My cutie pies

I just had to post this. Jasmine and Rosie dancing around. ;)

Homeschool Freebie

I just wanted to share a site that I recently found.

Homeschool Freebie of the Day

Each day of the week (Mon-Fri) they post a new freebie. Each freebie looks to be a PDF download. This weekend they are having an 'End of Summer Bash' where you can get more then just one freebie.

Hope you find it useful. Have a great weekend!

This is so Awesome...

I just came across a new toolbar today. Yep a toolbar. But this isn't just any old toolbar. This one is so perfect....perfect for homeschoolers! :)

I love it! Seriously. It's the Homeschool Toolbar and it has some great features.

• Homeschool blogs
• homeschool websites/resources
• email
• Gadgets - todo list, notes, calculator. (I love the notes)
• weather
• You can personalize....I added buttons to open Word, Excel, notepad and paint with one click.
• The search box is really neat to. You can search the web, the site your on and ebay! AND if you see something on the page you're on that you want to learn more about just highlight the words and they automatically show up in the search box...just press enter to do your search!

How cool is that? Really? Ok, so go check it out. On their site you'll see their complete list of items on the toolbar (I didn't name them all) and at the bottom of the page they have a picture of the toolbar. I hope you like it too!

All About Spelling

Lily (10) recently started doing All About Spelling and so far it's working well.

She's a terrible speller (the poor thing) and after looking at many different programs I decided on AAS. Being that it's hands-on (letter tiles) with constant review of what she needs (index box system) I knew this would work very well for her.

We started with Level 1 and have been doing about a 'Step' a day. We are now almost through Level 1 (It's been 3 weeks now).

I just received my order of the next 3 Levels. :) Yep, the next three. See, I knew we needed Level 2 really soon. And then there was a sale on Level 4 so I wanted to buy that one too. So I might as well get Level 3 also. Right? To save on shipping. :)

Well, back to how Lily is doing. She really likes it. She likes spelling words with the tiles. She doesn't even mind spelling the words on paper too (and she hates writing). She's flying through the first level because the words are so easy, again she is 10. But I'm glad that I started with Level 1 for a couple of reasons. First, Lily's confidence about spelling is up because she is flying right through this first Level. Second, the review of all the letter sounds and the rules. For instances the letter o. Did you know that it makes 4 different sounds? As in - odd, open, to, and oven. I hadn't realized that. Then again, I never sat down to try and figure that one out. Anyhow, I'm glad that Lily is learning to memorize all the sounds associated with a letter and not just the basic sounds we all know.

In yesterdays lesson she learned how to tell whether or not to use the letter 'k' or 'c' in different words. Like 'kit' and 'cut'. It depends on the letter following it.

Oh, and I don't get a fight when it's spelling time now! That's a huge plus in my book.

When Lily is done with Level 1, I might start Jasmine in it. Of course we would go really slow. But I think she would be ready for it. She already can spell some what (3 letter words). She can read the Bob books, so I think she's ready for this. In fact, I believe that it will be fun for her because of the letter tiles. She's already trying to help Lily. Of course so is 'Rosie', but her idea of help and our idea of it are two different things. :)

Funny...

(from an email my mom received)

My five-year old students, are learning to read.

Yesterday one of them pointed at a picture in a zoo book and said,

'Look at this! It's a frickin' elephant!'

I took a deep breath, then asked...

'What did you call it?'

'It's a frickin' elephant!

It says so on the picture!' And so it does...

' A f r i c a n Elephant '

Wordless Wednesday

Argh

So my girls are currently all outside playing. I'm upstairs in my room when I hear the front door open, then Jasmine's voice travel up the stairs "Momma, is Santa Clause real?"

WHAT!?! She's only 4 (barely), who in the world is telling her that he's not real!

I dart to the top of the steps as fast as I can to say, "Of course he's real! Who's talking about Santa anyways?"

I race outside and set the kids straight. ;)

Then I looked at Jasmine and I asked,
"You get presents every year at Christmas from Santa don't you?"
"Yes"
"See, he's real."

I think she was fine with that. You know, if momma says he's real then that means he's real. After all, I know more then little kids. :)

That just really irritates me!

Kids need to know not to spoil it for the little ones!

My husband happened to see Santa at work today (not in a Santa outfit). So he took a picture with his phone. I plan on showing the picture to Jasmine tomorrow. :)

Rosie-Posie

My little Rosie-Posie recently celebrated a birthday. Ah, my sweet, bratty baby girl is now two years old.

Here she is wearing her birthday hat.

Just Kidding!

What can I say about this little girl? Well, she's starting to come out of her shell a little more. She enjoys playing with the neighbor kids. She'll now give some of them hugs and let them hold her. She has started to talk a little more. Yesterday she put three words together (instead of the usual two) to say "Momma helpa me". :) She absolutely loves her big sisters! In fact, they haven't been her the past couple of days and I can tell that Rosie misses them. First thing in the morning these last two days she got out of bed, went into the hallway and started calling "Me-me". (Me-me is what she calls Jasmine). Awwww. That really made me smile.

