So, I've been doing fairly bitsy peicey science with Frodo this year... we had Dr. Joe's awesome classes in term 1 (and will have them again starting next week, for 5 weeks!) and we did a bit of a mini astronomy unit leading up to the Transit of Venus and the eclipse just before it.  But I was still on the fence about an actual *program* for us to use between all that other 'real life' science. I had found one I liked, only to find out through research that the authors' intent was to plant seeds about Intelligent Design in the minds of the youngsters using it.  I was not impressed.  It's not my business what other home schooling parents teach their kids (although being perfectly honest, I don't think teaching ID or creationism sets them up particularly well for future studies or careers that are influenced by science) but I think selling something that is glossed over to make it *look* like actual secular science, when it is in fact not, is just dirty pool.   So... I scrapped that idea and commenced to testing other programs!
 Both cells have a nice strawberry for the nucleus :)   The rectangular one is a plant cell, with it's cell wall keeping it nice and blocky...and it's many chloroplasts (aka melon balls of honeydew lol) which are what make the plant green.  The animal cell, which is all blobby & round, only gets a nucleus (although we did discuss a bit about some of the other parts as well)  and is yummy mango jelly :)  (which is jello for American readers!)

Here's an up close.

 The other experiment involved looking up close at a cell we're all pretty familiar with, especially at breakfast time,  the good old chicken egg!   We cracked one into a bowl and used a hand magnifying glass to check out the blastodisc (basically the nucleus of a chicken egg) and than discussed which parts are actually cell parts, and which parts are there to protect the cell itself.

I'm also finding the activity based nature of it really working much better for him with his ADHD issues as well... almost no time in his seat listening to me prattle on, just getting straight to it!  We do MOST of it at the kitchen bench, so he can stand, lean, perch on one foot or whatever he needs to do.

Completing lab sheets!

A sample of the really good lab sheets that come with the program. Frodo announced that it looked more like an avocado than an egg after he coloured it... methinks lunch was looming in his mind?? lol

After this, it's on to the human body systems... awesome.. I get to pull out my many excellent x-rays for this heh heh.

In other news, we've been booking it to get through the first 'unit' of history odyssey so that next week we can skip ahead and do the (rather huge) unit on the ancient Greeks... to coincide with the Olympics!   And Frodo has learned how to find the area of a triangle in math :P  Funny thing, the boy really enjoys math that involves formulae as opposed to computations!    We also did a spot of gardening and planted up some strawberries, capsicum and some herbs to revitalize the potted veggie 'patch' a bit :)

Grow my little pretties, grow!  (we won't discuss the horrid state of the 'garden' on the other side of that fence.. it's at a 50degree angle and impossible to maintain *sigh*  not that the real estate agents care!)

Hope you have all had a spectacular of a start to your 2012 as we have!   We have been thoroughly enjoying our family time since I last posted.    We rang in the New Year relatively early, by watching the 9pm fireworks on tv... we thought about driving into the city, but the weather was a bit iffy so we just played some Cluedo and hung out at home.

A few days later, we headed off to Wet n Wild for a day of fun in the sun.  This is Buccaneer Bay, which is specifically for kids under 10... great water slides, cannons, pools to swim in, and the ever popular big water dumping bucket.

 Except when it came to the tooth that has been dangling for weeks lol. It was painfully obvious that he would leave said tooth to dangle till the cows came home without intervention... so hubby decided to give it a bit of help.  It was attached by the teeniest sliver of gum, but there was still copious amounts of wailing and carrying on like someone was murdering him... but out it came.  Now, of course, he is quite pleased with himself ;)  and looking mighty adorable at that!  He'll have that gap for all of about 5 minutes, as the adult tooth is already through!

On the school front,  we go in to get the little dude uniforms in 2 weeks @@, I can hardly believe it.  They are looking forward to the first day of school :)   I started buying Frodo's home school materials this week!  I've had most of it selected for a couple of months so it's more just exercising the visa debit card than much in the way of decision making.

