Weekly Wrap-up - EGG-cellent!: August 4-10

In Our Life

Who wouldn't thought just how many eggs 7 chickens could lay in just 8 1/2 months?! The clucks have given us 1001 eggs this year thus far!

A surprise trip to the water and amusement park on Sunday! The Saplings were SUPER excited! We met up with my sister and niece and her friends at the park, but mostly did our own thing. *I* even went on some waterslides! ::laugh:: Unfortunately the park closed down soon after we started exploring the amusement park side due to a thunderstorm rolling in around 6:00pm. But guess what? They have a weather guarantee and we have 4 more passes for the amusement park to use another time!

Lots more time at the lake, swimming and picnicking and "hanging out" with friends. We're very fortunate to have a large, clean lake just 4 miles away to enjoy! And to have Rec Center Free Lunch for Kids available RIGHT BY the lake! It's been GREAT not having to think about lunch (or to shop for it) Monday - Friday!

But the MOST FUN is swimming after dinner! We've been having a blast swimming at sunset before bedtime!

And I also took the van to get inspected on Tuesday and ended up needing some significant repairs - ::sigh:: Really?! - and the dog and cat visited the vet for their annual check-ups.

What's Cooking?

A taste of fall! For our special dessert this week - and one that we shared with friends at the Rec Center and lake - was PUMPKIN WHOOPIES WITH MAPLE CREAM CHEESE FILLING from Brown Eyed Baker. Want to try them? Click here for the recipe! You'll like them! ::wink::

In Our Homeschool
Well, we finished up our first Create Better Writer's paragraph. (Did you see my review post here?) And unfortunately it "brought to light" that my older Saplings have more writing review work to do. So, guess WHO'S doing some more writing in August? "But, Mooooom, it's summer!" What better time! ::laugh:: And Balsam Fir continued his phonics and sight word learning with an on-line program we're reviewing.

And White Pine made pickles from some of the garden cucumbers. I suppose it's not REALLY school, but it was something new that he's never made before, and they came out AWESOME!

We're Reading...
...Love, Aubrey by Suzanne LaFleur  (me...and no laughing because it's a middle school book ::laugh::), We Few by David Weber (White Pine), (Sugar Maple), Nate the Great by Marjorie Sharmat (Balsam Fir), and The Cricket in Times Square by George Selden (read aloud).

A Few of Our Favorite Things

Behold! It's the, um, son? daughter? of Capacity Dad and Fraction Mama! Nah, it's just an idea I found on Pinterest at S is for Second Grade for Gallon Man that I "ran with". I'm hoping this will answer my younger Saplings questions of, "How many cups in a pint? pints in a quart?" And, of course, I had to do something for the HAIR. Don't you think the fraction "locks" work? ::grin:: I decided that breaking down cups into tablespoons was out of the question for Cap-Frac. Can you imagine all those little pieces of paper! Blue Spruce suggested I add LITERS, but I think that's a project for HIM to complete. ::wink:: Cap-Frac now decorates our wall next to the thermastat and the beginning of our SOTW timeline from Tending our Lord's Garden.

Yeah, Cap-Frac Turned Out Bigger Than
I Had Anticipated

Here's Cap-Frac Beside the Beginning
of Our SOTW Timeline

Ponderings
Guess what? My boys both have LOOSE TEETH. I never thought I would be able to say that considering they're 6 years apart! But, yes, my 13-and-a-half-year-old is FINALLY losing that last molar...and my little Sapling is wondering when tooth #3 and #4 will fall out.

Giggles to Share

Blog Hops

What My Child is Reading: Aprl 23-30

J is continuing to read the Honor Harrington series by David Weber. This week he finished up Flag of Exile, Honor Among Enemies and In Enemy Hands. Honor Harrington is a captain of a spaceship who wants to defeat the People Republic of Haven. Great Sci-Fi books for teens to adults!

C was excited to find another Wimpy Kid book at the library to borrow, The Ugly Truth, and DEVOURED it in a day. And then she returned to Indian Summer by Ella Gilman Conger - a historical fiction book about a young Iroquois-white girl living in northern Maine - and The Family Under the Bridge by Natalie Savage Carlson. This is a sweet story about a homeless Parisian man who is determined to find a better home for a mother and her children who live under a bridge near the Seine River.

S continues to work on his Hooked on Phonics: Learn to Read readers Sam and the Mitt, Ann's Hat and Pop Fox, and Learning Language Arts Through Literature 3 Big Hats.


