The month of November was entirely beautiful. I knew going into the holidays that I wanted to take things slow. I wanted to enjoy my littles and protect their schedules so that they would have plenty of opportunity to play and discover.
The art projects recommended in AYoPS have been lovely so far. Sunflower painting was an activity all four boys jumped into with big smiles. My youngest is still not too sure about certain paint textures, but we see steady improvement as he engages with each sensory activity. We never force him to do one, we just make it available to him.
I have found that providing one special play box filled with something he really loves is great incentive to keep working through sensory activities he is not too fond of. A shiny reward after a morning of hard work. Lately, the treasure is this tiny collection of Safari Toob birds.
He sits for well over an hour with them. We bring abandoned nests inside for him to use along with the birds. Sometimes he builds them nests out of leftover ribbon scraps. (We had plenty of scraps left over after making hand kites for all the boys!)
November turned out to be a slow and steady month for us. The older boys plowed through their work in the mornings while the littles played at the table with different bins. We would all rush out the door after finishing our schedules block times and play outdoors. There are aspects of AYoPS that the eldest children demand to be a part of. We save those big activities for the afternoons.
Every month I have been laminating seasonal prints on construction paper. In November, we used pumpkin prints numbered 1-10. We used leftover seeds from our “pumpkin-cano” as counters.
We tweezed a lot of Indian corn and saved the kernels for our “On the Farm” sensory bin. (Kernels + Farm themed Safari toob)
Our gummy bear science project survived exactly 4 hours and 30 minutes. I came back to the classroom and discovered 4 empty jars and 2 mangled bears on the floor. I am assuming salted gummy bear and vinegar gummy bear were not quite palatable.
Out of all the November activities in AYoPS, pumpkin-cano was our hands down favorite.
Lots of mileage out of this pumpkin.
First, the boys pulled out the guts. Then they washed off the seeds. We saved some for baking and the others went into a wood bowl to be used as counters in the classroom for our November activities. Next we went outside and got all the ingredients ready for the eruption. Everyone was shrieking with excitement and gearing up with enthusiasm. The eruption was fun. We did it a few times. Then one brother asked, “I wonder what it would take to make this baby explode?” Well, a few minutes later we were throwing the pumpkin down from various heights. I was surprised how much height and force it took to finally bust that sucker open! We saved the pieces of pumpkin and carried them out to our compost pile. We laid one piece out on top, buried another piece and left a third piece partially buried. We observed the way it decayed over the next few weeks.
One of my favorite things about AYoPS is the monthly character trait development. I am always surprised and delighted to find that focusing on one trait over and over for four weeks, becomes a part of my children’s character. I am always tempted to do too much, too fast. Some things are better absorbed in a slow and steady way. This month, I wondered how I would teach my barely verbal 3 year old how to be thankful. I still don’t know if he completely grasps the concept, but I do know that because of faithful repetition, “thank you” is a regular part of his vocabulary now. I like to think of it as a little thankfulness seed, just waiting to grow with time.
The garden is in, my friends. No sooner had we turned our backs on those lovely beds than the heavens began to pour out rain. All our seedlings seem to have doubled in size the past week thanks to the ceaseless rains.
Unit #21 brought our merry group of adventurers to Robert Fulton and his Steamship.
Day 1: I read out of the recommended book basket list and set the boys loose in the yard with 4 kiddie tubs and an assortment of plastic trash. Empty bottles, milk jugs, egg cartons, straws and robber bands. They had a marvelous time constructing their own “steamships.” This eventually led to us hauling out one of our Usbourne science books and executing another round of “sink or float” with other backyard items.
Day 2: We hauled out tons of books and encyclopedias that catalogued various ships throughout the ages. The boys looked at “Into the Unknown” by Stewart Ross and copied his diagram of the steam engine along with a few other pictures of steamships detailed within.
“Into the Unknown” by Stewart Ross
This was intense work for the boys. They took notes and later spent two hours drawing highly weaponized steamships.
While we folded ships my youngest two tackled their own projects. Give the three year old an entire sheet of tissue paper and a glue stick–it will buy you at least 20 minutes!
The 5 year old was content to light up his Christmas trees with the correct number of red and white pony beads.
Day 4:
After finishing our state sheets, the boys did a little more work on their nature journals. On this day they transferred one of the public speaking presentations from our last week of the semester at our Classical Conversations Community. I love when they work so carefully and meticulously.
