Our First Valentine’s Day

Happy Valentine’s Day people!!! What a fun day we had and it isn’t even over. I usually protest this day, in the commercial sense. I’m all about a day to focus on love. I’m all about some love. Usually I’m stressed trying to perfect valentines cards and card boxes and treats and such for two different classrooms. This year though, because of homeschooling, I was able to focus on us. I was super pumped to plan this day and focus on loving my people. I got to focus on one classroom, MY classroom, with my children. It was wonderful.

Jess had the great idea of staining some paper in tea to make it look old and having a good old fashioned scavenger hunt. So we did just that. The boys planned their own hunt for each other and with our help they found their gifts from us. They really enjoyed it and so did we! There is a lot of footage from this adventure that it’s own video will soon follow.

Here is how our day panned out.

I decorated the room and had it all ready to start our school day. I couldn’t resist the chance to decorate with flowers, hearts, balloons and a light box. Seriously this light box brings joy to my life. It’s the small things people. I put our to-do list on the big chalkboard today since we would all be working on the same valentine activities. We learned about the history of Valentine’s Day, did some Valentine’s math, reading, art and science.

All things Valentine.

We joined a group of over 300 homeschool kids around the country who wanted to exchange valentines cards. We got put into a group of 20 and we sent our cards out. In return we got 19 cards. I really wasn’t expecting the cuteness overload that arrived in our mailbox. We got mostly handmade cards and they were all just adorable. We hung them up in our room so we can look at them all month. Seriously, the cutest idea. The boys loved checking the mail and seeing their names on 19 envelopes. So much thought was put into them all too. Just. Love. It.

London and Carter were so eager to start the scavenger hunt so we did that first. Here are a few pics from that. Video coming soon.

I found some fun activities using conversation hearts so we started with that. They both immediately popped one into their mouth and then instantly spit it out. Ha! I informed them that this is why we are using them for activities, not to eat. No one likes to eat colored chalk.

The first activity was a little STEM project where you estimate and then count how many hearts you can stack on top of each other. They both underestimated themselves. Then, they built a wall however they wanted to using the hearts. We also estimated and counted how many conversation hearts would fit into the big heart I drew. London guessed 25 and Carter guessed 70. The actual amount was 131. They were WAY off.

Our math activity also included these little hearts. Carter used the hearts to show all the ways to add to make 10 and London used them to brush on some basic multiplication skills.

The both need all the penmanship practice they can get. Today, they wrote some valentines words in print and cursive. This was their least favorite activity but that’s ok, they still did a great job.

For science today, we did a really cool experiment. We used heart shaped cookie cutters, put them in a little milk…then we put some food coloring in the heart. After that, we put some dish soap on Q-tips and touched the food coloring. The food coloring rushed away as if the Q-tip had the flu. It was really cool to watch. They played around with the ingredients and had a lot of fun.

The last activity we did with the hearts was dissolving them in water to see what happened. I thought this may be a little young for them but they really enjoyed it and had all sorts of ideas for how to mix the colors, stir it to make it go faster and of course Carter volunteered to taste them all. Maybe colored chalk water is better than just colored chalk. Ha! Probably not.

We learned about the Fibonacci sequence and made cute Valentine art to go with it. I let them do it all themselves so it didn’t turn out exactly like it was supposed to. Isn’t that motherhood though?? They still turned out cute and hopefully they learned a thing or two.

After the math art activity, we took a snack break while I read two Valentine’s Day books to them. Then, they both made me the sweetest cards. The messages they both wrote, brought tears to my eyes. My sweet little boys.

The last thing we did was set the table for our fancy dinner tonight. I gave them all the things and they placed them all. They are super excited about this. We are having heart shaped steaks. Needless to say, we are all excited. Our plans for the rest of the night are, have a delicious candle-lit meal, watch a movie together and go to bed knowing we are all loved. Thanks for reading our blog. We hope you had an amazing day. Love to all!

We’ve got spirit, yes we do!

We have been quite busy lately which is why I haven’t posted a new blog. This is all new to me so I will get better, I promise. Here is a recap since the last time I posted. If you enjoy reading about our homeschool days, please subscribe for updates! Your support means so much to us.

I had no clue that there was a homeschool spirit week but when I found out there was, it was game on. We had a lot of fun with this. We had some field trips that week too so we didn’t participate in every spirit day. I mean, you can’t win em all right?

