Treasure Island

I really, really enjoyed reading this book, which surprised me. I remember picking it up as a kid and setting it down after a page or two. I think that may have been a revised version for children though. It makes me think that books should be read in their original text, the way they were meant to be.

There is something about the way this book is written. Before I knew it I had read 100 pages and when I thought about it during the day it felt more like I had been watching a movie. Sometimes I would fall asleep reading it at night and then dream about it too. This is the kind of book I get lost in.

Jared and I spent a very long time sitting in a restaurant booth talking about this book. We sat there way after we finished our meals. That is one our favorite things to do. People would be surprised to see me doing 99% of the talking while on a date with my husband. I've got the Disney movie coming on Netflix so we can watch it together too.

There is something nostalgic about pirates and sailing ships and treasure. Kendi is obsessed with them. We even play pirates every Saturday while we do our chores. She can't wait to read this book, but I will have to explain to her that it is not such a happy story throughout and it gets gruesome. It will be interesting to see if she loves it or not.

Big Book of Play and Find Out

This is by far one of Kendi most favorite things to do. So far, we have made parachutes, bouncy balls and played with water and air. Kendi begs to do this more often and talks about it to people when they ask about what she is learning in homeschool. It is something that the two year old can be a part of and be entertained enough and not be in the way. I have to admit that I always look forward to the days we have a "science experiment" planned and I'm surprised that I have learned some new things from it too.

Book Review - Sense and Sensibility

To be honest, I didn't even finish this book. I've noticed that a lot of Jane Austen's books start out very slow, but get good at least half way through the books and they always end up being worth reading, but I've been in the mood for a good page turner lately and this wasn't doing it for me. I wasn't highlighting very many interesting thoughts either. At this point, I'm hoping that I will come back to it when I need a Jane Austen fix and hopefully I will love it then.

Time Flies When You're Having Fun!

I can't believe it's been two weeks of homeschool already. We've had fun and we've had some tough moments, but only one bad day and I've learned a lot from this experience. Keeping this blog is mostly to help me remember the things that I've learned along the way. I'm sure things will just keep changing too. I'm a parent, I'm use to that.

Kendi loves the new, bright, shiny workbooks right now. I was surprised by that at first, but I think it's just because they are new and something different. I have a feeling that the newness may where off. I'm even more surprised that Kendi doesn't love some of the games that I put together for math and such. In fact she kind of hates them. haha. Math is something that I really need to make a priority of figuring out right now. I think she needs more hands on manipulative math to do. The math book that I ordered is way below her level and not even fun anymore.

Kendi loves art. What kid doesn't? I'm so glad that this subject is well taken care of. I just need to schedule it into our week to make sure that it happens. There is so much we can do everyday and so little time to do it. Kendi could paint for hours.

My aunt passed away a couple of years ago. She had been taking art lesson's from Jared and was really quite good at it. Kendi and my aunt had become really close when my aunt was diagnosed with brain cancer. I was also very sick at the time and Kendi spent a lot of time with my parents who were also spending a lot of time with my aunt. Kendi and Aunt Mary would go for walks, draw and just talk together. It's safe to say they were best friends. My heart has never broken so hard as when I had to tell Kendi that Aunt Mary was gone. Mary's family left her art supplies with Jared. She had accumulated a lifetime supply of water-color equipment. Jared doesn't water-color much, but Kendi loves it. It is so fun to see her painting with professional paints from someone she loved with her daddy in the mountains that Mary was so fond of.

Kendi loves projects. I'm trying to think of some on-going ones. She already wants to start a project for the county fair next year. I'd like to get started on some service ones too.
I need to really remember why I'm homeschooling in the first place and not get all caught up in the fun things to buy and do. I really want Kendi to socialize with all age groups which means I need to start getting those types of activities set up soon. I also want her to learn how to work hard with a happy attitude. Anyone needing work done at their house, let us know. I also need to make sure that I'm focused on teaching her how to think and not what to think. I need to be a mentor, not a teacher. Sometimes this is hard when it comes to things like handwriting. She taught herself how to write and really doesn't want to take the time to relearn. I need to come up with a way to inspire her to want to.

I figured out that it helps to have a short, fun activity to start the day. It gets us in a positive school mode to begin. I'm glad that I have that old Kindergarten resource book from DI for that.

I just found out that the Montessori school nearby may let her do a subject or two with them. I'm meeting with them soon to find out more details. I love so many things about Montessori and it would be hard to do it at home so this would be a way for her to have Montessori and work with groups of kids in more age groups.

So far, I've really enjoyed homeschool and Kendi says she likes it too. My only fear is that time is flying by so fast. I want to make sure that I cover all the things that I wanted this homeschool to do.