Alia Starts School

Alia started 4 day 4 year olds today!  She was excited to see her friends again, but not excited to actually go to school.  She has really enjoyed having all of my attention the last 3 weeks and we've played a lot of baby and momma.  That is her favorite make believe game by far.  I always end up being the baby and she takes care of me.  This is what she had to say about school:
1.  "Mom I am really strong now, I finally made it across the monkey bars!"  Then she says she had to tell her friend she couldn't play because she really needed to practice getting better at the bars!
2.  "My brother helped to teach me how to do the bars."
3. " "I like that my friends were there."
4.  "My teachers liked that I had painted finger nails."
5.  "I got a piece of candy because I ate all of my apples."
6.  " I liked playing with the castle at school."

New Experiences

 Alia planted a pumpkin seed in school last spring and brought it home.  We decided to plant it outside in the front yard.  We had a nice vine growing through our front yard this summer and I had to continually cut it back so it wouldn't take over the house.  We only ended up with one pumpkin because pumpkins produce both male and female flowers that need to be pollinated. The female flowers are open for only one day and will produce pumpkins if pollinated.  I guess it was more difficult to pollinate the flowers than I would have thought.    Either way, I am so happy we ended up with one!  Alia was proud that she had her own pumpkin but sadly I don't think it will last until Halloween. 

 We checked out a neat science book from the library that had lots of experiments dealing with sight and optical illusions.  Avery wanted to do two of the experiments in the book.  This experiment is "Pepper's Ghost".  According to Wikipedia Peppers Ghost is an illusion technique used in theater, haunted houses, dark rides and in some magic tricks. Using plate glass, Plexiglas or plastic film and special lighting techniques, it can make objects seem to appear or disappear, to become transparent, or to make one object morph into another. It is named after John Henry Pepper, who popularized the effect.  It works by taking an object and reflecting it off of one area to be seen in another area.  It should make your object appear transparent or ghost like. 

 We used Snow White and Prince Charming.  Ours wasn't made perfectly, they would have looked more transparent had we covered the whole box in black.  If you're interested in it, You Tube has a few videos on it.  We had fun with this project!  We also made a periscope with mirrors so Alia could spy on Avery around corners and not be seen. 

 We found a Jackfruit at the Dekalb Farmer's Market.  We first came upon these fruits in Hawaii years ago and always wanted to try them.  They are native to Asia.  This fruit is the largest tree borne fruit with the fruit weighing as much as 80 lbs!  It is said to taste like a combination of apple, pineapple, mango and banana.  I don't think ours was ripe enough because there wasn't much of a taste.  We were told that it is ripe when it smells like an onion and ours did but I think it could have gone one more day. 

 The fruit is the dark yellow pods.  There are seeds in the pods that you have to take out.  Scott is wearing gloves because the sap of the fruit is made of latex and it is super sticky.  We had the hardest time getting the sap off of the knife!

 Alia is holding one of the fruit pods. 

 Jackfruit carnage!  We got quite a bit of fruit from it.  We ate some and then made the rest into jackfruit kefir. 

 See these two stuffed animals?  Of all of the animals Alia has she chooses to sleep with these two!  I am always so surprised that she is able to keep track of them all night!  When she was much smaller she would scream in the middle of the night because she couldn't find them. 

 We took the canoe out today to explore our new lake here.  They dammed the river we used to hike and made it into a huge lake. Since we can't hike it, we decided to canoe it. It is a really pretty lake with lots of little islands to explore. 

 Alia and Daddy paddled all of the way home.  She was having so much fun!

 Avery decided to give his new fishing pole a try. 

Avery and I enjoyed the entire ride back to shore while Alia and Daddy paddled.  We were watching his bobber to see if he caught anything.   We never did catch anything but it was fun!

6 month picture updates!

