Settling Dust

Now that our little school has been in session for a little over a month, I thought I'd peep in to reflect on what sort of routine we have settled into. Despite my best wishes, I don't believe any year has kicked off without a hitch or adjustment. This year is no different, although I do feel more settled and peaceful about our curricular pursuits. If you are keeping score, you may enjoy doing a compare/contrast to what I initially planned on doing. I was amazed at the differences! You can find my initial blog post on the upcoming year here. Here's where we stand now that the dust has settled...

For my 10th grader:
This year my son will be continuing to expand his horizons academically. I have made a lot of changes in order to anticipate upcoming SAT/ACT and SAT Subject testing...

• Math U See Algebra 2
• Notgrass World History: This is the first time we've strayed from the Classical approach, and I did it intentionally, to help son prepare for SAT subject tests in May. Neither of us are as happy with it as we are with Biblioplan, so although we are going to continue with the curriculum structurally, I have gone ahead and purchased the Companions for years 1 and 2. He is planning on supplementing Notgrass with Biblioplan, as we both agree it is more thorough.
• Apologia Physics:  he talked me out of Chemistry for the year
• Teaching the Classics/Windows to the World, as organized by Jill Pike's Syllabus by IEW.  This has been my personal favorite so far!
• Introductory Logic.  This has been son's favorite subject, much to my surprise!
• Rosetta Stone German and German Demystified
• Analytical Grammar High School Reinforcements of British Literature and World Literature
• Guitar Lessons continue, and
• He has begun a running program to qualify for Physical Education

For my 8th grader:

My middle guy is seeing less change overall, but there are still some changes that we are exploring. Here's what he's working on currently.

• Math U See Algebra 1
• Easy Peasy Homeschool Ancient History, Ancient Art, and Ancient Music:  This has the most delightful surprise of all. Both of my kids who are working through this have enjoyed it very much, and I have enjoyed the multi-sensory opportunities for learning that have been offered. It's a true gem!
• Apologia Physical Science:  This particular level is one of my personal favorites by Jay Wile.
• IEW's The Elegant Essay:  This course, while very good, has proven to be the most challenging for me to implement so far.
• Analytical Grammar, completing Season 3 and moving on into the High School Reinforcements
• All About Spelling, Level 7:  A wonderful, Orton-Gillingham based course in spelling.
• Math U See Stewardship:  Consumer math for Christians!
• Critical Thinking, Daily Warm-Ups Logic: a fun little critical thinking vitamin for the day (180 days total)
• Teen Coder Java, because this kiddo is totally wired in that way!
• Literature studies as directed by me. I anticipate reading historical fiction, poetry, and some novels and short stories throughout the year.
• Basketball and guitar round out the year

For my 6th grader:

My youngest is continuing to advance her skills in reading. A strong dyslexic, she has struggled to find a place to pin her reading skills, but they are coming together nicely with specialized curriculum, namely...

• Barton Reading and Spelling System: a God-send for the dyslexic student and her instructor/parents!
• Math U See Zeta
• Apologia's Exploring Creation Through Astronomy:  I think this one is my personal favorite. I love the projects that are listed within its pages!
• IEW's Fix-It: This is a big win for my daughter this year. She's learning grammar and editing, all while rewriting a classic novel. The errors are embedded in the text, and she fixes them, looks up vocabulary words, and rewrites the corrected passage. It's brilliant, and really works to her strengths!
• A Reason for Handwriting, Cursive
• IEW's Ancient History Writing Lessons.  It fits in nicely with her history, which is...
• Easy Peasy Ancient History, Ancient Art, and Ancient Music, just like her brother's.
• Sign Language for Everyone. Because learning a foreign language is nigh impossible when you're dyslexic!
• Simply Grammar by Karen Andreola as accompaniment to Fix-It.
• Added to all that, she is involved in a local soccer league for recreation.

That's it in a nutshell. Things seem to be coming together nicely. This year I'm going to pray for smooth sailing and that we would all enjoy each other. The year will fly by, and there are fewer and fewer school years to look forward to with all of us together. Before I know it, one will be leaving the nest. I am so thankful for all the wonderful memories we have shared as a family who homeschools. 

