Letters From the Homefront

Well, there's no time like the present for changes to occur. Especially unexpected ones! In a nutshell, my husband will have to spend the better part of next year away from us, due to work, school, and retraining for a new job [insert sniffle]. We had talked before about any changes we would have to make while he is gone - if you know much about the military, you will know that a lot can be involved in a temporary duty assignment, and when you have a family in one place and you are in another, it can get tricky all the way around. On account of that, my husband decided the best and easiest thing in the long run would be for my children and I to stay with family, where I wouldn't be alone and it will make some important things a little easier.  So, about two weeks ago, we began preparing to relocate the kids and I and what we can fit in with my mother, and have been feverishly trying to pack, clean, organize, and dispose of unnecessary items. This also brings a big chan

Months ago, when I began making free printables for personal use and sharing on the blog, I made a few for Fall/Thanksgiving time.  Thanksgiving Puzzles Cornucopia (with miniature fruit pieces to cut and glue inside the 'horn of plenty') These can be found on my  FREE PRINTABLES  page. These have yet to be printed off, and may be something we use for Thanksgiving day while visiting family, so they can have something to keep their little hands busy while giving my husband and I a chance to enjoy ourselves as well :) One that I have printed off and put on the shelves so far, though, is our 'What's In The Pie?' printable! I have a fun, simple printable for you today!!!! These cards are approximately 5 1/2 inches in width, 3 1/2 inches in height.  I altered the way it looks for the post, but in actuality, it's going to print out like this: with four cards to a page.  The set contains six different types of p

Oh, I've been such a bad blogger! In truth, we have been very busy this past month.The last several weeks have seen a lot of work, some 'school' related, some 'life'. I've been leaning on my favorite term, life-school, here lately.  Bug working with the stereognostic bag. We have had many school days since my last post, and started some fun new things. Little Mama has *finally* begun to use the multiplication checkerboard that I made last year, and is working with five digit multiplicands, and  two digit multipliers. Due to her tendency to get overwhelmed, she generally tends to do only one equation when sitting down with that work, and I'm usually with her or close to her. She moves slowly with it, but I am glad, because she is seeing it work. Since she is already a second year/fifth grader, I wasted no time, and showed her how to use the board and how it looks to work it out abstractly on paper, all at the same time. I didn't push, but just

THE DOMINO GAME A few weeks ago, Hoss and Bug were playing dominoes at the dining room table. Well, they were trying. My dear children had NO idea about the rule of the 'running domino', and had some kind of board set up that looked akin to a 12-legged spider. I sat down to play with them, and explain the rules. When we finished, they were going to start another game when an instant burst of inspiration hit me. It had to have been from the Lord, because it's been loved for three weeks now. Enter: The Domino Game Invite a friend (or brother, or sister) to the table with the dominoes. Line them up in two equal rows, so every domino will get used before the end of the 'game'. Choose two dominoes (similar to a matching/memory game). If they match, keep them. If they do NOT match, flip them back over and the turn goes to the next player. IF they matched, as in, having two sides with the same amounts, put the matching sides together. The am

Phew. It's been a long week and a half. The beginning of last week had us recovering from a long weekend of stomach bug - all over the place. Buddy Boy had come down with something the Wednesday before, and I was hoping (and praying) the other kids had avoided it. It was not to be so. So, after a tough weekend (not a lot of sleep, because just when one would stop making trips to the bathroom, another would start), we spent a couple days recovering. Then - it was a life school end of the week. Thankfully, by Friday we got back to some school time around the house. Days like that, though, tend to discourage me - as a mother, and a homeschool mama. Those tend to seem like two different, and yet the same, jobs sometimes.  I was trying for a better start to the week today, and got the feeling that comes all too often. You know the one - the, "I'm barely scratching the surface, and am so TOTALLY going to fail my children and I must be the worst mother ever" f

*a little late in posting, but it's better late than never!* Week 6&7 Grammar seems to be showing up everywhere here lately - at least, in the pictures it is! LM (not pictured - at all) is finishing up the review of parts of speech. Many of them she - brace yourself - hasn't had the formal first presentations for. That doesn't mean she doesn't know what they are - she just hasn't gotten every presentation that some of the younger ones have. I want to get to the advanced grammar that she is really ready for, so we are having some fast review lessons so she can get the notes down in her binder and be ready to move on.  Hoss worked on reviewing verbs these last couple of weeks. He has a hard time keeping track of the name of the pos AND what each one does, and being able to tell me both. Example: He can sort the phrase "the little boy sings" in to article, adjective, noun, verb if I give the sentence, but then can't quickly tell me what

Week 6 - Day One On Monday of this week, I left my children alone. After waking up and getting their breakfast, we started our morning cleaning routine, complete with work cards, and spent a little while at it. For some reason, Monday mornings are rough cleaning days, although goodness knows why - half the weekend is spent at church, it seems, but somehow - they always are.  Then, I left my children alone. I dove into the abyss that is school materials, determined to clean out, rearrange, and reorganize. There were still things that needed to go on the shelves, Buddy Boy needed new theme trays, and it had to get done. Immediately. We had choir that afternoon for LM, and still had to fit lunch in before that. I faintly heard LM say she was going to start with the multiplication checkerboard as I began to move my couch away from my hidden, built in shelving.  About halfway through, this is what I found the kids doing. Miss Priss did this puzzle of the states - three times.

Wait for it.... Wait for it.... IT'S FINALLY FALL!!!! Okay, so I might be a little premature to call it Fall in the South, but the last part of last week, it sure felt like it! :) Fall = BAKING LM made her first ever solo batch of Pumpkin Bread. This recipe is one that I can't say was handed down through the family with tons of secret, special ingredients. I will say, though, that it was a favorite growing up, and the tradition continues in my home now, with my children growing up loving it. It was also greatly associated with Fall, Thanksgiving, and Christmas time. The recipe is so simple and easy to follow - you'll have great smells filling your house in under an hour! You'll need: 3 cups sugar 1 cup oil 4 eggs, beaten 16 ounces pumpkin (canned or fresh!) 3 1/2 cups flour 2 tsp baking soda 1 tsp salt 1 tsp ginger (not ale - typo in cookbook!) 1 tsp nutmeg 1 tsp allspice 1/2 tsp ground cloves 1 tsp cinnamon 2/3 cup h