Earth Science: Water and Water Purification Part One

 Learning about purifying water is a lot more fun than you might think.  We started by reading the material in our actual science book and then we filled out a worksheet about the earth's water resources.

 After that we read a bunch of supplemental books.  How Did That Get to my House?: Water by Nancy R. Masters was probably the most pertinent of the books we read.  It was a really good overview of water, the water cycle, why we need water, and how you access water and clean it.  Excellent book to read if you are studying water.

 Our World of Water: Children and Water Around the World by Beatrice Hollyer was by far my children's favorite.  It showcases six children who live in various places around the world and discusses how each child gets water.  This was perfect for reading around Thanksgiving.  I think access to water is blessing many of us take for granted but not after reading this book.  At least, not until we forget again.  My children loved this book and really came away with a sense of gratitude for water.  I highly recommend.

Why Living Things Need . . . Water by Daniel Nunn was a very basic introduction to why water is important.  It took five minutes to read, it had nice pictures, and my children liked it.

Nature's Cycles: Water by Dana Meachen Rau is another super-simple book. I really liked it though because we have talked about the water cycle numerous times and my younger kids still don't have it down.  This was a good review.

Follow the Water from Brook to Ocean  by Arthur Dorros was perfect for what I needed.  It discusses how snow melts and trickles into brooks that trickle into streams that flow into rivers that wind up in the ocean.  This book provoked a lot of good questions and helped the kids understand sea level and things like that.  

 Later that night, when Dad came home, we pulled out a science kit.  It was only $11 so you can imagine that it wasn't the highest quality.  However, it did a good enough job that I think it was well worth the money.

 First you put your little tubes together filled with carbon, sand, gravel and a little paper filter at the bottom.

 Then you make some dirty water.  I think that was the kids' favorite part.

 Then you pour the dirty water through your filter and see what comes out at the bottom and what gets stuck in the filter.  The box specified that the filter doesn't work well enough to drink the results but that was pretty obvious by the end result (I didn't take a pic of the filtered water--oops).  It was a lot cleaner than it started though.

 We had a lovely time watching the process and it led perfectly into the field trip we went on the next day.  Pics of that soon to follow.  Happy drinking.  :)

Earth Science: Clouds

 We are back to studying the weather.  Not for long though.  We are almost done.

 Studying clouds involved making clouds out of batting and cotton balls.  The kids had a blast.  To reinforce the concepts I put up a chart of different types of clouds on the wall and every day the kids evaluate the clouds outside, find the closest match on the chart, and then write down that day's type of cloud on a "chart" (piece of paper) taped on the wall next to the chart.  This has really helped the kids learn to slow down and think about the types of clouds.

 Even Lady Harriet made clouds!

Awesome.  For some supplemental material we read:

 The Cloud Book by Tomie de Paola.  It was the perfect length and mix of text and pics for the elementary level.

Wild About Weather by Ed Brotak pgs. 82- 92.

Miriam's first major sewing project

Miriam made her first quilt.  We've been doing small straight-sewing projects since Miriam turned five but I thought it was time for her to do something a little more complicated.  I only know how to sew in a straight line so I couldn't do anything more complicated.  In lieu of complicated, I opted for more involved.  Something that would take more time and have more steps.  

First I looked up a free pattern on a quilt website so I would know how much fabric we needed.  Then we took a trip to Joann's for the fabric, which Miriam picked entirely on her own.  Then Miriam washed, dried, and ironed the fabric.  I cut it into squares although I let her do three or four.  I was paranoid about wasted material.  I'm working on it.

Then Miriam laid the squares out on the floor and decided how she wanted it to look.  Then she sewed the squares together.  The best part is that Miriam is pretty much an independent sewer at this point, if it is straight line.  She can change the bobbin and thread the machine.  She knows how to backstitch and pin small pieces of material together.  I don't have to watch her anymore.

I did help a little.  Miriam sewed the first two rows together but then she had a hard time managing the amount of fabric hanging around the sewing machine, so I sewed the rest of the rows together.  Also, Cowen was desperate to sew, so he sewed some blocks together as well.

 I'm still a bit of a wimp when it comes to putting a quilt on the frames.  I've put on enough with my Mom that I'm pretty confident I could do it if I had to, but I still prefer to not be the one in charge.  My Mom donated a day to the cause and came to help.  It was a good thing.  I wasn't very patient with teaching Miriam how to tie.  I'm not very patient with many things right now, in fact.  Mom helped Miriam tie a row and helped Cowen tie a row and then my sister Lindsay, Mom, and I finished.

