History & Geography Fair is Here

Well, tomorrow anyway :) Here is Eliana's finished project- she did hers by looking in books and picking out (from the pictures) what she wanted to show in her representation of ancient Egypt.

The overall project
The tag on the blue says "Nile river" and the tag on the green says "crops"





Looking inside, the bird to the right is an Egyptian Goose which she actually learned about from the farm Malia gets horseback riding lessons at. I have no idea if it existed in ancient Egypt, but she felt it had to be included :)





The sacred Ibis and the pyramid she made





The house up close





It didn't quite fit inside the scene, but she wanted to include a mummy-filled tomb (but of course!!)







Next, Malia's... She compiled hers by reading of various breeds and picking those she felt had the most interesting facts. Then she chose some facts and pictures to adhere to a foam board.
The overall project:






The individual breeds
















































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New Bike!

Malia has her first real big kid bike. No pedal brakes, aluminum frame, bike shop quality 7 speed Mountain bike.



Today we took the bikes out to Lake Bella Vista to ride the trail around it. Eliana had amazing endurance and did all 4 miles on her single speed hello kitty bike.

We are happy to report that the hitch Dathan put in himself works... No bikes were hurt during our outing. :)

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So Much to Do!

Thursday is our History & Geography Fair. Malia is about done with her display, but we still have more work on Eliana's. Malia is doing hers on the history of different horse breeds-very fitting for her current interests. Or interest rather :)

Eliana was doing hers on Egypt but seems to be losing interest and is wanting to do it on the story of Ostara or something of that nature.

Speaking of which, she was all set to dress up as Cleopatra again and has (just recently) decided she wants to dress up as a Goddess or Ostara instead. We have a costume party Saturday so I am hoping U can it together by then!

Malia is dressing up as a prairie girl and Sasha as Kiki from Kiki's delivery service.

So basicaly we have projects due Thursday and costumes Saturday. Anyone want to volunteer to make me a green skirt with leaves and vines coming from it? Or have a white fluffy bunny to spare? Hehe


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Busy Week!

Wow, what a week! October is turning out to be a very busy month. Dathan was off M, T, and W and we really enjoyed his time home. I am more convinced than ever that we spend way too much time working in our society =P

I can't even remember all we did this week or I would fill you all in :) Friday was big fun though, we had two friends over for the day. We started off the day making marble magnets and then at 10 went to Walton Arts Center to see a Latin/Contemporary dance performance by Luna Negra Dance Theatre. All five kids seemed really into the performance, and it was incredibly peaceful and easy. Babies were sweet, but it is so nice to be able to do such activities and just enjoy it. No tears, no boredom, no complaining. Just fun. After that we went out to eat, back home for a bit and back out to Malia's horseback riding lessons. The kids didn't want their friends to go, it was so much fun.

Here are the kids crouching down on the paved part of the drive trying to stay warm :)





Later that night their favorite babysitter came over so Dathan and I could go see the evening performance by the same dance company. Had a wonderful time!


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Wonderful Rainy Day

For being way too stinkin cold, and way too stinkin wet outside today- we actually had a good day. Did some research this morning for the History & Geography fair. Malia is doing her display on the history of different horse breeds and Eliana is trying to decide between a display on Cleopatra or the history of different types of dance- she is really most interested in ballet and belly dancing.

So anyway, then we went to Crafty Cottage for a homeschooling knitting lesson. Imagine my luck, school was closed and the couple's 12 yo daughter was there. After the girls painted the pottery they made on the wheel a few weeks back the younger two played with their daughter while Malia learned to knit. In talking to the woman, she pulled out some needles and taught me too!

Needless to say Malia and I are enjoying practicing (a lot).

Then we putted around to a few thrift shops and met Dathan for dinner. Good day, good day!


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Just A Quick Post...

before I run along to bed. Well actually before I run along to find my phone so I CAN go to bed. This should be fun =P


Riding at her lessons today <3

Arabian Horse Club

What a hit the evening was... Malia's trainer invited us to her Arabian Horse Club. All the girls had so much fun, and so much freedom wandering around the farm. Eliana made new friends, Malia visited horses... And even got Gabriella (a new horse who isn't broken yet) to come up to the fence to see her and take a treat from her hands... Big news :) Sasha ate lots of food and played all evening. My crock pot full of 15 bean soup was polished off and many cookies were eaten. A great, great night.

