Homeschooling Archives -

Sometimes life gets a bit crazy!

WHERE HAVE I BEEN?

You may have noticed that I’ve been a bit neglectful when it comes to posting regularly. Well, as the title says, sometimes life gets crazy!

I work part-time/seasonally for a wonderful local accountant. Most of my work comes during tax season, which has just ended. Well, mostly anyway. This year was particularly crazy! So my life lately has looked like this: (please excuse my messy floor!)

Also, we’ve had a decorating challenge going on at our church for our Sunday School rooms. I was leading one of the teams. Therefore any free time in the last six weeks has been spent at the church. But more on that in another post!

HOMESCHOOLING?

As for homeschooling… we’ve been squeezing in what we can. A little Life of Fred here, a novel there, some spelling practice strewn throughout our day. Mostly, we’ve just been out in the mud enjoying the sun… and a little rain as well.

Silly girl — Don’t you just love that hair sticking out?

Pirates ahoy! — Grandpy turned the play structure into a pirate ship

silly boy — Not happy about being on the ship. lol

Clean that boat — Waiting her turn to swab the deck.

sandbox — Mr Moo just wants to play in the sand

Walk the plank! Mr T built this all on his own!

There’s been some building: a plank, and an ant feeding tube. There’s been some mining for rocks and ore. Trips to Nanny’s to play in the pirate ship and sandbox. And there have been a few wheelbarrow rides. Best of all, there’s been dirt and mud!

Mr. T has also been working on a quilt. He asked for the Easter Bunny to bring him a sewing machine and set straight to work! As soon as mommy gets the bindings cut we will finish it up.

He’s also decorated his wall in quite a unique way. He was making “machines” on it, though I think most of those are gone now.

I wish I could say that life was going to settle down now that tax season is slowly coming to a close. Unfortunately, it won’t, as now we move into birthday planning for Lil Miss and Mr. Moo (they share the same birthday), Vacation Bible School planning and decorating, and planning for a women’s retreat. I do tend to thrive on being busy, but a little break here and there is nice! 😜😂

Homeschooling life…

Homeschooling

I’ve had a brief hiatus from blogging and homeschooling due to a family tragedy, but now I’m back!

We just purchased the next four Life of Fred Math books from Christian Book Distributors and have started in on Cats. Mr. T loves seeing what trouble Fred finds himself in.

Also, we are starting the Exploring Nature With Children year-long curriculum since my kids absolutely love being outdoors.

Life of Fred

Other than that our homeschool days have been filled mostly with playtime, little arts and crafts were thrown in there. We made some super cute facecloth bunnies for Easter. Daddy made the kids a giant cardboard castle. And we’ve been taking it pretty easy.

Of course, there has also been some time for photo filters with the two youngest!

What have you filled your homeschooling days with these past few weeks?

Free Holy Week Study

Homeschooling

Have you all heard of Skrafty?

If your kid is into Minecraft, (Mr. T is obsessed,) then you should definitely check it out!

Right now they have a free Holy Week Study We haven’t signed up for the subscription yet, but we plan to once Mr. T is a little more confident in his reading. I have only heard good things about Skrafty, so I feel very confident in recommending the free Holy Week Study, and I will probably help Mr. T with it as a good trial run for purchasing a subscription!

Sometimes, we just play in mud!

Homeschooling

Has your homeschool day ever not gone as planned? That’s how a lot of our days are lately. We always have the best intentions but sometimes it’s just not worth the fight or stress. This has left our school days kind of low-key lately.

We’ve found some more William Joyce books at the library so we’ve spent a lot of time reading. Mr. T has also fallen in love with The Curious Garden by Peter Brown.

After reading it the first time he is convinced we can grow a grass staircase in our garden. Should be an interesting experiment, and I’m not quite sure how he plans on accomplishing it.

The kids have also spent some time playing the Teach Your Monster to Read app put out by Usborne, who also make some of our all-time favorite books. Mr. T’s reading has really taken off since he started playing.

