Journal Jottings of a Maine Mama: March 14, 2016

CLOCK READS
2:22pm

WEATHER IN MY NECK OF THE WOODS

Overcast, high 30s.

OUTSIDE MY WINDOW and IN THE GARDEN
Piles of dirty, dingy snow have dwindled in the warmer temperatures. Scattered twigs, pine cones and leaves dot patches of brown grass. A trail of frozen mud marks the walk to the coop. The swollen brook rushes by behind the chicken run.

WHAT I'M DOING RIGHT NOW and AROUND THE HOUSE
I'm resting. I was quite ill yesterday, vomiting. :sigh: I don't usually get more than a slight cold, but this belly bug hit Cate first, then Jake, and settled on me this weekend. Thankfully my wonderful husband willingly took over household tasks and caring for the kids while I spent the day in bed. But it's Monday and there's things to do...

TODAY'S TO DO

• Laundry
• Dishes
• Jazz Band Practice
• Homeschool
• Vacuum
• Salvation Army Donation Drop-off
• Bake Chocolate Chip Banana Bread
• Work on Camping Blog (LINK)

DINNER MENU
Chop Suey and Peas

WHAT'S ON TV
I catch most of my favorite shows, "The Amazing Race", "The Big Bang Theory", "Survivor", and "The Voice" on Hulu and CBS sometime during the week after the newest episodes air. Tonight? I'll be watching "The Amazing Race" and "The Big Bang Theory" from last Friday.

FROM THE CRAFT BASKET

I haven't been sharing updates on my daughter's temperature blanket. It's done in Red Heart Super Saver yarn in red, orange, yellow, spring green, green, blue, navy, and purple with a FPO SC. I started with a chain of 250 using a 3.5mm hook. It's interesting "reading" the blanket for weather! It's definitely obvious that spring has sprung!

Purples are temperatures under 20 degrees, navy 20s, blue 30s, green 40s, bright green 50s, and yellow (up top) 60s.

I'm sharing my crocheting creations over at Lucy Blossom Crafts (Mondays), Frontier Dreams (Tuesdays), Small Things (Wednesdays), Oombawka Design (Wednesdays), and Lunamon Design (Wednesdays).

PAGE TURNER

A BLESSING
Our camper is finally home! We bought it February 13th, but it's been at the RV Center for repairs. It was finished over a week ago, but we weren't able to arrange a time to fit everyone's schedules to have a "run through" of all the systems with the RV tech until this weekend. It's been such a blessing to have the provisions to purchase the campervan and have everything repaired! I've started a blog for our camping and fishing adventures if you'd like to see what we're up too (LINK).

DEVOTIONAL and INSPIRATION

But my God shall supply all of your need according to his riches in glory by Jesus Christ. (Philippians 4:19)

I'm linking up to The Simple Woman's Daybook and Happy Homemaker are Mondays.

Weekly Wrap-up: Week 16 - Celebrating the 100th

We're celebrating our 100th day of homeschooling today! Cate actually reached 100 days on Monday, but Friday just seemed like a better day to celebrate when Sam reached it too. (And by Friday we all like a slower, simpler day of homeschool.) At this pace our year could wrap up by mid-April!

CORE WORK

CATI

• English Grammar 101: Section 5 Modifiers - Adjectives and Adverbs
• Writing - How to Stay Motivated and Focused 5 Paragraph Essay
• Vocab Test List 14 (92%) -15 (96%)
• The Swiss Family Robinson (Wyss), Laddie (Straton Potter)
• Khan Academy Pre-Algebra - 80% Completed

SAM

• Grammar and Writing Handbook: Unit 2 - Possessive Nouns
• Writing - My Favorite Outdoor Places Perfect Paragraph
• Grammar Ninja - Level 2
• Cursive Copywork - Ephesians 4:32
• The Borrowers (Norton), Rascal (North)
• Khan Academy Math 4 - 45% Completed
• Saxon 65 - Lesson 1 (Number Sequencing), Lesson 2 (Odds/Evens), Lesson 3 (Place Value with Money)

Sometimes changes must be made. Sam hasn't moved forward on Khan Academy, reviewing the same concepts without mastery, in 6 weeks. Even a 2 week break did not "reset" his learning. "Blocks" happen for everyone, but especially for kids with unique learning challenges. For now, he will continue on with Saxon 65, watching DIVE lessons and completing daily problem sets.

