Advent Unit Studies

B,D,C & A are enjoying this seasons Advent studies.

Bartholomew's passage is book two in a trilogy of Advent stories written by Arnold Ytreeide. Mr Ytreeide is a fins storyteller who cares deeply about spiritual growth in families. He is also the author of Jotham's Journey and Tabitha's Travels.

Bartholomew's Passage offers readings for each day of the Advent season. It is a family story and devotional that gives you the opportunity to create a seasonal tradition of storytelling in your home as it helps you and your family prepare for the miracle of Christmas.

This is our Advent wreath that we look forward to lighting every year.

This years Advent calendar

And yes...the Lego Advent Calendar is probably the kids favorite:)

As always...Enjoy your kids

The Reason For The Season

This year we decided to decorate outside very simply. The nativity tells the simple truth of Christmas. At night the nativity is BEAUTIFUL. It lights up blue and has gorgeous white stars shining all around.



This is a picture from our annual trip to La Salette. B, D & C are posing with baby Jesus and the little drummer boy. The lights there are just fabulous. We had a great time.

Gobble, Gobble

Check out the turkey cakes D and I made for Thanksgiving. We had so much fun, and they were actually very easy to make. Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Enjoy your kids!!

Getting ready for Christmas

Yup, Christmas is coming!! We are excited. We already have the car radio tuned to Oldies 103, which is playing nonstop Christmas music:) I just got an email saying the Christmas cards we ordered have been shipped, yup we're ready. In case you were wondering, this is the picture we chose for our cards!!

Gotta run...Enjoy your kids!!!!!!

First semester coming to a close

Wow, can you believe it...we are almost done with the first half of our school year?! Next week we'll be finishing our unit study on Betsy Ross Designer Of Our Flag. The folowing week we'll be doing Thanksgiving books and activies and then we'll be on break.

December 1 wil be the beginning of our advent studies. We focus on enjoying our family, crafts, the true meaning of the season, classic holiday litereature, crafts, baking, crafts, music, Christmas specials on TV and did I mention crafts??We always have so much fun in December. And guess what? Kids learn when they are having fun, go figure..lol!

Last year we had one of those days that was just about perfect. We went to a college production of the Nutcracker (it was wonderful) on a day that was warning of a blizzard. When we left it was cold but clear skies. We got home and started making Rice Krispy treats in the shape of gingerbread men. As we were eating our treats and drinking cocoa, we looked outside and saw that it was snowing. It was gorgeous. We threw on our winter gear; coats, hats, mittens, and boots and went out for an adventure. We went sledding, built snowmen, had snowball fights and just had a grand old, freezing cold time :) When we finally came in to thaw out we decided to order Chinese for dinner. We spent the evening cuddled up on the couch, eating take out and watching TV together.

The best part of that day is the fact that the kids are still talking about it! Some may say, where is the educational value in that? Let me tell you the kids learned so much. On top of that they laughed, loved and created unforgetable family memories...that is something they'll never get in a classroom. I am so looking forward to the memories we'll be creating this season.

As always. enjoy your kids!!!

Princess Hair

OK, I was inspired. Another FIAR mom posted pictures of her daughter's renaissance hair. It was beautiful! I realized I had never even attempted to braid D's hair. So, I decided on a double french braid style. D loves it and looks just like a princess. I'm so glad other moms are so willing to share their creativity!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

My little trick or treaters were all decked out this year!! Here they are at Nana and Papa's house.

This will be our first year attending a trunk or treat. The kids are so excited. I'll post tomorrow with more pictures and stories of their night.

Hope you all have a fun halloween!!!

Introducing...E!!!

E was born on Tuesday, October 13th, on her brother's 4th birthday. C is very happy with his birthday baby!!
She weighed in at 7 lbs 9.9 oz. and was 20 inches long.


We celebrated C's birthday at the hospital.

Here are the cupcakes I made for C. He loves spiderman. These were a labor of love as I literally was in labor while making them!!

Lego Star Wars Day

What a fantastic day!! The kids had a great time. Believe it or not, the entire day was free of charge. The event was put on by Titcomb' s Bookstore in Sandwich and held at the Oak Ridge School in East Sandwich.
10-10-09


Boba Fett is B's favorite character. He was thrilled to meet him!!

Some friendly storm troopers

Sew what?

We had our first sewing lesson today. We are in the final chapters of The Boxcar Children. Violet and Jessie sew a sock teddy bear for their little brother Benny. We decided to sew something too! Since it's October, and since it was such a simple project, we decided to make ghosts out of an old t-shirt. The kids did a great job. We hung them from the ceiling fan in our class/play room. They make great Halloween decorations.

Wilton Course 2 Graduation

Last night was course 2 graduation night from our Wilton Cake Decorating Class. The top picture shows D with her cake just after receiving her certificate !! She learned the basket weave design, rope border and how to make royal frosting flowers...pretty intricate stuff, to say the least!!

The smaller picture is my final cake project, made with the same techniques as D. We had such a great time in class. Our instructor, Teri is just wonderful. We are planning on taking a small break from classes, since the baby is due any day. But we hope to take courses 3 and 4 after the holidays.

Both D and I highly recommend these courses...they are fun, and teach a great skill!

What, no school today???

