To the Beach!
We had an exceptionally warm day this week (High 70s!
Anybody jealous? It's usually too cold to get in the water). The girls and I decided to spend the afternoon at the beach. They had a blast frolicking in the waves and making friends with another little girl. We saw lots of seagulls, a few sand fleas, and even a seal playing in the waves!

Music for Everybody!
I actually managed to find a local music school that not only teaches piano, violin, and drums, but could fit all three girls into the same time slot! (Do have any idea how amazing that is?!) The piano teacher could start Goose last week, and the other teachers were able to start Monkey and Bug this week.

Goose was decidedly anxious (and a bit teary) about meeting her new teacher, but she still played well. She went into her second lesson with no hesitation, and she and Miss T were able to get a much better handle on how much she knows and do some additional activities with flashcards and hand tracing activities (to help her match notes and fingers). The very next day her keyboard was delivered! She absolutely loves it--especially since it comes with headphones, so she can play whenever she wants without having to worry about bothering anybody.

Bug has renewed her love/hate relationship with violin. Fortunately, she really loves her new teacher, Miss A! They did her first lesson without her actual violin (which arrived a couple days later), and reviewed things like notes on the staff and proper stance and holds with a fake violin. However, her violin arrived out of tune (apparently), and Bug dramatically refuses to play it until it's been tuned (not entirely unreasonable). Miss A said she'd teach us how to do that next week.

Monkey was thrilled to discover that her new drum teacher has a full electric drum kit for her to do her lessons on! Mr. E threw a lot of new information at her during her first lesson (names of all the drums & cymbals in the kit, different kinds of notes, proper holding technique--different from her previous teacher--etc.), but she handled it beautifully and came home with a dozen lines of rhythms to practice.

Good-byes
We had to say a couple of very different good-byes in the past couple of weeks. The first was a long-distance good-bye, when Daddy's grandmother passed away after fighting Alzheimers for nearly 20 years. The girls didn't know her well, but they knew of her. We talked about our beliefs about the afterlife (Ma gets her memories back!), and the importance of being there for family (Daddy flew back East to be with Nana for the weekend).

This week we also had to say good-bye to some good friends of ours who moved across the country this weekend. We watched their toddler one afternoon, so the parents could pack. Then we met Miss H and the kids at the park to play while the movers packed up the truck. I have to admit, I think it's good for the girls to be on the staying side of a moving away good-bye for a change.

The Three Rs
The only real three Rs update this week is that Goose has started a new reading curriculum: Alpha-Phonics. It's a similar phonics program to the one we started and quit months ago, but this one assumes letter recognition and the ability to sound out. As a result, it moves a lot faster, which Goose appreciates. She'd still rather read real books, so we do some of that too.

All the other formal lessons continue as usual!

What's Coming Up
On this week's grocery shopping trip, we discovered a bird's nest
with three baby birds in one of the concrete barriers in the parking lot. Obviously, this discovery let to a whole slew of questions about birds, nests, bird life cycles and habits, etc. As a result, I checked out three books about birds from the library that we'll be reading over the next couple of weeks: Birds (picture book), About Birds (kids non-fiction), and Everything Bird (kids non-fiction).

At Monkey's request we've started another study of a female artist, this one more contemporary: Georgia O'Keeffe. We had to go into the regular non-fiction section to find a book with many pictures of her actual paintings, but we came home with a total of three books about her life and work: My Name is Georgia (picture book), Georgia O'Keeffe (kids non-fiction), and The Georgia O'Keeffe Museum (adult non-fiction).

Here are the highlights of the week!

Aquarium
We rejoined the local aquarium, and the girls were so excited to get back for a visit! Monkey held onto the map and served as a very capable navigator. As usual, we arrived with an agenda, and they all agreed we needed to hit up the touch tanks first. Last time we lived here, they were all too scared to touch the critters or ask questions, but now they're all about it! They touched everything the staffers pointed out, and they fearlessly asked questions about different sea animals and the functions of their various strange parts. The girls new-found confidence also meant they got to see the feeding and training of the sea otters this time. It's an extremely popular event, but the girls were brave enough to wiggle their way to the front without me, so they could see and hear everything.

