Day 2!!

My favorite part today?  hmmmmmmmmmm.....maybe that Eli slept until 11 and we schooled about 3 1/2 without him? :-)

I guess I better say Writing.  Handwriting is an area that I have miserably failed the boys.  But this year I wanted to grab that bull by the horns and straighten it out.  So back in June I went to the CHEK homeschool conference in Louisville and met Iris Hatfield.  She has written New American Cursive  Penmanship Program published by Memoria Press.  Actually I had purchased the books before I met her...but once I met her and she gently talked me through the program...I felt empowered.  Thanks Iris!  It is our second day and the boys are loving it and begging for more than 10 minutes on writing :-)

She also introduced me to Twist 'n Write pencils...so we are off to a fun start on our writing.

word strips

The school year is winding down but I wanted to share this really inexpensive and fun phonics tool.

Paint chips!!
{{{thanks Walmart!!}}}

Word Worm!!

Just wanted to share Nates word worm!  When he masters new words me make a body part...it has really helped him want to work on his reading...and the worm is growing wildly!!

Magic Traveling Suitcase!!

Mrs. Wizzle may have a magic traveling school bus...but she is a cartoon charactor and I cam a real, breathing, likes to eat cold cereal mom! And the other day I found a beautiful leather suitcase at a yardsale for 50 cents...it came home with me and it is going to "travel" all the land of Imagination ;-)


I packed the suitcase with secret supplies....


We took our "school" outside to the nearest cool shady spot...

---yeah someone is wearing their pjs...hope you like their uniform!!

Then we climbed up in the learning tree to read the story of Madelines Rescue


Back to the desk...so that we would still be in school...we learned about France where Medeline lives...we enjoyed some french food...koolaid(wine) and cheese(cheese sticks).


Thus began our lapbook about Madeline and our study of France:




travel courtesy of Magic Leather Yardsale Suitcase and Imagination Voyages

22nd Day of School!!

I am so behind on posting about life, school, ect.....but here is a go!

So far we have had three field trips!

The first one was to the Louisville Zoo!  Funny but the boys favorite things about the zoo are the playground and the african culture exhibit!!












The next week we went to the Kentucky State Fair...their favorite exhibit was the 4H bug collections and the fossil digging from Mammoth Cave!


I was totally taken by the winning 4H cake!!


This Monday we went to the Air and Space Museum at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton Ohio.


I will have to find more pictures of that later :-)

Field Trip: St.Louis Science Center

Building arches...out of foam blocks

...pillow blocks

Sky walk across the interstate.  Looking down on the cars.

using radar to see how fast the cars are going

binochlars to see ahead

checking out the planet Mars

walking down the time corridar of Space exploration

Moon sauce in honor of Neil Armstrong...posted the pic for my cousins from Wapakoneta :)

Step on the scale and it tells you how much you would have to pay for a ride in space....{I didnt take a pic of my amount :)}

Oh yeah the Science Center is F*R*E*E!!!

Field Trip: St.Louis Arch

Nate standing in line to get on ride up to the top of arch.

Eli being kept from running around while we are waiting to go up.

Ben, Nate and Eli posing with Mark Twain.

We rode up in car 7 on the North tram and down on car 7 on the South tram.

Piling in to the car.

Leaning out to look over the city.

Looking down on the capital building.

Notice the curvature of the Earth!

Feild trip

Our annual trip to the pumpkin patch was the perfect feild trip to go along with our Autumn Treasures lapbook study that we are doing.  Also in science we are studying the five senses...and what more of a perfect place to use all of the senses than a farm!

First Day --of Homeschool Co-op

so Thursday was our first day of Enrichment classes with one of our homeschool groups.  Ben and Nate were both excited to get new backpacks and attend classes and hopefully make new friends.

Eli got to go too...he just used Nates backpack from last year.  All he had to take was a pull-up, wipes and a snack.