We'll be using a lot of old favourites:
- History Odyssey ancients level 2 (history, literature, geography and a lot of writing) (books ordered to go with from Fishpond.com ... go the free shipping!)
- Math U See  (we'll be going through the multiplication & division levels for a bit of confidence building)
- Time 4 Learning (supplemental use, especially for math)
- Reading/ Writing a-z  (great online/printable comprehension activities and writing tools)
- Science -- I was really sold on Real science 4kids but ...I'm waffling lol, Mr. Q's chemistry is looking
             pretty sweet at the moment AND he has a half price special starting on the 17th!!
*Still trying to find a good source for a time line and a few other bits, so if anyone knows one that doesn't charge a fortune for shipping or is Australian, please share :)
-LOTE (Languages other than English) - We were going to do Auslan, but the classes that were getting organized didn't work out... they ARE doing Spanish, so Lucas said he'd give that a go.  We'll probably use Livemocha for practice in our own time.
-ART - Lessons with our home ed group for 2 terms, after that we'll use our Usborne Art Gallery book and trips to the local galleries.  Lucas is also interested in learning guitar (his dad & the Teen are both learning) so we may get him a 3/4 size instrument and lessons sometime later in the year.

Can't wait for the parcels to start arriving.. I LOVE a box of fresh home school stuff to explore... and it gets the boy pretty excited and interested as well!

Is going along rather swimmingly, if I do say so myself :)  We did not get to go to the bowling/art gallery outings today unfortunately.  Strider was supposed to be off work today to stay with Merry & be here for the rental inspection.. but his boss decided they'd just start late instead.  I'm not complaining about the money of course ;) but we were looking forward to it.  Instead we picked up a nice bakery snack and popped into the bookstore and picked up some fun reading material.  And I do believe we're going to go to the office supply store & pick up a few bits like a binder for his subject notebooks, and a zippered pencil case that has binder holes in it (IF I can find one) so Frodo can always find a pencil etc if he has his binder handy. 

Frodo is using Time4Learning to fill the last 4 weeks of the 'school year' .. I figure it'd be a pain to start our actual planned curriculum and then stop for summer break!  We may go somewhat through breaks during the year, but after the year this poor boy has had, he deserves a nice long break!  So far, he seems to be enjoying the program.  He happily logs on and does at least one activity of each section ... today he did an antonyms lesson + quiz, some multiplication review, an activity about the layers of the earth (and wrote notes in his science notebook & did a diagram & pasted it in) and did the quiz on that too.  We did the section of social studies on the Olmecs and wrote some of the important bits in his notebook yesterday, and today we grabbed out the Usborne IL Encyclopedia  and read a little more about them and cruised a few links.

I am liking the T4L for the fact that he is enthusiastic about ANYthiNG on the computer, the activities are relatively brief (a god/dess send with his attention span), and we can then add to it with other resources!  I may end up having to add Samwise to the account because I can see Frodo wanting to continue over summer with it since it's only an hour or so worth of 'work'... and Sam will get quite jealous! 

And I have just been told I have the most beautiful gift coming from a lovely friend!  I adore the artwork in Barefoot Books, but they are not available widely in Australia (you find a *few* here and there on Aussie book sites, and the odd one in Borders.. is Borders still Borders here?? lol).  I soooooo wish the company would get on opening an Aussie distributorship, I would sign on to sell them in a split second!  (if just for the discount LOL)  So to my wonderful friend, thank you!  It will be a lovely holiday gift for the boys..and *sheepish* me lol, because I love a gorgeous book :)  

It's been a hell of a month... and honestly I'll be glad to see October. DH has started a new job that he seems to love, he txt'd me earlier this week saying " loving it so far, it's just like questing in WOW" (for those of you that don't know it, we are serious World of Warcraft players LOL) He likes that it's something different every day ... once this week he went to both coasts for work.. in one day! lol

With all the stress in the house (new family member, dh losing his job, etc) things have been rather hit & miss in the realm of schoolwork, but we're getting back on track. Our co op activities on Monday are finished for the year, but the group has other great things planned and we're looking forward to it. The boys will be finishing up their swimming in November, and in a week or so we'll start tennis lessons with the home ed group. The hobbits are VERY excited about that! I really considered the ice skating lessons they have planned, but Frodo is not overly coordinated ;), and Merry would not be tolerant of hanging out for an hour. Maybe next year I guess!

At our last co-op, I purchased the next TWO levels of Math U See for Frodo (gamma & delta) and he pestered me for days to start Gamma instead of finishing boring old Beta hehehe. I've never seen a kid so excited about multiplying ;) The Teen is sure I've ruined them, no kid should ASK to do math! lol Sam is just finishing Primer now, and will start Alpha this coming week.

