Oct 21 - Oct 25

This week has been a bit different than normal. My oldest son and my husband have been gone all week on a mission trip to Puerto Rico. So that left me, the dog, and the 2 little kids to hold down the fort. We had major pool problems this week too. Of course, because things like this always happen with the husband is away. I discovered that we possibly had a leak, so I started letting the pool drain with the pump off. I did the dye tests to try and pinpoint the problem. In the end, I've ended up calling a professional, who will be here next week, to come out and look and I am currently filling the pool back up. I dread seeing our water bill this month, not to mention the cost of leak detection and repairs. I hope everyone is happy with a fixed pool for Christmas. :) We did school this week but a lot less structured than normal. We usually stick to a general time frame but with only having to teach one school aged child, and one toddler, we were able to be a bit more flexible. We did most of school in the afternoon. 

Thursday, my youngest son had a doctor's appointment in Birmingham, so I dropped off my daughter at my sister's house and took him to his appointment. We got excellent news. He's allergy free! When he was born, he had a severe milk allergy. He was born a big baby which turned out to be a blessing because he began to lose weight and couldn't keep his formula down. Every 30 minutes, he had terrible diarrhea with blood in it. We had to swap him to a hypoallergenic formula. We were told he'd probably out grow this by 1 and then by 2, but he still hadn't outgrown it. The doctor had us doing a challenge by introducing milk slowly back into his diet but it was never pretty. About July or August, we started introducing it again, and he was tolerating it. She did some tests and they all came back negative so we continued to give him the milk. This was our follow up appointment and we got the green light. He no longer has a milk/soy allergy. Yay! 

After we left the doctor, we picked up my daughter and went to my Grandmother's house for a visit. It's been a busy and hectic week and I can't wait for my oldest son and husband to be back home. 

Here are some pics from the week 

putting the puzzle together - I was asking him what all the animals said
as he putthem in their spot, got to the elephant and he said "Roll Tide"

Driving his cars on the H

She is saying "What?"

Spelling words with the game Boggle Jr. 

Lucky Ducks 

Having fun with the marker board

So long old friend! I'll miss you!

Well I decided to give up my most favorite drink, Diet Dr Pepper. I considered it for a while but couldn't ever do it. I had a friend who brought to my attention the negatives of the aspartame that is in these diet drinks. I've also read all the harmful things about it and what it does to your body and I kept saying that when I emptied one case, I wouldn't buy another but then that horrid caffeine headache would come and I'd quickly run to the gas station to get another drink, then to the grocery store to buy more. Sounds like I have a problem, doesn't it? I didn't want to swap them for the regular stuff because I don't want the sugar and actually prefer the taste of diet to regular. So, I decided to start drinking unsweetened tea. It's definitely an acquired taste.  It's been 2 weeks and so far so good. I actually like the taste of unsweet tea now and it gives me a little caffeine to keep off the headaches. (Yes, I know caffeine is not good for me either) I do miss the fizz of the sodas and when I see one, I think how good it would be. :) I have tried club soda with Mio in the past and I think I will try this again to see if this helps. However, if you see with a Diet Dr Pepper, don't judge. LOL

Oct 14 - Oct 18

This was a fun week for us! Monday was a holiday so we have school. We had friends over instead. We did school on Tuesday and then Wednesday, we carved pumpkins, then went to a friends house. They have horses and goats so the kids enjoyed that. Thursday was supposed to be park day. Unfortunately, it got rained out, so I took them to Bass Pro Shop instead. They love to go there and look at the fish, explore the store and play on the boats, supervised of course. 

I did Elmo

This is the work of the 2 year old
He didn't carve, he hammered clear, colored, pegs
into the pumpkin

This is my oldest son's. I told him
nothing scary, however, he chose this.
His response was "Mom, everyone has a skull,
it's not scary" 

My 5 year old's work. She carved a face

Oct 7 - 11

This is our week at a glance as well as how a typical day goes for us. I get this question a lot from people who wonder exactly how you home school with different aged kids. Everyday is different and doesn't always go as scheduled but this is how it is supposed to look. 

We begin our day with Calendar Time, then a devotion. Then we split up. I take the 2 year old, while the other two work independently.  

Tot School
Using Heart of Dakota's Little Hands for His Glory

We start by reviewing our letter for the week. Last week, we learned the letter H. He traces the letter on our flashcard book and then we review the words in the book that start with that letter. Next, we move onto his Bible Story and then either do some sort of activity or read more books. We also work on colors and numbers. This week, I took a cute video of him counting. 