We also discovered some fun little things we didn't see or didn't remember from before. Near the upstairs touch tanks we found an interactive wall that had the girls hunting for camouflaged sea creatures. A few fish managed to completely elude them, but the girls got to be pretty good! Out on the back deck of the aquarium the girls also discovered one of those glass bubbles that you let "enter" the fish tanks.

The aquarium added a new live show while we were gone, and the girls loved it! It takes place in the tidal pool amphitheater, and the actors use both the deck and the tidal pool itself to take us through a history of fishing and conservation efforts in the area. The girls were pretty excited about seeing things like American Indian rafts, Chinese night fishing boats, and Japanese abalone divers in action.

 Library Fun
The girls experienced a paradigm shift regarding the library's story time a couple of weeks ago. Bug in particular was annoyed with the storytime librarian. At some point at home, in utter exasperation, Bug exclaimed, "She's more like a music teacher than a librarian!" I suggested that maybe she should just think about it as a music class that happens to take place at the library. "Oooooh, . . " Now all three girls actively participate in "music class" and have a great time!

Our week actually involved an extra visit to the library to watch a marionette group perform an interwoven re-telling of "The Tortoise & the Hare," "The Three Little Pigs," and "The Ugly Duckling" to the musical suite Carnival of the Animals. The girls managed to get front row seats and were absolutely enthralled. They even stuck around through all the librarian's announcements afterwards, so they could hang out with the puppeteers and get a closer look at the marionettes. We even came home with the book, I Can Make Puppets. They've already been scoping out which puppets we have the supplies on hand to make.

Unrelated to the public library, the girls also rediscovered our home library (beyond their shelves of picture books). Daddy and I actually managed to get our massive book collection organized this time around, and the girls had me give them a tour of all the different sections, highlighting which books are about at their level or simply of interest. Goose has been pulling picture-filled non-fiction off the shelf, Monkey has been poring over a drawing instruction book (not aimed at kids, but fascinating nontheless), and Bug has started reading stories out of the Through Golden Windows series (vintage anthology of stories and poetry for children). Happy little bookworms!

Swimming & Sunshine
I'm making visits to our neighborhood pool a weekly event, and this week we had sunshine to go with it! The girls decided to enjoy their morning snack on the front steps, while "making vitamin D!" (our nutritional studies are sinking in!) The girls are doing well with their actual swimming too. Monkey has gained a lot of confidence in her skills, Bug can swim the width of the pool, and even Goose can jump in solo and swim a few feet to reach me.

International Influences
All the international stories we've been reading lately have been seeping into their playtime lately (it's so much fun to eavesdrop!). Characters and plot points occasionally crop up, and Bug and Goose were especially pleased to show off their rendition of the saris from Mama's Saris.

Here's what the entourage is up to these days! (Sadly, I completely failed to get photos of any of this stuff. *sigh*)

"I Like to Move It! Move it!"
Besides the fact that they love this song and have had a number of living room dance parties lately, these girls are always active.

They continue to practice on their bikes, and Monkey conquered hers first! Daddy put the pedals back on, and she's now whizzing up and down our street. (We knew she feeling confident when she started trash talking Daddy as she zipped by.) Bug has made a lot of progress, and she's almost ready for pedals (the fact that Monkey did it first has been a character-building experience). Goose is finally managing to coast a little! Since she's starting off so much younger, I think she'll stick with the balance bike longer than the other two.

They are loving having an actual playground at church again. Goose has been working hard on conquering the monkey bars, and she can almost make it all the way across! Monkey and Bug on the other hand have taken to using the top of the monkey bars as balance beams. Also, they can now climb all the way up the supporting poles of the swing set. Nobody has fallen off of either of those . . . yet.

In case you weren't aware we have a runner on our hands! Goose joined Daddy for one of his running club events this week, and she ran 2 miles without stopping or walking! Fellow runners on the rec trail were very impressed that such a tiny person had the endurance to run so far, and she got a lot of encouraging comments from female runners in particular. She's ready to go again!

We finally made it to the neighborhood pool this week! The girls had a blast practicing their swimming skills again--particularly since we happened to run into some friends of ours while we were there. Goose was a little nervous about getting in initially, but once she hit the water, she was fine.

