Baby, it’s cold outside!

Happy New Year–a little late.  We made it through the holiday season and were blessed with health, family fun and lots of presents under the tree.  Ds8 and Ds6 each got a DSi for Christmas and it has proved to be an incredible motivator.  I’ve never really had any problems getting them to do their school work but telling them that they can’t have media/electronic fun time before their school is finished has caused us to get started and finished with school faster than ever.  Nice!

Changing the subject, I have been reminded several times per week one of the reasons why I am so glad that I home school my sons.  From time to time Ds8 or Ds6 will prefer to stand beside the desk to do their work or stretch their legs during a lesson.  Because I’m usually only dealing with one child at a time it’s not distracting.  In a class room of 20-30 students there is no way a teacher could allow the students to stand up and do their work or walk around the lesson is being taught.  It would bring utter chaos to the classroom.  But, imnsho, children don’t need to be sitting still for more than very brief moments at a time.  If my son can better concentrate on the lesson while standing up or walking around, then so be it.

Tis the season!

The busy, busy season it is!  We’re preparing for the holidays and I’m wrapping up the loose ends of this semester of grad school.  We’re still trucking along doing Time4Learning and our language arts workbooks.  Ds6 is reading daily and learning new words all the time. He asks what every word he sees is.  I love this age!  It’s so much fun to watch them wake up to words and reading.  They realize that words are everywhere and reading is something to be enjoyed as well as a new way of discovering information about their world.

Officially a first grader!

Ds6 has finished his Kindergarten work and is officially a 1st grader.  Where we live he misses the public school birthday cut-off by a few weeks.  I wonder how this will affect him if he chooses to go to public school someday?

I’m super proud of my little guy. He worked hard to complete the Kindy work and is reading and writing right on target.  He’s great in math, too.

Trucking through Kindy and 3rd

Ds6 is just days away from officially being a 1st grader.  A few more math assignments and he’ll be there.  Ds8 is right on schedule with his third grade work, too.

I have to be careful not to push too much since they are newly six and newly eight.  I don’t want to get too far ahead.  Then again, finishing the basics leaves time for exploring their specific interests during the summer months.

A dedicated school room

I am very excited to be getting a school room that will have no other purpose than school!  We have four bedrooms and right now each child has his own room.  In the master bedroom we have two queen beds.

Ds3 has been sleeping in one of the beds for over a month now.  Around age three-four our boys have always shown interested in co-sleeping again whether it be with us or with their brother(s).  He rarely plays in his room, either.

Ds6 and Ds8 have a “sleepover” every night on the floor of Ds6’s room.  This is, of course, after we bought them all these super comfy, environmentally smart, organic mattresses.  Ha!  So, we’re moving all of the beds into Ds6’s room.  He has a very large walk-in closet that easily fits all three dressers as well as everyone’s clothing.  His room will become the boys’ bedroom.  Maybe they’ll use those beds now?

Since Ds8’s room will be bed-less it will become the play room.

Everyone is excited about the change and I’m happy that I’ll have my dining room back as just a dining room.

Rainy week

Last week was filled with rain, rain, thunderstorms and more rain.  Every single soccer and football practice was canceled.  On Friday, ds3’s soccer coach held a makeup practice.  On Saturday we had soccer opening ceremonies and ds8 and ds3 each had a game.  Of course, there is no score keeping but ds3 scored two goals and his team won . . .er, made the most goals.  Ds8’s team also won and the boys at that age make no apologies about keeping score, whether or not the coaches are allowed.  LOL

Ds6 is flying through his Kindy work.  He’ll be finished with it by mid-October and while he’s still working through his “100 Words Kids Need to Read by 1st Grade” workbook, I’m going to consider him a first grader once he finishes his core Kindy work.   I’m so proud of him.

Fall in full swing!

Tomorrow marks the beginning of soccer for ds8 and ds3.   Ds5’s first game is on Tuesday.  I’m still waiting to hear more details about ds8’s football league.  I’m not sure how we’re going to work it in but I’m hopeful.

