Blood

We made BLOOD! OK, not really blood...but we used some stuff from the kitchen to represent the different components of our blood.

*Yellow liquid=plasma

*Cheerios & red food color drops=red blood cells

*White marshmallows=white blood cells

*Purple pompom balls=platelets

*Salt=salt and other minerals in blood

We talked about the job of each part of our blood & the Reese helped me put each item in our jar. It ended up looking pretty gross at the end :) but he had a great time putting it together!

Artwork

Reese & I went to the Dallas Art Museum last Tuesday for their First Tuesday Free day. I really don't like driving to Dallas because there is always traffic, but a free day at the museum makes it worth it!

There is a whole room dedicated to children & allowing them to explore art, and there's even a great Craft Bar where you can choose from any number of supplies to make your own creation.

Reese used three cardboard shapes & I helped him tape them together so they stood in a house-shape. He took shells to put inside the house & a pile of pipe cleaners for the top of the house.

I was scratching my head trying to figure out how exactly we were going to get this masterpiece home, until he said "Now please take a picture of it so we can remember it forever."

He didn't want to take home a sculpture. His artwork piece was meant to be photographed :)

Let Your Voice Be Heard!!

If you're here at this site, you're most likely a Mama, or a homeschool person, or a combination of the two! The third option might be that you're a freaky stalker, in which case this post won't interest you...move along now....

But...every single Mama I know has lots of opinions about everything...we share favorite Dollar Aisle finds from Target, where to find the best cardboard Great Wall of China to color (no joke...had that conversation today with my buddy Deb!), what laundry detergents work the best, what vitamins kids like, what 60-second-dry nail polish really works, etc.

Well, now there is a place to let your voice be heard on a grand scale...and get paid to do it & receive free product to test out! I know that I read some of the big, important Mommy-bloggers in the world, and they are always offering free things to their readers and writing up reviews for products companies have sent them to try.

You can get into the act now too by joining Business2Blogger! Just click on the chalk board to learn all about how you as a Blogger can connect with businesses who want to hear your voice...


Also...if you are a business and would like to get your product or service in the hands of real, live people and receive immediate feedback & publicity on their blogs, you can click that nifty chalkboard above as well & find out all about it!

I joined Business2Blogger today...come check it out and see if it's something you might like too!

Color Me Mine

CoOp met last Thursday at Color Me Mine for a morning of painting fun! When I told Reese where we were going for CoOp, he instantly knew what he was going to make...a coffee mug for Daddy :)

He chose the colors & the mug and got right to work...

That tongue...comes out when the brain works hard!

"Mommy, don't show Daddy what I'm making until we pick it up when it's finished!"

The Color Me Mine lady was very nice.

She took the kids to the back room to see the kiln and told them about how they fire the pieces, and that it cooks them at 1,800 degrees! Wowza!!

We learned that if the pieces are fired and are touching at all, they will be permanently stuck together. And it takes about a full day to fire the pieces.

Who knew?

Pizza Fractions

I found this Pizza Fractions game at the educational supply store last week & couldn't help myself. Love the pictures, and I especially love that it has six different spinners for the different games so that you can play it for the most basic level (identifying smaller fractions...perfect for Reese at this level) all the way up to making equivalent fractions for higher grades.

Of course, Reese was ready to dig right in when I brought it home & he loved the realistic look of the pizza photographs!

Science: Mixture vs. Solution

In Science we have been working with water & reading about all the things it can do. Today, we read about solutions & mixtures and set out to make our own!

We gathered our materials. Reese chose what we would mix into the water...

oil, flour, sugar, blue food coloring drops, sand, & red powdered paint.

We made our predictions on which would become a solution & which would remain a mixture...
Reese was in charge of the mixing & observing...

And tasting...

he wanted to see what the blue food colored water tasted like...

gross....

and I had to stop him after a few sips because I just couldn't stomach feeding my child a cup full of food coloring!

We used a filter to see if we could separate the particles...

Reese watched to see if our predictions were correct...
Mixing our red powdered paint...

Mixing oil & water...

Once we were finished, we recorded our observations...

I'm still not sure about the flour though. When we stirred it, it looked like it had completely dissolved and was gone. But after it sat and I was cleaning up our things, I noticed a big lump of flour at the bottom of the glass, so I guess it remained a mixture?

Ancient Greece

In History we have been learning all about Ancient Greek culture so this week we had a Greek Food Festival! Reese was beyond excited to wear a toga (thank you Hubby for knowing how to put a toga on Reese....Mommy failed miserably at that task and had Reese in tears!)

I made the laurel leaf headband from cardboard, tin foil, & a paper-sack headband...

My laurel leaf headband was construction paper leaves & a paper sack headband,

and my outfit was a sheet with a hole cut in the middle and a rope around my waist.

I read multiple accounts that women did not wear togas unless they were prostitutes (!!)

so this is NOT a toga! It is a traditional drapey-fabric thing women wore.

