Just a picture post today! Busy day, but first – remember to enter the draw… go to my 1000th entry and leave a comment! And now for the picture – Hello Kitty feltie take 2! This is just the head and unstuffed – it is to go onto a hairclip! More tomorrow I promise!
Hello Kitty!
Heads up on the 1000th post draw! If you haven’t entered already you have to go to THIS post and follow the instructions. If I get enough entries I plan on drawing two names!
Slow progress on the mood change today but we are working on it. The boys are simply not motivated right now so I am trying to mix it up with different worksheets, topics and breaks in our actual work time. We finished off our Stuart Little time with reading some books on REAL mice we got from the library and then as a group we made two lists – things we learned about Stuart and things we learned about real mice that interested us. Each of the boys then drew their own mouse on our page. We have everything from a brand new baby mouse to a full out nest!
Our group mouse page
Today marks the beginning of two of our new topics of study – Snowflakes/winter and Recycling. There are lots of resources on the internet for both topics but for recycling we started with a maze and colouring pages both off of Education.com. You can check out my Recycling Worksheet Collection on their site. I will be rating them and adding to it as we go along.
Snowflakes began with some worksheets off of abcteach.com you can pay for membership but we have found a few useful free worksheets and printables there. This topic marks the beginning of our winter craft bucket as well… I try to find things on sale, at Dollarama, etc etc and save them according to season. You can find the dot-to-dot snowflake we did here.
I have ordered a mini kit from Fun-in-a-box-Canada for Emanuel and Trinity. I ordered the Christmas min kit and it came to under 8.00. They ARE revamping their concept though and after the 17th will not be shipping the activity boxes. So I am bookmarking their page and going to check back after then. If they remain reasonable and have the same sort of set up I may do a 10 month series for Emanuel when he starts his first registered year!
We had a power outage today so I drug out the Winter Crafts bucket and let the kids create. I don’t know that they made much but they did familiarize themselves with the contents, muck around and keep busy when we couldn’t do our Starfall or watch their WordWorld DVD (the laptop it was to run in has VERY limited battery power). I love the big windows in our front room. Even when the power IS on it is rare that we need the light on over there in the morning or afternoon.
Crafting in all natural light
It is a Christmas egg - there are red bells and blue stars pushed into it!
Poor Echo got woken up when Ken went to check our breaker before heading to the neighbours to ask them if they were out as well (the whole street was as if you looked down to the convenience store their sign was out). So after fighting her all day to get a much needed nap in celebration of cutting her top RIGHT molar she was woken up. Poor thing, she has a horrible rash and is out of sorts BUT now has FOUR molars!
I was able to drag my craft supplies out of the bedroom before Echo started her naptime trauma and finish up a scrapbook page I started last night. This was back in June when Karyn was in New Orleans and Esther came to visit (you can see Esther and Echo chatting with Karyn via MSN video). I used up the last of my tiny flower die cuts. Now I have to remember whose punch I borrowed to make those!!
Finished page
It has been a bit of a long day but I think we are making up for it over the week by gradually planning more and more fun activities. The little ones have their library outing tomorrow… the twins and I are going to decide on some snowflake creations… I found completely by accident a neat craft to create a pop bottle pot for a plant that the kids are going to do for their aloe plant… you can find that here.
Snowflakes!
I was so busy this weekend with company and kids and such that I really didn’t explain our newest homeschooling hit – It is called Magnetic SuperMind. Which apparently “Makes kids super smart!”. It is slated for ages 5-9 but Trinity at 3 had a BLAST as did the Aunties and Uncles over this weekend past. I am hoping to get more cards as there is only a select number in the kit, but with the magnets and the nice tin to keep it all in this is already becoming a favourite.
A new favourite!
Tomorrow is a new day and hopefully a much smoother one!
Just the girls
1001 posts! There is a bit of a rush knowing I have made it THIS far with sharing our life and resources with everyone! Remember to go back to THIS post to enter for your chance to win a feltie.
This has definitely been a guy weekend. We had a group of Ken’s friends come to celebrate his belated birthday weekend with a traditional LAN party. There was even a cake (ice cream) thanks to Kristen and Fydo! (Inside joke on the slogan written on it).
CAKE!
Kristen, Echo and I spent Saturday out and about town… we started at the library (the branch closer to us) and picking up two books I had on hold for this week’s schooling. It is a complex actually so we looked into skating and swimming information. Seriously, if anyone wants to go swimming with us in November!! We need more hands than we have to safely swim with all 5 kids.
After the library it was down to the south end and Michaels. There were some Christmas (I know ALREADY!) sales and coupons to use. There is a free make-it-take-it activity there on the 20th of this month I wanted to confirm was going on. I did pick up some more adhesive so I could get back to crafting. Duct tape is next on the list (some specific colours for Christmas gifts) but I figured I needed to get some scrapbooking out of the way to clear my crafting areas! AND it is Emanuel’s turn tomorrow to get his scrapbook page done.
Bathing Beauty
A Girl and Her Sheep
We had lunch at a mall foodcourt where at Edo Japan I actually got right through the line! Faster than Kristen at NYFries! Odd that! And then over to the kids’ educational store. I had a payment order number and a wish to shop for another couple gifts for Christmas. Echo made minor messes (easily tidied thankfully) and crawled around exploring while I bought more than I had planned but remained well under budget. I even got them a toy for right now – magnetic spacial game. Though it was TRINITY more than anyone who was interested in it.
Fun with magnets
In the evening we actually pulled out the game I got Ken for his birthday – Settlers Trails to Rails! Kristen, Fydo, Ken and myself gave it a go… it went A LOT longer than our usual Settlers game and was a bit more complex AND Ken did win AS USUAL… but fun! I look forward to playing it again with a firmer grasp of the rules AND starting earlier in the evening.
All new Settlers
Today was a rather big deal for our little family – the kids sang at church with the Sunday School. It was Trinity’s first time! She was a little nervous and Emanuel was trying to chatter at first but they gave it their best! I was VERY proud!
The lesson during Sunday School was a group craft one about Saints for All Saints Sunday. Everyone made a Saint Nicholas. Rather cute I think!
Two of our saints
We had to say good-bye to our company today. Jeff and Zachary were onto the next leg of their vacation with Sean as their ride (he has been steadily getting sicker over the weekend but toughed it out and had fun). We feel so spoiled that they came and visited all the way from California! Kristen picked up Fydo around lunchtime so that left Alan and Ted to spend the afternoon and into the evening with Ken gaming and just hanging out. As much as we LOVE our new place, I do miss this sort of company. Feels so weird to see them so rarely after it being a weekly or more visit at our old home.
A basement full of men
Uncle Ted helping Trinity watch Charlie and Lola
Watching the gaming
I finished up a few crafts sitting around as I set about putting the house back to normal. Echo’s bow board is finally done. I love the colours. The material was what Echo’s Birthday present was wrapped in from Victoria. I put the bows on that she received from a lovely lady who runs Hairbows for Princesses. Be sure to check her out! Aren’t the colours great?
Echo's Bow Board
Oh and we figured out why poor Echo is not only cranky BUT has a bum rash – she cut another tooth – a molar!! (what is it with this kid and the painful back ones?)… her back left bottom is cut now as well as the two top ones… OUCH
This was definitely a weekend to remember, and now it is time to get ready for the rest of the month. Our facilitator is here on the 17th so we need to be sure we have our science stuff ready to show… I have a crafting event to plan, a van we need to get a date on for fixing, library meet up to plan… oh the list goes on. BUT I am hoping to move my focus to creating Christmas presents now! And that is exciting for us all… CRAFTING!
Post church pretty