HYPER!!!!!

Okay, today my children were hyper. I don't know if it had to do with their sleep, their food, or the basic fidgety-ness of feeling the weather turn colder. But yowza! They were so very silly and loud. Short attention spans were in residence. And truly, their behavior bordered on the annoying.........but STILL I am glad to have them home with me. I have asked them to do better tomorrow, and I have given the two older kids a cleaning task as a deterrent to further silliness in class. Aunt Nova is getting a dog crate for me to give to her friend, and the kids are cleaning the crate out for her. Nice! I really didn't feel like doing that. They are doing it joyfully (and with much silliness) out on the deck. Perfect time and place for silliness!

School started a little late today--the kids were up late and I had a Bible study last night, so everyone was just a bit tired. So Bailey read Henty during breakfast, then the kids did Math while I unloaded the Amazon Fresh pre-dawn delivery groceries. Next, Bailey did preschool stuff with the littles while I did Grammar lessons with the olders. Each had a separate Grammar lesson today and each also started on their new Vocabulary notebooks.

For Geography, we looked at Ethiopia. We have many friends from Ethiopia, and indeed their connection to our Grandmother makes them nearly family to us. So we looked at a typical Ethiopian family and the kids could see that the people have very little in terms of worldly possessions. The children have no toys to speak of. Animals are a very important element to the Ethiopian family, and the oxen were actually listed as that family's most prized possessions. The thing that struck us most was that, in order for the kids to attend school, they must buy their own nice clothes and school supplies. The cost for those items is approximately 1/3 the average income for the family for the year. Astounding! Another problem is that the language they know and use in the rural schools is not the one they need in the city to get a job. Tough stuff. The kids enjoyed locating Ethiopia on the map and the globe, and we also looked at India again in those places, to compare size.

Last stop today was Science. We finished our sun chapter, so we looked at solar eclipse info and learned about color waves. We studied the concept of how our eyes interpret color based on which color waves are absorbed versus the ones that bounce back. Fascinating!!!

Okay, the rowdy ones need Mom to sit on them. (Not literally, of course, but you know what I mean.) Another day down!!! :)

My Tuesday was a Monday

Haha...well, Monday went so great that we just HAD to have a sorta rough Tuesday! Oh, it was fine, just had a bit of a tough start and got derailed by the unexpected. I had ignored an early email from a family member the day before and had almost caused some difficulties for having done so, so I did NOT ignore one today, and then I got distracted. But I managed to acquire a super fabulous bday gift for my hubby (a Kindle all his own) and also started the ball rolling for a group excursion to the Mariner game Thursday night. Looks like Dave will take the 3 older kids, along with Jerry & George, Eric Letsche and 2 of his boys, and maybe 3 Kumley folks. Should be fun for all! I will stay home with the cute little girls. Bails has to work, so she can't go...boo hoo!

I got to have some fun time with my preschoolers today working with pattern blocks. They also did their Math meeting time...getting better and better at that. I was amazed to see how much Beau and Geneva are picking up of the 23rd Psalm...terrific!! It's fun to hear them say the phrases in their cute little voices.

Bailey read the Grammar script to Kat and Dane today...it was a long one! After, they wrote paragraphs. Kat wrote about her favorite kinds of stories and Dane wrote about his favorite games.

We were low on groceries (Amazon Fresh is due tomorrow morning), so we hopped in the car and went through the McDonalds drive thru for lunch. Bailey read our Henty aloud along the way, so we got our history done on the move! The Danes are attacking the Saxons here and there, pirating quite a bit, so the Dragon is back on the open seas. It has gone ashore in France during a storm. Looks like Paris will be held in seige in the next chapter.

We ended the day with Lit, so no Latin and no Science. Tomorrow will be better!! But for being "not the best" today, it really wasn't all that bad! :) I'm sure glad I had Bailey here--she helps me by listening to me and encouraging me. Can't pay enough for that kind of help...but don't tell her that. (wink, wink) (are you reading this, Bails?) :)

Ah, yes....MONDAY!!

