Fishing: It's not a Total Waste of Time

Last year my dad gave us some of his fishing poles and lures because Steve wanted to try and fish with Drake. I think our first fishing experience was back on June 28, 2008. It was a cool, windy day. I wasn't so sure Steve knew anything about fishing. He took forever to get the fishing poles ready for us all to use. Once they were ready to go, some of the excitement had died, but we tried it out anyway to see if we could catch something.

We tried and tried to catch a fish but didn't have any luck. It was quite disappointing. Fishing takes a lot of patience, something I will admit many times that I lack.

Here Steve has his hat, but it wasn't long and it blew right off of his head and into the lake.

It was a good thing we had a fishing pole, so we could retrieve it. I knew that thing would come in handy for something!

Fast forward to October 18, 2008. We took a road trip to the Mississippi Palisades State Park. Once again, Steve was having a little trouble rigging up the fishing pole. Drake thought it would be funny if I took a picture of him falling asleep while waiting. It is funny. If fishing doesn't teach us patience, waiting for the pole to be ready will. Ahh...my poor husband. We didn't catch any fish that time either.

This year Steve and Drake have gone fishing a few times and still didn't catch anything, but something incredible happened over this past weekend! Drake actually caught two fish!



Here he is on April 25.

He caught another on April 26.

Now that Steve has the fishing poles ready to go, there is no longer any wait time: just throw on a worm and go. Yay! I'm happy that they found something to do together that they both enjoy. I think that as boys get older, they really need that bond with their dads. They need that time to hang out and talk about things. Whether it's catching fish (or not), playing ball, or riding bikes, it's the act of spending time with each other that matters most.

Time can't be returned once it has past.

~Our Garden~

Thanks to my sister-in-law, Penny, we will finally have our very own garden this year! Well, it's not a garden quite yet, it's more like a patch of dirt for now. ;-) Penny and her husband recently bought a brand new tiller and let us borrow it. It did the job well! I'm excited to start planting! Although I do like to try and eat organically when possible, with the economy the way it is, it's hard to spend the extra money. I have also been in a bad eating slump since last fall. Motivation to make healthier choices should come easier with the garden. In the summer months it seems a lot easier to eat healthy. This week the planting will begin!

Want to Learn a Foreign Language?

I recently came across byki: a website that offers a free download of their Language program. I'm not sure how complete it is, but we have used it a few times. It's really fun! It seems to be similar to the Rosetta Stone approach where you see the pictures of each thing as well has learn how to write the language.

History Pockets, Journals, Tops Experiments & More

Since the school year is almost complete for us, I thought I would share some of the things the kids have worked on. Each child has their own large binder to put special projects in. I use plastic sheet protectors to keep the work looking nice. This is the first year we have started something like this, and I hope to continue. I like that it gives all of us a feeling of accomplishment; that we did actually do something throughout the school year.

Drake did lots of Tops experiments the past two years. This year he learned how magnetism and electricity work. I don't have any of those to put up, but I do have the corn and beans experiments he did last spring/summer.

When the seeds first sprouted, he had to draw and label the different parts.

Keeping a daily record is very important because the plants progress fast.

This year Drake did Sonlight Core 4 (the second half of American History). He learned a lot about the Civil War and World Wars. He also learned about different inventions of that time period. We used the Civil War History Pocket to add something fun and crafty to the mix. Instead of making a pocket out of construction paper, we slipped each project into one of the sheet protectors.

Below is a Sonlight LA 4 assignment. Drake had to think of something he wanted to invent and try to sell it to people by creating an eye catching ad for a magazine. He also had to create some kind of logo for his product. His invention turned out to be a car that, when driven, can actually make the world a better place.

(Notice the not so good spelling, ex: ded instead of dead. This is before using the All About Spelling program. I will post our progress with spelling sometime in the future.)

Here we have Ava's binder.

This year Ava did Sonlight Core 1 (the first half of World History). She learned about ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, India, Africa, Europe, and China and how the people lived many years ago. To go along with her Sonlight studies, we chose the Ancient Civilizations History Pocket.

The picture on the right shows a scene Ava drew of herself coming back from war, galloping through a Triumphal Arch.

The "Words to Know" section provides four vocab for words, which are great for review.

Here are a couple of Ava's journal pages. She can write about anything she wants to.

These last two are assignments from Sonlight LA 1. In this first one, she had to write a simile and draw a picture to go with it.

Here she had to write a poem about a color. Each line had to begin with that color, and she had to use her five senses to describe it.

There you have it. A little insider look at what we've done this year.

Drawing Fun!

Today was a beautiful day! The kids and I were able to get outdoors and enjoy the sun. I thought it would be fun to have them keep a nature journal. Charlotte Mason recommends that children have this type of journal, so they can draw everything they see in nature. It will help them later as a reference and would be something fun to look back on.

They quickly gathered their art books, pencils, and colored pencils and hurried outside. We took a walk around our house to see if we could find anything interesting to draw. I felt slightly limited since we live in town. I think a park or somewhere out in the country would have more to offer. Though it is only early spring, and everything (no matter where we go) is still a little brown and most plants are just now starting to shoot up out of the ground. However, we do have some crocus flowers in our front yard. I just had to ask them to draw those.

They are so pretty!

I know it's not quite Mason's teaching; I should have let them choose what they wanted to draw. Next time I'll let them pick anything they want. This time it was my choice. ;-) As they worked on their drawings, we heard lots of birds chirping and saw a few cardinals. It was quite enjoyable to do something different for a change. We also took our Miniature Magnifier/Microscope outside with us. I love that thing! We looked at our chive plants, sand, seeds, moss, and a worm.