Meanwhile….
Day 5:
Thanks to the delightful “A Year of Playing Skillfully,” the boys and I discovered the lovely idea of window painting. My Adventurers join in almost every AYoPS activity and this was not to be missed.
We wiped down our sliding glass door, mixed the paint, layed out our painting blanket to catch any wayward drops of color and set to work!
We recently looked through our London Gallery Nativity book which featured several diptychs of the nativity. With two large glass panels at our disposal, we all agreed to make our own “Stain Glass” diptych featuring the nativity. The 5 year old was our creative director. He loves “Starry Night” and it quite obviously influenced his work.
We ended the day with a little sensory therapy in the form of homemade peppermint playdoh. It was worth the 20 minute make time. Peace on earth for over an hour!
We are on track to finish Adventures by the end of March. We’ll spend the rest of the month enjoying advent, studying The Nutcracker and prepping for our “Adventures in US History” Road Trip!
I love Advent. I love the confident wait, the certain hope, the undeserved miracle. I love the still, quiet moments around the table with our kids. When the house is shrouded in darkness save for those glittering candles reminding us of His light and His love.
Our firstborn son was born the day after Christmas. In fact, I was admitted to the hospital Christmas night, swollen and scared and wondering.
Anticipation, expectation, wonder.
I have walked Advent with those very palpable feelings tied about my heart. As Mary makes her way round our wooden advent wheel, I am right there with her. Expectation and wonder. Scared and filled with joy.
We have shared 7 advent seasons with our children. Some of them were rife with illness or stress. Some were lonely, painful seasons. Some we crawled our way through, we made it by the skin of our teeth.
All of them had hope, because all of them had God. After all, Emmanuel has never skipped an advent. He’s right in the thick of it with us. We don’t have to put on our Sunday best to meet Him. He gets the broken bits, the tattered rags. He doesn’t mind that I haven’t done the laundry or that dinner was more than slightly burnt. Or that I skipped the Caroling at the Nursing Home field trip because I did not want to be around people. We are a mess and, unlike me, Emmanuel still showed up.
For those that have been writing in and asking what we do for advent, yes, I will be including a list of our favorite books and resources below, but I wanted to write first and say that you don’t need to buy or make anything so that your children can experience advent. Emmanuel–God with us– is all that truly matters. He is near to us as we wait with confident hope. The tender security of this season is not dependent upon what we mothers accomplish as social directors of the season. Lets make time to draw near and worship. Lets make it the priority.
We often see Christmas as our time to serve the community, or to teach our kids about loving others. Are you looking for opportunities to serve in your community and minister to others this season? Fantastic! Don’t forget to love God first. I have to remind myself of this over and over again. Our most important commandment is found in Matthew 22:34-38, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.” As Henri Nouwen says in The Living Reminder, “It seems that in fact we live as if we should give as much of our heart, soul and mind as possible to our fellow human beings, while trying hard not to forget about God…But Jesus’ claim is much more radical. He asks for single minded commitment to God and God alone. God wants all of our heart, all of our mind and all of our soul.” Yes, love others this Christmas season. But we can’t forget to love God first. A few years ago my obsession was not getting, it was giving. And not the good kind of giving. I emptied myself so much I was basically inside out. A frazzled, empty mess. God was not first. He was not even a distant fourth. Everyone and their mother (except this mother) came first that year. My devotion was distracted. He showed up and I left the room to help someone else.
Lets lead our little ones to the advent wreath and spend time with the Lord, but let us not forget to get ourselves there first. Your advent season with Jesus matters too. So before you skip down to the resource section and kill yourselves trying to add in every single book or print out, find time in this often too busy season and carve out space for yourself to celebrate this expectant longing for Jesus. Wether or not you have an advent wreath, step away from the chaos and be near to Him. He loves you so. Come, let us adore Him.
The Story of Christmas by Pamela Dolton
This Advent I am asking God to help me understand the depth of His love for me. All these years of walking in faith and I still wonder, “really? Do you really, really love me?” I am a disgusting human being. Could He, in all the magnificent splendor and blinding blaze of His perfect righteousness, truly love me? My Sunday school answer has always been “Yes, He loves me!” I am certain of His love for others. Greatly, greatly certain of His love for others, but always cautious and insecure when it comes to me. I am praying for it to hit me like a ton of bricks this Christmas. I want to be utterly wrecked by His love. At the end of this Advent season, I want to live life like an unchained, freedom-gifted girl, adored by the God of this universe.
