A good Monday to start off the week

My little nursling Everett just hopped off my lap, looked up at me, waved good-bye and toddled off. What a love bug. He is getting so big. He just hung out at the window for 6 minutes or so jabbering to me and then finially says, "Side! Side!" He wants to join the kids he sees playing outside. He's running around for a few minutes with them while I take a minute to blog.

This morning I "made" some yogurt for the kids. I just started buying big 4lb plain (rBGH free!) yogurt from Costco. I store about 10 of them in the freezer and a few in the fridge. My kids, like most kids, LOVE yogurt. I hate buying yogurt though because of how much sugar is in it. Even when you buy organic without the additives and food coloring, it's still a dessert. (And organic is too expensive.)

So I take my own sugar and sweeten plain yogurt for the kids and then we add in our own fruit. We also use specialty jams that give it a yummy flavor. By my best estimates this cuts the sugar in half (or more). The kids go crazy for frozen fruit that they like to add in, too. (Also bought in bulk from Costco or Sams Club)

Mixing up breakfast for 7 kids

Everyone has a potato in their bathtub, right? Why is this here? I donno, I have a 1 year old so that must be why. I was passing by the tub and saw it there. 

 Charlotte, 15, makes an ordinary day fun. Found this in the bathroom and had to do a double take while thinking 'did I just see a toilet paper owl?' lol. Clever, funny kid.




We started a unit study about well known outlaws of the wild west. Today we learned about Billy the Kid and now the kids are watching an old western. I asked the kids to make a fictional wanted poster. Charlotte did Waldo, it cracked me up.

I love part of a review on Netflix of the 1939 movie Days of Jesse James, "Theatre of yesteryear when men were men and women were damned grateful for it!" 

Watching westerns together. I take photos all the time of family watching movies together. It's just a memory I want to be able to hold in my hand and my heart. Now they are munching on popcorn and little Sebasian fell asleep. :)

Day of the Dead

We had a really fun time decorating skulls for Dia De Los Muertos, The Day of the Dead.

It was a memorable but super easy craft. The skull molds only took me a half hour to make (we made even more than is shown here) then they dry over night. I was shocked at how well they stayed together. All that is in them is sugar, meringue powder, and a tiny bit of water. The trick to good decorating frosting is also meringue powder. I can't wait to apply this new learned trick of the trade to cookies this holiday season! We bought this kit on sale here

Summer School

Is it really summer? Because the kids have been doing nothing but exploring their world and asking lots of questions about life, science, social studies/history, art, religion, and more. Learning all the time (unschooling/homeschooling) means summer holds the same learning power as the rest of the year. Actually I'd have to say we are much more productive learning in the warmer months of the year. The colder months seem to bring us more wasted time, dark evenings, and lazy days than spring, summer, and fall.

The kids have been enjoying weekends with dad being home. They have had many meaningful discussions. I over heard some world religion ones, mentions of physics, Albert Einstein, Issac Newton, and some other guy --the name escapes me right now. LOL.


What sparked at least some of those subjects was Charlotte enthusiastically pointing out that this months issue of Muse Magazine had pages about Leonardo Da Vinci. What tickled her though was the page number for the section about him was written backwards. "Just like his notes he wrote backwards to keep secret!"


I love being a part of their discovery and learning everyday. I didn't always think this way, but now I see that public school keeps a part of my children that I wouldn't get. Just like daycare gets a part of baby or toddler hood from children. (yes I know some people need to use the services of childcare, I'm grateful I don't though, and I have opinions about it's misuse and overuse). I never wanted my children in daycare, I always thought about how much a parent (and child) misses by not being "there" constantly throughout the day. I now feel that way about public schooling too. I see things in a different way now that I have been homeschooling for years and I now know first hand that children do learn all about interesting important things without structured, planned lessons. My children are more excited about learning then I ever was! I am so excited for them.

Layla keeps up with the good questions too:
Layla asked me, "What is under the toilet?" So she headed off a conversation about septic, waste disposal, and health. This morning she also woke up sleepy eyed and crawled into bed with me like usual and said, "Mom did I brush my teeth?" "Yes Layla you did last night." She rubbed her eyes and said, "Oh good thing, cause in my dream I was eating food."

Hahaha. She is SO good about her teeth and tries to keep them brushed very well! And she is SO funny.

Back home

Our trip to Las Vegas was fun. The kids played a lot with their cousin Echo, which is a big highlight of the trip. Grandpa Craig (my dad -Pictured below with the kids) took the kids to Old Nevada http://www.bonniesprings.com/ where they got to learn a little about the old west and see two old west shows. We went along as well, and it was a lot of fun. They also spent many hours in the pool at Grandpa Craig and Grandma Mindy's house. My little brother's wedding was very beautiful and fun. We also got to see my mom and Grandma Smith. They had never met Penelope yet. My Grandma Smith brought the kids a beautiful chunk of petrified wood because she knew they loved stuff like that. (She is a great fan and collector of rocks, minerals, fossils and bones.) More pictures on my blog

It's good to be home now...

Lots of curious kids, and why we cry

QUESTIONS? QUESTIONS? QUESTIONS?
Lately the kids have asked about all kinds of interesting topics.
What is supply and demand? What is capitalism? How does reselling work? Why do we buy so much from China, why is it so cheap there? What is child labor? Fair labor? Minimum wage?

