Back to School 2012!

This year I decided we would ease into the school year.  It has been a good choice for us and has allowed the kids to explore their new subjects, get excited about them, but not be forced with a full schedule right away.  So we've done 2 weeks of part-time school, working on 4-5 subjects each day.  Most of their subjects only take 10-15 minutes, so during the week they usually have about 10-12 subjects and some aren't done every day.

I think their favorite subject this year will be Science.  We're using the Apologia Anatomy and Physiology text with the notebooking journals and the lab kit. 

Each chapter is done over about 2 weeks.  There are a few small experiments, but at the end of the lesson is a bigger experiment/project.  This project was creating a cell out of jello and candy!  They were very excited about this and forced me to read the whole chapter in one sitting so we could make our cell!

We ended up waiting overnight for the Jello to set, so they couldn't wait to get started the next morning!  I think snacking on the candy was their favorite part.

Here's a photo of another clay "cake" creation by Mary Clare.  It's a bouncy house with a big J on top and a little boy.  She wanted me to send it to our friends whose son is getting ready for a bouncy house birthday party!  I think this would be considered "art class," right?

 

They had seen some blog photos of friends with these little fairies they'd learned to make at a girls' club meeting, so I bought some supplies while on a mom's evening out to Wal-Mart (Daddy took the kids to get bikes and I watched a show at home and then went shopping!).  They had so much fun creating these little fairies!

Thomas' favorite "educational" activity of late is using the kitchen tongs to play with the cookie cutters!

And he's now totally obessed with the tongs and wants to play with them all day long.  He will drag us to the kitchen, saying "want THAT."  I need to make a list of his little phrases right now, because the baby talk is so cute!

Last weekend we hosted a big "Back to School Fajita Night" for some of our homeschooling friends from church.  We ended up having 5 families over, each having 4-6 children.  It was a full house!  The dads had fun watching the little ones outside, while grilling and drinking beer.

The moms were in the kitchen most of the evening, getting a lesson in homemade tortilla-making!  My kids really wanted to help!

This little guy might have enjoyed it most of all!  He really likes helping in the kitchen.

We set up the fajita buffet in the playroom.  I definitely enjoy hosting things like this and I'm glad Steven is starting to enjoy it, too :-)

This weekend I've continued to plan for the new school year, working on checklists and making my final book selections.  After a nice and relaxing holiday weekend, hopefully we'll have a good week and I won't need to post another whine/vent like last week!

(By the way, for my photographer peeps, these photos all look too yellow.  I think my white balance must be off again.)