And Abraham Went Out . . .: Fruits

Just stopping for a minute to be thankful. Thankful for the fruits of my labor that I couldn't have labored for if it weren't for my husband. He's give me time and money to do these things that mean so much for me (and hopefully to our family as well).

So below are some veggies that I brought up from the garden today. What a colorful bounty!!

Below are some fruits of my educational prep work. Doug essentially kept the kids busy and away from the house for two weekends. This last weekend was especially fruitful. I couldn't have accomplished so much if it weren't for him. I'm in a much better place to begin studies next week. I still have my list that I'm chipping away on but I'm in a decent place now. Thanks hun!!

It may not look like much but this binder is my workhorse. It's the command station in our Grand Central Station (the kitchen). Many families have a dedicated school room. For our family, the home is our primary location of learning, and the kitchen is the heart of our home, so that's where things generally spiral out from. We have a number of study places all over our home (and outside) but generally the kids know that if they need to come check-in with me, that is where they will find me. So this binder will often be on the kitchen counter or table. Beginning with "Morning Time"

This weekend, most of my work when into compiling this binder.

On top you see our overall schedule. The kids all have copies of it in their folders as well.

Morning Time routine below. And new memory selections behind this page. Review memory behind the next tab. And future selections behind that.

I'm hoping this list will keep my organized and up-to-date for what I'll need for science

experiments and Mace's pre-school units.

Our first memory selection for Shakespeare. This year's play is As You Like It.

One thing that was time-consuming (but hopefully delightfully fruitful in the future)

was our geography plans. I wanted to delve into geography in a fun way this year. I had no desire

to purchase a geography curriculum. I have enough formal curriculum in other subjects, that wanted

something a little different for geography. So I wrote out my own curriculum of sorts. It took a bit of time to write out the year's plans. We'll use The Handy Geography Answer Book to digest small chunks of general geography knowledge daily. The same book also has interesting bites of info on the regions we'll be studying. We will learn about one new country every week. We'll memorize

the capitals of that country and of a neighboring country.

As you might be able to see here, our first week we'll start in the Middle East (because our history also starts in the Middle East; Ancient World), with Iraq and Iran. Mace and Nutmeg and I will read through several pictures books on every country. The boys will watch videos on each country.

You know I love food and trying new things, so each we'll also have a dinner recipe from each country. All the books, dinners, etc are all planned out.

I found some pretend passports for .99 cents and over a hundred flag stickers. So I'm sure Nutmeg and Mace will have fun with that.

After breakfast I'll quiz the kids on the country locations with these maps. I also added several new geography apps to our iPad. I tried one myself: stellar! I think I found a new little hobby with my spare time. :)

In the binder I also have Mace's pre-school plans ("Mace's Alphabet Path.") I don't like buying pre-school curriculum either. Honestly, I don't even think pre-school is necessary but it builds in active together-time into our day and that's an excellent thing. I don't Mace to be shuffled away during the day for long periods, so I'm pleased to have some wonderful plans for him as well.

Here are our Unit One history plans behind the history tab. . .

And our studied dictation (spelling essentially) selections for the year.

We inherited a bookcase from Grandma, so we were able to move many of our books downstairs and now have ample room upstairs (near the kitchen) for all our books/supplies for current studies. Thanks Grandma!