Week 13

Not much of a post but I took pics!!

Wordless Wednesday

Week 12

Well, our week started out finding our elf in the fridge! We guess he got stuck after trying to sneak leftover pizza! We also celebrated St. Nicholas Day for the very first time ever! I learned about him of course in Catholic School and I have story books about him but never really got into it much. Skyler has been asking lately about Santa Claus and in my heart I know this is most likely the last year she is gonna believe. I know that the time is coming when all the childhood fairy tales will be over and thats just sad for me.

I feel like there shouls have been more, I wanted 6 kids years and years ago. All boys. I never thought Jack or I would be happy with girls we always talked about boys. I used to dream of our boy that would have his eyes and mouth and curls. I love our girls needless to say though. The one like me and the one like him despite what I always thought. I remember our first Christmas with Devlin. We had our first tree and the presents were stacked taller than her. It was amazing. Years and years of stories and Santa Claus stretched out before us.

All the traditions and stuff still yet to happen. Devlin is 15 and her Santa years over now the baby as we call her is drawing near to that too. I wanted her to learn about St. Nicholas though so she would know he was real and the things he did started a tradition that would bring happiness and joy to children for generations. I loved Christmas growing up. My best memory is of me and my mom and big brother decorating our tree. She would tell us about the ornaments. When she made them, where some came from and how old they were.

Whatever stuff we had made in school or whatever would join all the others on that tree like they were becoming part of history. Now those things all hang on my tree and my childrens things join them year after year. It is a huge hodge podge of things many little hands created for so many years. I had so much fun decorating the first tree with Jack for Devlin. I wish we would have had more trees to decorate. I remember picking out the perfect ornaments it was so silly we wanted to get it just perfect for her. It was I think. It was all just wonderful.

So, we celebrated St. Nicholas by a little stocking filled with treats and a juice box and a St. Nicholas story. I placed them under their little personal trees.

I got each of the kids there own little tress last year on clearance. I thought they were adorable. I split the boxes of minature ornaments Jack bought me forever ago that I refused to hang on our trees cause I was always so scared they would get lost. So the first ornaments my children will have will be those that daddy bought! I admit I am very guilty of missing my kids dad at the Holidays especially. Even when we argued it just always felt complete with him around. Of course all we do is argue so that most likely doesn't spread cheer to the kiddos.

In between the decorating and the Christmas past stories we of course did school. Nothing fantastic just school. Skyler is still loving cursive the boys still hate it! They hate writing too and I have realized that will never change.

They also worked on their "newspaper" for history from Homeschool In The Woods Time Travelers. This one is The Town Crier and they wrote about Jamestown and The Thirteen Colonies.

Of course the highlight of the week was decorating!!

Yes all the little tress are beautiful but Foxs looks awesome!!! He really took his time and I love the way it turned out.

Of course my older daughter wanted no pics posted of her and her tree! It looks great though so you all know!  Of course I had to have a little tree too so mine sits in the schoolroom and is decorated with of couse Harry Potter stuff. I had to make it fit in and by the time the kids said I needed a little tree I had already given away all my mini ornaments! So mine is decorated with things printed offline and a little light up toy train that Fox says is the Hogwarts Express at Christmas.

The Golden Snitch tops it off LOL!

We had fun decorating. I hope everyone else had a great week too.

Wordless Wednesday

Christmas Activities

I am over Christmas lapboooks! We have made several several between 4 kids over the years. Yet you just have to do something for Christmas, right? I stumbled acroos this blog on pinterest and this looks amazing! She has a ton of different countries and many blogs are linking up. Of course we won't be able to do them all but I think we will do quite a few. My kids are already saying they want China and Egypt of course!

 Make sure you go to her blog and grab your free Christmas around the world ebook and a blog button!! We are strting this week, first up for us is going to be China!!

In Loving Memory Not So Wordless Wednesday

This is Skyler and Huggies. The strongest little hamster I have ever heard of. Huggies was a gift from daddy which made him all the more special. When they brought him home the pet store had told him that Huggies was young and he would get bigger. That was a lie I have been around hamsters a while and Huggies was no youngin! I thought great he won't live long. That was a bit over two years ago. I have read quite a bit and it said most hamsters don't live long enough to go blind, he did. Most will die after going blind, he has been this way over a year now.

Most will die from wet tail, he has survived it...twice. I know in my heart I should have put him down but I teach the kids that these pets are our family and I didn't want him to die alone on a vet table. For two weeks now he hasn't been able to get down his tube so we have been hand feeding and holding his water bottle for him. Cleaning him daily. all the kids have helped take care of him. Lastnight I noticed he wasn't breathing well so I wrapped him up in a paper towel and we all held him and talked to him, the kids even made him little cards.

What amazed me is a few weeks ago when he really started slowing down I heard my little girl tell him he couldn't leave her. He was her bestest friend and don't leave her. About a week ago I heard something else. I heard her tell him he could go. That she would be OK she knew he was tired she loved him and he could go. I heard my youngest son tell him he would take care of Skyler that he could go to Heaven no one would be mad. Still Huggies held on.

I checked on him throughout the night. Petting him telling him we loved him. This morning I went to his cage. He raised his little head, took a big breathe and fell asleep forever. He fought so hard to stay with his kid. He was the strongest, bravest little hamster I have ever heard of. I know when my little girl wakes up her heart is gonna break. I am heart broken. But he fought so hard he deserved the rest. Animals have a way to win your heart, and I think make us a bit better for being there.

Little Elf has returned!

We woke up this morning to find our friend had returned in the night! I think Foxs guards thought he was an intruder! What? You don't have guards? Come on now every little boy who loves Legos have guards all over the house to protect it, right? No! OK then, just me. LOL

Week 10!

