Mothers Homeschool Journal 9/16/2011

In my life this week…

Wow it has been a very busy few weeks. We spent a day in Indianapolis. We went to the Scottish Rite Cathedral which has beautiful architecture and stained glass. We also went back to the Conservatory. We took a very short vacation to Michigan a few weeks ago. We have now seen Lake Michigan from the Illinois side, the Indiana side, and the Michigan side. We like the Michigan side the best. I climbed another sand dune while Dr. Lazy Palate and Miss Bubbles only made it about 25% of the way up. Little BBQ did eventually climb up the sand dune to watch the sunset with me, but in reality he was more excited to roll down the sand dune. Other than our short vacation our life has been filled with lots of canning. We have been canning peaches and tomatoes. Today we get 3 bushels of apples from a local orchard, so we will be canning tomatoes and apples next week. We are also making chili all week next week for freezer meals. We will be making several different variety of chili to give us some easy freezer meals.

In our homeschool this week…

Our homeschooling group has been revived after a turnaround in the leaders in the group. Everyone seemed enthusiastic, so I hope this enthusiasm continues and field trips actually get planned and executed. I would like to do more as a group. I also hope that some younger kids join the group so Little BBQ has some more kids closer to his age since all the young kids have moved away.

I am inspired by…

I have found Pinterest really inspiring. I like searching for topics that I plan to teach Little BBQ for ideas on activities that we can do since he is very hands on.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

This week we stayed close to home. Tonight we will be going to an open gym at a gymnastics center which is one of our favorite activities.

My favorite thing this week was…

It has been a long few weeks. Last week Miss Bubbles was sick. This week Little BBQ and Dr. Lazy Palate were sick. This has left me running myself ragged trying to keep up with everything. My house is a mess right now. So far my favorite thing this week was harvesting a bunch tomatoes, peppers, okra, and ground cherries out of the garden. I always enjoy working out in the garden outside. Too bad it rained a lot this week, so I did not get to work out in my garden as much as I would have liked.

Things I’m working on…

I have been working on the kid’s felt board. I have made several pieces. The kids seem to love the felt board. Miss Bubbles has used the felt board to learn a lot of different farm animals so everything is not a puppy any more. Little BBQ has finally started using the felt board to tell stories which is why I made the felt board. Now I have Little BBQ begging me to make more pieces.

I’m reading…

I read Intelligence and How to Get It by Richard E. Nisbett which was a great book to read. The book goes into a lot of detail on how we school and things that we do at home can affect intelligence. This book is perfect for a lay person. Nisbett uses a wonderful critical eye to examine the studies in the field and does his best to give a nonbiased report on the latest research. I also read Quirkology by Richard Wiseman, PhD which I really enjoyed. The book covers the psychology of quirky things in life like how to detect a lie, how to tell if someone is really smiling or not, and how superstition affects our society. I am currently reading 1491 by Charles Mann. This book is an alternative history on how Native Americans lived before the arrival of Columbus. The book really resonates well with me. He argues that Native Americans were not merely submissive characters in mother nature’s story but instead they alterned the land and became the master of their own destiny. He argues that the population of the Native Americans was much higher than historians originally thought. He argues that Native Americans routinely practiced controlled burning to keep their land fertile and they planted trees. It seems that their society was a lot more complex than we originally thought.

I’m cooking…

I have been canning tomato soup, ketchup, peach BBQ sauce, tomato consommé, peach sauce, peach pie filling, sugar free peach jam, pizza sauce, and tomato sauce.

I’m grateful for…

Everything.