This has kept Ricky and I busy answering all sorts of interesting questions! I love how worldly homeschoolers are! Not that other children in formal education can’t also be worldly, but gosh it’s amazing how much more so homeschoolers are, and from such a young age. There is so much world out there to be aware of and so much to discover. I’m so glad they explore, ask, and ponder so much and so freely!

SOCIAL STUDIES/ OR EARTH DAY IS EVERY DAY
We did a unit study on consumerism. We watched clips from http://www.youtube.com/ of the new National Geographic special The Human Footprint. We talked about what we all can do to make our impact on Earth smaller. We also had a good conversation about how we could all take better care of our stuff so that it lasts longer, and as a result we would need to buy less new stuff. Also when we take care of things our old stuff can be used by others more effectively when we are done with it.

SLANG WORDS ~ FUNNY ETHAN
The kids asked what slang was and I gave them several examples and had them come up with some of their own. Ethan then asked, "Hey mom, isn’t slang from Uncle Doyle’s time calling a girl a plate?"

I could barely keep a straight face. It was so funny!

"Ohhh you mean a dish Ethan, yes a pretty girl was called a dish."

So cute. I remember years ago telling them about a dish being a older saying (from around Uncle Doyle’s generation) for a pretty girl. And he remembered that, sort-of. Haha.

WHY DO WE CRY?
This was one of the most interesting questions and answers I’ve researched on behalf of the kids. At first I was like 'well we just cry cause our body triggers tears to fall.' Then I said, you know what kids, we’ll go look that up. (I didn’t really want to) BUT I soon found that I never knew how interesting tears were until reading this http://www.gibbsmagazine.com/CryinLaughing.htm

First of all there are three types of tears.
Second, and totally interesting is this:

"Scientists have discovered that the emotional tears contain higher levels of manganese and the hormone prolactin"

I know about Prolactin of course, it is the hormone that is primarily associated with lactation. While it is actually secreted by the pituitary gland in both men and women, it is considered a female hormone because of it's connection with breastfeeding. Prolactin is what stimulates the production of milk (along with oxytocin which lets down the milk). It’s these feel good hormones that relaxes the mother, promotes bonding, and promotes maternal behavior. Prolaction has also been associated with not only feelings of well being but also as having a tranquilizing effect on nursing mothers and babies. So, this could also explain why we feel better after crying!

So finding out prolactin is secreted as a part of our emotional tears is very cool to learn for me!
This also explains why women tend to cry more than men. Women produce more prolaction.

From a different article online:

"...women have serum prolactin levels much higher than men. Prolactin is a hormone connected with the production of tears as well as breast milk. "Hormones may help regulate tear production and have something to do with crying frequency."
Interestingly, studies show that there is no difference in crying patterns between boys and girls up to the age of puberty. "Then, between the ages of 12 and 18," says Dr. Frey, "women develop 60 percent higher levels of prolactin than men, and they start crying nearly four times more often." "

Just fascinating!

BRAINS!

In addition, Sage knew where the pituitary gland was located when I mentioned it. Brainpop.com how do you do so much magic on my kids and teach them so much?!! :)

Also, This site is cool with a diagram of the brain, where we are learning about the parts of the brain.

JOURNAL

Charlotte wanted journal prompts and I found lots she loves here Hopefully I will get her in the habit of writing in her blog now. Today she wrote a draft on paper, but didn't finalize it or put it in her blog yet.

April 7-12 2008

WEATHER/SCIENCE:
Since a conversation about the weather and temperature came up we made a quick make shift chart for our wall that gave an idea of what different temperatures are like. For example in 20-30 degree weather we pasted a picture of a snowman and the word freezing cold. At the 40 degree weather mark we pasted a coat and the words cold. For 50-60 degree weather we pasted the words coat or jacket needed and the word cool. 70 degrees got a picture of a park and a guy riding a bike, 80 and 90 degrees got a guy swimming, sunglasses, and shorts. This took all of 10 minutes to discuss, make a wall chart out of our last strip of butcher paper and put it together. Online we also went to a few weather related websites. They also have asked about other various things I can’t think of right now, one such thing was about sonic booms, which we haven’t discussed yet as we got sidetracked.

READING: Ethan finished his 100th lesson at http://www.clicknkids.com/ YAY ETHAN! It really seemed to teach him a lot, and of course he has become a reader since starting the program. Sage still doesn't want to do the click n kids lessons. So we are still limping our way through phonics workbooks. Sage did really well with his reading flash cards this morning. He separated words he knows and words he needs help with.

SOCIAL STUDIES: Some 'disturbing' topics came up for some reason. Their thoughts/ questions are in parentheses: Cannibalism (does it really exist?), the death penalty (it’s legal in the US ?!), serial killers (they kill cereal?)

SATURDAY SOCCER: Charlotte had soccer today (2 games in fact) and it was 35 degrees with sleet. The other kids stayed home with Ricky and I braved the cold with my lounge chair, feather down coat, and a sleeping bag. I thought I was going to outsmart the cold, BUT I still froze my butt off. All my fingers actually went numb and they didn’t feel cold after that, just tingly and numb. The things we do for our kids!

IN THE KITCHEN: This week we made homemade cracker jacks and 3 glass pans of banana cake. SOOO goood! I am trying to make at least two things a week with some (or all) of the kids. Layla is a little baker. She loves baking.

LAYLA: When I fix something for Layla she exclaims in a really over exuberant voice, "Thanks SUPER MOM!!
I just love when she says that. :)