 THANK YOU, MOM!!! (and no, I don't look anything like my mom--I'm still bitter about it)

 There's me--not showing any children how to do anything.

And my mom being patient again.

The next day I sewed the border and voila, Miriam had a quilt.

That's her in the bottom bunk, fast asleep under her new, very warm, and very special quilt.

Great job, Miriam!!!

Christmas Excitement: Cowen

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!  It snowed--again--and my kids bundled up from head to toe and went outside and threw themselves (literally) into the snow.  It took Harriet a few minutes to figure it all out, but then she ate snow with the best of them.  

Cowen, my charming green-eyed 7 year old, was fairly easy to shop for, unlike some of the other children.  He has some really obvious likes and dislikes and he gets excited about everything.  He is the personification of the "all-boy" stereotype.  He does not hold still, he does not do gentle, and he adores his mother.  He has a very special place in my heart.    

This first present, the ever popular football, is for Cowen's birthday on March 1. You can't go wrong with sports equipment for little boys.  Especially as Cowen played flag football this year and loved it.

Cowen's Santa present is Snap Circuits Jr.  Timothy and I have been wanting to get him this for a few years but decided he was finally old enough to enjoy it and old enough to do most of it himself.  

 I couldn't resist getting Cowen two books.  The first one, Fencing for Fun!, is out-of-print but we found it used through Abebooks.com.  Cowen is in the Options Day program through Harmony and he is taking fencing.  He's wanted to take fencing since he was about four years old and he loves it.  There weren't many non-fiction books about fencing geared for the elementary crowd but this one is pretty decent.  Cowen will love it.

I've already raved about the book The Crossing: How George Washington Saved the American Revolution on this blog before.  You can read the full review if you click on the "must-read book" link. Suffice it to say, Cowen is a George Washington super-fan and this is the best George Washington book we've ever read.  It was an obvious choice for Christmas.

This incredibly awesome tiger thing is Cowen's stocking stuffer.  Papo just came out with a new line of fantasy figurines that feature animal fighters.  My hubby has not stopped raving since we first saw them in a Papo catalog.  Cowen's getting the tiger, Timothy's getting the lion, and Eli's getting the rhino.  I, myself, want the big-horn sheep.  So awesome.  I can't wait to see these guys take on our Schleich knights.  Sa-weet.  

LEGO Brickmaster: Star Wars (LEGO Star Wars) is great-grandma's present to Cowen. Cowen loves legos and Star Wars so this should be a winner.

And there you have it--Cowen's presents this year.  He's going to be so excited!!!  I love Christmas.  Just plain LOVE IT!!!!!!! 

Too Close for Perspective

Sometimes I wonder if moms are too close to their children to really have an accurate perspective on their children.  Then I wonder if maybe moms are too used to certain behaviors/successes/attitudes to really understand whether or not they are "normal."

Basically, I have a child that really tests my mothering skills/lack of skills and we have struggled since this beautiful girl turned three.  I mean really struggled.  Struggled so much that at one point I went to the temple begging to know WHY this child had come to my home because I did not know how to parent her and thought maybe God had made His first mistake.  I found out why.  It was comforting but still didn't help me know how to parent her.

This year we decided to get some outside help to . . . well, help.  I went to a conveniently close therapist and she said a bunch of stuff that freaked me out.  Your daughter is extremely socially behind, you should put her in public school immediately so she can be socialized by the other kids, you should consider introducing her to things like Justin Bier so she can better fit in, etc.  I went home in tears.  But then I started using my brain and realized that this was the wrong therapist.  Her idea of socially normal and my idea of socially normal were too different for us to be able to work together on helping my daughter with the problems I saw.

Then I took my daughter to another therapist that is annoyingly and inconveniently far away who only works during the day creating a major babysitting dilemma.  However, she met with me and my daughter and said, "We need to work on helping her express her feelings."  Yes!  I tentatively brought up that we homeschool and did she feel my daughter was "years behind socially."  This therapist looked at me in surprise and affirmed what I thought--social skills are not the problem.

We are working together to help my daughter with her problems and at the same time help me learn how to help my daughter.

But one thing really struck me from this whole experience of meeting with these two therapists: both of them went on at length about how bright my daughter is.  Like, really crazy bright.

I've never thought she was really crazy bright.  She talked young, she read early, she's incredibly imaginative and picks things up quickly but . . . so do/are a lot of people.