Well, enough of that. Here are some more pictures.

Her yummy birthday cupcakes...

A pic of the three girls...

I love this one...the birthday girl playing with one of her new toys.

Or perhaps just the box it came in! :)

New shoes...and a new BUG?

Here's my Lily...

Do you like her fancy new shoes? Hey, they even match her shirt!

She made those herself. Well, with a little help from her Grandmother! It was her history project for the week from Days of Knights and Damsels.

Here's a pic of Granddaughter and Grandmother...





and finally...

A very strange looking bug that I'm told "Just fell from the sky".

Anyone know what type of bug this is? Jasmine keeps telling us it's a caterpillar. :)

Just some thoughts...

I just finished reading The Latin-Centered Curriculum by Andrew Campbell.

Here are a couple thoughts....

First, I decided while reading the book that I would drop Wordly Wise 3000 from Lily's schedule. The book pointed out that if they are learning Latin they really don't need an additional vocabulary curriculum. Well, duh. Just wish I had thought of that before. Lily never really liked doing Wordly Wise anyhow and I don't think she was really learning the vocabulary. So, that was an easy decision.

My next thought was this - Self-Education. For Me!

I'm really looking forward to starting down this path. I have already requested How to Read a Book, and The Well-Educated Mind from the library. Those should be in within the week. Then I'm going to move onto A Student's Guide to Liberal Learning and A Student's Guide to the Core Curriculum (My library system has those as well. Yeah!).

I'm excited. Now I just hope that once I start reading the Great Books that I don't get overwhelmed right away and give up.

You know, I really need a Grammar/Writing course. Hmm. Are there any adults that go through the Classical Writing series? Or are there any other good adult programs. Maybe (and I know this sounds funny), but maybe I should do copywork from the Great Books. That seems so silly though. If kids can learn that way though then I should be able to, right?

Ah, well. I don't really need to worry about that right now. It's not like I have the extra money to run out buy something for myself. *pouts* No fair!

Signing Time freebie

I was over at Signing Time today and found this freebie...

Starting June 10th, Signing Time Summer School is in session! At the beginning of every week from June 10th to August 22nd, come to www.signingtime.com to download fun, interactive worksheets and Signing Time summer activities that will keep your child learning and exploring the wonderful world of sign language. From making tambourines so your child can dance along with ‘Move and Groove’ to making ice cream with ‘Everyday Signs,’ the Signing Time summer packet will exercise your child’s mind and help to keep them one step ahead all summer long.

Click here to go to the Summer Activities page.

They also have a Teachers' Page here. There they have some activity guides, a chart to track your progress and some other useful information.

History Copywork

I created some copywork pages to go along with History Odyssey 1 - Middle Ages using a Getty-Dubay font from Education Fontware. A lot of the quotes that I used came from Trivium Academy's SOTW2 copywork and other sources.

Here's a sample...

If anyone is interested you can download the pdf document here.

*Here's hoping that I'm allowed to post that document. If not, please let me know*

Our timeline book

I'm so excited about our timeline! What can I say, I'm one of those people that gets all excited over anything that I work hard to create. Yeah!

So of course I have to post pictures of my work. :)

When thinking about doing a timeline I decided that a book would work best for us. I decided that I liked the notebook timeline from Homeschool In The Woods the best. They have a whole page that shows pictures and gives directions on how to make many different types of timelines. The one I made is about have way down the page, number 2 under Creating a timeline notebook. I printed each time period on different colored cardstock. I also added the time period to the top right corner of each page. It took me awhile to figure out how to do this. :) But in the end, I made mine using Excel. I made four pages, one for each time period, and printed each sheet separately changing the date each time. Yeah!

Here's a few pics.

Here's a page from the Middle Ages printed on blue cardstock!

*warning - the enlarged photos are really large, not sure how to fix it*

And a page from Ancient Times printed on tan cardstock.

After Lily gets some of her timeline figures in the book I'll post more pics!

Getting Organized Part 2

After creating the daily folders, I know need to create a weekly schedule.

In my last post Getting Organized Part 1 I mentioned that we were using an excel form from donnayoung.com that we really liked. But, I wanted to come up with something that would help Lily stay even more focused. Lily is my motor mouth and she distracts herself (and every thing distracts her) so easily. So I decided that it would be nice to have some sort of daily schedule to put into each of her folders. Good idea huh? Well, I couldn't find anything I wanted online. You know what that means...do it yourself. I created this very basic chart that I could just change each week, print off, cut up and place in her daily folders. Yeah. (Oh yeah, I've been printing it on colored paper for a splash of color.)



See, a very basic form but it's really helping. This system works even better if I gather all of her books and set them in a pile next to her. :) The only thing that may be an issue is that I don't have a copy of her 'weekly schedule'. I kinda do, I have the copy on the computer. Currently I've been looking in her daily folder to see what exactly she needs to do. So I might create another form for myself. I'm thinking maybe a 2 child weekly form so that I can schedule some stuff for Jasmine all on the same form. There's a form over at donnayoung.com that looks like it might work. It's called Planner for Two Children.

