Hazel"nut" Academy Update

Here are some pictures from yesterday's colonial day activities. It was our family plus some dear friends that also homeschool and happen to be covering American History as well. The day was a success in terms of hands on learning and good fellowship.

We made quill pens out of turkey feathers we found in the woods. We used store bought ink (cheated on that one) and the kids wrote letters. When they dried we sealed them with red wax and they got to use a signet with the letter H on it to seal up their letters.

Here is Princess Poodle at our mock signing of the Dec. of Indep.

Triple H taking his turn.

This is the craft we made. It is a Game of Graces. We decorated the hoops and painted the sticks. The kids had fun tossing and trying to catch the hoop. We also played marbles which didn't quite work out like I had planned but that's ok. Triple H and his buddy lets call him Monkey, mostly enjoyed rolling the marbles all over the house. On our Colonial Day we also made butter, took a nature hike, and ended the day back in present day at a local Mexican restraurant. hee hee

In other news,

We have completed 14 weeks of Writing With Ease as well as some added dictation because Princess Poodle is ready for this.

We have completed almost 50 lessons in Saxon 2.

We have enjoyed learning about the explorers of North America, the mystery of Roanoke, the first settlements, some on how it was in colonial times, and now we are geared up for the Revolution!!

We have learned about mammals, insects, and spiders. We have taken several nature studies including going to a local animal preserve twice this year. Our most recent adventure is in a post below. We have added many entries to our nature journals.

Princess Poodle is working on her fourth poem for memorization. I will try to post her reciting these soon.

We have added in cursive to Princess Poodles handwriting. We are going to go slow and practice alot. Handwriting is not her favorite thing in the world and never has been . Reminder to self: do not push this to hard!

Triple H is doing so well with his phonics. He is working his way through the single consonant tickets on the Ferris Wheel song and his blending of three letter words improves a little at a time. He continues to learn how to write his letters properly. He is counting well to thirty and by 10's to 100. He loves art as does Princess Poodle and we will continue with our art just taking a break from AP and learning about some artists and their work.

Our second quarter seems to be off to a better start due to some prayer and some added flexibility. Instead of daily folders labled and filled with each days work, I changed the labels to reflect subjects etc. This will work as long as I don't let math slip and have to do three lessons in a day or something like that. I just like that I feel free to do stuff each day as we want and as life leads still making sure to get the basics in of course.

Have a wonderful weekend! I'm so glad it is Friday. And I'm glad that its noon and I'm still in my jammies, and Im glad that Princess Poodle is in her room strumming her guitar making up some kind of song and that Triple H is downstairs writing another quill pen letter. I better go check on him to make sure ink isn't everywhere.

Sheryl