“Insta”-replay, winter can’t last forever

Winter can’t last forever, right? We just had groundhogs day and punxsutawney phil promised spring would be early!

In the mean time here is a look at our last of winter fun.

I started decorating for valentines, but still need to undecorate Christmas.

We had a fun movie day with Aunt Coral!

Spiderverse was a great film, I recommend it for children of all ages.

We had some fun science experiments. Any excuse to use the phone microscope, is a good excuse.

Merry’s started doing school curled up on the couch, usually in a blanket.

And we got a dusting of snow! More is actually in the forecast, although I’m not convinced.

January seemed to drag on for a long time.  But now February is finally starting! And with crazy weather (and a few exciting events scheduled) it looks like this month will be a memorable one!

"Insta"-replay: A good way to start the year!

Happy New Year! We are off to a good start, enjoying the new year.

 The girls stayed up until midnight to toast the new year with us.  A first for them, and to be honest it has been a while since Jon And I actually stayed up until midnight either.

 

We started a new theme for daily picture books, STEM books.  It was interesting to see which books promoted science and which simply featured characters who liked science.   

 Merry has started factoring in Math, it's the area of Algebra which I really loved.  I'm hopeful that she will enjoy it as well, or at least not dislike it as much as her sister did.

Charry is starting the year strong as well, I'm trying to work a little more with her, having her do Latin translations on the white board rather than just checking her notebook later.

 Proud mom post: Charry got to set up the new display at the library, they let her pick out some of the books and arrange them on the cart.

 We aren't spending all our time at schooling.  We are also enjoying treats with Grandma Kelly.

 Family game nights, where we try out some of the new games we got for Christmas.

 And movies! We've already seen one as a family.

And one as a date night!

So we are off to a good start, having fun, and being productive!

New Year resolutions

This year I am resolving to start back to schooling strong! Although looking at the school supplies I’m not sure how well I am keeping that resolution.

As you can see it is a bit discombobulated. But the school room is on my list to clean tomorrow, so maybe.

One part of school that has been going well is our group time.  Since Charry and Merry have no classes together we try to have a small group time where they have to take turns sharing ideas and listen to what the other is saying.  I’m hoping it will help them communicate with other people.

The main part of group time is a picture book, which leads to discussions of literary concepts, art styles, or social issues.  We started with just some of our favorites, then spent November reading biographies, December was Christmas books, and now we are reading STEM books.

I’ve also figured out how to put books on hold from my phone app, which kind of goes with the month’s theme.

Along with the books, we also do flash cards and make charts, maps, or diagrams. I find working on something together can help to make information stick.

Happy New Years! 

“Insta”-replay skipping ahead to Christmas

So I have been even more lax than normal about blogging, mostly because my mind was preoccupied with school for most of the last few months.  And not the homeschooling which I love sharing but my school.  It is my final year and senior classes are hard! Then as I was finishing up my hard classes came the holidays and more distractions. So I won’t bore you with my math but I will share some of our holiday fun!

We put up our tree early, during the Thanksgiving break. It is full of memories and personal ornaments.

My mom celebrated her retirement with her entire family! It was great to see the Idahoans.

Since so many cousins were in town we had a Ward family Christmas party. My aunt Sandy showed her music teacher skills, letting the kids play along with a variety of percussion instruments while she played piano.

We seemed to spend a lot of time at shopping centers yet still forgot a few gifts, sorry.

I finally got to go to the movies with my family, last month I stayed home to work on school while they went on more than one occasion. And Mary Poppins Returns was a cute movie.

Christmas Eve at my moms was a blast, so much laughter. And Christmas crackers which are a family tradition. Merry had three crowns on at one point.

Another Christmas tradition is the girls playing Christmas songs. Honestly I don’t think they are getting any better, but I think they would if they practiced.

A Christmas tradition I hope to keep is going for a walk before eating all the goodies. And I spotted a hummingbird, although it’s kinda a blur in the picture.

My brother-inlaw and his family were in town the entire week after Christmas! We had a great time visiting, not many pictures but I had to share this one, someone knows how to spot a camera.

New years is coming, and that means new goals. One of mine is to blog more, I like being able to look back at my year.  Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and that the new year will inspire you to reach for a few new goals.

“Insta”-replay: picture of the week

September is off to a good start. Girls went to visit their great grandmother, without me so no pictures. And we finished up our first week of school.

In order to stay on schedule, we doubled up on subjects and tried to stay focused.  I also attempted to stay focused on my own school, not sure if I succeeded or not.

Long story short, I took only one photo last week:

Merry completing an experiment. 

Hopefully next week I’ll pull my camera out more!

“Insta”-replay: goodbye summer

August is over, September begins.  Where I’m from this marks the end of summer and being of fall.  Despite the calendar insisting the first Day of Autumn isn’t until September 22.  Which to be honest has always kinda bothered me, but c’est la vie.

We already jumped back into school so summer break has ended.  How did we finish of the season?

Planning for next year: 10th grade

Highschool is tough yo plan for.  On the one hand you want your child to enjoy learning and find classes that interest them.  On the other hand you see your child’s potential and want to push them to continue to learn.

Hopefully Charry will have a balanced year of  working hard on things she enjoys learning