I must say that I love her site. :) I also printed off a yearly calendar from her that I put in my binder. I highlighted our planned 'vacations' and then I just mark an X on each day that she's present. Tuh-dah, our fancy attendance form.

I then printed off *surprise* another form from her site. :) This one lists subjects across the top and dates down the side. Then after she completes a subject I put a check in the box for that date. This is a great visual for me. I can just glance at it and easily see how we're doing or if we're behind on doing a subject (like art).

This year-at-a-glance form at Smooth Stones Academy looks like it might be nice to create. Hmm, I think I'm realizing that I like seeing stuff in bright colors.

I suppose that's good for now.

Have a great day.

Getting Organized Part 1

I haven't exactly figured out how to organize our homeschool. So far I have tried something different each year. Let's see here...

For the first year I used The Homeschool Planbook. Which probably would have worked wonderfully except that I filled out the planner for the whole year, at the beginning. Yep, you guessed it. I set myself up for failure. As soon as we got behind in one thing it messed everything up. Then I would start feeling bad, and that voice in my head would start commenting about me not being a good enough homeschooler...blah blah blah.

So then I switched to just scheduling one week at a time. Which helped a lot. I used this lovely excel form for donnayoung.org. I really liked this form. I would type out Lily's schedule for the week and print it out. Then I would tape it up so that it was right there and easy to get to. Then when Lily when finish a subject she would put a check mark in the little box.

This was a great improvement on keeping Lily focused, but not perfect. Also, I was trying to type up the schedule on Sunday evenings. This process meant that I would pull out each book and see what she needed to do next and the page numbers then key it in. As you can see, it was still a lot of work for me to do each week. This was also the time that I made any copies that we needed for the week.

And that brings us to now. We have only been using this new method for almost 2 weeks now. But so far it has been working wonderfully! But before I tell you what I do....I must tell you where I got my info. :) I have visited many blogs and websites (and I mean MANY) and I took a little from here, and a little from there. So I will try to give credit as I go along.

The first thing I realized that I needed (from many ladies over on the WTM board) was to continue making a weekly schedule each week BUT have a master schedule for each subject first to pull the information from.

I hope I'm making sense! :)

So to make up my Subject schedules I used a blank schedule form from Core Foundations and typed in our lesson plans. I then printed it off and put it my teacher binder. (I put colored dividers in the binder for each subject).

Here's an example of our Latin schedule keyed into the blank schedule.

Phew! It took me forever to figure out how to post that image. Anywho...

Next I decided to create daily folders. So Lily would have one folder for each day of the week and in each folder she would have all the worksheets/handouts that she needed that day. Yeah! And it's working. Lily is staying focused, she doesn't have to get up (and distracted) quite as often. I got this great idea from Trivium Academy. I plan on getting this desktop organizer for the daily folders.

It's been awhile...

I'm behind on blogging but I guess that's pretty obvious. It's so hard to get it up and going. I still haven't decided what to put on my sidebars. They're looking a little bare. So here's another attempt to get going again. =)

We're all doing good, enjoying summer. You know, swimming and playing outside. Fun, fun.

Jasmine just recently got her hair cut. It's really cute, but... well, I miss her long spiral curls. =( The curls kinda disappeared. The back is just slightly wavy now, almost straight.

So, here's before

And here's after...

Well, the pictures aren't the greatest. Ah, just another thing to add to my to-do list [figure out how to take better pictures]. Yeah, no problem. *rolls eyes*

Here's another pic, just because I think it's cute.

Me & my girls

Oh Happy Day!

Oh what a beautiful day today was!

We had the windows open!! I think I have spring fever. =o)

We took a long walk again today. Well, not Lily, she was running around with a friend. It was very enjoyable. When we were done with our walk neither girl wanted to come back in, so we went to the little 'baby' park here.

India went down the slide all be herself. It was so cute. The first couple of times she had a 'I'm not sure how I feel about this' look on her face. But she kept going done it again, and again.

They were outside almost all day though. Inside for a 'Littlest Pet Shop' break and then right back out the door.

Lily had a lot of fun climbing the trees with the neighbors. I didn't get to see her. But she was pretty excited when she was telling me about it. Apparently she is getting better. =)

______________________________________________

I made some very yummy oatmeal/chocolate (with a touch of cinnamon) cookies tonight! They taste good. Ok, well we think so. =P I usually don't make home-made cookies though. I'm usually a 'roll of cookie dough' kinda gal.

Here's the recipe if any one wants to try it out: (makes 2 dozen cookies)

1/2 cup rolled oats (regular or quick), 2 1/4 cups flour, 1 1/2 tsp. baking soda, 1/2 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. cinnamon, 1 cup (2 sticks) softened butter, 3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar, 3/4 cup granulated sugar, 2 tsp. vanilla extract, 1 tsp lemon juice, 2 eggs, 3 cups semisweet chocolate chips, and 1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts.

