Two Parents, Two Kids, a Cat and a Chinchilla!

We are now the proud owners of an absolutely adorable chinchilla.  You have got to love Craig's List!  Free for the taking a few miles from our house was an animal that would cost us hundreds of dollars to buy, plus he came with all of his gear, cage, food and the like.  So we took a book about chinchillas out at the library the day we found out we would be getting him, and we learned all about these cool animals.  He is four years old, and the previous owners never named him.  We are thinking it is a him anyway, they didn't know the gender!  The kids named him Auryn Shelby Hansen, ASH for short.

And here he is!  He is so so soft!  We are learning so much about responsibility for pets with him.  He is far more maintenance than Logan, our cat.

And here she is, checking out Ash.  She hasn't gone after him a bit, and when Ash was rolling around in his ball while we cleaned the cage, they ended up napping together with Logan wrapped around Ash and his ball.

He is quite the interesting addition to our family, and the kids adore him.  Logan seems to like having another animal in the house.  We just can't believe our luck.  Even after this animal suffered through neglect he seems very happy and well adjusted.  We take him out and groom his fur nightly (since he is nocturnal) and let him exercise in his ball through the house.  Each night he gets a raisin for a treat, and he seems to love being around the kids.  He lets them pet his head and he even tries petting himself on their hands.  He isn't skittish, but is quite energetic.  We cleaned his cage really well, which I am sure hadn't been done in months at least.  We got him a wheel large enough for him, and a few other little things.  Dust for his dust bath, and a pumice stone for him to chew on and stand on.  He is so much fun to watch and we are all enjoying this new learning experience.

 Don't those faces just say it all?

Month of Crazy

So between gardening, heat, thunderstorms, school finishing for Mason's mom, and all the other million things, this month sort of got away from me.  We have been doing so much learning, but without much rhyme reason or organization.  Today we spent some time on patterns.  First with breakfast, we ate our fruit salad in a pattern, first melon, then cherry then apple.  We made patterns with sidewalk chalk outside.  We did a few worksheets identifying patterns, which CJ told me how to do it and all the correct answers before I even got the crayons out!  They did some more practice with the tweezers, and some scissor practice.  Tomorrow they told me that they want to do more school in the school room.  So I have some stuff planned.  We never did finish all the stuff for N and 14, so that will be on the agenda for tomorrow, and of course lots of reading.  CJ is coming along so quickly with the reading that it boggles my mind.  We can't even spell things to each other because he is able to figure almost any word out.  We are going to have to learn a new language to keep secrets from them!  I would really like to finish the alphabet by fall and to start on letter blends and more in depth decoding and phonics.  Their interest in learning amazes me, and I hope to get in some really great science activities soon.  Rich is going to start a new schedule, where he works 4 10 hour shifts and has Saturday, Tuesday and Wednesday off.  He is going to be helping me with science, since it is his biggest interest.  I can't wait!

100th Post Today!!!

Today is my hundredth post.  Thank you all for reading all 100 long-winded and oft times convoluted ramblings.  I love chronicling what we do and how the kids are growing and learning.  This week we are back to "official" lessons, the letter N, number 14, Newt, Narwhal, and feelings.  We are also focusing on fine motor skills, using child friendly tweezers, lacing bead onto shoelaces, and other activities that encourage fine motor coordination, patience, and appropriate pencil holding.  Tomorrow we will spend a fair bit of time making feelings puppets and using them with our puppet theater.  In between cooling off outside in the sprinkler and baby pool, of course.  I am sure the kids will also be sneaking some of the bountiful berries growing in the garden!  Pictures to come.  Again thanks for helping me write 100 entries!

Belated Birthday Pics

It occurs to me that I never finished posting pictures of CJ's and Eliza's birthday party.  I was having computer issues, and then whoops it just slipped my mind.  Well I will remedy that right now.

 These would be the cakes I spent hours making.  Eliza wanted a butterfly, and CJ wanted a rainbow.  So I made both.  From scratch.  I know not my brightest idea ever.  But they were adorable, and the kids were thrilled.  That little white pile of frosting was supposed to be a cloud, and I used edible glitter on it.  It was generally decided to look more like unicorn poo than a cloud.  :)

 CJ and Eliza loved their new trikes though only now are able to start using them without a lot of help.  Our friends are so great playing with the kids, and helping them.

 All the kids crowded around when it was gift time, and everyone who came knows the kids so well, that they got perfect gifts.  They received several outdoor games and gardening tools, books, clothes and awesome stuff.  CJ was particularly excited for the Amazon gift cards they received, because it meant he could "go shopping on the computer."

And the ever proud grandparents, who can't stand to be away from them for more than a day or two.  They adore them, but sometimes that isn't so easy. 











And now pictures of CJ's actual birthday.

 Here he is blowing out the candles.  I would show you his birthday dinner, but it literally was the exact same thing that we had for Eliza's, as that was what he asked for. 

We went to an Easter Egg hunt at a local nursery on CJ's birthday (shortly before Easter) and the kids loved getting to hunt in the plants and meeting the Easter Bunny.  It was a pretty great day all around, good weather, and lots of good family time.  Who can ask for more than that?

What a Wonderful Weekend!

