1st day of School At Home!!

Each year in the past, the day before school starts, we do a treasure hunt.  At the end of the treasure hunt is a treasure chest full of school supplies.  What is the link?   Well learning is a treasure.... I know cheesy, but its true to me.  Usually I make a map and we do the whole hunt outside and the girls have been known to dress up a bit.  This year, we had to change that just a bit.  Being on modified (thank heaven!) bedrest I could put together that huge event.  But we do have tons of fun new supplies so we did a modified treasure hunt of hot and cold inside our home....

The loot!

Ok!  So bed time!...

Here is our homeschool command center.  It looks a bit cluttered but i needed everything to be in sight at reachable by the girls so that I don't have to get up 1000 times.  Just to the left of that small open bookshelf is the armrest of our couch.  Where I am supposed to be sitting :)

We went to the front yard to take some pictures ~ it was so delightful to hear the school bus and not have my kids on it!  It was also AMAZING how  much smoother our morning was when our commute to school was just from the kitchen to our bonus room!  Love it!

I am biased, but dang! I like these girls!

Totally posing at their desks... they were so excited, which of course was thrilling!

We started off with our opening routine... primary song, prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance, Calendar, and then we read a daily email from Brave Girls Club.   They have a darling truth email sent every weekday little girls and one sent for older girls.  The girls loved it and Emma wants to print it out and hang it up every day.

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Then we did a first day of school book, we spend 45 minutes decorating the cover so we have to finish it today.   While we worked on that we listened to a book on cd from Story of the World about Charlemahne.  Emma was so fascinated  that Charlemagne didn't know how to read or write.  And because of that, he started school and made sure his children learned how to read.

We worked on our Classical Conversations memory work.  Learning the continents, the Oceans, A history sentence about Charlemagne being crowned Holy Roman Emperor.  We also worked on skip counting and introduced the 7 biomes.

Next was time for Halie to practice writing and work on her reading skills.  The pencil in her mouth was killing me.  It started behind her ear but kept falling out, so she stashed it in her teeth. 

Here is Emma doing her Math U See and enjoying a little smoothie.   (left over from breakfast)

Halie had to get her writing just right.  We are using the Bob Books, a little writing that goes along with each book that I found at teachers pay teachers, and Happy Phonics.

Next Emma worked on her cursive and then read to me from No Flying in the House by Betty Brock.  In the meantime Halie was supposed to be doing her math, but I lost the supplies!  So she just played with blocks.  Emma found Halie's math stuff while they were cleaning up at the end of the school day so today we are all set!

We breaked for lunch at this time and then....

We worked on a paper mache globe.  Yesterday we did the paper mache part and today we are going to paint it in the morning and finish it in the afternoon with the continents.  Tomorrow Emma is going to label!

We finished off our day by me  reading a shortened Original version of Repunzel.    We read that because Charlemagne was from Germany and the story of Repunzel is a  German Folk Story.  We are going to read a German Folk Story each day this week!

Hard parts of the day?  Halie wanted to listen to the Classical Conversations music CD while Emma wanted to listen to Story of the World, so we alternated.  Halie didn't enjoy the memory work but mainly because she didnt get to have her way.. go figure!  And Emma didn't want to do math.   We broke things up by interjecting fun Brain Breaks throughout our morning.  After lunch is pure fun stuff so no brain breaks needed!

All in all?  An outstanding success!  I LOVED being unplugged all day. I turned my phone to silent, and have all of my other "stuff" put on the side during our school time.  Once we were done, the girls wanted to watch one of Halie's phonics movies (mainly because I always say yes to those).  While they were doing that I wrote our schedule for today. When their 1/2 hour show was done they went outside to play.  (for some reason they didn't want to, but I forced them... so mean)  While they were outside I returned phone calls and read my novel.  Then it was time for dinner.  As First Day of School tradition dictates... we went out for ice-cream after dinner.  Yum!

Well, in 15 minutes they are going to be awake... so I gotta go!

The Beginning of Summer or ... finishing off the school year

Of course with the coming of summer accompanies the anticipation of cold yummy sugary treats.  We couldn't wait for school to finish to indulge.  

So we rode our bikes and toys on over for the first summer delight!

Halie, my sister and I made a random, surprise stop at a fun nature center.  of course this is the only pictures we took.  Halie was THRILLED.  Its always fun to make a 4 year old soooo happy so easily.

