Cooking Cookies with Sissy

Every year we make cookies with one of our closes family friends.  The cookies we make are not always the same every year but my kids have looked forward every year to making them.  This year was no different.

 P.S. (I've decided to change the name I normally use for everyone.  It was easier to remember and type.)



This years cooking experience was rather messier then normal, but the most fun the kids have had yet. 

 Sissy and Hondo rolling out the cookie dough.

 Cutting out the cookies.

 All the kids making cookies. 

Love this picture simple because he got flour just in that one spot on his hair.

 

 Kakes was really into making her cookies.

 Hondo thought that Sissy needed a flour make over.

Later on they had a flour fight and this is how he ended up looking.

 Sissy didn't come out as clean.  She lost the flour fight cause all the kids joined in to help Hondo.

 A friend stopped by later and help ice all the cookies.

Hondo loved the eating part the best.

In the end we made a good amount of cookies to give away.  The hardest part was trying to keep Hondo from eating the cookies and frosting once we were doing decorating the cookies.  He managed to seek a few while everyone was busy decorating.  But in the end they had fun and that's what mattered.

Snow Day

I know that it has been a while since I last posted anything, and I am sorry.  But I'm sure that you all understand how busy life gets.  Even though I didn't managed to find the time to sit and post anything;  I did manage to take pictures of the things we did do.  


One of the many things we did was play in the snow.  Although for most of you that live in the part of the world in which you get snow during these months it doesn't seem like anything out of the normal.  But for us (where we live) it has been unusual to have snow like this until later in the month or in January.  Most of the time we just get freezing rain and ice.


So it was to our surprise that on Thanksgiving we got a good few inches of snow.  Then just last week we got another good dumping of snow.  Which made a great excuse for all the kids to put on their coats, gloves, and hats and head outside for a romp in the snow.  All after a sometime doing school.  Yes, we still have school when there are snow days, but it isn't as full a schedule then we normally do.




So here is how "our snow day" went.

 

There is Wonder Girl gathering up snow.

 

 Dare-Devil Boy rolling in snow.

 Snow Angel

Taking a romp in the snow.

 She told me later she was gathering snow to make a sled out of our wagon.

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September Overview

Sorry that I haven't updated since last month.  But really just got a bit more busy.  My husband has had a crazy work schedule the last month or so.  He's been on day shift and then one late night shift most times all in the same week.  So we've had to adjust.

But here is a quick overview of what we've been doing lately with school, church and just our crazy lives.


School:

History- We've been working our way through Colonial Life and learning a bit about Ben Franklin.  This has been the best part so far.  It was tough making our way through the discovery, conquering and settling of America.  Mostly the section of early explorers where the hardest.  Both Dare-Devil Boy and I got a bit bored.  But once we moved into colonial it has been great.  Learned about the Pilgrims (which brought up some great questions from Dare-Devil Boy.), the founding of Jamestown, and right now we are going finishing up on learning about Ben Franklin.  There was more but I can't fit it all in.  

By far for my husband colonial has been his favorite part too.  Mostly because this week we had a colonial meals all week and will have a tea party too some time this week.  My husband loved eating all the different dishes I made.  So much that he requested that we do add those meals to our menu, but also asked if we could extend colonial meals for the rest of the month.  

What we eat?  Here is a look at the menu (I wanted to add that I made all the meals for dinner, but they were things that they would of eaten for those meals back then):

• Breakfast- Fried Turkey (we don't eat ham so i sub it for turkey) with gravy, Dressed Eggs, and Breakfast Puffs
• Lunch- Chicken Salad Sandwiches and Cranberry-Apple Punch
• Dinner- Turkey Balls (again we don't eat veal), Sweet Potato & Apples, Green Beans and Baked Pumpkin Pudding for dessert.
• Tea Party (plan on doing it sometimes this week)- New Year's Cookies, Queen Cakes with Liberty Tea

I got the recipes from this book, Felicity's Cooking Studio. I will going to our library to look for more colonial recipes.


Science-  We've been learning about how the different parts of our human body works.  So far we have learned about ears, eyes, lungs and mouth.  