~Drake's picture~
His drawing focused on showing not only the flowers but the bush beside them too. He was careful to draw nature exactly as he saw it.

~Ava's picture~
Her drawing focused directly on the flower and also included detail of the crumbled leaves that were scattered around on the ground.

I hope to incorporate more fun days like this into our school!

Easter 2009

This past weekend we had a lot going on: Easter eggs to color, a wedding reception to attend, food to make for Easter events, and last minute trips to the store. I tend to stress out easily when extra things get added to my usual daily routine. Saturday we had a late start to the day because my husband and I were up until 1:00 AM trying to get things done. I wanted to make a chocolate swirl cheesecake and have the kids color the eggs before we left for the wedding reception later that night. I managed to cook the eggs quick and put the cheesecake in the oven. By then it was time for lunch. When you’re in a rush, there is nothing better than leftovers, so Steve opened the refrigerator and pulled out the leftover chicken stir-fry we had two nights before; then proceeded to heat it up in the microwave. We use the timer on the microwave whenever we cook, so he had to subtract the time the food was heating and reset the time so I would know when to get the cheesecake out. While this was all going on, I decided to head to the computer since I had a few minutes. It wasn't long after, when I began to smell the cheesecake and asked Steve if the timer went off. Well, I guess it did and neither of us heard it. We were left with burnt cheesecake! It was horrible. I put the blame on him, since he was the one messing with the timer, but I know I should have been checking on it instead of sitting at the computer. I asked him if he thought I could take something like that to our family gathering on Easter. He didn’t think so. I wasn't so sure either. How embarrassing; however, I am not one to waste. I don't like the thought of throwing things out espeically when I think of how much money or time was invested into it. Now, I know cheesecake isn't that expensive to make, but with the way the economy is, unessessary waste can not be tolerated in our house.

Meanwhile, the kids were able to color the Easter eggs with their much favored Pokemon theme.

I ended up taking the cheesecake to our family gathering, and told everyone it was a new recipe I tried called Burnt Cheesecake: pathetic, I know. Hey what can I say, it was family, you can serve them anything. They are supposed to love you no matter what right? It tasted fine really. It just didn't look very appealing.

We didn't take many pictures on Easter, as I later realized. But, we did get a really good one of our handsome little nephew Tristan! It turns out that beads are a delicious addition to Easter dinner! Who knew?

Crochet Anyone?

Recently, my friend/sister-in-law, Erin, taught me how to crochet. I've seen some of the things she has made (as well as things my other relatives and friends have made) and thought if they could do it, maybe I could. Ava wanted to try and learn too, so she came along with me to pick up Erin. We went to the local fabric store to purchase some supplies. Soon after, we were headed to Erin’s house to get started right away. First, I needed to learn how to make the slipknot: easy right? Ha! Not so! I think we spent about a half-hour just on that part. Who knew making a knot could be so hard? I was worried that maybe I was incapable of this crochet stuff. I’m not known for having much patience, but I plugged along anyway. Ava struggled as well and soon became bored. I think she expected it to be a speedy process. She was hoping to walk out of there with her very own handmade purse; that definitely wasn’t going to happen. Defeated by the needle, Ava thought it was time for her to go home. Steve picked her up, which left me with the rest of the night to try to produce some kind of result. I was taught the basic single chain, a double chain, and some other things that I can’t even remember. I can say that I do know what a single and double chain is, but ask me anything else, and I’m still clueless. I did manage to make a few things. I don’t know what they are, so I let Ava have them. She was happy I brought home something, and I'm sure she'll find a use for them. I do hope to get a little better with practice, so I can actually make something notable.

Here are my creations...try not to laugh. ;-)

This was supposed to be the start of a purse, but as you can see, the ends never quite matched up. I started over on a new one; it's turning out a little better.

Happy Easter!

This is the day we celebrate the resurrection of Christ! Or is it? I wasn't too surprised when I googled the word Easter and found countless images of colorful eggs, bunnies, candies, baskets, and various spring-like pictures. It appears Easter is just another holiday in which we overindulge ourselves with food and accumulate more "stuff." I suppose it is just another Americanized way of life. We gloss over the true meaning, throw in some candy, visit with family and we're good. We don't give thought to the fact that Jesus Christ died for our sins and arose and that it is a BIG reason to celebrate. Our sins can be forgiven. He paid the price!

I hope everyone has a great Easter and can take some time to reflect on the true meaning of the celebration.

Books Galore!

Since our new school books came, I spent some time the past week organizing our bookshelf. I did have all of Core 3 packed away and decided that it was better to put everything out. Now, I know compared to some of you, this collection is quite small. Most of these books are from Sonlight Cores 1-5.

The Great Turkey Walk, Gone Away Lake, Little Britches, Moccasin Trail, and Old Yeller were some of Drake's favorite books this year. I enjoyed reading Lincoln: A Photobiography to Drake and cried like a baby on the part when Lincoln was shot. It was sad. Of course I knew he was assassinated, but it was all in the moment I guess.

Understood Betsy, The Usborne Time Traveler, The Usborne Book of World History, Magic School Bus at the Waterworks, Follow My Leader, and Greek Myths are some of Ava's favorites.

The George Muller Book is one of my favorites from Core 1 history. I'm happy that we will get to read more in the series.

Core 3 books

The Sign of the Beaver is Drake's favorite book from this core. I think I was all choked up during that story too.~New books that we can't wait to dig into~