The Story of Christmas by Pamela Dolton
What will you ask Him to show you this season? What will you ask Him to reveal to your children this season? Pray faithfully over it. Pray it often. Write it down and pray the same thing over and over. I am determined to forget the dishes for awhile, arrive late to the party, leave the Christmas movie for later. Are the kids fighting? I’m committing to take a few minutes to intervene and help them reconcile before we move on and come to the light. If I start fighting with my spouse? I can stop in my selfish choo choo tracks, make it right and gather with my frail human family and worship Him– immortal invisible God only wise. There are a thousand distractions, a million blinking lights, begging me to turn away from the only light that matters. I refuse to be blinded by them.
Turn out the lights, come to the table, strike a match and light the candles.
Soak in His light. Hope, peace, joy and love.
He is coming.
Nothing can stop His coming.
Not fighting kids or messy rooms or canceled plans or strained family relationships.
The Story of Christmas Illustrations by Pamela Dolton (illustrations are featured above)
The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey by Susan Wojciechowski
A Tree for Peter by Katie Seredy
The Glorious Impossible by Madeline L’Engle, illustrated by Giotto
The Journey to Bethlehem by Chris Molan
The Christmas Stories of George Macdonald (one of my favorite collections!)
The First Christmas by The National Gallery London
The Legend of the Poinsettia by Tomie dePaola
The Candle in the Window by Grace Johnson
A Cowboy Christmas by Audrey Wood
The Small Miracle by Peter Collington
Josie’s Gift by Kathleen Long Bostrom
An Orange for Frankie by Patricia Polacco
Christmas Day in the Morning by Pearl S. Buck
Song of the Stars by Sally Lloyd Jones
Father and Son by Geraldine McCaughrean
Humphrey’s First Christmas by Carol Heyer
Back to the Manger by Margaret Ann Philbrick
Go Tell It on the Mountain by Debbie Trafton O’Neal
The Crippled Lamb by Max Lucado
The Tale of the Three Trees by Angela Elwell Hunt
Letters from Father Christmas by JRR Tolkien
Christmas Tapestry by Patricia Polacco
Christmas in the Country by Cynthia Rylant
The Little Drummer Boy by Ezra Jack Keats
B is for Bethlehem by Isabel Wilner
I still get a lump in my throat when I remember our assessment interview with the local early intervention program.
“What word would you say defines your son’s day?”
The whole office and the four therapists sitting in front of me blurred for a moment.
“Frustration” I croaked. “He is frustrated.”
They wanted to diagnose him with heavy words. They wanted to place him in a state run preschool for special needs. Schools that are underfunded and understaffed, filled with children that are not getting the attention they need and deserve.
He was frustrated. He was limited to only a few words.
In the mornings he would often dig his fingers into my shoulders and arms, desperate for some kind of pressure relief.
I made a decision.
A bold decision.
A terrifying decision.
The right decision for our family.
I ignored the grim expectations and moved forward with our EI therapist and “A Year of Playing Skillfully” a beautiful play-based curriculum.
We are three months into AYoPS.
Ask me what word defines his day?
Go ahead, ask me!!!
Joy.
The word is Joy.
Hallelujah! The word is JOY.
Joy & PLAY & more JOY. That is the focus this year as he gains his freedom from the frustration that ensnared him before.
Thankful does not seem like a big enough word. Thankfull? Thanksoaked? Thankwhelmed? One of those. It overflows.
Containing bugs, naming dinosaurs, tree climbing, up for adventures, making people happy with food, handy with a slingshot and always up for inventing something new.
Born to do this job.
Yet every once in a blue moon….
When the house is overwhelmed by farts, potty talk, poop jokes and crying from the latest gonad kicking contest…
I feel this way down deep pang of longing for a little girl.
For afternoons filled with high tea and Jane Austen. Mornings spent reading Anne of Green Gables or Little Women. Sewing projects and canning jam.
This longing has always made me feel guilty. I have been blessed with four healthy boys. My hands and my heart are full! How can I still want something other than what I have been given?
I pondered this today as I chopped basil for my husband’s salad and washed mint leaves for our afternoon tea. Our second born walked up and asked, “Mom, I want to preserve this St. John’s Wart for my collection of herbs.” I glanced at him, “You are collecting herbs now too?” He smiled, “Yes! I want us to grow them and then I want to preserve them so we can use them at home for all these different ailments. Just like the pioneers did. Just like Ma Ingalls!” I grinned back at him, “That sounds like fun! Lets do it! Dad and I are putting the new garden in this weekend and I’ll make sure we get our herbs reorganized and ready to go.”