Our togas/drapey-fabric things lasted all of about 15 minutes and we decided they were uncomfortable for cooking & eating & playing...but they made for a fun picture!

Our Greek feast included roasted chicken (food of the peasants & land owners...for city folk, meat was too expensive with the exception of pork), cheese (goat cheese was what they ate, we ate colby jack because Mommy forgot to buy the Feta), grapes (grapes & raisins were popular fruit choices), and Goldfish (fish was a staple of their diet but Reese said a big "no!" to fish, so Goldfish were our substitute)!

During meals, they used bread to wipe their fingers instead of napkins, so we used tortillas as our napkins. The Greeks would then throw those pieces to the dogs after they wiped their fingers, but Reese liked bread too much and ate them! And no forks, so we dug in with our fingers.

The Greeks drank wine (although they watered it down because to drink it straight up would be barbaric!) so I bought some sparkling red grape juice for our feast. Reese also thought it was cool that he didn't get to drink milk with dinner because the Greeks thought drinking milk was also barbaric, as they saved the milk to make cheese & a thick yogurt-type drink.

While we ate dinner, we watched a Wishbone episode called Homer Sweet Homer, & it told just a bit about the Odyssey (although we had read much more about Odysseus already).

For dessert we made Loukoumades, which are a sort of Greek donut (although I don't think these were an ancient Greek treat...but whatever!). We made the dough (flour, yeast, salt) and let it rise. Then we took balls off the dough & fried them. After cooling a bit, we poured a syrup over them made from honey, sugar, & water (cooked down into a syrup) and sprinkled with cinnamon. Honestly, I wasn't sure if I would like them because I don't like honey, but Reese pegged the flavor just right when he said they tasted just like a cinnamon roll! The texture was more like a little dinner roll but the taste was really, really good.

Flip!

Pancake-Flipper Extraordinaire...

and Daddy's helper :)

Pretzel Glasses

I love how everything can become something else :)

:)

Can I tell a secret?

It took a lot of work to get this picture that looks like it just "happened" :)

Let's just say that Reese was tired of Mommy trying to take pictures...

what a good sport!

Disney Fun

Riding the parking lot tram is fun too!

Reese never, ever just "walks". He runs, jumps, skips, hops, twirls...I could never keep up with his pace if I did all the foot-work he did!

Watching a dolphin at EPCOT

A good sport about riding Mission Space: Green (less intense). Mommy took him on Orange once and I was terrified and will never do that again!

Our favorite park!

Please, Tooth Fairy, For The Love of Pete....

Please come snatch this snaggle tooth from my son's mouth....

Because I don't know how much longer I can handle the

Dangly-Tooth-That-Can-Stick-Out-Of-His-Mouth!!!

Please help!

The Lucky One

I don't know which one is luckier....

Getting to spend all your days with your best buddy is pretty sweet!

Dream Big

Dream Big my son!

You can go anywhere your dreams can take you!

Valentine's Day Homeschool Ideas

This year, we're taking the day off from our regular curriculum for a day in February to have some fun with Valentine's Day themed activities! Here's a bit of what I have planned so far....I would love to hear any ideas you have to add to our list!

*Of course, the obligatory Valentine Candy Heart Math activities.

Predicting how many hearts are in the box

Identify how many tens & ones in the estimation number & actual number

Sorting by color & phrase

Graphing the results for number of each color

Creating word problems & algebraic equations using the numbers of colors of hearts (How many green and orange hearts do you have? If you have 3 green hearts and you need a total of 7, how many more do you need...3 + x = 7)

Identify greater than/less than using colors

Use an internet site to create a pie graph showing different colors & discuss different types of graphs

*Using a large version of graphing paper, Mom will draw hearts & we will use RedHot candies to find the area & perimeter of different hearts.

*Play a matching game using "broken hearts" and addition facts

*Play Heart Bingo

*Play Hershey Kisses Battleship.

Using a 10 x 10 grid, we will label the x-axis with letters and the y-axis with numbers. We'll place a few Kisses on our grid and will play Battleship. This will help teach map reading skills, along with graphing skills and how to read the x-axis and y-axis of a graph or map. If you find the Kiss, you get to take it & eat it!

*Using a Hundreds Chart and clues, solve the Valentine's Day Hundred Chart Puzzle

Reese will have to follow my clues (Place a heart shape on the number that is equal to two tens. Place a heart shape on the number that is 10 more than 36. etc) in order to solve the puzzle, which ends with a picture.

*Place Value Chocolates activity

By reading the clues (I have a two in the thousands place. I have a five in the ones place, etc) we'll find the chocolate with the correct number and glue it into place. As an extension, all even numbered chocolates will be colored dark brown and all odd numbered chocolates will be colored light brown.

*Make Sparkling Valentine's Hearts with borax

We'll shape pipe cleaners into heart shapes & suspend the shape into a large jar by a pencil. The Borax solution will crystallize on the pipe cleaner. We'll talk about the science behind our work. The Borax dissolves in warm water but when the water cools, the molecules of Borax crystallize 0ut of the solution and stick to the pipe cleaner. We'll use our hand-held microscope to view the crystals.

