Time for a change of scenery.....

Well, the time has come...finally...

We are heading out of town for 2 weeks to Minnesota. Now it isn't all vacation. My husband has 2 weeks of seminary classes ahead. But, I think that relaxing on the farm in Minnesota is just what we need.

Maybe a time with some quiet and nature will help. After dealing with my husband's stressful job, full time studies, and volunteer ministry, while I try to school the kids, get them from here to there, balance the house, play the trumpet...the list goes on....

I cannot wait to see this place in person. Maybe be able to listen to God and what his plans for us are, in the midst of 40% pay cuts at work and the noise and frustration of everyday.

Little nervous about this staircase though. :)

So, we will be off for a couple of weeks. Exploring the zoo, museums, farm life and of course the Mall of America on my birthday! Hoping to return with a new perspective and perhaps news of change to come.

Video Tip

So, I decided today that we should have a movie time this afternoon. I searched the library system and found a couple of videos that applied to our studies this week. I was pleasantly surprised at how these videos fit exactly what we had studied in our Sonlight curriculum this week!

This video from the American History for Children video series is fantastic. If you are studying early American history, the story of Pocahontas, or early Native American culture this video is great. I would definitely recommend it!

This video, Ancient Mesopotamis, from the Ancient Civilizations for Children Series, was fantastic! My 1st grade daughter Emma kept telling me all the things she remembered from our history books this week. It was almost as if it was made to parallel our text book! Fantastic.

Anyhow, just thought I would share a good find from the library that made learning a bit more fun this Friday.

A Day in the Weldon Homeschool.

So, I am still participating in the Not Back to School blog hop over at Heart of the Matter. The next week's topic is A day in the life. Because a friend of mine has been reminding me (cough, cough) to put my schedule up for her to see, I'm posting a few days early! Well, here it is.....our school schedule that has been created by myself and my wonderful husband, who was a great help.

830 am Bible Reading as a group, just a short passage from our lesson book (5 min.)

835 am Emma and I together

Bible Memorization, History/Geography, Reading and Language Arts, Handwriting

Anne on her own

Bible Reading and Memorization, History/Geography reading and wksht, Reading

10:00 am Emma break

Anne and I together

check work, reading discussion, Language Arts

11:00

Emma and Anne in school room together

Math each day

MWF Science

Tue. Music

Thur. Art

1200 LUNCH

Afternoon:

Time for Spanish lessons a few days a week and the girls can finish up any loose ends if they have them in the afternoon.

So, this is the schedule. Our school is essentially completed in the morning, leaving the afternoon for chores, play and various things. Also, gives time to rest the mind a bit before gymnastics practice, piano lesson, church activites, etc. The evenings, at bed time, will be split between Jeff and I doing read alouds with each child. I believe for the first two read aloud books, I am reading to Emma and Jeff is reading to Anne. This will help Jeff be a part of the reading and takes some of the load off of me during the day.

That is the plan....we will see how it goes!

It's Student Picture Week

So, it is time over at Heart of the Matter and the Not Back to School Blog Hop for school picture week. I am planning on taking some new "school" photos of the girls to be framed, but won't be working on that until later in the week.....my oldest is at camp this week! So I pulled out some recent photos of the kiddos here so you could get to know them a little bit.

This is my oldest, Anne Marie. She is 7 years old and is starting 3rd grade this year. She is an amazing young lady. Intelligent, talented, fun, caring...she's just a wonderful person.

This is Emma Jane! She is 5 and is starting 1st grade. The picture sa ys it all....Full of personality and as smart as whip (what does that mean anyhow?)



Next is Hadassah. Just a cutie and very funny. She's only 2, but she does like to color and play dolls during school time.

So, that is the crew over here. Can't wait to see some of your posts as well.

What does your school room look like????

So, I am a week late but I have decided to join the Not-Back to school Blog Hop over at Heart of the Matter! This week is share what your school room looks like week.

I am very fortunate in that my husband made this school room up for us last summer, and it has been a wonderful blessing for our school days!

First, this is the entry way to our school room, which is part of our finished basement. The double doors are kind of fun! :)

Inside are the girls desks and you can see some shelving and our little computer nook back there which always comes in handy.





This is our newest addition. My husband just hung a new white board for us which will come in handy for math lessons and our new Sequential Spelling lessons as well.




Right off the main school room is our music room. I am a trumpet player by profession, and music is a big part of our lives. Anne Marie, my oldest is really taking to the piano, so we had this one moved down here for her!

I have a nice little sitting and reading corner here in the school room as well.

We have plenty of room for books and you can see we even have our tadopole/frogs in their home on the desk.

There they are....our ongoing science project from last year's life science books....one of them just got front legs yesterday!

When you step back through the doors we have our kids playroom which is great for break time or to keep my 2 year old daughter entertained!

SO, I'm looking forward to seeing what others do with their school space, and to the rest of the Not Back to School Blog Hop.

Marble System

Take 1

Well, today starts a new day here in our home. We are instituting the marble (or in our case the shiny rocks because that is what the dollar store had available) system! I have purchase three good sized plastic jars and several bags of shiny rocks. I have developed a list of chores that need to be done around the house that the girls are very capable of doing. Each chore is put into a 1, 2, 3 or 4 rock category. Tonight I plan on decorating the jars with each of the girls names. I will then go through the list with them and they can begin earning shiny "jewels" to fill their jars. When a jar is full that daughter will get to have a special treat, something like a friend to sleep over. Money to go shopping with. A night out with mom and dad. Something like that. The girls are very excited...and already have a tally sheet of rocks they have earned today for me to put in the jar. I hope this excitement keeps up. My husband has also suggested that we add in pro levels of cleaning, kind of like on the wii. If you fill 10 jars you are a bronze medal cleaner, and so on. Hmmm....we'll see. Anyhow, I'll keep you up to date on how this plan is going. Even little Hadassah wil have her own jar! : )

SOME THOUGHTS FOR TODAY

As I was thinking and praying today about what is going on with the oil leak this verse came to mind.