A week or so ago I got a discount voucher in the mail from Learning a-z for their writing program and checked it out. It looked really great, and for 20bucks even if it wasn't it still wouldn't be much of a waste. So far I really like it, I think it will help Frodo with his 'creative' writing a great deal. He is good with the mechanics of writing, and can write sentences with no problem, but grouping those sentences together into an organized, related, collection of thoughts... not so much! They have some neat exercises, and good printables, like a 'graphic organizer' for writing a personal narrative. They have them for various levels, from a beginnging/grade 1 writer (generally expected to be able to write one paragraph with 5 sentences) to a more advanced student (grade 3ish, where they 'should' write 3 paragraphs with more developed sentences) We're going to give slot that into our days this week and see how the hobbits like it. They DO have a free intro lesson as well, that includes some of these things, available for download from the site :D

I also got sucked in by the raz-kids reading site (also on learning a-z) and we're doing their 7 day free trial membership. I'm thinking we may pick it up (well, once dh gets regular pay! 80bucks is not in the budget at the moment!) The boys are really enjoying it. There are tons of levels (all the way up to about age 9-10) .. Sam is doing aa for the second time, his choice.. and Frodo is doing level Q which is a lot more involved and even has web based 'quizzes'. Bonus is that it is paid for by the 'classrom' so I have one classroom, and my two students at their own levels.... so no purchasing the program twice :D

There's a noticable lack of photos today, sorry 'bout that. A couple of garden ones to come, but I haven't been great about keeping the camera handy lately! Sam on the other hand, is becoming quite the shutterbug according to the memory card heh... maybe I'll share some of those in the near future.

Give her a quality movie (Braveheart was the choice for this hs mum), a good cuppa coffee, and a pile of newly laminated montessori activities to cut out for her eager learners!   Thank goddess this was NOT on a Friday night, or I'd have to be a bit worried about mys social life ;)  But for a Monday, quite accpetable hehehe.  

We spent the weekend doing a major cleanout of the garage, and took a major load of stuff for donating & dumping, so my plans to test drive my new (el cheapo) model laminator kept getting put on hold.    But yesterday I got everything mounted on heavy paper and went to town.  It worked VERY well for a cheapie model... and I do mean cheap, this baby was 18bucks.  Hell, the laminating pouches (100) cost more than the machine did LOL.  

My big goal was to get Merry's very cool dragon activities laminated before he killed them.   He was a bit taken aback today when he asked for them and saw their new state.  'They're TRAPPED!'  he said.  LOL!    I was super surprised when he was quite ok with them being trapped when I explained that now they couldn't get destroyed and would last 'forever'.    Score one for mum.  

For Sam & Frodo, I have been geeking at This site, thanks to Kylie at Our Worldwide Classroom.  They have some great materials that you buy in pdf form, then print off & laminate yourself.  Certianly cheaper than other options for us down here!  Last night I made up the solar system nomenclature cards (although I do hate the pretentious sound of nomenclature... we're talking 6yr olds here lol) for the boys and this morning they have already been matching & defining to their hearts content.   Here' Sam busy at work :)  

 He really enjoyed matching the unlabeled picture cards & the proper label up to the control card (which has both the pic and the word).  He even sounded out a couple of the starting sounds, which we have been working on lately.  This was actually a team effort, as Frodo read the matching definition card and put it with the matches as Sam made them  :)  

They totally loved being able to work independently, which was nice for me as well!  I was able to get the laundry in without multiple trips back into the house to assist with schoolwork lol.  

I picked up several other thing from that site, a moveable alphabet (that will NOT get done until I have a paper cutter, as that is just TOO many small squares to contemplate cutting!!!), a living/ nonliving things activity, one on the layers of the Earth (as Earth is our next science unit study) and a 'research guide' for Frodo.   Each guide gives a list of questions to answer in a short 'paper' the child writes on the topic... the sun, a planet of their choice etc.   The idea is that the child can write the paper all by themselves using the guide to help them know what to put in it. Frodo is going to pick his favourite planet and have a go at that later this week.  I won't expect a thesis, but it will be one of his first attempts at independent writing, the only others have been the couple of letters he's written his pen pal.  

So lots of new, fun and independant activities for the boys to get stuck into!   

 

Mr. Merry has been getting VERY disruptive and cranky when the bigger brothers & I try to do any organized schoolwork lately!  So I've used playdoh (the brothers end up distracted wanting to play as well lol) and crayon colouring (works well enough, until he wants to reach over & scribble on one of the boys work!) with marginal success.    My recent replenishment of my printer toner brought to mind a very cute pdf of early educational activities I purchased a few months ago... with a castle & dragon theme! 

