McCall's Pumpkin Patch

Today we went to McCall's Pumpkin Patch with Julia's Montessori School. The kids got to select their own pumpkin, for the first time at a real pumpkin patch. However, they have big plans to grow their own pumpkin patch next year. =)

They actually picked out their pumpkins in two or three minutes! We were the first back on the hay ride. The rule: pick any pumpkin you want, but YOU have to carry it!

This is a picture of Ms. Beth, Julia's teacher and most of the kids in her class. Lucas is not her student and she is missing two of her own. As you can see, Aidan is a leetle bit nervous!

There are more things to do there on the weekends, but today we fed the goats, played in a Wee Western town complete with bar and jail, played in a corn box (not sandbox), took a hayride, climbed a very tall hay mountain, went on a tunnel slide and did a kids maze. A few other things, too, but you get the drift. We had some lunch and met a couple ladies and their kids who were using American Sign Language and made friends with them. They told us about a play group at a deaf school in Albuquerque that is free to the public, and we will be going! If we are going to learn to sign, we need to make friends with people that sign, too.

I'm glad we got to go, we were going to hit the apple orchard but it sold out in three weeks and closed. Ooops! So much for bushels of apples and cider! Gotta find a new source so I can do all my apple baking.

A chicken update: I finished some nesting boxes over the weekend, which was very amazing of me, since I was sick. But those girls are over 20 weeks now, and could lay anytime. Then again, they might wait til spring. No telling. But I promise, the first egg will be a huge deal, and you will see many pictures of it! =)

These nesting boxes are stained and ready to go, but I have to do some renovations in the coop before I can screw it into the wall. For now, it just sits there. Who knows how long til I get the next phase done? Maybe next time I get sick. =) And here's a pix of my girls with chin and cheek whiskers. Cute, eh?

I have big plans for this weekend, I want to post some of my favorite fall and winter recipes. I also plan to try my hand at apple strudel. Time to turn to hearth and stove and crank up the baking, stewing and souping. Especially the baking! My wall sign that appears this time of year?

"Gobble til you Wobble!"

A-men.

A Little of Everything

Well, it's a Thursday night and the weekend is in sight! I feel a little beat and ready to just relax a bit. I like that about our Friday's: no plans! Everyone is home, and it's our one normal school day when Julia can be home for school in the morning.

Today was our morning at Wildlife West, and this time I left Aidan at the Montessori School with Julia. No issues there, he would like to live there if he could! Miss Beth seemed to adore him from the day we met her, and had many positive things to say about him today. =) And the fact that he wasn't potty trained yet didn't deter her at all, and happily Aidan did not reward her with wetting his pants, either.

We had some excitement at WLW today, however. Myself and a senior feeder were just going in to Spirit's cage (a young, female bobcat) and it has two gates for extra security(they all do). I met the feeder in the "air lock" and passed her the food. She went into the cage to clean it, and I went back out. We both left our gates ajar... Spirit came stealthily padding out and down the path, straight at Lucas! He yelled for me, but Christie, an even more senior feeder told him to be perfectly still. He did as he was told, and I went to him and locked him in a different bobcat cage (but no worries, this bobcat was secure in a different enclosure) and Lucas was out of harm's way. I grabbed the food, lured Spirit closer to her cage and when she saw her own open gate, she ran back inside. WHEW!!! Lucas explained to all how he was so scared he was shivering! Luckily, Spirit was hand-raised from infancy and is still very young, so she probably isn't too much of a danger. But we don't like to find out!

I thought I'd post some picture of Lucas and Aidan's room, and the space decals I've used in there. I also have a shot of Lucas's private desk space, he loves to "save" everything!

And here is Lucas's little school corner. He likes the idea of having a place to invent and experiment with his scientific endeavors.

Earlier this week, I saw this sherpa blanket thingy at Costco and could not withhold it from myself. It is so cosy and everyone thinks it belongs to them. I have to remind everyone that it's MINE and I'm nice enough to share. Mom rarely gets blankets of her own! And this is my first, although I admit it does look good on Aidan.

Julia got some new PJ's too, some cute, ruffly stuff that mommy could have made, but with all the things I need to do, I just decided to take on thing off my list for now.

Things hanging over my head:

Nesting boxes to build

Several school organization projects for teaching stuff, reading, school room and the activity closet.

Water collection from the chicken house roof (already bought the materials so I can't scratch it from the list)

Painting ~ I still have Julia's room, hallways and my room. THEN I can do things like bathrooms and laundry rooms =D woohoo!

I have baby blankets to finish before the babies graduate from college

Patchwork denim comforters for the boys bunkbeds

aaaaaaand I WANT to sew for Julia! Hanna Andersson is my new inspiration! Lots of A-line and trim, I like the simple, elegant look.

Chicken update: as noted above, they need nesting boxes because they will begin laying any day, now. They are big and lovely girls, they don't look so scrawny anymore. They have some attitude, but will do anything for fresh corn, heh heh. I have a cardboard box in the coop for them until I can design a nesting box that will be attached to the inside of the coop permanently. Garden: I have green tomatoes on the vine. Oh, and lots of basil. And that's all!

So, how do you fit it all in? Caffeine? No sleep? Super organized? "Just that type"? I dunno how I can make it all work, but I'll let you know how it goes!

~ttfn

Swingin' with School

Tonight I feel encouraged. This week has been a very good week for homeschooling! I have the right materials, I have the right approach and I even have the right timing! I have all of these things by accident and lucky chance, but you can bet I'm not letting them get away!

