field trips

We've been on two field trips since I last posted!! Where does the time go?

In April, we went to Soul Honey to tour a bee farm! It was our largest group yet and so much fun!  The sweetest family owns and runs the farm/field trips.  She educated us about bees, showed us the hives, and the garden she's growing to attract more bees. They had a large playscape for the kids to play on and sold many products in their store.  I hope to visit them every few years to help their business and see how they grow!

* * * * * * * * * *

In May, we went to the Dallas Museum of Art for a private lesson on Art Olympics where we studied art from ancient Greece and Rome.  Our teacher, Leah, was awesome!! She really got the kids attention and it was right at their level. We had another great turnout which always makes it more fun.

The kids did a parade like the Opening Ceremony.

They learned about the ancient olympics and how they are different now. They acted out different sports (track, swimming, discus, etc).

They each decorated their own medal for something they excel at.

Joshua won the medal for riding his bike!

unfortunately, some kids are missing from this picture

Afterward, we enjoyed lunch at Klyde Warren Park. We got pizza from a food truck and it was YUMMY! The kids played at a playground/splashpad nearby. It was so nice!!

I'm so glad I took the leap and formed this field trip group! I am looking forward to next year, and making a few minor changes.  I have so many fond memories from the field trips I went on as a child and hope to give my boys the same opportunities. 

BFIAR: Katy No-Pocket

After Corduroy, we rowed Katy No-Pocket by Emma Payne.  I have to admit, I did not love this book, like I have the others.  It was a long story, and while it was cute, it just didn't capture and hold my attention. It's about a kangaroo who doesn't have a pouch to carry her baby in so he's always left behind. She asks several other animals how they carry their babies but none of the solutions work for Katy. So she heads to the city and finds a carpenter wearing an apron full of pockets. He gives it to her and now she has a way to not only carry her own baby, but other animal babies as well!

Our companion books were about Australia and other marsupials:

• Are We There Yet? by Alison Lester
• Wombat Goes Walkabout by Michael Morpurgo
• Pouch! by David Ezra Stein
• Does a Kangaroo Have a Mother, too? by Eric Carle
• Elmer and the Kangaroo by David McKee

We added many, many, many cards to our Animal Classification Collection.

We made aprons so the boys could carry beanie babies around.  This lasted a whole five minutes with my boys. It might have been more fun with girls, or aprons with bigger pockets. 

We learned about tools, like the carpenter in the book had.

And that's about all we did.

This week, we also went on a tour of the police station!  I hoped to do this when we rowed the Red Carpet, but it didn't work out that way. It was still a lot of fun! We had a group of nine boys!

meeting room

where the police officers put their weapons before entering the jail

inside a jail cell

checking out the police car

where evidence is stored

Thank you, Highland Village Police Department!

BFIAR: If Jesus Came to My House

This was not a normal week for me, but it was reality. Frustrating as it was, it truly needed to happen. I've always known one of my biggest struggles in homeschooling would be flexibility.

I am a planner.

I like my schedule.

I like routine.

And I don't like change.

But that's not life... and if I refuse to change, homeschooling will never work.

This week the weather has not cooperated (which affected my plans and my mood), we had a field trip, and an *almost* emergency trip to the ER.

Monday started out cloudy and cold... the perfect storm for mommy to battle depression.  All I want to do when it's cloudy is snuggle on the couch under a blanket.  How realistic is that?!?!?  Even if it's not raining or cold, it's cloudy way too many days out of the year to let this affect my schooling. But today it did. All we accomplished was reading our book. We rowed If Jesus Came to My House by Joan Gale Thomas.

Our companion books with a shadow theme were:

• The Shape of Me and Other Stuff by Dr. Seuss
• Moonbear's Shadow by Frank Asch
• Nothing Sticks Like a Shadow by Ann Tompert
• The Black Rabbit by Philippa Leathers

On Tuesday, the weather was still cloudy... aka not good for learning about shadows. So we read our book again and I had Joshua build a castle for Jesus with his blocks. Of course I didn't get picture, because that would've been too cool. <sigh>

On Wednesday, we went to the Dallas Symphony Orchestra! We had box seats so that was really cool. Joshua loved it! I thought the music choices could have been better... they did an American theme, so music by American composers. I thought it would've been better for Joshua to hear music by Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, Rachmaninoff... or at least songs that were familiar! But it was still a great experience. I'm sure there will be many more symphonies in our future.

Joshua LOOOOVED the organ! 

By the time we got home, I was exhausted and no school was completed.

On Thursday, we read our book again and discussed rhyming words. This is still quite a difficult concept for Joshua to grasp. The other day he told me "turkey and turkey rhyme!" He said it with such excitement it was hard to tell him that wasn't exactly true. We'll keep working on it.

We experimented with shadows inside and matched animals to their shadows.

We also added some more animal classification cards: kitten, dog, elephant, cow, rabbit, bear, and butterfly.  Joshua enjoyed learning the animal baby names (kid, lamb, calf, cub).  I had him match the card to the animal in the book.

On Friday, I was determined to get more accomplished. But our emergency changed all of that.

By Saturday, the sun finally came out and the weather was warm enough to be outside! Thank You Lord! We traced Joshua's shadows at 10, 11, 12, 1, and 4.  It was cool to see them move and change from long and skinny to short and wide. This was a great activity!

I so enjoyed this book. The thought of Jesus coming to play is such a great analogy to teach little ones kindness toward one another. The pictures were beautiful and it's written like a poem, with stanzas and rhyming words. This will be a treasured book in our home for many years to come.