a beary world

Boo-boo has been learning all about bears, both real and imaginary. So yesterday in school we made a little bear of her own. She wasn't being very cooperative when it came to taking pictures.She looks mad in this picture but she wasn't. I think she wanted to just go and have some quiet time with her new special friend.

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I helped her cut the bear out, using big sharp scissors. Then she stitched around the whole bear and stuffed it. At supper time she finally picked out the eyes she wanted and we gave bear a little face.

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A fun snowy day craft!

where have the children gone?

Really! I thought we were doing school!
Yet not one of my children,

Were at their desks!

Instead, they were digging delightfully for candy in the halloween bucket!

So good for their concentration and emotional stability! Not!

But I won't tell them how many times Mom and Dad have snuck a treat or two or three!

sailing the high seas

We have been taking a look at the world.

Studying climates, weather, water cycle, food chains, and habitats of animals and the ocean. Today we went on an ocean adventure and sailed on the high seas. Bugsy (my gluten goblin) made a sailboat so she could test and observe the force of moving air.
Can you guess what they have planned for the afternoon? Boat races. She wants to help her sisters make them. Anyone have more yogurt containers?

a homeschool day

Involves a little bit of baking. I wish that was always true! Too often we get a little busy and forget. Although we have been donning our aprons quite a bit lately. What really happened was we were completely out of bread and had no quick fixes for lunch, so we thought some Cranberry Crumble Muffins might be in order. Of course I had a willing helper.

A little bit of spelling practise is always good. One cup for learned words and one for words we are working on.

Kindergarten has a bit of cutting, pasting, coloring. counting and phonics all in one.

Writing a creative story is always up my girls alley. We found an idea generator on Scholastic that had the girls laughing.

Then of course there is math! Some hate it and some love it. My older two girls each fall into one of those categories. Oh, Bugsy also made a terranium today. Really cool project that teaches her about the water cycle. Will have to post more about that another day.

it was cosmic

We went cosmic bowling yesterday! Do I really need to say that we had fun? Boo-boo was determined to bowl on her own. So I gave her wings and let her fly at it!
The girls got creative and turned their glow-sticks into earrings and bracelets. Each of the older two got at least one strike.

I was thinking bowling was kind of an out-of-date pasttime! Was I ever wrong! Turn of the lights and put on some whites and you have a real party!

Afterwards we joined other kids, parents and adults for a picnic in the local park. It was a great afternoon where the girls met new friends and enjoyed the outdoors.

what plants need

we did a great experiment over the last 10 days
papaya need to find out the effect that sun, water and air have on plants
we bought three plants
plant 1 went in the window (sun) and got no water
plant 2 went in the closet (no sun) and got watered regularly
plant 3 went in the window (sun) and got watered regularly
they all started out the same size and turned out very different in the end
even between plant 2 and 3, there was a big difference in size and colour
it was a really good hands of way for her to learn the effects of sun, air and water
i do feel bad about killing a perfectly good plant though!

school day stuff

so here is what our days look like at home
okay, we still do lots of book work too
but these are the parts the girls love
hands on, domestic, experiments
bugsy helped get the muffins in the oven
whole wheat banana...the best!
they get made alot and get eaten just as fast!
papaya's has been learning about flying things
we have been looking at natural and man-made flying things
we also did an experiment the other day with a homemade parachute
the girls thought it was pretty awesome when mom dropped it out a second story window a few times and it worked, really well!
here she made a paper kite just by folding and string

luau party

papaya needed to plan a celebration as part of her homeschool work

she decided on a hawaii party

her choices for food were

snickerdoodles, which she made with oma

(who convienently disappeared from the picture)

fresh fruit with coconut dip

luau punch

the games of the day were suppose to be

hide-and-seek and crazy eights,

but that didn't exactly pan out

everyone had fun and lots of sugar

o canada

papaya learned the national anthem for school

she is very cute singing it

especially since she lost one front tooth last week

and hit the other with a ping pong paddle,

so it is hanging by a thread

a fun day

today our homeschool program organized a family fun day

we went to the local pool and rec center and went rock climbing or belaying

the girls had a blast, all three of them were able to manage some part of the course

our youngest was able to join and although she didn't make it to the ceiling

she got high enough that I couldn't touch her feet anymore, she did a lot of bouldering

the older two girls tried alot of different courses and were up by the ceiling alot papaya went up too many times to count, she was the last one begging for just one more run

bugsy was doing lots of runs too but took a real fancy to bouldering on the outside of cave

it was a really fun adventure and of course mom couldn't keep her feet on the ground, i tried my share of runs and they just kept giving me harder ones until finally my arms didn't want to cooperate anymore, I hung up my harness after that! now i should convince rick it would be a great place for a date night....what man wouldn't like that?