Ds5 has finished his Kindy Language Arts and we’ll concentrate on Kindy Math more intensely before going to the Kindy Language Arts extensions. Ds8 is sailing through his 3rd math and going a little more slowly through his LA.  Ds3 loves preschool and so far the only issue is that he plays too rough with his “best fweind!” who also has older brothers.  His teacher is an angel and is more amused by them than upset but is nipping the rough play in the bud now before someone gets hurt.  They aren’t allowed to sit beside each other.  As she was telling this and assuring me that ds3 is a sweet, helpful boy he was jumping off the third step up and giggling while his older brothers urged him to be careful.  This one has NO fear.  He can’t.  He has to keep up with the brothers!

Art for Homeschoolers started on Thursday and ds8 and ds5 loved it.  Ds5 did his project almost completely in green–his favorite color. Ds8 used all the colors of the rainbow that he could fit on the paper–just as he’s been doing since preschool.  I love it.

First day back to preschool!

Today was ds3’s first day back to preschool.  He loved it, of course.  He’s in “for real” preschool as we jokingly call it when our boys have graduated out of the two-mornings-per-week Mom’s Morning Out and into 3-mornings-per-week preschool.  This year he had the option of going 4 days but I chose the three day option.  I’m just not ready for him to be away from me that much.  Also, he’s starting soccer this year and with our crazy Fall schedule that extra day would be overkill, I’m afraid.  He already needs to start napping again because it seems nearly impossible to get him bed early enough to counteract his early waking. lol

Homeschooling is going well with ds8 and ds5.  We’ve recently visited a very gracious local homeschooling family who invited our homeschool group over to see some baby chicks.  The boys loved the experience!

Soon we will have our annual back-to-school get together with the homeschool group.  I’m excited for that because this year it is my goal to have the boys meet as many other homeschool children as possible.  Last year was all about getting it together and getting into our groove as a homeschool family and now we have time to “socialize”.  Hee hee!  I couldn’t resist . . .

Changes. Again.

I’ve decided to lighten up on the course load for the boys for fall.  Ds5 is clearly not ready for piano just yet.  Bless his heart, he tried but he’s just not there.  I decided to wait until year to begin teaching him.

I also decided to drop Spanish for ds8 and the additional history lessons for ds8 and ds5 until at least January.  For now we’ll concentrate on Time4Learning’s Language Arts, Math, Science for both and add Social Studies for ds8.  Ds5 is very interested in maps and learning the countries right now so we’re unschooling in that regard and he’s picking it up so quickly.  In addition to the computer curriculum we are doing grade level vocabulary/spelling/writing and literature.

Ds8 will continue with piano and is doing great.

We start at the same time and work with one short break for each child until around 3:30-4.  Trying to cram Spanish and History in was overkill.  It worked with our relaxed summer schedule but not so much now.  There will be plenty of time next Spring and Fall to pick those up again.

Gearing up for Fall!

This is our last week of easy-breezy.  Next week things start to pick up.  Ds8 had his 8 year well check today to make sure he’s ready for sports.  He’s signed up for soccer and flag football, although I believe the two are going to conflict and I don’t know how he will play both.  :/  He could play tackle football in a different league but isn’t interested. He has “tryouts” on Wednesday and dh has coaches meetings on Thursday.

All three boys will be in soccer this year and it’s likely that dh will be coaching all three.  The league needs coaches and never seems to have enough.  We thought things were crazy last year when hubby coached the older two.  Oh boy!

Next Thursday ds3 meets his preschool teacher.  I’m very excited about the teacher he got.  We’ve been in the preschool since ds8 was 2 and it seemed that for whatever reason when the older two were 3 this particular teacher was taking time off from teaching.  She’s an excellent teacher and has been there a while.  Ds3 knows her and she knows him.  The boys have always had amazing preschool teachers and they have loved them and still talk about them so I feel very fortunate.  I will be sad when I’m all out of preschoolers to send to this preschool. lol

I start Fall semester on Monday.  Preschool starts on the 31st and then art classes will start for the older two the week after labor day.  Sports will start then, too.  After that it things will be fast and furious until January.  Hang on tight, family!