We also read some math literature on angles and cones.

VAN SCHOOL
Several times a week, Sam and I do some of his studies in the van while waiting for Cati at band practice. It's not an optimal time to focus, but a perfect time for read alouds and review.

With Sam's learning challenges, he often has trouble recalling basic information that we've reviewed over and over for many years. This can be frustrating for both of us, yet necessary to learn and understand. This week I pulled out his month flashcards as he wasn't able to tell me the 12 months, in or out of order.

• Month Flashcards
• Grammar and Writing - Commas Review
• Rascal
• History of Us - Woodland Indians, Treaty of Peace

ASTRONOMY

Sam finished up Mars with making a salt dough model of Olympus Mons, and creating a volcanic eruption with baking soda, vinegar and food coloring. Then we started Chapter 8: Rocks.

• Chemical Reaction to Model Volcanic Eruption
• Introduction to the Solar System: Crash Course Astronomy #9
• Meteors: Crash Course Astronomy #23
• Asteroids: Crash Course Astronomy #20

GENERAL SCIENCE

Cati finished Module 6: Foundations of Geology in Apologia General Science this week, learning about rocks and minerals, sedimentation, and physical weathering. Unfortunately, due to it being winter, some of her experiments will be postponed until the spring when we can obtain dirt from outside. She received a 100% on her exam.

U.S. HISTORY and GEOGRAPHY
I read aloud to Sam from History of Us: The First Americans Prehistory-1600 (Hakim). We covered chapters 10-12.

• The Black Legend, Native Americans, and Spaniards: Crash Course US History #1
• Mound Builders (Adenas)
• Algonquian and Iroquois
• 6 Nations Treaty of Peace

And he continued to review US geography with Sheppardsoftware. 50 out of 50 states consistently placed correctly at Level 3!

MUSIC HISTORY, GEOGRAPHY and CULTURES
Cati finished early American music history with Easy Peasy Homeschool, and that started Geography and Cultures. Since the lessons are quick, she completes one week per day, sometimes more. This week she completed weeks 35-36 and 1-3.

• Composed Original Music with Beatlab
• Reviewed Instruments of an Orchestra
• Violin, Viola and Cello

ENRICHMENT

Cati

• Jazz and Concert Band
• CNN Student News
• Walked miles
• Photography

Sam

• Cub  Scouts
• CNN Student News

DAYS COMPLETED: CATE - 103 | SAM - 100

As always, special thanks to these bloggers for their weekly homeschool blog link-ups. Click the buttons to see what other homeschoolers are doing!

Happy Homeschooling!

Weekly Wrap-up: Week 13 - Winter Break

EVERYDAY LIFE
We tried really, really hard to focus this week, but how could we? The week before Christmas with family, presents, good food. The week before knowing we've got 2 whole weeks off. Not that we JUST didn't have 2 weeks off for Thanksgiving...

But I could focus on my CROCHETING. (I need a smiley face icon, huh?) I created a cover for my 2015 Bullet Journal/Planner. I love the colors, but I'm not crazy about the cover itself as it's already pilling and collects hair, fur and lint like velcro. :: sigh:: I may just remove it and decorate the Moleskine notebook cover instead with scrapbook stuff. In the meantime, I'm trying to make some fingerless gloves for Cati. (Pattern here.)