I also learned that her trainer's family have owned a photography studio in the area for years and years. They had big old enlargers and their first cameras from the fifties- it was pretty neat.

Glad we went, will plan on attending most events they host-kids didn't want to come home. You could tell they just thrived in that environment.


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Tuesday Fun

Today is normally horseback, but because of the rain we are going tomorrow. Thankfully it is mostly cleared up today because tonight is Arabian Horse Club Meeting. We are making Cajun 15 bean soup and Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies to share. The girls just finished helping me make them and they are filling the house with a wonderful smell!!

If cookies werent fun enough on their own it lead to some great chocolate chip math and practice with skip counting.









The math eventually turned to creative play, of course.







And Sasha's mushroom



Which led to full scale fairy living quarters



Just before the cookies I went in the kitchen to do dishes and prepare to make them. The girls had no idea we were gonna be making cookies. I stood there, tired from not sleeping well and said that I was so very tired today.

Eliana and Malia insisted that they do the kitchen chores while I go lay down for a nap. What a considerate thing for them to think of! I wasn't going to argue with them, I left them to it. They even checked on the 15 bean soup and stirred it as needed. Apparently they also tried to clean the floor because I came back in to this sign


It has been a fun day so far. I sense we are going to miss swimming at our current rate... But we are having a great day.

Just in case you didn't know, weeds last forever in water! The other day the girls picked me "green poppies" and they still look as fresh after a few days inside.



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At The Library Today

I teased Sasha at the library when she ignored me and a staff member reminded her to walk... I said "what part of walk did ya miss??"

She replies "wuh, wuh... the W!"


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Love This Kid!

It has become quite obvious that Eliana has a strong tendency towards the right side of her brain. Visual-Spatial it is often called. We have learned so much about the variance, and it is fascinating. Phonics are harder for kids who process in a visual-spatial way rather than an audio-sequential one. VS kids tend to learn in a whole to part process rather than a part to whole process. In other words they tend to get the big picture and fill in the details later, rather than putting the details together to get the whole picture. Phonics are surely possible, but many rb kids are considered late readers and then begin reading more suddenly in a whole-word method. They say this is because they develop their 3D visualization skills before the 2D visualization skills needed to read. This is also the reason they often write letters backwards for longer, they simply see the letters different. As if they could lift it off the page and spin it around with their eyes.

At this point Eliana is more interested in creating words than reading them. I think the many words on a page are visually overwhelming for her- but she is getting a surprisingly good grasp of phonics in the mean time. If I tell her a word breaks the phonics rules, she scrunches her nose at me as if she is contemplating rocket science. Ultimately she prefers to leave the word as it sounds to her, or as she knows it when it's a word she has simply memorized.

The above information is not at all vital to the story... I do that sometimes. Fascinating none the less though, no? ;o)

So Eliana asked for some celery at lunch, I informed her we were out but she could make a list on the board if she would like us to buy some... So she did.







And there it is... selre. Celery. And hotwel. Can't forget the hotwheels. I love seeing her words around the house, she is teaching me so much about trusting each person's inherent desire to learn in the best way possible for them as individuals. <3

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Home Depot Saturday

Today was Home Depot Saturday, the girls built fire station piggy banks. Malia built hers entirely be herself and Eliana was extremely proficient with the hammer today!













And as a bonus they had all kinds of emergency response vehicles out for the kids to explore. At noon we gotto watch a helicopter take flight. Malia was thrilled with experience!




After that I met up with a girlfriend... Went to Tienda Martinez, and then thrift shopping. I found a brilliantly quirky turtle that just had to be bought :)



Then a few of me and the girls in the front porch :)



Notice the fairy house mess, I mean supplies behind Sasha?








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Poor Sasha

I guess we will be heading back to specialists for Sasha soon. Most of you know she was born with kidney reflux, which they expected her to outgrow. She went some years without a kidney infection so we assumed she had.

