Creative-Mommy

Well, for those who are interested..here is an update on life here. I am having a hard time posting pics because my phone, which I was using went KAPUT and my new phone takes HORRIBLE pics. So, I have been avoiding the blog. But I forgot the reason for the blog in the first place. It was not just a place to show off our homeschooling activities, it was a place for me to have a place to talk about the things that are going on in my life and to update family and friends on those things too.

Baby Abby is not so much a tiny baby anymore. She is already 3 1/2 months old. It is so hard to believe. I am still struggling with her birth, but we are getting through it day by day. Even knowing how things turned out at the hospital though, I would have waited for labor again in a heartbeat. No matter who it pissed off. She has been the healthiest baby. And she is just beautiful. She has the biggest smile I have ever seen.

Liz and Rachel and Julia have been working on school. I am loving having all three of them home, and it is such a blessing to watch the relationship between my girls grow and flourish. They are doing so well. I am really proud of them. Sometimes I think its a good thing that I have bright kids, since we are still learning our way around homeschooling.

Julia's new favorite game is what we call THE BUMP GAME. Basically, I stand up 8-10 crayons on the table and she bumps them over, the only catch being that she picks one that corresponds to a color I name. We win when all the crayons are laying down. It has increased her knowledge of colors by a lot and she loves it. Rachel is working on pre-reading. She has been showing an increased interest in letters and the sounds they make in regards to the printed word. She has known all of her letters for quite a while now but is just now getting to the point of realizing those printed symbols correspond with a sound.

Elizabeth is reading chapter books, working on her math, writing and just loving being able to learn at her own pace, which seems to be a tad faster than her age.

Well, I am off this morning to make a Thanksgiving Tree. We are making a tree to put up on the front door and between now and Thanksgiving we will each be writing something we are thankful for each day and putting it on the tree. Thanksgiving I plan to have everyone share the things we are Thankful for. I know Jason especially has been feeling a little low lately, and think this would be a great way to count the many blessings we do and take a fresh look at life.

Love and blessings to you all.

I have several craft and fun pictures and information to upload and will be doing so in the next couple of days. As always, thanks for your continued patience. This time especially it will be worth it. I found the GREATEST site ever!

My littlest one in a fit of crankiness!

This is an absolutely awesome site devoted to learning about other cultures and countries through crafts and swaps. Worth being checked out and bookmarked.

Well we started our homeschooling year today. I was awakened at 7:30 by a little girl who was super excited to get started on school- namely she wanted to make caramel apples for a snack. One of my goals this year is to involve my girls more in cooking, to instill that love of cooking and to teach them the lessons that are inherent in food preparation: patience, measuring skills, reading a recipe etc...

Since we are starting our year off with A, the snacks we will be making all feature something that starts with the letter A. Two of these I will post on today are Alligator Swamp Water and Caramel Apples. Caramel apples are not usually a major production, except that the girls and I made our own caramel. The recipe is super-easy and very tasty and unlike other caramel recipes this one uses ingredients that are already in your cupboard. I call it 1 Cup Caramels.

One Cup Caramels
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1 cup butter or margarine
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 cup Karo syrup
1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk
dash salt
1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine all ingredients except vanilla in a sturdy saucepan. Cook on medium heat, stirring occasionally until soft ball stage is reached. On my candy thermometer, to set properly I cook it to 245 degrees F, but the soft ball test, of dropping candy into cold water also is an accurate test. Remove from heat. Add vanilla. If making caramel apples, dip apples in hot caramel. If not, pour caramel into a greased 8x11 or 9x13 pan. Cool completely. I had some large leaf shaped sprinkles from last year and after the apples had sat for a few moments, I let Rachel press leaves onto the caramel for pretty fall apples.


Alligator Swamp Water
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Mint chocolate chip ice cream
2 liter bottle of ginger ale, sprite, 7 up or Dr Pepper
Chocolate ice cream topping

Put 1-2 scoops of ice cream in a clear glass. Add soda until foam reaches the top of the glass. Let sit a moment until the ice cream colors the soda. Top floating ice cream with chocolate syrup. Serve immediately.

Mostly I wanted to see if I could post pictures directly from my phone, which it appears as though I can. But this is my baby, 23 days old. In my opinion she is getting prettier and prettier everyday. I am not biased, I assure you...

Found here originally: http://mamakatslosinit.blogspot.com/2009/08/writers-workshop-things-i-have-learned.html
I thought it looked fun so I decided to give it a shot...
Choose a prompt, post it on your blog, and come back and sign Mr. Linky. For good comment karma try to comment on the three blogs above your name!!

Things I have learned from my toddler. Parents cannot hear a baby crying two feet away if you do not tell them about it. Uncooked noodles and cat food are delicious. Playdough in the bathtub equals gooey squishy fun. Toys are so much easier to find if they are scattered all over the floor. 15 baths a day is a perfectly acceptable number. Fruit snacks = mana from heaven. If a story is good the first time around it will be amazing the 2 millionth time around, and its best to space those readings as closely together as possible. Any squishy medium is great for finger painting. No one wears shoes unless they are going for a walk or to the park.

Links: 5 Little Shapes and 5 Green and Speckled Frogs both came from http://www.childcareland.com. The flashcards I sent to a friend for her little boy, and forgot to save the website. If anyone knows where they came from please let me know!

I find that flashcards are great for my kids, not so much so I can walk around and drill them on whatever it is we are working on, but so they have something to hold and carry around. Julia will take one to me and ask about it, then take it to her dad, and her sisters then back to me. The reinforcement works very well, and it gives her a special manipulative that is hers to "play with". The set I made her is for basic colors. This site had many more I would have loved to have, so please let me know if you are familiar with it. I saved the file to my computer, but not the address to my favorites.

The shape song is to the tune of Three Blind Mice, and can be found on Shelley's childcareland site, under the freebies. It promotes basic shape recognition and once again provides a manipulative for my daughter to use and move around.

5 Green and Speckled Frogs is a song I learned in pre-k many years ago. My oldest learned it in pre-k as well. The frogs themselves came from Shelley's site, although any clip art of frogs would work. You could also make a glove puppet or finger puppets, depending on your child's interests and learning style. The pattern was for a flannel board, which I do not have at this time. However, as I have shared before, I do have a metal board my husband made me, and so I find that magnets work well for us. As always, everything on here has been reinforced with packing tape, although contact paper or laminating sheets would work as well.