TOTALLY adorable.  

So, despite not having cardstock to mount it on, OR a laminator to run it through... I printed out a few of the activities anyway.   I'd link them... but sadly they are no longer listed on the site :(   Boy, am I glad I didn't wait to go back later to buy them!  But here's a shot of one of them...

 I didn't plan my picutre taking well, as there is no picture of both pieces.. ah well.   Underneath those stinkin CUTE dragons holding shapes... are castles with the same shapes.   The files are abotu 60odd pages long, so there are TONS of activities ranging from alphabet matching ones, to size sorting,  to shape & number matching.   

Merry already knows his shapes & colours, but he was just GIDDY at having mummy make a game just for him.   We were all required to take multiple turns playing HIS games with him.. which just delighted him to no end!

 Here's the little wizard playing his game (for about the 100th time I'm sure!)  I kid you not, he played this game on the rug for at least half an hour.. it was wonderful.  He was happy, the bigger boys were able to get a bit of writing done and such...and I was able to sit and laugh at Merry being so funny with his new activity.  

Yesterday he was asking repeatedly to do school with his brothers...  Today he was doing just that, well, as much as I would ever expect of a 3.5yr old!  And judging from how overjoyed he was to have his OWN 'school' to do... I'll be burning up the toner cartridges this weekend.  

And shopping for a laminator. 

I don't often order books, but I needed a few for the boys new History Odyssey as we have moved on to the Medieval times, so I decided to test out Bookdepository .   I usually go with amazon, but these guys do FREE worldwide shipping so I figured I'd save a fortune.  I ordered on the 8th.. and all but one of my books arrived today!  And I ordered in the evening on the 8th even.  So exactly one week to my door, not bad from the UK really.

Frodo has already had a good browse through a couple of the books and is chomping at the bit to get into This one, which is a King Arthur story just for kids about his age.  I'm hoping he'll be able to manage it independently, as it looks like an easy read and it isn't too long. 

The activity guide, with all the neato crafty stuff, for this level of History Odyssey is Days of Knights and Damsels.    It looks VERY cool, if possible even better than Ancient Egyptians and their Neighbors! ( last levels' book)   There are instructions for creating your own middle age costumes and many other things.  Seriously, middle age shoes made out of felt or scraps of heavy fabric with laces... we're talking very awesome stuff!   We are going to have a LOT of fun with this.

The other book I was really itching to get is an Usborne book (I'm a huge Usborne fan) called 'See Inside Castles'.  It's a FLAP book, and if it is anywhere near as good as the 'See Inside Space' book in the same series  the boys will just drool over it constantly :)  (I actually checked that one out.. and renewed it.  The sadly had to return it, but the next time I was in the library.. a whole week later, it was there .. so I snagged it again LOL)   The Castle book was sadly NOT in the mail today...I'm hoping it will arrive tomorrow, or that there's a slip in the mailbox because it was too big for the postie on his little bike to carry around.  

Our Medieval history study just got a whole lot more fun!

Not too long ago, I was reading blogs and saw this idea and it stuck in my head. Unfortunately the person who I borrowed the idea from, did not lol. I've seen it a few times though, so I don't think I'm stealing any intellectual property here ;) M&M math.. man when *I* was a kid I'd have loved to learn to make & read graphs in such a cool way!

Supplies required: 2 small bags of m&ms, plain or peanut is your choice though lol!,  small bowls, crayons, and graph paper.  I made my own graph paper using a website I stumbled across, then promptly forgot to bookmark!!.  Oh you also need kids.. well, not REALLY, I mean I suppose you could do this yourself and eat the evidence... but as a home schooling project.. the kids are helpful ;) Here are Frodo & Sam hard at work (ok, not so much.. especially if you notice the lego creation which appears glued to sam's hand lol)   I was hoping that Sam's orange m&m's didn't end up totalling more than 10 or he'd be out of room!

 A bit better shot of the graph... well, an attempt at one anyway ;)  After all m&m's were on the graph, the boys wrote the # of each colour down and then pulled out their crayons, put their m&m's back in the bowl, and coloured the graph in to save in their notebooks.