Twenty minutes later the third born sauntered by, pantless, of course, arms laden with felt and a rapidly unwinding spool of thread. “Mom, can we make more Christmas ornaments?” We sat together for a few minutes, cutting scraps into shape and getting them ready to decorate. He looked up at me with his melting chocolate brown eyes, “I love making things with you, Mom.”
Half an hour ago my eldest found me folding laundry. “Mom, remember that story about the four sisters? Their Dad is fighting in the Civil War and their Mom’s name is Army?”
I blink. “Marmie? You mean, Little Women?”
“Thats the one!”
“What about it?”
“Well, I wanna get the Audio CD out again and listen to it.”
“I thought you didn’t like it?”
“Oh no, I liked it just fine. I wanted to move on to Guardian’s of Ga’hoole because I was excited about owls at war so we never talked about it. But I liked the story for many different reasons. Can we listen to it again and then talk about it? Like we do with all the Narnia books?”
“I would love that!”
I ran my fingers through his brown hair and said, “You know, CS Lewis and his friends were in a club of sorts. They would get together and talk about writing and life and books and faith. They called themselves the Inklings.”
He smiled big at me. The gap where his two front teeth used to be drawing me in with its devastating charm.
“Mom, we should do that too!”
“Talk about books? I already told you we could.”
“More than that! Make a club. You know? Drink tea as long as it comes with shortbread and talk about our favorite books and stories we want to write.”
“That sounds heavenly”
He hesitated, head tilting to the side in thought,”And we can call ourselves…. Your Littlest Inklings.”
“Or just, Littlest Inklings. What do you think, Mom?”
We studied the War of 1812 last year during cycle 3 of Classical Conversations. The minute the boys saw our topic of study they launched into the corresponding song, “The war of 1812, gave confidence to the US to write the Monroe doctrine…”
I made several recordings of their young warmly voices as they sang out “The Star Spangled Banner.” Its difficult to imagine what they will sound like a few years from now.
We recreated the Battle of Ft McHenry in our bathtub. We will not be sharing those pictures. Suffice to say, there was a great deal of water outside the tub when it was all said and done!
After spending the first two days of our unit reading about the War of 1812 and the writing of the Star Spangled Banner, the boys asked if we could take a detour with Lewis & Clark. I love homeschool detours. We always learn so much! Here’s what happened…
We jumped in with our Interactive 3D American History maps.
We looked up the various Indian tribes and geographical features mentioned on the map. The boys were very excited about researching these terms in their child craft encyclopedias.
We made a lap book from Tina’s Dynamic Homeschool Plus. All the printouts were free and easy to assemble. We listed defining characteristics of various tribes, studied botany and mapped out Lewis and Clark’s route.
We printed out the corresponding coloring sheets to fill in while I read aloud from our Louisiana Purchase book list (see below).
Lastly, I purchased a few pounds of white sculpty clay and the boys fashioned pieces for our Corps of Discovery diorama. I read aloud from a few books written from the experience of Seaman, the massive Newfoundland dog that accompanied Lewis and Clark on their journey.
We baked the pieces in the oven and then painted them a few days later.
This was a great project! I love how hands on it was. I also got a lot of reading in while they worked and afterwards, while they played.
On Friday, we went for our usual nature walk. The boys had spent the week cataloging the plants in our backyard. We dissected a bird of paradise flower and labeled each part. I had seen a great link for making your own grocery bag nature journals, a la Merriweather Lewis. I had planned to let the boys fill their homemade journals with drawings of native plants as though they were the original discoverers.
In the end, I opted to just let them enjoy the great outdoors with a project in mind.
When we returned home, they worked on their natural journals and sketched a large piece of brood comb from one of our pine trees. They also sketched a honey bee and labeled its parts.
I’m glad we did this instead of the journal. They were much more excited to sketch bees today. Some days, its better to let them lead their own learning.
We ended the week by playing one of our new favorite board games, Wildcraft, in honor of those crazy botanist/explorers Lewis & Clark.
Louisiana Purchase, Lewis & Clark Expedition Reading List
This past week, I opened American Pioneers & Patriots and began reading the story of the O’Neill family heading down the Ohio River.
