CHRISTEPHI

We learned about Robert Fulton this week, an engineer and inventor who is credited with developing the first commercially used steamboat.  He also invented the first submarine and marine torpedoes.  We would have liked to take a trip to the Steamboat Arabia Museum , but it didn't happen this week. Maybe soon! We usually do our spelling words verbally, but since our list this week was comprised of words that must begin with a capital letter in order to be spelled correctly, Miss M did them on the marker board! Another exciting thing happened this week.  It was the one year anniversary of Hubby being sworn in as a U.S. Citizen!  We celebrated with red-white-and-blue streamers and cheesecake decorated with tiny American flags! We spent a lot of time at the local library this week!  First, we attended a special showing of Pecos Bill or How the West Was Fun.  The kids had so much fun watching this cute vaudeville show. An Elvis-inspired ...

This week started with day 1 of a week long science project.  Although our intuition tells us that seeds won't grow without water, we are scientists and we mustn't say so until we test our theory!  Miss M put 10 unpopped popcorn seeds on a paper towel on a plate and covered it with aluminum foil.  Then she put 10 unpopped popcorn seeds on a paper towel on a plate and added enough water to fully dampen the paper; then she covered it with foil too.  Each day she opened the two foil covers to observe what was happening to the seeds. On Tuesday, Miss M sorted and rinsed a pound of red beans.  Then she put them to soak in a large glass measuring cup. The next morning she drained and rinsed them and put them in a pot of water to cook.  She cut up an onion, a green pepper, and some andouille sausage. Why did she do this, you ask?  Because we were learning about the Louisiana Purchase, of course!  We ate Red Beans and Rice for supper that ...

My first "real" post for the Hands-On Homeschooling column at Homeschool Mosaics is up! Come read about the Birds and the Bees ! Don't worry! It's 100% family friendly! :-)

We had a short week of school this week.  Hubby was home from work Thursday and Friday, so I did a bit of rearranging of our schedule: dropped 2 days of math & reorganized our science and history to fit in three days.  I figured out that we're going to be done with math before we're done with the rest of our lessons anyway. In Bible we reviewed the story of the Passover from last week and talked about what it meant for the Israelites to put the blood of the lamb on the frames of their doors.  I gave Miss M some strips of red construction paper to put around the frame of her bedroom door.  This activity wasn't part of our curriculum, but I think it helped her understand what happened at the first Passover a little better. In history we learned about Johnny Appleseed and I gave the kids each a cup of tomato juice, the state drink of Ohio.  They were both pretty disgusted. Ha! Little Guy wanted to do a little scientific investigation of his own whi...

Nothing is cooler -- and at the same time modest -- than a maxi skirt in the summer!  Inspired by this pin , I converted an old pair of holey jeans into a cool, flowy maxi skirt. I added a tiered skirt of cotton voile from Fabric.com with an underskirt of plain bleached muslin. I was careful to pull the front pockets inside out before cutting and sewing so I wouldn't render them useless.  I love pockets and wouldn't want to sacrifice them! Similarly, I did  not  want to cut off the back pockets!  So before cutting off the lower portion of the jeans, I picked out the stitching on the lower half of the pockets.  After adding the skirt, I re-stitched the pockets down right overtop the voile!  It's a detail I'm in love with! It's comfy, cool, and versatile! And feminine! I feel so pretty when I wear it! Perfect for summer!

We are officially halfway done with our year!  Week 18 marks the start of the second half of 2nd grade.  If we stay on track -- and we've been doing a wonderful job of that; much better than when we used Calvert! -- we'll finish the middle of October and take the rest of the year off.  This week also marked the first week of our "official" homeschooling since Miss M will be turning 7 in the fall, the age of compulsory school attendance in Missouri.  Missouri requires 1000 hours of instruction between July 1st and the following June 30th, so we just started a new school "year." This week we learned about Eli Whitney and his invention of the cotton gin.  I purchased some cotton bolls from etsy seller Pattie's Passion so the kids would be able to see what they're like hands-on.  Our teacher's manual had recommended flattening out cotton balls and glueing construction paper "seeds" to them for this lesson, but I wanted to show them ...

I saw this pretty United States panel print at JoAnn a few months ago -- on sale! -- for just a few dollars and couldn't resist buying it. Such bright colors! Such cute drawings on each state! Little Guy driving across the U.S. while it was still a work in progress! I've been thinking the kids need a more-kid-sized quilt since they're quickly outgrowing their toddler-sized ones.  So I added sashing and some blocks from flannel I had left over from other projects. Finished quilt hanging on the garden fence. The resulting quilt is, well, I never actually measured it, but it's smaller than twin size and larger than crib size. I used a scrap of red knit to put a heart in Missouri. The kids thought that was the coolest thing ever! Uh oh, now I've posted a close-up shot and you can see my horrible attempt at free-motion quilting!  It was my first attempt!  I have a lot to learn (obviously), but it was so much fun and the kids don't car...