Easter and Spring at Last! {An April Daybook}

Outside my window...

Glorious sunshine with temps in the high 50s!  Oh, Spring, at long last you've arrived! :)




I am thinking...

...about how to best manage all the springtime trips with the kids (think picnics in the park and zoo trips) with a newborn in the mix.  Newborns cramp my spontaneity just a tad!  I've also been thinking about our homeschooling year.  It's been all kinds of crazy with the move and the baby!  Many homeschoolers reassess their academic year in February but I kinda had a baby instead, so here I am doing it in April!  I've been especially focusing on how to make my oldest more motivated to write.  He loves writing tasks when he gets to orally dictate, but cannot stand the mechanics of writing and spelling.  It's like pulling teeth.  I've tried to make it as fun as humanly possible--I made a snazzy journal jar filled with fun questions and even added a computer-time reward, but it's slow progress...as in watching mold grow seems to be faster and more pleasant!  Suggestions welcome! :)




I am thankful...

bubbles!

 

...for the sunshine and for everything greening up!  There's nothing like watching the kids digging around in the dirt and coming in from the yard with grass-stained knees to boost one's spirits! I'm also thankful for the Easter season!  We've been having fun using our Garden of the Good Shepard calendar as a launching point for activities to celebrate:

Megan making a marshmallow "sheep"

Luke's sheep

In the kitchen...

Ummm...still haven't found my groove with the cooking nice things for dinner yet.  All hail the quickie no-brainer meals!  But I did manage to make this yumminess for Easter:

soooooo good!

It's an adaptation of this recipe: Fresh Raspberry Almond Tray Tart.  (I made a strawberry walnut version!)


I am wearing...


Ick...sizes much too large.  Now that my little man is officially 6 weeks old it's time to get back in shape.  I just started using this DVD this week.  The pain, oh the pain!  I'm (reluctantly!) going on Weight Watchers, too.  It's what I've done after my other babies and it's always worked well for me. Getting started is always the hardest part!








I am creating...


Well, the kids have been crafting lately and I help out--does that count?!  They made these Easter "sun-catchers" last week:

coffee filter sun catchers

 

 We also dyed eggs:

I love the green one toward the center with the purely accidental cross on it!

This week we made a Nature Mandala:

The mandala was an idea from the book 15 Minutes Outside.  I highly recommend it if you're looking for quick outdoor ideas to do with the kiddos!  It has 365 ideas broken down by season, so it's great to reference each month to pick out your faves when you're feeling uninspired.

I am going...


Still not too many places just yet!  But oh, how I have plans!!

I am wondering...



When I'll be able to read anything of substance again without falling asleep!  There are so many books I'd love to dig into but I just don't have the energy in the evenings.  Someday...


I am hoping...


...to find some homeschoolers here in our new town.  I don't know a soul here and it'd be nice to get together for afternoon play dates!




I am looking forward to...


walks without jackets and the return of flip-flops!


I am pondering...


how to "live slow."  With a lot less time during the day and less energy in the evenings, I feel like I try to rush to cram things in, but often lose joy in all that hurrying.  I feel like I'm always looking at the clock to gauge my time left before the next feeding, the next mealtime, the next....   So, I'm trying to figure out a way to just be ok with less time and enjoy it to the fullest.


A favorite quote for today...


"Dost thou love life?  Then do not squander time, for time is the stuff life is made of." --Benjamin Franklin


Oh how this rings true these days!  Less idle time=more quality time.  It's a tough balancing act because when I'm tired I tend to just waste time clicking around on the computer or watching inane TV.  But then I don't feel fulfilled.  But I'm too tired for the deeper things I love to do...so it's kind of a catch 22.  I know it's just a transient season of "newbornness" that will pass, but I'm trying to figure out how to best enjoy it!



One of my favorite things...


As part of my homeschool assessment, I've been thumbing through one of my favorite homeschool books, Real Learning: Education in the Heart of the Home.  It's so refreshing and inspiring whenever I'm feeling kind of...meh.

A Peek into my Day...

His double chin is coming along quite nicely, don't you think?  :)

Worm "grunting"

 After reading an article about worm grunting, we decided to give it a try.  It was a total and complete bust!  Not one measly worm came to the surface!  Decidedly we are NOT worm charmers.  But the kids had fun digging around in the dirt anyway. :)  They found all kinds of other creepy crawlies as a substitute!

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Simple Woman's Daybook

Our Week in Homeschool {in which we all had colds!}

In My Life This Week:

It was a slower-than-usual week for us with sniffles and sneezes abounding. So, we spent less time on our usual lessons and more time being spontaneous. It's on those "looser" weeks that I tend to really notice the kids more. You know, all those little sweet things like how their hands have grown a bit, and being awed by the imagination that knows-no-bounds.


In Our Homeschool This Week:

The boys spent a lot of time inventing--inventing a money game, a Zhu-Zhu pet obstacle course from blocks, a detective game in which they tried to crack the case of "The Mysterious Sound in Megan's Bedroom" complete with boobie traps, an observation notebook and even outdoor investigating (which, by-the-way, they never did solve! Hmmm...maybe it's better to not know that one?!). And we read. Lots and lots of books.