Okay, so there I was last night, truly looking forward to my Monday, but then I forgot to set my alarm! The kids, who are now able to contrast these structured morning days with the not-so-long-lost lazy mornings of summer, did their best NOT to wake Mom. Ha! I finally stirred at 8:45 am and jumped out of bed, ran downstairs, and found Kat & Dane doing their Math lessons while Beau & Geneva danced around in the office. No one had started on breakfast and no one was in their school uniforms. Sigh...well, at least nobody's gonna miss the bus, right?? :)

Kids had a quick cereal breakfast and got dressed and started on Bible verses. Bigger kids continued their Math while I nursed Ansley. We actually only got started 15 min later than usual, so it worked out fine. The big kids had Chapter 3 Grammar tests, which I had prepped the night before. Both did great! The littlers are splitting a little on their cutting/gluing work...Beau is improving AMAZINGLY and is cutting right along the lines. He knows where to glue what, and he is able to work on his own quite a bit. Geneva, on the other hand, easily tires of cutting and her attention span is much shorter than Beau's, despite her new age (turned 3 on Sept 25!) So Bailey is helping her more and trying to vary her sitting time a bit. Both Beau & Geneva look forward to their Phonics dancing time each day, and today was no exception. It's so fun to hear them dancing and singing their letters and sounds!

Henty was exciting again today. King Alfred had hidden away on a secluded island while the enemy took over his land. He and many other Saxons were biding their time until it might be possible to rise against the Danes. Edmund's return to England meant a revival of spirits for all, and after much training, fortifying, and arms manufacturing, they planned a revolt in the spring. They did much good by attacking by surprise, but the Danes remained smug as they retreated toward their fort at Chippenham. The Saxons performed well under the king's leadership and they routed the Danes, though they were greatly outnumbered. The much smaller remnant of Danes returned to Chippenham until the Saxons forced them out with a seige. Hungry and weak, the Danes surrendered. Rather than send them away, King Alfred chose to allow the Danes to stay and peacefully incorporate themselves under Saxon rule. The Danish king chose to embrace Christianity, and so this battle turned the tides of the future for England. If they had lost, England would have remained Danish. Since they won, England was restored and yet some Danes remained, intermarried, and continued a settled life. The next chapter is entitled, "Four Years of Peace," so there is more excitement coming! We are just past halfway through the book, so it will be interesting to see what comes next. I am especially interested to know if Edmund returns to the north to claim Freda as his bride! (Am I a romantic, or what?!) :)

For Science, the olders wrote papers about the sun and its effects on the eyes. They also drew pictures for their Astronomy notebooks.

I got to spend some time with the preschoolers while Bailey read Robin Hood. Beau is definitely doing well with his numbers, and I enjoyed reading aloud to all 3 littles. Ansley finally objected, however, and had to be put to bed. Beau and Geneva particularly enjoyed the "Hippos Go Berserk" book and they themselves enjoyed getting up and "going BERSERK!!!"

FUN MONDAY!!!!

I LOVE MONDAYS!!!

Okay, I don't think I have ever said that before, and I'm not sure if I will continue to say it much longer, but right NOW, I DO love Mondays. Monday means Bailey comes in the morning and we get to start a new week of fun and learning. That might sound corny, but since we aren't piled up in textbooks all day, the learning IS fun! In fact, I am seriously tempted to do more living books for more subjects...but I'm going to keep on with what we've been doing for now.

New addition: Spelling Wisdom! I got this from the SimplyCharlotteMason.com site...it looks really good. It's basically 140 lessons (in each book) with an excerpt from great literature...the child is to study the short piece and then identify words within that seem tricky to them. Study those words. Then, write out the excerpt from dictation. Anything that is spelled wrong is immediately covered up and corrected so that the child doesn't spend any time looking at the wrong spelling of the word(s). Cool!

