We had some beautiful ones before the hospitalization, one of the loveliest back to school seasons of all.  I am grateful for that smooth start because it did get bumpy after. Our 'before" mornings were spent in the schoolroom which opens onto the patio and yard so the little girls could float between the two spaces.  Tess is a strong K4 this year however and very much enjoys her 'work' with us, particularly adding and adding and adding some more.  Brendan is reading and working through a strong mental math program.  

I moved between the bigger and smaller people as needed.  The boys bring  their assignments so I can do a quick lookover before they begin.  Then I return to the littles next lesson.  When they are finished I stopped and checked the boys' work and set them to the next thing. All in all it was a strong start.  

They have carried on during our harder weeks.  I watched a documentary in the hospital about kindergartens testing an ipad integration program.  We had been using educational app's during the older children's practices to great gain already.  I downloaded several more Montessori and other app's after the show and these have blessed tremendously, being portable and mess-free.  (can be done on the couch with mommy)

 Much as we wish to provide our children with a seamless, bump free existence, I have always felt it to be a more practical life skill to learn how to roll with the punches.  Life is more likely to bring those and we have to learn to adjust and thrive anyway, especially as Christians.  It seems once you desire to be more Christ-like He obliges by teaching you how to suffer just like He did. So we flex, we press on, some times one way, some times another, and we meet our goals. It is the blessing of learning together.

In the middle of all this another cool thing happened.  I was contacted by Barilla Pasta's Italian website wishing to feature our site and link to our family learning.  Some of these images can also be seen there. 

I hope your school year is moving along nicely despite whatever bumps you may have at your house. We all get something after all. : ) 

 
You might just be a homeschooler if you overhear one boy calling his brother to see "the coolest thing" and that cool thing is….

the sentence he just diagrammed. ; )  

Odds are even greater if that brother exclaims, "If you think that one is cool, you should see the one I did last week. It had bars and connectors and went up and down! THAT was the coolest!"    (he got to diagram compound subjects and verbs)    

We are easily amused.  And I wouldn't have it any other way. 

Do you ever wonder what a 'typical" school day looks like in a clan like ours?  Here is a glimpse of our first day back at (home) school:

We had our test drive of the new binders.  

We have made no significant changes to our home school in recent years but we did switch correspondence programs for the elementary kids since the new school offered online reporting options which was huge being overseas.  I had previewed the lesson plans pretty thoroughly in the days before but the first day was still a little bumpier since the system was new.  Required a fair amount of this:

Even Tess is in on the action this year bringing the pupil count to six plus a toddler who are  also involved in two sports and four different teams.  There is some juggling but we are getting a good system down for sharing mom and checking/recording work and getting to those practices.  I admit to fantasizing about bilocation….

We managed to start by 8, break for snack at 10, and were mostly done by noon.  Alannah made these self frosted oatmeal cookies which were a huge hit. 

Lest that all sounds a little too perfect let me assure you we had  a couple mini disasters which I share in the interest of giving a full and accurate report:

Someone dropped a lunch plate.  It happens. Husband keeps telling me to get dishes that bounce.  

Self explanatory.  This is why I wear $1.99 lipstick folks.   

Dad follows up at the end of the day to see that everyone has completed their assignments and keep tabs on which subjects they are doing well in and which are more challenging.  He provides a gentle accountability for the kids and their mom <g> Truth be told there are some days where a student or two horses around or lets the work slide until this moment of reckoning.  That is their choice.  But since those extras depend upon successful completion of the core work it isn't happening often. 

And this post pretty much ate up my computer time and then some today!  Tschuss!  

"We involve (them) in our work, not as a punishment, but to feel the teacher's (mama's) creative strength focused on a particular activity….

Washing dishes is a wonderful healer…

Pouring warm soapy water back and forth in the little baby food jars we use for painting is great fun and helps smooth over momentary irritations." – Beyond the Rainbow Bridge