We had a beautiful weekend, weather wise and otherwise.  We spent time with friends, helped out some family, and enjoyed the weather and great food that came with the weekend.  On Saturday CJ and Eliza convinced Daddy and our friend Justin that they needed an obstacle course.  This made me happy since I know I should be doing more physical education activities, and this fit the bill perfectly.  He started with the word start in chalk on the sidewalk, then a math problem they had to solve first.  He drew boxes they needed to jump into, built planks up for them to climb up and walk across, things for them to crawl through and under.  He even used his traffic cones for the kids to run around.  It was great, and they had so much fun, they did it for literally hours!  We decided that once a week (or weekend) we would build one based on whatever gross motor skills appropriate for them. 

 Here CJ was explaining all the rules to Eliza.

 I love this picture of her, it really shows her adorable running and walking style.

 I was amazed at how well they "walked the plank" here.  They climbed right up, walked right across, and in the dozens of times they walked it, they each only fell once.

 Eliza had a little trouble with the squatting under the finish line.  I don't think she will be a master of the limbo.

CJ did a great job jumping right into the squares he wanted to.  By the time they went to bed they were exhausted and fell right to sleep.  Plus we all had so much fun doing this together.  What a great activity for us to do instead of watching television.

Vacation From School, Not From Learning

Generally children and parents have a summer vacation from schooling.  In our house I believe it will be a spring vacation.  I have spent so much time getting the garden prepared, planted, weeded and what not that it has left me little time to devote to true lesson planning.  I have taken the kids to several classes at the library, most of which were incredibly disappointing.  They have learned a lot about seasons, weeds, insects, plant types, etc.  Yesterday CJ was looking at one of my gardening books, pretending it was a scientific field journal.  He noticed that the word flowers was on it.  He asked me what the rest of the words said, and I told him he already knew them all, and he read to me the big book of flowers.  He even opened it and recognized some types of flowers we have in the yard.  We have been doing small learning projects like finishing a book of colors and shapes.  We have been reading, and measuring the water in our rain gauge.  We have been identifying clouds and insects.  We have done some projects involving recycling, and a lot of mini lessons focusing on feelings, and appropriate ways to show feelings.  They are getting to the age where controlling their tempers is becoming extremely difficult, especially since they aren't getting nearly enough sleep.  The more tired they are the less they are able to handle disappointment, frustration and changes in schedule.  Hopefully we will have a relatively quiet and restful holiday weekend.  The garden is officially planted, and all I have to do now is keep up with weeding and watering.  The kids love watching things pop up after planting.  They are helping their Memere with an herb bed at their house.  They helped plant the seeds, and helped fill the bed with soil.  When the seedlings are big enough they are going to help plant them.  I am sure they will also help eat them! 

We have already been harvesting parsley, oregano, chives, onions, leeks, scallions, thyme, cabbage, and greens.  So much of the garden was still strong when we uncovered, and many things reseeded themselves. 

It is wonderful to finally see some green everywhere and know that soon we will have wonderful food to harvest and flowers to make us happy.  Rich even built me an arbor to grow moonflower and morning glories.  We have it on the stone patio he just put in this year, where we go at night to have a fire and relax.  It will have an evening fragrance garden.  The kids helped me pick out some beautiful plants for that area.  

Here is where CJ and Eliza learned all about perennials.  They noticed when they started seeing strawberry flowers that they were the same as last year.  We also harvested some rhubarb and they learned all about how to can strawberry rhubarb jam!  They helped me measure the sugar and the fruit.  They loved tasting the results!

I think we will have some wonderful school time in the coming weeks as the work in the yard slows down.  I am particularly excited to start Eliza reading.  CJ is coming along so quickly that he reads everywhere.  Eliza sees letters and numbers, but really wants to start reading words.  What a joy!

Themes and apologies for my absence!

So again, sorry to be so sparse in my update duties, but the computer has been acting wonky when I try to update anything, and we have been working like mad in the garden.  I will be posting pictures soon of CJ's birthday, and of the new improvements in the garden.

I really want to talk a little bit about how important using themes to teach the kids has been to me.  Today we listened to the song Scarborough Faire on my ipod.  I love the song, and I am sure you all know it.  Parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme?  Well I taught them a bit about what the song means, and we went into the garden to look at all the herbs, discussing that these herbs have been used by cooks and medical practitioners for centuries.  We looked up the herbs in a book and found out what people used to think they did, and what the herb names mean and stand for.  Rosemary for example was often given as a gift and means remembrance.  We are having Scarborough Faire chicken for dinner, using all these herbs from the garden.  We talked about how they grow, and how the plants are different and the same.  We tasted them all.  We learned the words to the song.  We even read a children's book that took place in medieval times to talk about how people lived differently. 

Recently I have also done themes for Earth day and recycling.  There was a recycling program at the library for the kids, which actually wasn't very good, but helped me form a theme for the kids.  We recycled newspaper and some seeds into plantable seed pods.  We recycled dryer lint by putting it out for the birds.  We found ways to recycle many items in the house to help us with the garden and other projects.  The kids understand what recycling is, and why it is important for the earth.  We read Earth day books, and watched Sesame Street Earth day movies.  We spent a few days talking about the Earth and how to take care of it. 

Teaching in themes makes it so much easier for me to plan lessons, and I find it makes the lessons stick with the kids much more.  This is mostly because we spend so much time with one topic and we learn about it in so many ways.  We integrate all subject areas into the one topic making it a part of our entire day and week.  This makes it seem important.  I even try to integrate topics into our games and play.  For recycling we made toys to play with using old discarded items.  For today we are playing ring around the rosie, a game that originated in medieval times.  There are so many ways to integrate and use themes in everything we do.  I also love the consistency it brings to our learning. 

That is all for today, and I will be posting pictures soon, as long as my computer allows it.  Off to plant some more seeds in the garden!