I'm really interested to see what happens next in Henty...the last chapter was the best so far!

Okay, off to bed I go. Wait--it was just 11pm...how'd it get so late??? :)

Time flies...

I can't believe it has been almost a week since I last posted. I'm trying to get to bed earlier, which means I don't make it into the office late at night as much. But things are going so well!!!

I have a dream job--there is no doubt. I am SOOOO loving seeing my kids all day! Bailey and I just go along as a team and things are pretty smooth and the whole process is endlessly interesting!

In Henty, the Saxons grounded their ship on Danish soil, which led to the Danes capturing Edmund. Thankfully, one of the leaders of the group had been spared by Edmund earlier, along with his daughter, Freda. Ahh....wilt there be romance in our tale? Methinks yes!

In Science, we've been studying the solar system. Today, we mounted balloons to the ceiling that hang down like the planets and show the basic scale of all planets with reference to each other. The only one that is really off is the sun because we didn't have a balloon big enough. But we made it as big as we could (good job, Dane!)

The kids did REALLY well on their first Math tests and Grammar tests--woo hoo! They are plugging along in Latin, but Geography is a big favorite. We looked at India yesterday...featured a rural family. They hardly owned anything. Plus, no TV, radio, or computer...the kids were amazed.

Dave has been out of town since Tuesday night. He returns Saturday, the day after Geneva's birthday. We will celebrate her bday with the Kumley family tomorrow, and then the kids will stay at the Kumleys because I have a 40th bday party with Jenny S. It's a sleepover!

So off to bed I go...

Co-op Day! (Well, Park Day w/Co-op)

Until our Hillside Co-op starts up on Oct 16, we seem to be doing "park days" on Fridays. We aren't really planning to participate in park days at this point since the parks are often far away for us and we really want to get comfortable with our home schooling, being the newbies. I don't want Fridays to be wasted school-wise for us since we have so many adjustments and adaptations to deal with first year. HOWEVER, since park day was scheduled to be at OUR HOUSE today, we of course participated, and it was so fun!!!

3 families were out with illness etc., so we had 5 families involved. That meant about 21 kids were here. My kids did Math in the morning before the folks arrived, but the rest of the day was spent playing out in the woods and enjoying time with our friends. The kids get along so fabulously...one of the highlights for Dane was that 2 of the boys brought their pocketknives, so he felt fully justified in carrying his around too. I saw lots of kids spending time in the treehouse and swinging out over the ravine on the new rope swing. The ladies mostly sat out on the deck together under the sunshade...we enjoyed our sandwiches and listened to the kids play. Pretty relaxing!

At 3, Bailey came to watch the kids so Dave and I could go sign our mortgage refinance papers. The happy news is that our payment is slightly lower than we expected and we also don't have to make our first payment until Nov. 1. Pretty cool! We also get some cash back from our original lender, so that's pleasant.

Dave is headed out in a few minutes to celebrate Dale's birthday with the rest of the co-op guys. I think he's pretty worn out, but he is trying his best to get to know the guys.

I don't think I wrote about yesterday's school day--it was very good. We started 1/2 hour later than usual since we'd been out to the musical the night before. We didn't do Latin, so that meant we got back on schedule pretty well. We finished reading our first chapter in our Science text, and we got through chapter 6 in Henty. Kat has nearly finished memorizing her poem for English and both kids spent time writing out sentences of the 4 main types and also doing some journal time. Good stuff!

A & B Days

I have decided that my home school days have been "A" and "B" days so far. The "A" days are the days that have gone great! The "B" days have meant a few bumps along the way. I am hoping we don't degrade to "C" and "D" days, but I suppose that is likely to happen at some point. Yesterday was a "B" day, but today was an "A!"