I decided this week that I will be more organized with the workboxes. The days we use them are much better for all. I hate setting them up every night though. It seems the last thing I remember to do and it don't get done. So starting Monday instead of them being emptied they were refilled as they went along. Everytime they handed me something done I gave them the next days stuff to put back in the drawer. That has saved me alot of time in the evening. I also decided no more loose papers. I usually let all their work that goes into binders set in a pile that I put away on the weekend. I hate this too and stuff gets lost so from now on as soon as it is done it goes right where it is suppose to be.  I have also been working harder using my Master Planner. I like keeping track of what they do.

I have also decided to read through science and history every weekend to see if there is anything I need that I may not have as well as have all the stuff for the week printed out. When my kiddos are in the groove to do school they don't do too well with having to stop and print stuff. We finally wrapped up the Winterpromise All American Explorers section and will be starting The Colonial Period this next week. The Homeschool in the Woods Time Travelers are so neat. A bit much on the printing but still neat!

I have drank the pinterest Kool-aid and now have a pin thing so that has become my newest addiction. I like my boards! Fox started double digit multiplication and he is not liking it so this may be the part he slows down on. He had been behind but then began to pick up speed so hopefully this won't be so bad. Both boys still hate cursive and writing in general so that will never change. Skyler is happily moving along with her cursive letters still calling it pretty letters! I still make that effort to have lunch ready the night before so there is no thinking about whats for lunch or wasted time doing it!

They did a fieldtrip to the library this week. A science fair workshop. I am thinking of having them do a little science fair of their own! I also found another pizza themed lunch food for them! Yes it was from the pinterest  of course! We also started using Xtra Math again to help them speed up a bit and for memory.

One of the last few projects was making pieces of eight and doubloons for history. They really enjoyed this. Sadly I was out of gold spray paint and we wound up having to use plain yellow for the gold but we had silver for the pieces of eight. Yes this day was big on talking about Pirates especially Captain Jack Sparrow! They had fun learning about Blackbeard. This has always been a favorite for the boys.

Here are some of the pieces of eight while they are drying.

 

Here is Skyler filling in her map for Connecticut. We just so happened to get our travelers home a week or so ago from Connecticut!

 

Fox doing some Xtra math on the computer. Not a bad little program especially since it is free! That makes it all the better!

 

 

 

 

Here are the new pizza items we added! Crossaints filled with string mozzarella and pepperoni. They dipped them in pizza sauce. We used the garlic butter flavored crossaints and they were major yummy! My kids would eat anything pizza every day if possible.

 

Skyler learned cursive h and did really well.

 

 

They all three dressed up a pirate this week. This is Damians pirate. Pretty colorful!

They each made a little treasure chest for their coins and it has a value chart inside. These were meant to hold the coins they made but our coins were way too big so we made some paper ones for this project. They just put the bigger ones in the seamans chests they made before.

Both of the boys were thrilled to chop up red cabbage for Skylers science experiments this week. I do not like the smell of boiled cabbage by the way and I am grateful my mom never made me eat this EWWWWWWWWWWW!

We did a taste test of sour and not sour the faces she made were so funny! The suprising thing was she managed to swallow all of them except grapefruit juice!

After the tasting we mixed things with cabbage juice to see the reaction.

She recorded everything in her lab book. She is not liking the questions before the experiment too much. The what do you think is going to happen? She does not wanna do those.

The boys basically did the same thing with the mixing of different things to see the reactions. They didn't taste anything though. Skyler was only too happy to help out of course. She really loves science. I am liking the Real Science 4 Kids program.

All in all it was a very full but good week! They also attended the library workshop on science fair projects which they liked the mentos and soda experiments!

She also enjoyed looking at all the displays that were there for ideas.

Of course we had a full Magic School week too.  I also have tons of extra pics as well.

Thanksgiving Lessons!

Every year for three years now I say the week of Thanksgiving I am going to use this. I never do. I forget, I get busy etc. life happens. This year we are going to do it. Next week I will. There is even a virtual tour of The Mayflower and letters from the pilgrims as well as the Indian Tribe. I think this will be much more interesting than the kids making yet another Thanksgiving lapbook they soon forget about anyway.

I have learned I over did it with lapbooks when they were younger so now I have to pick and choose. This also fits right in with Winterpromise American History.

                                     
The First Thanksgiving, reproduction of an oil painting by J.L.G. Ferris, early 20th century.

Credit: Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (neg. no. LC-USZC4-4961)

Wordless Wednesday

Week 9

This was a pretty full week! Skyler is loving learning cursive, the boys of course hate it. They have been making progress on Winning With Writing. The boys need alot of ideas when they have to come up with their own stuff though. Skyler is doing well still struggling a bit in math but she will get there! Fox is making steady progress so YAY! Damian has alot of repitition before he grasps it but thats OK too.

They are doing well with RS4K Chemistry. Skyler is liking the experiments. The boys are not liking vocabulary words. They hate writing and think I should let them type everything lol. The also believe the should use a calculator in math.

If you can tell by the look on her face she did not like the smell of vinegar! She had alot of fun watching things bubble, fizz and making sour milk. It was really sweet when she came and said she was sorry that the milk got wasted.

 

 

I loved how quick she jerked back, it was so funny!

 

Fox and his love of legos! This is his army station. He has developed a thing for army lately.

 

Skyler was very proud to hand in her math and not have to back over anything!

Fox learning the little q. I have to remind him a hundred times to put on glasses.

 

He has that mean I hate writing look on his face! Too see extra pics you can go here. To see our awesome Magic week you can visit us here.