November 10-15

Can you believe we have less than two weeks to Thanksgiving? Already?
We are having the most gorgeous weather today! It is in the 70s! Our last hurrah before winter comes.

Monday was such a quiet day for us. I spent about two hours giving a friend a bit of information on homeschooling. She had called the week before and asked to set up an "appointment" for me to tell her the ins and outs. Of which there are many and not enough hours in the day to cover everything! I reviewed the legal requirements for CA, and talked about how I homeschool. Although there are as many ways to homeschool as there are homeschoolers, we basically sort ourselves into one of MANY categories. My category would have to be "eclectic". Which means that I pick and choose from my options. I might choose a pre-packaged curriculum for one subject, and something totally different for another. I personally have several resources that I use as grade-level guidelines (what should a 3rd grader be able to learn?). Then I choose materials that I think will help get us there in a fun, exciting, and child-appropriate way. Meaning - what works for Brynne might not work for Logan. So I talked about those sorts of things with my friend. It can be very overwhelming - but also so liberating. I love the freedom I have with my days. They are busy, but fun!
So monday is usually not a school day for us. We did laundry and cleaned and played. I love mondays. :-)

Tuesday Hannah was home from school and let me tell you...I realized how much I MISS that kid! For starters, she is so incredibly helpful and such a good worker. We started a Thanksgiving lapbook while she was home (I knew she'd want to participate in that project) so we did some more studying about Thanksgiving, Pilgrims, etc. Logan and Brynne spent all last week learning about that stuff so they were ahead of the game. The kids also had a playdate that afternoon so Mom got a break! Kenna took a nap and I did whatever I wanted (which meant clean and read and relax). The best part of the day came when Josh called and said he had a hankering for Chinese food that night. There is a new Chinese place in town. So we tried it out. We were SUPER pleased. FINALLY, some decent Chinese in Fort Bragg. We felt like we got a lot of food for our money, too. We still have leftovers!

Wednesday was a fun day. 4H had their annual Potluck/Awards night. It was my first night to see Hannah in action as a Hostess. She is in charge of handing out flyers and the minutes from last month. She also leads the group in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance and the 4H motto. Much like the BoyScouts, who earn patches, 4Hers can earn pins for their hats. It's not as much stuff as Boy Scouts earn, but it shows some recognition of their efforts. Hannah earned some stuff for her role as a Junior Officer, and also a special pin for attending 100% of her General Meetings last year. Yay! The potluck was fabulous. I'm sorry now that I didn't attend last year.

On Wednesday and Thursday Brynne started work on a Christmas present for Hannah. I'm not going to post pictures of it until after Christmas...just in case! But Brynne is very excited about this little labor of love for her sister. It's turning out SO cute!

Throughout the week we've been working on the regular things...math and reading. I am giving Logan official reading lessons and he's doing really well. He asks to do them - which is a huge readiness sign. He's been plateaued at about the same level of readiness for a long time, but I didn't want to push and make reading a chore. After all, he's still young! And he was really focused on math for a while. Now it seems he's switched interests and it's all about sounding out words. It's one of the joys I get from educating my children is participating in this journey of discovery. Brynne has been faithfully working in her math book and we are spending extra time with mastery of numbers. I think that the better you know your basic math facts and see math patterns in the numbers, the easier higher math will be for you. So for instance, we practiced counting by fives...not just starting at 0,5,10; but starting on 1,2,3 or 4 and figuring out the pattern from there. And why is there a pattern? I love math! I wouldn't have said that when I was younger but it is really so COOL!

Logan requested a science project this week and chose it himself. He found pictures of bread dough and, since he loves cooking, was sure that was the project for him. :-) It was about yeast. We watched the gas bubbles form and talked about how yeast is alive and what it eats. Then the kids took the finished dough and created their own...bread? I don't know what to call it. They cut it out with cookie cutters so we had some fun shaped rolls. Then we cooked the dough, which kills the yeast. I noticed that Brynne is getting good at corresponding measurements. For example, how many teaspoons in a tablespoon, how many tablespoons make 1/4 cup, etc. I have a chart - which I have to refer to every time I cook 'just to make sure'. But Brynne has memorized it (because she loves cooking so much) and was telling ME how to simplify our measuring!

Kenna's been practicing using her spoon when she eats. Love watching all these stages. She's also getting better at her sign language. She is using the sign for "all done" without prompting now. Much better than a full bowl of food over the side of the high chair!

Josh found this really cool spider web on our front porch. The kids thought it was beautiful!

Today, Saturday, we've been making graphs of our favorite fruits. I think the main winners were oranges, kiwis, and mangos. Yum! Makes me want fruit salad tonight!

This next week Hannah has minimum days all week and I have a visitor all week, so I'm sure it will be an unusual week...but hopefully a fun one!