Friday, August 17, 2012

Weekly Wrap-up - The Missing Piece: August 11-17


In Our Life
With White Pine off to Advanced Culinary Camp at the community college, it felt like something was missing all week. Funny how that works, huh? And this weekend I'll be packing up the Saplings for a week visit with Grandpa and Nannie Lobster. I'm staying home to catch up on some household projects and gearing up for another year of school, which is set to begin September 4th. 



What's Cooking?
Bread Machine English Muffins!

Ingredients (Place in Order Except Cornmeal)
6-7 oz warm water
1 t salt
2 T butter, cut into small pieces
2 1/4 c bread flour
1/4 c dry milk
1/4 c wheat germ
1/4 c quick cook oats
2 T sugar
2 t active dry yeast
1/4 c cornmeal 

Place everything, but cornmeal in the bread machine and select dough setting and run. When the dough is done, sprinkle cornmeal onto the counter, place it on top, and roll out until 1/4 inch thick. Cut into 3 inch circles. (I just used a plastic cup for this. ::laugh::) Place onto an ungreased cookie sheet with cornmeal side down. Cover and let rise for 30-45 minutes in a warm area. Now, you can either preheat a griddle or dry frying pan to 250 degrees and cook about 8 minutes on each or side, or you can do it the lazy creative cook way like I did: throw them into a 350 degree oven for 10 minutes and call it good! ::wink:: Makes about 10 muffins.

(Now, I was planning on adding a photo because the muffins did come out really well, but for some reason Photoshop isn't loading up the the photo! ::sigh::)

Homeschool Happenings
Sugar Maple continued to work on her How to Write a Paragraph paragraph. "Mooommm, do I have to edit it again?" Yep! She doesn't see the point in going through the editing process, even to clean up Grammar and Spelling, but we're working on it. And looking up words in the dictionary? ::laugh:: She's been getting around it by changing the words she isn't able to spell into words she can! Sneaky, huh? 

And Balsam Fir continued with his on-line reading, writing and spelling lessons. (Stay tuned for our review later in the month.) I can't say he's crazy-liking these educational games, but maybe it's just being on summer break? I DO like the program though and think it's beneficial to his Language Arts.

I guess all of this doesn't sound like DELIGHT-DIRECTED learning, but sometimes we - kiddos and Mamas alike - need to just tackle something even if it's not on our Happy-to-Do Lists. Some things just need to be worked on! Wouldn't it be nice to skip dirty dishes though? or long division? So, as much as I would like school to ALWAYS be exciting it simply can't be, but I do try to make it as interesting and "painless" as possible.

We're Reading...
...a thriller entitled Gone Missing by Linda Castillo (and it's not from the Young Adult Room!) (me), WHO KNOWS (White Pine), a mystery book called Trixie Belden: the Mysterious Visitor by Julie Campbell (Sugar Maple), early readers Nate the Great by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat (still) and Henry and Mudge and the Bedtime Thumps by Cynthia Rylant (Balsam Fir), and The Cricket in Times Square by George Selden (still) (family read aloud).

A Few of Our Favorite Things
So, I've been continuing to get stuff ready for our new school year. My latest crazy creative idea is to fill a box of hands-on learning games and puzzles for Balsam Fir (and maybe Sugar Maple) to do when he's needing a break from more formal, challenging lessons. I've added Coin War from First Grade Frogs, Math with Roman Numerals from Relentlessly Fun, Deceptively Educational, and now Silly Sentences from Instant Display. We probably won't use the games EXACTLY as described, but that's how we roll! ::laugh:: Silly Sentences will be used to learn nouns, verbs and adjectives, and write random sentences with correct punctuation and capitalization, and to read new words. For now.

Roman Numeral Game Board Slipped Into a Plastic Page
Protector. Balsam Fir will Learn to Values of Roman
Numerals First and then Adding and Subtracting
Roman Numeral Playing Cards and Help Chart Slipped Into
Back of Page Protector and Game Board
Colored Coded Silly Sentence Game Pieces
Game Instructions That We Probably
Won't Use
Silly Sentences to Organize, Read and Write into Complete,
Correct Sentences for Copywork
Add up Coin Values on Cards and Highest Gets the Cards.
First to get All the Playing Cards, Wins Coin War

Ponderings
Remember last wrap-up I shared that both boys had loose teeth? Well, Balsam Fir's came out...Well, ONE did. The other tooth was swallowed at dinnertime! Imagine his surprise to notice it was gone while eating cheese pizza! ::wink:: But White Pine is STILL waiting to lose that final molar! It's hanging on!

Giggles to Share

Blog Hops
Favorite Resource This WeekHomegrown Learnersfriday favorite things | finding joyMagical Mouse SchoolhouseScience Sundaylearning laboratory at mama smilesHip Homeschool Hop Button3Boys&aDog DEALS!Photobucket

19 comments:

  1. Your sneaky one sounds like mine! I admire the creative problem solving, but no you still need to learn to speed those words!

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  2. Thanks for visiting my blog!! Nice week!! I especially like your printables!!

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  3. I love your idea of a box of hands on learning games and puzzles! Great idea !

    I do think it's early to start back to school... Last year we started Sept. 6th. I think we'll slowly ease into it.

    Yep, 2 months in the rv. We had an amazing trip. We too, wanted to travel for a year, but circumstances changed, so it was only 2 months.

    We do have kayaks and love them! My husband prefers the canoe, but I'm a kayak girl.

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  4. Enjoy next week and try to have some fun mom time and not spend the whole week school planning, as if thats possible!

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    1. What?! ::shock:: Not plan for school? ::laugh::

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  5. Have have fun next week, all of you :-). I like the games box. I was informed today that we need a similar sensory box for my girl. She needs to have a go-to box for when she feels frustrated during school. All part of SPD, apparently?

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    1. Having calming activities available before she gets TOO frustrated can be a HUGE help getting through a school day (or any day). Finding just the right calming activities can be a challenge though!

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  6. Wow Culinary Camp sounds amazing! How cool! I hope the Saplings love their grandparents visit. I hear you on the Paragraph Writing. Editing is not that fun. Trixie Belden! I used to LOVE Trixie! I think I have a couple of books about here around here. Love the Silly Sentence game!

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  7. bread machine English muffins? I'm impressed. And it sounds heavenly to have to week to ponder school and work on projects. Love the giggles :)

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    1. If you try the English Muffins out, eat them quickly! ::grin:: Since they don't have preservatives in them they only lasted about 4 days. The chickens enjoyed the last one though! ::wink::

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  8. Those giggles are just priceless :)

    Wow busy week in your home. Looked very productive.

    Blessings on the week ahead.

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  9. Oh, I just love that first picture of S.

    Glad to hear the online reading is going well for someone. Not so much at our house. It's pretty ugly. lol

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    1. Thanks, Stefanie! That was taken this summer at the ocean where my parent's live.

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  10. Culinary camp does sound incredible!
    Thanks for sharing your game ideas at Favorite Resources :)

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  11. That makes me want to buy a bread machine. Your game ideas are fun! Have a good week!

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  12. Hey Jessy, re. your collage question. I use Picasa 3...free download. I know that Mary at Homegrown Learners uses PicMonkey which is a great one too. No download you just do it on their site. Hope this helps! :)

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  13. Hope you have a fun week doing your own thing while the kids are away. If you are like me, you will feel lost without them.

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  14. Ooooh! Bread machine English muffins! I can't wait to try them! :-) Thanks so much for linking up with "Try a New Recipe Tuesday!" Your printables look awesome, too! :-) Many blessings, Lisa

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