I haven't posted in a couple of weeks:(  I was sick and so were both kids so we were on a bit of a modified school schedule.  In the middle of that, was my birthday.  Not the most fun birthday.  Here are a few pics of the kiddos at the pumpkin patch.  I need to get the good pics off the big camera.  These are just from my phone.

Jaron working on counting by 10's.  He picked this up fast! 

Addison loves to draw.  She copied this from one of Jaron's cutting activities.

Addison is on schedule to finish her 1st grade reading/grammar the week after Christmas with Math not far behind.  I think we will be adding some supplemental activities before we dive into the 2nd grade stuff.  I am due Dec. 19th (hoping for earlier) so we will probably slow down or take a little break from school when baby gets here.  We will also be doing some Advent activities in December:)

Jaron continues to LOVE cutting!  He is doing very well with his Hooked On Phonics Kindergarten Program.  He loves the sticker chart and is so proud when he finishes a reader.  His writing skills are coming right along too.  Any time we get fine motor activities out, both kids get very excited.  Tongs, tweezers, etc. are so much fun for them!

I am busy preparing for Christmas and for baby.  I have 2 gifts left to buy for Christmas and have been sewing some for baby too!  Goal for the week is to look over the want/need list for baby and decide what I really need to get and pack hospital bags.  I should have a few weeks, but you never know!

Another week down!

Addison is now officially well past the halfway point in her Language Arts and Math curriculum for 1st grade.  We are adding some enrichment activities and doing some additional Social Studies for now and will be adding a study of the states soon.  She is pretty excited about it.

In other news, I am working on getting ready for our newest addition due in December.  I embroidered his name on his carseat cover this week and finished a quilt top as well.  I will post pics when that is done:)  Clothes are washed and put away.  I still have some things to buy and get ready, but we are all on our way.  Since he is due shortly before Christmas, my goal is to have everything ready (including all Christmas gifts wrapped, etc) by December 1st.

Here is Addison doing a crossword puzzle with some words with prefixes and suffixes.  And yes, she is dressed in a cow costume.  We were in the car this week and she was reading a library book.  She was very excited to point out that all in one sentence, she had found a work with a suffix, a contraction and a compound word.  We have worked on all of these recently:)

Jaron continues to love anything that involves cutting and really doesn't like coloring.  Here he cut out the squares and is working on AB patterns and AAB patterns.  We also started the Hooked on Phonics Kindergarten level with him this week.  He has his sticker chart on the fridge and loves reading time.  I used this program with Addison when she was three, and she loved it as well.  I waited a bit to do it with Jaron (he just turned four), but he is doing great.  Since he begs for more every day, he is already past where I had planned him to be. 

Back in July, Addison asked Jesus in her heart.  She had been asking questions for a while, but I really wanted it to be her idea so I let her bring it up when she was ready.  I really wanted to get her a real Bible (not just a story book) of her own, but wanted one that was a translation she could read and understand.  After some research, I chose the NIRV (New International Readers' Version).  It is geared toward 2nd-4th grade readers.  Since she is around 5th grade with her reading, it is just perfect.  There are lots of different ones to choose from, but the Princess Bible was right up her alley!  Not only does it include the entire Bible, but it also has some added pages with pictures of princesses AND it's pink!  The added pages include character qualities.  It says, "A princess always..." and includes a Bible verse to go along with it.  These are some of the first verses she will be memorizing.  Here she is with her treasured Bible.      

There are many reasons we homeschool.  One is for the academics.  We are able to move at their pace rather than basing their activities on their birthdate or what everyone else is doing in the class.  Another is that I am selfish.  I will give you the long version sometime, but I started doing "activities" with Addison when she was about 4 months old.  It grew and grew and suddenly she was reading and doing things well beyond her age.  I have loved every minute of teaching her things and seeing her light up when she discovers new things. Now I get to do the same things with Jaron and she loves to jump right in there and teach him too.  I wouldn't want to miss these times for anything.  The most important reason we homeschool is so we can talk about Jesus.  I want my children to have the head knowledge AND the heart knowledge of Jesus.  I want to work on character qualities and be able to take advantage of serving opportunities as well.  I know this can be done when they are in school outside the home, but homeschool is where we feel led for now.  People ask me all the time if we plan to homeschool through high school.  The wonderful part is we don't have to decide that now.  For now, we are called to homeschool.  There may be a time down the road, they we feel led back into public or private school.

I hope everyone has a great day!  We are off to do some painting and run a few errands soon!
Dedra

The last few weeks!

I am way behind on blogging.  Life has been busy.  I am 31 weeks pregnant and failed my 1 hour glucose test a couple weeks ago.  Had to take the 3 hour, but passed!  Woohoo!  Found out I'm anemic which explains why I have been SOOOO tired and have had a few dizzy spells.  So more iron for me.  Bleh...

