Christmas

Christmas Eve we had cocoa and toast and Phillip read the Nativity story from the Bible. 

The kids opened their stocking gifts.

We watched It's a Wonderful Life. 

A very relaxing time together at home.

The kids had the idea of getting matching plaid shirts to wear on Christmas Day. 

Phillip told them they would never have gone for it if it had been our idea. So it goes. :-)

This was funny. 

We have a story of Phoebe when she was maybe 4 years old, shaking her fist at the neighbor guy and saying, "Give me fourteen dollars!" 

So Jonathan's gift to her was $14 with this note.

Aupa's serving dish was for cookies this time.

Our children's minister came over for lunch. It was a lot of fun to talk with her about life at a children's home and with missions and Enneagrams. 

Harrison got on the Lego assembly right away. 

Jonathan played "Silent Night."

Phoebe got Harrison a model airplane kit. 

He received three airplane gifts this year. He's enjoying them all. 

Jonathan is working with the drawing tools his friend Liam gave him. He's doing a sort of bullet journal of weapons right now. I gotta say.... I like it.

 

Christmas Celebrating

 

The girls and I went to La Cantera to window shop.  It's a fancy outdoor shopping area. The Christmas lights there were beautiful. We stepped into an art gallery to see what the area had to offer in the way of art. There were some pretty pieces in there. Even a couple of modern-art types that I would have taken home had I been in the market. 

Fun time with my girls.

 

I thought there'd be more to the Riverwalk lights. There was not. But we got some walking in and got Slushies for the trip home. It ended up being a warm night.

Phoebe got this from the White Elephant gift exchange at the youth group Christmas party. 

They are so glad to be having youth group! They have recently realized that Harrison will be old enough to be in youth group next year and there are shocked faces all around. 

Phoebe's deadpan sarcastic exultation in her mini Lite Brite: "This is thrilling."

Gore Brothers, Inc. 

Jonathan teaching these kids how to play Mafia. 

Jonathan and Phoebe were a big help with a little Christmas party we had yesterday. 

I mostly wanted to tell the Nativity Story to the neighbor kids, but we threw in games and snacks too. They are making dipped pretzels above.

Nativity Story with my favorite porcelain Nativity set. 

They each had a piece that they used to participate in the story. They were calm and listened well. They got plenty rowdy later, but I had prayed for a calm story time.

This was surprising hit too! 

I found this set of 15 miniature bird puzzles at Hobby Lobby. Each kid had a bird to put together. And they all loved it! I thought for sure they'd poo-poo the idea and throw the pieces at each other. 

We are off of school this week and enjoying our time together. All the kids are home, there are no relationship troubles, no health problems, we have plenty of books to read. It's good.

Nature Study Ideas this Year

 Nature Study is not our strongest Charlotte Mason piece, but I've definitely grown in that area since we started homeschooling many years ago. I get so many good ideas from blogs and podcasts which is great for pumping in excitement when I'm planning.

This year we have several "kinds" of nature study going on. I have the ideas all listed out in our homeschool planning app, and I decide the week ahead which activity we'll be doing.

The pictures below are all from a trip we took a couple weeks ago to Cibolo Creek Nature Center.

~ We take a hike about every month or two. ~

When we do this, we just enjoy the hike. The kids don't draw in their nature notebook.

~ We concentrate on one special study per term (3 terms in our year). ~ 

A special study may take 2-3 weeks. This year we are identifying the flowers in "the ditch" near our house. We did an ant farm and studied up on harvester ants. And I'm not sure what the last one will be. Ideas will likely come to someone. Sabbath Mood Homeschool has some good special study ideas here. And she has a blog post explaining special studies here. 

~ There are a couple other activities I wanted to involve the kids in: grow mold on bread, plan a butterfly garden, purchase a bird bath. ~ 

I'm loving the little bird bath! We've seen birds in it a few times. The neighbor cat Nina drinks from it a lot as well. 

~ Brandy from Afterthoughts blog had a great post called "Nature Study in Suburbia" that I've been reading every year to gather inspiration. ~ 

Ha! I just noticed it was published in 2019. So I've been reading it every year for the past two years. 

