Thought I'd catch you up on what we've been up to for school lately.

A couple of weeks ago, we had Beyond Five in a Row Camp!  We read Homer Price and learned all kinds of things and did a few activities, too.  I simply took the manual and picked out the topics we were most interested in, gathered my materials and we started off on our adventure.

I have a pretty good collection of Reminisce magazines, so I was able to find a few articles about early radio, television, and telephones.  Since Thomas likes to listen to old radio shows, he heard a lot of names in the old stories that he recognized.  He spent the week writing a melodrama, which he, Abby, and Katie performed as a finale to our study.  Thomas and Abby made sandwich boards one day and proudly marched around the yard, he read Whatever Happened to Penny Candy (I thought it might be over his head, but he really enjoyed it and seemed to get the gist of it), we read "Rip Van Winkle", and made some pretty yummy donuts.

We've had our noses to the grindstone ever since the first of January and have made great progress, and this week we're being rewarded for our hard work with some interesting read alouds.  If you've never read The Great Turkey Walk, you should see if your library has it. It's a very entertaining book!

Next week, we're planning to do a bit of art and music appreciation, and then we're going to do a unit study on chocolate!  We're really looking forward to that!

Read Aloud Week!

This is our final read aloud week for the year, but actually we have several things we're doing.

Since I want to finish our math books before the end of the year, we're starting each day with one page of math instead of our usual 2 pages. This hasn't taken very long and then we are on to the main event: reading!

Abby, Thomas and I are reading Winnie-the-Pooh. I think it's actually the first time I've read all the stories and I'm enjoying it as much as they are. We are also reading Laddie by Gene Stratton-Porter. There is so much nature study that I keep thinking I should do a unit study instead of merely reading it, but I've managed to squelch that idea, since the whole idea was simply to read the book and discuss it.

For history, Abby and I finished Bread and Butter Indian and have started Bread and Butter Journey by Anne Colver. These stories are based on pioneer journals from the author's family and are sweet reads for young girls. They are illustrated by my favorite, Garth Williams.

For Christmas I got The Apple and the Arrow by Mary and Conrad Buff for Thomas and we started it today. It's the legend of William Tell and it's pretty exciting so far!

Thomas has been studying the science sections in Beyond FIAR's Neil Armstrong. We're nearing the end and I've spent a good bit of time on the internet, trying to figure out how to pull all the information together and do something hands-on at the same time. I decided to make the space lapbook in The Ultimate Lap Book Handbook by Tammy Duby and Cyndy Regeling. This handbook has instructions for lapbooks and minit books, as well as other kinds of books, such as pizza books, stick books, accordion books, etc. and projects for each school subject. We'll post some pics of it when we finish up. This week, we're working on hamburger-fold minit books about each planet and learning information about each one as we go.

Abby and I are finishing up The Bee Tree by Patricia Polacco. We spent a couple of days talking about the orchestra, reading Zin! Zin! Zin! a Violin and The Story of the Incredible Orchestra and playing on a neat website done by the Dallas Symphony for kids. We read about bees, of course. And today we read Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney and made maps of our neighborhood and the inside of our house. I have some beeswax sheets to make candles, but will have to wait until I get to the big city to get some wick.

Next, Abby and I will begin rowing our last FIAR book, Miss Rumphius.

We've had a busy week with lots of other things going on, but we've learned a lot, too!

Read Aloud Week!

It's almost lunch time. There's bean soup in the crockpot, because the oven is going full blast. Rachel has already made a beautiful 3-layer chocolate cake with chocolate curls and more chocolate drizzled all over the top. Carrie has her pumpkin-pecan cake layers made and is waiting to make the cream cheese frosting. Emily is mixing up chocolate layers and will make white frosting, then press chunks of white chocolate and almonds all over the outside. Anna and I are waiting in line for our turn with the mixer and the oven to make a whipping cream pound cake and another pumpkin-pecan cake to give out for samples.

I've already made a Wal-mart run for some more pie pans and bananas for the pudding tomorrow. While I was there, I took advantage of sweet potatoes for 25 cents per pound and a reduced price on cranberries, which I throw into the freezer and use all year. I also picked up lots of pita bread and a round loaf of multi-grain bread for tomorrow night's communion service at church. We're missing Katie, who is out of town helping Granny to start her Christmas shopping this weekend. Big doings today!

Abby and I started a new book for her history.


And now Abby and Thomas are watching David Macaulay's Castle on DVD, as a go-along for The Duchess Bakes A Cake.

We're going to be off school next week, but we will read Calico Captive as a read aloud, probably starting it sometime this afternoon after our work is finished.


