I love Thanksgiving. I still remember the green tasseled table cloth at my grandmother’s house; how I always tried to sit right next to my favorite aunt and that I could never get anyone to pass the olives or the butter once the food had all gone around once and the grownups started talking. I would get so full I really couldn't move for a few hours. When I was finally able to move my legs again, I'd go back for another piece of pie.
These days I still use the very same dishes we used to use at my grandmother's house, and now I get all the olives I can eat...if the kids don't get to them first.
The more history I learn, the more I enjoy this holiday. Mechanism is preparing a report on the colonies while my husband will be reading George Washington's Thanksgiving Proclamation. I also like to read excerpts from William Bradford's "Of Plymouth Plantation".
Here is a link to a website that contains Both George Washington's and William Bradford's Thanksgiving Proclamations.
http://holydays.tripod.com/brad.htm
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Family Nights
Spending time as a family is essential for so many reasons. It helps us maintain an open relationship with our children and builds happy memories for them. I have also found it helps restore that playful spirit marriage often loses through years of struggle, responsibility, and work. A giggling child's enthusiasm is contagious and just the thing to put the spring back into my step. After a great family night I find myself laughing, and being just plain thankful to be a part of this little group called my family.
We never schedule things on Friday nights anymore. That night is reserved for our famly time. We make sure to eat dinner together, even if we have to wait for Dad to come home late from work. Sometimes we eat something special that the kids helped to make, but often it's a pizza or something easy so we don't have to clean up.
We keep a running list of ideas handy and usually Friday morning I'll pick something from the list. If Mom and Dad had a rough week we just snuggle on the couch and watch a movie, but there are so many more adventurous options. Here is a list of our ideas. Most we have done and a few we have yet to try. You may find some inspiration here and then start your own list and add to it! Each activity listed costs between nothing and $15 for a family of four.
1) Movies: Don't just stick with the latest block buster hit, but sometimes try a favorite movie you and your spouse love to watch like "The Princess Bride" or some of those wonderful old calssics, "Singing in the Rain", "My Fair Lady", "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"; or pick a theme for the month, 80's movies, "The Star Wars Trilogy" The "Back to the Future" movies, Christmas movies, check out a ballet from the library, etc.
2) Have a Poetry Night. Have each family member work on memorizing a favorite poem or Bible verse during the week. Then give each person a chance to recite while the others look on encouragingly.
3) There is always game night to consider. That is self explanatory. We usually choose a game our youngest member can play pretty well so no one gets left out.
4) Work on a puzzle together. My parents used to serve sparkling cider and popcorn to make these kinds of things special. There is great opportunity for conversation while working puzzles as well.
5) Music Night: This one may take some time to plan, but if you home school, preparing for family night can become part of the curriculum. Learn to sing a hymn, a patriotic song, or a Christmas song. If you are really talented someone can play an instrument as well. Over time, learn several songs and you are in for a major jam session!
6) Puppet Show: On Monday read a simple fairy tale or other short story to your children. Then during the week let them make popcicle stick puppets to fit the story and have the performance on Friday night. It's amazing what you can do with a little paper and crayons. Make a theatre from a cardboard box.
7) Play an impromptu game of flashlight tag or hide and seek. Autumn is great for this because it gets dark early and you still have some pleasant evenings left.
8) Visit the local observatory to see the stars through a lens.
9) Build a fire and read out loud, or tell stories.
10) Make a craft.
11) Play in the snow.
12)Have a math or spelling contest
13) Go for a flashlight walk around the neighborhood, or in summer, take an evening bike ride.
Well, those are thirteen of my best ideas, so if you are feeling crotchety or disconnected, grab your kids and go have a family night!
We never schedule things on Friday nights anymore. That night is reserved for our famly time. We make sure to eat dinner together, even if we have to wait for Dad to come home late from work. Sometimes we eat something special that the kids helped to make, but often it's a pizza or something easy so we don't have to clean up.
We keep a running list of ideas handy and usually Friday morning I'll pick something from the list. If Mom and Dad had a rough week we just snuggle on the couch and watch a movie, but there are so many more adventurous options. Here is a list of our ideas. Most we have done and a few we have yet to try. You may find some inspiration here and then start your own list and add to it! Each activity listed costs between nothing and $15 for a family of four.
1) Movies: Don't just stick with the latest block buster hit, but sometimes try a favorite movie you and your spouse love to watch like "The Princess Bride" or some of those wonderful old calssics, "Singing in the Rain", "My Fair Lady", "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"; or pick a theme for the month, 80's movies, "The Star Wars Trilogy" The "Back to the Future" movies, Christmas movies, check out a ballet from the library, etc.
