The second week of homeschooling officially for our year was a little more of a struggle BUT Thursday we had Zander’s first spelling quiz – 3 out of 5 right! I am very proud of my often frustrated learner. He is understanding that he has to learn five MORE words over the next week AND practice the two he got wrong. I am so proud of him, he spelled “a”, “all” and “about” correctly. The next set of 5 in our big sight word book are rather simple ones like “and” and “am” but those are GREAT for confidence boosters! Gavin is staggered in time and won’t have his first quiz until next Wednesday. He is starting at the end of the list with words like “yellow” and “would”. First steps to really writing their own sentences and stories.

First quiz

We got a VERY special package in the mail – our Wonder Box that I won from an online draw done by the site The Adventures of Supermom. We had to open it right up and look through…

Wonder box

Even with our not so motivated week I was amazed at how quickly we got through our list of to do’s. Math was conquered, reading done… Trinity started a new workbook with great joy and Emanuel was over the moon with his letter practice. I am so glad that my littles are learning as well as their brothers.

I managed my first tie in of yarn. I had to move onto my second ball of yarn for Ken’s scarf. I think I did a pretty decent job. If you want to learn how to change colours, add that next ball, there are some great left handed instructions in this video. 

Loving the colours

Our investment in beads and plastic string was a great one! As the whole group of them were huddled over the stash creating away! I definitely need to purchase some more. Though there may be an issue with the string and smaller beads. The big draw of the plastic string is that it is easier for the little ones to use and does not fray… but I am sure we will figure it out!

Beading

With results

We ended our week rather quietly. Since Ken was dealing directly with HR in regards to the test code they wanted and NOT the developers it turned out that the HR guy was using a term improperly and muddied the waters. So any plans to really go out and about were completely blown out of the waters. Thankfully we DID make it out to Target to ask questions at the optical place and do a little shopping… oh and get a free cookie. Gotta love the cookie clubs at grocery stores!

Instead they created a Lego tree full of parrots!

Trinity and I did her Wonder Box… I am going to do a separate blog entry on this wonderful amazing gift! I cannot thank Supermom enough for her draw! I have wanted to get Trinity a Wonder Box since they came out with the program and here I had the opportunity to share it with her. I have high hopes that in the new year I can get another one for our budding learner. She was so lovely about sharing it with Echo and Emanuel as well!

Sharing her project with her sister

Miss Echo even let me sit and take a few pictures of her in the sunshine. 

Pretty baby

I have a few freebies to share that I have been linked through emails!!! There is an ABC Notebooking set that is free now… you can find it on Currclick HERE. With Emanuel’s new interest in the Turtleman and the Crocodile Hunter I was so excited to see that Activity Village has added him to their famous people section now 6 years after his death. You can find print outs for him HERE. Moffatt Girls has a free fall themed math print out you can download right now as well. You can find that gem HERE. And there is a daily notebooking set you can download and print off HEREfrom Confessions of a Homeschooler. I hope to utilize these soon. I picked up sheet protectors for reusable notebooking sheets for  Trinity so I guess in my spare time this weekend it is time to make Trinity up some learning material.  

Working together (Zander)

September 11-12

There are days when you question your parenting and days when you rejoice in it. Tuesday was more of the former and less of the latter. We are still trying to drum through our twins’ VERY thick heads that listening to Mommy and Daddy and telling the truth right off the bat is the best choice. We still stand by that if you tell the truth and come to us then the punishment will diminish or in many cases there will NOT be a punishment. Sadly after acting up the day before and losing their computer time they still felt the need to tell fibs, disregard instructions and generally be difficult. The punishment – they lost almost half a day to time outs and went to bed immediately after dinner missing out on popcorn and movies with the 3 littles. 

Movie time

I am very thankful that we managed a productive morning. With Ken freed up from his search and code work he took over the Minnesota unit and they blasted through portions of it. Yours truly is working on talking to other homeschooling families via egroups to find some good affordable/free areas to visit that are not too far away. I have already started talking via email with a lovely and helpful momma here in Minnesota who is a fountain of information. 

Emanuel’s Minnesota colouring page

Trinity practicing her Y’s

I made up a special counting game for Trinity to practice her numbers 1-10. It is a great print out you can find HEREcalled Lickety-Split Numbers Craft. Anything I can find to get her interested and practicing! 

Just need to glue some stiff cardboard to the back

So with our absolute shut down on the twins that was the end of that. I am hoping that the fact that when we punish we follow through and are absolute will lead the boys to altering their behaviour. This is something I really appreciate about homeschooling. When there is an issue I can stop the world and deal with it. Not worry about others and continuing the day. 