PEOPLE & PLACES
❄ Jazz & Concert Band Practices (Cati) ❄ Christmas Band Concerts (Cati) ❄ Bible Study (Me) ❄

FROM THE KITCHEN
❄Chop Suey with Cucumber Slices & Carrot Sticks ❄ Biscuit, Egg and Cheese Sandwiches & Clementines ❄ Baked Chicken, Rice & Peas ❄ Meatball Subs ❄ Clean Out Fridge Night ❄

HOMESCHOOL HAPPENINGS
Determined to get in a full productive week of learning, Sam and I had some long, long afternoons. Cati finished her core work most mornings before Sam and I rolled out of bed. Isn't it interesting how unique we are? Sam and I are "night owls" who prefer a late morning start, but Cati is an early to bed, early to rise person. We're fortunate to have a schedule to works best for all of us.

Cati's Accomplishments

Capitalization of Greetings & Transitive and Intransitive Verbs
Multiplying/Dividing Mixed Fractions, Algebraic Equations, Perimeter, Decimals, Roots & Order of Operations with Exponents
Types of Fossils, Radioactive Dating, Geologic Time Scale & Earth's Eras
CNN Student News

Phys. Ed. Walking

Sam's Accomplishments

MobyMax: Describe Events in Stories/Dramas, ID Supporting Details in Paragraphs, Quotations, Suffixes, Prefixes and Word Roots, and Vocabulary Building & Grade Spelling Weeks 35-37

Multiplication Facts, Word Problems, Fractions, Time, Square Roots & Regrouping
Inside a Volcano, Types of Eruptions & Volcanic Landforms

CNN Student News

Phys. Ed. Walking/Jogging, Biking (in the Snow)

READING & VIEWING
❄ Star Wars (Cati) ❄ Stuart Little (White) (Sam) ❄ Ben and Me (Lawson) (Sam) ❄

❄ "Different Types of Volcanoes" (You Tube) ❄ "Volcano Eruptions Song" (You Tube) ❄ "What is a Volcano?" (You Tube) ❄

PONDERINGS

With all the celebrating coming up, I'm not sure I'll be getting to more blogging until 2015! So, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

As always, special thanks to these weekly link-ups:

Don't forget to check out my other blog posts this week!
Tuesday Coffee Chat: Christmas Traditions
Wednesday Hodgepodge: Randomness

A Peak At Our Week: Session 5 Week 1 - Beginning the Home Stretch

In My Life This Week

Spring HAS arrived at Our Side of the Mountain! Relaxing in the hammock under the budded maple trees, the Spring Peepers and wild birds sing loudly and the red squirrels scamper around the branches above. Green grass is growing and early flowers have sprouted in Sugar Maple's garden. The heat inside the house has been shut off and the windows are open days. And we're on our last session of Year #9!

Cluck and Quacks

The Saplings fashioned a make-shift pen for the lil' chicks out in the veggie garden for their first outside romp now that they have most of their big girl feathers. Although Nutmeg, Amber and Butterfly were on high alert, they scratched and pecked and fluffed while the older hens, outside the wired fence, ignored them.

On the Dinner Menu
☀ Ham, Cheese and Broccoli Strata with Pineapple Chunks ☀ Hot Dog Roast Outside with Baked Beans, Cole Slaw, Potato Salad, and S'mores ☀ Homemade Ham Fried Rice with Veggies ☀

Homeschool Happenings
SIMPLIFYING.

I've wanted to figure out a way to get some of this "delight directed" learning in despite my more "traditional" school views. But where to start? Gardening! Alaska! This week I decided to sit down WITH THE SAPLINGS and just learn about gardening and Alaska without any preplanned studies. We read. We wrote. We drew. We discussed. Whatever worked. And the sapling were confused. Not our usual approach to school.

We also read on in SOTW 2: Middle Ages, completing our mapwork and wall timeline along the way. And the younger saplings worked on their Saxon Math and Math-U-See. Sugar Maple is super excited that she should finish her ENTIRE math book this year.