2) Have a Poetry Night. Have each family member work on memorizing a favorite poem or Bible verse during the week. Then give each person a chance to recite while the others look on encouragingly.
3) There is always game night to consider. That is self explanatory. We usually choose a game our youngest member can play pretty well so no one gets left out.
4) Work on a puzzle together. My parents used to serve sparkling cider and popcorn to make these kinds of things special. There is great opportunity for conversation while working puzzles as well.
5) Music Night: This one may take some time to plan, but if you home school, preparing for family night can become part of the curriculum. Learn to sing a hymn, a patriotic song, or a Christmas song. If you are really talented someone can play an instrument as well. Over time, learn several songs and you are in for a major jam session!
6) Puppet Show: On Monday read a simple fairy tale or other short story to your children. Then during the week let them make popcicle stick puppets to fit the story and have the performance on Friday night. It's amazing what you can do with a little paper and crayons. Make a theatre from a cardboard box.
7) Play an impromptu game of flashlight tag or hide and seek. Autumn is great for this because it gets dark early and you still have some pleasant evenings left.
8) Visit the local observatory to see the stars through a lens.
9) Build a fire and read out loud, or tell stories.
10) Make a craft.
11) Play in the snow.
12)Have a math or spelling contest
13) Go for a flashlight walk around the neighborhood, or in summer, take an evening bike ride.
Well, those are thirteen of my best ideas, so if you are feeling crotchety or disconnected, grab your kids and go have a family night!
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Comfort Food
On a blustery autumn evening, it is finally time for some comfort food. Here is my favorite comfort food recipe (or recipt as Laura Ingals calls them). I got this recipe from the Delaney Farm Blog last summer and my five year old told me he loved it so much he wanted to eat it for every meal of the day for the rest of his life. If you cook the squash a day before hand, it is a cinch to make.
Mashed Coconut Ginger Squash
1 large winter squash
1 Cup coconut milk
2 tblsp chopped ginger
2-3 garlic cloves, plus 2-3 coloves minced
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Fresh cilantro (optional)
Preheat oven to 375. Cut squash in half and scoop out seeds. Put on a baking pan and drizzle with olive oil. Put 1-2 cloves garlic in area where seeds used to be. Bake for 25-35 minutes or until soft when pricked with a fork. Remove from oven and cool. Scoop out squash from skin.
Heat olive oil in a pan on medium and saute chopped garlic and ginger until lightly browned. Turn heat to low and add coconut mild and squash. Once warm, remove from heat. Season with salt, pepper and optional cilantro.
Mashed Coconut Ginger Squash
1 large winter squash
1 Cup coconut milk
2 tblsp chopped ginger
2-3 garlic cloves, plus 2-3 coloves minced
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Fresh cilantro (optional)
Preheat oven to 375. Cut squash in half and scoop out seeds. Put on a baking pan and drizzle with olive oil. Put 1-2 cloves garlic in area where seeds used to be. Bake for 25-35 minutes or until soft when pricked with a fork. Remove from oven and cool. Scoop out squash from skin.
Heat olive oil in a pan on medium and saute chopped garlic and ginger until lightly browned. Turn heat to low and add coconut mild and squash. Once warm, remove from heat. Season with salt, pepper and optional cilantro.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Math Alive
Math Alive is a concept invented and taught by Elaine Gaines. She has been a math and science teacher and a home schooler for many years. I took one of her work shops last year and have had a lot more fun teaching math since then.
She takes math concepts and teaches them in ways that students can make their own discoveries about math and thus, really understand the concept. One thing she stresses is pattern. We use these ten squares to do addition and subtraction problems so that the pattern of fives and tens is instilled in our minds and counting on our fingers becomes a thing of the past.
Always fill in your ten square the same way. The first five from top to bottom and then the next five from top to bottom. Use different colored markers for each number in the problem.
For example, four plus three is seven. You can see your four and your three and you can see that it fills up the first five spaces on the ten square and the next two, so that is easily recognised as seven. As a student continues to solve problems this way, it becomes easy for him to visualize the ten square in his mind and he soon should no longer need his fingers for counting.
Texas and Mechanism really love using this method, and it gives a break from all those sheets of math problems.
She takes math concepts and teaches them in ways that students can make their own discoveries about math and thus, really understand the concept. One thing she stresses is pattern. We use these ten squares to do addition and subtraction problems so that the pattern of fives and tens is instilled in our minds and counting on our fingers becomes a thing of the past.
For example, four plus three is seven. You can see your four and your three and you can see that it fills up the first five spaces on the ten square and the next two, so that is easily recognised as seven. As a student continues to solve problems this way, it becomes easy for him to visualize the ten square in his mind and he soon should no longer need his fingers for counting.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Proverbs 24:13-14
"My child, eat honey, for it is good, and the drippings of the honeycomb are sweet to your taste. Know that wisdom is such to your soul; if you find it, you will find a future, and your hope will not be cut off."