1. Preheat oven to 350`F. Cover 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Place rolled oats in blender or food processor and process until finely ground. Combine ground oats, flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon in a mixing bowl.

2. In another bowl, cream butter, sugars, vanilla and lemon juice together using an electric mixer. Add eggs and beat until fluffy.

3. Stir the flour mixture into egg mixture, blending well. Add the chocolate chips and nuts to the dough and mix well. Using 1/4 cup of dough for each cookie, place 2 1/2 in apart on prepared baking sheets.

4. Bake until cookies are lightly browned, 16-18 minutes.

Store in a sealed container to keep them soft and chewy.

Enjoy!

The recipe says that the prep time is 10 minutes. Well, it took me longer then that. But then again, I'm not a natural cook by no means and I was putting everything back were it goes once I used it. It made for a quicker clean up. =)

I hope everyone has a great week! =O)

Yes! It's starting to warm up...

I am so happy that it is finally spring. I don't like being cold. I hibernate in the winter. =(

Today we were able to get out for a walk. We still had to wear jackets but at least it's dry and not so cold, although it was pretty windy.

Before we headed out today I pulled out our copy of The Berenstain Bears' Big Book of Science and Nature'. We read the section on Spring. Then while we were on our walk we looked at the different trees and the grass and talked about the changes that will be happening soon.

I got a little workout there too...pushing the double stroller against the wind. Go me!

Your Business Math update

Lily loves it!!!

She just completed the first month of business of her very own 'pet store'. It is so exciting to see her enjoy doing this. We only do it on Fridays, the rest of the week she works on Saxon. But here she is, learning new math concepts and she doesn't even mind. And dare I say she's having fun...

Are there any other similar math products out there? I would love to add in something hands-on like this every year. If you know of something, please let me know.

Writing Tales

We started Writing Tales I about a month ago. So far so good. It's easy to do/teach. Lily gets done with the daily lessons pretty quickly. Which is a good thing (for her at least, she likes to take ALL day to do school). I need to work with her on....creating more. No....oh heck, well her stories have just been short and to the point. I want her to get into it more, spend more time on her story. Lily is a talker. She NEVER runs out of things to say or talk about. I just need her to apply this to her writing too. Not totally though!!!! Oh man, the story would never end then. =) Hey, she's a jabber box.

Any ideas on how to get her to output more?

Well, we are only on lesson 5 so I suppose she will get better as she gets more practice. I really shouldn't worry about it yet, huh?

Latin for Children

We finally started Latin for Children Primer A last week and we really enjoyed it. I bought it a couple months ago and kept meaning to start it. But....I was scared. Silly, I know. But it's true. I finally told Lily, "We are going to sit down and do Latin, no ifs, ands or buts about it!" So we did.....and I was AMAZED at how easy it was.

I had thought, that I would have to listen to the CD once, trying to remember the pronunciation. Then, teach the lesson. Boy was I (very happily) wrong! The first page 'Memory Work' of each chapter is completely chanted on the CD. AND the chant is catchy enough that you remember it.

I have been doing my own set of worksheets along with Lily. I figured that doing it this way I will be able to learn it too. Lily really enjoys having me do it all right along with her.

I even hear Jasmine doing the chants throughout the day. =o) She will also ask me for aqua when she's wanting some water. Or when she just wants to use the 'fun' new word she learned.

Down the road we want to learn Hindi. How do I decide how long to wait? A year? More? Oh, I just don't know about this. Eventually we'll also add in Spanish. Those are the plans in my head anyhow. =)

Jasmine and Signing Time

Signing Time just had auditions for a new baby signs video. All you had to do was record your child signing certain signs and send it in. Jasmine had a lot of fun doing this so I thought I would post it here as well. It's nothing fancy at all. Just my cutie pie.

I'm a FLYbaby!!!

Hi to any fellow FLYbabies out there! *waves*

I just started flying. It's been about 2 weeks now and things are going pretty good. My sink is still shining! =o) I love waking up to that!

School is going smoother now too. I love it.

I'm still working on decluttering. The downstairs is pretty much done but now I need to start decluttering upstairs.

If you have absolutely no idea what I am talking about then go check out the Flylady. She pretty much helps people (us unorganized people) get control of their lives, the CHAOS in our homes.

Shirley Temple Fan

I'm so proud! I turned my little girl into a Shirley Temple fan.

I have a collection of her movies but they have been packed away for years. I just pulled them out the other day and the girls have already watched quite a few. Last night Jasmine said to me, 'Momma, you got me to like Shirley Temple'. =o)

Yeah, that's my girl!

I can't wait to put her into dancing.

Reading....No India, don't eat the book!

School books....

We got our state refund back last week. Yeah! So I purchased some new books. =)

Writing Tales I - I can't wait to get and start this. I wanted to start it at the beginning of the year but we didn't have the funds for it. So, yeah!