Many people I know do not actually do school work with their younger kids, but instead give them something to keep them out of the way. I find that involving all my girls in school makes things go more smoothly for me, and the little ones are learning more than I would have expected.

At not quite 2 Julia can sing the ABC song, count to 10 on her own, manipulate objects to 10, recognize basic shapes, as well as knowing the words to several nursery rhymes. She is also learning the letters in her name. I do not sit down with her and drill her and make her do schoolwork. But she loves to sing, so we sing, and she loves to count spoons, so we count spoons and she loves to sit on my lap and dictate shape-drawing or letter writing. So we do all those things and I find that she is already gaining a love of learning. When I say it is time to do school, she is often running at the front of the pack to get to the table.

That to me is the beauty of homeschooling.

I am in the midst of preparing for school to start at my house. I had hoped to be all ready and started by Monday, but I seriously overestimated myself. Hey, it happens. So, today and the rest of the week are crack the whip time. Elizabeth will be home Sunday, so we will all start on Monday with school work, which means the rest of this week is time for me to set up our school room, aka my living room.

Rachel will be doing ABCs. I have some file folder games for her, a lapbook, recipes for snacks, an animal book, coloring pages etc... I will be posting as we do each letter. The first one, is of course A. We will have an alligator wall set up, as many of our crafts and science projects involve alligators. We will also be making pinweels for AIR. There are several songs we will be learning and a fingerplay. (All the information for this will be posted online, as soon as I get my pics up). I will post the links for you as well, and if there is anything on here that you are interested in, template-wise, feel free to leave me a message and I can email you what you need. I will also post the snack recipes.

Julia will be learning the 5 Green and Speckled Frog song, complete with magnetic puppets, working on the 5 basic shapes, colors and reinforcing her counting skills. There will be some overlap with Rachel's school work, as her coloring pages lend themselves well to kids Julia's age as well.

Elizabeth will be making a cat lapbook http://www.homeschoolshare.com/cats_lapbook.php found here. The lapbook Rachel is making is also found through homeschoolshare.com. It's a great resource, especially if you are new to lapbooking. She is also learning American History, beginning with the Native Americans. My hope is to have some overlap between the lessons I am using for her and Thanksgiving.

Please note that almost everything I use I find free online, or get the idea from a book I have and go from there. I do not purchase any materials online whatsoever so you will seeing a lot of links on my blog this year (as much of Elizabeth's stuff especially is found online) and they are all to free materials you can print out on your own computer, or download and save. I promise I will get this laid out in an orderly manner so you can find what you are looking for. I will be posting off and on over the next few days, as I get stuff organized and set up.

Well, it looks like Elizabeth will be taking a week long vacation with my aunt, so we will commence the school work when she gets home. I started gathering the materials I needed today. I found an entire workbook online for Liz for math, which will at least tell me what concepts she needs to work on and we can go from there. I also found a lapbook for her to do for science, and a great American History website for social studies. Throw in some vocab and a book/reading worksheets from LearningPage.com and I think we have her covered. For Rachel we will be focusing mainly on ABCs. My plan is to do one letter a week. I will be using a lapbook for each letter as well as resources and templates from several of my books. The crafts I will probably just spread out among all three girls. For Julia, we will be focusing on counting songs, stories, nursery rhymes etc in addition to the basics like shapes, colors, numbers, etc.

I will, as always be putting up the resources, as I find them and posting pictures for your viewing. I was dreading school starting up again, just due to the amount of work in putting together not only one, but three curriculums, but what I found today is that I am actually very excited to get started. So, we will be gearing up. I may start with Rachel next week, while Elizabeth is gone, but it will depend on how quickly I get her information scanned in to the computer and printed off.

I also need to make a supply run. I have been keeping busy making diapers for Baby and making cloth shopping bags. My kids keep absconding with the bags I make, which is OK since the ones I have been practicing on have Dora the Explorer, Tinker Bell and Cinderella. I also want to get started making some Christmas presents. It will just be a matter of getting into some sort of routine. I am kind of putting any major plans on hold, while I wait to start school.

I would also like to get back into working on my novel, which I have started on the Pheonix Rising blog. It would be nice to carve that time for myself again, at least until Bible Study starts again. But, as always, best laid plans and all of that. LOL. I also need to finish Liz's toucan bookmark. Wow, the more I type, the longer my to-do list gets. I guess I should get off here and actually get busy.

I will have some pics up soon as I start making games and manipulatives for the kids.

Well, baby Abigail Grace made her grand debut on the world on July 28, 2009, one day after Elizabeth's 6th birthday. She weighed 7lbs 6oz and was 21 inches long. Today is her one week birthday and she is doing great. She is a happy, peaceful baby.

The rest of us are trying to get back to some semblance of order. It will no doubt take us a bit, but the goal is to start school again on a serious note by the beginning of September. I am currently looking for any sites, ideas etc so if you know any let me know. Elizabeth will be in first grade, Rachel will be Pre-K/Kinder and Julia is Pre-K.

Thank you so much to everyone for everything. We will be back to business soon!

Well, I am still here, and still waiting for baby. Apparently she is more a slow-cooker than a microwave kinda gal. Its been nice though; we have been spending time with the girls. We took Liz to get her birthday presents this past weekend (it's early, but I didn't want to try to be doing it around who knows what else). Then we spent the 4th at the park.

Not much going on here. Just trying to stay cool and get through this summer. I am looking forward to fall so much! I hope to be back posting regularly after the end of this month. Thank you all for bearing with me and being patient. That is one of the nice things about homeschooling though, is that we can fit it around our schedule and our lives.

Peace and blessings to each of you.

I know this is usually a blog about our homeschooling journey, but these days it has been so hot here and I am so tired, we haven't done much. Mostly we have been reading, and coloring and singing the ABC song. I am counting down the days until this little one makes her appearance. Last night, or this morning rather, I woke up at about 5 with contractions. I was up with them for a couple of hours, and figured this had to be it, then I dozed off and slept until 9. When I got up, the contractions started again, mostly in my back, and they have been intermittant all morning. But, they aren't getting closer together and they aren't getting stronger (at least not yet). I am glad I didn't call Jason in the middle of the night and tell him I was in labor.