In preparation for writing his first 10 page+ research paper, White Pine read How to Write a Term Paper (Elizabeth James and Carol Barkin) and then chose his topic: Comparing Union and Confederate Civil War Battles . He spent the rest of the week taking and citing notes from his research...and finished up his Computer Science 101 class from Coursera and continued on with Biology, World History, Geography and Cultures, US History Video Project, and Algebra. 

What We're Reading
☀ Darling Jim (Christian Moerk) (SP) ☀  Julie of the Wolves (Jean Craighead George) (SM) ☀ The Bear Scouts (Stan and Jan Berenstain) (BF) ☀ Prince Caspian (CS Lewis) (Read Aloud) ☀

Places We Went, People We Saw
☀ Scouts (All) ☀ Softball (SM) ☀ Library ☀ Co-op/Playground (All) ☀

Our Favorite Thing

Something to Share

As always, linking up to these WONDERFUL blog hops!

Kids in the Kitchen: Tootsie Rolls

When the 2nd round of snow arrived on Monday - Did you hear the sigh from here? ::sigh:: - and the kids were antsy for something to do (besides SHOVELING), I pulled up a simple recipe for homemade Tootsie Rolls from Food 52.

If you want to see a great photo tutorial on how to make them then I would suggest clicking over to Food52. Jugging powdered ingredients, wiggly kids and a camera doesn't work so well for me, but I did snap a few.

Homemade Tootsie Rolls 

(adapted from Food 52)

1/2 c honey

1/4 c + 2 T dark cocoa powder

1 t vanilla extract

1 T melted butter

1/4 c powdered sugar

1-1 1/4 c instant nonfat dry milk powder

Instructions:

Mix the honey, cocoa powder and vanilla together. Mix in the butter. Add the powdered sugar. And, slowly mix in the milk powder (in 1/4 c measures) until a stiff, not-too-sticky dough ball forms. Rest ball on "Pam" sprayed Parchment Paper for 5-10 minutes. Cut into bits, roll into "logs" and wrap in small rectangles of cut Parchment Paper. Refrigerate. Makes about 20 pieces.

Were our candies like Tootsie Rolls? Not really. ::wink:: We didn't follow the recipe exact. I only had DARK cocoa powder...and salted butter...but they were a not-too-sweet chewy chocolate candy that were tasty and didn't have HFCS in them. And creating them kept the saplings busy for an hour.

Do you cook with your kiddos? Share the fun on Tuesday with Adventurez with Kids in the Kitchen and Try a New Recipe at Home to 4 Kiddos!

Kids in the Kitchen: Fly Guy Approved! Shoo Fly Pie with Vanilla Ice Cream

You know what's really special? Snuggling under a warm blanket on a chilly morning with your little guy while he reads to you for an hour. 

"Shoo, Fly Guy!"

Have you seen the Fly Guy books? It's a series of Scholastic early readers about a boy named Buzz who has a pet fly.

 

And Balsam Fir thinks they're funny!

The books are really too easy for him, but sometimes you just gotta read for pleasure rather than challenge, right? And it's a wonderful way to build his self-confidence and enjoyment with reading.

Fly Guy's favorite food is "brown, oozy, lumpy, and smelly" Shoo Fly Pie. Go figure! ::wink:: I had a "light bulb" moment and asked Balsam Fir if he would like to MAKE a Shoo Fly Pie. 

"Shoo Fly Pie is really a pie?"

So, I searched All Recipes on-line and found this simple Shoo Fly Pie recipe. But wait - no crust! (Yes, I buy my crusts and just roll them out! ::wink::) Could we REALLY make the crust from scratch too? 

I found a pie crust recipe on All Recipes called "Easy to Remember Pie Crust" here with only 3 ingredients. And you know what? It worked! We can actually make a decent pie crust from scratch! 

Well, at least my 7-year-old can! ::laugh::

Once the crust was chilled, rolled out, trimmed, and filled with our Shoo Fly molasses layer and brown sugar-flour crumble, we waited impatiently for it to bake and cool. It smelled wonderful! And then we topped it with French vanilla ice cream...

and we had one proud chef-in-training!