Your Business Math - Pet Store - This was a new find for me. I'm so excited to get this. I'm not sure how soon we'll start it yet but probably pretty soon. I downloaded the ebook version so now I need to print it all out and put it in a binder.

Ok, some more books too but those were the highlights.

Next week I'm planning on purchasing Latin for Children A. We haven't started Latin at all yet so it'll be interesting to see how it goes! Lily is excited about getting this though! That makes me happy! She told me a couple weeks ago that she wants to learn the language the Romans spoke. =o) She's really been enjoying history!

On that note... I think we're going to add in Hindi next year for the whole family. I would like to add it now but I figured it would be better to wait since Lil is starting Latin now. So, Jasmine and India will be learning Hindi first and then Latin later. I actually prefer it that way for them anyways. They are, after all, my little Indians! =)

Anyhow, I'm pretty excited. It always feels like christmas when I get a shipment of school books. Oh My Nerd! ha ha ha

Bowling

Hubby and I took the girls bowling yesterday! We all had a lot of fun.

Lily did pretty good. In fact, I only beat her by 3 points. Of course, I'm not any good at bowling. But still...

It was Jasmine's first time going. The very first ball she rolled down the lane didn't make it all the way to the end. he he. And all the rest after that went down in slow motion but they made it! =)

India even got to help daddy push the ball a couple times. (and he still had the highest score, what's up with that!)

Too many toys...

Ugh! I'm trying to figure out how to organize the girls toys! They have too many and I've been trying to get rid of some but... there are still too many.

Right now we have a lot in a toy box. Well, the ones on the bottom never get played with.

I'm wondering if we should get some shelves to set them out on. Will that help? Then they can actually see their toys.

I still need to get rid of more, I know. It's just kinda hard to do. The youngest may want to play with it someday. So there I am keeping it for years, for the 'maybe' she'll play with it.

I wish I was a natural organizer. =( Instead, I stand here staring at the problem trying to figure out how to fix it...forever. And it hardly ever gets fixed. But I did waste a lot of my time staring at it. argh!

Hey, I'm not alone right?

How do you manage toys?

We have toy racks too. With the little baskets lined up on it. I guess that helps. But each basket is a total mess. Hey, it's a contained mess though. That's good right? =)

Living Math

The past couple of days I have been researching living math books. I'm trying to find as many 'lists' as I can. I originally was looking with Jasmine in mind. A gentle way to learn math at a young age. But now I see I can add them in for Lily too. She doesn't normally like math so I think she would really enjoy this. (I would just add them with Saxon, not replace it).

Here are some sites I found so far....

Living Math! - This is an awesome site! They have so much info. They have the books arranged by concept and topic. They also have a Living Math Through History list.

CM, Children and Lots of Grace (blog)

http://charlottemason.tripod.com/CMmath1.html

Homeschool Math

OurLosBanos.com

MathStart

I also came across Your Business Math series for ages 8-12. You can also get it at Lulu.com.

'You own a store. You want a profit. You do the Math!'

Oh, I'm so excited that I found this. Lily will just LOVE it. There are 3 'businesses' in the series - book store, sports store, and a pet store.

I'll definitely be getting the pet store for Lily! Man, I'm so excited - cause I believe that Lily will be excited about it!

*adds this to my already long list of things I want for school* phff

Date Night

My mom watched the girls the other day so hubby and I could go to the movies. India was actually without me for 5 hours!!! That's a record for her.

Anyhow, we went to see Sweeney Todd. I really enjoyed the movie!! It was wonderful. When I asked my husband what he thought about it he said, "I didn't care for all the singing, but besides that it was pretty good." I loved the singing. I thought it was awesome how most of the story was told through song. Loved it!

I had to close one eye for some of it. =o) That's what I do on scary parts....cover one eye so that I'm just peeking at the movie. Oh I'm sure I look pretty silly when I do it too.

I love Johnny Depp, he is an amazing actor. Someday I'd love to own all of his movies. Yeah, I'm dorky like that. =o)

Pampering Mom!

Oh My!!!

Ahhhhhhhhh!

My sweet little Lily....

She asked me to come upstairs - when I got to the top of the steps she told me to close my eyes. She takes my hand and walks me to my bedroom door. Then I hear music start (Tim McGraw!). And I'm told that I can open my eyes. =o)

There is a candle glowing, my bed is made and on top of the bed I see....lotion, a massage bar, make-up and nail polish.

How sweet is that?????

Lily told me to lay down on the bed and she massaged my back. After the massage she put make-up on me. We never got to polishing my nails because by then Jasmine was in the bedroom wanting make-up on as well.

It was such a wonderful massage! Such a wonderful daughter!

One happy momma in the house tonight!

(until hours later and they turned into brats. he he)

Signing Time

Signing Time is a huge hit in my house! Jasmine (3) is totally in love with the series and we are all learning so much.

Love it! Love it! Love it!

