Letters From the Homefront

August 1st was our official 'First Day Of School'. We hit this yearly milestone the homeschool way - by not being at home at all. We went to the local Nature Center in town. Of course, it was classified as a *field trip*, so I didn't let it slide away without trying to get some inspired learning in.  Armed with food and a backpack full of goodies, off we went. During lunch, we got our first zoology observations with the geese that frequently come up out of the water and walk all over the grounds. My kiddos had a blast throwing them bits of cheese and banana (turns out, these geese wanted nothing to do with bananas) and seeing them come as close as within a foot or two to eat what they just threw down.  After that, I pulled out our printable journal pages, pre-stapled together for them, and we had a little botany-inspired art.  Leaf Rubbing My only mistake was to NOT get some blank paper stapled together for Buddy Boy, thinking he wouldn't be in...

I can't believe it's been a month already since I last posted! The truth is, summer is keeping us busy! Just a little update until we get back in to a normal routine. My kiddos are all reading like crazy, enjoying the summer reading programs that we participate in every year. Hoss has hit one of the 'hardest' reading years, because he is able to read a longer chapter book (long is relative in this case), and enjoys them, but it still takes him a while to finish each book. Miss Priss has surprised me by being an amazing independent reader this summer! By independent, I mean she can read on her own, doesn't need my help, and doesn't have to read to me for me to know she is reading her books right. At this point, she has read *75* books since June 1! I think I have another great reader on my hands! Baseball season came and went with not much change in status since last year's season - Hoss' team has learned over the last few years how to handle defeat ...

I've been missing from this blog so much this summer.....  I can't help it - we've been having TOO much fun just enjoying ourselves!                                                                                              We've Been: Riding the train at the park Swimming with friends Picking blackberries (and eating them!) Doing A LOT of reading. When the summer started, I picked a few books for Hoss that just went completely over his head - and reading level - and it really discouraged him. I learned my lesson to not rush through picking up books at the library. So when I went back and found some perfect for his reading level - easy enough to read on his own,...

All the wonderful  summer plans I blogged about  in the beginning of the summer - forget them! They were wonderful, well-laid, well-thought out plans that DID NOT happen. As I said before , the time has flown this summer so far. June went by like the blink of an eye, and now here we are in the middle of July, the middle of the year, and nothing seems to be slowing down. Except, that is, us. Well, at least a little bit. I didn't realize until we were taking our loooong break that I really needed it. Needed the time to think less about school for a little while and just have fun for a little while. In fact, I haven't even (insert *gasp*) been reading my regular blogs as often. For the last few weeks, I have really been wanting to get back in to the swing of thing 100%, but every time I started to work on something, I could just tell I wasn't ready and the kids weren't either. But last weekend I was getting the itch back to prepare some fun things, and two or three of my...