Within the last 6 months or so she has had some symptoms returning. She seems to have a very classic kidney infection, and when it becomes obvious we can't kick it- we go to the DR to get medicine to help. Her labs haven't been classic though. For some reason her bacteria count isn't as high as they would expect for her symptoms but her ketones are well higher than they would expect- even if she has eaten fine. That said, her sugar isn't as high as you would expect if the ketones were caused by diabetes.

So we don't really know what is going on, but we will probably be seeing a specialist before long. She is sick this weekend, hopefully she will feel better soon. Poor baby :(


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Skatepark

Well, the girls have been asking to ride their bikes on the skatepark and today we got up and went when we could be the only people there. I trusted them to only do what they felt comfortable doing... I might have forgotten how very comfortable Eliana is in everything she does- even flying through the air. At one point she went over a ramp that just ended on the other side.... No ramp, just nothing. She literally ditched the bike mid-air and landed in her feet in the grass. It was great!

Malia was cautious, but made a point to try most everything. She was handling her bike so well... She didn't take even one fall, seemed very in control of herself out there.

They both loved it and can't wait to try again.














Sasha even got in the action (and is obviously still anti-pedal bike)



After that we went to the square... Had to get some laminating done at the school supply shop and have Dathan's bike repaired. Then grabbed some lunch and headed to chess club, which conveniently doubles as a mama planning meeting for the following month. I am really excited for our fall celebration now.

Right after that I went to my lovely and wonderful friend's Montesori classroom to get a few ideas for Montessori Math. She was so cool to meet me after school and school me :D

Long day, but quite fun. Tonight there are a few belly aches and I am really hoping the kids are feeling up to their Thursday school tomorrow!!! If it is a bug, may it pass quickly!

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Sidewalk Math

The girls have been enjoying a lot of outdoor time. The weather is getting so beautiful... and I have decided our street is so dead during the weekdays that they should be able to play and ride bikes without my constant watch. I think they have felt a big sense of freedom, and are using that freedom so responsibly. Yesterday I went outside to find them writing math problems for each other to solve. Pretty cute that they still think Math is cook and fun <3 based on the handwriting I think Eliana wrote this one.




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Oh Yah... Tamales!

I forgot to post Monday while we were making tamales! I worked on some ingredients ahead of time, so come Monday (am I the only one who just started singing?) all I had to prepare was the masa and assemble them. The girls were really helpful! I didn't really have to do much more than show them once, and they were quite productive. I loved sharing this with them :)




And once they noticed the camera more, the full on poses start



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Horseback Riding

I am sitting here at Malia's horseback riding lessons- Eliana and Sasha running around petting farm dogs and extremely tolerant cats. Malia seems to be a natural on the horse once she gets past her initial cautiousness. Today she is riding Praise who is a bouncy horse. She is working on holding her form and hands properly while the horse is trotting. She is getting more proficient at brushing, cleaning hooves and such upkeep.

It is nice to be here, out in the country, her trainer's parents often let the younger ones help with chores and the like. Like it here :)

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Long Time

I haven't been updating this blog in way too long. I added an application that allows me to update it from my phone, so we should be back in business. I rarely get a chance to sit at a real computer since my laptop died :) I had a hard time keeping itvup while Malia was in school last year too. Everyone says I am crazy to commit myself to home education, but I swear I have more time this way... I felt constantly on the go last year.

To catch you up, me and the girls went to Michigan over the summer. Gosh, I never fully appreciated Michigan summers until I moved away. We spent time just being at the beach, picking berries and sailing. It doesn't get any better than that. I hope to continue going every summer. I will try to make a post soon with more details of our trip.

Malia decided to return to homeschooling this year, which I am secretly excited about. :) They are getting to be such cool kids, and I am really enjoying this process. We are trying to let them lead the way in their education... Giving them ablotbof room to explore subjects that they are personally interested in. Hoping to really nurture a love for learning more than anything else at this point.

In addition to Math and reading, Malia is enjoying learning about chemistry, horses, different forms of poetry, chess, and logic/math riddles. She is most invested in her horseback riding lessons for now, she is all about the horses. She is still an amazing reader- whizzing through 3-5 chapter books a week. Right now she is enjoying the boxcar series and sone various mystery books. We are reading The Secret Garden together, which she quite likes.