Lily usually signs when she wants to ask me something and not have anyone else hear. =)

Jasmine signs for fun. Right now she makes up her own signs for words that she hasn't learned yet. It's pretty funny to watch.

Rosie likes to try and sign along with us. =) She waves her hands around in the air. She does this a lot when we sing/sign the ABCs.

And Mom (me), actually has fun watching and listening to the videos as well.

Jasmine likes to watch these over and over but it doesn't seem to bother me. I just sing right along. (and sign a little).

Fun Stuff...

After reviewing the posts that I recently posted about Jasmine's preschool I decided that I had better go back and post about all the fun learning toys they have to play with too. =o) It's not just all workbooks and no fun.

• Play-doh (with alphabet cookie cutters too)
• Puzzles
• Legos
• Lincoln Logs
• Sewing Cards
• Books Galore! (seriously)
• Blocks (building and abc)
• Art supplies (Jasmine loves, scissors, glue stick and construction paper!)
• Matching games
• Chalkboard (they enjoy this)

We have a lot more stuff but that's what popped in my head. These are all educational things that they can play with whenever they want.

I understand that most 3 yr olds are not going to want to sit down and work in workbooks or do worksheets. Jasmine just happens to be little different and loves them. If it weren't for the fact that she was always asking to do them, I probably would not have purchased them yet. Right now 'school' is fun for her and it's kinda like a game. I want to point out that I am following her lead.

As a side note, I'm really curious to see what India will be like when she's 3. Will she be anything like Jasmine? Will she be the complete opposite? I think it will be very interesting to see.

Math already?

The only thing I can say is that Jasmine is my little school nerd! he he *grins* Shhh, don't tell her.

She has been requesting a math program just like Lily's. So for Christmas guess what she got. Yep, a math program. How did you know? Hmm. =o)

Ok, I got her Saxon Math K. I had read about how a lot of people use it for preschool instead of kindergarten so I figured we would give it a shot. It's really hands-on. Lots of manipulatives, pattern blocks, linking cubes, teddy bear counters, a scale and things like that.

We sat down to do our first lesson Jan. 1st and she ended up doing 3 lessons at that time. The beginning ones are so easy. Like counting to 5, playing with pattern blocks...she's been doing both for over a year now. So we have actually sat down for math on 5 different occasions and we are already up to lesson 16. I don't know if she'll do that for much longer though. Pretty soon she'll come across stuff that she doesn't yet know and that may slow her down.

The only part that's hard for her right now is snapping the multi-link cubes together. They're hard. So one evening I just sat down and popped them together and apart, together and apart. It has helped a little bit. So I know they'll get easier to use over time. Right now, I'll just continue helping her 'snap' them together.

Reading...

When Jasmine was right around 3yrs she started sitting down with her sister's chapter books and pretending to read. Then she would bring the book over to me, pointing to a word, and ask "what word is this"? She would do this over and over again.

So I'm like hmm.... I think she may be able to start learning to read.

I decided to purchase Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. And Guess What? She started reading at 3 1/2! We're on lesson 30 something right now, I believe. We actually had to put the book down for awhile, before she was reading. She would sound out the words for me, but she couldn't hear what it was that she was saying. It just wasn't clicking. We waited a few months and tried again and it clicked. Now she has also started reading Bob Books and working on Explode the Code book 1 (ETC). Right now I don't have her writing the words in ETC. She would just get frustrated if she had to do all the writing. Our main goal right now is reading.

We don't work on this stuff every day. Just when she's in the mood for it. Either she tells me she wants to do it. Or I ask if she wants to. If she says no, I simply so 'ok'.

Sonlight PreK

I started researching preschool curriculum. The one that I liked the most was Sonlight's Pre-K (Core B now). I really liked this one because of all the story books that are included it it. Simply put, it's literature based. Read to your child!

While researching this program I came across this yahoo group SL Preschool. I have learned so much about teaching little ones from the ladies on this list. I'm very glad I found it. In the files section there are also 2 different schedules posted for Sonlight PreK. Of course, you have to be a member to have access to these files and they are copyrighted.

I own most of the books now for this program but not all. And we don't sit down and do it everyday. In fact, we're kinda lacking on doing this lately. So I'm hoping to get back into it.

I have all different workbooks that I purchased to go along with this. We've done a page here and there but I would like to start working on it more. (of course only when Jasmine wants too. It's her choice.) Here are some of the workbooks we have:

• Developing the Early Learner (DEL) - we've done about 10pages so far.
• Building Thinking Skills Primary
• Visual Perceptual Skill Building
• Cuisnaire Rods Alphabet book & cuisnaire rods.

Again, we've only worked a little with these right now.

ABC sites (free)

We discovered Starfall.com for Jasmine. She loved that site. It got old after a while though and she stopped going to it. But when we finally went back to it she loved it all over again.

Starfall is an awesome site. It starts with introducing letters and their sounds and works up to learning to read short stories. It's very fun for little ones.