But, most days…. we just end up outside playing in the mud with rocks and sticks, and visiting the chickens. The kids love to dig in the mud patch which was left behind when we took down our pool. Mr. T has been telling me he’s digging a mining shaft. Mr. Moo and L’il Miss just love to find rocks and acorns to fill their toy car or the tricycle. We have a willow tree in our backyard which has provided the kids with hours of entertainment, and mommy with much shady relaxation. In a few weeks, the yard will also be filled with various bird songs. The Cardinals are already out singing, as are the chickadees and goldfinches.

As much fun as these days are, they do tend to provide a lot more laundry for mommy to do… yay!

How do you handle days that don’t go the way you’ve planned?

Adventures in Nature with Kids!

Homeschooling

Our homeschooling day today took us on an outdoor adventure… in the rain. The rain part was not planned. When I originally suggested the outing it was 10 degrees and had cleared up. By the time we actually left it was raining, 8 degrees and dropping. However, we continued on our adventure.

We went for a long walk and ended up at a little beach. Unfortunately, my phone died and we missed out on some fun pictures. Here are the few we managed before the battery died.

When we got home the kids filled daddy in on everything we saw: train tracks, dog tracks, bird tracks, funny rocks, ice rocks, logs floating in the water, a time capsule burial spot, sea grass, etc.

After some hot chocolate to warm up we moved onto some math with the second book in the Life of Fred series (I buy these from Christian Book Distributors). Mr. T loves these books! We read through three chapters. When we were through, Mr. T asked where a certain word was in the book. The word “mob” to be exact. A few minutes later he shows me this:

Gotta love it when he does copy-work without any encouragement or bribery. It’s usually quite a fight to get him to read or write.

Any tips on how to encourage a reluctant reader/writer?

William Joyce, a new favorite!

Homeschooling

Have you read any of William Joyce’s books with your kids?

Another homeschooling mama, My Little Poppies, recently posted on her Instagram about some of his books. We found a few at our local library and they have quickly become favorites. The stories are creative and silly and the illustrations are eye-catching and sometimes goofy. Perfect for capturing a child’s attention.

The first book we checked out was The Mischievians. My six-year-old, in particular, fell in love with it and we were reading it 2-3 times a day. Anyone who came to visit had to read it to him as well. He and my four-year-old searched for Mischievians around our house, made up new ones, and had hours of fun planning their own books like this. This led me to look for more of Mr. Joyce’s books.

The next two books we found were The Numberlys and Billy’s Booger: A Memoir (sort of).

I remembered seeing The Numberlys at a library event I had gone to where we viewed books nominated for the Caldecott Award. Mr. T loved this one as well, perhaps even more than The Mischievians. This book is shorter and is a fairly easy read.

Billy’s Booger was also much enjoyed by Mr. T because, well, he’s a boy and it has boogers in it. What I found most interesting about this book is that contained inside is a book Mr. Joyce wrote when he was in fourth grade. The story, or at least the majority of it, is actually true events that happened. The real beginning of an amazing writing and illustrating journey. Mr. T was incredibly inspired by this fact. He loves to draw and make up stories so he felt truly connected to the boy (Mr. Joyce) in the book.

We have a few more of William Joyce’s books on hold on the library and are impatiently awaiting their arrival. I would highly recommend at least these three books I have talked about, but most likely any of Mr. Joyce’s books. Especially if you have a child who is an outside-the-box thinker or very creative.

Have you read any of Mr. Joyce’s books? Which were your favorites?

All my adventures combined!

Adventures, Cooking, Crafting, Homeschooling

My husband and I recently decided it would make more sense to have one site for all of my writings. Instead of having a separate blog for each of my hobbies, we are combining them all in one place and just using categories to make it easier to find a specific topic.

Since I am no longer trying to manage a home business, it made the most sense to adapt my business website into a blog. So, that’s what it is happening! This site we will be under construction for the next few months while I figure out exactly how I want it to look. Please bear with us during this transition.

You may also notice that some of my posts will contain affiliate links now.

Ready for some adventure? 😊