Whatevs

Obviously managing three kiddos, keeping house, making exercise a priority, and doing school, keeping up with this blog has been difficult. We have been doing Five in a Row most weeks since I last wrote, and we are doing all kinds of learning in the Gerlach house. We took a trip to Astoria for 4 days for Spring Break, and it was a great trip too! I have been praying and considering what to do for next year and have a lot planned for Caley's kindergarten year. We decided to refer her for a special education evaluation with Mukilteo School District because of some concerns with her speech articulation, and depending on whether she qualifies will determine some of what we can do for her school next year. I am looking into working with a district north of Spokane so we can access state funds and be reimbursed for some of our costs such as piano lessons if we choose to do them. There are some legalities that need to be determined however, and I'm currently weighing whether the reimbursement is worth adhering to the state's rules. Such as, I'm not sure if I want to commit to a lesson plan for next year when it's our first official year as homeschoolers and we'll (I'll) be learning the ropes doing school and balancing the other two kids and such. I'd kind of rather keep things simple until I understand more of how this homeschooling thing goes.

However I have decided to use a unit study curriculum called KONOS which arranges the units by God's attributes. In the fall we will do a unit on attentiveness and study such things as hearing, ears and eyes, sounds and music, frontiersmen, and indians. To supplement we will also be using Saxon K Math three days a week and 100 Easy Lessons for phonics/reading. I'm not sure what to use after Caley's worked through the phonics book, but I for sure don't want to squish her love for reading, and may just assign her books to read and do spelling lists, etc. Still praying/talking/deciding on that one.

I'm also realizing how excited I'm getting about school! Field trips and books I can enjoy with my kids, seeing them love to learn, I can't wait! Just this week we were researching about Russia because our FIAR book was Russia when I went in another room and captured a housefly! I showed it to the girls and then suggested we draw a picture of it. I put it in a bowl and we each drew it the best we could. We had to look closely to see how many wings and legs the fly had. Instant science lesson that I couldn't have planned if I wanted to!

We have been reading some fun books that I need to at least list here so we don't forget. I would like to get several of them for our personal library.

Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel- cute, cute book that almost made me cry!

The Glorious Flight- The girls loved saying, "Papabluray!" because the main character was Papa Louis Bleriot who flew over the English Channel

How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World- this one was adorable! Caley and I acted out parts of the book and it made her little imagination take off! We also read the spin-off book by the same author "How to Make a Cherry Pie and See the USA"

Grandfather's Journey- We weren't as much into this one...

Cranberry Thanksgiving- This was a cute, cute story. It in they sing "We Gather Together" and it gave me the idea to open our school days next year with a hymn, either on the piano or on CD. The book also had "16 Men On A Dead Man's Chest" which the girls loved because lately we've been listening to pirate music in the car.

Another Celebrated Dancing Bear- This one took place in Russia and Caley knew the drill- find Russia on the map and color the Russian flag.

Weekly Wrap Up: Back in Action

We have been doing school the last few weeks but I haven't found the time to blog about it. The week of Valentines Day we read "A Pair of Red Clogs" by Masako Matsuno and it was a beautiful story about a little girl in Japan who got new shoes and accidentally cracked them and tried to trick her mother into buying new clogs. She learned not to try and trick people and tell the truth. It was a fun story for the girls to learn from. We talked a bit about Japan and did some counting and talking about weather. They also made a Japanese flag picture by gluing red yarn on a white piece of paper in a circle. I am really enjoying that through the FIAR curriculum the girls are learning about other countries. They regularly recognize American flags and are showing awareness of other country's flags too.

That same week we picked up doing Caley's reading book again and she showed great improvement and fluency in her reading, although the lessons were review. I realized it might be helpful for her to do lessons at least twice before moving ahead, and it so far is working. Caley is enjoying the stories again, which is so encouraging.

The following week the story was "The Rag Coat" by Lauren Mills which was the sweetest story, and it made me cry. It's about a little girl in the Appalachian mountains in the late 1800s (I'm guessing) who isn't able to attend school because she doesn't have a coat to keep her warm in the winter. Her father worked in the coal mines and said he'd find a way for her to attend school, but is unable too because he passes away. Her mother's friends who work on quilts to sell, "The Quilting Mothers," then pool their quilting scraps and make the girl a coat and she's able to attend school and makes friends. Caley really liked the story and asked lots of thoughtful questions about the girl's friends and funerals, wearing black, and going home to be with Jesus. It was beautiful to snuggle on the couch with her and talk about real things.

That week the girls also made a rag coat craft by ripping paper, did shape puzzles, did some other puzzles, and helped me make laundry detergent. Caley also sorted laundry into darks, lights and towels. It's encouraging to have our school be so much a part of real life and I believe teaching skills through real life makes it much more meaningful.

Last week we read "Who Owns the Sun" by Stacy Chbosky. This was a surprising book. It was written in 1987 by a girl who was 16 and won the "Written and Illustrated by" award which honors young authors. The story is about a young boy who asks his father "who owns the sun," "who owns the birds" and "who owns the flowers" and his father replies, "No one, they belong to everyone." Then the boy realizes someone owns his father, because his father is a slave. His father says he is not really owned, and the boy perseveres despite knowing the hard truth.

