Where have we been??

I definitely have not visited my own blog is quite a while! And much has changed over the past year. Both girls started their public school journey last year with Squeak entering 4th and Packy entering 2nd. The transition was harder for Squeak than Packy. I also started back to work right at the school they attend. The LORD was sooo good to provide this position for me. We are on the same schedule, therefore no day care.

My husband decided it was time for them to attend public school.

This past week, Packy finished Summer Soccer and I was the assistant coach. She was also selected to participate in Odyssey of the Mind (OM) which I also co-coached her team. Packy was also a Brownie (Girl Scouts).

Squeak participated in band (playing the baritone) and was in chorus. She plans on continuing with the baritone next year as well.

Our new family addition, Zander Rommel Catalli

Zander Rommel Catalli

He is joining our family on Sunday, April 12th!!

How Great is the LORD!!!

My sweet Savior has blessed me with another year of home schooling! I really thought this was the end because my husband no longer supports it. BUT THE LORD is faithful for HIS will to be set forth!

We have been rather relaxed the past few years and I have been lazy with teaching. This year we are going to try Rod & Staff for most of our curricula. I have prayed about it and decided against My Father's World and feel the Lord has settled us on R&S. Math is still a tough one with Julie but I decided to step away from Singapore Math as well. She is at a level where I am no longer able to teach something like Singapore. We will have to find other ways and I am still praying and exploring options.

Our school year will begin on August 25th!

This fall, both girls have been participating in cheer leading!

Sooo...perhaps I will attempt to blog more of our home schooling adventures!?!?! 

Our family is expanding!!!

Popping in to let everyone know that our family is expanding!! We are bringing home this baby boy on April 4th!!

His name is Panzer and he is a Bengal kitten. We are patiently counting the days until we can bring him home!!

Mid-Week Check in....

Squeak is plugging along. As usual! Especially in math. I will add science and history beginning next week. I have also decided on which Chemistry Curriculum we will use after Astronomy:

Apologia Chemistry and Physics

The Junior Notebook is coming out next month. I don't need to order anything yet as our Astronomy Unit will be at least a month long.

Here are the school girls:

Packy (K)

Squeak (2nd)

We begin our year tomorrow....

August 26th is officially our first day of school. I haven't quite made a plan but have our material ready...almost. I have NOT ordered Singapore Math 4 yet. I am not sure I will be able to teach it because math and I are not friends. At all. SM 4 has stuff like Improper Fractions (*gasp*), for example. Even with the Home Instructor's Guide, I don't feel confident to teach the material when I have little understanding. Yes, this is Elementary Math but again, math and I are not friends! I am praying and considering what to do. For now, I have a website with 4th/5th grade math materials we can use to start the year with so I'm not concerned.

Anyhoo...I hope to blog more updates this coming year with pictures!!!

Preparing to start...

Our BJU materials have arrived! Squeak is very excited that the Spelling book has a giant puppy on it! We just need to order math materials and pick up a workbook for Packy at Walmart. The only supplies we need so far are tape and glue! Things are rolling along!

Hello August!!

Yes, I have not been blogging much. It was really fun to begin with then just fell to the wayside!

Our next home school year is fast approaching with Squeak starting 2nd grade and Packy beginning K!! Here are the main materials I plan on using this year:

Both:
Bible and devotionals
BJU Heritage Studies 2
Read alouds, crafts, PE, music

Squeak:
Singapore Primary Math 4 with other (TBA) supplements
Astronomy for science
BJU English and Spelling 2, writing
Readers and chapter books
Cooking/Baking

I have resources at home for Packy but she will get her own workbook and I think Brain Quest workbooks look fun. I think they are a little "behind" so she will start with Grade 1.

We have been busy this summer with summer soccer (both girls play and I coached), summer recreation, family camping trips and day trips. The LORD has blessed us abundantly and we are thankful for HIM!!!

If anyone is still reading our blog, HELLO!! And I hope I will be here typing more this coming school year!!

A week of Cooking and Baking

Squeak received the DK Kid's Fun and Healthy Cookbook for Christmas and we have really put it to use this week! We are reading through the different types of food and their health benefits along with making recipes in the book. The girls have also been tracking their fruit/vegetable intake this week. Additionally, we read about Creation in our Bible study and discussed how God made all of these foods perfect to fit our nutritional needs.

Here are some pictures of the girls cooking and baking. Squeak is learning how to use the stove and together, they have made breakfast (eggs and toast):

(these are from last week):


I will have to insert pictures another time because it is NOT allowing me to access my computer picture library!!

A few Pictures from this Month

Despite my lack of blogging, school has been plugging along here. Squeak is plowing through all of her subjects especially math (no surprise with that anymore) and Packy is now 4 YEARS OLD!!! She turned four back in November.

The Lord has really blessed us. He has been providing all of our needs. What an amazing love He has for His children!

Here are a few pictures of the girls doing various art projects:

 

Paper plate wreath

 

Toilet Paper Roll Wreath (still working on this!)

Squeak compared 15 seconds and 15 minutes by drawing the same picture during both time frames.

Packy drew our family!

This is what Packy drew on the chalk board this morning:

Dad, Mom, Squeak and Packy

Fall Field Trip!

Yesterday was a beautiful day so we went on our fall field trip to a local farm market and the girls enjoyed a corn maze, a hay ride to the pumpkin patch and the play ground area.

 My little pumpkins!

 

 The girls made a couple of "friends" in the corn maze!

 

 Squeak made it out!!

 

 

 Pretending to build a fire in the play area
 

 

Riding to the pumpkin patch!!

 

 

 

 

The pumpkins that the girls chose!

 



Three Week Update!