We started school again this week. It is so sweet to see how much the boys have matured. We now have peace and quiet as they study with a good attitude. It is a far cry from a few years ago when mostly one could hear wining coming from our school room as someone wiggled on the floor in protest to being educated. Finally, the persistant prayer and discipline is paying off.
We started school again this week. It is so sweet to see how much the boys have matured. We now have peace and quiet as they study with a good attitude. It is a far cry from a few years ago when mostly one could hear wining coming from our school room as someone wiggled on the floor in protest to being educated. Finally, the persistant prayer and discipline is paying off.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Loving Books
I have a special sentimentality for books. I still go back to my parents house and look through the books they used to read me when I was a child. I grab up my favorite copies of books at garage sales(no matter how many copies I already have)and I love to lay in bed at the end of the day with a good biography. I am so enriched by the books that other people write and illustrate. I guess that's why I thought it would be important to pass my love of books on to my children. Then also,if you watch PBS, you know that "experts say reading with your child is the best way to help them learn to read".
So, as soon as Mechanism was old enough to sit in the stroller, off we went to the library. We went to story time, and checked out more books than we could carry. We didn't stay in the children's section either. While children's books are very wonderful, my kids love to peruse the adult science, nature, and engineering shelves as well. We sat on the sofa and read them all...again and again. I enjoyed it as much as he did, and we started collecting our own books when ever we could.
I set up little reading nooks all over the houses we lived in. No matter where we lived, there had to be a low, soft spot with all kinds of books on shelves or in crates or just stacked on the floor, and Mechanism was attracted to these reading nooks like a little magnet. He spent hours looking at books. It never seemed to bother him that he couldn't read the words.
Then came Texas. He didn't like to be held, let alone sit on my lap for a story. But I kept reading aloud while Texas played cars or colored, and he started coming over to see the pictures. Now he likes to be read to almost as much as Mechanism.
Now, learning to read is a whole nother issue! It can be very hard work, unless you happen to have one of those kids who teaches themselves to read when they are three. But I had to teach both of mine the hard way. We learned phonics, which helped a lot, and we did a lot of snuggly, mommy and me reading time. Texas is still struggling through the mommy and me times, but I have patience and hope knowing that Mechanism
struggled also. Then he found a serries of chapter books he really wanted to read and never looked back. I think that when the hard work of reading came for my boys, it helped them to already love books. They already knew reading as a comftrable, time they enjoyed with me, and the having to learn to read part was softened by that.
Now we try to take at least a half an hour a day for quiet reading time, especially in the summer. It kind of replaces nap time. We all lay down somewhere after lunch and enjoy a book or two. I don't get to read my own books at reading time yet, but as soon as Texas gets off and running, I'll be able to enjoy that too.
So, as soon as Mechanism was old enough to sit in the stroller, off we went to the library. We went to story time, and checked out more books than we could carry. We didn't stay in the children's section either. While children's books are very wonderful, my kids love to peruse the adult science, nature, and engineering shelves as well. We sat on the sofa and read them all...again and again. I enjoyed it as much as he did, and we started collecting our own books when ever we could.
I set up little reading nooks all over the houses we lived in. No matter where we lived, there had to be a low, soft spot with all kinds of books on shelves or in crates or just stacked on the floor, and Mechanism was attracted to these reading nooks like a little magnet. He spent hours looking at books. It never seemed to bother him that he couldn't read the words.
Then came Texas. He didn't like to be held, let alone sit on my lap for a story. But I kept reading aloud while Texas played cars or colored, and he started coming over to see the pictures. Now he likes to be read to almost as much as Mechanism.
Now, learning to read is a whole nother issue! It can be very hard work, unless you happen to have one of those kids who teaches themselves to read when they are three. But I had to teach both of mine the hard way. We learned phonics, which helped a lot, and we did a lot of snuggly, mommy and me reading time. Texas is still struggling through the mommy and me times, but I have patience and hope knowing that Mechanism
struggled also. Then he found a serries of chapter books he really wanted to read and never looked back. I think that when the hard work of reading came for my boys, it helped them to already love books. They already knew reading as a comftrable, time they enjoyed with me, and the having to learn to read part was softened by that.
Now we try to take at least a half an hour a day for quiet reading time, especially in the summer. It kind of replaces nap time. We all lay down somewhere after lunch and enjoy a book or two. I don't get to read my own books at reading time yet, but as soon as Texas gets off and running, I'll be able to enjoy that too.
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