Luckily, he will be home from his class this afternoon sometime. It has been a rough couple of days here, due to some issues with family that I will not go into at this point. But as I sit here and type this, I am getting phone calls from an unknown number and so am pretty sure the family in question is up to some new tricks this morning.

I am just praying this baby gets here soon! I am so worn out and not sleeping well. But I will keep everyone who needs to know posted, and be patient with my homeschooling hiatus. I don't know why I was thinking we could manage a whole curriculum this summer. I must have been out of my mind.

Pretzel Fish

2 C warm water
1 T yeast
1 t sugar
4 C flour
1 T table salt
2 T baking soda
1 T sea salt

In large bowl combine 1 1/2 C. warm water, sugar and yeast. When yeast is bubbly, add table salt and flour (1/2 c. at a time- more flour may be needed). When stiff dough is formed (similar to bread dough), place ball of dough in bowl and let rise until doubled. When dough is doubled, punch down. Pull off golf ball sized pieces and shape into long thin ropes. Twist ropes into fish shapes. Mix last 1/2 c. water with baking soda. Dip fish shaped dough into the water and place on a greased cookie sheet. Sprinkle with sea salt (or other topping of your choice) and bake at 400 degrees for 15-18 minutes.

I apologize for the lack of postings lately. It has been sweltering here, and i have not had the energy for much. I did make Elizabeth a set of magnetic poetry. I looked online for a word list, where someone else had made a set for their own kids. However, much to my suprise the only ones I could find were overpriced commercial sets. I bought some magnetic strips at Wal-Mart (88 cents for 15 strips.) I stuck them to a piece of paper and wrote several copies of each word running from and, the and of to octopus, flashy, fish, seahorse. I covered the strips with tape and cut them apart. Elizabeth can then play with it to make sentances or poetry on a cookie sheet. I spent less that 5 dollars, (closer to three I think) on a set of magnetic poetry that would have run me closer to 15 had I bought it retail. :)

Well, we spent yesterday repainting the girls' bedroom and assembling and repainting some bunk beds we got used from a friend of a friend. The kids were super excited to get their bunk beds finally, and although it took us almost 9 hours, we feel like it was a job well done. I cleaned their room again and repainted the walls off-white (which they badly needed) and made the trim and the beds a powdery blue (which Rachel loved since it matched her shirt lol). Anyway, just wanted to share. :)

Elizabeth and I made a drawing of a diagram of what the ocean floor looks like. I had found the detailed instructions to draw one (let me know if you need the directions) and then she and I painted it with tempera paint. The next morning, we added labels such as continental shelf, shoreline, plain and trench. (The goal for me is not that the girls memorize all these features, but that they are introduced to them and introduced to the idea that the ocean floor is not a flat surface. Eventually I am sure we will come back to oceans and I want the seeds of knowledge to be there.)

SAND MODELING DOUGH: (textured play doh!)

1 cup sand

1/2 cup cornstarch

1 teaspoon Alum

3/4 cup hot water

food coloring if desired

Mix sand, cornstarch and Alum in bowl. Add hot water and stir vigorously. Add food coloring if desired. Cook over medium heat until thick. Let dough cool. Mold into desired shapes and let dry in the sun for several days. Store any leftover dough in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Then we used this recipe to make sand modeling dough to make our own ocean floors. I will get some pictures up of the finished product, but they are still drying. The directions for the floors says to have the children make diagrams of the ocean floor and label the features. We did not go quite that far (especially as the activitiy is for 2nd graders). But the girls had a wonderful time creating sea features for their ocean floor like coral beds, tunnels, starfish etc.

It always amazes me how much kids can rise up to the expectation set for them.

While I wait for the sand dough to cool so we can make our models of the ocean floor, I thought I would post on here about some texture bags I made for the girls last night. Julia (my two year old) hardly gets as much fun school stuff in the form of games as the other girls, but she loves this. I took a very sturdy zip-loc bag and added hair gel to it. Then I took a handful of shells and wooden beads that I bought at Wal-Mart and dropped them into the gel. I sealed the bag, folding down the top and taping it. She then can squish the beads and shells around, as well as play with the gooey hait gel.

Rachel wanted a bag too, but since I was out of hair gel, I made an adaptation of it for her. I took some tempra paint and squirted it in a zip-loc bag. I then took a magic marker and wrote her name on the outside. After sealing and taping the top of the bag, I turned it over to her. She can trace the letters in her name, while playing with the squishy paint, and has a "big-girl" texture bag. Both were great hits!

Again, the pic is not of our experiement, but I wanted to share it with the friends and family who browse this blog.

Yesterday marked the first "official" day of our summer schooling program, although we had been doing work before then. We did the funnest experiment. Part of what we are doing prior to actually starting our first lesson on the coral reef, is learning about the ocean itself. We have learned the names of the oceans and where they are on a map (although memorization will be an ongoing proces. We are also learning what makes the ocean different from other bodies of water, both in terms of the salinity of the water and in the formations beneath. Tomorrow we will be looking at a diagram of a cut-away of the ocean floor (which I will be drawing today) and then making our own models, so I will get pics up of that. Yesterday however, we talked about the heaviness of the salt in the water, and how it makes the water sink compared to tap water.

I had found an experiment online and as the directions weren't very good, couldn't get it to work. Bless my husband, who sat there until he found an experiment online that did work, then tested it to make sure we could recreate it, then helped corral kids while we actually did it.

Luckily, I had an old water testing kit my mother had given me for aquariums that had small glass tubes. They worked perfectly. Here are a fairly concise set of directions. I hope you have as much fun with this as we did!

Take three small containers of water (100ml). Add food coloring of contrasting shades to each container. We made two of ours too close in color and it was harder to see the end result. Then add 1/2t salt to one of them and 1t of salt to the other. The third leave unsalted. With a dropper, squeeze half a dropper of water out along the edge of the tube, so it runs down the inside of the tube into the bottom. This will prevent the force of the water from mixing the colors.

