Remember these?

Well, here's what they look like now...















Scroll down...

























Are you excited?

Here they are!






















um, yeeaah. That's about what they look like. And, yes, this is the same picture, but the truth is they didn't change. We're really bummed. I asked someone on the message board & she said that she has 5 kids who all planted 2 plants each - out of all of those only TWO grew! So, I don't feel as bad. I guess we'll probably try again. I'll let you know if we do.

Our Projects...

Remember this project?



















Well, it didn't go so well.

The one WITHOUT the xylem was suposed to die. Part of the problem (we think) was that we put food coloring into the one with xylem to add to the fun. Oops.

And, we finally planted our apple trees. Someone threw away the first set of seeds, so we had to start new ones. This time there were only three seeds. So, Dad & the kids worked together on this one. Here they are getting their hands dirty:































I'll keep you updated on how that turns out.

And, last but not least, here is our world map.





























He made the white splotch for Antarctica's ice.
Didn't Superkid do a great job?

We all had a good time this week.
Can't wait to start next week in USA!!

Finishing up the second week.

This seems to be going faster than I thought it would. Since I didn't schedule math or english on Friday's it makes it pretty easy to do extra work beforehand so that we could take Friday's off. All that is scheduled this Friday is Bible, Vocabulary, Geography and making a cake. :-) We may do the cake decorating tomorrow? Supermans birthday is on Monday and he took the day off work, so I'm not sure how next week will work.

We woke up earlier and got started early this morning, so adding a few extra things in hasn't been hard. We just did the extra Bible study right after todays and the same with our geography. It worked well.

For everyone's information, I will be skipping the "animal life" lesson today. I just can't do it. I've been trying to psych myself up since I first saw it, but alas I'm chickening out. If you don't own the curriculum and you are interested in what it is that I could be talking about, send me an email & I'll fill you in. ;-)

So, after two full weeks of using this curriculum I have found I fall very short in the area of the "book basket" and with the songs. Well, maybe not the songs as much -we have done them twice a week (but, not on the specified day - which is fine!) I just find that my kids like to run around crazy while they listen to the songs, so I put it off. Oh well. Anyway, as far as the book basket, I thought we'd do really well with these and maybe we're not doing too bad. But, we are certainly not reading every day. I think I've only sat and read them out loud once or twice in the full two weeks. My son does take liberty to sit and read them (and I've "made him" sit once or twice - not that he REALLY minds that much, but still...) I'd like to go through them with him more, but after sitting with him all day doing school time, it's a struggle to get myself to sit and read out loud anymore. We'll see if it gets any better (or if I come up with any grand ideas).

Anyway, I'll be back later to post some pictures up: Our planted apple tree, the science experiment gone wrong, and the cake!

See you then.

And then there's today...

We're done!!! It's not even noon. What's the deal with that? Yesterday seemed to go on and on and last forever. And now, here we are - DONE! That gives me some hope that even when we have those rough days, they don't all turn out so bad. :-)

Superkid woke up this morning saying that he was determined to get school done early today. That's my boy! He put his mind to it and did it! Oh kay, we'll give God some credit here. He did pray that we would be done early - so, it was actually a miracle from heaven.

I just have to mention too, he's even done with almost ALL of his chores. He has daily chores he's in charge of, simple things like feeding the dog, getting the mail, taking out the trash and keeping the living room picked up. He's done almost ALL of them!! Amazing!

I'm just so glad for him. He will have a great afternoon playing freely today! YAY!!

Hope you have a great day as well.

Is this day still not done?

Wow. I really expected to be done by noon today. High hopes I guess. We had done our science last night, so I figured we'd just zoom through the rest today and get done quickly. Um, no. Didn't happen. It's almost 4:00 and we STILL have geography to do. I think after that we will finally be done, but it sure has taken all - day - long. Don't ask me why. A little time here and there stolen I guess. I thought we were doing OK at noon, but since then it has been a huge struggle to get finished. Starting with right after lunch when I put my littlest down and Superkid started reading his geography book to me. I was listening, I really was, but I must have gotten a little too comfortable and dozed off! I woke up and found to my surprise that Pickles really had NOT gone to sleep, she was playing in the bathroom. Ah yes. That was a nice moment in the day.



Here's my son's art project from today:





















His turned out much nicer than mine did. We both decided mine looked like spiders. If you haven't caught on by now, I don't have much in the creative department. Yet, I keep trying hoping someday to have some kind of skill. His turned out great though! I'll just live vicariously through his artistic abilities.



I'm waiting for Superkid to finish cleaning up from art and we'll be ready for geography. I am SO done with this day!



Hope yours went better.

A day filled with learning!

We're back! It's a good thing we went to the park this morning because although Superman got home really early (which makes for a VERY happy Mommy!), we didn't get to go tonight. Pickles had been really cranky and needed a nap. So, we did SCIENCE instead!!







Let me first tell you about our trip to the park.





























This was the kids favorite tree they picked out to draw. I tried to keep our focus on trees today. We first walked by the creek, hoping to find some kind of animals. We did see a bird flying, but not much else. I kept pointing out all the different kinds of leaves and how colorful the trees are right now. Then I sat on a bench while they ran around chasing each other with sticks. After watching this for a few minutes I decided to direct their attention elsewhere. So, I had them gather some of the different leaves around us.









Here's the leaf my son found for me.

Isn't that the sweetest?

He's always finding hearts in things and giving them to me.

