Valentine's day

This was Brianne's first year to take part in the festivities of handing out valentines....and she loved only one box, thus only one box got her valentines.  Try as Delaney might, she just couldn't get her interested in placing some in other boxes....nope, just this one! and that's all!

Christy H. loved getting them too!    She just laughed and said, "all I did was paint it like a rainbow."

The attendance was low this year, probably because the party was on Thursday, but it allowed us to buy valentines this year, which they loved (gotta love Dollar Tree).  Making them is fun, but sometimes a store bought one is good too.  

Wit and Wisdom of Liam

While visiting mom the other day she related a moment with Liam. She said that she had made both Liam and Brianne some popcorn and hot chocolate while they were watching television. After both the popcorn and hot chocolate were gone, Liam sat with his head in his hands thinking deep thoughts. All at once he sat straight up and exclaimed, "Wow, hot chocolate and popcorn all on the same day!"

My mom took Brianne and Liam shopping with her a couple of days ago. She had told Liam that after they were finished shopping they would go to McDonald's for a treat. This of course was looked upon with great favor by Liam. Unfortunately mom temporally lost her car keys. She told Liam that they would have to find the keys before they could go to McDonald's. Liam did not get upset in the least and told his Granny, "I ask him." When Granny inquired as to who Liam was talking about, Liam just pointed up. He bowed his head and said a prayer. A few minutes later the keys were found. Out of the mouths of babes.


Vicki here--I was up in my room trying to put order to the mess that never seems to end, when Liam came in and told me, with great conviction, that the scriptures were more powerful than a wand. (He's been into Harry Potter since our week long Harry Potter movie festival after Christmas.)  I said, "Yes, I believe that too.....who told you that, did your primary teacher say that or maybe Connor?"   His response,  "Oh, Heavenly Father told me that mom."  Well there you have it...verity at it's finest!

Happiness is.....

....finally finding the perfect place for my sewing machine. Why didn't I think of the kitchen before?  Thanks Christine!  Delaney's quilt will soon be done, Yah!!

....Watching Brianne play.  She loves to "cook" and "stir".  Many time, she gets some water (when somebody forgot to lock the water on the fridge) and stirs it...then ceremoniously dumps in all on the floor! ....that part isn't the happiness part!

 I moved the tupperwares to a cupboard she can easily access....she loves to play with them at her cousins house, I"m sure she'll enjoy playing with them now that she can reach them....so this is happiness for her.  Now we just need to get the bead necklaces.

....play dough or moon sand!! (to bad I can't find anymore to purchase, I'll have to find a homemade recipe.)  Liam loves them both...along with dress up, guns, bows and arrows.  quite fun!

The Snowy Day......Liam's Snowy Day

I love FIAR!!!  and I LOVE Liam!!!   Put these two together and we have some great memories!

   This book's been a fun one to row with him this past week.  We got on line, at the Reading is Fundamental website we listen to a digital telling of the story.  Liam likes doing worksheets...somewhat, and he had fun doing a few of these.  He much prefers writing actual letters over doing the zig zag--loopy type worksheets that are made to help writing readiness.  I didn't know that before.

One of the most enjoyable things we made during this row was a book of Liam's Snowy Day.  I had him stage some photos that mimic the illustration of the book, then we took the words from the book and created his own Snowy Day book.  Some of the photos came from sledding activities and the first BIG snow we had a few weeks prior to creating this book.....but most of them came from an early morning impromptu photo shoot before the sun melted all the snow.

We made some "snowflakes" for FHE dessert one night....Monday night to be exact!  They may not have turned out to look exactly like snowflakes, but each one was certainly different from the other....and yummy too.

Here's a few photos from the "photo shoot"    

Crunch, crunch, crunch, his feet sank into the snow.
Liam walked with his feet pointed out like this:  

 He walked with his toes pointing in, like that:

...he found something sticking out of the snow that made a new track.   

It was a stick

--a stick that was just right for smacking a snow-covered tree.

Down fell the snow--plop!    --on top of Liam's head.

He made a smiling snowman, (below) 

and he made angels. (above)

He thought it would be fun to join the big boys in their snowball fight,

 but he knew he wasn't old enough--not yet

He told his mother all about his adventures while she took off his wet socks.

Riddles and a Second Breakfast

The more you have of me the less you see.  What am I?

What gets wetter the more it dries?

What can you catch but not throw?

What belongs to you but your friends use it more than you?

There is a girl in a butcher shop in Chicago who is 6 feet 8 inches tall, has a 42 inch waist and wears a number 12 shoe.  What do you think she weighs?

I have a head and a tail but no body, what am I?

It occurs once in every minute, twice in every moment, and yet never in one hundred thousand years.  What is it?

A duck, a frog, and a skunk went to the circus. Tickets were a dollar. Who got in? Who didn't?

 We read the book The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien for book group this month.  I've never really wanted to read it....I've started it, but always stopped halfway through somewhat bored.  But book group forced me through this "stopping point" and I'm glad it did.  This was good.  I now see why the boys have loved it for years.
Cailin's begun to read the Lord of the Rings trilogy because of it

The younger kids went on a treasure hunt to find:  Sting, the ring, spiders, and an archenstone.
We talked in riddles... Connor stumped us with some of the stuff he's reading in his logic book, but then again, he stumps us quite often with all sorts of things ...and ate a yummy second breakfast, just as Bilbo did before he began his grand journey.