We did our first day of Geography study. The kids had been talking about Japan and calling the people "Chinese," so I decided it was time to look at those countries and observe some of the differences. We have a book called, "Material World, A Global Family Portrait." It is really fascinating! We read about the "average family" in both Japan and China. The most interesting differences were that China is SO much larger, has SO many more people, and that about 75% of the Japanese are urban dwellers, while only 25% of the Chinese are urban. The kids enjoyed looking up the countries on the globe and the wall map. Aunt Gretchen has offered to come do some special stuff on a Geography day, so that will be fun to plan.

We have gone forward a few years in Henty, to 875 A.D. Things are not looking good for the Saxons, but King Alfred is working hard training his men to defeat the Danes.

We began our Science text today. It is Apologia's "Astronomy" textbook. I read some aloud and the kids seemed to find it very interesting.

The kids are doing well with their Bible memory module. I think they have 3-4 verses pretty well memorized. Even Beau and Geneva are doing well with this.

Kat is memorizing a really nice poem from her Serl book. We studied the 4 main types of sentences today and talked about classifying the different words in the sentences. Tomorrow the kids will do another entry in their journals. I'm happy to see how much they enjoy the journal time, but I was amused at how much they did NOT want to recite their Grammar jingles. I think the jingles (Shurley Grammar) are cool--an easy way to memorize the info. They complained some about it, but I think they were relieved that they didn't need to stand up and do it like they had done in school.

Beau and Geneva continue to love dancing to their Raceway and Phonics songs. Today we danced in the foyer, and there was much joy! What a precious age they are.

Tonight, I got to go to the Paramount to see "Wicked" with Bailey, Hahnna, Carter and Mattie. What fun! I really didn't enjoy the book, but the musical was very fun. The sets and costumes were fantastic, and the music was beautiful.

Dave and I finished watching "Quantum of Solace" tonight, and I must confess that I am a bit confused about the story-line. Sigh. I need to pay closer attention to these "guy" flicks. I try to do a little school prep now at night....not the best choice when taking in 007. Oh, dear...it's late. I've gone backwards. :)

Tough Weekend...

Got two pieces of hard news this last Sunday. Our good friend, Jeff, has been diagnosed with leukemia (chronic myeloid). He got blood drawn Saturday and was called in to UW Med on Sunday. VERY SAD! He and Rene have 5 kids, and they own their own business and home school. Prayers of the saints are going up EVERYWHERE, which has been extremely encouraging to see. These people are loved!

As for school, it was an interesting Monday. We had an 8th-grade girl here as a "helper" since she was suspended from school this week. She did a great job cleaning the floors for me and hanging up loads of baby clothes (oh, and folding 2 loads of laundry--yay!) I was amazed at how nice it was to have a girl that age getting things on my list done while I taught my children...felt very efficient!

Beau and Geneva do not have the fine motor skills to make letters yet. I knew Geneva would be challenged with it, but I don't think Beau is quite ready either. They both did GREAT at the Math meeting calendar, however! They picked right up on the color pattern, and they managed to say the date. They are also doing well with the Genesis memory verses.

"The Dragon and the Raven" by Henty continues to be very exciting! I am enjoying studying that time period this way. The kids also enjoyed the creation science video about dinosaurs. I even managed to get my workout in today during Latin...I did Turbo Jam Fat Burner and I have been suffering a headache tonight to celebrate. I ALWAYS get a headache first day back, so I'm hoping it clears soon. I am hoping to see some benefit from the Shakeology drink I have for breakfast. It should be a very good thing...hard to see the results clearly, however.

I'm dull tonight (probably due to the headache) so off to bed I go. Oh, look...the time is even earlier than last time! That's progress!!

Bottom line: I am REALLY loving schooling my kids. The very, very best thing of all is that I am with them during the part of the day when I am fresh and cheerful. So we are having a constant party...of course, having Bailey here helps make the party run smooooothly....:)

School is FUN!!!!

