Weekly Wrap-Up/Homeschool Mother's Journal

In Our Homeschool This Week:
Yesterday, I posted about some of our first week of My Father's World, including our Chrysanthemum activities.

I've always wanted to start an official "tea time" with the kids. We finally did it and plan to continue it two or three times a week. The kids scurried around, putting everything on the tray. Sissy's yummy idea was to take Aunt Patsy's homemade organic strawberry sauce to spread on the chocolate chip cookies. We began reading our Christopher Columbus books as a part of our Adventures in My Father's World.

We had bought a carton of  Little Me Tea to try, which they enjoyed. It's a tea (low sugar, no caffeine) flavored with juice.

Here are our versions of the Scripture Art idea that I found at The Crafty Classroom.

The kids ran masking tape down the length of art paper, then used watercolors on craft poms to create the greens and blues over the whole background. After removing the tape, I instructed them to use side strokes to create the look of the tree trunk. They copied Ezekiel 17:24 onto paper and glued it to their art. (Sissy did an abbreviated version.) I loved the finish product, and we are going to try her other ideas for Scripture Art next.

This week, my 5 year old and 7 year old finished up their super fun summer experience at Mother's Day Out. It was mostly science and art based, and it couldn't have been more perfect for them. Here are the plastic carton with tape masks they made last week.

Here are the "find the object" sensory bottles they put together.

And their volcano collages from Volcano Week.

Guess who's living with us again after being set free for the night? Snails 1 and 2, which were given to him by his Mother's Day Out teacher. After I convinced Dash to let them go after a week inside, I was awakened early the next morning to his desperate concern. The damp area next to our house where we let them free was covered in Grandaddy Long Legs, which apparently is a predator for snails.  He found one of the snails close to where we left it. In two seconds, I went from feeling like, "Did you seriously just wake me up?" to jumping out of bed, feeling like, "Those Granddaddy Long Legs aren't going to get OUR snails! By golly!" I found Snail 2, but Grandpa Snail was nowhere in sight (and thankfully, neither was his empty shell). He must have wanted to be free! :) 

So, we went to the store that day and bought a whole snail world, complete with organic soil, hide-outs, growing plants and a fresh, daily diet of salad and strawberries, etc. plus calcium supplements. I was rearranging their home about 5 days later because I read that is a nice thing to do, to make the snail feel more challenged and stimulated like it would in the outdoors. Ryan looked at me like I was crazy since it had been less than a week. It's good to be a snail in The Academy at Thousand Oaks.

What We're Playing This Week:

We made homemade play dough. I instructed the kids to take it outside to make nature prints.

Matisse Art in the Bathtub!

I saw this idea at The Imagination Tree. I bought a big pack of foam pages at The Dollar Tree and cut them into dozens of shapes. Later in life, Matisse began expressing himself by creating collages with cut-out pieces. That was always one of my kids' favorite art projects, (and in fact, Tornado is always making collages "like Matisse") so I knew they would love doing it in the bathtub. They stick so well.

There were 3 play dates today, which isn't the norm around here. The first one was playing in bouncy houses and a swimming pool at a local church student center. It was a joint play date/service project to collect school supplies for an elementary school. My 7 year old jumped off the low dive for the first time without a life jacket. This might not seem like a big deal for a 7 year old, but this was only the fourth time we've been swimming all summer. This was really his first opportunity on a low dive, so I was very proud of him. And that, of course, is Tornado sweetly cleaning debris from the pool, not surprisingly.

We met our friends, the Davidsons, at Jump Zone. Always fun with those 7 together (and Baby Bro, you'll be able to join in soon enough). I tried to get a picture with more of them, but I only had my phone. They were always whizzing by.

I surprised Sis with a date out for the two of us tonight. I had requested some of her preschool friends to meet at the Pineapple Whip stand, and these two cuties and their families joined us. 

What We're Thankful For This Week:
Continuing on with my Gratitude List (#401-406):

#401 - Grandma and Grandpa from Illinois sent the kids a box of goodies including school supplies and this cute bib for Baby Brother. Thank you! The kids enjoyed their gifts, especially their individually wrapped bunches of stick colored pencils.

#402 - Last weekend, it was back to Missouri for plenty of cousin play time...

and my Grandpa's 92nd birthday (#403). Thankful for a life that was blessed to make it to old age. (#404) Praying for as much peace and contentment as possible for him during his remaining time on this earth.

Spunk wrapped in sweetness, these two. (#405)

Baby Brother made some new friends, including Uncle Chuck. (#406)