 Here are two boys working VERY studiously on their math, because after all is said and done, SOMEBODY has to eat all those m&m's!    They also had a short questionaire about the graph, basically which colour had the most, which the least, were there any 'ties' between colours.  And most importantly... did you EAT any before you got them counted? LOL

For all the fun involved, it ticked off a math outcome for Frodo ;)  And now the boys have a basic idea how to read a graph!

Merry was involved as well... I gave him a small bowl of m&m's and a muffin tin and TRIED  to get him to help me sort them by colour.  Total flop LOL.  ALL he wanted to do was eat m&m's, of course!   I attempted to get a pic of him, but they all came out blurry.. I guess he was moving pretty quickly.  What, with the sugar high and all LMAO.

I'm sure I mentioned my Sam being VERY upset that his turn in the maths workshop ended before he got the opportunity to have a go with a certain item that he had become enamoured with.  He was really  REALLY sad.  And I felt really bad, because he had waited paitently for the workshop organizer to get to him to answer his questions on other games.. and a couple of times it took SEVERAL minutes, which really ate into his fun time!

 I hate that he missed out on something that he wanted to do, merely because he had to wait around on a grown up who was actually there *to* help him.  (mild grumble in that she spent a lot of time showing games to other adults that IMO should have been spent helping the children, or at least showing the adults so THEY could help the children ya know?)  So,  I commenced to searching the web for this particular item.  Not knowing the NAME of said thing really didn't help lol.  But it's amazing what typing ' magnetic geometric construction toy' can come up with!   Almost immediately I found it!  Then I set about finding it HERE in Australia.. again, located it straight away.  

Google, I love you.  

THIS is the object of Sam's affections ...   

 And I am going to buy it for him.  His birthday is this coming week, and he will be ecstatic that mum would not have him miss out because some lady was too busy to help him.   Thus making me the hero!

It can be found here . (and various places on the web in the US, as well as evilbay, of course!)  

I think... that I may just have to slip one of these onto the order as well.  They have challenge cards that you can work through to build some pretty incredible things!  Frodo had a ball with those yesterday, so they'll be a winner around here as well. 

I'm a tad concerned that my house may start to look like an educational store soon LOL.

I think I mentioned previously that I created my own science set up for the boys this year.  We do science together, so I basically beef up activities for Frodo's lvl or lighten them a tad for Sam.   Currently we're doing the Solar System, and as boys usually do, they're loving it!   We usually do science twice a week, unless we have a LOT on in a week, so this unit will last us at least the rest of this term! (term ends Easter time I believe?)  

We use Magic School Bus books as the initial jumping off point because they're such fun, and pack a lot of info into one book.   So far we have read about the Sun, Mercury & Venus, at the rate of about 2 topics/planets per week.  Today was Earths big day :)   Since the Earth & Moon get their own ENTIRE term, today was just a quick fly by covering the same info as we have for the other planets.   The boys & I get comfy in our little reading corner in the family room and they really enjoy all the satellite photography in the books, and Frodo does most of the reading for us.  

I thought I would share the framework of my little 'curriculum' on here, as I've had a few people enquire if I was going to make it available (either free or for pay, really flattering!)  At this point it's just a framework, I'm always adding in new resources that I run across.   For some things I simply have the url and every weekend I check for things that will fit in nicely during the week, and the boys do many of the web based games/activities during 'non school' time whenever!

Without further adieu... Here it is :D  Caz's Magic School Bus Science of the Solar system!!!!

 (I hate to have to say this, but I guess I need to these days.  This is the property & creation of Caz Milton.  Feel free to copy it for your own personal use, but if you'd like to share a link to it, please share the link to THIS post instead of posting this on your own site.   I am offering it here to SHARE it, not for it to be 'stolen'.   This isn't anything award winning, but I put a fair bit of time into it, and still do daily almost to improve it.  So in short, it's not nice to take credit for other people's work, please don't do it!)

*STarter book:  The Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System
                 Guide to using ‘Lost in the solar sytem’ in the classroom (if I can find it!)