Eliana has been enjoying chess, ballet, these math/strategy games I have made, art, pottery, story writing, and counting/grouping numbers. Eliana seems to really enjoy creating. She likes to do interesting things like group marbles by numbers and create a different, but related, design out of each numerical set. It is really neat to watch how educational her play is, even if not traditionally so. Eliana also really likes pokemon and super friends comic books right now.

Sasha is doing great, she is leading the way in reading. Starting to sound out phonetic 3 letter words and attempting to sound out her own words. The other day she wrote "boobaree" for blueberry. She seems to be a bit of a whiz at checkers... She can usually win against everyone in the house without coaching. She is getting bored with the checkers game on my puonebecause she always wins. Guess it is time to knock it up a notch to the hard level. She enjoys the computer as much as always, butbis beginning to enjoy bikes and outdoor games a bit more as well. She likes the super friends comic books, super heroes, Kiki's Delivery Service and Totoro (both movies) and she adores magic school bus books. Actually all three girls are quite in to them right now.

We have this great book by Constance Kamii, "Young Children Reinvent Arithmetic". The whole first half dives in to constructivist theory and how to apply Piaget's theories to Math... But the end is full of games you can make (or play with cards) that help build Math skills and concepts. Patterns, strategies, probability, and so forth. It has been a great resource for us, the girls love thier math games and feel very empowered in the subject. They love doing their Singapore Math workbooks as a result.

Let me see... So much going on, so much to share! The girls are all enrolled at at this great one day a week cooperative school for homeschoolers. Every Thursday we go at 9 and stay till 4. They get to choose from a variety of classes in their age grouping and are really loving the experience. Eliana especially seems to really embrace the indepence she has been experiencing. She has specifically asked me not to help her switch classes each hour- likes to manage it entirely on her own. They are all really loving it and I plan to keep going a long as they love it so much.

I am trying to make tamales this weekend (first time without a house full of hands to help!!) so I best get to the task- will do better at keeping this blog up now that I can do it from my phone (though that might mean many typos ahead) :)


-- Posted from my iPhone

Sasha's Workbook

We recently discovered the girls enjoy doing workbooks so we bought a couple to pass the time while waiting to pick Malia up from school. Going over Sasha's with her we were working on a couple pages of "which one is different" and when we came to this one Sasha said "Lizards are not water animals" I thought "why not?" Great out of the box thinking there, right?


Then we came to this one where there is a dog looking very much out place with three winged animals, but when I ask which is different she circles the duck and tells me "Ducks live in water, the other animals live on land" <3 I am just loving her thought process on these!

My New Lens

I've been dying for a chance to upload pictures from my new lens. I've been so crazy busy.

I took some on film and I don't have them processed yet... and I shot some in the back yard while the kids were just playing. I'll post a couple here. I've resized them for web but left them otherwise- just how they came. LOVE this lens. I can be a mile away and still be right up on them!

This is one of the first pictures I took. Can't you just feel that tree?


Eliana is much more in to playing than pictures these days. haha.


Sasha on the other hand has been a bit of a ham, which is out of character for her.

If I Were The President...

A little conversation from the car today.

Eliana: mom, how do guns work?
Mom: gives simple explanation of function
Eliana-Mom, if I were the president... I would make no guns allowed in the world
Sasha- Mom, if I were president... I would have a gun to protect myself
They discuss these possibilities for a few minutes, Eliana telling her that if she didn't take all the guns out of the country than she really couldn't be protected.
So I asked them how they felt about guns used to hunt animals for food (remember, Eliana is a strict vegetarian, and Sasha is not)
Sasha: they can just buy meat at the store!
Eliana: I would let them hunt animals, they could get a special piece of paper from me that only I could sign. It would let them hunt animals.
mom: What else would you do if you were president?
Eliana: *pause*
I would tell them, in that other country, that they should let people help the other people who live there (referring to something she overheard on NPR today about Sudan)
*pause*
Nobody could cut down trees, that way we can all breathe better and for longer.
*pause*
I think people should have to pay no bills. And NOT get their stuff taken away.
*pause
And mom, I would make everyone take a nap before going to their friend's house. Because, mom, I was really tired at Ivy's party. That is how I thought of that"

The conversation then evolved in to parties... but I thought it was so cute. From the deep thinking minds of 4-6 year olds.