Haha...looks like my posts are creeping slightly earlier and earlier each night...good thing...I need more rest! If I keep this up, I'll be able to put myself to bed by 10pm....oh, my...can't really imagine that happening anytime in my adult life. But miracles do happen, right? (The miracle would be me WANTING to go to bed by 10, in case you don't know me well.)

Should keep this short since we have company staying (Raoul & Jamie--yay!) We had such a super-fabulous-terrific-outstanding school day today that I can hardly believe we were learning. But we were! THEY were! One high point for me was when 4-yr-old Beau looked up from his puzzle play on the floor during Henty read-aloud time and asked, "Mom, did you just say that the guy had a SWORD???" Hahahaha...YES!!! A sword, a shield, a battle...awesome stuff! All in 870 A.D. Three days ago I could not have told you ANYTHING about what life was like for people who lived in 870 A.D. Today I could. Cool! Also very wonderful today was that 9-yr-old Dane made us all waffles (Eggo), scrambled eggs, and apple slices for breakfast. Woo hoo!!! I heard someone in the kitchen when I got up, but I was so pleasantly thrilled that breakfast was ready for everyone. Good job, Dane!! Then, after Bible, I went up to nurse the baby and when I came back down, the older kids had begun their Math on their own. Nice! Bailey took the pre-schoolers today, so I got to enjoy Language Art stuff with the olders. Kat read a story and narrated it back to me beautifully. Shurley assignment today was journal-writing...I caught both kids writing in their new journals a number of times later in the day...on their "own" time...sigh...I'm liking it.

VERY exciting news today was the birth of Chesterton Merryman Hyink. That's baby #5 for the Hyink family, and I got to take them their first meal. I cried when I held that gorgeous baby boy...born at 5:14am, so he was SO BRAND NEW!!!!!

Also attended a cocktail party at the neighbor's house, as a courtesy. I'm not really in the market to be a direct seller right now. I have ENOUGH going on, I'd say...;) The company is Trump Enterprises...customized vitamins. We'll see where it goes for Val.

Time for sleep! Tomorrow is a free day...we are going to go ride the Seattle Ferry to Bainbridge Island with the Langin family (visiting from Kentucky). Maybe we can look up some stuff about the ferries after and keep having fun doing schooooooooooool! :)

First day down!

Yes!!!! We had our first day. Was it perfect? No. Is that okay? Yes. Will there be worse days and better days? I expect so.

Took a bit of effort to drag the summer slugs out of their beds this morning...they were excited about school, but it still seemed early to them...8:15am, that is. We got to the office for Bible verses and prayer by 9 rather than the planned 8:45, but that was okay. Math was a bit of a tough start because I had to get Kat keyed up with her DIVE Math program on the laptop...couldn't figure out how to un-mute the sound...the whole thing was delayed so that ran into our Grammar/English time. Dane flew through his Math pretty fast and well. I worked on "wetters" (that's how Geneva says "letters") with Beau and Geneva in the basement. We practiced recognition of a-g, lowercase. Beau was only confident about "b," "c," and "f." He seemed to really like "f." Geneva had a hard time keeping her buns on her seat. The write-erase board stuff by Crayola was fun for them, but they didn't try to make any of the letters.

Grammar went very well, although we were behind on time. Dane studied a picture and answered questions, and they both did some work with synonyms/antonyms and vocabulary. Kat whizzed through that stuff, while Dane struggled with finding all the vocab words in his big dictionary. We could hear the pre-schoolers hooting and whooping in the basement, where they were doing magnetic motor-skill work with Bailey on this cool thing I found at the Lakeshore Learning Center.

Next we read aloud from Henty. Pretty old English, lots of awkward phrasing and words, but I thought it was very cool. Once the story picks up, I think the kids will engage more. As it was, Kat and Dane did pretty well listening. The little ones cut pieces of paper up with their new scissors, but they were pretty quiet.