The boys were decidedly not interested.
I knew attention and participation would be an all day, uphill battle.
I was not in the mood for that.
So I took some cardboard and the hot glue gun and built a flatboat. Then, I asked the boys to bring out the aluminum foil. We walked to the driveway with a bucket of chalk. I sketched out the states surrounding the Ohio River.
We set the foil out along the line of the river and curved the side up high. The eldest grabbed plastic teepees, warriors and canoes. The six year old held the raft and began gathering “supplies.” Little leaves, tiny berries, small stick to use as rifles.
We poured water into the Ohio river and the cardboard raft achieved lift off.
The boys were thrilled. As I read aloud from our book, they acted out each page. They asked thoughtful questions that sent me running to the computer for more information. They played with this set up for hours. Long after I had finished our assigned reading and the extra books in our basket, they played on.
I sat in a green lawn chair and hummed through Over the Rhine’s Ohio album.
By the end of the day, the water had leaked out and washed away the chalk. The next day, the boys ran out of the house with a laminated map in hand. Together they determined where the boundaries of each states should be. They carefully reshaped the Ohio river and even thought to elevate one end with flat rocks to help the stream flow in the right direction.
Its good to change the scenery sometimes. Its good to give their small hands something to do while they absorb information.
Before starting “On the Banks of Plum Creek,” I handed each boy a bowl, tweezers and an ear of Indian corn. They pried kernels loose while I read. We are collecting all these colorful kernels for our upcoming Thanksgiving unit. I love the concentration they exhibit during this exercise. The silence is also pretty fantastic.
We read five or six books on Johnny Appleseed this week. Our whole week was infused with apples! I made apple dumplings for the boys to eat while I read aloud from Margaret Hodges book. We sliced apples in half and used them to stamp butcher paper. We carefully folded up our project and stored it away for next month, we’ll be using the long rolls of apple stamped paper to wrap up presents for family. My five year old collected dozens of apple seeds and we used them as counters for our math lessons. The boys learned a great deal about John Chapman’s character this week. I believe it is the first time they have ever truly considered the idea of legacy. They are starting to wonder if they could change the world around them, even in a small, yet still significant, way. I pulled out Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney. After reading about the transformation Miss Rumphius ignites in her neighborhood, I charged the boys to begin thinking of ways they could impact our neighborhood for Christ. I am looking forward to hearing what they come up with!
We have been studying kingdoms and classifications in Classical Conversations this year. We used a few of our science worksheets and lab sheets to reinforce our MFW Science. The boys really enjoyed this exercise in particular.
Animal Kingdom Notebook Printables helped flesh out our Animal Kingdom Classification Books. Divider pages for each different kingdom are provided. The boys filled in facts about each one and went through a pile of magazines and cut out animals for each category as an “end divider” for each kingdom. Now as we study various animals we encounter in stories, on nature walks, or in our curriculum, we can draw their picture, record facts and file them behind the appropriate kingdom.
Team B enjoyed many fun projects and games throughout the week with their Year of Playing Skillfully curriculum. Team A joined in the fun! They still need heavy doses of play throughout their day. Pumpkin volcanoes and a Van Gogh study kept hands and minds engaged during breaks this week.
We also had the opportunity to watch a free performance of “Peter and the Wolf” at our local library. I was amazed at how much the boys remembered from their study last year during My Father’s World 1st grade. They called out the names of different instruments and characters and remembered the majority of the plot line.
We are getting ready to study “The Nutcracker” in a few weeks. I have finished compiling all the assignments and we will complete the entire unit before attending the show! We can’t wait!
We have taken full advantage of all the FREEDOM homeschooling has to offer these past few weeks. During our study of Eli Whitney, we managed to travel south to visit my family for a celebration, we returned home to host my in-laws for a few days and we visited Legoland. We managed to stay on schedule, despite a birthday celebration and the stomach flu tossed into the already crazy mix.
Legoland offers wonderful deals for Homeschool families. We enjoyed an almost empty park and the boys returned, brimming with ideas for new builds. Perfect place to be for studying the great Eli Whitney.
We always love heading back to my hometown. The boys have four great grandparents living there and they soak up all the time they can with them. After spending time discussing the process of harvesting and deseeding cotton, the boys had a chance to visit my grandparents and harvest coffee beans off their coffee plants.