We only had a little bit for our "nature walk" so I told them to pick their favorite tree. It took a LONG time for Superkid to decide. He liked the climbing ones, but finally decided to go for the bright purple one. It really did look cool from afar. Then, as we sat under it, it seemed like it was all green inside. It was pretty. Pickles picked the same tree, which turned out to be good so we could all stick together. We all drew our pictures. No, I WILL NOT show mine. I am a terrible artist. But, you only learn by doing, right? So, I'll do it around my children who don't know any better. (smile)

After we drew our trees (Pickles drew a leaf she said) then we did bark rubbings. They actually didn't turn out as well as I had hoped they would, but hey, it was fun. We collected a few of the leaves from the "favorite tree" hoping we'd be able to identify it. But, I'm not too good at that. Anyway. I don't know what we'll do with the leaves (if anything). Altogether I think everyone had a good time with our "tree study."

Here's a picture of the bark of the tree. The actual tree picture is up above. Anyone happen to know what kind of tree this is?

Anyway, we showed up at my parents just right about the time the "fish guy" (who is cleaning their tank) was suposed to show up. He wound up being super late. Usually Superkid would sit and soak up whatever this guy talks about. They guy certainly has a lot to say, especially about fish. So, I always consider it a real learning experience. Today, I think everyone was just tired, so after reading a few picture books, we turned on the tv and watched snorkles and smurfs. Amazing they're still showing those cartoons. And amazing all the witchcraft right smack-dab in the middle of these shows. ANYWAY, that took up most of our afternoon.

We came home late, Superman came home early. After putting Pickles to bed we decided we needed to do something...How about some science!!

Oh, I forgot to mention that Superkid pointed out to me while we were at the park about the rings from a tree trunk tell the trees age. I had him show pickles and explain it to her. (cute!) Anyway, God worked it out so perfectly today with "Plants" being the subject.

Here's our celery pictures:

Sure hope we did it right and got all those xylem strings off.



And here's our newest apple tree's birth:







































We'll be planting it tomorrow.



And that concludes our day. Wasn't it fun?

Focus, Focus, Focus...

Well, some days just don't go exactly as planned. Not that I had REALLY planned this day out, but...

I knew in the afternoon I needed to be at my parents house, but I didn't know what time exactly. I still don't. Which just makes my decision about WHEN to go on our nature walk a little confusing. I could go right now, but for some silly reason I called my hubs and invited him. He said yes. What was I thinking? I would LOVE for him to go, but...he doesn't get off work until it is almost dark and the weather isn't too great today. Hmmm...I'm just trying to figure out how to get today's goal accomplished.



I have plenty of other things I'm doing in the meantime. Sorting out summer/winter clothes for my daughter. Paperwork. Yep, they are all just keeping me sidetracked from my goal here.

You know what? We can go twice. What's wrong with that?? There, I've made my decision & I'm sticking to it. :-)

Ok, we're off to the park this morning for only about an hour or so. (I'd rather be early to my parents) Then, we'll go to the grandparents house for a few hours and maybe do another nature walk tonight. Sounds like a great plan!

Check List:
Lunch Cooler
Clipboards & Paper
Field guide from library
camera
jackets!
children

I think that's it. We're ready to go...
See you later!

Great Day

After breakfast we said goodbye to Daddy. Sometimes we'll go out on the porch and wave. Most of the time Superkid runs down the street racing the truck. Anyway, today we all stood on the porch waving & blowing kisses. Although it looked cloudy, it was actually very nice weather. After sitting on the porch talking for a few minutes, we decided to start school out there. We started by reading psalms (since today doesn't have any real Bible reading) and then we read a chapter of our read aloud - Pocket Full Of Pinecones. I scheduled this in knowing that the first two weeks didn't have a read aloud and we only had 8 chapters left. I think we only have 3 now. My 2yo sat and played with rocks next to us while we read. It was such a beautiful morning!

Toward the afternoon my stomach got pretty queasy and my sweet, adorable, little girl started getting quite an attitude that I needed to deal with. I knew I needed to eat, but ugh. I called hubs to talk to him (um, more like complain- poor guy) and my Superman told me he was in the neighborhood and asked if I wanted anything delivered! Isn't he the sweetest???? What a treat!! I was mostly just excited to see him in the middle of his day. It is a VERY rare happening. It's too bad the food didn't help my stomach very much though.

Here's my son's narration of The Hen and the Golden Eggs from his English lesson today:

Lesson 37 - First Language Lessons
September 28, 2007

The Hen and the Golden Eggs
There was some poor people who lived in a house and they had a hen that laid a gold egg everyday. Each day, when the got the egg they said, "Thank you for your gift." And at night they gave her mush and said, "Have a good night."
After awhile they got enough gold eggs they could build a little cottage in the woods. But the problem was every time they got greedier and greedier with the eggs. So, finally the man said, "Why don't we kill the chicken, because there will be lots more gold inside of her." So, they killed the chicken and they were surprised to see that there was no gold. They got poorer and poorer even though they used to be getting richer and richer.

In geography, he had a tough time trying to draw the smaller scale of his hand today, but he really loved the concept of latitude and longitude. He had fun playing the game where you named a latitude and longitude pair and had him try to find the spot. I let him have a turn to name them too.

Science went ok. I didn't make him draw today because the whole thing was just dumb. It was about global warming, which sparked some interesting questions from him. But, there really was nothing of real value. And, I have to say that I've been noticing that these topics are pretty advanced. I guess he's on the lower edge of the age spectrum for this curriculum and it's a good thing that he is interested in learning so I can keep his attention, but I don't know how other second graders would do. I also have to say, I am thankful that I've had a LITTLE study in this area, so I could answer SOME of his questions. He asked a few that I had no idea how to answer. Anyway, tomorrows lesson looks a little better. Oh, and as for then "animal life" page, I'm still not sure if I can do that one! The day keeps creeping closer...

We skipped handwriting because his papa came and sole him. :-D

All in all, today was a really good day!