First add the saltiest water. Next add the next saltiest water. Finally, put the plain water on top. What you should end up with are striped bands of colored water. Just to show what happens if you change things up a bit, make another tube, this time with the plain water on bottom, followed by the less salty and then the saltiest water. Discuss what happens and why. Why does the first tube stay banded and the second tube mix?

My kids thought this was akin to a magic trick and we did it probably 6-8 times. Then they had a great time shaking the tubes when we were done to mix the colors. This is a great chance to review color mixing too. :) Hope you have as much fun as we did.

First a quick note about the picture. Yesterday was dry as a bone, about 93 degrees and you can see my kids in their special go-pick-up-sister outfits. The rain boots and knit cap cracked me up and I had to snap the pic.

Anyway, we started our official ocean unit last night. Until that point, Rachel and I had been working on some ocean-themed worksheets I printed out online from learning page. We looked at a map of the world, and identified the oceans. We discussed how much of the world's surface is actually water. Then the girls colored each ocean a different color to match the corresponding map key.

After they had done that, we did our first ocean water experiment. I took two mason jars, and filled both with water. To one I added about 1/2 salt. The kids tasted the water, observed the clarity of the water (salt water is very cloudy). We put the jars onthe mantle with no lids to observe the effects of evaporation.

Please note, these three are all my own creations. Aside from some templates I borrowed from other resources, the ideas and executions were mine.

You can see Rainbow Ootopus. His body is made of blue felt. Just a large oval shape with a flat body. I added googly eyes, a pom-pom nose and a magic marker smile. Then I took and cut eight legs from various colors of felt. I found buttons in corresponding colors (except for the white leg- it has a black button) and sewed them on by hand in evenly spaced intervals. Then I cut a slit in each leg so I can be buttoned onto the body. This is a great fine motor skills game, as well as a way to teach colors and counting. Very hands on.

I made an Oceans of the World file folder game. I took a simple map of the Oceans of the World. This is in fact, the map we will be using for several of our activities. I printed out one copy with the ocean names, and another copy with the names erased (thank goodness for art pad huh?). I colored them identically and glued the labeled map to the top half of the file folder and the unlabled map to the bottom half. Then I took an index card and make small lables for the oceans. Rather than just having 5 labels and a zip-loc bag, I once more broke out the magnets and attatched a magnet in the correct positions as well as magnets on the back of the lables. It makes for a very sturdy game that is movable in its pieces, but strong enough to handle being shifted around. And if by some change we do lose a lable, they are very easy to replace.

The final game on this post is one I call How Fish Use Camouflage. I took a file folder (one of the long ones) and taped it open, then covered it with blue construction paper. I then took sea creatures and habitat features and cut them from different colors, patterns and textures of materials. I cut a starfish and two rocks from sandpaper, a manta ray and coral from craft foam, a killer whale and coral from a foam veggie tray, a shark and seaweed from bubble paper I colored blue, an eel and seaweed from a polka-dotted piece of tag board I had from who knows what and an octopus and coral from plastic canvas (very cheap and we will use it for another craft). I colored the octopus and coral purple. I then tacked the file folder to the wall and again, using magnets (I figured it would be easier to play with than having it flat and losing pieces) I put a magnet on the back of each sea creature and a magnet on the front of each piece of coral, rock and seaweed. This allows the kids to play with various textures of creature vs camo and they can see what works and what doesn't. It will also be a great tool when we study camouflage. Some of you might remember a smaller version of this I made for insects. It just highlights a very important survival technique for ocean animals.

While these games are a touch on the time-consuming side to make, they do provide a great hands-on opportunity for kids and I find them very well worth it.

For summer school, we always try to do something fun, and relatively craft based. Last summer, we spent our time learning about life around the world. This summer, our topic is Oceans of the World. You can see the wall map I set up, so the kids can see the world's oceans; there is also a set of ocean-themed numbers (I have ABCs but dont have them quite finished yet; Julia is learning her colors so I have made a Rainbow Octopus and a set of color sea-life flashcards for her; there is also a magnet board full of sea creatures for play. There is also an ocean-themed board game. The pile of stuff I have amassed on my living room table is amazingly impressive. I will try to post all the information here as I had a very hard time finding enough stuff online and in my books to cover an entire summer of ocean fun. I had to make up a lot of the stuff myself, which is fine, but boy am I glad I got started with it now.

The World's Oceans is basically a map that I bought at Target for a dollar last summer, after having to draw my own world map on newsprint paper. I tacked it up on the wall and added my own bulletin board letters to spell out THE WORLD'S OCEANS. We will be learning the oceans of the world this summer, as well as looking at where different countries lie along the coasts. I wanted the girl's to have a concrete reference for this, as well as giving them the beginnings of map introduction.

On my living room walls, we normally have posters with the letters and numbers, as well as weather charts etc. For the summer, I have taken them all down, to give my living room, which also serves as our school room, the best possible chance of being turned into an underwater showcase. I also wanted the kids to have something new and different to look at this summer. I wanted to find ocean themed alphabets and numbers to put up, again for reference and because we always do a lot with letters and numbers (tis the age at my house). It took my a goo dbit of searching, but finally I found a site called Sparklebox, which had the numbers you see featured and a set of lower case letters which follow the same theme (I will get them up on here once they are up in my house :) ). Rather than making a static chart, what I wanted was to make something the kids could actually shift around, so I put magnets on the backs of them. I buy magnetic strips for less than a dollar a package in the craft section of Wal-Mart. My front door is metal, we have one window covered in sheet metal (you will see it covered in magnetic sea creatures) and Jason also made the girls a large magnetic board. It is our solution to a flannel board. When we are done with a unit, the pieces go to the refridgerator door where they provide another countless set of hours of entertainment.

Anyway, magnets are great at my house because even Julia loves to play with them and rearrange them. I plan to make the alphabet magnetic as well. You can also see a picture of magnetic sea creatures. I still need to add seaweed and coral to the mix, but basically its a large version of those magnetic books you can take in the car. It will allow sorting, putting in order of size, and just general play. It is also a good way to expose the girls to the general creatures under the sea. We have already begun the "what is this called" game, which leads to the "what does it eat, where does it live etc" game.