The concept of slavery was one that I wasn't sure about broaching with the girls, and I hope to read this book again when they may better understand. But we still did coordinating activities and had a fun week. The illustrations are with paint, so we did some painting, talked about Genesis and creation (because really everything belongs to God), and talked about food and food groups. They peeled some carrots and Caley identified which foods belonged to what group. Caley also did some more reading book and is such a good little reader!

We spent some time at the doctor's office for Wesley's 1 month and Caley's 5 year appointment. Caley was very compliant with her vision and hearing test, and they played "doctor" with the tools in the exam room. Later in the week we went to playgroup where the topic was China so they practiced using chopsticks, "fishing" and eating ethnic foods. We also went to an awesome park with a merry go round, or "merry go around" as Amelia calls it. They also moved rocks and helped Daddy in the back yard, there's nothing like a little manual labor to encourage character! :)

Doing school is largely doing life together, and learning together through it all. Although I am starting to feel the pressure that in September Caley will officially be a kindergartner and school will need to be somewhat more structured, or at least I'll need to make some decisions about how we will do things in the fall.

Weekly Wrap Up: Taking it Easy

We didn't do a "Five in a Row" (FIAR) book this week but we did get back to our semi-normal routine. Mostly this week involved going to our regular groups like women's group and playgroup, running errands, playing games and reading lots of books. We also spent a lot of time cuddling with Wesley!

Next week we will get back into the routine of FIAR with the book "A Pair of Red Clogs."

Friday however, we took a trip to the Edmonds library and made some Valentine's Day cards, and the girls had a lot of fun. We went last year too. The library had all the materials and handled all the clean up, so we just went and crafted for nearly two hours.

This week also we have been working on general obedience and teaching the girls how to play and keep themselves busy while Mommy is busy caring for Wesley. Much of this is in the form of making Caley doing things for herself, like putting on her own socks and shoes, instead of doing it for her. Generally she will get frustrated and yell or cry because she can't do it (or is unwilling to try) and I have to be persistent in telling her she's doing fine and I won't be able to help her. A little bit of frustration is good--it teaches them to keep trying.

Caley is getting better at reading, or at least recognizing words. Grama and Papa Bales gave her some Disney books with a pen that reads the words on the page. Caley plays with the books while in the car and is getting better at recognizing words and letters. She also is interested in writing words and regularly asks how to spell something. During these instances I try to help her figure out what letter is next instead of just telling her. For example she wanted to write "Apple Cider Day" because she and Amelia were drinking apple cider. I helped her sound out the letters in "apple" and then told her to add an "e" on the end because it's silent. Teachable moments!

Something that I'm also working on is patience, and could use prayers for patience in learning how to manage three kids. So far it's going okay, but there are better days than others. Thankfully little Wesley is a good sleeper and I've been getting adequate sleep at night. I just need to learn to rest during the day when I can instead of go go go around the house. Although a small victory in the "managing three kids" category on Wednesday--getting all three to nap at the same time!

Thursday night Caley had a Daddy Date and Amelia had a Mommy Date. I'm not allowed to know what happened on the Daddy Date but I think it involved getting me a present. :) For the Mommy Date Amelia and I sat in the upstairs bathroom and listened to music, ate candy, painted our nails and did makeup! She's such a beauty queen.

Until next time...happy learning!

We haven't done formal "school" in a while because Mommy had Wesley on January 28th! He's so cute and we love him very much. We are practicing being big girls and good big sisters by being patient and helpful. Today we helped Mommy give Wesley a bath and we like to give him his binky. We are hoping to start school next week a little, depending on how Mommy feels. For now, enjoy this picture of when we first met "Baby Boy Wesley."Love, Caley and Amelia

Weekly Wrap Up: Madeline

This week our book of focus was Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans. The girls both loved this book and by Wednesday they could recite many lines in the story. Madeline is about a little girl who lives in a home in Paris, France with 11 other girls and a nun. She gets sick and has to have her appendix out. The story is simple, the illustrations are simple but beautiful and there are a lot of subjects to draw from and learn about.

On Monday we took a trip on the Mukilteo ferry to Whidbey Island, and I tried to help Caley understand the importance of living near water since a river runs through Paris. She maybe understood a little, but had a blast on the ferry and playing in the sand on Whidbey. They also colored a French flag and we compared it to the US flag they colored the previous week.

During the week we also took a trip the the Imagine Children's Museum in Everett and the girls, as always, had a great time. We spent a good deal of time in the firetruck play area and the train area. We went to storytime at the library on Wednesday, which was a treat because it's been several weeks. Our friends Bekah and Ashton were there with their mommies Bethy and Patricia and the girls loved seeing friends. We also went to playgroup.

Friday we did some applied math and I was impressed at Caley's skills in this area. We talked about size, more and less, and matching and sorting of little colored beads.

Pretty standard week!