 Alia 4 1/2 years

Avery 7 years

 

 

 

 

Avery's First Day of First Grade

Avery started school today.  We chose to enroll him in Crossroads Christian School this year.  This school offers smaller class sizes, shorter days, and lots of parent involvement.  The school follows Charlotte Mason's philosophy on teaching.  "She was a British educator who believed that education was about more than training for a job, passing an exam, or getting into the right college. She said education was an atmosphere, a discipline, and a life; it was about finding out who we were and how we fit into the world of human beings and into the universe God created."  Anne White

We read the book For the Children's Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay.  It's a great book that talks in detail about Charlotte Mason's teaching philosophies.  This site talks about the 7 characteristics of Charlotte Mason education.  After doing extensive research we felt that this school was a great fit for Avery.  I can already say that after the first day of school he came home saying he liked school!  In the 5 years he has been attending preschool and grade school he has NEVER once said that.  He always says he doesn't like school.  I was so happy to hear that!  I am looking forward to the enrichment days when Scott and I get to teach his class.  It will be nice to get back into the classroom after 7 years of being home.  I also think the prayer and share once a month will be nice so we can really get to know the other 8 families in his class.  I am happy that it is also a Christian school because it is an extension of home.  Avery questioned why he couldn't talk about Jesus or learn about him last year.  He said he only likes schools that are with churches.  I was really touched that in his student questionnaire his teacher asked how she could pray for him.        

         First Grade- 7 years old

Good bye summer!

I still can't believe that summer is over!  We all really enjoyed the quiet, laid back days at home exploring, playing and creating. 

 Avery in his ninja training, attempting to be stronger.  He decided that the best way to be stronger was to carry Alia around.  She liked this arrangement just as much as he did. 

 They spent hours building this sled from things around the house.  When it was completed he asked if he could take it down the stairs.  I calmly explained the risks involved and let him know he would most likely be a "fail" video.  He thought it over and decided he didn't want to get hurt.  Thank goodness!  For the record I never would have let him go down, but I did want him to think through the choice and make the best one because there will be times when he is with his friends and he will be dared to do crazy things. 

 The stick on the side with all of the duct tape and necklaces was his brake! 

 I bought clay from JoAnns and we made pots and dishes.  This picture shows Avery's covered dish, bowl, plate, and coral. 

 Here is the cat I made for Alia and Alia's bowl and lid.

 They played together really well this year.  I don't know if it was their age or the fact that they didn't want me to find something to do if they didn't get along because that usually involved sight words, reading or worksheets.

 Notice the dinosaurs in both of these pictures.  Avery created the teams of dinosaurs so they could fight.  Interesting that Avery has all of the big dinosaurs and Alia has all of the little ones. 

 We were making bread and I wanted to show them what happens with the yeast and how it makes carbon dioxide.  They watched the balloon grow bigger throughout the day.


 When Scott got home he decided to show them what happens when you pour that invisible carbon dioxide over candles.  It was magic!

 We made window catchers. 

 

 We were invited to water days at a friend's house. The goal here was to build a series of interconnected pipes for the water and marble to go through.  It took a few attempts but they eventually solved it.

 Water limbo!

 We woke up one morning to find our tomatoes like this!

 Scott had fun drawing faces while we all slept.  Notice the ninjas fighting and the friend's concern in the background. 

 This summer Avery collected so many bugs, spiders and snakes.  This snake is a northern brown snake.  He eats snails and worms and is harmless.  He has special teeth that allow him to extract the snail from the shell.  There is another snake here that looks almost identical in color and size but has yellow on its tail.  That snake is poisonous so we had a long lesson about the differences.  We actually found that snake today in our garden.


 Here he is with a wolf spider.  He loves watching him devour other spiders whole.  This spider is a ground spider.  He doesn't make a web, he makes a hole and covers it and then ambushes his prey.  He is fun to watch.  I love that Avery goes exploring everyday for food for his friend.

 Isn't he huge?!  

 Another craft.....I remember making these as kids.  These ones glow in the dark and light up their rooms at night.

 I loved this guy Avery created...he is a super hero.