No words

Back from a great week at Disney. Husband layed off today. ISn't that great timing?!!! Hopefully a school update coming soon. We are still on vacation for the rest of this week and I"m glad, I need it!

Quick Updates

Why can't I seem to find time to update this blog? Here are a few tidbits about what we have been doing. In Geography we learned about Italy. We made Venetician Carnival masks, read about Da Vinci, and colored our maps and flags for that country. Princess Poodle also read a mystery about Rome. Triple H seem to be progressing with his reading. We are moving slow but I am very proud of his progress. He wants to read like his sister but I keep reminding him to be patient. Truth is I want to read like his sister. She is a reading machine! I'm beginning to think she reads to get a break from him. ha ha
We will start our co-op in a few weeks and I know the kids are ready for that.

This coming week is family vacation. We are off to our favorite resort at Disney World. Coronado Springs here we come! This vacation is needed so much right now. The kids and I are exausted and need a change of scenery.

Finally, I am still continuing to paint when I can get a chance. And I feel fall in the air. Yeah!!!!

Thanks for stopping by and sorry for the lame post.

Bonjour!! With Pictures.

Crepe filled with chocholate! Yummy

Triple H making crepes.

Princess Poodle making crepes.
Monet water lily tissue art.

Just a few pictures from our time spent in France. We have also started French lessons. Our local library has Rosetta Stone on the computers for free. Why French? Why not Spanish which would be much more practical. I don't know. We are just doing what we want to do. Triple H works on math and reading while Princess poodle and I take French. What fun! Off to French lessons. Au Revoir

Update on Hazelnut Academy

I wanted to post a few pictures of some of the things we have been working on in addition to our curriculum basics. I won't bore you with posting math sheets or cursive writing practice (oh the torture!). We spent two weeks "visiting" England in our countries and cultures portion of school. My goal is not to have the kids walk away being able to quote the type of government or the population total of each country. I want them to get an idea of where in the world these countries are, how life can be like in some of these areas, but mostly to just enjoy the sights, sounds, tastes, etc. of a place different from their own. Who knows what or how much of what we teach will stick. History and geography and culture are not like math facts. I did almost fall on the floor when Triple H came to the office and asked me in his still very toddler sounding voice, "Momma, how do you spell Joseph William Mallord Turner?"((the four named artist was said so speedily and with slurred sounds that only a Momma could decipher) and then , Momma, what do you think about him? He was attempting to write about him in the Hazelton Sunday News, or at least his copycat version of what his sister was doing. She was writing about Shakespeare. For Princess Poodle, my literary minded child, Shakespeare was right up her alley and she is begging me to buy more kid versions of his plays. This past week school was put on hold for a four day long art camp in our small town. The kids got to spend time learning from a painter, fabric artist, photographer, and basket weaver, and got to make projects in each discipline. The kids had a good week. Tomorrow its off to France. We will be studying Monet and Degas for our artist focus. We plan on making crepes and at the end of the second week having a mock tour de france. Note to self: must purchase cheap gold medals. Hope you enjoy the pics. Thanks for stopping by.

Paper mache globes. One earth is a bit crooked. We are beginners at this.

Art project for our Turner study. Stormy Seas by Triple H

Storm seas by Princess Poodle. Travel Log entry below.

Princess Poodle's Turner information page for Travel Log. We place all our maps, artist focus, country informational pages etc. in travel logs for each of the kids. At the end of the year we should have a documented trip around the world!

Jingle Bells...Jingle Bells

Am I the only one out there that has Autumn fever and has started singing Christmas carols in the shower? They just come out of nowhere, I promise. One minute I'm shampooing my hair and the next I'm belting out "oH the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful..". I think I must be crazy. It has got to be this GA humidity. Seriously, there have been days when I thought I was melting, just like the witch in The Wizard of Oz. I am known for being a holiday nut in my family. I love it all but the Autumn/Winter holidays which include for me, Halloween, my birthday, and Christmas, are the very best of the year. My Christmas "itch" usually starts in late August, and yet it has come sooner this year. I don't know why I rush things like this. This autumn my Princess Poodle turns eight, I am horrified and still not over my baby boy turning five on me. But the carols and visions of colored lights are flooding my mind and today as I watched 10 pine trees being cut down and chopped into mulch, the smell nearly sent me into fits of joy inside! We have much school to accomplish. My big goals for the kids this year. ..For PP I hope to see her math facts solidified and her writing progress. For Triple H, I want to see him come to love reading and move beyond, Al has a fast cat. I would also like to see some improvement in their chores around the house and in my own as well. (gotta be honest) Mostly I want to see us find a rhythm to our schooling and our days. I hear others talk of such a rhythm but we have yet to find it and I feel that is my own fault. As for school, we are studying Great Britian and next week I introduce Princess Poodle to Shakespeare for the first time. We will be reading childrens versions of A Midsummer Night's Dream and Romeo and Juliet. Triple H is loving memorizing poetry which suprises me a bit. Princess Poodle is working on The Violet. Math is new to us and so we are working on a level that is a bit easy in order to transisition into the new program. WWE level 2 has introduced dictation. This is somewhat new, especially in the length of the passage dictated. For spelling I think I am going to go for a combined approach of a workbook and real life application. PPoodle writes all the time. She is working on an infomational "book" about space. I think we will work through Spelling workout and also add words to our list that I find her misspelling in her fun writing. I won't make her correct her fun writing, I'll just put these words down in some type of list/folder/etc. Triple H is working in the Kinder part of SIng spell read and write. I would love to finish the Kinder portion this year but I will move at his pace. He won't officially be a Kinder until the 2010/2011 school year. We will do some ETC pages along with this. He also enjoys much of our math and sits in on our countries and cultures lessons most of the time.

I'm off to check on dinner and maybe sing a little Silent Night as I finish it up.

Christmas Morning 2007 Kids still love the boxes more than anything!

First Week of School, Spelling Impaired, and a painted Friend.

We finished our first week of school here at Hazelnut Academy. I now have a second grader (oh I see a rabbit in our yard!) and a K-5 boy! Hard to believe. For the most part school went well. We started our geography unit which is the kids favorite part of school. They are making paper mache globes which are an experiment to be honest. We studied maps and they each made a map of a local nursery/art studio including a map key. Tomorrow we head off to Europe with our first stop being England. I really need to update my curriculum link with the full story of what we are doing but time hasn't permitted it yet. I have noticed that I have let Spelling slide and Princess poodle, being an avid writer and wanna be journalist, really needs me to kick this subject into high gear. I guess I was just hoping that it would come naturally. Hopefully a better weekly update with pictures will come soon. I'm still here but swamped from trying to get into the routine of things. As usual the house and meals suffer when school is in session. Why can't I have enough money for a maid and a cook? ha ha Also I have discovered a new passion, or hobby, or maybe just a release. I'm not sure what to call it but I am enjoying playing with paints. I am not an artist. My sister is the artist in the family. But at the age of 33 I have picked up a paintbrush and I like the way it feels. Here's a picture of a recent, really my first real, painting. Its very simple really but I enjoyed painting her and now she is somehow my friend. Thanks for stopping by.

A new Hair Style and New way of thinking

I am undergoing quite a change in my life. It has been coming on for some time now. Part of this change has been learning to relax and take life a little more as it comes. To savor all that is sweet and beautiful and smells good. I am no longer blowdrying my hair. Perhaps I never will again. I am wearing it in its naturally wavy state which is a bit messy but that is ok. So here's to tossing the blowdryer and flatiron and embracing my true self or at least my true hair. What are you embracing these days? What are you tossing?