But we're still working on this part! ::sigh::

Do you cook with your kiddos? Share the fun on Tuesday with Adventurez with Kids in the Kitchen and Try a New Recipe at Home to 4 Kiddos!

A Peak at Our Week: Session 3 Week 2 - Into the Groove

In My Life This Week
Why do I always slack on keeping bedtimes and no screens until after dark?! ::sigh:: I'm telling you - best rules evah! (That /ah/ at the end is Mainer talk; just so you know. ::wink::) Everyone, well, everyone but my teen son (of course), wake up  "bushy-tailed", and they spend their days being creative, imaginative and productive. Our days just seem so much calmer! Now, to keep those habits in place. Isn't that always the hardest?

My Favorite Thing

Balsam Fir's Writing Notebook Entry

Homeschool High School
Can I just say that White Pine has been "rockin'" school since coming back from vacation? PRODUCTIVE! He's already finished Grammar 101 mod 3 for this session! And a chapter and 3 labs in Biology! And most of a unit in Excellence in Literature II! 

Getting Ready to DNA Labs - Googling Asia History

He's also TOTALLY loving his Google Earth SketchUp class at the high school. He chose to design the hospital for the group's digital town, and has been hard at work creating it. Problem? He's on MY LAPTOP doing it! ::wink:: But I'll give up my Facebook time for him.

Images of White Pine's SketchUp Hosptial - 3D Imaging In Progress

Accomplishments
A Grief Observed, CS Lewis Approach Paper, Grammar 101 Mod 3, Graphs of Linear Equations, DNA and Acid Experiments, Google Earth SketchUp, Asia Geography and History

Homeschool Elementary
Balsam Fir has learned to "borrow"! Such exciting news, huh? We've had a challenging math year with little progress so learning something new was a big "thumps up"! And we've continued to trudge on with Time Bingo and Coin War. Wonder when those concepts will click?

Balsam Fir Reading Fly Guy Books - Balsam Fir's Visual Helper Word Wall -Sugar Maple
Hiding Behind Math - Learning to Borrow

We're still covering the finer points (elementary-level) of states of matter for Chemistry with Chem4Kids and watched this You Tube video and made Rock Candy (crystals).

And we briefly headed to the Americas to learn about the Nazcas who carved HUGE animals, flowers and other things into the earth that can be seen from planes and the Olmecs who made a mud pyramid in Central America and created sculptures of HEADS only. Then we returned to Ancient Rome in SOTW.

Balsam Fir's States of Matter Notebook Page - Sugar Maple's Mapwork -Balsam Fir
Reading

Sugar Maple's Accomplishments
Phantom Tollbooth, Heroes of Olympus: Son of Neptune, Creative Writing (on Computer), Spectrum Reading Comprehension, Sequential Spelling Days 32-36, Operations with Mixed Fractions, Decimals and Percentage, States of Matter, Ancient Rome

Balsam Fir's Accomplishments
In, Out and About in Catfish Pond, Thank You Notes, Book Report, Word Wall, Borrowing During Subtraction, States of Matter, Ancient Rome

Books, Books, Books!
I'm still reading aloud the Treasury of Greek Myths: Classic Stories of Gods, Goddesses, Heroes & Monsters to my younger saplings. Sugar Maple is SO into Greek Myths! (Note: There are some questionable areas in the book. I'm OK with them, but you may not be, so skim through before sharing with your kids.) And Balsam Fir can't wait to hear Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever before bed.

Places We're Going, People We're Seeing
☃ Basketball (SM/BF) ☃ Scout Achievement Awards (WP) ☃ Scouts (BF/WP) ☃ Enrichment Class (WP) ☃ Library (All) ☃ High School Basketball Game with Friends and Overnight (All) ☃ 

Something to Share

Thanks for visiting us at Our Side of the Mountain! We hope that you and your family are well! We're linking up to these awesome blog hops!