The right to freedom, equality and naps for all!

Funny Conversation

Eliana, in her 'i'm telling the funniest joke in the world' voice: "Let's just have a Dad and give our mom away"
Malia: "ANA! but then we can't ever have PIZZA!"
Eliana: "Yeah, but Dad buys us peeps and other food with COLORS!"

Malia has Earrings!

I'm a little floored by it, honestly... I always said I would let them choose, but I really did expect it later. Especially from her, she is not usually one to put beauty ahead of comfort. They were important to her though, and despite all fair warnings about them hurting and all the things that could go wrong, she decided it was worth it.





being silly

Baby Party!

So long ago when Eliana was just one, sshe picked up the most adorable little baby doll. She carried that (for her massive) box around our favorite toy store (Dilly Dally) for so long. Normally she would eventually drop the box in favor of something new that caught her eye. Not this time, she was not letting go of her baby. "Baby Beh" (it is more of a sound than a word, if that helps make sense of her name)

So we took her home that day. She's been Eliana's favorite baby all these years. She's literally falling apart from love. One leg and one arm both hanging on by stitches, matted hair, and a fair bit of dirt. We decided it was time to buy a new baby, so we went to Dilly dally again yesterday and got the exact same baby again.

She's officially been named Valentina, but I secretly imagine it won't stick. She calls her baby beh more than Valentina for sure. Time will tell.

Yesterday we had a little party to welcome the new baby and retire the old one. So far she hasn't really retired the old one. haha.

I'm sure you can't really tell which baby is new and which is old...


With her babies

First Time with Staples!

We've done stitches, we've done glue... but we had our first time with staples this week.

on Friday Eliana was running across the living room and fumbled over her feet and ran straight in to our (soft, padded) recliner. She didn't even hit a corner. It was really surprising, she must have hit it with a whole lot of force because it split her pretty bad.

She was so brave to, I'm telling you... I have the strongest girls. She fell asleep on my lap around 9, and we didn't get back to a room until 2. I could barely move by then I was in so much pain, they brought a bed out to me to lay her down and then wheeled her back to the room. She continued to sleep until the DR came in and talked super loud and woke her up.

He meant well though, he wanted to make sure she knew what was going on and what he was doing. Which is awesome.

After he did the first staple he said "this will sting for a few minutes" and she boldly replied "well, it doesn't hurt me" and she laid still without needing any restraint for the next two staples as well. After they left she said it hurt a little and her little eyes were teary, but she said it was ok and not to bad. Oh, sweet girl.

Ongoing Fever

Sasha has been having a bit of an ongoing fever. We've alreayd ruled out it being infection based, so we're not really sure how or why she is struggling with this. She seems to go 2-3 weeks healthy and then have a fever for a day or two. it is really sad.

She went for a blood draw yesterday and I was just so proud of her. I told her that they tie a ribbon around your arm, and then poke a needle in to the blue vein (showing it to her) and told her how it pinches for a minute. She asked if they will take the needle back out (haha) and once i answered she said "ok, I'm brave enough for a pinch" and she was. I gave her a lolly right when he started tying the band around her arm and she just watched. Asked a couple questions and afterwards said it was no big deal. Tough chick!

I'll keep everyone posted on how the results come out. They are testing for long term viral infections like mono, epstein barr, parvovirus. They are really the only thing that makes sense right now with how long it has been going on. Everything "dangerous" would have progressed by now.

Ice Storm

We had quite the ice storm here... I hear our state was even declared a federal disaster area. Our particular town faired well, but the county just south of us was hit really hard.

When we were without power we went outside and grilled eggs, biscuits and breakfast meat on the grill in my cast iron pans. We had a big sleepover in the living room around the fireplace. So it was a bit of a fun adventure for us really... we wish it had been as fun for all of our friends.

Our trees weighed down by the ice



The position from which I took most of these pictures


tree Limbs


Being Cute


Sasha was, as expected, the last to go out and first to come in asking where her hot cocoa was.


notice how their feet aren't sinking in at all? Solid sheet of ice dusted with snow.


My poor van was stuck and sealed shut by the ice.