Filling the spare time with a kitty picnic

My laundry helper

Wednesday was an overcast and rainy day so really we were stuck indoors. On the plus side the boys kept working on Minnesota with Ken and we FINALLY got in time making our twirling toys science craft! They all had a blast dropping them over the railing.

The lesson

The application

Then there was our trip out to Jo-Ann’s. A homeschool mom alerted me to the fact that as a homeschooling mom I can qualify for the teacher’s discount – 15% off entire purchase, coupons and sales included! All we had to do was take in our intent to homeschool forms and BINGO! That meant that I had a 50% off coupon for a regular priced item and then got stuff on sale and on top of that 15% off. So we got another ball of yarn to complete Ken’s scarf, some Halloween themed stickers (to begin the rebuilding of the Halloween stash), and a Perler bead idea book all for 5.00! Then when we got home the kids set to work with the beads. 

Beading

Ken had ANOTHER set of code to make up Wednesday night… not going to put those eggs all in one basket so until there is a guaranteed job he keeps the looking and code writing and interviewing. I have great faith in Ken and his abilities and really appreciate all the prayers and positive thoughts and networking everyone is doing for and with us! 

I am on the hunt for Fall crafts, ways to get Trinity going and confident and of course… affordable fun! I am hoping to have more links to share! I have added All Kids Network to my links for Homeschooling. They are becoming a great resource for some crafty ideas. As always there are my favourites – Education.com AND Activity Village! If you know of any links you just can’t school/live/craft without – please send them my way!

Our baby and her kitties

NOTE… A gaming friend of Ken’s from his EVE game died in a terrorist attack on an embassy overseas on September 11th, 2012. We want to extend our prayers and love to his family who were kind enough to alert the guys of this horrible news. It is hard to understand WHY this happened or to really grasp the horror of it all. This is one of multiple attacks at various embassies on the 11th… he will be fondly remembered by his friends on EVE Online!

September 9-10

Ending the weekend and starting the week is always a bit awkward. Especially after an action packed Saturday. Add to that a last minute email from the company that Ken had his interview/code/tour at stating that they wanted him to revamp his code so that he could be considered for ALL of the positions he applied for (an oops on their part for not noticing the multiple applications in their system as altering code is harder than writing it that way from scratch). This did mean we couldn’t go out to meet up with the Novaks for church and then a play date. 

Yet another stick creation

Playing with Daddy

Future programmer or future soccer player?

I have started Ken’s scarf and then some but first Sunday night I FINALLY finished Trinity and Echo’s dolly blanket. Not perfect but a first double stitch piece and the recipients were very happy!!! 

Dolly blanket completed

Apparently Sunday night the neighbour across the street had their truck keyed! The police were by to see if we had noticed anything. Sadly since we spend our time in the evening in the basement where our computers, tv and comfortable chairs are so we didn’t notice anything. And, of course, Zander acted up in front of the police officer before I could even get out to answer the door. The boys were playing outside, thankfully in the front and no where near the road. Thus ends, for a few days at least, their time playing outside without one of us outside with them or at least sitting in the front room watching them play. I am curious as to why the vehicle was keyed as we cannot put all the vehicles here in the garage. 

Monday was a nice day… weather wise. I had Ken (who actually had spare time!!) take ALL the kids out on a nature walk to collect leaves and such to include in their art project for the day. After the walk they all played outside together. I think they have missed having this precious time with Ken as this job hunt has (rightfully so) taken up the bulk of his time and focus.

Walking with Daddy

My babies

Our art project was to take the found items and the bucket of newly purchased and collected items and create something. Even Echo got in on the fun, lots of glue, leaves, bits and pieces and everyone ended up with something pretty to go on display! I absolutely love having back our IKEA table and having FIVE chairs for it! 

Crafting together

Up on display

Mail today brought my Amazon order – three new books to read and review! 

THREE new books

We are super proud of Trinity today – I found her another number worksheet to practice her 2’s and after telling me she couldn’t she sat down and did row after row of 2’s. Some were a little off but WOW what an accomplishment for my often reticent learner. This one went right onto the fridge downstairs where we have dedicated the space to homeschooling bragging. I have also printed out the 3 for tomorrow. 

Working on her numbers

Our herbs are growing along… well for the most part. 2 out of 3! And since Monday marks one week of growth the twins drew pictures in their observation journals of the seedlings. If only the Parsley would start growing! 

2/3 going strong

I tried the new Halloween themed creme egg – SCREME egg… it was sweet! I find that one of those is more than enough but I swear they have gotten smaller over the years!

Cute

Green !

With Ken’s scarf on the go and the kids’ schooling to plan, I feel rather occupied and I like it! 

I am in love with the colour combinations and the 20 stitches across has worked really well with this particular yarn!

Now to continue the momentum and get the boys’ paperwork out… I will feel much better with that out and on its way!  

Trinity and I