Our Month of December

This month was all about Christmas. We put all schoolwork on hold and spent our time reading Christmas storybooks, watching Christmas movies, playing games, doing crafts, baking, cooking, card-making, painting, and having playdates. My hope was to be as laid-back as possible and spend time enjoying my kids. I tried to get us all outside as much as possible for morning walks, but it was a pretty wet month and we were indoors way too much! 

For the first time, we decided to start a celebrating Hanukkah. Armed with a new menorah, we got several books about it out of the library, watched YouTube videos, and talked to a Jewish friend about the history of the holiday and how to celebrate. I learned so much that I never knew before! The boys looked forward to lighting our menorah each night after dinner and listening to Mark read the blessings.

I got sick the week of Christmas. Luckily (or Providentially), Mark had already planned on taking the week of Christmas off, so he was around to help out. There were four days that I couldn't do anything except lay on the couch, so he got the kids out of the house as much as possible. On one day, they spent hours at Coyote Creek trail. They rode scooters, played in mud, and discovered a new creek. 

Mark and the boys shot off rockets at our local high school's sports field. They had a ton of fun.

We had a family hike to the halfway point of El Toro. The boys wanted to go all the way to the top, but Mark and I had the girls on our backs, so we weren't able to. 

Our Month of November

Now that I've been keeping track of what the kids have been up to, I'm noticing that they get really interested in one thing for a month, and then drop it. Stop motion animation. Toppling dominoes. Monopoly. Baking. RC cars. This month it was Perler beads. Early in the month I picked up a $5 bucket of beads at a trip to Ikea. We got home and they went to work right away. They worked hard on their projects every day for weeks! They decided to make Christmas ornaments out of them and sell them at our homeschool craft fair. It was neat to see them so motivated and work so hard on something.

We went to the beach.

We went to a storytelling workshop and listen to Jim Weiss tell stories, and they got to meet him afterwards. (He narrates a lot of the audio books that the boys listen to like Story of the World, Tale of Peter Rabbit, plus a ton more). I met him once before at a homeschool conference, but it was a first for the boys. Ben actually drew a picture of one of the stories he told and gave it to him. We made a mom-kid date out of it and Mark stayed home with the girls. It was a fun night!

Dominoes were rediscovered.

Painting

Tommy made these scene of our street out of powdered tempura paint, masking tape, and toothpicks. It was a huge mess, but worth it to see him be so creative.

I resolved to get out into nature more this month. We try to go for a walk every morning (it usually works out to be 2-3 times a week). It helps everyone's mood to get some exercise and fresh air first thing after breakfast, and helps the boys burn off some of their ample energy.

Our Month of October

The theme for October was stop-motion animation. During a trip to The Exploratorium early in the month, the boys used an interactive stop-motion animation exhibit. They were totally enthralled with it. When we got home Mark researched iPhone apps and found one that was easy enough for the boys to use. They spent hours and hours making stop-motion movies with their Legos. Here's some of their movies:

We made caramel apples

We spent the day at Anderson Park

Ben drew some cool pictures

We went apple picking with friends

Tommy designed a baby walker by repurposing an Ikea kids'  stool

We sat on the roof and watched a really cool sunset. 

Not pictured: 

Lots of outside play

Playdates with friends

Watched movies featuring stop-motion animation, like Nightmare Before Christmas, Coraline, and Paranorman. 

Lots of reading aloud and audio books

Our Month of September

September was a fun month. In the first week Mark and the boys headed down to southern California to attend a wedding. The girls and I had to stay behind because of some rules regarding our foster baby leaving the county. Mark decided to make a daddy getaway out of the trip and they headed to Legoland for a surprise trip. 

Handsome boys ready for a wedding

Riding bikes in Newport Beach

Legoland with Dad!

Mark needed to change his brakes so he let Tommy help. Then he taught him how to change the oil. He did everything himself, with just a little help from Dad. He was so happy to have done so much himself!

Friday morning coffee date with Tommy. He's an early riser, so while the rest of the kids sleep, we head to Peet's, then walk around the block with our drinks and chat about everything under the sun. Mark works at home on Fridays, which makes this possible. :)

Monterey Bay Aquarium field trip with cousins (only 5 of 9 cousins are in this picture ;-)

First day of fall tradition: we bake something fall-ish and yummy. This year we baked an apple tart from scratch. 

Our 3rd annual First Day of Rain celebration: we put a fire in the fireplace, make hot chocolate and popcorn, and watch a movie on the first day of rain in the fall season. On this day we watched The Muppets Most Wanted. 

Ben got into the Halloween spirit a bit early and has been drawing Halloween pictures for a few weeks now. He gets his inspiration from this Ed Emberly drawing book. My boys don't usually draw very often, so it's been great seeing him get into drawing lately.

Other fun stuff not pictured:

- lots of Lego play, inspired by visiting Legoland. The boys wanted to buy themselves a few Lego Technic kits, so they earned the money by doing extra chores around the house to buy them. 

- Lots of playdates with friends and cousins

- Made Halloween decorations, which involved plastic trash bags,, balloons, dryer sheets, pipe cleaners, and lots of other odds-n-ends. I wasn't involved with this!

- Classic car show

- Listened to audio books: Grimm's Fairy Tales, a book about Christopher Columbus, Story of the World, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

- Read alouds: The Bible, A Child's Story Bible, Pinocchio, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Pilgrim Stories. 

First Day of (Un)School

School started for us this past week, on September 1st.

Yes, I know we're unschoolers, and we should be learning year round, not be beholden to any schedule, and all that goodness. But I crave structure, so for my mental well-being, we are still going by a loose interpretation of the school calendar. I plan to use the same school schedule we've been using thus far, which is to school from Sept through November, take off the month of December, and then school January through May. 

This past summer we had a lot of fun. But for me, the fun is more fun when I know there is some structure just round the corner. Actually, not much is changing- I'm just adding in a bit of math and handwriting and the boys are continuing with piano and taekwondo. The difference between this year and the past years is that now I'm prepared to throw out even that little bit of schoolwork if I see it's interfering with the boys' free time or with our relationship. I don't see that happening though.

In their back-to-school gift boxes they each received a Mad Libs Junior book. It has been the best thing ever! They spent the rest of the day filling in all the spaces and reading their stories out loud to each other. In just a few days they filled up the books, so we got some more in time for a long road-trip they'll be taking soon.

We only "do school" three days a week, and this is their checklist. They practice piano and taekwondo every day, but three days a week they have a single sheet of math, handwriting, and cursive to do. They are free to do their work whenever they want, as long as it's done before dinnertime (around 5:30). Tommy is the first to wake up and he generally chooses to do it during breakfast. He's done with his work by 8am! Ben wakes up much later, usually after Tommy has already finished his schoolwork, his breakfast, and his chores. But when he finally does sit down to do his work, he likes to work several days ahead so he can get more days off later. 

For history we listen to Story of the World audio CD when we're in the car and sometimes during meals at home. These books below is what I'll be reading aloud for US history. The books are from the Beautiful Feet Early American History Read-Aloud list, with some extra biographies added in based on what I know the boys will be interested in.

Check out their previous first days:

2013 

(2nd grade + K)

2012 

(1st grade + Pre-K)

2011 

(Preschool)