Our school week begins to pile up quickly. Julia is at her Montessori class three mornings a week. We spend Monday's at Explora where the kids can do Science of all kinds all day. We pack a lunch and play on the playground at noon. Then back inside for more hands-on stuff! I never have to say "don't touch!" or "get down!" or "don't break that!". It's very refreshing. It is also a very worthwhile day spent for their education.

On Thursday's we are trying out a new thing; volunteering at Wildlife West, a last line of defense between animals who cannot be released into the wild and death. Today I brought the boys, and it was very amazing and creepy the way the two cougars watched Aidan. They couldn't take their eyes off of him! And they'd follow him around as much as they could with a fence between us. We are learning (and it will take awhile!) how to feed the animals. We go with two other senior feeders and learn the ropes. It takes a year of consistent following to become a feeder yourself. The non-contact animals go into an "air-lock" while the feeders clean their cages and put out the proper diet. We got to go into the bear cage and look for scat. Yay! =) Also, javelinas, bobcats, and cougars. Some of the contact animals are racoons and wolves. Yes, WOLVES!!

But the thing that is giving me the most joy is that when we are just at home doing the "regular thing", we are having fun! We will add more but for now we are working on language arts, writing, reading, math and sign language. Each one is a small segment packed with pith, interest and work. Once, Lucas began to express weariness with writing, but only had two more words to finish! As I pointed this out, he quickly got back to work and finished up. I love to see the effectiveness of small, packed lessons. While I collect the materials and prepare for the next lesson, they get a small break to play or snack or whatever. Then back to something fun. The math is very cool, very hands on, very reasoning and concept oriented. All my kids like it when it's math time; therefore I do as well.

Chores have suffered, I must admit. But I spent four or five weeks getting a good chore system going and I don't mind if it slacks off for a while as we get a good school rhythm down. I am keeping the kitchen clean, this is a miracle and causes my husband to caress me more often. Kitchens are my weakness, as my family and friends know all too well. I hate doing dishes! But I love a clean kitchen, so what can I do?

All in all, I'm happy about school, I'm happy about feeling more competent, more motivated and more successful! It is hard to justify homeschooling when you aren't sure what in the world you are doing!

The curriculum I'm using right now is:

Math: Making Math Meaningful, by David Quine

Reading: my own "expertise" with Guided Reading + Phonics

Lang.A and Writing: Susan Wise Bauer of The Well Trained Mind fame

Sign Language: American Sign Language DeMYSTiFieD, by Kristin Mulrooney, Ph.D.

Science is Explora, of course, and for Geography, I'm just starting with map and globe basics for now. We'll delve into history a little more fully in a few months.

Julia has been dazzling us with her Montessori prowess with the binomial cube and now the trinomial cube which her teacher says she's close to mastery with! Today she copied a complete sentence of her own narration, which was more than I expected of her. I was so proud! She told me tonight that she wants to go to school forever at Miss Beths. =) I was happy to hear that! All in all, things are coming together in a way that leaves my doubts behind and that is a very nice place to be at.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

First Day of School

And the homeschooling mother sends her daughter off to school!

I've always wanted my kids to have some exposure to the Montessori method of learning, and in our very own "backyard" we have a private school with a properly trained Montessori teacher! So I conferred with the hubby and it was decided: Julia can go three mornings a week for her Kindergarten year. I'll school her the other two days and afternoons with the boys, but she'll get that great start I'm hoping for. Aidan can go next year.

Brothers want to be in on it, too! So far no jealousy, which is good.

And here she is, outside Ms. Beth's school before we dropped her off. She didn't cry or complain!

So today is day two of her new Kindergarten and both days she comes home telling me she did "nothing" and that it wasn't very fun and probably she won't go back. Then, later in the day I hear about stories of children around the world and the foods they eat; I hear about letters she drew; I hear about painting; I hear about dress-up; I hear about the calendar; and most of all I hear plans for what she's going to do tomorrow. =) Seems pretty typical to me!

Honestly, I'm a little worried that she's going to refuse to go at some point. Then I'm not sure what I'll do, since we are obviously homeschooling and she's got the option to stay home. But hopefully three mornings is enough to get invested and not so much time that she feels like she's away from Mom too much.

Still stressing about curriculum at this point. I need a good math curriculum! Badly! I want just the right mix of it all, and plenty of manipulatives, critical thinking and skill building. But I have no idea what any of these things are out there. Sigh... I did "ask Mom" and I've got some leads there, so maybe I won't be high and dry for long. I also want to learn sign language this year, but we're also going to start Spanish and I worry about being too ambitious.

I've got several lovely sets of books I ordered... I'll have to post pictures of those. Plus, I've got a couple sets of computer resources for school covering all subjects, including learning 16 languages, if we want!!! =) (Which, of course, we WANT to do right this minute!)

Another quandary about Julia and Aidan as well... I was assuming that Julia was in Kindergarten this year, only to discover that in NM public schools, children who are not five by September wait til the next year. So she'd be in Kindergarten next year. And I was also assuming that Aidan would be in Kindergarten next year, however, he will have been 4 years old for 5 months when he'd start Kindergarten next year, which is kinda pushing it for being so young! So I guess my kids aren't as stair-stepped as I thought. So what do I do? The reason I'm wondering is because Aidan is already sounding out 3 letter words. Julia still can't tell me the name and sound for all the letters in the alphabet. Aidan can say, sound and sign them.

Here's my "sort of" solution: I'll provide teaching and opportunity for learning, especially where they show interest or seem to be lacking. But since they are young enough, I can take it easy if any frustration even starts to rear it's ugly head. I also think that PLAY is critical in the development of children and want to make sure that they are all getting opportunity for unstructured, creative play. Is that balanced enough? Should I just let Aidan go for now? Or should I take advantage of his seeming interest and ability?

So many questions, so much at stake! =)