This boy turned four on September 26th.  He is all about Batman (and Spiderman) these days, so that's what he chose for his birthday shirt:)  

He got a Spiderman mask and web shooter for his birthday.  He loves it!

Jaron's new Trio blocks set.  We love Trio blocks around here!  So much creativity.  He is making more and more complex robots and vehicles.  Love it!  Here is Addison posing with it:)

Working on fractions (and real life), we made muffins!  Addison poured the milk and Jaron did some mixing.

Jaron working on bars at gymnastics.

Horrible picture, but here he is at dance class:)

And Addison with the geoboard.  She loves it!

Jaron showing off his cutting activity.  He is getting very good and often asks for any project that has cutting. And yes, he is not dressed for the day yet.  Don't judge.  Homeschooling can happen in underwear too.  Ha!   For those that are curious, Jaron uses a restaurant highchair (with the front bar removed) for school.  It puts him at the perfect height for writing, etc.  This prevents me from having to sit at the kids' little table and Jaron doesn't learn strange habits for writing because his posture isn't right.  I can give you an earful on proper sitting, etc. for writing!

Thanks to Pinterest, the kids have brand new cups that live on the fridge.  Kroger had these on sale so the kids got to pick their own.  I added 2 magnets to the back of each and they can now get water from the fridge, drink and put them back.  No cups sitting on the counter or kitchen table and they always know which cup belongs to them.  They love the independence too:)

This post has been heavy on Jaron, but Addison has been hard at work too.  She is supposed to be in Kindergarten, but we are working on 1st grade this year.  She just passed the midway point in her math and reading for the year.  Yikes!  We have started working on different types of writing.  A couple of weeks ago, she wrote a letter using all 5 parts of the letter.  She has also written a personal narrative.  This was her report on peacocks.  She got to choose the animal and then we did some on-line research to include several facts.  She was very proud!  This one is on the fridge:)

Just a fun picture of my girl:)

I'm not a big fan of pictures of myself, but here is Jaron "snuggling" the new baby.  They both love to come give him kisses and feel him kick!

Week in Review

No pictures this week. Bad mommy!  Addison worked on contractions and fractions (we are all about rhyming our topics of learning - ha!) this week.  Because she is constantly reading, she keeps finding either contractions or words that could have been contractions and pointing them out:)  We are going to do a couple of fun recipes this coming week to do some practical life reinforcement of fractions.  Hopefully I can manage to get some pictures of that!  She has been asking me to teach her to sew for a long time so I need to make plans for some simple projects for her.

Jaron is working on writing.  We also got to visit a friend's classroom during Addison's piano lesson and he got to play with her "feed the dog" fine motor activity.  He loves using tweezers and tongs:)  He has loved his cutting projects this week and especially a "Cars" reading book we bought at Half Price Books.  That comes in handy for motivation in doing other activities.  You may call it bribing.  I call it motivation:)  He also loves his Team Umizumi math activity book.  I plan for 1 activity and he always wants to do more!

We read some books about stars and planets this week, but didn't get to our planet project.  We will try to do that this week and get some pictures.  We read plenty of Mother Goose rhymes and finished our book about William Tell.  Both kids loved that book.  Jaron really liked the archery.

Another week in Review and Jaron's 4 year old well-check

On Monday mornings, Jaron has gymnastics.  Here is he is running back from "ringing the bell" for doing something well.  I think this was for his back roll.  

Jaron is quite proud that he can write his name so we have been practicing in different ways.  A great way to build hand strength is to have them write "on the wall" or upside down (on paper taped to the bottom of a table).  This was with new washable Crayola dry erase markers (woohoo), but we usually try to stick with the dry erase crayons on the board as that gives him the resistance needed to build that hand strength.  The markers just don't do that so it looks shaky, but he loves them so we "play" with those too:)

I have a small embroidery business that helps to pay the bills so I can stay home.  I do lots of applique like the shirts below, but can put names on lots of things and even business logos on polos, dress shirts, etc.  Here are a couple of project from the week:)  Hudson is one of my former preschool students and Houston is his little brother:)

Jaron is working on identifying and putting numbers in order through 20 right now.  Here he is hard at work!

Addison has been working on contractions and fractions mostly this week, but here she is with a couple of geoboard creations she was particularly proud of.

Jaron woke up from nap time to join the fun.  He added some to sissy's creation.  Please excuse our nap hair!

On Fridays, we go to our Homeschool co-op.  This is Addison shortly after returning.  It's a long day full of activity, but we love it:)  And yes, she is asleep! 

And finally, Jaron had his 4 year old well-check since he will be turning 4 on the 26th.  He was 33 pounds (25%) and 38 inches tall (20%).  He is on the small side for his age, but doing great.  What can I say.  His mama is 5'1" (almost) and his daddy is 6'1".  The kiddos have half a chance at being a normal height.  Ha!

