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Today while I was at the dentist Grandma and Grandpa read When Winter Comes by Robert Maass, Time to Sleep by Denise Fleming, Dandelions by Eve Bunting, and Pony Express! by Steven Kroll. Then after lunch we went to see a children's theatre production of A Christmas Carol. In the evening they asked me to read I Know Where My Food Goes by Jacqui Maynard, and we all watched the Charlie Brown Christmas special on tv.

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School keeps getting interrupted this time of year, with all the holiday stuff going on. This week we managed to go to a piano lesson, do some math and spelling, attend the service of Lessons and Carols at the cathedral downtown, and E had her first basketball practice of the season. We also read Cells Are Us by Dr. Fran Balkwill, Kites by Demi, and Ma Jiang and the Orange Ants by Barbara Ann Porte. E and T both worked on ornaments to give for Christmas presents.

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We did a regular day of school last Tuesday, but I can't remember what any of it was! I think I read Cassie's Journey by Brett Harvey, The Emperor and the Kite by Jane Yolen, and The Fourth Question by Rosalind C. Wang. Probably there was more, but I can't think of it now. And of course math and spelling. Over the weekend E got to bake some cupcakes with the little mini set she bought with her birthday money.

Today we started with Polar Bear, Why is Your World Melting? by Robert E. Wells, then Dakota Dugout by Ann Turner, and Warm as Wool by Scott Russell Sanders. While we were on the subject of wool, we looked at a little folder with samples of wool at different stages of manufacture that I got free from Pendleton. Then I read The Story About Ping by Marjorie Flack and Ms. Frizzle's Adventures in Imperial China by Joanna Cole. After lunch and spelling I read I Know How My Cells Make Me Grow by Kate Rowan and then E did math. Over the weekend we did a lot of getting-ready-for-Christmas stuff, like making an advent wreath at church and making paper chains to keep track of how long until Christmas (and keep T from pestering me: "Is it tomorrow, Mommy?") and we started listening to the serial radio program (from the 1930's) "The Cinnamon Bear" which we got from homeschoolradioshows.com.

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For T I read Aliens Love Underpants by Claire Freedman & Ben Cort (my husband wanted some "boy-friendly" books--when he saw the title, he said, "Yep. That's about right."), and Parts by Tedd Arnold. Then Thanksgiving by Alice K. Flanagan, which is a good introduction to the holiday and its antecedents. Then Lon Po Po by Ed Young, Two of Everything by Lily Toy Hong, and The Dragon's Tale by Demi. We did spelling and the kids found China on the world map and colored China's flag and banners with their Chinese zodiac characters (dragon for E and monkey for T--I always said he was a little monkey). Then math for E and the letter K for T. She finished writing her thank you notes for birthday presents and now they are downstairs watching her new "Schoolhouse Rock" DVD.

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Friday: E had her art class, then we got ready for our big neighborhood Halloween party. E made Salty Bones and Monster Toes, my husband made Witches Brooms, and I made Pumpkin Rolls and these cute gingerbread skeleton men:



Today we started our study of China by going to see a performance of Jungua: Descendants of the Dragon, a performance of martial arts and acrobatics from China. It was marvelous. Then we went to have class photos made. Oh, and oops! We weren't quite finished with Japan--I had E label a map with major landforms and cities.

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Today is J. S. Bach's birthday so I read Sebastian: A Book About Bach by Jeanette Winter, and we listened to some of his music. Then we started on the American colonies with The Thirteen Colonies by Dennis Fradin. Then we went to a big Easter Egg Hunt at the park!

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Ok well it's been a very long time since I blogged but I've just been struggling with the blues, a cold, T being 3 1/2 (that was the worst), and all the busy Christmas season stuff. We did do school every day, so I'm going to just write it all in no particular order. E did math most days and has finished level 1B. She'll start the 2A book next semester. E went to see the Nutcracker with Grandma and Grandpa. We did several Christmas-y things. I finished reading Galen by Marissa Moss and read all of Julius Caesar by Richard Platt. E and T went to Dance and Tumbling class. E went to piano class and had a piano recital (she was great!). She also went to basketball practice and had a basketball game. We watched a lot of Peep. In honor of Beethoven's birthday last Sunday we read Ludwig van Beethoven by Mike Venezia and listened to the 9th Symphony. We made igneous rock out of melted chocolate, ate sedimentary Snickers bars, and made metamorphic rock (rice crispie bars--heat and pressure, don't you know). We did scratch tests and streak tests on our minerals, and also tested them for magnetism and put several of them into vinegar (calcite bubbles). All these activities are from the great book How the Earth Works by Michelle O'Brien-Palmer. I read Growing Crystals by Ann O. Squire and we looked at crystals of calcite, iron pyrite, quartz and amethyst. We also looked at crystals of salt, sugar and ice, and saw how a single line viewed through a piece of calcite seems to split into two lines. We made borax snowflakes. I read Comets and Meteor Showers by Paul P. Sipiera and we looked at some animations of comets. E answered several questions about Neptune in her notebook. Tomorrow E has her final piano lesson of the year and then we'll add Neptune's main moon Titan to our solar system wall and call it done! Vacation here we come!