Life:

I've been teaching one of our AWANAS classes since last year.  My class is the Sparks class. It covers grades K-2nd grade.  My class as about an average of about 16 children, but we've had nights with more.  With such a big gap in ages, grades and reading levels it tends to get chaotic some nights.  I don't work alone, I have another worker that helps me.  But even with her we are don't always have enough people to do each child's book.  But the kids are loving it and are learning so much.  We've just finished working our way through a lapbook that I've made.  If you wouldn't like it you can downloaded here:
Sparks Lapbook

My husband has been working nights and days lately so his schedule has been crazy and to say the least not happy.  But he's managed to set up a few ministry things.  A few climbing days with varies people from our church.  Also a few CPR classes.  There has been a few great things going on with the youth group.  But other then working with our local church and work, my husband has been doing some online classes.  He is working to get his EMT license.  "Why?", you ask.  Well...there is lots of reasons.  But one that I can write here is that he's always wanted and enjoyed doing these kinds of things.  He has also wanted to get more in his training.  He currently is a Wilderness First Responder and we both feel that EMT training will help with the outdoor ministry and be a better way to provide for our husband.

There is more.  But that's about it for now in a nutshell. 

Bug Box-What's Bugging You

There is a caterpillar in there somewhere.

It was a box that was found by my husband when he came home from work.  The mail man left it there thinking no one was home.  We all were but I think that we were all laying down for a nap.  But anyway...the box was quickly opened and what did we find inside?



Well...lots of different things from the grandparents.  But the biggest hit was the Bug Box.  Mostly cause my Wonder Girl loves bugs.  She couldn't wait to fill the box with bugs all kinds and being alive wasn't a problem.  She put some dead bugs inside too.

So far we've had a caterpillar, several ants (most who escaped through the wholes in the screen), random insects that i really don't know what they are called, and currently a spider and crickets (so the spider can eat.)  Those who know me, we now have a spider as a pet.  Yes a spider.  Which still creeps me out.  But it is living outside in the bug box so I'm okay with it for now.

This isn't Charlotte, but another spider she found.

The best part is that Wonder Girl and my husband have gotten some time to spend with each other.  They spend every few days hunting around the house and yard together for crickets to feed the spider and other insects for it to eat.  They even manged to get some science in as well.  Learning about the spiders, who I forgot to mention that its name is Charlotte (after the spider from Charlotte's Web), from videos and the knowledge of what my husband already knows of spiders.

Wonder Girl with her bug.

But before I go I did what to state that since they catch several crickets at once and the spider takes a few days to eat them all they do feed the crickets too.  That is until the Charlotte eats it.  They give it a slice of apple to share and as of this afternoon there is part of Wonder Girl's waffle in the box also.

Daddy School

There is so much to do throughout our school week that sometimes I just don't get a chance to do everything.  So to help out I introduced "Daddy School".  Which has bee a great deal of help.  

The simple idea of Daddy School is a simple at a glance paper that tells my husband what we are covering this week in our school.  It tells what each child is learning, projects that he can do with them, the bible verses that they need to learn each week, spelling words, and even if he wants to teach science that week what he can do.

Its been a great tool and help in teaching.  Spider-Dad will test  Dare-Devil Boy on his spelling words when they are outside playing or ask him to multiply.  He will review whatever letter I am doing with Wonder Girl.  Mostly its when they are hunting in the yard for bugs.  Asking her if she can name animals or insects that start with that letter.  Or counting the leaves that they find.   

In short its been the best addition to out homeschooling.  I've included a copy of one week of our Daddy School week.

Daddy School

A Brave New World

Last week we learned mostly about Christopher Columbus.  How he thought that he was in sailing to China, his ships and everything else.  It was an informative lesson about the founding of the New World.  

Along with our regular books I added in Draw Write Now books.  We've never really used this series before, but so far Dare-Devil Boy is liking it.  What we've liked about it is that it has stepped by stepped instructions on how to draw the picture.  This has made it easier for Dare-Devil Boy to draw.

Mapping Columbus's Journey

Dare-Devil Boy's Columbus Lapbook

Dare-Devil Boy's pictures that he drew this week using Draw Write Now.

Columbus as a boy.

A Map of the World

Columbus's ships.

B is for Boat

I never got a chance last week to post about what Wonder Girl has been learning.  After a weird week we just finished up learning the letter "B", before we moved on the letter "C".  So here is  small look at what we did.

The pieces to make our "little b" Boat

 

 Smiling boat

Putting it together

 

The boat together.

A little handwriting work too.

 

Viking Videos

I couldn't post with when I posted about our study of Vikings discovering America a few days ago. But her it is now.  It is a short video of Dare-Devil boy explaining about what he learned about vikings.

 

Also another video of Dare-Devil playing with his Vikings.  It was a Romans vs. Vikings battle.

Tepi, not TP

Beside our trip into the world of vikings last week we also have been doing a Native American study.  This week we focused on the Hopi and a few of the Plains Indians.  The highlight and the biggest thing that came out of this was our Tepi.  

Dare-Devil Boy and my husband did the actually building of the Tepi or the none paper one at least.  Wonder Girl and I made a paper one for her to play with.  Complete with people and other things.