Monday was PJ day which is funny because in homeschool every day can be PJ day. We actually got dressed into our cute wintery PJ’s for the occasion. It was way too hot in Georgia to wear these to sleep in though. London and Carter looked super cute doing their work in their adorable pajamas.

 

Tuesday was out and about day. We spent this day visiting Dauset Trails Nature Center and Noah’s Ark. We had such a fun time! When we got home, the boys drew pictures of their favorite habitat. I love seeing their art work. London, being 11, has started getting insecure about his art. Carter wants the whole world to see his. I love them both!

 

Thursday was crazy hair day. They kept their hair in these crazy hairstyles all day long. It was hilarious.

 

One thing I want to focus on with homeschooling is teaching them skills they need to know when they are older. Every day, they have cleaning as part of their schooling. They each pick a room and clean it up or a certain chore, like the dishes. One day, we decided to wash the cars. I loved washing cars as a child and they really enjoyed it once they realized the water hose was involved. On a different day, London helped to wash our cow, Lolli. It’s never a dull day on the farm.

Another aspect of homeschool that makes me happy is the breaks we get to take to hang outside. There are so many learning opportunities in the outside world and I love taking the time to lead them in those opportunities. Here are some pictures of them hanging outside with the animals, enjoying lunch outside, taking a nature walk, and other fun pictures.

 

On our nature walk yesterday, we collected some pretty fall leaves. We pressed them and then made leaf rubbings. I included this with their copywork for the day. They turned out so cute.  Carter collected some acorns as well. We used these to create sight words. He of course had to have Flossy help him. This cat is his personal baby doll.  I love using nature as a part of their lessons.

 

At the beginning of the school year, I asked them each what is something  positive that they think about themselves. I wanted to take their statement and focus on it to help them internalize positive attributes about themselves. London chose, “I am a nice person.” Carter chose, “I am a kind person.” I try to focus on these and refer back to them as often as possible. I had them write it down and create a poster and we hung them near their desks as a visual reminder. I put their sayings on our light box too just to have it somewhere else in the room. 

 

Here are some pictures of them working. I love our homeschool room and the natural light it brings in. It’s one of my favorite places to be.

 

I also love the sunrise view I have out of my homeschool room window. It’s so beautiful.

 

Lastly, I wanted to share how we organize their activities for the day. They love having a visual of what they should be doing each day. For now, I write their activities on little post it notes and put it under their names. When they are finished with each lesson, they move their post it note. London moves his below, and Carter moves his to his locker.

Thanks for reading our blog update! Have a great week!

Our Random Past Couple of Weeks

 

I just wanted to take some time to update our homeschool blog. We are still slowly moving into our regular schedule so we have been doing some different things here and there.

I have been a nanny for the Weissglass family since Ethan was 5 months old. He is now about to turn 4! So crazy how fast time flies! My boys love going with me to their house to play. Little Ellie is obsessed with London and Carter loves baby Claire so much.

 

After playing at their house one day, we took our first homeschool field trip to Fernbank Science Center. We had a lot of fun. London is my little scientist so he loves going to any kind of museum.

London and Carter raced a penny, nickel, dime and quarter. We timed each one and made predictions on which one would take the longest to fall in. It was a lot of fun.

 

One thing I have absolutely loved about homeschooling is watching London and Carter work together. In a normal school setting, this would never be an option. I get to teach them about things at the same time and they get to learn from each other. For example, Carter was working on adding two digit numbers. With his little math brain, he has his own way of figuring things out. London really wanted to teach him the standard algorithm of adding with carrying and Carter was excited to learn from him. London showed him two problems and Carter had it down. London was very proud of himself for teaching him. Times like this are when this homeschool life really makes sense to me.

Then there are times when Carter says, “London I could really focus more if you would rub my back.” HaHa These kids….

 

We are still doing our read aloud of Judy Moody. I let them pick where we read each day. This is the time they get a snack and a drink and we relocate to “listen to mom read.” It’s one of my favorite times of the day. Here is a picture of us sitting on the front porch for read aloud time.

 

I met my dear friend Hilary when I worked at a school last year. We instantly clicked and have a lot in common. Her husband was living in Nicaragua and they were working through the Visa process to get him to the states. It was a long road but he finally got approved and was set to come to America two Monday’s ago. It was September 11th and Hurricane Irma was set to hit Georgia as well. Not the best combination. The boys, Jess and I made signs and prepared to welcome him at the airport. This was super exciting for us all. We were the first ones there! Unfortunately, his plane got rerouted to New Orleans because the conditions weren’t safe to land. We had to get back to our farm of no power to make sure the animals were alright so we weren’t able to welcome him home when he finally landed that night. I loved being able to include London and Carter in this journey though.