Field trips/projects
 *Enchanted Learning solar system book
 *Planetarium visit for *Passport to the Universe
                                         *Saturday night ‘Live’
 *create a solar system mobile/model
 *web resources for photos of planets, the sun, nebulas, stars etc (nasa.com)

 *book 11 planets: a new view of the solar system Aguilar, David A   (ISBN 9781426302367)
 Beyond planet earth [interactive multimedia] from library

  ***Starting with the Sun/ Sol go through each planet using the solar system book.  
                                     -What is the planets name sake? 
                                     - What is the length of their day & year? 
                                     - How much would you weigh and how old would you be there?
  *Blast off! :Mercury by Orme, Helen ISBN 9781846960499
  *blast off!: Venus Orme, Helen I SBN 9781846960482
  *Eyewitness Mars Murray, stuart ISBN 1405312653
  *Lets explore Mars Orme, Helen ISBN 9780836881264
  *blast off!: Jupiter Orme, Helen ISBN 1846960568
  *blast off!: Saturn Orme, Helen ISBN 1846960533
  * Uranus and Neptune and the dwarf planets Mist, Rosalind  ( ISBN 9781845389659) 
  *Gas giants Knapp, Brian ISBN 1862143676
  * Briefly discuss the asteroid belt and comets.

 * Lesson Pathways  *** excellent resource, free, lots of net based games & activities to supplement with! I’ll be picking from these as we go, so feel free to choose any that look cool.

*solar system ‘cloze’ sheet from EnchantedLearning
*solar system ‘quiz’  

 Magic school bus sees stars
 Magic Treehouse: Midnight on the Moon
  *MTH guide for space

It doesn't LOOK like a lot, but I'm amazed at how many extension activites I find here & there.  We're on week 3 and only just now hitting Earth.  Thursday it's on to Mars & the Asteroid belt.. after that it's on to the Gas Giants and Planet Fart (LOL thanks for that Wendy & Gavin.. I laughed SO hard!  Only a mom of boys would understand I think ;)  

I hope you enjoyed it!

For a whole week!  That'd be the direct result of me actually trying to keep us on track with the routine I've set up for our school days!   Mondays are our gymnastics/art class days... every other Friday (this friday) are our extra curricular days with our DE group.  That leaves basically 3-4 days, depending on the week, for actual 'schoolwork'.    So we get busy on those days!  And often at the end of the day the LAST thing I want to think about is the day just finished lol.  

Today for example, (we're getting a late start as I slept in a bit ;) we're doing Math U See (both kids), Headsprout (Sam), Reading comprehension (Frodo), some reading on Ancient China AND starting our China history pocket, as well as putting together a Planets 'tab' book from Enchanted Learning.   Unfortunately it's on the members pages, so I can't link IT specifically.  But seriously, I can't say enough about EL... I find the best worksheets & such to supplement whatever we're studying on that site!   So it should be a fun, busy, day.  Oh and there will invariably be at least one snack and one lunch break... else Frodo may waste away to nothing ;)

I posted a while back about Homeschool Skedtrack, and while it was a cool program with lots of neat features... I guess I'm a pen and paper kinda girl ;)  I need to be able to see a week at a glance and KNOW what is on the plans for each day in that week.  I have swiped a nice, basic grid form from This site and am test driving it this week.  I've had to cross out /substitute some 'subject' headings but that's not a problem.  It's a 2page weekly spread with good sized blocks for being able to fit 'assignments' for both kids in there ... as long as I don't get TOO wordy!   So far I like it, I like having more space than typical 1page weekly planners give as well as being able to see it ALL at once.

In other news.. someone please turn off the faucet in the sky... at least for a little while?   I have fungi popping up all over my yard... so if I cease posting, I've probably wandered into a faerie ring  and been carried away for a nice long holiday with the fae  LOL.

Today was our first FULL day of schoolwork for the year.  On the plan for Sam was Headsprout, Math U See, and handwriting practice in his new workbook (which he loved... something about a shiny new book I guess hehe) Frodo had Math U see, handwriting (learning cursive), grammar, science reading and spelling.  

It turns out Frodo has zero handwriting stamina.. his handwriting took him a little longer than it really needed to and he kept stretching his hand out.  I noticed the reason why later.. the child has a veritable death grip on his pencil!  If I held mine like that it wouldn't take long for my hand to collapse into a screaming cramp either.  SO, for now we are going to have to put spelling on the back burner (at least written spelling, we can still work on it other ways)  I'll also spend a lot of time working with him on a better, more relaxed grip so that in a month or so he might have worked up the ability to write for a reasonable amount of time.  For now we'll just have Grammar Once a Week , handwriting workbook to learn the entries & exits of cursive, and Catching onto Comprehension B which will account for most of his writing.  (science & History Odyssey have a bit, but not nearly this much).  