If my people who are called by my name,

would humble themselves and pray

and seek my face and turn from their ways,




then I will hear them from heaven

and will forgive their sin

and heal their land. 2Chronicles 7:14

Now, I am NOT saying that God sent this problem to us because we are awful sinful people. No. the word tells us the opposite. Every good and perfect gift is from above. My thoughts today go out to us and our job now. To call on the Lord and to watch for the fulfillment of his promise.

Check out this new website. I'm enjoying it very much. They are having a great giveaway now as well. Enjoy!

Confessions of a homeschooling mom....

Well, where did I go? The spring cleaning challenge has not been going 100%. I did spring clean my bedroom, and started the kitchen and am still trying to find the laundry room, but alas I am behind. For now, I am trying to just keep up and finish the school year out strong with my girls. Looking forward to planning for the fall with a new curriculum through Sonlight and looking forward to the spring and summer jobs with my brass band, the Dodworth Saxhorn Band. But first I need to keep plugging away and hopefully get my garden all planted here this week so we can have fun watching that grow throughout the summer. As for the spring cleaning....well it will be finished later in the spring than I had hoped, but we'll get there. More to come soon.

Creation

Today we learned about an amazing little thing. The sea shell. Well, actually we were learning about mollusks in our science curriculum. What we did discover however is how mollusks form sea shells. Also, they all create a very wide variety of types of shell, and you can identify what type of invertebrate lives in the shell by it's specific shape. As we were going about identifying different seashells we have with the photos on the online sea shell guide, I was amazed by how God is into details. He created so many beautiful shells that not only are designed perfectly for the average mollusk : ) , but also are beautiful and descriptive and just amazing. I'm just not sure how one could look at all the creativity in God's creation and see just randomness. Nothing planned, nothing created, just there. Anyhow, if you want to learn something about how God is into details check out the variety of shells and the mollusk. Certainly if He designed all of this, He is into the details of our lives as well, which I guess could be the biggest lesson of all.

Spring Cleaning Challenge part 2

Bathroom Before and After

Well, once again thanks to Sarah at her blog for inspiring this Spring Cleaning Challenge. If you want to join us just check out her blog and get started!

Well, what I learned from the before pictures is that 5 people and one bathroom has caused a MAJOR mess. So, I have put up the VERY embarassing before pictures....but the after pictures make up for it (after hours of work over several days! Phew!) So, here you go.

The cupboard before ... (I told you Danielle!)

The cluttered medicine cabinet

Hard to put things away from the counter when the cupboard looked like it did!




The overstuffed bath toy holder.

A picture of the whole mess!

Look a bit different?

A new flower on the medicine cabinet.

A clean sink and counter...and a new picture on the wall!

The white curtain makes it look brighter.

Still lots of stuff, but in order anyhow!

Far less, clean, bath toys to deal with.

Ahh....a much more organized medicine cabinet.

Well, that's it. Next weeks challenge is the master bedroom. Looking forward to it! Hope you are having some success in your own spring cleaning!

Spring Cleaning Challenge

Well, it happened. I started the spring cleaning challenge on the Beautiful 2 God blog. I've took some photos of the newly cleaned and decorated entryway to our house. I cleaned windows, walls, floors, and steps. I also added some new paintings that I had packed away somewhere and a new rug. Phew. Sorry, now before photos this time....I'll do better on the next project. The bathroom!!!! I hope this challenge will inspire you to do some spring cleaning yourself. Good luck!

A happy Anne walking up the clean stairway.

A new rug to help keep the floor clean.

A view from the living room.

A clean window and knick knacks.

Some new pictures.

Field Trip Learning

A sample of our latest trip to the Arboretum

There were fruit trees,

Beautiful art in plants covering the ground,



Unusual plants like the sausage plant,

and the Lobster Plant!

and of course Hadassah loved the fish!

So as you can see, the next way I 'd like to share with you is how we have been learning in a hands on way. We completed a while back now our science book on the World of Plants through Answers in Genesis. Well, since it was winter at the close of this unit we travelled to the Nichols Arboretum (www.lsa.umich.edu/mbg/) at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. This was an awesome experience because we were able to see and observe everything we had spent time learning and working on. Also, it was a cold day and the tropical plant area felt like a vacation! I have found that going and actually seeing what we have studied is an amazing reminder to my girls of all they have learned, and Anne Marie always amazes me with what she knows. Here are some more of the pictures from that day.

One of the many pitcher plants we learned about in the carnivorous plant chapter. We also saw Venus Flytraps which we had studied.

These field trips are always a great time for dad to participate in what
the girls have learned as well.

Emma the collector.....she found several things along the way that the plants had dropped just for her.

So many beautiful flowers!

I would say one of the best parts was the trip was FREE. If you haven't already check out your libraries Museum Adventure pass program. The one for Michigan can be found at http://www.detroitadventurepass.org/ . We had a wonderful time with this and I would encourage you to get out and bring your kids on a "field trip" of your own, whether you homeschool or not!

Next up, we have moved on to the World of Animals and have made some trips to the zoo.....so.....to be continued! Have a great day.