Kindergarten

Using Heart of Dakota's Little Hearts for His Glory

Once we split up, my 5 year old works on the computer on either www.Starfall.com or PBSkids.org. When we come back together, we work on her memory verse for the week. We do Awana at church, so these are the verses that she learns. After this she begins working on either A Reason for Handwriting or Rod & Staff's Do it Carefully workbook. She enjoys working on both of these. Next, she moves on to Math. She's been busy working on shapes and patterns. Both of which she knows pretty well so it's just been a review. After math, we move to Phonics, which consists of Explode the Code Workbook and Hooked on Phonics. It makes me so proud to see her reading and writing words. I'll have to post a video of the next H.O.P. book she reads. Then comes Storytime. We've been reading the Burgess books as well as library or some books we already have at home. Right now, I'm reading The Adventures of Peter Cottontail. She does like these books but I can tell she enjoys books with pictures much better. She listens to both, but when I read a book with pictures, she sits close and looks at the pictures while I read. When I read the Burgess books that have no pictures, she goes to the floor and plays or dances around while I read. This is not really a problem because she can still answer the questions I ask her at the end. So she is listening at least. History is great because we read Bible stories for this with the Family Time Bible. Next, we do either Science or some type of acting out play. For example, last week, she picked up cotton balls (which was bread) with tweezers (which was a raven's beak) and placed them in a bowl. This was after reading the story of how God used the ravens to bring bread to Elijah. Sometimes, we have a song or rhyme to go along with our Bible Stories.

4th grade
Using Heart of Dakota's Preparing Hearts for His Glory

My oldest son starts on his independent work by going over his memory verse from Awana, then moves on to Science or Handwriting depending on the day. Next, he goes to the computer and does Math. We are using Teaching Textbooks this year. Then, he takes the 2 year old, so I can work with the Kindergartner  After I get through working with her, she takes the youngest and they play in their room while I work with my oldest. We start with English and Spelling, then Reading, Vocabulary, History, Storytime, Typing, and Art. We don't do all of these everyday, it just depends on the day. Last week in English, we wrote a letter to give instructions to someone. He chose to write to his 3 year old cousin telling him how to play the drums. When my nephew received the letter, he was so excited, he called my oldest son to tell him he got the letter. It was so cute! He thinks the world of him. In History, we are reading from a book called Grandpa's Box. He really enjoys this book. It is about 2 kids who visit their grandparents house everyday after school and the grandpa tells them all about the Bible Stories. It's a really good book and keeps you interested. My son usually complains if we read to long and he enjoys this one. That's a definite plus.  

Well this is our typical day. It doesn't always go smoothly. In fact, more times than not, it's very crazy. With a 2 year old running around, there's never a dull moment, but somehow we make it work. 

Here are some pictures from the week. Somehow, I only managed to get a couple of the princess from the week but Friday we had Field Day, so I included pictures from that as well. 

Picking up the bread and putting it in the bowl

Drawing a picture of what Heaven might look like

Field Day

Field Day

Field Day

Crab Walking

Crab Walking

 

Wheel Barrell racing

Wheel Barrell Racing

sack racing

Sack Racing

 

Tug of War

Helping the little ones on her scooter, she's such a little momma

Jacob counting 2 years old

My baby girl asked Jesus to live in her heart!

Tuesday morning, my 5 year old daughter did the most important thing she will ever do. She asked Jesus to come live in her heart. I am definitely so proud of her. She is very excited too. She grabbed the phone to call Daddy immediately. We were doing school and had just finished our devotion when she asked me why Jesus died on the cross for our sins. I explained to her why and made sure she understood what a sin was and told her that if He lived in our hearts, we get to go live in Heaven with Him one day. She said she wanted to invite Him into her heart and we prayed the prayer sitting on the school room floor. Definitely a good day! 

What has J-Man gotten into today?