Spider-Dad first tracing out the shape.

 

Next cutting out the fabric.

 

As my husband was doing that Dare-Devil Boy 

was trying to put up the poles on his own.

The final product.  Even with Native Americans.  

(I didn't mange to get the actually raise of the tepi because

the did it while I was out.)

Later Dare-Devil Boy set up his Indian guys and Viking guys

for a formal meeting.

And finally...Wonder Girl's Tepi.  She was very 

excited to have one of her own.

A Vikings Nicer Side

Do Vikings has a nicer side?  Well I would like to think so.  This week in our study we learned that Vikings were more then Raiders, most of them were farmers,  that they are exploders and they never wore hats that had horns on them.  (Yeah, I was shocked to learn that too.)  Just to mention a few other things.

This is was our 2nd week of school, but so far our favorite.  Dare-Devil boy has much loved or is fascinated by the Vikings.  He would pull out the books we had around the house that had to do with this subject and would read or look at pictures.  Then proceed to ask questions on things that at the time I could never answer.  

So when we went into this week he was a bit more excited or interested in what we were learning.  Her is a small list of what we both learned about this semi-misunderstood group of people.  We learned that...

• ... they NEVER had helmets with horns on them. 
• ... they were actually the first of discover American and not Columbus.
• ... most Vikings were farmers and not raiders.
• ... came for a place call Scandinavia.
• ... that Scandinavia was made up of three countries: Denmark, Sweden, & Norway.

To go along with our study of Vikings we made a lapbook that I got from Homeschoolshare.com and a few notebook pages too. Also we did some great hands-on paper crafts that Dare-Devil Boy like a lot.

A picture of the inside of Dare-Devil Boy's Lapbook

The paper Viking Long House & Ship we made. 

Water colored Map of the place the Vikings Discovered

The Vikings fighting the Romans

Also the Vikings meeting the Native Americans when they came to North America.
(The Tepi was made during out study of Native Americans we also did this week.)

Pencil Box Lunch

A quick post about our first day of school.  

Unlike public or even private schools my kids done buy or bring their lunch to school.  They get it made fresh, made for on the spot and whatever (as long as we have it in the house) usaully whatever then want that day to eat. (This doesn't count candy, cakes or junk food.  That's a dessert in our houses.  And are given only if good.)

So to mix things up and make the first day of school fun.  I packed lunches.  But I didn't pack them in any old brown paper bag.  Nope. I used their old pencil boxes.  I cleaned them, packed what i could fit in to that box.  Which is more then I thought I could.  Then when it was time to break for lunch I pulled them out for them to eat out of.

It was an instant hit!  The only thing that didn't fit in the box was a drink, but that didn't bother them to much.  I just poured some milk and soy milk for them on the side.  This was simple, fun and my kids want me to do it more.  So it just might be something more regular we do in our school days.

Now I Know My A...

Since last week we've started Preschool with Wonder Girl.  She is loving and enjoying it a lot.  For me teaching her and getting her ready for Kindergarten has actually been more fun and busy then when I was teaching Dare Devil Boy.  Mostly cause I know more what I doing this time around and I have been able to get more help and find more resources then I did with him.

This year we are doing a bunch of things with Wonder Girl.  I'm using a mix of Totally Tots and No Time for Flash Cards to help and some crafts to learning letters each week.  Also it has made it more fun for both her and me.  (Even fun for Daddy.  Since he gets to tap into his creative crafty side when he teaches her too.)

Also we have been making a letter notebook.  Which I got the lapbook from Homeschool Share.  Adding to all this I've just made up much of our own Math games to teach numbers, counting, sorting, patterns, & everything else.  Then finally for some handwriting we are doing Handwriting without Tears: PreK Get Set for School program, which she is enjoying.

So here is a peek at last week's letter (Aa) and game.

Wonder Girl making her big "A" alligator

The finished product.

Pasting something in her Letter Notebook.

Simple Egg counting game.

I picked up some plastic eggs over Easter knowing I would use them for something.  Which I have done.  I used pom poms and beads.  There are 12 eggs but the amount of beads or pom poms in each egg only go from 1-6.  Which means that each number is used twice.

Then I used large index cards and labeled each card with numbers from 1-6.  Next I had Wonder Girl stamp something on that card amounting to whatever number is on that card.  Ex.  Card 1=1 butterfly stamp, card 2=2 flowers stamps and so on.

Finally I let her open each egg, count the number of pom poms or beads in that egg, then find and place that object on the correct number card.  Once she was done doing that, she placed the items back in the open egg and left it in the carton.