Tangled Contemplation

I have never been much of an artist. It wasn't until I found knitting as a medium that I really hit my stride as an artist. For me, art has always been of the useful variety. A knitted sweater, a beaded necklace, or a lacy scarf, while beautiful art, was always useful. I never considered that I was any good at drawing until I discovered through my favorite podcast, Craftlit, an art form called Zentangle.

When I heard Heather mention this thing called Zentangling, it stuck in my head for a long time before I bothered to look it up. To learn more about it, I bought a copy of the book, One Zentangle a Day:  A 6-Week Course in Creative Drawing for Relaxation, Inspiration, and Fun.  Well, I read through the preliminaries, bought some basic supplies, and started in. Right away, I was hooked!

What is now known as Zentangling is what I used to call doodling, and it typically happened for me between the lines of my notebook paper when I was zoning out in class when I was in high school. While there are specific steps, essentially it is doodling on steroids. This doodling, however, is done with a purpose, namely to de-stress.

It worked. I took about thirty minutes to work my first design, and at the end I was hooked! I started tangling every day, and it wasn't long before my daughter noticed me at it. She asked to join in, and I started teaching her in our little impromptu class. She also found that it relaxed her as well.

One of my first attempts

Eventually, I decided to ask a few families over to learn about this relaxing and contemplative art form. I set the time for rainy Friday afternoon, adjusted Pandora to a relaxing station, lit a candle, and shared some basic motifs with everyone, and they were off. Both mothers and daughters appeared to enjoy the process, and I saw some lovely designs come out of it as well.

Our little class, in the creative zone.

In addition to the music and candles, our group also incorporated some prayer and Scripture, although that is entirely up to the individual about how she approaches the art. For me personally, it is a wonderful time to still my worries and open up to the Holy Spirit.

While I am not a "certified" Zentangle instructor, I was able to introduce our girls to a different way of expressing themselves and releasing tension. I highly recommend this to anyone who is looking for a way to reduce stress and build creativity. Supplies are minimal (Zentangle tiles - we used squares of paper for our class, Pigma Micron Pens, 2H and 2B pencils, and blending stumps). Over time, you can build supplies to design other Zentangle inspired art pieces, but the basics will take you a long way. 

Our class board

Frankenminion

It's been a monstrous couple of days. I'm currently suffering from some fairly extreme pain (literally) in my neck, and it seems no amount of massage, medication, or manipulation is working for it.  It didn't stop me from responding to a call on my Ravelry Tom Bihn group to knit a mini monster, however! After tossing around a few possibilities, I decided to knit a Minor Minion using the pattern designed by Heather Sebastian. It was the perfect time to tackle the little fellow, as we were breaking from our lessons to enjoy time with a friend from North Carolina who is visiting for a few days.

I decided to use some Knit Picks yarn called Palette in the colorway of Edamame for the miniature body, and then cap it all off with a stocking cap knit in some scraps of my handspun. Unfortunately, the tightness in my neck made it a little challenging to complete, but I finished it eventually!

And here he is... FRANKENMINION!

Here he is, peeking out of my Swift bag by Tom Bihn.

He was nice to knit in a lull in my design work, and I'm looking forward to knitting another monster as soon as I recover a little more in my pain department.

Here you see him resting in my hand for scale.

He was knit with size 0 (2.00 mm) stainless steel double point needles in order to get a nice tight fabric. I started him yesterday and finished today, although I'm certain he could be knit in less time. I can already imagine the girls' knit club having fun with these guys!

Kick Off

While our school year started a couple of weeks ago, we had the opportunity to kick it off in style, by attending a class to decorate notebooks! My girlfriend was so sweet to open her home and get the new school year started off in style by jazzing up plain notebooks with all sorts of different supplies!

Ready to start!

While the girls got busy on their creations, the guys had time to catch up on everyone's summer with some visiting.

And once everyone was done, it was time for a little cool-off in the pool!

Needless to say, everyone had a great time doing something creative, spending time with friends, and swimming in the pool.  We are all now ready to get started with the year, complete with a decorated binder!

Love it!

Pretty hibiscus I saw

And a cool beetle!

Clubbing It

As a knitter, one of my hopes was to pass on my love of the craft to my children. The first one to get excited about it was my youngest boy. He has become quite a fine knitter in his own right, and I love to see his unique creations, as he rarely uses a pattern.

