Lasso The Moon

In Which I Announce My 31-days topic for 2014

October is right around the corner.  I had so much fun with the 31-day challenge last year, that I wanted to go for it again.

This year's topic will be...

One of my favorite things in this world is making a gift for someone.  I love every part of it--the planning, the making, the wrapping, and the giving.  
 

I'm going to take you along as I make some of this year's Christmas gifts, show you some that I've made in the past, and share some of my family's traditions involving handmade.  There will be tutorials, advice, my philosophy on giving, some tips on making gifts for hard-to-gift people like MEN, and a handmade gift buying guide.

Are you excited?!  I am.

See you next week on Wednesday, October 1st for Day ONE!

 

Welcome to Space Club

 For science this year we are using Apologia Astronomy . Apologia uses a system called notebooking, where the kids retell the information they've learned and add it to a notebook for future reference. I love this, because it combines several different learning styles into one lesson. My sister Abby B, and my friend Abby P also are doing Astronomy this year, so we decided to get together for a collaborative group of astronomers once or twice a month. We call it Space Club. 

 

Our first meeting was mostly just for the purposes of kicking off the year, and to let the young explorers get to know each other. So mostly, it was about playing in the inflatable pool in my backyard. It was also a little bit about eating space food and making a spacey art project.

 

Abby B made these rockets from strawberries, marshmallows, and cantaloupe. Her advice is to use under-ripe melon for the flames, and a flat skewer for the stick, to help keep everything from sliding immediately off of the stick.  Also, it helped to stick a littlee more marshmallow under the mellon.  It kinda looks like smoke.  We got the idea here.

 

Abby P brought some hilarious mini UFO's and cheese cut into star shapes. 

 

She also made this excellent meteor of a snack. It's chocolate cereal, butter, and marshmallows. We cut off meteorite chunks and ate them up. I minutes there was nothing left but a crater where the food had been.

 

The project was one that a I found on this website. There weren't any directions, so I just made them up.  

 

What you need:

black construction paper 9x12

white cardstock

white printer paper

crayons or oil pastels

glue stick

a black and white photo about 6.5 inches square – we printed ours (fast print) on regular printer paper.

 1. Take a profile photo of your space person. This is not easy with kids for some reason, so we had a second person stand to the side and tell them to think of getting a giant birthday cake. The faces were pretty much what we wanted. 

2. On the printer paper, draw 8 or 9 circles to represent the planets. They do not have to be to scale, and they do not have to have rings, unless you want to include them. There really don't even have to be the right number of them. Add a few big stars in there if you feel like it. Then, have your little artist color in the circles and shapes with crayon or oil pastel.

3. Cut out your space helmet. I would have loved to include a template for you, but my internet is down at the moment, and I'm typing this at McDonald's. Sorry. Print out a quick-print copy of your child's profile in black and white. Make sure it fits in the opening you made for the helmet.

4. Glue down helmet, portrait, and planets. If they are still not finished, ask them to add some stars or comets in the background.  Add some decorations to that helmet too!

 

Oh my goodness I love these.  

For the rest of the afternoon, we learned what baby Landon had to say about the solar system, although he talked so fast none of us could really understand him.

 

And we played with this Inflatable Solar System. 

Next time at Space Club, we hope to make some kind of official space club t-shirt, and we'll be doing experiments with the sun. Stay tuned!

ps. If you know any great space puns, we could use some more ideas for our t-shirts.

Geography :: Maps and Globes

Our first two weeks of school are under our belt, and we are having so much fun!

Since we are following My Father's Word: Exploring Countries and Cultures for the main portion of our curriculum, the first couple of weeks were all about learning about maps and globes--their history, and how to use them.

To show how much for accurate a round globe is than a flat map, we drew the basic continent shapes onto a mandarin orange.  Then we carefully peeled the orange to watch how the shapes and sizes of the land would have to be distorted to fit onto a rectangular map. 

During one of our morning walks, we walked down one side of our street, and then the other, counting houses on each side.  Later, we laid out a large sheet of paper, drew a street down the middle, and stamped the correct number of houses on each side of the street.  We used directions during the whole project, and made sure to include a compass rose on the street map.

The first time Esther (3) saw me stamp a house onto the paper, she came out of her seat with excitement.  I guess she'd never seen a stamp before!  She was equally involved in this project with the big kids.

On a different day, I drew out several streets in our city, and had the kids help me remember where the places were that we frequently visit.

I really wish there weren't quite so many fast food places on this map.

We added grandma's house, the zoo, the library, and several Sonic locations.  Then they took turns giving each other directions (north, south, etc) to the next place, while the driver "drove" a matchbox car around the town.  If you are unsure about how the streets line up in your town, take a look at google maps to help you out.

After we had practiced driving around our map for a little while, we hung it up at baby level, and let the little ones play with it.  We also continued to play the directions game as we drove around (mostly to Sonic) throughout the week.

Here are some of our favorite library books about maps and globes:

 

This one is so helpful and beautiful that I will probably end up buying it, so we have it for the whole year.

And of course this one is just plain fun!

::

What I have learned from our first weeks of homeschooling:

:: The little kids want to be way more involved than I expected.  And not always in a quiet, calm way.  This is not necessarily a bad thing--it's just going to take a little extra planning.  With all the extra time I have now.  Heh.

:: I thought I was patient.  But this teaching-multiple-grades-with-toddlers-in-the-h0use thing is taking me to whole new depths.  And because I did not just wake up with the new level of patience required by my new role, I have also discovered a whole new level of humility.  I have said, "I'm sorry" a lot these past couple of weeks.  But I think our bond is that much stronger for it.