 

 Mmmm, buttermilk pancakes with blackberry syrup, scrambled eggs, pineapple and banana slices.

We also talked about The Path to Success.. which is:  The Call    Opposition    Chasm    Hard Work    Endurance    Ultimate Test    The Pressure Lets Up. (....and Barry adds a little bit of luck) We found that path in Bilbo's journey to the mountain and even compared it to the story of the Three Little Pigs!   This is something we'll use with all our books...and personal problems in life.

Christine explains it better than I...so I added her written thoughts here:

One of the common models for studying novels is the Hero Cycle.  “The Student Whisperer” by Tiffany Earl and Oliver DeMille uses a similar but different  model called “The Path of All Success.”  Almost every story uses this Path to show success and sometimes failure.

There are seven “tests” in the Path.  They are:

1)    The Call

2)    Opposition

3)    The Great Chasm

4)    Hard Work

5)    Endurance

6)    Ultimate Test

7)     The Pressure Lets Up

A familiar fairy tale demonstrates the tests.  In “The Three Little Pigs” the pigs are called to leave their home and venture out into the world.  They meet opposition in the Big Bad Wolf.  We have the three pigs constructing their homes, two with inferior materials and one who works hard to build a solid home. The great chasm includes the idea of choosing the less popular path rather than the easy way. Two pigs choose inferior materials to build their house and the third pig chooses the harder path.  The Big Bad Wolf destroys the two other homes and goes after the third.  The third has to endure several trials. The wolf tries to trick him out of his home and the pig leaves early to beat the wolf at his game.  The ultimate test ends up with the Big Bad Wolf trying more directly to get into the third pigs house resulting in the death of the Big Bad Wolf and then the pressure lets up and the third Little Pig continues on with life.

Answers:
darkness
a towel
a cold
your name!
She weighs meat
a penny
The letter M
The duck got in because she had a bill, the frog got in on his green back. But the poor old skunk couldn't get in because he had only a scent, and it was a bad one.

School's cancelled due to....MUD!

I don't think that will ever happen in the public school system, but after being cooped up inside, cold, and wishing for warmer weather, how could I stop the fun?

It's been wintry cold, wet and windy. Today it's in the low 60's.  The warm weather will be gone in a day or so, so we're taking the day to play.

Of course Cailin did get her math done and Delaney, a reading lesson in, but other than that, it's fun in the mud!!  There is plenty of that--(I hope the grass comes back in the spring).

 

Cailin's having fun painting with mud!  Silly Girl!   I"m not sure if I should scold her or just shake my head and make sure she cleans up after herself....I'm going for the later, its such a nice day and really, I just don't care....as long as it doesn't come into the house!

History Happenings in January

January 7th--  "One", Betsy Ross, and more time with the Revolution for the older group

The older group has begun using the book  Beginner's Guide to Constructing the Universe by Micheal S. Schneider.  Connor gives a brief description of the book and Cailin's thoughts are further down in this blog.  It's interesting discovering ways the Lord uses numbers to bring order to his creations.  This week they looked at the number 'One" and all it's possibilities.



Hello, it's The Great Conn here, reporting on the book The Beginner's guide to constructing the universe. It's an interesting book which outlines all sorts of mathematical nuances within mathematics, specifically geometry. I enjoy the book.

We are delving into different personalities of the Revolutionary War.  This week we talked and learned a few things about Betsy Ross.  We discussed aspects of the flag, what the colors stand for (blue-justice, red-courage, and white-purity)  They created a paper version of the flag using torn paper.  The older girls made 5 pointed stars....just as Besty Ross created for the original flag.

January 14th-- Two, and  George Washington,

The older group began looking at the number "Two".

The younger group spent the morning learning about George Washington's life.  I found a cute colonial wig craft on Pintrest and we attempted to make it.  It called for a painters hat, I found a folded hat pattern to use for that.  I think our turned out more like a hat with cotton balls plastered all over it, not like the craft on Pintrest, but they had fun....and that's all that really counts anyway!  For math we're working on learning our addition math facts by memory.  To accomplish this we're playing lots of games....favorite one is WAR!

January 21st....
The older group studied vescia pices...or the number two for math.  In history they are studying about the childhood of Abraham Lincoln and the life of Daniel Boone.  Cailin gave the devotional this week.

The younger group talked about George Washington again--this time we talked about his leadership during the Revolutionary war, specifically the Crossing of the Delaware during the Battle of Trenton and Valley Forge in the winter of 1776.

 (The Patriots camp is in the lower left hand side...the books as tents.  They "crossed" the silver caped Delaware River to then walk 9 miles up to Trenton, where the Hessian were located.)

Crossing with our fancy boats.....that kinda looks like shape sorter train piece!

January 28th...

 Having fun with math.... playing Sorry! and working on our addition fact.  I had them add two card's numbers and progress with that # on the board.  For history we finished our timeline velcro paint sticks and learned about the Preamble of the Constitution. We learned signs to help us remember.

 Connor, Beryl and Cailin finished up exploring Vesica Pieces...number two.

Cailin here: We used compasses (not the north, south, east, west kind, the kind that you can adjust to make perfect circles,) to make different patterns that were sort of fun to make and interesting to look at. I don't know how it has to do with math, but I suppose how big to make your compass does have to do with measurement.

Eating lunch...we have our own little cafeteria line going here. On the menu-- brown rice, chili, coleslaw and carrots with chocolate chip cookies!  Definitely a favorite part of the day!!