H is for Habitat

So it has taken a while to get this post up! We took this week off to celebrate Thanksgiving with family in town.

Our H week went pretty well although as usual we didn't get to everything I had planned! We read books (which I forgot to take a picture of this week sorry:( on different animal habitats including the desert, meadow, forest, rainforest, ocean, and the river/pond. We then colored pictures of animals from each place to stick up on our habitat poster seen below ( not all the animals are on yet...Snow White is a very meticulous color-er!)



To finish off our habitat study I have cards for matching the animal name to its home. Here is an example of one of the pages. I got them from taking an online montessori class with Karen Tyler. Her albums have been very useful although I have not been able to stick with a "pure" montessori environment in our home!



We were also busy making Thanksgiving decorations handprint turkeys for place settings on the table. This picture also shows our gourd basket that decorated our Thanksgiving table



and our local library had a turkey craft time where we made paper bag turkeys that are so cute!


Well I think that's all from H week! This week is I week and I is for Indians and Ice Cream! The plan is to make our own Ice Cream! I am also hoping to post some of our advent activities!

Katie

G is for

Well G week has come and gone! Another 2 week letter week....not because I was so full of activities but because we had a trip to New England to visit family for a week and school (although I brought it with us) just didn't seem to happen!

G is for Geometry! For lack of anything better to study and although it is not the sound of G I was going for with my 3 year old we spent the week learning about shapes. We read a variety of great shapes books from our library.



We went on a shape hunt to find shapes in the living room of my in-laws house. I was surprised at how many my 3 year old was able to find on her own. I am finding more and more that she knows so much more that I have taught her! We made tessellations! I remember doing these in geometry class in high school and one of our books talked about them so I thought that Snow White would enjoy making one. She chose the trapezoid from our Geometric cabinet (a harder shape than I would have chosen!) and she got started. It turned out really well and she was very proud of it.



Flower Picker did track a triangle one time put then she had enough! She is still working on the tracing skills!

We also learned about solid shapes compared with flat shapes and used our geometric solids
Both girls really enjoyed using them.



Our author this week was Mirra Ginsburg. We read a varitey of her books including Do-Do's favorite:

Good Morning Chick

And a childhood favorite of mine

How the Sun Was Brought Back to the Sky

Overall I was pleased with what we got done and the amount learned this week. I am really looking forward to H week. H is for Habitats. Snow White can't wait!

Here is one last picture I thought worth sharing! Everyone at work on their handwriting!!!



Katie

All Saints Day Fun!

We had a great day on All Saints Day yesterday. Our co-op group had an All Saints party and all the children dressed up. They all had a blast. They went Saint or treating in the bedrooms upstairs where older siblings were dressed as saints handing out candy, played saints bingo, did a cake walk and made their own saint medals. Here are some photos to sum it up!


A group shot.....in case you can't tell we had 5 Mary's!!


Another attempt to get everyone in!


St. Therese and the Immaculate Heart of Mary


David the Shepard boy

F is for Fire Safety

Well here is all I have from F week....this is the second week that we have attempted letter F and it has not been much more successful than the first! We have been reading books on fire safety

because after a recent trip to the fire station I realized that Snow White didn't even know about 911. So we have touched on 911 and emergencies, her address and phone # (she knows her address but we still have some work on the phone!), what to do if there is a fire, we have tested and cleaned our smoke detectors, and learned all about fire trucks and fire fighters. Here is the only project we did related to fire safety!



I am hoping to work a little more on parts of a flower tomorrow and have her label her own drawing of a flower. (snow white already knows them so it would be a good review and some writing practice!)

We have had some fall fun lately along with our F activities! We had a trip to the pumpkin patch with Granny and some fun in the leaves in our back yard.



So F is for Fall Fun too!!

Katie

I'm still alive!

