So Long Ordinary

Last week, we needed a little something special.  Our regular homeschool routine was feeling a little dull and lifeless, so I decided it was time for a tea party. When you have little girls, tea parties are the easiest go-to cure for whatever - for bad days or grumpy attitudes or boredom or celebration.  It always works.    We whipped up some scones (and added chocolate chips, of course) and some Ginger Lemon tea. I put on some peaceful music to play.  We donned our favorite dresses, brought the dollies to the table, and set out our nicest tea set.  A flowery sheet was our tablecloth.  I pulled some of our favorite poetry books off the shelf and we took turns reading poems to one another, giggling at silly lines and talking together about what the poem might be saying.   We didn't linger too long.  It started to get hot and our dresses began to feel itchy.  But when we went back to normal life - cleaning up our mess, tackling math and sp...

Madison and Paige learned about the Romans today!

Taking the Final Math Tests! These two happy little girls are really excited.  Today they have completed all their work for 3rd and 1st grades!  They have worked extra hard this week to finish up so that we can have a nice little break before starting up again with grades 2 and 4 in a little over a month.  Paige will also be starting Kindergarten - which you can imagine she is excited about - she's been watching her sisters and wanting to "do school" for a long time. I really love homeschooling our girls.  Long ago, when Brooklyn was a preschooler, I dreamed of homeschooling my kids, but when it came time for Brooklyn's kindergarten, we were in the throes of support raising and it just didn't work out.  Then, we were in language school and I was again not able to homeschool.  But when we started our first year of homechool in Brooklyn's 2nd grade year, I knew I'd found my calling. I'm not sure I ever would have had the guts to homeschool if it hadn...

We are already in our THIRD week of homeschooling! Wow, we've been so busy the first few weeks have have just flown by. We're getting in our groove at last and I've got to say - we're having a blast! We got off to a bit of a rough start. Brooklyn was sick her first week and she was in no mood to do school, but I pushed her anyway because I didn't think she was that sick. She looked like she despised everything we did in school, even when we were doing things I had expected her to enjoy. Near the end of that first week, I began to wonder if she had something more serious going on but lab tests for Malaria and Dengue came back negative. Then I worried some more - was I killing my child's joy in learning with bad curriculum choices?! Was she actually depressed or going through a major emotional, developmental shift? (She was really not herself.) Was the spelling we were doing that horrible? What was wrong?! The second week went better but Brooklyn was s...

Hey all, here's a list of the haps around here.... We have started homeschooling! So far, I'm really happy with my curriculum choices for this year. I learned a ton last year and we've tweaked some things - added some things and taken a few things away. I love getting to plan and create our very own homeschool and tailor it to our needs. And then it comes in the mail.... Oh, the joys of opening up boxes and boxes of new books and materials! I'm in a tiny bit of heaven just now. I'm also a tiny bit of a nerd - or so I've been told. My kids are maybe less enthusiastic about our new stuff. They are, however, working hard anyway and as we get accustomed to our new routine, things are getting easier for all of us. We are getting things ready for MAF teammates, the Rogers, to come to Palangkaraya from Tarakan (the other MAF Kalimantan base) to help us out through the end of the year. We're super-excited to see them come! My niece is in Hawaii for college ...