There was also a crucial scheduling mistake by moi... the Magic School Bus book we were going to start our science year with is NOT the one I thought I had!  Nor is it one our library has *sigh* So the one unit of science I've completely written up?  Is not the one we're going to end up starting with LOL.  So, I best get off my rear and get the Earth unit written up so we can start that at least.. since I actually POSSESS the book ;)   Kind of a bummer though, I was so looking forward to sticking my many xrays (including ultrasounds of the kids in utero, hand, chest and hip xrays!)  to the sliding glass doors.  I'm sure the neighbors will think I'm insane *gryn*  

Other than the handwriting woes (although his writing WAS very tidy) and the book that isn't.. the day went very, very well :D

(Jon coined that last phrase lol)  Update, my hip is a LOT better after a serious massage with Tiger balm last night by dh... plus a handy valium tablet to turn the muscle into mush so I could sleep ;)  I don't know how readily available Tiger balm is outside the pacific region.. but man that is some awesome stuff.  It's a chinese topical thing that just works wonders, and smells good too.   Anyway, still a bit sore, but I can get around more like a 60yr old instead of a 90yr old lol.  

Yesterday the radiology people sent the films home with me and said they were faxing the report to the doc as soon as the radiologist was done writing it up.  I found it amusing that on the flap of the envelope they seal it with a sticker that says "CONFIDENTIAL:  To be opened ONLY by referring doctor"   It's MY friggin hip!... confidential my arse.  So of course, I immediately opened it up to have a look (just as I did with my pneumonia xrays hehehe)  The ultrasound looked like... well not a damn thing honestly lol.  But the hip xrays are wicked cool!  Excellent shots if I do say so myself.  

Interestingly enough, our first Magic School Bus science unit is going to be 'Inside the Human Body'   and now I have rocking visual aids for the skeletal system when we get to it!  Hip and chest xrays.   Which brings us to masochism for knowledge sake lol.  I was chatting with Jon (must get him a nickname too, everyone else has one!) on facebook and he said wow.. you're such a devoted  mom,  you nearly crippled yourself to provide learning materials for the little dudes.  That's awesome...  I nearly died laughing.   The guy has a warped sense of humor.. yeah I'll take at least partial credit for that ;)    

So, sometime in February, my house will be decorated with sticky taped up pictures of my various internal structures... all in the sake of learning ;)

I had my post underway here earlier and the kids informed me that there was a knock on the door. Down the hall I went and I could see the bright orange shirt of the parcel delivery guy.. which is always exciting, don't ya think??   I signed for the parcel and brought it inside, and you would think it was already Christmas morning! lol   See, 11 days ago Lakeshore Learning  had a pretty decent sale.  It was spend $1oo and get $25 off.  Oh I can spend that easy lol.

I'd waffled about ordering, and even checked their Aussie distributor, but the Aus prices were so ridiculously high (especially considering our exchange rate is awesome!) that I finally just decided to mentally apply that 25bucks to cover part of the postage to make myself feel better.  I went with the 'cheap' shipping (using that term loosely lol) because the expensive/fast shipping was almost as much as the order was!  It was supposed to take about 4 weeks, so I was shocked to have it in hand on the 11th day.  Here's what we got:  

A couple of 'Draw and write' journals, a bucket of fraction circles, a personal size dry erase board with lines, a dry erase cursive book, a set of rubber 'base 10' block stamps, a set of geobards, and a massive set of sandpaper 'sight words'.  

 Frodo & Sam were beside themselves... so much for school being basically over for the year LOL.  Immediately they had to make circles & patterns with the fraction wedges, then the geobards had to be test driven.  That was funny because what did Frodo do?  He used the rubber bands to make '10 blocks' or 'unit's ala Math U see LOL.   

Sam has been writing up a storm on his dry erase board and loving it.   I forgot to grab a pic of the large magnetic learning clock, which has taken up residence on our fridge :)  Frodo has been checking the digital clock, then going and positioning the hands on the learning clock, and writing the time at the bottom..all day.  It's dry erase as well, which is awesome, and it seems very sturdy.. so hopefully Merry will not be able to tear the hands off it like he did the old one we had!

I can't wait to start doing a bit of journaling with them in their 'draw & write' journals.  I think Frodo is at a good age to get him into writing about things, instead of just 'functional' writing.  He's itching to get ahold of them.  

I'm very happy with our purchases, and will definitely be back in the future... my wish list is substantial hehehe.