That post has inspired studying Nina the neighborhood cat, growing more plants and vegetables, and observing a tree in all its seasons. 

~ I'm asking the kids to each plan a nature study session this year. ~ 

These pictures from Cibolo Creek Nature Center come from Harrison's plan. We drew in nature notebooks at the marsh and then went to the creek to wade.

~ We take a short walk at a nearby park or around our neighborhood and bring something back to draw, identify, and sometimes write about. ~

I heard these great prompts from John Muir Laws that we now try to do at least once a year. We take a short nature walk and then sit and answer these three prompts in the nature notebook. 

~ "I notice.... I wonder.... This reminds me of......" ~

~ Simply Charlotte Mason had an interesting post about observation lessons which help when doing nature study. ~

We had a fun time with this one. I had each kid use each a different sense to figure out and describe the object I handed them. Then on the last object they used all 5 senses to figure it out. The handy dandy mandated masks work great as eye covers.

~ And lastly, we've been doing One Square Foot Space once a year. ~

I can't find where I got this idea, but there are books about it now. Each kid takes a length of yarn, makes a square (or circle) with it in our yard, and then lays down on a towel to observe everything in their encircled space. They draw and describe in their notebooks. 

So that's Nature Study for 2020/2021. A list to go off of and lots of flexibility and room for change. I sure love the homeschool community and their free-flowing ideas!

Liz Turns 19 and Christmas Decorating

 

Liz is now 19. She spent a night at a bed and breakfast in the Hill Country. She loves beautiful atmospheres and this place is beautiful. 

The cake she made is based off the pattern of a broken plate she found..... somewhere. Maybe in Joplin. 

We're so glad to have Elizabeth home!

We decorated for Christmas a little earlier this year. A few days earlier anyway. 

Jonathan wanted to put lights up outside, so he was in charge of that.

A real tree this year!!

I'm excited for Christmas cheer more than usual this year.  When the kids were young and I was tired, I didn't want to really decorate or do too much 'extra.' But the music and the lights and the cookies..... I am grateful and I'm loving it!

Gavin and Harrison being buddies at the table.

Jonathan designed and built the header for this Lego combine. Looks pretty sharp!

Thanksgiving 2020

 

I've loved reading everyone's thankful posts on facebook this year. 

Our Dollar Shave Club newsletter had an article about gratitude and how good it is for our brain ~ for our physical and mental well-being. It actually makes your brain grow! It relaxes you and increases serotonin, the happiness chemical. 

I love it when God tells us to be thankful, and then we find out how good it is for us! 

Jon's been practicing "Ashokan Farewell" to play for us on Thanksgiving. He does really well picking up music by ear. 

Alec (stationed here in San Antonio in the Navy ~ friend from Seattle area) came over for dinner. He brought the turkey and stuffing. Perfectly cooked turkey too! 

Here he's convincing Jonathan to take a bite of his stuffing. 

Jon finally did. Alec eventually got all the kids to take a bite. 

Phillip working on an app idea. He's so creative. He keeps going too, until he has a good product. Our family sure is loving the homeschool planning app. And our customer base for Flexible Homeschool App keeps growing. 

I went through the house after dinner and found each kid doing something off alone (except for Jon ~ he was playing chess with Alec). Liz had her hair up in knots of purple dye, so I didn't post her pic. Harrison has found that he loves his closet lately. He listens to the Penderwicks and draws. He's on the fourth book of the Penderwick series and this is a sad one, he tells me. So he listens in his closet. 

Phoebe diligently working away at a sewing project. She's into hand sewing lately. These girls do this wonderful handwork and then rip up so much of it to start over when it isn't perfect! I'm impressed with their work though. 

The most fruits and vegetables I've fixed for one meal, I believe. Cornbread casserole (it has corn in it!), cranberry sauce, cooked apples, lettuce salad, sweet potato soufflé, lemon-pepper green beans, and kale/Swiss chard soufflé. 

My dad's serving dish was perfect for the rolls. 

Alec re-enlisted with the Navy this week. He had the ceremony up on the hill near our house, and we were glad to be there. Quite a few other buddies showed up too. 

Congratulations, Alec!