 

 

Another fun day we had was visiting GiGi’s yoga studio. My mom is a massage therapist and yoga instructor. I was having some serious pains in my neck and back so we went to visit GiGi. The boys were able to get a little massage too! They were in heaven. It was really a sweet moment.

I love homeschooling mostly because of the flexibility. We are able to do whatever we want to do. London really wanted to do these two experiments that he had seen online. So we did them. One was to take a syringe and needle and take the yolk out of an egg, then take the glow stuff out of a glow stick and put it back into the egg. This experiment was somewhat of a fail but was still fun. We did manage to get a tiny bit into the egg and then took it into the dark bathroom. The glowing goo that we did get into the egg was cool to see. 

Then London made this goo called Oobleck. It comes from the Dr. Seuss book, Bartholomew and the Oobleck. It’s a non-Newtonian fluid; it has properties of both liquids and solids. It’s pretty cool. If you try to punch it, it’s hard as a rock. But if you put your hands into it slowly and lift them up, it drips down like a liquid. Super cool!!

If you made it this far, thanks for tagging along in our journey!! I am excited about starting our new week and all the fun and adventures it will bring.

Homeschool Room

We spent many hard hours working on getting the “homeschool room” perfect and it is beyond that. It is, by far, my favorite room in the house now. It has such great natural light and we can do school all day without using any artificial light…one of my pet peeves of public schools. Just see for yourself….

 

This table, we got for free off the side of the road. Add some spray paint and a dab of wood glue, and you have the most perfect homeschool table. We found some old used chairs and painted those too. Such a great addition to our table with it’s accented legs. It makes for the perfect space to sit when I need to work with them one on one or all together.

I knew I wanted a big map on the wall. I just love the look of it and it also helps them learn about the map by being exposed to it every day. I found this one at Hobby Lobby. We are going to put it on some plywood and frame it, eventually. The two desks just add to the “school room” look. Carter’s desk came from Maw Maw and London’s came from a yard sale. They love to sit in them and they look so adorable. Added some decorations for our first day but they will probably stay a while because they are so cute.

This is our chalkboard/quote wall. One of my favorite sections of the room. Well, they are all equally my favorite I think actually. I am just so in love with it all. The light box is just added fun. I plan to let them each put their own words there each week.

The built in cabinets in our homeschool room are perfect for our needs. We have a place to store all the things. We added some pictures, some of my favorite books and some various other nicknacks.

 

The whiteboard area is useful for when I or they need to write on it. We added a few cute decorations and reminders of “Love is Spoken Here”, “You are my only Sunshine” and “Be Strong and Brave!”

These lockers just complete this room. These were an awesome find. Took many, many hours to sand and paint them but they are perfect. I like that it gives London a little of the “middle school” experience. They love having their own place to put their things with their own lock. They MAKE this room, in my opinion.

Our First Day of School

When I decided to fully immerse myself in the world of homeschool, I learned about something called “Deschooling.” Deschooling is basically the process of giving your child some time off of school so that they clear their minds and expectations of what school should be like. During this time, you try to learn about your child in terms of what they are interested in and how they learn best. We did this for the month of August and it really was awesome. We took a 4 day camping trip and did some other activities that we wouldn’t have been able to do if we were locked into a school. London and Carter were so excited to start school and see what all of this homeschool stuff was about.

I decorated our perfect room the night before our first day! I awoke before the sun to  make their favorite breakfast. We had “Maw-Maw’s breakfast casserole” and a yummy fruit salad. I found the perfect plates and napkins and we had a yummy little feast. Speaking of Maw-Maw, her and Paw-Paw and Aunt Katie joined me, Jess, Josh and Kristina to celebrate their big day. I wanted to make it just like other first day’s of school and even a little extra special to celebrate being home. After we ate, we took some obligatory pics and then said goodbye’s to our visitors. We then ventured outside to take some pictures on the farm.

 

This was super fun. As Carter was walking through the pasture with Willis, the donkey, and some of the horses, I just thought “#homeschooled”…..this is the life. My heart was filled with happiness and I just felt a peace about all of this.