Where do you lose perspective because you are too close?  The second therapist (the one we are sticking with) said that she rarely saw a child my daughter's age with such a keen visual memory or such a quick grasp of abstract concepts.  She also said that really bright kids often have significant hang-ups in other areas--like an inability to verbalize emotion or with impulse control.

It doesn't really matter if my daughter is a little smart or a lot smart, I just want to help her learn what she needs to learn to be successful and happy.  But I am curious about perspective.  Because I was a certain way growing up, that way feels normal.  Because my siblings were/are a certain way, that feels normal.  Because I have had my children since their births, the things they do feel normal--even when they aren't normal.  And if we do lose perspective on our children, how does that impact our ability to raise them?

How do we make critical decisions like: keep homeschooling to go at their pace, or put them in school to teach them how to handle things and verbalize in a variety of situations?

Why is parenting so stinking hard anyway?  Excuse my language.  Does parenting make anyone else tired--mentally and/or emotionally?

At least these experiences have clarified for me how I feel about some things.  Like my daughter's ongoing ignorance of Justin Bieber's existence.

I'm pretty happy about it.

The Symposium that Didn't Happen

I keep fearing that you charming homeschoolers will give up on me and this blog.  I really am doing school and periodically I do come up with good ideas.  Unfortunately, the follow-through has been lacking the past few weeks.  I would tell you the whole sob story of the wracking cough that kept me up at night followed by the flu that got bad enough I called my husband to come home from work.  I didn't want to freak out the children by passing out on them.  I was pretty dehydrated.  

But, school must go on!  So, when my hubby came home from work he read the following books to our children: 

 What's Your Angle, Pythagoras? by Julie Ellis.  It is listed as a math adventure so don't be surprised that the author takes some liberties with the story of Pythagoras.  She was more interested in the math than the history.  However, I still think it is a great introduction to one of the amazing thinkers that ancient Greece produced.

 Wise Guy: The Life and Philosophy of Socrates by M.D. Usher is a great introduction to philosophy and Socrates.  My kids were pretty outraged that Socrates was killed at the end, but that led to some pretty interesting discussion.  We really enjoyed this one.

The Librarian Who Measured the Earth by Kevin Hawkes is about Eratosthenes.  He was a scientist/mathematician/geographer/brilliant person back in ancient Greece.  He served as a tutor to the princes of Egypt and was a curator of the museum at Alexandria.  The book is interesting because the man is interesting.  

Now, here is the sad part.  My hubby read the books (not Socrates, I'd read that one the day before) and then that was it.  I had planned this great activity where I wrapped the kids in bedsheets for quick and easy togas, gave them a handful of grapes, and had them lounge around on the floor while we talked about big ideas.  I was hoping for a Greek symposium type of feel.  It didn't happen for us, but it should happen for someone!  Someone please use this idea and tell me if your kids liked it.

Here are some other great ideas for Greece that I didn't use:

1) Read The Hero Schliemann.  The book talks about how Schliemann was a compulsive liar and a skinflint but he did discover the remains of Troy.  We read some of it but it was too long for my youngest kids.  Miriam finished it on her own.  I was going to have the kids create a picture of a hero and describe what makes a real hero.

2) Read 300 Heroes: The Battle of Thermopylae by Terri Dougherty (one of our very favorite books about Greece) and The First Marathon: The Legend of Pheidippides by Susan Reynolds then go to the park and run races.  The winners would, of course, be presented with a wreath.  Instead, we read the books and watched synchronized swimming on youtube because my children had never heard of some of the less well known Olympic events.

3)  Read The Librarian Who Measured the Earth and take a thank you gift to your charming librarians.  We love our library and our librarians.  This one won't happen now, but I'm going to make it a priority to take them a Christmas treat. 

Sorry our Greece unit flopped.  My children loved all the books and we did make a cool parthenon, so it wasn't a complete waste.  I just love ancient Greece more than any other ancient civilization and I wish I hadn't been sick for so much of the unit!  Onwards and upwards, I suppose.  Next week we are resuming our weather unit for the last time.  I had to create an actual agenda for Harmony and I am determined to follow it so we can get to rocks in the spring.  I'm not motivated so much by Harmony but by the rocks unit.  We bought a rock tumbler and everything.  My kids and hubby are so excited.  

I hope your homeschooling is progressing without any sick breaks!

Christmas Excitement: Emeline

I couldn't keep myself from posting about Christmas today.  It snowed--first of the season--and my kids and I went bananas over the gloriousness of it all.  We also happened to finish listening to the audio version of The Best Christmas Pageant Ever which I absolutely love.  Yes, I cried.  I always cry.  Then I felt all warm and fuzzy and when we got home I immediately went inside and put on Christmas music.  Then we laughed and danced and sang, and I felt the happiest I've felt in ages.  Christmas does that for me.  Helps me relax a little.  