Green! Yellow! Red!
I decided to tackle nutrition for our next science/health topic, and the girls have really gotten into this one. We checked out several books over the past couple of weeks: The Edible Pyramid (a picture book featuring a cafe whose menu is based on the food pyramid), Eat Healthy, Feel Great (picture book featuring the green light, yellow light, red light method of categorizing which foods we should or shouldn't eat much of), and Vitamins are Vital (this books gets into specific vitamins and minerals we need, what they do, and what foods we need to eat to get them). Bug actually read the Eat Healthy book on her own before I could get to it during our reading time, and spent an entire dinner time excitedly telling us about everything she had learned! (Wow! She's crossed that learn-to-read/read-to-learn milestone! Yippee! As a home school parent, it was a very validating moment!). They've taken to evaluating most of our meals, and they've been  pleased that we eat predominately green light foods. The real score-one-for-good-parenting moment was a conversation I overheard happening in the backseat on the way home from a church night activity: Both big girls had won candy has prizes for answering questions, but they realized that they had already had ice cream and a cookie that day, so they decided to save the candy to be a treat for a different day.

Originally unrelated to this topic but dovetailing nicely, the girls have started helping me meal plan. (I was feeling bored and frustrated with the process, so I pulled them into it, much to their excitement.) So far each girl has had one opportunity to plan a meal and be the primary person to cook it (I'm constantly available to help of course). Their menus so far:

• Bug: meatloaf, carrot sticks, mashed sweet potatoes
• Monkey: beef tacos with lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese on top, refried beans, guacamole and chips, watermelon
• Goose: personalized pita pizzas (topping options included pepperoni, sausage, ham & pineapple) and plums

Loving our Neighbor
It's one of those "this is why I love home schooling" moments: One day this week we chose to set aside our academic lessons in favor of a hands-on one about loving our neighbor. A neighborhood friend of ours with an infant and a toddler experienced a minor medical emergency that required an overnight hospital stay. The day after she was discharged we spent the morning with them at the park (so the girls could chase 2-year-old A, and I could hold the baby while Miss H and I chitchatted). We went our separated ways so the toddler and my trio could get a quiet time, then we picked up the toddler for the afternoon, so Miss H and the baby could get nice long naps until Mr. A got home. The girls and I had discussions about why we were setting aside our own plans for the day, why Miss H needed to rest even though she was feeling better, and the kind of things they would need to do to take care of A (what toys were appropriate, what areas of the house she could go in, etc.). They were very excited about taking on such a responsibility (supervised, of course).

History & Geography
We're still watching Liberty's Kids. Recent episodes featured frontier life, American Indian relations with the British and Americans, and John Paul Jones.

We're continuing to work our way through the states, and we've covered Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, and Indiana (they've been to 4 of those).

By happenstance, we've been learning about some international countries and cultures as well through the girls library book choices of both contemporary and classic stories. Recently the following book choices have led to learning a bit about the following countries:
Max's Magic Seeds and La La Rose (France)
Uno, Dos, Tres, One, Two, Three and Poco Loco (Mexico)
How Many Days to America and Mama Does the Mambo (Cuba)
The Pink Fairy Book (Japan and Denmark)
The Moon Lady (China)
Mama's Saris (India)

The Three Rs
Yep, those are still happening. We finally got binders and pencil cases again, which the girls are pretty excited about. Now I just need to get my act together and finish filling them! The big girls are continuing to read books, work on their workbooks, and this week do a little free writing. Monkey has been writing about her favorite characters from the Harry Potter books, and Bug has been making up little stories and illustrating them.

We found a couple of workbooks for Goose that's she's already started on--one is a pre-k workbook about same and different (this helps with math, reading, and writing skills) and one is a kindergarten addition workbook, which I'm hoping will satisfy her request for more challenging worksheets (for the record, the Target dollar bins have awesome workbooks). She's continuing to read Go, Dog, Go! She's made it all the way through the book twice, I think, with a lot of repeat reading and an increasing amount of sight reading of particularly common words. I also printed up a bunch of little cards with the vocabulary from the book printed on them. She's enjoyed playing around with those--finding ones she can read and creating her own phrases.