I made Julia a set of color cards. She has recently become fascinated with learning the names for everything. Among her recent loves in this regard are counting (she can count to 11 believe it or not) and colors. I just took a set of game cards from one of my books, although any small ocean clip art would work and colored them the basic primary colors as well as brown, grey, white, pink and black. Then I took a binder ring and punched holes in the top corner of each card, threaded them on the ring and viola! A set of flashcards she can't lose the pieces too. Another color game I made her I will put up in the next post- Rainbow Octopus.

Finally, I found a free board game maker online and made the girls a board game. The site allows you the option of putting in your own text, so mine includes things like bonuses for using camouflage and penalties for getting caught in whirlpool. Then of course, since I don't have color ink in my printer, it was time to break out the markers and color the board. This is a great activity for the kids to do together, and in fact one the whole family can be involved in.

Well all, I am back to finally finish the bug unit I started and to post our summer fun of Oceans. As you know, Elizabeth's school has become the bane of my existence these days, and the last couple of weeks have been no exception. They have been very needy, sending home lists of things for her to bring to school. Just last week she ended up taking 4 bottled drinks, 2 packaged snacks, 1 "birthday cake", 1 pkg of paper plates, one jug of kool-aid, 1 pkg of napkins, and one bag of silverware for three days of activities. I am still not entirely sure why they even bother with school the last two weeks, as they are just play days pretty much.

Anyway, the photo above is the cake I made. I won't bore you with details, just suffice to say that it was one of those cases of everything I tried to do I didn't have the ingredients, and yet God came through for me in a big way. The crumbs on top were chocolate cookies I made, then there were two chocolate cakes and chocolate (powdered sugar-less) frosting. One of the richest cakes I have ever tried but very tasty. And even though the recipes were all ones I had never tried before the cakes turned out perfectly.

I also managed, on a very tight budget, to find plates, drinks etc very cheaply! YAY! Anyway, with the rest of our insect unit, we spent one afternoon at the park catching bugs and drawing pictures of the ones we caught.

Over the past weekend, it rained here pretty hard. The girls went into the backyard to play, on a clear part of Saturday and made an awesome discovery. There, near a fire ant mound, were tiny, fuzzy bright red bugs that looked like spiders. Well, it took a while to figure out what they were, but come to find out they were Velvet Spider Mites. Apparently they only come out here after a hard rain (which is not that common) and they eat all manner of pesky bugs. Jason tried to get pictures of them both with a cell phone and with my camera, but all the pictures were too blurry to use. However, we were very pleased to have gotten to see this rather rare occurrance. And what a fun end to our Insect Unit!

We learned about dragonflies one day over the weekend. Actually it was really cool, because Jason sat down with the girls to do this craft and mini-book (both pulled from http://www.lapbooklessons.com/FreeLapbooks.html. He took the girls online while their crafts were drying to learn important dragonfly facts like how a dragonfly's eye works, where they live, what they eat and how fast they can fly. Then, they made their books and assembled their books. He does not do school with them very often, so I try to encourage it on the weekends.

The crafts were simple, just a printed template and a popcicle stick, colored and decorated with glitter. The book was a mini-book from the lapbook on dragonflies on the site above. It was part the success of this simple little activity that made me decide to try my hand at helping the girls lapbook this summer.

The butterfly we made from tissue paper was a very simple craft to make. I just took a simple butterfly outline template from one of my fine motor skills books, and the girls put down glue with paint-brushes, then pressed pre-cut (I cut them ahead of time) squares of tissue paper over the glue. I wrote their names on the butterfly bodies, as they both love to watch you write their names. Even Julia is getting able to recognize letters in her name and she will promt you when you say them outloud as you write.

We took a paper plate and painted it red with tempera paint, then the girls took a cotton ball dipped in black paint to add spots. We accordian-style folded six legs(which imo gives it a spidery look- lol) and then added google eyes. With drying time, it took us the better part of an afternoon.

Hey all. Sorry. We have been busy with schoolwork, but I have not had much time to post. So once more I am playing catch-up. In addition to regular schoolwork, I have begun starting to gather things together for at least a month or two of our summer work, so I am not trying to pull it together right before/after the baby is born. I will posting pictures of our summer unit as I get them done. Then, we also plan to try our hand at lapbooking this summer. I think Liz will really enjoy it. The set-up is pretty neat. For now, I am using a series of lapbooks I found free online at http://www.homeschoolshare.com/animal_studies.php. Check out the ocean ones in particular, as I think we will spend our summer diving under the sea. I had thought to just do animals, but its too broad for us. So, we will be concentrating it down. Then we will pick up other animal groups as time allows. We will however, be spending time learning animal classification, etc... Honestly, take a look at the lapbooking site. I am very excited about it. Of course, we will do much of the same things we always do: games, art, math, reading etc. Also, if anyone can think of kids movies featuring ocean life please let me know. We have Little Mermaid, The Reef, and Finding Nemo and that cartoon where Will Smith is the fish's voice (can't remember the name off the bat).

Well, as anyone who checks here often can tell, I havent been posting as much as before. Its not that we havent been doing school its that I have been lazy. I need to get our dragon fly stuff up here, our ladybug stuff and our ants we made yesterday. We also got our painted lady butterflies in the mail. At Christmas, more than anything else, Elizabeth wanted a butterfly house, so that is what she got. The cool thing is that you can send away for the caterpillars to raise. We are really excited about them. I will see if I can get some pictures of them today. It might be hard since they are essentially in a plastic cup. It has been so hot here, and it is supposed to be 101 today and 103 tomorrow. On top of that, I have been back in my old sleep patterns of insomnia and horrific nightmares. I am sooo tired!

Anyway, I will get our pictures up in the next day or so. We had a great playdate the other day with a super nice mom and her three little girls! I am really excited about that and hope that we can continue to get together with her. We have also recently found a church (fingers crossed), and God answered the what are we eating today question. Hopefully things are back on an upswing for us. It seems like every time we get a little ahead or even caught up, something happens. But we have to start getting things ready for this baby.

She is coming in two months, give or take and there wont be any stopping this one. She already reminds me of her oldest sister. Heaven help us all. LOL.

BTW the picture at the top is what happens when Rachel and a bottle of glitter collide. Poor thing, she poofed the glitter container and had glitter everywhere. This is the after-effects many hours later and you can still see how she shines- as if she needed any help at all there.