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I had every intention of doing at least 2 days of school last week, but E had her birthday on Monday and felt sick on Tuesday, and that plus general laziness meant we didn't do much but play. We did a few things here and there though, so I'm going to list them and call them about one day's worth of school. E and T had dance and tumbling class Monday. I read Geysers by Larry Dane Brimner, and we went online to watch a video of Old Faithful erupting and an animation of how geysers work and looked at some cool infrared photos of Yellowstone. On her own, E read Danger--Icebergs! by Roma Gans, Get Ready For Robots by Patricia Lauber, Amazing Grace: The Story of the Hymn, by Linda Granfield, and countless chapter books (why the Cul-de-Sac kids are so cool, I'll never know). We watched Peep several times. We gathered a basketful of leaves and made a wreath for our door, writing something we are thankful for on each leaf. E did a GeeArt lesson. We also made paper turkeys out of a footprint and several handprints and gave them to Grandma and Grandpa. E and T worked on the ornaments they're making to give as Christmas presents. E's are like this, only she's making them out of colored paper decorated with glitter glue. T's are made from small rectangles of craft foam to which he added sticky craft foam cut-outs. Alarmingly, they show a very nice grasp of composition. E did a copper embossing project from Klutz's Book of Artrageous Projects that she got for her birthday, and she wrote and illustrated a thank you note to her godmother.

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A short day today--we're busy getting ready for the party! E narrated "The Great Bull of Crete" in Heather Amery's Greek Myths for Young Children, and I read the rest of Odysseus' adventures from that book. Then we read about Perseus and Medusa and Andromeda and the rest in D'Aulaire's Book of Greek Myths. E did 3 more pages of grammar, and I showed her some neat pictures of Saturn and Titan from the Cassini mission. Then we cleaned house and put together costumes! Oh, and of course, we watched Peep.

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Piano first thing today, then we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house to make costumes for the dollhouse dolls. They are very scary! E followed our route on the map as we went there. That's really all we accomplished though.

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A pretty great day today! For narration I read the myth of Prometheus from Usborne's Greek Myths for Young Children. She seems to be having some trouble with these longer pieces, so I asked her how she was listening. She was trying to memorize them! So I suggested she try to picture the events in her head while she listens, and then play the movie back as she narrates. We'll see if that helps tomorrow. Anyway, then I read Growing Up in Ancient Greece by Chris Chelepi, and a few pages of DAulaires' Book of Greek Myths, and we had a break. When we came back, I read Richard Harris' I Can Read About the Sun and Other Stars, and had her do a little worksheet they gave us at the planetarium-- the configuration of the stars of Casseopeia (a big W) repeated four times and the child was to make different pictures out of it and label them (basically making their own constellations). She made a W, a robin, a moth, and my personal favorite, a flying pig. I downloaded this cool free planetarium program, Stellarium, last night and we used it to look at the constellations. You can look at them just as stars, as stars with connecting lines, or as artistic pictures laid over the stars. We looked up a lot of the constellations we saw at the planetarium yesterday. Then I went here and let her mouse through a thoroughly cool introduction to finding Orion, Betelgeuse, Jupiter, Casseopeia, the Big Dipper, and Polaris. She did so well at finding the constellations! Sometimes even I couldn't find them till she pointed them out. And then I let her and T go in the closet with a flashlight and The Glow-In-The-Dark Night Sky Book by Clint Hatchett. Then after lunch she did her math while T watched Peep, and she watched Peep when she was done. Grandma and Grandpa came over and helped us decorate the front of the house for Halloween, which made her very happy, and then after they left she did four pages of nouns. I found these cool Constellation Detective worksheets which I forgot to give her--I'll probably just give them to her to do on her own when she feels like it.