Yesterday was the first day that I ever encountered this experience. Hubby was home in the morning, so I left the youngest 3 at home with him and took B out to run some errands with me. At first, I didn't notice anything, but then I started to realize that people were looking at us...hmmm. Finally, one man turned to B and said, "No school today?" When B said there was, he responded, "Oh not feeling well, huh"? Again, B's response was not what the man expected. I broke in and stated that we homeschooled. His response? He turned to B and said, "my son has the same sneakers". And then he walked away. I guess he didn't know what to say, lol!

We went to 3 other stores. Two people questioned why B was out and about and not at school. One even asked him if he was in first grade. We said no fourth. This seemed to confuse her. But she smiled and said she thought he looked older than a first grader. I guess she thought only young children could be homeschooled. At Borders, I thought, "here we go again" as the sales person approached us. To my surprise she simply wanted to inform me that it was teacher appreciation week, and that any educator even homeschoolers were entitled to a special 30% off. At last, someone understood!!! It's amazing how some people view the world through blinders. Just because public school is the norm, doesn't mean it's the only way (or even the best way )!!!

BOO!!!! It's October 1st

We LOVE Halloween. I promised the kids we'd decorate as soon as it was October. Well, today is the first and look at what we've done, lol!! Of course the kids did their assignments and chores first, but I've never seen them work so quickly :) Not that I'm complaining!!

What a Hoppy Bunny

Our bunny has a new home, thanks to her chicken friends! When they moved into their new home they left behind a lovely house and a large penned in area. Fluffy was so happy to be "free" today (under the kids supervision of course). She ran around her yard and had a field day. When she got tired she was happy to hop into her home on her own.

D helped me clean the whole area. We also placed chicken wire under Fluffies enclosure to protect her from any predators. D was happy to help since one of her chores is to feed and water Fluffy every day.

"Play"ing with dough

Family Fun Magazine had an article on making all natural play clay. My kiddos LOVE Play Dough but go through it very quickly. So, I figured this would be a good opportunity for us to learn how to make our own...plus help us save some of our hard earned "DOUGH". We made the brown clay, because I honestly didn't have any beet juice (makes pink), paprika (makes orange) or turmeric (makes yellow). I did have cocoa, so brown it was!!!

All you need is:

* 1 cup flour

* 3/8 cup salt

* 1 tbsp vegetable oil

* natural dye

Brown -3/8 c hot water & 4 tbsp. cocoa

Pink - 3/8 c hot beet juice juice from 15 oz can

Orange - 3/8 c hot water & 1 tbsp. paprika

Yellow - 3/8 c hot water & 1 tsp. turmeric

Have fun playing!!!!

All cooped up...

I've gotta say, our chickens seem quite happy with their new coop!! We've had the girls since they were one week old. They are definitely pets for B, D, C & A. These chickens are used to being carried around and played with...they are so friendly. Anyway, their old digs were getting too small for them, so it was time for a new coop. I found this homemade bunny hutch on Craigslist and thought it might work. Did it ever!!! What a find, plus it cost much less than any other coop we looked at. Needless to say Ivy, Robin, Spiderman and Rose are some happy chickens for sure.

Speaking of Labor

In The Boxcar Children, the siblings have no parents. They have to take care of themselves and take on many parental roles. This got us discussing chores and the roles that we all have in a famiy. B & D have chores, but we decided to make them a little more organized/disciplined. Each child made a helping hands chore chart. They have craft sticks with individual chores listed on them. As they complete a chore they deposit the corresponding stick into the chart!!!

Happy Labor Day and enjoy your kids.

Saturday Game Play...

Good Morning!! It's Saturday and for us that means video game day,lol! The kids are not allowed to play video games during the week, so it seems like they are always a little too eager for Saturday to get here :) We actually had to work out a system to keep the gaming fair. B, D, & C get their names pulled out of a hat to determine the order in which they get to play the game of their choice. A timer is set for one hour (EXACTLY) so nobody gets more play time then the others. CRAZY!!! But luckily, they are the same way when it comes to home schooling. I've got to say, I have been blessed by a great group of kids!!

Let Them Eat Cake

Well, D and I have signed up for Course 2 of the Wilton Cake Decorating classes. I'm proud to say D has quite the flair for baking, decorating, basically the whole nine yards. Seeing as she was only 7 when we took the first course, I couldn't be any prouder of her skills. Check out some of her wonderful designs!!

D's first cake was the Italian flag, she made it for the Festival Italiano in Newton. She

made the double clown cake (yes those are made out of frosting) to lift her Nana's spirits when she was in the hospital. And was proud to present her Nana with the Welcome home cake upon her return from the hospital. You'll
also see her Course 1 Rocks cake, that she made at the completion of her first class.

Enjoy!!

Give me shelter

The kids are learning about various forms of shelter. In The Boxcar Children, the children turn an abandoned boxcar into their home. We've discovered that there are numerous forms of shelter all around us. Farms can act as a shelter. Historically, castles are shelters. And culturally, there are different shelters...such as teepees. B and D had so much fun making their models.

School has begun!!

We were so excited to start school this year that we started two weeks earlier than planned. We started up on August 17th. So we just finished our second week of school today. We are using Beyond Five In A Row as our curriculum and loving it. The kids are reading The Boxcar Children and really enjoying it!

We belong to the FIAR forums on line and have signed up for the third year in a row to take part in the ornament exchange for Christmas. This year our ornament will be about The Boxcar Children since it is the story that we are working on right now. The kids will design and make the ornaments. I'm sure they'll be more than proud to post pictures of the completed ornaments when they are ready.

Anyway, enjoy your kids and happy home schooling,

Krissie