My Last Post….

at this blog address, that is. I am merging this blog with my new one:

Rusty and Redone

As my life evolves and interests change, I feel having one blog that shows my life as a whole, better suits me at this moment. I am still homeschooling. I am still a stay-at-home mom. My views and beliefs have not wavered.

But I am heading in some new directions, and I’m excited to see what God has in store for me and my family.

So, I hope you will check out the new blog, and continue to follow me as I post about our homeschooling, family life, field trips and a whole bunch of new stuff!

Blessings~

And thank you~

Christmas in the Trenches

During the Christmas season I try to read as many Christmas books to the kids as I can squeeze in. It’s not possible to read every night, due to other holiday going-ons, but the kids take turns picking out which story they want to hear when we are snuggled in at home.

Tonight Blake chose Christmas in the Trenches by John McCutcheon. This is a book I picked up at ,where else but,  a thrift store a couple of years ago and  it remains one of our favorites. The author first wrote a song, then a book was developed from that. The touching storyline is loosely based on a Christmas truce that occurred during WWI.

The book also contains a brief author’s note on how he came to compose the song and a historical note on the actual occurrence of the truce. The last pages of the book are the lyrics to the song, itself.

So, to wrap up our story time, we found a video of the author singing the song and watched that. If you have the time, it’s worth viewing, especially at this time of year.

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving Week

Since today is December 1, I thought I ought to share our Thanksgiving activities with you before it made it too close to Christmas.

We were invited to have our Thanksgiving meal with some good friends of ours. Since, all of our family, except one grandma, still resides in California, we’ve been adopted into a couple other families here. It’s been wonderful having some friends that are so easy to be comfortable with; they even let their kids call me Aunt Shannon. I love that!

Anyways, on to our meal.

Robin decorated our table so nicely. I loved the centerpiece.

                                             

                           

                          

It was so much fun to hear the kids goofing off together at their table. Don’t they look like they’re enjoying the meal?

                          

I should have taken a photo of the food. It was all fabulous! We had turkey, mashed potatoes, 2 kinds of gravy, sweet potatoes, a gluten-free stuffing (which turned out delicious), green salad, corn, green beans, frog whip (whipped cream concoction), rolls and a lot of dessert. Robin’s other half, David, made a homemade Reese’s cheesecake. There was fudge, homemade carrot cake, and a gluten-free pumpkin roll, which was delicious. Since I’ve been gluten-free, I’ve not had a pumpkin roll-so this was a nice treat made for me by Robin’s mom.

We spent the afternoon playing Boggle, then went home for naps so we could rest up for some midnight Wal-Mart shopping deals.  We managed to come home with a laptop for Connor. He’s been saving his money and of course the best deals are the day after (or of) Thanksgiving.

I’ll share next on our town’s tree lighting ceremony that we attended the day after Thanksgiving. It’s pretty picture heavy, so I’ll give it it’s own space!

I hope your holiday was as blessed as ours was.

Mommy Duties

This last week I had to do perform a mommy duty. Well, I had to perform more than one, but this was one I always put off. 

Ironing.

Usually I wait until I have a pile of items and then turn on a show I enjoy and iron away.

But not last week. My children had a special ironing request that had to be done.

Immediately.

These are what were so important:

A horse….

                       

Red Skull from Captain America….

                                         

and Captain America himself.

                                         

Melty beads or fusion beads, as they could be known. My talented little boys like to create all kinds of creatures with these and then wait patiently for me to iron them. (Just a little sarcasm inserted there.)  But once they’re completed, they have oh-so-much-fun with them. And it was certainly worth pulling the iron out for.

Is That a Bookworm?

Connor recently found this living in his Language Lessons workbook:

Yep, Connor opened the book up and this little guy was basically living inside it.  Now, I’m fairly certain that we read last year in his Nature Reader that bookworms don’t actually eat books. However, I’m not so sure that was accurate, as this guy was working his way through the current page, as evidenced in the following photo: 

                                         

And, yes, I do think that’s worm poop

 

Which Would You Prefer?

Last week Connor read about marsupials in his science book. He was especially intrigued by opossums. The author recounted a story of having a opossum as a pet and showed a photo of a baby opossum.

It was pretty cute.

However, growing up in the country as I did, you learn quickly that opossums are not cute. They are pretty nasty creatures.

So, when Connor asked me if he could have a opossum as a pet, you can bet I said, “no way.” He proceeded to explain to me why it would be a good idea. How they were pretty much immune to any diseases, could eat poisonous plants and not get sick, how they played dead and emitted foul smells-pretty cool traits to an eight year old, I’m sure. I still said, “no way.”

Fast forward a couple of days.

It had finally rained! There were snails all over the front walk. Connor asked for a jar to catch one. Being the good homeschooling mom that I am, I obliged him. Then he asked if he could bring it in the house to watch it. I said, “No way.” He said he wanted to keep it as a pet. I said, “No way.” He said he either wanted an opossum or a snail for a pet.

I said, “Bring on the snail.”

                          

Nature Study News

I took the opportunity on Wednesday to snap some pics of the boys at their nature study class. They weren’t exactly thrilled, but I managed to sneak a few in.

    

Connor decided to act just a little goofy for the camera.

Their subject this week was a Burr Oak Acorn. Their teacher, who is a friend of mine, also, has a backyard full of them, so she brought a few in for an up close and personal study.

We have found these on our walks around the neighborhood, but never knew what they were. They kind of look like regular acorns on steroids.

Here are their sketches.

Connor                                         Blake

Next week is the final week of class. The co-op is considering either a leather working class or a writing class using Story Starters by Karen Andreola. Either one would suit us just fine!