Jelly Nougat...... old timer candy........ my favorite candy.....
I know Forest Gump said " Life is like a box of chocolates" but I think he was wrong. I think life is more like a jelly nougat........ Creamy soft nougat...... chewy fruity bits. Some bits you prefer more than others but the overall consensus is that it is sweet . And so it is with life.
There are so many things that have happened in the past month that it is difficult to create a cohesive post. I have a feeling that it will be much like my favorite candy, a conglomerate of chewy little bits.
The red jellies are my favorite and so I believe I will start with my favorite thing to share.... our homeschooling adventure. And believe you me it is always an adventure.
The last few weeks we have been working on a unit covering soil
I found a really wonderful website full of short videos with printable packets for each video, games, and teachers guide. It also has links for kids to other great sites.
It is called Growing the Next Generation
On one of the days that week we used the Discovery kids microscope we have to look at different soil samples and study the differences between them and then discussed what that meant in relation to their ability to hold water and their nutrient levels. If you have children who are young ( elementary level) I highly recommend the Discovery Kids microscope for one big reason. It comes with a cable so that you can hook it into you television and look at your samples on the t.v. This means that the samples are easily seen by multiple children at the same time.
On another day we discussed how soil can be saved and harmed. To illustrate the idea of how plants save soil we did a little hands on activity that the kids really liked. I wish I had a picture .......
What I did was take pearled barley and poured about half of the bag into a tray. I then turned on the hair dryer-on high- OUTSIDE. The barley flew away. I then poured the other half of the barley into the tray and had the kids imagine that the barley was soil and their fingers the roots of plants. They each dug their hand in and held onto as much barley as they could. Again I turned on the hair dryer and they could see how their fingers/ plant roots kept the barley/soil from being blown away. They had a good giggle with this.
I also found two good videos which I strategically played while I was getting lunch ready but helped to reinforce what we were talking about. The "Magic School Bus Meets the Rot Squad" how to make rich soil and "The Magic School Bus Rocks and Rolls" all about water erosion. By the way if you check out Pinterest they have a pin with lesson plans for every Magic School Bus video there is.
Of note I have to share that my oldest daughter said I was just like Miss Frizzle from the Magic school bus............I was so thrilled- best compliment ever!
We have been up to other things here at our little homeschool. But they get taught by a different teacher......He teaches music and shop class mostly but he has been known to pitch in and lend a hand whenever needed in other subjects.
Piano! My husband has had many years of piano lessons and is more than qualified to teach them....and honestly he is an awesome teacher! The keyboard can be attached to a computer program and you can get a pedal for it so that it simulates a piano and produces the same sound. The kids have already learned to play a few simple songs. He is trying to teach me- along with the kids but, I may be a lost cause . The kids can play with both hands.........I can not........
This is shop class. Our oldest is working on creating a design she worked on with my husband. She is making a set of game boards that can slide out and be played - checkers, chess, Chinese checkers, etc. Our youngest daughter just finished a barn she and my husband made for her horse figurines and my son and husband are working on a sword.
Of course life would not be complete without gardening and I think many of you will love this site: The Edible Schoolyard Project. Talk about amazing ! Resources, tools, lesson plans, videos! Every time I read their newsletter I am inspired!
You may also like: Classroom Victory Garden
My free Victory Garden Poster is already in the mail!
Oh and I can not forget to mention the Book It Program. Some of you may remember this program from school but the wonderful thing is that it is available to homeschoolers as well. Pizza Hut will send you the free start up packet. The basic idea is that you and your children set up a reading goal. When they meet it they earn a ticket/coupon that entitles them to up to 1 free personal pan pizza a month. What I love even more about this program is that if you go on the website you can set up an account and under teacher tools their is an online reading tracker that you can set up and customize! The kids read, go to the site, select their name, and drag a button with the number of minutes they read to their name and as your kids progress a small tree begins to grow. My kids are thrilled with this.
O.K. so the red jelly nougat part was huge but the orange and yellow are shorter...promise...
So The Orange jelly nougat is my second favorite and so we move to gardening. I have learned a lot this season. Like how the pickle worm overwinters in Florida-not good. They ate all 5 of the baby pumpkins I was hoping to have on my table this fall. Since they are pretty much un-killable- at least organically, I ended up ripping out the pumpkin plants. I planted a later crop last week and because Florida is so warm I think they will be just fine- and we will just have to eat the pumpkins when they are ready. On a happier note the butternut squash is doing great and so are the loofah's and red beans.
This is a loofah, also known as Chinese Okra but very similar in look to a cucumber.
So this is a picture of my newest little experiment. Fall peanuts. I think it may work. I learned that when the peanut blossoms is self pollinates, the petals of the flower fall off, and the remaining stem turns downward into the soil and becomes a peanut . So each flower produces one peanut with the average plant producing 25 peanuts. I was so excited about this info that I just had to call all the kids outside and show them this and explain how a peanut grows. They were absolutely as un-thrilled as is humanly possible. I got a "huh" and then they ran off to play. I guess it's just me who finds that fascinating!
O.k. jelly nougat number three.....the yellow jelly.........
O.k. this is really not fair because by no means is what I am going to talk about third but it is a little bit of randomness so .......
One of the neatest books for girls age 7+
This thing is one of the best toys ever! The Cranium Fort kit. It is a fort kit but it has directions so that you can make it into a hot air balloon, helicopter, car, or anything you can think of. Hours of enjoyment!
My kids imagination never ceases to amaze me. As I was mopping the kitchen floor they decided they would use the dining room bench as a plank. My little guy is Captain Hook and my sweet girl is Wendy.
Another scene from their Peter Pan play: Wendy telling her little brother a bedtime story...poor dog had to be Nana.
A late afternoon shower that ended with a beautiful rainbow.....
I know everyones life is different and I know that life is hard........mine included, even if that is not what I choose to discuss in my blog......but this blog has made me realize just how sweet life really is if we focus on the positive. And for that I am so thankful. Your life is a jelly nougat...........enjoy it!