:: Speaking of bonds, can I just say how absolutely in love with my children I am falling.  I had been missing so much.  They are hilarious.  They think of the craziest things to say at the most ridiculous times. They are wildly inappropriate with the potty humor, which I'm sure they get from their dad...

And they are smart--I mean really smart.  I can actually watch them taking in new information and retaining it.  I have so much respect and admiration for their processes.  I can't wait to see it again every morning.

Rainy Day at the Zoo

One Sunday we were out to lunch when it started to rain.  In August.

This is like a holiday in Texas, because the temperature can quickly change from triple digits to mid seventies in minutes.  Our mood changed just as quickly--and we decided we had to do something outside before the heat came back.

So we went to the zoo.

It was such a good idea that Donnie and I are still arguing about whose it was.  I'm absolutely sure it was mine.

We called my sister and her family, and they met us there, since we all have passes--passes that usually don't get used much in the summer due to the heat!  When we got there the place was empty.  I'd never seen it like that.  So awesome.

Emma is standing on the back of an elephant sculpture.  It's anybody's guess what Ethan is doing.

Emma and her little cousin Maddie share some special time on an elephant.

We were inspired by the weather.  It was cool, had stopped raining, and all of the animals were out to greet us.  Even some snails on the fence by the gorillas.

The gorillas were hanging out right next to the window. I'd never seen them so chilled out before.  ( That is, of course until one of them banged on the window so hard, I thought the poor lady standing next to it was going to faint.)

I love this guy's chubby little legs.

 

This is Justin, a friend we brought with us.  The Lorikeets LOVED him.

A lot.

After this, the zoo closed for the day, the temperature went back to normal, and we went home happy and tired.

A rainy August day is the perfect time for a trip to the zoo.  And the light is great for taking pictures.  What do you do on rainy summer days?

 

 

Paint Like Jasper Johns - Art Class at Home

 

As we move around the world in geography, I thought it would be fun to learn about some artists in each of the countries that we visit.  But what fun is an art class with only two people in it? Not as much fun as inviting some friends to come and join in.  Our first American artist is Jasper Johns.  This was an easy pick, because he painted iconic symbols of America, like the map, and the United States flag.

For our project, we chose to emulate his "Colored Alphabet" painting.

photo source

For our version, we used the following supplies:

Cold Press 140-Pound Watercolor Paper, 11 by 15-Inch

Crayons

Watercolors

assorted paint brushes (the one that comes with the paints is almost always terrible.  Throw it away!)

pencil and ruler

2-inch letter stencils (optional, but great for working on fine motor skills)

 

To start, lightly draw a grid on the paper with the pencil, 5 boxes across, and 5 boxes down.  These will be the spaces for each letter.  You might wonder how we fit 26 letters into 25 spaces.  We sneaked the "I" between two of the boxes.  See the original below.

While you are making the grid, you can give your child a scrap of watercolor paper and some crayons to experiment with.  Then show them how the wax resists the watercolor when painted over the crayon lines.

Now you are ready to make the letters.  Using the stencils or free-handing, outline all 26 letters in pencil.  Then, use the crayons to color the letters in.  You can make them all the same color, or make patterns within each letter.  The harder you press on the crayons, the more wax that is transferred to the paper, and the better it will resist the watercolor.

After all the letters are colored, it's time to paint!  To make the borders of the boxes more defined, we painted a line on the border, and then filled in the box.  This is not necessary, though.  It's fun to experiment and try different techniques. 

Some of our artists used lots of different paint colors in each box, while others used just one.  See how the paint changes when you add more water. 

A good practice when changing colors is 1) swish in the water, 2) tap on the edge of the cup to let some water drip off, and 3) blot the water on a paper towel.  Personally though, I love to mix colors, and I don't mind when they blend a little bit with each other.   

And you're done!  Don't forget to take a picture! 

If you do this project with your kids at home, or with your class at school, let us know! I'd love to see how they interpreted the lesson!  You can even share a link to your project in the comments, or on the facebook page.

Here are some other resources on Jasper Johns:

American Masters

Jasper Johns Documentary on YouTube  Great info.  A little boring.  Good for gathering details to share with the class.

Don't forget to check the library so they can see some of the work up close and study it.  I used binder clips to keep curious eyes from seeing artwork they aren't ready for.

::

If you are still in the mood for more watercolor fun, check out some of the projects we did for Emma's watercolor birthday party.

And the school poster Emma made that won first place!

 

He's Got the Whole World in His Mouth

So, do you want to know how our first week of homeschooling went?

So.

Great.

I mean, besides the fact that we decided to rip out part of the bathroom the night before the first day...

And besides the fact that the youngest of the potty-trained children continually had to be re-trained to use a different toilet than she was used to...

And that she had more accidents than a new puppy...  And than one of them happened while she was on the top bunk...  And it dripped rained down on her baby brother's head...

And besides the fact that at one point I was yelling out information about the prime meridian, because the big kids could not hear me over their berserk teething toddler brother...

 Besides all that, it was totally one of the greatest weeks ever in my life.

Because things happened like this.

That's our model of the earth, drawn on a mandarin orange.

Which naturally inspired a round of "He's Got the Whole World In His Mouth."

Of course, Essie had to make her own little "Erf". (Earth)

And that kind of thing kept happening all week.  The little ones saw the big ones having fun learning, and they couldn't help but join in.

Here they are reading a fun Dr Seuss book about maps.

 

Making a map of our street with rubber stamps.

And driving cars on our map of the neighborhood.

On Friday, after Emma and Ethan took their spelling tests, Esther insisted that she take one too.

And even though I could barely lift my head off the pillow on Saturday morning, just from sheer exhaustion, I cannot wait to do it all again this week.