Dirt Under My Nails

We started school today… Kaia is now an official second grader and Leif began his pre-pre-pre K studies.  (He he, ok, so he ran around grabbing pencils, walking over workbooks, and sitting on Kaia.  I did read him The ‘A’ Book, though!)  I like the schedule I have mapped out for this first semester.  On paper, it seems pretty manageable.  Even with breakfast, chores and many interruptions, we were still done by 1 pm.  Then, the mail lady arrived bringing two boxes of yummy goodness that I’d ordered to add more fun to our homeschool days.  Kaia immediately dove into it all!  In our boxes we got:

Unjournaling - I didn’t think we’d actually start this until late in the year, but Kaia wanted to dictate some journal entries to me.

Funny Fairy Tale Proofreading- again, Kaia wanted to keep doing this late into the afternoon.  I finally had to tell her I was done teaching for the day

The Periodic Table - We are starting chemistry this year, and though a lot of this is beyond her at this point, I still thought this would be a fun way to learn about the elements.  She ended up flipping through it for over an hour to find the ‘cute’ elements.

Amelia Rules - I got the first three books in this series and they look adorable.  Kaia is really starting to get into reading.  Over the summer she’s really bloomed.  So, since she loves comic books, I thought this would help fan her interest.

Vocabulary Power – Idioms – This is an idiom a day flip-type book.  Each day gives you a new idiom (like It’s raining cats and dogs) and what it really means.  Kaia said “do I have to do only one a day”

Vocabulary Power – Words – Another flip book… I thought this would be a great way to add new vocabulary words to our days.  Each page has a word, pronunciation, definition, and use in a sentence.  Any words that Kaia doesn’t know we add to our vocabulary list.  Occasionally I will draw from these words and their definitions for copy work.

Haiku Stickies - We haven’t really done much in the way of poetry yet, but I couldn’t pass these up!    They are yellow sticky pages with partially written haiku on them.  You fill them in and stick them some where to be found!  How cool is that.  I thought this would be a fun way to introduce some poetry.  (And what’s really cool is that the author, Allan Wolf, is a friend of mine…. we met in Tae Kwon Do)  (Sarah, don’t get these for Meg… she’ll be getting some for her birthday!)

First Art – I had to get something for Leif, too.  This looks like it’s going to be a great project book for keeping little hands occupied.  Thanks for the recommendation Nikki.

Kaia is doing well recovering.  She can almost straighten her leg and the swelling is almost gone.  She’s still using a walker, but she’s gotten super fast!  You have to watch out for her if she’s moving around or she’ll run over your toes!

Here’s the little foot hammock she created on her walker.

And here’s speedy gonzales!  See, she’s just a blur when she gets going!

We took everyone peach picking this weekend.  Kaia got pulled around in a wagon… pampered princess.  She was actually easier to pull than the load of peaches we got.  In the end we had 2 bushels of peaches, a peck of apples, a gallon of apple cider, and a dozen fresh apple cider doughnuts!!  (Umm, yeah, there’s only one doughnut left!)

Kaia and I have been taking time this week to get her prepared for starting the second grade.  We’ve labeled and decorated folders, picked up some books from the library, filled her art box and refreshed her nature kit.  I think I’m more excited about school starting than she is   I’m also trying to prepare for the fact that we will have a crazy little toddler trying to get into everything that Kaia is doing.  So, I’ve gotten some ABC craft and cookbooks (including this ebook which is full of fun ABC crafts) to work on with Leif, made smelly playdough, and dyed some rice.  I’ve also moved a little table and chairs (just Leif’s size) into the living room where we usually do our work.  I want to have some easy play things to pull out for Leif when Kaia needs to focus on school stuff.  Next week she will be spending some time with her Nana, so we plan to officially start on Aug. 30th.  I’m looking forward to getting into a routine.  Summer does a good job of sending us in all directions with no routine at all.  But that’s what Summer is for, isn’t it?

Drying Rice

Kaia is really enjoying the projects we are doing from Ancient Egyptians and Their Neighbors!

I have to admit…. I’d kinda like one of these head dresses for myself!

Tomorrow is her last official day of first grade!  Wow!  Calling her a second grader just makes her sound so old!!

I can’t wait to start on our summer study units.  We start mythology next week and I’m still trying to find a little bow and arrow so she can dress up like Athena and practice archery

One of the things I was worried about when deciding to homeschool Kaia is that she would feel that she missed out on some of the fun things that big schools offer like going to school games, prom, and year books.  Now, I laugh about those things, but back then, they were a huge deal.  I’m lucky to live in an area with a big homeschooling community.  There is a homeschool yearbook, homeschool prom, and homeschool athletic leagues, and if Kaia and Leif chose to participate in those… great.  But in an effort to cover all of my bases, Kaia and I decided to create school t-shirts.  First we had to decide on the school name:  Green Meadow School.  Then we had to create a mascot: a flying unicorn with a shape-shifting mermaid on it’s back.  Once that was done, we knew that the motto had to be “Where flying unicorns and shape-shifting mermaids RULE!”.  The school colors are “blue and rainbow, with a hint of gold” (yes, that is exactly what Kaia said).  We may create a new shirt each year… maybe we’ll change the mascot and colors, too.  We’ll see.  But, now, she can show her school spirit and be proud of her school when people ask her about her shirt!

(Some family and friends have asked for one also, so I created a store. You are welcome to one, too!)

Here is our family school picture:

No, wait, that’s not it….

Here it is:

OY!  It’s so hard to take a picture of all of us being still at the same time in the same place.  Let’s try this one:

Much better

Last week, were were able to enjoy a day at the Biltmore House during their Homeschool Festival.  They put this on twice a year and it’s lots of fun.  Their focus this year was Farms, Flowers, and Food.  We made terrariums, listened to a stories about farming, learned to make peanut butter, made leaf prints, and lots more.  But my absolute favorite part was stomping grapes!  We all got in the grape bucket and tried our turn at making wine, even Leif!  Then we made prints of our feet (the prints are actually made with purple ink).

It also happened to be during the time of their Festival of Flowers, so we were able to enjoy that too!

Kaia and I have been working on the concept of symmetry in math for the last few days.  We’ve looked at the symmetry of shapes, objects, foods, etc.  We talked about how our bodies are symmetrical (one arm on each side, one leg…), but thought it would be fun to see what it would look like if our faces were really completely symmetrical.

I took a picture of Kaia (she hammed it up) and then altered it so that we could see what she would actually look like if the right half of her face was exactly like the left (and vice-versa).

Here is the original picture:

Here is her right side.

Here is her left:

Her favorite part was seeing the design that her hair makes.  It would be neat to make something like this with an object from nature… maybe a tree, and look at the symmetry of the branches.