It began to rain as we pulled the red beans off the plant. The large green leaves overhead kept us mostly dry. It was a moment to etch upon my soul, working alongside my little guys in my Abuelo’s backyard, the rain falling all around us and pitter pattering on the leaves. We chatted as we gathered, then we tried to come up with ideas to make the coffee harvest a bit easier. I spent a few days cleaning up all sorts of coffee gin prototypes off the floor. My favorite lego creation featured a giant claw hand that was manipulated with a long hollow stick. A button on the side opened and closed the hand. The beans fell through the stick into a sorting compartment that hulls the seeds with “tiny razors.” Later, the compartment detaches, the seeds then dry out in the sun within the confines of the compartment. Once the seeds dry, the compartment can be placed over a stove top for roasting. They spent a long time thinking through the design of their coffee gin. The five year old wants to market it. Sometimes I am tempted to make projects for the boys, especially models of things we are learning about. I have to remind myself that they learn nothing from sitting by while I fashion something. It is always, always better to let them build and discover for themselves. The boys made the cotton gin pictured above. They failed repeatedly before they got it just right. Every week, they are getting better and better at failing. Its wonderful! They are learning how to make mistakes and how to recover from them. They are learning that success takes patience and hard work. Sheltering my kids from mistakes and failures is probably one of the cruelest things I could do to them. I want them to experience failure while they are in my home, while I am nearby to support them as they sort out what went wrong.
We are looking forward to learning more about other great American inventors. So many learning possibilities await! I am currently gathering all sorts of odds and ends, from broken appliances to random spare parts. We are making room in our home for an Invention Station. I can’t wait to see what they come up with!
We are more than halfway through Adventures. The boys have completed over half of their Saxon Math work for Grade 2. They completed the Wolf level of Wild Explorers Club and have moved on to the Bobcat level. It all feels an awful lot like growing up….. We celebrated all these good things with a day at the theater. I am thankful to live near a theater program that includes homeschool families in their arrangement with the local public school system. Its costs our family much less money to attend the live theater than to attend the movie theater.
Ohio Pioneers are on the horizon. Looking forward to building rafts and making maps with my boys!
October has come and gone. It was an incredibly busy month for us. I am still trying to process all the things we learned together. I brought in lots of extra ideas from The Homegrown Preschooler this month. My newly minted 5 year old is quite over the moon whenever he gets to do “baking math,” my 3 year old is over the moon about the end product of “baking math.”
I love having my little Team B on this AYoPS curriculum together. It is fascinating to watch how they approach a new skill or activity. Add in sensory issues, speech & developmental delays and two very different personalities, and its a research field day of love and laughter! I set out the invitation to play. Usually on a surface at his eye level and equipped with baby wipes or a small bowl with water and a dry towel, ready and waiting in case someone becomes overwhelmed by something. While the eldest children dive right in, my youngest always approaches new material with caution. Sometimes it takes him awhile to acclimate to a new sensation or a formerly distasteful, but currently acceptable, sensation.
***Side note: Please never ever force your child to touch something that freaks them out. It will not “cure” their sensory issues.
At times he will pause midway through an activity and stare at his hands this way. Wonder, watching, waiting? I’m not sure what he is doing, but he does it almost every time. I leave out the invitation and walk away. He approaches and deals with it on his own terms. Its been working for us and his confidence is gaining momentum.
I love that his curriculum and therapy bring him JOY. That is a big, big deal.
I remember paging through “A Year of Playing Skillfully” while standing by the Homegrown Preschooler booth at the FPEA convention last May. The month of October listed the character trait: Orderliness. I wondered how it would manifest itself in our home.
Yes, the boys put clothes and shoes away. Yes, they helped tidy up dishes and even swept under the tables for me. But the real surprise with Orderliness was ordering their world to the extent they did. The boys loved reading “A House is a House for Me,” last month. It carried over to the month of October and into the trait of orderliness. Finding a birds nest on the ground means that my little guy will carry it in and fill it with his toob birds. Tucking socks inside shoes because, “Go home, sock!” Making the bed because, “Go home, bed!” Wanting to put bananas back inside their peels because, “Go home manamana!” Last month he would count when putting toys away, this month he would say, “First, and then, and then, and then.”