Squeak completed her third week of school yesterday. We started on August 28th and have been working on stuff through yesterday (Friday). So far, I've changed two things: math - we are returning to Horizons Math, and science - I'm going to use a free online curriculum so I can sell my science book (if you or anyone you know is interested in Christian Kids Explore Earth & Space, let me know...it's brand new, never used)!! This year is also our first year of reporting to the school district so Squeak is an official 1st grader according to the state!

Week #1 August 28 - 31

Our first day of school was actually a field trip to a local waterpark! (Gotta love the PE requirement!)

Prior to heading to the waterpark, Squeak worked on handwriting (which is now a daily requirement) and I have been reading aloud The Magic Treehouse Series. I read a few chapters from MTH #3 to the girls.

Squeak and Packy and all of their cousins went on this trip!

 

 

This week was also the week I was deciding on what to do about math, so Squeak worked on math fact sheets until I figured out if we were going to change. Other things completed this week were: Bible readings, crafts, handwriting and chapter book read alouds (MTH #3 and #4).

 

Painting has been the art class of choice

 



 

Handwriting - we are using a Kumon workbook daily

 

Packy's coloring - she has great fine motor skills and colors sooo carefully!

 

Week #2 September 4 - 7

 

Even though we took Labor Day off and I didn't mark it down as "school", the girls still worked on art, PE and math facts - kind of an unschooling sort of day.

 

We started Bible devotionals again and reading from the Bible. We also started recycling cans and bottles together.

 

Squeak also started reading out loud to me this week. The four days of school were pretty full with chapter book read alouds (MTH #4 and #5), daily handwriting, art and painting with music, BJU English and math fact worksheets (by now I have ordered Horizons Math 3 and we are just waiting for it).

 

BJU English

Math fact worksheet

Painting for art class

Squeak made some robots with the math linking cubes!

 

Week #3 September 10 - 14

 

Now we are current on weekly reports!

 

This week, Squeak started Horizons Math 3 and worked on handwriting, BJU English, PE, fall themed craft projects with music, reading aloud to me, I read MTH #5, and we also went to the library and made our weekly recycling trip. We continued with our Bible devotionals and Bible readings. The girls have also been playing outside a lot. Squeak has read four readers to me so far.

 

 Horizons Math 3

 Tissue paper trees

 Paper plate scarecrows

 I made "puffy paint" - it was ok, not worth the use of the ingredients

 Packy using her hands on her puffy paint!

 Horizons Math

Squeak has also been helping more in the kitchen! (she is making chicken and rice here)

 

 

We have a family vacation scheduled to begin this Wednesday through next Monday!! Yippee!! What a blessing!!

 







Wordless Wednesday

Random Update

We begin school on the 28th with a field trip to a water park. Perfect way to kick off the year! I've been re-organzing the school room and putting stuff together that we are going to use regularly. Squeak asked last week if we could end summer break early to work on math! LOL!

This past weekend at a family picnic, Packy just decided she could swim! And she swam all over the pool including the deep end and actually jumped off the edge into the deep...all by herself!

Next weekend, we are headed out on another family camping trip. This one is for two nights. I will post pictures!!

Family Camping Trip

We went on our first overnight tent camping trip this past weekend on August 4th! The girls had a blast and we loved the isolated, wooded area that was for the tent campers (and we were the only ones!). Here are some pictures from the trip:

Our setup

The girls' tent

Daddy and Packy in the pool

Stuffed from smores!

Breakfast in the gazebo

Starting a morning fire

 The girls took great care of the fire



They have it really going!

Our next trip is August 25th - 27th. We are also looking for a place to go in early September!



Our 2012-2013 Curriculum

This year is our first "official" year since we need to begin reporting to the state. I am in the process of filling out Squeak's curricula choices for the school. Here are a few highlights of what I plan to use this coming year:

Bible: BJU Truths, devotional readings
Math: Singapore Primary Math, Beast Academy
LA: BJU English & Spelling, various readers and books
Handwriting: I will print off stuff online, Squeak has a pen pal
Science: Christian Kids Explore Earth Science & Astonomy
US History/Geography: BJU Heritage Studies
Music & Art: Various CDs and a storage bin full of art supplies

Those are the highlights though I have more materials and resources available.

Grassroots Festival

We attended a portion of the Grassroots Festival last weekend and the girls had a blast! They played in the Kid's Area and:

Squeak:
-worked with clay
-had a fiddle lesson
-tried to start a kindle fire like the Indians
-made "war" paint and painted her arm
-had her face painted
-used the "makeshift" drum set and dress up clothes

Packy:
-worked with clay
-watched the juggling performance
-played in the playhouse with a lamb and stroller she found (this took up about 85% of her time!)
-used the "makeshift" drum set

I didn't count this towards school but they easily had a 6 hour credit in that Kid's Area!!

No school in June...

Enough said!

It was on May 25th when...

I officially had Squeak complete 1st grade! Normally we end on May 31st but I was getting a bit burned out so I decided that we were going to end slighly early. Our family has been on several adventures since from hiking, walking, a park with unique rocks and rock formations, museums, historical locations and more! Squeak has also been using Rocket Math on the iPad as well as various other "unschooling" activites. So she is still learning along with Packy!

Packy's latest activity is making designs on the Lite Bright. She also made a huge castle with our two block sets...very cute!

I am undecided in regards to our summer plans. Orignally, I was going to begin Sonlight P4/5 and work on that about 2 or 3 days a week. Now, I'm thinking of just starting that in the fall and do a unit study based on The Magic Treehouse books. Whatever the book is about, we will work on projects and such on that topic. I have time to decide since we are going to start summer school around June 18th. Even if I decide on P4/5 and order later on, I can keep them busy until it arrives!

Wellllllll......HAPPY SUMMER!!! AND MAY THE LORD BLESS YOU AND YOUR FAMILY!!!