If you see my posts on Facebook, you know that I have a very curious, into everything, 2 year old. I love him to death, but he constantly keeps my on my toes. Anytime you turn your back or take your eyes off of him for a second, he gets himself into trouble. Like the time he poured baby powder all over his room, or the time he emptied the wipes container one by one and placed them all over the floor. What about the time he climbed up on the counter to get a cup out of the cabinet. Well today's post for "What has J-Man gotten into today?" is he sprayed Febreeze all over the floor. (Because this is a blog for all to see, I've chosen not to use my children's actual names, so they will be referred to with nicknames)

I was in my room getting ready. I was in the bathroom straightening my hair and putting on my makeup when I noticed that J-Man was very quiet. This is highly unusual and actually only happens when he's doing something he's not supposed to. However, I gave him the benefit of the doubt, also called denial and decided he was probably just playing, and I was enjoying the quiet. Shortly after my thought, he came walking into the bedroom so I thought ok, he's good. Until he said to me "Look Mom, I'm spraying." I said, "Ok, buddy,......wait, what are you spraying?" He held up a bottle of Febreeze and said "Dis." I thought to myself this can't be good. I said, "Oh no buddy, we don't need to be spraying that, where did you get that?" He took off running into the next room and then starting crying. I run to see why he's crying and he has fallen on the wet, slippery, Febreeze soaked floor. Yes, it was everywhere. Apparently, he'd been spraying the entire 10 minutes I was in my room because the bottle was empty and the floor was extremely wet. I said, "J-Man, why did you do this?" His response was priceless..... "Because I pooted." Wow, it must have been bad. As I'm cleaning up the Febreeze off the floor, he says "I sprayed my toys in my room too." Oh joy! 

Well our house smells wonderful now, haha. Kids, gotta love 'em!

Things kids say

The other day the kids and I were getting ready to go somewhere. As I was heading to my room to get dressed, I said to my 5 year old daughter, "Will you go get "J-Man" an outfit and get him dressed for Mommy?" She said, "Sure." I overheard her trying to get him dressed. She was saying, "Come here, let me get your clothes on. Be still please. Do I need to go get Mommy? Be still, do you want me to call Daddy?" I couldn't help but laugh as this is apparently what I sound like.

2 weeks worth of school Sept 23- Oct 4

Well as usual, I'm late again posting our week recap. I will actually be recapping the last 2 weeks. 

2-3 Tot School & Life
I didn't have a whole lot of pictures of him doing school this week. I did manage to capture a few. We worked on the letters F & G as well as learned about Moses. 

Playing with the animal cards and telling me what sound they make

Coloring the letter G

 

Driving cars on the letter G

Throwing a ball, which was a "stone" at Goliath's head, which was the plate on the top of the wall.
They all enjoyed this activity

Lacing cards

Had cousins over for a visit and we went out for a walk.
By the way, that's a leotard and not a swimsuit. We were heading out to Gymnastics after this. 

Out for another walk, the weather has been so great

We took a "field trip" to meet Daddy for lunch.
Enjoying the free ice cream for dessert at Chappy's

Ok, so this isn't school but this was taken at my oldest son's football game

 Kindergarten
She's still doing well with reading. She's definitely catching on. We're still struggling with the difference of  b and d, but I'm sure she'll get. She also sometimes writes her name or any letter for that matter backwards and doesn't even realize she's doing it. I'm blaming that on her being left handed for now and hopefully this will clear up. I don't mean just letters backwards but literally the whole word backwards written from right to left. On the flip side of that, it's kind of neat that she can write both backwards and forwards. She is really doing great and I'm very proud of her. She's having a great kindergarten year!

Gluing construction paper squares to paper.
This was a tapestry that she could hang in God's temple.

Working in her Explode the Code workbook. 
This is one of her phonics programs.

Getting ready to read another H.O.P. book

We had a wedding shower to attend at my mom's office for her co worker.
We brought school with us and this is the princess and Whitney playing with the matching cards.

 

Workbook time, she's finding the matching words on the page

 

Math 

Here she is aiming for Goliath's head

Coloring

Out for a walk

walking on the curb like a balance beam

Taken at the football game

4th grade
This has been a challenging week for us. He's not been feeling the workload and giving everyone a hard time. I've revamped his schedule to hopefully make this a bit easier for him and me. Nobody likes a grumpy child. Haha

Working on English

This is a funny pic I wanted to share, simply for the look on my oldest's face.
He couldn't believe I was asking him to take a picture with these statues.
How embarrassing, haha

Hard to tell from the pic but this a picture of a pyramid he made.
A replica of the pyramids he was studying in Egypt. 

My football man after his game!

Like I said, they all enjoyed this activity.
It's a bit of a blurry picture, but you can tell he hit Goliath!

Reading a verse in his Bible

His map he created of the 12 tribes of Israel

at Chappy's enjoying their dessert.