Meanwhile, the 5 year old ate up all art and music activities this month! We currently have an orchard of family trees and more yards of apple stamped butcher paper than I know what to do with. “Don’t worry, Mom. We’ll tell every one its jingle bell paper and use it for Christmas,” he said with a sly smile. Ah, yes. Fall colored jingle bell paper. Perfect. 🙂
We went on many walks in October. After reading “Counting on the Woods” by George Ella Lyon and making ever so many Nature Counting books, the boys are now on a constant watch for math in nature. “5 Kestrels and 4 vultures, ahoy!” Being outside with them is my favorite. Nothing to make or prepare beforehand, nothing to clean up afterwards. Just the boys and I and all the time the day has to offer.
They come home with dirty toes and a million ideas. Nature calms and soothes my little guy. On days when I know the invitation to play will be asking a lot of him, I make sure he gets time outside in the wide open.
We made our pile of leaves out of rubberwood tree offerings. The boys like to restock and form the pile anew almost every day for more jumping and leaf throwing. It was probably their favorite activity of the entire month and it required next to no preparation from me.
Though our little guy does take his time putting the pile together.
“First this, and then this, and then this, and then this, and then this…..”
Wilderness Road! Wilderness Road!
This curriculum is just too much fun.
We started unit 17 with a long walk through our local grassland preserve to celebrate our “Wilderness Road Day” Celebration. Thanks to the damp sand, the boys managed to track a rabbit for some distance. They also managed to track each other for a good long while, which was very funny. They’d ask, “What on earth made these funny tracks?” I would respond, “Hmmm, looks like a North American Pre Pubescent Homo Sapien to me.” Their father played this trick on them weeks ago but they still fell for it when I did it. Yessssssss!
We spent the rest of our walk imitating bird calls. One boy would pretend to be Daniel Boone and the rest of us were Native Americans. We’d hide and call out like wild turkeys to try and draw him out. We went through our yard and ate lunch based off of what we could find outside. We ended up eating eggs and cocoplums, and drinking pine needle tea, just like our friend Daniel Boone. It was terrible tea and we laughed over the tops of our cups and there were plenty of gagging noises and melodramatic “death by poison” scenes acted out at the table.
Then the Lincoln Logs were brought out and the boys built ever so many forts while bedecked in coonskin caps and fringed pioneer pants. We ended our Wilderness Road Day Celebration with “wagon wheel “cookies and milk. Don’t go looking on pinterest for an adorable recipe for wagon wheel cookies. You won’t find it what we made. Our wagon wheel cookies were made by my son. They are regular old sugar cookies with wagon wheel tracks on them. 😉
The boys happily settled in for their Saxon math lesson after all that exploration, building, gagging and feasting.
We’ve been able to build some really cool models and replicas this year. For this unit, we built a Frontier fort with the help of a very patient homeschool principle. I found this fort at the Rainbow Resource booth at the FPEA conference for $3. A quick search of the Rainbow Resource page did not yield an available link for purchasing this kit. Here is the more expensive Amazon link for the fort. This fort kit if for ages 8+. The boys definitely needed help with using wood glue and clamps to get the pieces to hold together.
This winter we will be harvesting from our first big garden here on the farm. We spent this month preparing the beds and starting our seeds. The boys are excited to eat like frontiersmen. I keep reminding them they will be working hard too. This garden will be a full time job!
We spent that Saturday morning sorting through our seed archive. We talked about what plants would yield the most crop at this time of year. What would be most beneficial for our table to plant? How would we store these vegetables once they came in? The boys had so many interesting answers based off of our readings in Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder. They are quite eager to harvest the crop and find ways to preserve our food! It is their dearest wish to pack something in sawdust and then walk in to the kitchen to find that I have cooked a mountain of food the way Almanzo’s mother does every five minutes. (Seriously, that woman cooks SO MUCH FOOD!!!)
Little House on the Prairie blog has these great pioneer paper doll printables, (along with a dozen other cute things) that we used this week. The boys loved putting these together while I read from Pioneers & Patriots. They ended up coloring and cutting out a bunch of accessories for their paper dolls to take on the long journey.
All this Wilderness Road/Pioneer reading made for a pack of mighty wild boys. They spent the week running, playing in the house, jumping in leaf piles, chasing the dog and bouncing on the adventure rope. I am so thankful that they get to run wild.
On days when our parenting is terrible, our boys walk in through the back door and I look at them and take comfort in knowing that in this we are doing what is right for them. Sweaty hair, red faces streaked with dirt, grass stains on their clothes, windblown, smelling like sunshine and laughter and joy and childhood.
farmhouseschoolhouse.com 