Here are the presents hubs and I selected for our darling Emeline, who just turned 6.  She is a charming lady, with bright orange hair and a 100 kilowatt smile.  She loves to draw and checks out copious numbers of how to draw books at the library.  She is in kindergarten this year but is already a fairly good reader and she loves stories.  She also loves imaginative play and anything that is small.  She's always preferred small toys to large.  Calico Critters are a favorite of hers but she usually buys them with her own money because I'm cheap.

So, if you have any lovely young ladies to shop for this season, here are a few ideas.

 All of our kids get a book (or two, or three, or, in this case, six) for Christmas.  I knew Emeline would be almost ready to read the Mercy Watson series independently by Christmas, and we love the books, so it was an obvious choice. I couldn't resist getting all six and I wanted the hardbacks so I bought them all used from Abebooks.  You can buy the complete paperback series but with a little more effort I have all the hard backs for the same price.  Yay!  Of course, I wasn't too pleased when one seller listed a book as "like new" condition and then when it arrived it was not up to Christmas standards.  Such is life.  I was still pleased, overall.

If you are unfamiliar with the series rush right out and get them from the library!  I read all the books to my kids a few years ago but we haven't read them in long enough that it will be like the first time again.  The books are by Kate DiCamillo of The Tale of Despereaux fame.  I love all her books.

 The Mercy Watson series includes six titles: Mercy Watson to the Rescue 

Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride

Mercy Watson Fights Crime

Mercy Watson:  Princess in Disguise

Mercy Watson Thinks Like a Pig 

Mercy Watson:  Something Wonky This Way Comes

 The illustrations are amazing with a retro feel.  I love everything about them.  Especially Mercy eating toast.  Love it.

I just found out you can buy this Mercy plush.  Argh!  I was almost all done shopping and my kids have enough, but the temptation is strong.  I think it might kill me not to get this for Emeline.  For one thing, the girl is already in love with Poppleton (read those books too--our very favorite early readers) and chose to be Poppleton the Pig for Halloween so in the tutu she's Mercy and without the tutu she's Poppleton.  It would be awesome.  I'll run it by my hubby.  He's much better at resisting temptation than I am.

 These Papo figurines were Emeline's 6th birthday present.  I'm adding them to the Christmas list because these posts are to help give people present ideas and these are a great idea!  I used to be a Schleich snob, but Papo has put out some really excellent figurines lately.  I'm in love with their ancient history line and I'm fairly certain I'll find an excuse to buy Cleopatra and Caesar eventually.

In the meantime, Emeline asked for a princess, a prince, a king and a queen for her birthday.  I picked out these.

For her stocking stuffer, I bought this fabric panel that I am sewing into a doll.  I am currently working on Harriet's and then, when I see how challenging it is, I will let Emeline and Miriam make some of it themselves.  By that I mean that I will put everything they need in a ziploc bag and put that in their stocking.  The panel comes with a doll, one dress, one apron, and one headband thing.  I'll post pictures when I get one done.  I bought mine from here.  

Emeline's Santa present is art supplies.  Hubs and I went back and forth debating the merits of getting one child art supplies.  The problem, of course, is that all my children enjoy art and they will all want the supplies as soon as they see them.  We finally decided that we'd deal with the jealousy because art supplies are what Emeline would most want.

Emeline goes through about 60 trees worth of paper a day (I'm only exaggerating slightly) and she always begs for my fancy paper (left over from when I gave up scrapbooking about five years ago--no, I didn't have that much paper but I never craft so it lasts a long time).  I don't share my fancy paper.  I use it almost exclusively for family home evening needs.  So the first thing I picked out was a nice 1/2 off pad of scrapbook paper that also has several pages of stickers and scrapbooking stuff.  Emeline will be ecstatic.

Then I bought some air-dry clay, those weird little bead things that you iron (we've never tried them but they contain small parts guaranteed to get all over so I'm sure it will be a hit), a watercolor set, and the granddaddy present of them all, her own tape.  The girl will be giddy with glee over the tape, I kid you not.

The one advantage of being cheap and stingy and keeping my tape under lock and key is that it makes a splendid Christmas present.

There you have it, all the ideas I have this year for a little girl around 6 years old.  Although, my 9 year old girl would love every single one of the presents I got Emeline, so we'll say this post has ideas for little girls aged 4-9.

Merry Christmas!!!