January 10-14 17-21 24-28

C ommunity Map.

Mary 's Seasonal Journal that we bound.

Mary's story and picture.
The inside of our circular compass lapbook. Insdie we have pasted our personification story and pictures. This was inspired by "Katy and the Big Snow" and part of our FIAR curriculum .


MAry's thought's and Illustrations of her observations from Sunday School class.

Aidan 's thoughts and Illustation of his observations from Sunday School class.

Canada Our Country..Lesson 14

LLATL drwing done by Mary. Mary was asked to draw a picture of her room and how she felt when she went to sleep.

Mary starting in on some major math concepts in Singapore. We use the egg cartons to make 10's.

Mary is working on her LLATL lesson.

Here she was asked to pick 5 cards out of our blended word index cards tht we have been creating all year. SHe then in turn was asked to pick the matching consonats and vowels that make up the word.

FIAR book "Storm in the Night"

The chidren have just finished drawing their light and shadow art . They have started in on their geoboards. Making elastic geometric shapes...this was in the FIAR curriculum also













A few examples of some of the work that we covered over this three week period.

January 27rh.A Day in the ....

Sideways book cover:)

Some family members at Jeff's birthday.
Bunny gets a bite..baby gets a bite.

A young woodpecker testing out his pecking skills. The children and I remained still after creeping right up on him. He appeared to be unbothered by our presence.

Today was a perfect day as far as a homeschoolers day goes. We have risen at a good time this morning. I achieved my favorite morning ritual of giving the children their breakfasts..putting my coffee on .. gettin gback in bed and enjoying one more burst of langorous warmth..then popping back out of bed and tucking the baby onto the couch with his blankie while he is awaking. Aidan and I did a LA review and he set right into his test polishing it off in no time. "I've got it Mum", he says"

The sun was trying to peak through the hill mists that have descended on the city for the last few weeks. We all put on our shoes and boots .. even the baby and checked out our back yard.

Fennel and chives are emerging from the ground confused by the mild and wet weather. I can't wait to get out into the back and get uprooting, and gardening. The children run in circles around and around the raised garden beds. I crouch down and watch them enjoying the few outdoor moments away from the pull of responsibilities. I feel content knowing that a yummy smoked ham hock is bubbling in lentils on the stove and raspberries..ones that we grew and picked then stored are snuggled in scones baking happily.

The childrens cheeks are glowing and red and I feel contented that they have pumped the blood through their bodies and that they are crazily happy in those moments of childhood joy.

We set Kellen on his trike and laugh with him as his boots dangle far away from the peddles.... our chore of caring for the bunny becomes a joy as Kellen chatters and warily steps closer to grumpy bunny.

I have planned some lapbooks for our FIAR book "Katy and the Big Snow" Round compass shaped folders that the kids will add N,S,E and W too. We will create some city signs for the inside and add some of the activities that are laid out in the FIAR curriculum to the inside.

Even though all of the kids have runny noses and feel sick we have still had such a productive day. They rallied around lunch and are now playing happily together at the sink. I look forward to enjoying "The Little House"with Mary this afternoon. Curled up on the couch .. and even though Aidan has finished his responsibilites in English he has quietly gond off to my room when asked and additionally read "The Ox -man" and will probably curl up with us to enjoy Virginia Lee Burton's mastery. Even th children recognize amazing literature when they see it. They barely take a breath when we sit with our classical stories.

Friday brings the prospect of FIAR in the morning.. finishing off the art and science areas that are being drawn out of FIARand the book for this week "Katy and the big snow". We then will head over to the curling rink where the children will get to see some of their mates who they just saw on Sunday and then again on Wednesday at the ladies M& M study that we attend. They get to have a fun /exercise game and socializing time with the children of the HS mums who atttend the study upstairs. I plan to thank the older girls who watch and entertain the chidlren for a couple hours downstairs. As they are HSr's... perhaps they would like me to give them some dressmaking lessons. We could make dresses together.

Math is on the menu tonight and we are pushing forward into the texts and workbooks. Mary and I just introduced ourselves to the art of making tens in Singapore Math. The egg cartons and counters have done wonders. She is confident and I have declared "sillyly"that I may not have anything left to teach her this week as she did her lessons and then when looking ahead started using the making tens method naturally, as it had been driven home the lessons before. Singapore is pretty good!

Next week, I will be going over about 3 weeks of things in our HS life. It will come after this blog but will cover what has come before this blog as well. .

....Oh, make mental note to take picture of kids while curling......

I am a HS Mom and today I feel that all is right and that this is a blessing from God. I like days like these.. now I need to get off of here and go read some classical lit. with my children while the baby naps!

January 3-7 2011

Last but not least is one of the Readers in Mary's LLATL activity book. We sew a cover onto the pages. Mary is asked to reread the book and title and color the front page.

Mary coloring the stand-up people for her castle. Thank-you Auntie Natalie for picking out such wonderful gifts for the children.

You can also see one of Marys most recent phonics wheels (purple) by the gel pen container middle of table.

I asked AIdna to go outside and take some snow pics. I love this one! If Mary wasn't feeling so sick .. she woul have been out their wrestling for the camera:)

Aidan - Reading comp. Boys

Mary - Reading Comp. Girls

Canada My Country Worksheet Aidan and Mary took turns reading their phonics book to Aunt Marion who stopped by for tea.

Mary's lifeline.

Aidan's lifeline.

We had a wonderful impromptu discussion about the Timeline of the worlds history . We counted the years by 100's and 1000's. We saw when Mum was born and entered 2011. We found were the Renaissance period was on the timeline. Aidan and Mary both filled out Lefe lines for themselves with sketches of meaningful moments. We might enact these meaningful moments in the future. Mary is already working on an invite!

3-D castle

We colored and cut out a Renaissance palace scene that was given to us for Christmas. Dad and Aidan also put together a 3-D castle complete with figures and numbered slots and instructions.

Note the little styrofoam knight in the castle grounds:) He was an effort between Mum and Dad. He proved to be a tricky fellow that only skilled hands and a glue gun could cure. The children did help by looking at the picture and instructions and trying to cypher.





Legends, timeperiods, dress and architecture were some of the things we learned about.











This week our FIAR book was "Clown of God" set in the Renaissance period. The story tells of a poor juggler who earns his keep to fill his belly with soup. He rises to a noticeable position in his juggling career, but when he grows old and loses his agility the crowds lose respect for him. At the end he falls dead after juggling his finest in front of the Statue of Mary and her son the Lord Jesus. A miracle happens!