Carter had to have his picture with every single animal it seemed.

Right now, our animals consist of:

~a bucketload of chickens and chicks

~3 horses-Moby, Rukka, Bella

~1 boarders horse-Bailey (SHOUTOUT to SOPHIA)

~1 pony-Blaze

~1 donkey-Willis

~1 cow-Lolli

~2 dogs-Bailey and Huck

~5 cats-Fluffy aka Flossy, June, Arlo, August, Chloe

I’ll have to do a separate post about all of these guys some day.

 

Back to the story…We came back in and decided to talk about our goals and objectives for this school year. We talked about what we were excited for in terms of our homeschool. We also talked about things we didn’t like about public school that we wanted to change. London said, “I don’t like when I’m working on something and really interested in it and I have to stop what I am doing because of specials or because we have to move on to the next subject.” I was so happy that he brought that up because that is one main goal of mine…to let them lead with what they are truly interested in.

Carter asked, “What’s the punishment for talking?” I replied back with, “Please erase that kind of thinking from your brain. You will not get punished for talking. I want you to talk. You don’t have to raise your hand to speak, you just have to be respectful if someone else is talking.” We then went on to talk about how there will be no punishments for any bad choices that are made. There will be consequences but that will be determined case by case. I don’t want them so hung up on what they CAN’T do. Instead I want us all to focus on the possibilities we do have. In visiting my children’s classrooms over the last 6 years and being in the classroom myself for more than that, it is obvious that directing behavior takes up a great deal of a teacher’s time. I won’t jump onto that soapbox just yet.

We will definitely be implementing a positive reward system but we are still brainstorming ideas for that.

After our brainstorming session, we then started working on our journals. I let the boys decorate the front of them with cute stickers. We wrote a 5 sentence summary together about our day so far. Both of my boys have really bad handwriting…like BAD! They weren’t taught in Kindergarten how to properly form letters….ugh. So one of my focus points for this year is to teach them how to properly write. Today, we spent some time doing copywork. It isn’t the most glamorous activity but I really want to rewire their brain to write correctly. Another concept that has me excited is doing read-alouds. I want to take time each day to read part a chapter book aloud to them. During this time, they can draw or color or do handstands, the only rule is that they say excuse me if they need to interrupt. Today, Carter asked if we could relocate to the guest room to read in there. ^insert another reason I love homeschool^

I didn’t want overwhelm them today or make them hate this crazy idea their mom had to homeschool. So I let them have some technology time before lunch. They decided to get on Minecraft and play against each other AKA “do a lot of screaming at each other.” After that, we had some lunch that consisted of left over pizza. Winning.

We concluded the working part of our first day by doing a little copywork and we tested out a spelling/grammar website. Brains were overloaded after all of that letter formation. *que Beyonce voice: “All my letters now let’s get in formation.”

 

We ended the school day with some outside play and homemade popsicles then headed off to Carter’s soccer practice.

Wow! What a day. I am exhausted but even more excited than I was yesterday. It’s going to be an amazing year.

And so our adventure begins…

WE ARE HOMESCHOOLING.

I remember being in my education classes in college and telling my friends that I was just getting a bachelor’s degree as a backup. They all thought I was crazy but I really didn’t plan on getting a degree and actually working. I wanted to have a family of little girls and I would homeschool them all. Funny how life doesn’t always (ever) go as you planned. Obviously, I was blessed with two boys and I wouldn’t change it for the world now. The whole homeschooling idea has always been on the back burner of my brain but honestly, I was intimidated by the thought of it. A lot of factors had led me to believe that I wasn’t qualified enough to teach my own children.

They were wrong. It took me a while to realize that but there it is plain and simple…I am THE MOST qualified person to teach my children. After all, no one loves and understands them like I do. Do I have it all planned out to perfection? Absolutely not. That’s the beauty of it though. I get to learn what my children are interested in, I get to nurture their learning styles, I get to teach them life skills through the use of the real world.

So, here we are. It hasn’t really been public knowledge until this very post. I am starting this blog for a few reasons. Mainly, because I want to document our days with not only pictures but words as well. I also want to keep our friends and family up to date on our adventures because we have an amazing village of support behind us. I have read countless blogs and a few books and the have all really helped me forge through this new world. I have fully immersed myself in all things homeschool. Hopefully, a future homeschool mom will find my blog and will realize they too are the most qualified teacher for their child.

Stay tuned for more updates. I appreciate you all.