We have been studying body systems in Science already, so I don't think we'll focus too much on the heart & it's job. If I can find an appropriate picture book about Milton Hershey I'd like to read that as well...or maybe there's a good website about him. Need to check that out...

So, we'll be doing a day full of math & science activities for our Valentine's fun :) What are your plans?

Week 17

We are finishing up Week 17 of our Sonlight Core 1 curriculum. In Science, we are talking about our water system & the water cycle...how water gets from outside to your sink faucet. Very interesting stuff! We currently have saucers of water in various locations to see which evaporates faster, and we also have 4 petri dishes growing germy swabs from places on our bodies to see what will grow.

In Math, we are continuing to work on adding 3 numbers, double-digit addition, memorizing facts, fractions, skip counting, greater than/less than, equal/not equal, counting money, telling time, graphing, patterns,...whew! At the beginning of the year, I did not like our curriculum much (Horizon 1) but I have come to really like the spiral learning technique & the constant review Reese gets daily. I didn't' think we would do Horizon 2 next year, but I am starting to think I may stick with it. Reese has been doing really well with it, and it seems foolish to change if it's working.

Our History & Geography talks have gone from Egypt to ancient Greece. We started reading Greek Myths this week & Reese is fascinated by the stories! Yesterday, we read about Odysseus, the Trojan Horse and the Cyclops. Some of the stories are pretty gory (sticking a stick into Cyclop's eye to escape the his cave? Heck yes, Reese loved that story! ) We are reading a cute book called Usborne Greek Myths and I like how the stories are compacted down in to two-page versions. I have reserved a big stack of Greek myth books from the library & will pick them up today so we can read a little more in-depth about the different myths. Another favorite is King Midas & The Golden Touch.

We are using Handwriting Without Tears to work on our letter formations & I have been so very happy with this program. I like that it has given Mommy the "language" to help make letters properly. For example, for the number 8, I had been having Reese just make two circles because I could NOT figure out how to explain the figure-8 shape. Well, HWT explains it like this: "Make an S and go back home". Duh. Seems so common sense, but I couldn't think to explain it that way! We are almost finished with the Yellow book (I think that's book 1?) and we are going to move onto the Blue book (Book 2?) in a few weeks.

We do daily reading & comprehension, grammar work, & creative writing activities. We also have a Bible study from our book Leading Little Ones To God that we do about 4xs a week.

We are also going to begin Explode The Code 3 because Reese has caught onto pretty much everything phonetic very easily, but the silent -e at the end of the words is not sinking in. So I'm going to pick that up next week along with the Blue HWT & start incorporating that into our mornings.

On Fridays, Reese has AGAPE homeschool PE classes. He has done gymnastics, bounce houses, & played group games, and this month he begins karate followed by a month of ice skating. I have also been happy with this program, & he seems to have fun for the hour of PE.

Let's see...what else...I think that about covers it. We work for about 2.5 to 4 hours a day, depending on what we have that needs to be covered...

That about sums up our year so far. We start Week 18 on Monday and will keep plugging along! We have 36 weeks total, and I have us finishing the first week of June as of now.

More Christmas Fun...

On Christmas Eve, Grammie reads 'Twas The Night Before Christmas every year...

Reese decided he needed 10 carrots for Santa's reindeer. No less would do!

Christmas morning, and Reese shows us that this year, he is SIX!

Austen & Sissy came over and then the present-opening fun began...

Mommy was so busy enjoying the morning that she didn't get any more pictures of our Christmas!

Lost Post...

Going through old posts and look what I found...pictures from our cruise at the beginning of December. Oops!

Daddy & Reese with Reese's special frog Clark Griswold.

We picked up Pirate Reese from Camp Carnival one night...

Karate chopping on the top deck...

Reese knows how to take it easy...

Mommy made a silly-face breakfast one morning & Reese wanted his picture taken with it...

Muffin eyes, Cheerio-freckles, & a banana smile!

Christmas Cookie Time

Once a year, at Christmas, we go all-out with our cookie decorating! Mommy & whatever kids are home help me roll the sugar cookie dough & cut out our cookie shapes. After we bake them, Mommy makes special Royal Icing and colors them & puts the icings into piping bags.

This year, it was Reese, Daddy, Grammie, & I that did the cookie decorating & we had great fun. It was the first time Grammie had decorated cookies...can you believe it?

Reese chose the blue icing which had a small tip & it was kind of hard to squeeze out...

Here, Reese is working on Sant's special cookie...

The finished cookie was a tad...red....and Santa was very thankful Reese made such a special cookie with lots of icing & sprinkles of every variety!
We set a special table for Santa with his cookies & a plate full of carrots for the reindeer...

Merry Christmas!

Grammie & Reese having a fun Christmas Eve...