Rachel made a book full of insects. The book has fact files with insect information. It was a family project, as Rachel gets tired of coloring. She delights in showing everyone the pictures they colored.

Grasshopper Crafts: We painted clothespins and thanks to my husband figured out how to add legs. We also made a wheel of the life cycle of a grasshopper.

Rachel has had a love of shapes for as long as I can remember, and knows more shapes than most people I know, including three dimensional shapes, and random-sided ones. Tangrams are the perfect activity for her. We have a set of plastic tangrams so she can make her own shapes, but I found a set of pages online with insect designs. I simply made two copies, colored one and cut out the shapes and taped the other set into a file folder. Add a handy zip-loc bag and she has tangrams she can take wherever she wants and play with anytime.

Using some coloring pages I found online, I created the girls two simple 9 piece puzzles. This is a great way to make puzzles for any theme.

I am almost done posting games. Hopefully, as of today I will be done. Its just that the girls have so much fun playing with them, either together, with me or their dad or alone. And I find them to be very effective teaching tools. Some units lend themselves better to games than others do. This insect unit has been great! The game pictured is a counting and marking game. There are two boards and each player rolls a six-sided dice. Whatever number they roll, they take the corresponding number of bees and cover the hives. Whoever covers all their hives first wins. These games also have a very practical funtion in that they give my two very different daughters something common to do together.

Jason left his hat home yesterday morning, and I snapped this cute pic of my littlest putting it on and taking it off.

Yesterday we made butterfly masks. I found a pattern for a mask on the internet. (If anyone ever wants links to these sites, please let me know). I let the two little girls color their masks then we added glittery accents. Rachel had a bit of a problem with sticking the glitter container in the glue and getting it clogged, but she finally figured out how to make it work. (My floor has a lovely green glitter sheen now that will take forever to completely get rid of). Then I cut out the masks and glued them onto sheets of craft foam for sturdiness. When they were dry, we added Mardi-Gras sticks (aka popcicle sticks) to make masquerade masks. Unfortunately my destructive little daughter has since destroyed them, but luckily I got some pics of the girls wearing their masks first.

I just wanted to put up a few random pics of my kids for family and friends who check in here. The first is of the three girls sitting on the couch. Liz is in the grey shirt, and the other two should be pretty easy to figure out. The other two I took last night of my big girls sleeping. They looked so cute when I went in to check on them. Liz is laying with her rather rag-tag best friend Sherbert the cat. Rachel is just sacked out. I will get more school pictures up sometime today or tomorrow. But I did want to share these.

This was a game I found on the DLTK site. It is one of my favorite sites, and I can't think of one unit we have done since we started that we have not found something there to use. The concept of this game is easy and teaches what seems to me to be a tricky concept. There are two game boards (only one of which is shown). One is labeled Odd Olly and the other is Even Elly. The game pieces are 6 spots for each lady bug and three leaf pieces, to cover the leaf template. The two players take turns rolling a dice. Say the first one is playing as Odd Olly and rolls a three. They would then take three dots and put one on the left side, one on the right side, one on the left. They would be out of dots, and would be asked if the two sides of the lady bug had the same number of dots. The answer of course is no, so they would get to put a piece of leaf on their board. Pieces of leaf are only awarded for rolls that match the "odd or even" of the game board. So Odd Olly would not get a leaf for rolling a 6. If the dots on both sides of the lady bug match, the number is even.

One of the things I wanted to do again with this unit, that we have done successfully in the past, is to give Elizabeth some vocabulary words. Rachel inevitably ends up learning a few of them too, but this gives Liz a chance to have her very own game and her very own little store of knowledge on the topic we are studying. I had found a printable on the internet over the weekend on a lapbooking site, that was ladybug templates, and gave you the freedom to customize it for the child's needs. They recommended colors, numbers, ABCs or simple arithmatic problems. For us, it neatly solved the problem of the vocabulary game. I just made a basic file folder game, with the words on the folder then on the colored sides of the game pieces. When you turn the game pieces over, the definition is on the back. She was excited to give it a try, but I didn't get it finished until late last night, so I expect it will be what she wants to do when she gets home from school.

I think my leg has a permanent dent in it from attending Liz's School Program. Why, you may ask. Well, let's just say I spent a good 30 minutes getting kicked repeatedly by a Julie-Bear who had a pretty nice tempo going along with the music. In the group photos, Liz is the 4th kid from the right on the bottom row. The theme was Rockin' Nursery Rhymes and it was cute. My little girls thought it was an absolute blast! The pic of just Liz was taken after the program when we stopped by the tell her congerats. It was awesome, Jason was able to take a couple of hours off work to go. You could tell whenever Liz saw us. She got the biggest grin on her face. Thanks to her teacher's advice we had the best seat in the house.

Sorry for all the posts; I am trying to play catch-up from being unable to post pictures. This is another printable game I found free online. It is matching a number a items with the numeral. Very easy to make, and fun to play. I find that file folders and tape and zip-loc bags make the greatest games. They are durable and easy to store. I saw online where someone was keeping a hile folder game closed with velcro so the pieces didn't fall out the sides during storage. I find it easier to stick the pieces in a zip-loc bag and staple it to the front.

Lizzie drew a picture I had to add to our bug wall. It also reminded me that I was leaving out two very important pieces of insect learning: life cycles and food chains. This will be a great introduction to our summer unit of animals. We plan to spend the summer studying animals. It will be easy to do with having a new baby in the house as the information available is overwhelming and it will be fun for the kids.

We learned that most caterpillars are not born green but rather turn that way from the chlorophyll in the plants they eat. What a great opportunity to explore color mixing. Even though the kids know what colors make other colors, there is nothing like the hands on fun of an art project and getting to see what you know in theory come to life...

The past couple of days have been busy here. We have been doing a lot of insect work, as well as keeping busy with everyday things. I have included a picture of one of the parts of an insect worksheets we did as well as the butterfly Rachel made out of hand and footprints. Elizabeth and Julia are working on theirs as well, but since it takes a good bit of drying time in between the different pieces, it is taking a while.

We have been working on mixing colors, so you will see a bit of that here, with more in subsequent posts. One of the parts of an insect sheets I got came from learningpage.com. It is not the one shown here, and features (instead of the cartoon-y bug) two very lifelike line drawings, one of a hornet and one of an ant that show the three body parts very clearly. It also shows the legs and wings only attached to the thorax, as opposed to the picture shown which is a little more vague.