Next we found Letter of the Week. This is a free curriculum teaching letters and their sounds. (they also have other things there too). We didn't follow this to a 'T' but here is what we did:

• I would print off 2-3 letter coloring sheets (for the letter we were on)
• I would tell her what letter it was and what sound it made.
• I would show her the ASL sign for that letter. (sign language)
• I would show her the letter on the keyboard. (she had fun typing it)
• I would pick up some of the recommended books from the library and we would read those throughout the week.
• We would place one of her coloring sheets into her ABC's book. (binder + page protectors, nice and simple but she loved her special book)

Let Preschool Begin...

Once I started teaching Lily, Jasmine had to be right there and involved. I constantly heard "Momma, do you have a worksheet for me"? Jasmine was requesting this at the age of about 2 1/2. At first I was just giving her extra math worksheets (etc.) and letting her draw and scribble all over them. Well, not just scribble. She was constantly trying to write words. Using little symbols and o's as her letters. I also had to start making a copy of Lily's history coloring pages so that Jasmine could do that too.

Eventually I purchased her some Kumon workbooks. First their tracing one, which she absolutely loved and then their cutting workbook.

So that was the beginning of Jasmine's preschool. I will make separate posts about the different things we've done or are doing since then.

Scrubbing...

I decided that it was past time to scrub the kitchen clean. So the other day that is what I did. I actually had all 3 girls in there helping me. =) No, I didn't ask them. They were having fun...washing the front of the cabinets, the fridge, the window, the stove and so on.

Well.... Rosie wanted some windex on her paper towel too, just like her big sisters. I of course told her no, that she was to young for chemicals and I went back to scrubbing the sink. A couple of minutes later I peek over at her to see how she's doing and I caught her......

Shaking her sippy cup upside down on the cabinet door and then wiping it with her paper towel!

Oh I tell ya! Kids. Yep, she's my little monkey butt. I couldn't help it, I had to laugh.

I, of course, started wetting her paper towel with water after that. There, now she's happy. (and so is momma) =o)

FREE History Schedule

I found this goody on the WellTrainedMind boards (which is now a forum, *whispers* go check it out) .


Lunablog.net has free lesson plans that you can download. I think it is so wonderful that she is offering these for free. The lesson plan is called Mosaic Introduction to World History Part 1: Myths, Maps, and Marvels. She has a couple different versions. One using Story of the World: Ancient Times the other using A Little History of the World by E.H. Gombrich. She also gives you a choice of downloading the 'plain' version or the 'prehistory and evolution' version. How awesome is that?!

The only thing that makes me sad, *pouts* is that we're getting ready to start the Middle Ages so I can't use this lesson plan yet. But I am saving it for when it's Jasmine's turn for Ancient History.

Parenting With Rosie

I've been having some issues lately with Rosie. I guess, really, they are my own issues. Oh, I don't know.

Issue #1
She's 1.5 and she still nurses constantly. It sure seems like it's all the time. And I kinda want my body back. =( kinda. I believe in child led weaning. So I don't want to force her to stop but I do want her to cut back on how many times she nurses in a day. But not stop all together, I don't think. Although, I still wouldn't have my body back. =) Hey, I can never make up my mind of what I want.

So right now when Rosie wants to nurse I try offering her a sippy cup of milk or water. It works sometimes...but mostly not.

I guess in a way she is already weaning herself. There are many times that she wants to nurse and then stops after like 5secs because something else caught her attention. This usually annoys me. Because I sat down and got all ready just for her to wonder off right away. I'm thinking now though, that I need to stop getting annoyed. That's the process of her starting to wean from some feedings. Right?

My older two weaned themselves right around a year. So this is all new to me. And while I have no problem with still nursing her, I just wish it wasn't so often.

Issue #2
Oh, and I have another issue with my little Rosie Posie. =o) I can't seem to get her into her own bed. Argh! The two oldest slept with me until they were, oh, 5 months, and then switched into their own beds with no real problems. But not this one! Nope. When I try putting her in the crib she screams like I am torturing her!!!! So I set up the playpen next to my bed. In hopes that I can transition her into that. Nope. If she falls asleep in my arms and I attempt to put her in the crib or playpen, she wakes up. She can tell/feel when I bend over and hold her out to lay her down. =o(

So I'm thinking, that I just need to buy a bunk bed really soon. (for my youngest two). Then when she falls asleep in my arms I can lay her down in that bed. Or if I lay down with her in the bunk bed, nurse her and wait til she falls asleep before getting up, maybe that will work? This is how she goes to sleep in my bed.

Any advice or encouragement out there? I would love to hear it!

I guess I should point out that I don't agree with letting her 'cry it out'. Especially when she will just SCREAM the whole time. (I know that's what my mom would tell me to do. =) so mom, please don't comment. he he ).

The Well-Trained Mind & 4th Grade

This past summer (after year number 1) I read The Well-Trained Mind by Jessie Wise and Susan Wise Bauer. It was a great read and I have definitely learned some new things. So now I have made some changes for our 4th grade year and I think we'll like it much better then the previous year. (my fingers are crossed). Lily now has her own binder set up with dividers for each subject. I like it!

