What a Monday looks like

March 1, 2010

I know some people are curious about what goes on in our homeschooling life, so I thought I’d post a regular Monday “school day”:

6:30am: I’m up and making coffee, starting laundry and answering emails for Cool Mom Picks.

7:30am: Wake up the kids and jump in the shower. By 8:30, we’re all dressed, beds are made, and we head downstairs for breakfast.

9:15am: Bring D to preschool. Arrive a few minutes late, but they have a “loose start”, so no big shakes.

9:30-10am: Back home to answer some emails and read some blog posts while the girls dance to “their music”. (can I call this Physical Education?)

10am: Start school. Give Jilly her Spelling Workout book and show her which pages to do. While doing her lesson, she’s practicing reading, writing and spelling.

I sit on couch with Belly and watch DVD lesson for Math-U-See Lesson 18 in Gamma Level (multiplying by 7). Belly then takes her workbook and does the first assignment for Lesson 18.

When she finishes Math, I give her a couple of pages to do in her new Scholastic Maps Workbook while I sit down with Jilly to do Math. She is also on Lesson 18 in Math-U-See, but the Alpha Level.

Jilly seems nervous about starting Subtraction today, maybe because the instructor, Steve Demme, so adamantly states that the kids must know their addition inside and out before they move on. To alleviate her fears, we decide to do another review lesson on addition instead of going forward with her lesson.

Jilly does her math review page while I ask Belly her spelling words from the list in Sequential Spelling. She likes this program since she is able to self-correct her work.

Sit down and do a grammar lesson in First Language Lessons with Jilly. We review the “fall months”, and when she sits down to do an activity for the lesson, I start Belly on her new Growing With Grammar book.

When Belly finishes that, she asks to do a page of cursive in Pictures in Cursive to get a little more of her work checked off for the week. I say, ohhhhhh, okay.

By noon, they are playing school with their dolls. We will do science, history and art later this week, and Friday we are taking a field trip to Old Sturbridge Village to attend their Home School Day.

At 1pm, we’ll pick up D from preschool and go to the library for an hour. At 2:30, D has speech and then the girls have gymnastics with friends. By the time we get home, it’ll be time for dinner. Tonight I’ll read to the kids and ask Jilly to read aloud to me a bit. They are all reading on their own now, but they still want a book at bedtime, especially Belly who still loves to snuggle in for her story.

Now a disclaimer:

Not all days look like this, nor do they all go this smoothly. I didn’t tell you that Jilly gave me heck about doing her work this morning. Belly has been easier this year than any other, maybe because she finally realizes how much she can accomplish in just a couple of hours while her friends won’t be home until almost 4. I wanted to have both girls read aloud to me this morning, but their “classroom” of dolls who were waiting to be taught was just too adorable. I can have them read to me at the library or tonight. . .or we’ll just do it first thing tomorrow. We’ll see how the day goes.

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Filed Under: Fairly Odd Kids, Homeschooling 12 Comments

I’m all out of love

February 12, 2010

It all started with the stack of Valentine’s Day cards that we made for the Veterans Hospital in town.

Then, I signed up our family for the 2010 Homeschool Valentine Exchange. We sent ten families these (from Family Fun):



Yes, those are glow sticks. I hope they get to where they’re going without cracking-and-glowing inside the envelopes. “Here kids! A plastic stick!”

While we were at it, one of my favorite bloggers asked if we wanted to exchange cards this year, and so our glowsticks are probably now stuck in Canadian customs while bomb-sniffing dogs circle the envelope.

But, with all of those cards going out by the 5th of February, it seemed we had SO MUCH TIME to finish all the other cards.

All 131 of them.

First were the 20 for D’s preschool class. He wrote each child’s name on the envelope and his name on the back of flying saucers. We put his little martian head on the front, and the words “You’re Out Of This World” on sticky labels so he could just peel-and-stick his sentiment. I called in my free labor (daughters) to help me cut and glue his little martian head (yes, I suck at any kind of “photoshopping”).


Then there were the 111 cards for today’s homeschool Valentine’s Day party (that’s 37 kids x 3 children).

Thank goodness Belly executed hers almost entirely on her own, using cardstock, an “I think you’re sweet” bird stamp, and a lollipop.

Jilly needed a little help, so we made puffy paint and decorated a zillion paper hearts which then were hung from a ribbon. She carefully wrote all 37 names in silver Sharpie after the paint had dried (warning, if you ever do this, your house will smell like shaving cream-glue for days afterward).

I knew D would smother me if I asked him to write his name 37 times, so I “cheated” and pulled out my secret weapon: Avery printable business cards. A few minutes on the computer to insert a photo and a little Valentine message, hit print and Voila!: “homemade” cards that he can shove into 37 bags today.

And, who can forget these little beauties from Cool Mom Picks’ Etsy contest? We didn’t–the kids have colored these to give to family and other friends who we won’t see today.

It seems humorous to me that I once worried that my poor classroom-less homeschooled kids would miss out on all the fun of exchanging Valentine’s Day cards.

Now, excuse me, I need to make cupcakes for today’s Valentine’s Day party. And fight the crowds at Target for a few little treats for my own sweethearts.

The irony? Do you think we’ve even started these lollipop plants? Of course not. Procrastinator’s version, FTW!

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FTW: “for the win” for all of you who don’t waste your idle time on Twitter.
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Filed Under: Fairly Odd Kids, Fairly Odd Me, Homeschooling 16 Comments

Valentine’s that do more than warm a heart

January 31, 2010

I’ve gotten to be a bit “bah humbug” about Valentine’s Day over the years. How did a holiday that is presumably about the sweetness of love become so over-commercialized and junk-filled?

This year, I decided to take back Valentine’s Day and do something to share our love with some people who could really use it. So, we decided to make Valentine Day’s cards for some of the Veterans in our local VA Hospital. Using the free and willing help of the kids in our homeschool coop, we sat down one Wednesday afternoon and got to work.

With a bunch of plain white cards, heart stamps and stickers, the kids sat down and made cards for the Vets. Even us moms got involved, writing messages like “Thank your for your service” and “Happy Valentine’s Day” on our own creations.

Last week, we took our stack of Valentine card’s to the massive complex that is the VA Hospital in our area. We delivered our cards to the Volunteer Services coordinator who will have them put on dinner trays on Valentine’s Day.

Our Valentine’s have already been delivered, but I’ve since learned of Valentines for Veterans, a project to boost the morale of Veterans during National Salute to Hospitalized Veterans Week that runs from February 7-13.

In addition, Bloganthropy saw my Tweets about our coop project and wrote to tell me of donations the website Dollar Days is making to Sew Much Comfort, an adaptive clothing company for wounded soldiers, in honor of National Salute to Hospitalized Veterans Week. For every blogger who signs their form by February 4th and then publishes a post about their Valentines for Veterans participation by the 12th, Dollar Days will donate $50 in clothing to Sew Much Comfort.

In addition, Dollar Days will donate an additional $50 in clothing for any blog post that gets at least ten comments. So, please leave a comment and help Sew Much Comfort get more items to help Veterans.

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For all the details on how you can help Sew Much Comfort provide free adaptive clothing to service members in need by making Valentine’s for Vets, please see Bloganthropy. Many thanks to Dollar Days for donating to such a great organization.

And please don’t forget to comment here—I need ten of you (and thanks to you too!).

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Filed Under: Blog Love, Fairly Odd Me, Homeschooling 30 Comments
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