The two older girls have been learning the vocabulary of the body parts: head, thorax and abdomen and sometime this weekend I hope to make Elizabeth some vobaulary matching cards. We did this activity with the unit on dinosaurs, and she learned many new words such as bipedal, carnivorous, incisor, paleontologist and prehistoric.

We will see how well it works, but we made a home for some worms. Of course, due to the place we live, worms are few and far between. How I miss the days of being able to pop into Wal-Mart for a styrofoam cup of nightcrawlers. By a happy accident, last spring we discovered that the local park is a verital heaven for earthworms. Rather than dig up my backyard, which may or may not have enough worms for our worm home, I took the girls along with a small kids shovel and a cool-whip container to the park. The place we dig for worms is technically in the sandbox, but is where the sandbox meets the dirt. In five minutes and in a hole the size of a piece of notebook paper, they found probably 45 worms.

There was an older gentleman at the park with his granddaughter and his dog. He came over and asked what we were doing. When I explained that I homeschooled and it was for a science project, he got a touch huffy. Then, when his granddaughter asked if she could have a worm, he replied that they had plenty of worms at their house and did not need to take worms from the park. I guess he didn't approve of me letting the girls take park worms. LOL. It's not like they will meet a gruesome end. I plan on letting them go in the beneficial insect garden Rachel, Julia and I planted yesterday.

Anyway, funny park guy aside, what we did is took a 2-liter soda bottle and cut the neck and lid off of it. I ran some tape around the top to keep anyone from getting cut on the sharp plastic. I then filled the container with nice, rich dirt and added the worms. They were looking a little limp from their ride from the park so I popped the whole show in the fridge. We will see. Anyway, you wrap a sheet of black construction paper around the bottle to make it dark and drop a paper bag on top like a lid. In theory, in a day or two I should be able to remove the papers and the girls can see the way worms tunnel. I will let you know how it works.

I made the cutest file folder game for the girls yesterday. Since we are studying about insects, one of the topics that comes up is of course camoflauge. In one of my other books, I have an idea for hiding octopi in different colors and textures of coral. I figured the idea could easily be adapted to insects and it was with great result. I took everyday household objects such as aluminum foil, wax paper, paper plates, felt, green tissue paper, craft foam and markers and some various printouts I found free online of insects and flowers. Then I enhanced the bugs with the different textile materials, and made plants and flowers to match. For example, I covered a beetle with aluminum foil I colored green, then made the stalks of a couple of flowers to match. An ant was covered in red felt and then a daisy made of the same material. The bugs virtually disappear from the page when they are placed on the plants that camoflauge them, just like the do in real life. I glued the flowers onto a file folder and stapled a sandwich bag on the front in which to store the bugs. It was a huge hit! Now, Rachel can explore the tactle sensation of different bugs and plants, while learning about the ways bugs use camoflauge to hide.


We also made a butterfly matching game. I found a print-out on learningpage.com of butterflies, and using the internet colored them the way they look in real life. I made two copies of the same 6 cards and after laminating (with tape of course, my fave), and cutting them out, we now have a butterfly identification matching game. Rachel is not as impressed with this game, but Elizabeth is in love. I will add pictures of it tomorrow. My phone is out for the moment, so all pictures will have to be on hold until then.

The following activities I either found online or in the case of the bug counting, in one of my many homeschooling books. The pattern was not for the activity I used it for, but oh well. It was to help fine motor skills by picking bugs out of "grass" with tongs. At this time, the bug counting is much more useful to us. The file folder game with the butterfly colors was a free online game and the bee tracing letters were also a free printable. I definately try to utiliaze free resources, although I do treat myself and the kids to new school books at tax time. I find it helps to flesh out our school experience and keep us from getting bored. Anyway, enjoy!

Today, in addition to making the world's biggest pain of a mural (mostly because Rachel got bored coloring and I ended up doing most of it) on which we will put the bugs we make, we make the cutest spider puppet. The pattern came out of the book, Puppets and Storytime. Its a Dr. Jean book, for those who are familiar with her work. Anyway, you basically take two small paper plates and decorate them. Then, you take 8 strips of colored construction paper and accordian fold them to make spider legs. You take one old sock, add google eyes and a face (we used a pom-pom for the nose) and then assemble. Glue the legs, four on each side of the bottom plate, then insert the sock between the plates and staple. If you only staple on the sides, then you have a sock puppet, a little small for my bigger hands, but perfect for the hands of my three year old. She was super-impressed with the puppet and I was impressed with how easy it was to make.

A lot of the insect information (including the mural) that we are using comes from www.learningpage.com. Its free to sign up, they don't spam you to death with emails and the lessons are great. I also supplement that with some activities out of a couple of fine motor skill books I have as well as an A-Z Mailbox book (I took flower cutouts from there to add to some bug cutouts for counting) and A-Z Themes for the Year. Holly sent me a scanner when her aunt came this way on family vacation, and it has made life a lot easier.

I will also post pictures of the color identification game I made (which I found free online) and the counting bugs and flowers. They are super-cute and the kids love them. Cover them with strips of packing tape and they are sturdy and durable.

I wanted to post a few pictures of my little girls doing school along with some pictures of Rachel with the Dino wall we made. I like to display the girls schoolwork and devote one wall of my living room to just that. I think it gives them a sense of accomplishment and pride in their work. It also makes a great springboard for showing off to Dad and visitors. They can then recap what they learned and exhibit their work. This started last summer when we took a trip aroudn the world, doing crafts from each country we visited. Anyway, I plan to be more consistant about posting regarding the insect unit we are doing, just to give those of you who are interested, an idea of what we do in school and how much the girls actually learn. It is an amazing thing how much they rise to meet your expectations. It makes me sad for the standards in public schools. I can see already Elizabeth with school learning to do what is expected and not what is best. To watch the kids beg to do schoolwork and art projects lifts my heart. I guess I must be doing something right. I will post tonight or tomorrow about the Insect stuff we have started, as well as some pictures of some of the games I have made the girls. I will also add the links to the sites we use, so again, anyone who is interested can look at exactly what we are doing.