The next subject was Latin. I was supposed to work out then, but the baby woke crying and I realized I hadn't worked out the feeding times right. Oh, well...will try to do better tomorrow. I set Kat and Dane up with their DVD tutors, but we got way behind here as well since Dane had an intro before his lesson, and then he didn't realize to stop watching before lesson 2 started, so he went too far. Kat was a little overwhelmed by all the work she had to do with one lesson, so I may try to make each lesson go for two sessions. Flexibility! How nice it is.

Lunch was next. We at closer to 12:40...so 40 minutes behind at that point. Bailey took the baby outside and the kids went out to play after eating, so I was able to eat and clean up in the quiet...nice break there. As soon as I loaded the dishes I called the kids back in for Lit.

Started "Robin Hood," and it was fabulous. The kids really enjoyed it, and even though Pyle's old English is a bit difficult, we all thought it was fun. This one is on the Kindle, so that's cool too. We were supposed to do Science last, but since we were so behind with our day, we decided to postpone that.

I took Geneva and the baby up for a nap, and I crashed for at least 20 minutes. It was very rejuvenating! Then I went on with my day...Costco, dinner, shower, birthday party for a dear friend WITH a dear friend...nice. But now it's late again, and I probably shouldn't have written all this, but I wanted to get it down while it was fresh. I have no wittiness in me after this day, so off to bed I go.

Last day of summer...

Yup. This is it. Tuesday is the last hurrah for our sweet, lazy day summer. And yes, I do need to start going to bed earlier. Why on earth is that so hard??? I know why...it's because the house is so quiet that I can actually hear myself think for a change. I don't long for my days to be quiet--I love the fun of our noisy house, but when evening comes...too bad I need sleep. I can get a lot done at night.

So what's my home school plan? We have hired our dear Bailey girl to help make our days run smoothly. My hope is to do school (lunch & playtime included) from 8:45am until 2pm. I plan to start with Saxon Math (3rd & 5th graders) and do pre-school/pre-K with the 2 (almost 3) and 4-yr-olds simultaneously. Bailey and I will eventually switch back and forth between those duties (if all goes well). Next is Shurley Grammar for the olders and playtime/naptime for the youngers. Then READING...sure to be one of my favorite parts of this whole thing. We will be starting with a G.A. Henty book called, "The Dragon and the Raven." Historical fiction...I hope it helps the kids (and me) remember stuff better. Then Latin for the olders, roomtime for the youngers, and workout time for me. Going to have to lug this mommified body down to the basement for some DVD fun...thinking of starting with Turbo Jam. Next is lunch and "recess." Then back for more READING...Literature this time. We will be starting with Viking Adventure or the Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, depending on which comes in at the library. (I can't believe I ordered a hold for Geography but forgot to order for the hold for Lit!) Last of all is Science. I am still working that one out. I have Bob Jones 6 in hand...but I am waiting for another book I might like to try...

Okay, time for sleep.

Happy at Home

I recently attended my 20th high school reunion...yeesh, how on earth did I get to be 20 reunions old? Well, okay, only 1 reunion old, actually, since I didn't attend any of the priors. But a guy there asked me how many kids I had, and when I answered 5, he seemed to be thinking really hard about something. "Oh, you must stay home," he announced. "How could you possibly afford a nanny for 5?" And why would I want to? Ha! If one chooses to have 5 children, one most likely has a strong desire to spend lots of time with said children, which certainly must alleviate "nanny-neediness." Yes, I stay home. And I love to stay home! I have a B.S. degree in Foods and Nutrition, and that fits well with staying home and feeding 5 growing people and one very fit husband.

But now staying home has a whole new meaning for us. We (I) are (am) embarking on a new journey...we have taken our kids out of the local (and beloved) Christian school and are going to try home schooling. It is a daunting prospect, but I, for one, am SUPER EXCITED!!!! I am writing this blog for myself...to document this journey. Hopefully, when my motor begins to wind down, I will be able to go back and see how excited I was. That might just be the momentum I need to continue going forward.

So that's it. I stay home. I home school. I am, without a doubt, Domestically Employed.