Well its been a while since I had the time/energy/motivation to post! A lot has happened in the last few months! The main reason I have been on hiatus is that I am expecting baby #4 in March! This has been by far the most difficult pregnancy I have had. Morning sickness...actually all day sickness...which seemed to be never ending, fatigue, hot flashes and on and on!

It is really funny though after a few weeks which I thought would never end I can't imagine that I really felt that bad! It is really amazing how memory works. It is like that for me in labor too....at the time I feel like I might die...but just a short while after giving birth I seem to think it wasn't all that bad. There must be some sort of selective memory function for mothers!!!

Anyway in the midst of all the sickness, my husband started a new job working 2nd shift which has been an adjustment to say the least and I started homeschooling my 5 year old. It has been going relatively well all things considered! We are following the alphabet path from the Serendipity blog. We are already beginning letter F this week

Here's a quick recap with no pictures since I didn't have the energy or presence of mind to take out the camera (one of my main purposes for blogging in the first place *sigh*)

A is for apples. We read some books about apples and apple orchards and we cut apart an apple to see the star shape inside. A is for ants we read a book about ants and made an ant hill drawing with raisins for ants. A is for Alligator we read about alligators and painted a giant alligator. Finally A is for Air we read a book about air and did some air experiments with balloons and bubbles. We also read books by the author Frank Asch



B is for Birds. We read bird books all week and played a matching game with parts of a bird cards, learned about bird feet and matched bird tracks to the correct bird, painted a bird and looked at where different birds live. We also did Bubble painting by putting dish soap, food coloring and water in a baking pan, blew bubbles in with a straw and then set a piece of white paper on the bubbles to make a bubble print! We read books by Jan Brett.



C is for clouds we read the Cloud book by Tommie de Paola and made cotton ball clouds. C is for continents we traced the continents from our big continent puzzle,
colored them in and drew on a landmark for each continent, Grand Canyon North America, Rain forests South America, Penguins Antarctica, Desert Africa, Castles Europe, Great Wall of China Asia and the Great Barrier Reef Australia. We read books by author Eric Carle.



D is for Dinosaurs. We read lots of dinosaur books, looked at our dinosaur figures to separate carnivores from herbivores, drew a picture of what we thought happened to make the dinosaurs extinct with a description of what happened and colored a picture of a dinosaur fossil complete with an attached narrative explaining how fossils are made. We read books by author Tommie de Paola.



E is for Experiments and we fell completely flat on this week!! We did 0 experiments all week. It was all we could do to get our reading, math, handwriting and poetry in. We did read books by author Lois Ehlert.



Too bad but hopefully we will be back on track this week for F week! F is for Flowers and Fire Safety!!

I will post again soon to share the other everyday school activities we do for math, reading, phonics, religion, and handwriting! I hope to get back to posting more regularly now that I am feeling better! We have really been enjoying ourselves!!

Katie

Felt Show Update

SO..The party was not a roaring success. Only 2 people made it and 1 will order and the other will host a catalog show. I am in the middle of my first catalog show right now so I am not sure how those turn out. I am sure that the parties are much more effective when you can see the felt in person and touch it and see that it is a much better quality than the other felt boards you can buy in the store. Plus I can explain all the reasons why Story Time Felts is so much better than other products!!!

I have a show tonight that I am expecting a better turn out from and I am picking up an order from a day care center tomorrow morning so hopefully this month will turn out alright after all!!!!

Katie

Story Time Felts

So this Saturday I am hosting a felt show at my house (I sell Story Time Felts) for my neighbors and some friends who have not been able to make a show yet. However so far only one person has given me an RSVP saying that she is coming. I am a little concerned but still hoping for the best.
I hosted a Pampered Chef show for my neighbors a couple of years ago and I dont think I got any RSVP's but 5 people came so I am just hoping the same thing will happen again. I was really counting on this show to help me to break out my circle of friends into people I don't know so that my business will grow. So I will just pray that the neighbors are in a neighborly mood tomorrow night at 8!! I will post the results soon!!