, or as she likes to say, "boon". It could just be the idea of getting something out of a "grown-up"drawer that fascinates her, who knows? Every time I'm in the kitchen she comes over, opens the drawer, and says, "boon, boon, boon" until I get her a spoon. Sometimes two. She will wander off, then come back empty handed asking for another one. Lately, there has been a spoon round-up at the end of the day.




She is learning new words everyday and it is truly a joy to watch her grow and learn.
water=wubee
toy
party (Johanna is always setting these up.)
horsey
bunny
birdie, and many more....
She is mimicking just about any word she hears.

She really is quite a character, and makes me laugh everyday.

Snow White and the Queen Bee

Last week we talked about the letters P and Q. I read Grant the Grimm's fairy tales Snow White and The Queen Bee. Can you find the P in the Snow White drawing and the Q in the Queen Bee drawing?

Grant and I drew apples from Snow White.

Grant's apple:

Mom's apple:

Grant and Julia playing in the schoolroom:

We continued on with our music lesson, and Grant gets better at jump roping everyday. Now he is even jumping in and out while the rope is moving.

The kids were sad to see the snow melt. So was I because now it is a muddy mess outside, and not nearly as fun to play in.

I am teaching an anatomy and physiology class this semester for ages 10-13 for our home school co-op. The first class was on fetal development and my students had to take an egg home and care for it for a week like it was a baby. We'll see if we have any cracked eggs when we meet again in two weeks. One class down, seven more to go! Next class - The Nervous System!

Suiting Up for Snow

Snow bibs - x's 3
scarfs - x's 3
mittens that don't want to stay on - x's 3
coats - x's 3
hats - x's 3
snow boots - x's 3

x's 4 is you include yourself in the equation.

Add in a little bit of non-cooperation, thumbs that don't want to go into the thumb hole, possibly a little whining from Johanna, and a Julia that acts like a limp rag doll and you have a MAJOR test of patience. Mom is not passing with flying colors on this one!

Static Girl

We are creating some serious static around here these days, especially when the kids get to jumping and rolling around on the couch. Check out this "do". It is hard to see, but Cory said it was sticking straight out all over the place. Personally, I just like her pose.

Julia in the School Room

Back To School

We jumped back into school this week with a new penny whistle lesson and the letters L and N. I told Grant the stories of Little Red Riding Hood and The Nail. We drew a picture of Little Red Riding Hood, drew a picture of the letter N made of nails, and made nails out of beeswax.

We were pretty certain that our pond was frozen solid with the days hovering around 0, plus or minus 10 degrees, so we spent some time before school on Tuesday playing on the ice.

This would be Grant licking the snow off the ice.

This would be Johanna licking the snow off the ice.

On Wednesday, January 6th, we celebrated Epiphany. This is the twelve day after Christmas when the wise men reached Jesus. We made a cake and hid three beans inside (it was supposed to be one, but Grant said since there were three kings we should put in three beans). The ones who got a bean would be kings the next day. I served the cake after dinner and somehow both Grant and Johanna got a bean. The third bean was in a slice we saved for the next day, and somehow Julia got that bean. Grant said he would like to be king all winter. I said that was okay, but he wouldn't be getting out of his chores!

We finally had SNOW Wednesday night, so Thursday morning we all went sledding before school. Everyone had a fun time. We put Johanna and Julia on the same sled and Julia just sat there, not moving, as we pushed them down and pulled them up over and over again. She just sat, chilled (literally), and rode.