Miss E did an amazing project on foxes.  The clay sculpture sits in a place of honor on my desk, only a mother could truly treasure such sweet things.  I am so proud of her and how hard she worked to make learn and present these cool little animals.

We will certainly miss Emmas teacher.   She was a blessing for us this year!  Emma sure adores her!  

Big News X3 ......

Are you ready for it? Are you? AM I?

News #1 I am pregnant!!!

wahoo!

News #2

nope, not twins :)

I am on bed rest ...

not wahoo but expected

I am 11 along weeks today.

News #3

We are a home educating family now!!!

Am I crazy?

I think so.

But this might explain the MAJOR lack of blog posts.  Even though everyone that reads this probably knew 2 out of the 3 big life changes that were mentioned above.

for the past 3 weeks, since my contractions began, i have been slowly but busily getting my home set up for bed rest and homeschool.  Now that I am pretty much ready (which is good, since I am now down) I will have more time to update this, here, blog. Over the next few days I am going to catch up from the all the summer adventures we've had.  After that I will be posting what we are doing at school and any outings if I can swing them.  I ordered a wheelchair yesterday, so hopefully I can do a little more.  Like go to church and our homeschool group.

We just had stake conference.  Of course the messages were geared right for us.  "See your trials as blessings."  And that is exactly what I intend to do.  7 months of bed rest? a trial? nope, I'm thinking it will be a blessing.  Help us focus on what REALLY matters in life.   Teach my sweet daughters so many life lessons.  Homeschooling? Hard? Probably, but I am thinking this will give us, (my daughters and I) something to do together while I am on the couch.

We are pretty much all geared up and ready to start our first day of "school"  - Pretty exciting times around here.

But if any of you are looking for something to do ... please swing by and say hello!

 We will welcome visitors anytime!

Any sacrifice is worth having children.  And any sacrifice, after they are born, is worth it to help them grow confident, loved, and treasured.  I love my sweet girls with all of my heart and soul, Miss E needed more that what she was getting at public school, I hope and pray that my Father in Heaven can help me supply her with what she needs!  I am amazed and grateful for the life which our Father prepares and guides us through.

Farewell Summer, Hello Schedule

I am always so sad when school starts.  I just LOVE summer.  I love the long days playing in the water.  I love to have no agenda but time with my children.  I must admit, My girls are THRILLED with the beginning of school.  Miss E got the teacher I have been praying for all summer.  This teacher is FANTASTIC!!! of course what Miss E is really excited about is ...  Friends and friends.  I guess thats a good thing.  Especially Miss H is excited for (pre)school, she is IN LOVE with having "important" things to be doing.  I am just grateful that I have only two mornings with them both away from home.  Those mornings have been quiet and nice but I am not ready to have my girls away all day, is that lame?  I just miss them!  I tried the homeschool thing this summer, but that CERTAINLY didn't work, Miss E does NOT like to have me for her teacher, we get along MUCH better when she is learning school stuff from someone else.  Its good to be honest with yourself...

Anyhow, here is first day week of school pictures!

I love how Miss E (in the black) thinks she is darling.   It's a good thing to have such thoughts.  There are enough people in the world telling you otherwise.  

Notice her shoes, Grammie, Nanna, Dad, and I went to about 10 different places looking for those.  We were about to say, "No shoes for you!"  Finally we realized she wanted sparking ballet slippers and we were trying to get her PE tennis shoes.  She needed both since all she had were flip flops and some Saltwater Sandals.  Can't wear sandals to school!  So once we figured that out, our shopping was done in ONE store. 

 Communication.  Its a killer!

(Notice Grandma in the background)

Yesterday after Miss H came home from (pre)school, and I sat and held her while she slept.  

Actually that is a lie!  

I went in to sit and snuggle with her, while she was watching a movie, and who do I find? Yep, Kyle was holding my sleeping child.  What a Punk!  I wanted to do that.  So I just sat myself right next to him and snuggled on in.  Kyle and I sat there for about an hour, savoring that little moment.

I found this yesterday...

On a separate note... last night we had Back-to-School night AND an adoption function, the first of four this month... can I just say, that its so hard to go to those things.  I want another child so deeply.  I feel selfish.  But it's the truth.  I am so blessed with my two girls.  But OH! to have a large, rambunctious, loud, fun, tumbling family.  My heart yearns for that.  Yearns for another child (children) to love and cherish and raise.