Week in Review

Well, Week 2 went so much better schedule-wise.  AND I took some pictures!  Here is just a little of what we did this past week!

Jaron doing a reading lesson from 100 Easy Lessons.  He is getting a little bored with this right now so I think we will change things up next week.  We will probably do some Hooked On Phonics (Kinder level).

Doing some fine motor pre-writing activities..

And some cutting.

A frequent sight in our house:  Addison reading to Jaron.  When she has free time, reading is probably the most chosen activity.  Love that!  

Addison showing Jaron her new Math computer game.  This has been much requested this week!

Choice time for Addison included making shapes/pictures with velcro sticks.

Both kids had a blast playing in shaving cream.  A little free play and some writing practice for Jaron and a spelling test for Addison.

We had our first day at a local Homeschool Co-op.  Parents come together and teach different classes while kids get to do some fun enrichment classes and be around other homeschool kiddos.  Both kids had an absolute blast even though they were pretty wiped out by the time we got home (so was mommy).  I get to help out with a few classes, but my official job is to watch kids when the day is over so the cleaning team can restore the church to "Sunday ready."  I'm hoping to be able to be able to teach classes soon since that is my love:)  Here is the only picture I got of the kids at co-op.  They are singing "God Bless America" at the opening assembly.  I hope this will be the start to many years in co-op!

Our first "official" week!

Disclaimer - Long post ahead!

I am so glad that we did some school this summer since our first "official" week was anything but normal.  For people who know me, they know I am pretty organized.  I am very much a list-maker and have my list with me at all times.  So starting out this week, I had workboxes full, checklists prepared, our homeschool area prepped as well as our lesson plans and supplies ready.  What really happened was a different story!  When you see what happened this week, I hope you will forgive my lack of pictures on this post!  So here was our week:

Monday - Jaron has gymnastic in the morning.  This is weekly and not a big deal.  Addison does school while he has class.  It changes up our schedule some, but not a problem!  When we got home, Jaron did some school and we did school together.  After a short break and lunch, our friend Lily came over for her piano lesson.  We do a group lesson (kids are ages 3, 4 and 5) with Lily and my kids.  We do piano as well as some general music and I try to make it fun by playing games.  When she left, it was rest time for Jaron and Addison finished up her school.  Successful first day!

Tuesday - Mommy had to go to the doctor and I brought the kids with me.  I love my doctor, but we often have to wait a while to see her since she ends up delivering babies, doing emergency surgery, etc.  We were prepared with some hands-on, but portable activities, books and snacks.  Jaron and Addison both played with Unifix cubes.  Jaron sorted them by color and then we worked on creating patterns with them.  This is old news for Addison, but fairly new to Jaron.  He soaked it up with no problem and starting creating his own patterns.  We talked about stars and planets and did some cutting activities and Addison did some of her reading.  Not sure what I'm going to do with that girl.  There are 2 big readers for the Language Arts curriculum we are using.  I had the first one with me.  After she read 4 stories (and could answer all of the comprehension questions), I flipped to the back to play "stump the Addison."  She loves this game.  I picked out words I thought would be hard for her, but she got every one!  Anyway, by the time we got home, it was time for a quick lunch and early rest time.  Addison finished school while Jaron napped, and then we ran to dance class.

Wednesday - We have had a big hole in our kitchen ceiling due to a water leak for a couple of weeks.  We finally got the information we needed from insurance and were able to get an awesome team to get started on Wednesday.  There was much drywall dust and plastic hanging in our kitchen, but we really just had to avoid the house as much as we could that day.  Because of the lay-out of our house, just going to the bathroom was going to present a problem.  We went to Chick Fil A for breakfast and playtime, a movie and then visited our old preschool for a bit before Addison's piano lesson.  The kitchen was not very usable that night so we ordered a pizza and had a picnic in the living room.

Thursday - more work on the kitchen and painting!  I have wanted to paint my kitchen for a while, but didn't really think it would happen any time soon.  I love it!  We were able to stay home, we watched a friend's 2 little ones for a few hours and did lots of school in the living room.  No kitchen that night either so with a coupon and a gift card, we ate at Macaroni Grill for $6 and that included tip!

Friday - the guys finished up the painting and we played "catch-up" with school.  I schedule for a 4-day school week since we have co-op on Fridays (starts next week), but today we caught up with most all but Addison's math (which we finished on Saturday).  The kitchen is done and Mommy had lots of clean-up and moving back into the kitchen.  I love my new kitchen!  I'll post pics next week.

We didn't get to a couple of fun enrichment activities this week, but we did the bulk of what I had planned.  I'm hoping this coming week will be a bit more "normal" so we can see how our daily schedule will work out.  If you got to the end of this post, I am impressed!  Next week should include some pictures and hopefully, a more accurate view of what we usually do at home!