Read aloud week is almost over, but it's one of our favorite activities and we look forward to it with much excitement.

Read Aloud Week!

The kids played at an Agape Feast for senior adults yesterday and had a great time!

We're back to school today, plus starting our baking frenzy (7 fancy cakes, 4 pies, and a banana pudding) for an auction on Sunday night to benefit Hope International.

Today's books....

My favorite autumn book!

Forget the movie - this book is the best!
(mine is an earlier edition illustrated by Holly Johnson, but I couldn't find a good image of it to use)

A sweet Thanksgiving story....

P.S. We finished Brighty of the Grand Canyon today and it ended with Thanksgiving! How wonderful was that?

Read Aloud Week!

Today's new books....

It's fun to re-read Cranberry Thanksgiving and remember the FIAR lessons we've learned in the past.

We're reading The Sign of the Beaver for Abby's history.

And Thomas is reading a Hardy Boys mystery independently.

We started The Duchess Bakes a Cake for our FIAR study for the next couple of weeks. My plan is to have a medieval feast when I have a chance to work it into our schedule.

Read Aloud Week!

We read a few Thanksgiving books every year to remind the little ones what it's all about.
We started off with this one today.

I've purposed to read an animal book every time I have read aloud week, so we can learn a little more about nature. I bought this book at a library sale because it is by Marguerite Henry, who also wrote Justin Morgan Had a Horse. It's a new read for us, and we like it.

Read Aloud Week!

This week we are reading, reading, reading!

And this week, I'm reading.....

During Arts Week, Thomas made bannocks to go with his The Door in the Wall unit study. He and Abby had a picnic in the yard with the bannocks, bacon, and cheese.

Read Aloud Week, Day 3

Today's reading:

We read this today for Abby's history. It's new at our house and worth finding for yours - the text is a bouncy poem with pretty illustrations.

Go-along for The Door in the Wall


Go-alongs for Gramma's Walk

The chapters for Little House on the Prairie and Snow Dog were especially exciting today, too! But we're going to be very busy for the next couple of days and may have to finish our books next week.

Read Aloud Week, Day 2

Here are some books we've read today:

We're well into Snow Dog, which is very exciting, and, after several weeks, we've finished Adam of the Road. Great book, especially with Robert Lawson's illustrations!


Both to go along with our FIAR book

After I'd read for several hours, Abby read this one to me as a go-along for Gramma's Walk.

We read this for Abby's history today. It's a wonderful story-within-a-story.

And, finally, we read this to go with Abby's history and are, at this minute, in the process of making the Goody O'Grumpity bread recipe in the back of the book: a dense ww loaf with lots of spices, raisins, and dates. Mmmm!

Let's Read!

Here's what we're reading today:

During read aloud week, we usually try to read a nature book of some sort.


Thomas is reading this book (all by himself, a great achievement!).

Abby's FIAR book for the week.


A go-along for our FIAR book.


Abby looked at this book while we were having our FIAR lessons.


This is Carrie's independent reading.


Abby and I are about half-way through one of my favorite books of all time.


This book is part of Thomas' The Door in the Wall unit study.


Abby's history reading for today.

Special Times with My Children, Part 1

Several years ago, I was feeling very frustrated because life was happening and read aloud time was falling by the wayside. Reading aloud to my children is one of most enjoyable, and I think one of the most educational, things I've ever done. I've read to them since they were tiny and it's been such a precious memory for all of us, hence my sadness over having this activity pushed aside day after day.

After praying about it and thinking about it for some time, I believe God gave me such a great way to solve this problem. I decided to make one week out of every 6 a read-aloud week. On that week, Abby, Thomas, and Carrie drop all subjects, except Bible, and we read aloud all week. I usually get a book on tape for Thomas and assign a book for Carrie to read to herself so they have something to do if we have interruptions or if my tongue is hanging out from all that reading. And Abby and I have Five in a Row all week, too.

We read books about science and nature, such as Gentle Ben, My Side of the Mountain, or Rascal. We read books for history - biographies or historical fiction, usually a book from our TruthQuest guide. We read books just for fun, such as Around the World in Eighty Days, Little Miriam of Galilee, or Gone-Away Lake. We read picture books, which all ages enjoy. And Abby and I have the opportunity to spend a bit more time than usual with our FIAR books.

The girls in high school usually can't break away from their schedule to join us all day, but they are in and out and I usually give them just history and science reading and drop their math for the week.

It's like a little vacation in the midst of our school weeks and has been a huge blessing for our family.