My daughter was a later convert, but like her big brother, she has also turned out to be quite a knitter. Over time,  I learned that she was a social knitter and preferred to knit with friends, so I happily taught some of her friends to knit in our homeschool co-op. Our co-op is no longer meeting, but one thing that has thankfully continued is the girls' Knit Club, which started a little over a year ago (or is it two? I forget!).

Friends (and a cat)!

Of course, it's not all about the knitting (or crochet). There's always the tea and yummy snacks!

Tea, with a little honey

And of course, there's lots of laughter and conversation. Some days, I think there's a lot more of that than actual knitting going on, but that's all OK. After all, the most important part of the experience is friendship.

If you have a child who is interested in something, consider expanding the fun and inviting friends to take part as well.  Who knows, maybe you'll have the best knitting, painting, literature, or coin collecting club in your area! And you undoubtedly will have wonderful friends there to share in the experience!

She's not fat, she's fluffy! (and fast asleep!)

Ancient Music Fun

This year, my two youngest are taking a bit of a divergent road from our accustomed "hard-core" history approach.  Believe me, I love and believe in Biblioplan, and I fully expect to return to it, but I have learned from my oldest (it's a pity we don't get Mulligans in child-rearing) that there's plenty of time to be more academic in some pursuits.  This year is my middle guy's 8th grade year.  Next year I'll have two in High School. So this year, I decided to spend his last year traveling down some different roads.

My kiddos have always loved history (well, with one exception, my youngest!), so there was no doubt that we would continue to study it. The question was rather, how we would approach it this year. I have personally gone through the history cycle (as outlined by Susan Wise Bauer in The Well-Trained Mind) three times fully. All of my kiddos have gone through it at least two full times. This year, we were approaching Ancient History, AGAIN. I just felt I couldn't face it. AGAIN. So I started looking at other alternatives, and as what I believe to be a God-sent inspiration, I came across Easy-Peasy.

Essentially, Easy-Peasy is a website that offers entirely free curriculum via your computer and an internet connection. I had never heard of it before, and was doubtful that it could be of quality, but I gamely started checking it out. What I have found is that it is a delightful combination of multi-sensory resources that are engaging, Christ-centered, and rigorously sound. While many out there are using the website, which was designed by Lee Giles, I have chosen to select just a few courses. For those of you curious about the program, you can find her FAQs here.

As a part of her Ancient History program of study, I chose to also include Ancient Art and Ancient Music, as well as selections of Bible. We are only one week in, so I suppose I can't completely assert that all is going to be awesome, but what a start we've made! For the first time, my daughter is enjoying history! This week alone, she has toured caves in France, virtually designed and built a pyramid, created music such that might have been enjoyed by Adam and Eve, and currently is in search of a rock and natural supplies to paint it with. In short, I'm impressed!

This is the type of learning that I've yearned for for my children. It is multi-sensory. It is engaging. It is creative! I will continue to evaluate it throughout this year, but in the meantime, go over and take a look at it. I bet you'll be as impressed as I am! And if you decide to take the plunge, you will find plenty of support at the EasyPeasy Facebook page.

Oh yes, one more thing of note:  for those of you who are wondering whether the curriculum adheres to Common Core Standards, Lee emphatically states that it does not, nor will it. For some of you, that may be welcome news, and for others, maybe not so much, but I found it something noteworthy. Obviously, you can see that it doesn't bother our family at all!

Lotus Flower

This past weekend was a good friend's baby shower.  This is her third.  It's been a while since I've had the joy of expecting a baby in my friend circle, so I went all out and knitted up a little baby blanket.  Called the Lotus Baby Blanket, this project casts on in the center, than then spirals outward into a sweet, squarish shawl. The most difficult part was the cast-on, but after you get past that, it was smooth sailing, as long as you remembered all those yarn overs at the corners (I frequently forgot them and had to go back to fix it).

The center Lotus Flower motif

For harried-Mom, easy-care washability, I used Vanna's Choice yarn in worsted weight. The main color I had in stash, and I purchased the contrasting edging color.

Love that orange contrast!

All in all, I spent a little over two months working on this blanket, although I wasn't able to give a ton of teach time to it every day, so I suspect it could be done in as little as a month.

The finished blanket

I'm looking forward to meeting this new little guy!  It won't be long now, as she is due in less than a month!

Happy Mom-to-be at her party