For Read Aloud books, I borrowed classical and award-winning literature from the library.

What did your child read this week? Share your GREAT books by linking up to What My Child is Reading blog hop! Click on the sidebar button!

What My Child is Reading: April 17-23

J finished reading Animal Farm by George Orwell this week for his Literature Study and On Basilisk Station by David Weber, starting book #2 in the series called The Honor of the Queen.

  C is REALLY enjoying the Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney series! When she ran out of those books, she read Indian Summer by Ella Conger. Indian Summer is about a young Iroquis-White girl in growing up in Northern Maine during the 1930s. It's a great historical fiction read! (Yes, I read it too! LOL)

 For mealtime and on-the-road reading:

S read Ann's Hat, Sam and the Mitt and Pop Fox from Hooked on Phonics: Learn to Read, and 3 Big Hats from Learning Language Arts Through Literature: Blue.

 And for Bedtime Reading, I read these books to C and S: 

 What did your kids read this week? Link up to What My Child is Reading to share with other homeschoolers and to get ideas for other GREAT books!

What my Child is Reading: April 10-16

J continued reading Animal Farm by George Orwell this week for his Literature Study and for pleasure he read On Basilisk Station by David Weber and the historical photo book New York September 11 by Magnum Photographers. (J greatly enjoys historical books!)

C SO enjoyed our Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne read aloud time that she wanted to reread the book on her own this week and then she started The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling.

S is moving right along in his Hooked on Phonics: Learn to Read books! He read Ann's Hat and Sam and the Mitt. And continued to work on his Bob Books Dot and Mit and LLATL Blue 3 Big Hats. (I'm having difficulties finding VERY early beginning readers for S, so if you have a suggestion please let me know in comments. Thanks!)

For mealtime and on-the-road reading:

And for Bedtime Reading, I read these books to C and S:

 What did your kids read this week? Link up to What My Child is Reading to share with other homeschoolers and to get ideas for other GREAT books!

What My Child is Reading: April 3 - 9

J continued to enjoy A Mighty Fortress by David Weber, the last novel in the Safehold series. It's a "lengthy" book and took a few weeks for him to finish. He started Animal Farm by George Orwell for his Literature Studies. He's read this one before, but wanted to reread it. Glencoe Literature describes Animal Farm as:

A masterpiece of political satire, Animal Farm is a tale of oppressed individuals who long for freedom but ultimately are corrupted by assuming the very power that had originally oppressed them. The story traces the deplorable conditions of mistreated animals—animals who can speak and who exhibit many human characteristics. After extreme negligence by their owner, the animals revolt and expel Mr. Jones and his wife from the farm. The tale of the society the animals form and its deterioration into a totalitarian regime is generally viewed as Orwell's critique of the Communist system in the former Soviet Union.

C finished up Brighty: Of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry, and, since I haven't been able to spend a lot of time reading it aloud, continued on with Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lingren and Stuart Little by E.B. White.  Amazon describes Pippl Longstocking as:

Pippi is an irrepressible, irreverent, and irrefutably delightful girl who lives alone (with a monkey) in her wacky house, Villa Villekulla. When she's not dancing with the burglars who were just trying to rob her house, she's attempting to learn the "pluttification" tables at school; fighting Adolf, the strongest man in the world at the circus; or playing tag with police officers. Pippi's high-spirited, good-natured hijinks cause as much trouble as fun, but a more generous child you won't find anywhere.

And Amazon describes Stuart Little as: 

How terribly surprised the Little family must have been when their second child turned out to be a small mouse. Apparently familiar with the axiom that "when in New York City, anything can happen," the Littles accept young Stuart into their family unquestioningly--with the exception of Snowbell the cat who is unable to overcome his instinctive dislike for the little mouse. They build him a bed from a matchbox, and supply him with all of the accoutrements a young mouse could need. Mrs. Little even fashions him a suit, because baby clothes would obviously be unsuitable for such a sophisticated mouse. In return, Stuart helps his tall family with errant Ping-Pong balls that roll outside of their reach.

S will be spending QUITE a long time on his Hooked on Phonics: Learn to Read books - there are many! - as well as Bob Books, Learning Language Arts Through Literature Blue readers and Progressive Phonics readers, but I added in some fun, less "curriculum" books that we read together.

And I read these books to the kids during our reading times:

What's your child reading?