Other than that, we are all doing well. Finally got the house and all the yards clean! I also added the van to that mix yesterday. It really frees up my time to clean before bed, but boy does it make me tired. Anyway, I am off to make spider puppets. Will post again soon.

Light, Blessings and Joy to all.

Last night, as I lay in bed thinking about this baby growing inside of me, and talking with Jason about the girls, I eralized how much guilt I still feel over losing Eric. I know Jason loves his daughters to death, but I had really hoped to be able to give him a son to watch grow up. I can't help but think in the back of my mind, where such thoughts are want to dwell, that had I not given in and gotten that original c-section, had I only stayed awake after I fed him that morning, that somehow it would have made a difference, and we would have a 4 1/2 year old little boy causing havok in our tiny house. Jason told me he was happy with his girls, and excited for this one, girl number four. And I guess I really have to take him at word. But there is still a bitter slice in my heart that torments me late at night. I know that my girls ending up in the hospital after their c-sections was my fault, along with the time they spent in the nursery due to inhaled fluid and breathing troubles. If I could turn back the clock, I would have done my homework a little better and stood my ground. I was thinking back to being pregnant with Elizabeth. I skipped all the c-section information as well as most of the delivery interference chapters in my book. I never thought they would apply to me. Her birth was awful, although at least it was vaginal. Then with Eric, when they started crying c-section, I was still so ignorant. I assumed that because I had done it once I would automatically fall into the club of doing it again. There was no need for his section, and I see that now, but at the time I was still in Dr is God mode, and honestly, it was presented to me as a now or later kind of deal. Plus, I had been waiting 40 plus weeks to see the rascal. I had Elizabeth at home, and Jason and I were fighting all the time. I just wanted to try to get back to normal.

That is the other thing I think about. I know my husband carries a lot of guilt over Eric. He wasn't there for the birth and he really was in "I need to grow up" mode. (I am not being mean, this is what he has told me). He hardly ever even held Eric. I wanted to give him a boy, with a birth he could attend to try to ease some of that trauma. I am lucky though. I don't know many men that would have stuck with me through all we have through together. And yet, our marriage today is so much stronger than ever. I thank God we decided when we got pregnant with Elizabeth (Jason's idea btw), that divorce was not an easy option for us. Most couples don't last through what we have been through.

Then with Rachel, having an anterior placenta, and after the down syndrome scare (part of the reason there will be no blood work this time) and after losing Eric and losing the miscarriage, I was just too damn scared to fight. Yet, when I think back to the midnight race to Lubbock to the children's hospital and the week and a half we spent there because she caught RSV (which had anyone listened to me, they would have caught a lot sooner!) I know that I should have bitten back my fear, and been stronger for her.

As for baby Julia, I keep her picture up on my mantle, the one they brought me when they couldn't bring her to me, of her covered in monitors and oxygen tubes to remind me of what a c-section baby looks like and to give me strength and courage to do this thing I have set out to do. Again, I thank God my husband is supportive. I am scared, even though I really think all will be well. If something goes wrong with another of my babies, I don't know how I will live with myself. But I really am trying. I have done so much reading on risks versus benefits. And I know if I go to the hospital, they will fight me every step of the way. I can't concentrate on getting a baby out when I am fighting over every damn interevention they can think of. And they make you sign the c-section consent when you get to the hospital. I tried to refuse with Eric and it was a huge issue. I just don't want to be responsible for another baby with problems. All of my c-section babies have either ended up dead or in the hospital at less than two weeks.

If I could find someone who would let me labor and deliver how I wanted, I would so do that. But at this point, I can't. I tapped out all those resources. My other option is the wait and oops I am in active labor, better go to hospital since its time to push. What then is the difference between those last few minutes here or there? We are less than two minutes from the hospital. If there is a problem, and God willing please there won't be, we can transfer. I plan then at that point to plead ignorance. Had no idea I was actually in labor. Whatever it takes.

I know that I do not want CPS in my life again, and I know they can try if something goes wrong. Not legally, as there is nothing illegal in what we are planning, but that has never stopped them before. I hate to tell them though. This mama has done her homework. There will be no more easy capitualtion into whatever all these people want to say. I know my rights, I know where I stand. And if I do transfer to the hospital, they better watch out! I will do so prepared to fight. Ever seen a cornered mother lion? At that point, that will be me....

Really this is just a quick note to wish all who read a Happy Easter. This is a long weekend, as both Jason and Elizabeth had extra days off, so that alawys throws off my routine. Tomorrow I will post the yummiest crepe recipe ever as well as my 27 week picture, although since Tuesday marks 28 weeks, I may wait for that one. Anyway, Easter here has been peaceful. We did eggs with kids this morning and made a late breakfast. Tonight we will have lasagna and bread and maybe asparagus. Not traditional Easter fare I know, but it is just the 5 of us and no one really cares. I will check for hams later and maybe do a prolonged Easter dinner at a later date. Well, I am off to plan out dinner. Happy Easter. Love all of us here.

I dont know how many of you have heard of the Mother's Act, but I was absolutely appalled when someone brought it to my attention today! http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=70961 You can view the article I read at this site. Basically, it would force treatment for depression on pregnant mothers and new mothers regardless of side effects and personal choice at doctor's discretion. Sadly, they even named it for a woman who committed suicide after being treated for these problems. Despite the possible side effects of anti-depressants on women and unborn babies, this act would make it possible for women to be pushed into taking them, as well as new mothers. The difficulty with breastfeeding here would be an issue, yet no one seems too concerned about it. Anyway, as a woman who struggled with depression while pregnant, I can tell you that anti-depressants are not something to be taken lightly. Yes, they can be necessary, but the risks should be weighed against the benefits. This bill is being backed obviously by supporters of huge pharmaceutical companies; the senator who is pushing for it is a known supporter of such groups. It is also being sneaked in via a conglomerate bill that contains many unrelated programs and benefits. Please take a moment and sign the petition to stop this bill. http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/stop-the-dangerous-and-invasive-mothers-act Peace, Love and Light

My husband was in the newspaper, front page this morning, working to restore an old clock that used to sit on the City Hall. It was hit by a semi this past fall. He would be the one relaxing (he says hanging on for dear life) LOL. Also pictured is his co-worker and friend Salome and their boss Gary.