4th Grade Curriculum

Saxon Math 54 - I also purchased the DIVE cd in hopes to free up some time to do preschool with Jasmine. We'll see how it goes.

History Odyssey - Middle Ages - I've changed history a little this year. We're still using SOTW2 as it's one of the spines scheduled in HO. We haven't started this yet, we're still finishing up SOTW1. I'm actually stretching it out a little right now because I haven't been able to purchase everything for the Middle Ages yet. One of the main things I still need to purchase is the Hands & Hearts Middle Ages Kit (and of course the additional student kit for J). I'm looking forward to adding that into our history for some hands-on fun. There are also many other things I am adding to History this year. But that will have to be a separate post for a different day.

Rod & Staff English - Building With Diligence (grade 4) - I am pretty happy with this curriculum choice. I think it works well for us. It takes us about 20min a day. We do some of the written work orally, don't do 'all' the written work. I pick and choose based on what she needs practice on. I feel that it covers things really well. Happy enough with it that I plan on moving on with it in 5th grade.

Veterinary Science Unit Study - Lily LOVES animals and is thinking about being a Veterinarian when she is older. So we did this for fun. We still haven't gone through their whole reading list. That's ok, it'll keep books in her hands for a while. (I hope).

Sonlight Science 4 - Electricity, Magnetism & Astronomy - We're not very far into this as of yet. We are changing it a little.....we're not doing the student pages that it comes with. We both (Lily and I) like notebooking instead. So now after reading a two-page spread or what have you, Lily will draw a picture that relates to what she just read and then write a little something about it. Then she adds it to her science binder. She likes this a lot better.

Spelling Workout D - We have the older 'sports' edition. We are not very far into this yet. So I can't really say much about it right now. So far, so good though.

Getty Dubay Italic Handwriting E - I decided on this book this year due to the fact that Lily has terrible handwriting. I hate saying that...but it's true. Even the pretty cursive was terrible. So, after researching different handwriting programs I figured this might be the best cursive program for her. Again, she's not that far into this yet either but so far, so good.

I guess that's basically it for now. There are more things that I want to add once we get the chance to purchase them.

A look at year one...

Last year (3rd grade) was our first year homeschooling. Better late then never right? I'm just glad we finally made the decision to do it! It was definitely a learning experience for us. In fact, it is still and always will be a learning experience. =) I'm still not totally comfortable with our routine. But I'm hoping that blogging it will help me work it out.

Curriculum used -

Saxon Math 3 - So far I like this curriculum. There are things I had to skip.... like doing the calendar every day and we only did one side of the worksheets. But it worked for us.

Story of the World 1 - Ancient Times - We are really enjoying this book. History is one of Lily's favorite subjects. She remembers so much of it. It just amazes me because I never really cared for history, until now, now I really like it. =) We also have the activity guide and my daughters love doing the coloring pages while I'm reading to them. Yes, my 3yr old also has to have her own coloring page. I look forward to continuing on to the Middle Ages!

Sonlight Science 3 - Introduction to Biology - My daughter really enjoyed science this year. Of course this is her absolute most favorite subject. =o) She really liked reading Usborne's Mysteries & Marvels of Nature. The TOPS experiments were a big hit as well, even for Jasmine (3). Jasmine enjoys watching the Discover & Do dvd and pretending to do the experiments.

LLATL - Learning Language Arts Through Literature (yellow) - This went just ok for us. I really like the sound of it but when it came down to actually homeschooling...well...it just wasn't the right approach for us.

Oh, I'm drawing a blank right now.... what else did we do last year? hmm....

We used a 3rd grade Health workbook. But I can't seem to remember the name of it.

Art - (drawing another blank) It taught color shading. We did it off and on. But it was only fun a handful of times. I'll try to look up the name a different day. It's too late to go digging through the closet right now.

I might be missing something, I'm not really sure. Also remember that this was our first year homeschooling. When Jasmine gets to 3rd grade this will probably look completely different. In fact I know it will. For one, she will start SOTW1 in at least 1st grade.

One really important thing I learned this year is to always make extra copies, or buy extra supplies so that the younger child can do the activity along with their older sibling!!! Well, that may not be the case for everyone else but it definitely was the case here.

Blogging....

I have been reading a lot of homeschool blogs lately. Wow! I've been learning so much from them. They have been such a blessing. I wonder if the bloggers even realize how helpful their blogs are. We are only in our second year of homeschooling and it has been so great to see what other homeschoolers are doing. What's working for them....what's not...what changes they make and on and on. In fact they are the reason that I'm sitting here right now creating my own blog. I'm hoping that eventually if I can get this up and running then maybe someone new to homeschooling will come across my blog and find it helpful in their journey. My other reason for starting this blog is in hopes of sharing our journey with our family (and friends).

Here we go.......