Where It Happens: West Coast Edition (Take 2)

Anyone who actually knows us or reads this blog regularly knows that learning is hardly limited to the walls of our house. Learning happens anywhere and everywhere for the entourage! However, our home is headquarters, and now that we're all settled into our new digs on the West Coast (again), here's a little tour of where the girls spend much of their time:

Their Bedroom: We upgraded their bunkbeds on this move, and they are pretty excited about the nearly endless possible set ups. For this location, the corner triple is working beautifully: Monkey's on top with the tent (for maximum privacy--poor little introvert), Bug is in the middle, and Goose is on the bottom. Out of sight from this angle, the girls have their usual overflowing bin of stuffed animals, crowded bookshelf, along with a couple of dressers.

The Playroom: The next area of the house that's most exclusively the girls is the playroom. They love that it's tucked away in the L-shape of the living room and not a "walking space." It's a bit cramped but the upside is that they have to clean up regularly or they can't walk in there! At their request, the playroom also features a gallery of famous artwork that includes Renoir, Monet, Seurat, Van Gogh, and Michelangelo.

The Living Room: Adjoining the playroom, is the living room, which means, of course, it frequently gets hijacked for playroom purposes, particularly since it has a lot more open space for setting up big puzzles or elaborate set ups. It's also the usual venue for reading times (them to me and vice versa), our traditional Sunday evening family movie night, weekday watching of more educational videos, and wrestling with Daddy (That last one's important! Bonding with Daddy, honing kinesthetic skills, and learning about personal, physical boundaries is crucial. Also it's hilarious to watch). It's also a library and museum of sorts since the walls and pretty much every horizontal surface are filled with books and memorabilia from our many travels. 

(Ok, so you can't actually see the wall lined with packed bookshelves,
but trust me it's there to my left just out of sight.)

The Study: After six months without one, the girls (and I) are very thankful to have this designated space back! We're able to unfold the project table to its full length for maximum elbow space during lessons and art projects and still have room for several more packed bookcases, a dresser full of craft supplies, a computer desk, filing cabinet, my favorite reading chair, and a white board. Hooray!

The Kitchen: Last but not least, the room I may actually spend the most time in! The girls spend a lot of time in here too as they participate more and more in the cooking and cleaning up process. We also do our daily Bible reading and memory around the table at breakfast. Obviously, you can't see the table in the picture, but it's there around the corner. It's just not very interesting.

So, now you know how to picture us!

Camping among the Redwoods

We took advantage of Daddy's summer break to go camping for four nights in Redwood National Forest. Those trees are truly amazing! The girls and I had prepped for the trip by reading several books about redwoods, and they were really excited about seeing them in person! Our campsite itself was full of fun things: a massive redwood stump to climb, a couple of snails (3 inches long with beautiful shells!) and banana slugs (6 inches long! Goose made it a dead leaves and dirt sandwich to eat), millipedes (so much fun to play with--Monkey convinced one to climb aboard a stick and carried it around for a long time), ferns, blackberry bushes (sadly, no berries yet), blue jays (I think: large, blue, and after our food), and of course, the usual collection of rocks and sticks that get pulled into elaborate pretend play (for example, they used their "magic wands" to invent a "latinmus"--a vehicle that can fly, drive, or swim and has TARDIS-like bigger-on-the-inside technology--out of the stump).

They declared themselves "Queens of the Redwood Forest."

Campsite cooking is always part of the adventure. This time around we figured out our new camp stove (successfully), experimented with cooking in a cast iron skillet over the fire (epic failure on all three tries), and played around with cooking things on skewers (scrumptious success--Bug in particular has mastered the art of perfectly cooking a Pillsbury crescent roll over the fire). Other fireside entertainment included reading from The Pink Fairy Book--we read Andersen's "Snow Queen," and the girls noted that it had almost nothing in common with Frozen, which was supposedly inspired by the story.

This sign appeared partway down the trail.
The girls posed with it on the return trip.