Luke making his way through another Nate the Great book-his favorite series of the moment!

We pulled out several of my old favorite childhood classics:

and

We also perused the bookshelves and re-discovered others including:

...which led to some seriously fun googling on the subject of microphotography including this picture of sand:

photo source

Who knew how stunningly beautiful sand could be under a microscope?!


We read some old issues of children's magazines we'd fallen behind on. An article from Spider on the Terracotta Army led to all kinds of fun readings on ancient China.

And we got our hands dirty with arts & crafts including heart etchings, thanks to a set of rubbing plates from Oriental Trading:

The boys also made "Knot Valentines" (courtesy of the February issue of Spider!):

they were all over anything involving secret messages!

This one made my heart melt--misspelling and all!

And paper chocolate heart boxes:

They also did a little excavating, thanks to the Dino Fossil Kits they bought from the craft store (with their own money!). It was way messy and loads of fun:

Adam. was. covered. in. dust.

ta-da!

Just so I didn't feel too badly for somewhat slacking in other subjects, we did manage to get through some math lessons!

Adam working on identifying 2-digit numbers:

It was a really fun week! I have to make sure we have more spontaneous "loose" days in the future!


My favorite thing this week was:

All of the cuddles on the couch under blankets reading stacks of books. Sometimes I realize those cuddles won't last forever, which reminds me to cherish them all the more. :)

Our Week in Homeschool {The Chinese New Year Edition!}

One of the things I'd like to try to do is blog more about our homeschool days. It's such a huge part of my life and yet, somehow I don't seem to write about it all that often! So I thought I'd give the "Homeschool Mother's Journal" a try:



In Our Homeschool This Week:

We've been enjoying lots of Chinese New Year celebrating with books, crafts and yes, of course-- Chinese food! We borrowed some great library books to supplement our collection at home:



We also explored other topics related to China: Great Wall of China, silkworms, Chinese inventions, traditional Chinese Calligraphy and Panda Bears. (*I* learned that Panda bears have slit-pupils, like a cat! How cool!)

Calligraphy in the works...

We made "Fai Chun" thanks to a craft page from the latest issue of Spider (love that publication!). Luke thought it was highly amused by the fact that you hang them upside-down since "Spring" rhymes with "upside-down" in Chinese!




The kids loved playing with this Chinese Zodiac spinner (Thank you, Enchanted Learning!):

They were fascinated to find out which animal they each were and their characteristics!

Chinese Lanterns:

By-the-way these are really easy and fun to make! My boys first made them last year, and now they ask to make them for many occasions throughout the year! We've made them for Valentine's Day, Halloween and more!

We also made "Lai See" :

(The kids were all over any opportunity to get a little treat!) They each got $1.00 and some ancient Chinese coin replicas I picked up from Oriental Trading. Fun!

Some scratch-paper fun to celebrate the "Year of the Dragon" :

Luke scratching away...

Adam's dragon

Chinese food lunch-love any occasion to have lunch delivered right to your door! The kids got to use (fake kid-friendly!) chopsticks with their zodiac symbol on them, which, after lunch became some sort of ninja weapons. :) (Gotta love boys!)

yummy!

You can totally see him plotting alternate ways to use the chopsticks!

I also made steamed dumplings (sorry, no pics! ) for dinner. They were messy and time-consuming (hence the lack of pics!) but I eventually got the hang of them. The kids liked them, but *I* inhaled the most! YUM! I think they'll be easier to make next time (I hope!). If they come out better next time I'll take pics and post the recipe!


With the leftover wonton wrappers I made this deliciousness:

Baked wontons with cinnamon sugared nuts & strawberries on top.
Sooooo good! I'll post the recipe next week!

Other Subjects:

We're memorizing the beginning poem from White Snow Bright Snow (at Adam's request!):

We've also been working our way through these sweet alphabetical virtue coloring pages from Pondered in My Heart. Love these! (This week is "G" for "Gratitude.")

Working our Way through the Faith and Life Series for religious study:

We discussed Corporal Works of Mercy, and how we can look for opportunities to put these into practice.

We're also reading through Emily Post's Manners book:

The boys love acting out various "good manners" scenarios from this book (we make them up as we go). They're always in stitches over feigning bad manners when we do these scenes! :p


And we continued plugging through our regular lessons from: Handwriting without Tears, Spelling Workout, First Language Lessons, Writing with Ease and Saxon Math. Adam is loving Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. He also loves practicing his letter and number writing. He feels like such a big boy sitting at the table alongside Luke this year! :)


Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share:

Luke has been enjoying the Nate the Great series we borrowed from the library. He highly recommends them. :) And I highly recommend anything that Luke is excited to pick up and read on his own!


My favorite thing this week was:

Hmmm...probably laughing at all of the good manners silliness that ensued. And eating dumplings & dessert wontons. They were really, really good. :)


So, that was our week in a nut shell. Phew, that was a lot to type! This makes me feel like less of a slacker, seeing our week all typed out! Whenever I'm suffering from the latest case of "Am-I-doing-enough??" I'll have to keep this in mind. ;)

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