Of course, we didn't just hang out at the campsite! Our first adventure was tackling Damnation Creek Trail, a 4-mile round trip of narrow paths and steep inclines that follows the route the Yurok Indians took to get from their village through the old growth redwoods to the ocean to collect shellfish. It's an absolutely gorgeous hike, and the girls had a great time examining the plants and climbing around the redwoods. A number of these survived a forest fire that left "caves" in their trunks--many of which were big enough for all of us to clamber into! Partway down we passed a warning sign about the steep, strenuous trail ahead, but there's no stopping this crew! The girls reminisced about the time we hiked down into the Grand Canyon in the snow and ice, and noted that in comparison this trail was "easy peasy"!

We spent quite a bit of time at the beach itself. Bug commented that it was really obvious why the Yuroks came here! The rocks sticking up from the surf were completely covered in shellfish! The girls did a lot of peering into tidal pools, scrambling around the rocks, and using water to draw on the rocks before we headed back to the trailhead. Goose was a real trooper! She wore us all out on the hike back up--even Daddy gave up on keeping up with her, and let Bug and Goose race ahead to meet us at the car.

We made it to the ocean!

"Oh, look! A cliff! Let's climb it!"

The next day we toured the Redwood National

Bug's fort seats two inside with "benches"
outside for more.

Forest Visitor Center in the morning. We watched the intro video, looked at exhibits about the redwoods and their ecosystems as well as the local American Indian tribes, and explored a beach full of driftwood. Bug, our budding architect, saw a beach full of possibilities! She scoped out a site and enlisted her sisters help to collect driftwood and build a fort where the bases of two trees created a corner.

That afternoon we took the girls kayaking in Stone Lagoon. We rented two 2-seater kayaks--Bug and I took one and Daddy, Monkey, and Goose took the other (Goose is too little to paddle, but the kayaks have a mini-seat for a child passenger). We had a great time, and Monkey and Bug were awesome paddlers! We think we paddled for about a mile and a half. We kept a sharp eye out for the river otters and elk that had been spotted recently, but sadly we didn't see any. We did pass by a well-populated nesting area along the shore--it sounded like hundreds of baby birds were up in the trees begging for food! We made a rest stop in a little cove and did a bit of exploring up a trail before venturing back into the incredibly muddy landing area to get back in the water (much to the amusement of a group of picnickers). Next we stopped at the strip of beach separating the lagoon from the ocean for a longer rest. Well, a rest from paddling anyway--the girls had great fun frolicking in the water and looking for agates and other pretty rocks (we came home with several). We decided to race back to the rental place. Daddy and Monkey won by a pretty big margin (as expected), but we had fun and it gave Bug a good chance to practice losing gracefully.

We didn't actually take our camera in the kayaks, but this is Stone Lagoon. Gorgeous!

The next day we headed out for another hike--a shorter loop this time (2.75 miles) that passed by

(Oops. Forgot my camera.
Here's the 10-foot falls
courtesy of  alltrails.com)

Trillium Falls. On the way, we stopped roadside with a bunch of other tourists to catch a glimpse of a herd of Roosevelt Elk (the species, nearly extinct 100 years ago, can now be spotted frequently in the park). Goose and I (and sometimes Bug) decided to take this trail slowly and examine the wildlife along the way. She was particularly fascinated by baby ferns, clover that are purple on the underside, and the intricate root structures of the old upturned redwoods. The falls themselves were gorgeous, and the girls loved practicing their agility by bounding around on the rocks below the falls. On our way back to the campsite we stopped by a WWII radar station on the coast. It was disguised as a farmhouse and barn and was used to spot enemy aircraft and submarines. The equipment has been long removed of course, but we were amused by the fake doors (they would "open" to cinder block walls) and fake dormer windows on the roof (you can see through the window that there's no room behind it, just roof shingles).

We stopped at the Golden Gate Bridge on our
way home. It's our second visit to the bridge,
and once again almost completely shrouded in fog.

So, here's what I love about home schooling: On this vacation to the redwoods, we covered the following subjects: physical education (hiking, kayaking), life skills/home ec (raise a tent, build a fire, cook, what to do if you're lost in the woods, etc.), science (biology, geology, physics, environmental stewardship), history (WWII, American Indian), and literature ("The Snow Queen"). I feel like I may have missed some things, but that gives you the basic idea--the learning never stops!