Suncatcher Christmas Trees

Monkey and Bug enjoyed this project (construction paper tree outline + contact paper + tissue paper squares), although Monkey decided to go minimalist on hers. Bug pointed out that Monkey's "lets lots of light through!" And, yes, I made one too--it's just such a neat project! 

Grocery Shopping

The entourage and I did two grocery shopping trips this week, so this seems like a good time to talk about that routine expedition. I know alot of moms who love that they can go grocery shopping without their kids. Since my girls happen to be great shoppers, leaving them home would just be a missed educational opportunity: We cover counting, colors, and identifying foods ("I need 4 yellow apples, ladies!"), also measuring/numerals because Monkey and Bug have recently discovered scales and insist on weighing all our produce and telling me how many pounds it is. They frequently help locate other foods in the aisles too. We've discussed price comparison occasionally when picking out their treat* ("You can get 1 juice bottle with the character on it for X dollars, or you can get 8 juice boxes for the same amount of dollars.") Smart girls--they always pick the juice boxes. And we've talked about healthy food choices (why we buy lots of veggies, but not lots of candy). Depending on their energy level, this trip can also be PE since Monkey and Bug like to run sprints up and down whatever aisle we're on. Goose finds this activity particularly entertaining. (Despite appearances, my kids are not running wild--they stop at the end of the aisle or sooner if asked to, and with few exceptions come right back when I call them. They're even getting better at pausing the running when someone else is coming down the aisle, so we're working on courtesy too.) And, of course, they learn basic life skills like waiting our turn in line and the fact that we have to pay for our food before we eat it. Whew! All that in a 1 1/2 hourish shopping trip!

* A note about the treat: This tradition did not start because I was desperate to get the entourage to behave. It began when I was 8 mos. pregnant with Goose, the military required Daddy's presence hundreds of miles away for several months, and I had 2 two-year-olds. I decided if I could get through a shopping trip under those circumstances without a meltdown, I deserved a little something special, and it just didn't seem fair not to share with the girls. So, we made a deal: if we are all good shoppers, then we get a treat. Anyone who has a meltdown, runs away, etc. loses their treat.

Fun with Math

Speaking of grocery shopping treats, on our first trip this week, Monkey and Bug asked if we could get M&Ms for our treat, so we could actually do the M&M counting book they checked out from the library last week. We did the sections that involved colors, sorting, patterns, and counting up to 12 before they lost interest, and we decided to just eat the M&Ms. Something tells me the M&M math books are going to be a recurring element in the entourage's education; there's a whole series of them. I also made them a numbers game out of frozen juice lids, with numeral stickers on half and hole-punched dots stuck on with contact paper on the other half. They had a good time working on matching them up: Monkey and Bug can do 1-3 very consistently, but they still have to be convinced to actually count out the 4-6 dots instead of just guessing at random. Goose likes them too--she's been happily banging them around and industriously shoving them under the couch (that's fine motor skills practice, right? :-)

Airplane!

Building Things

While unpacking the Christmas decorations, we discovered the long-lost "how to build things" instruction book that came with their workbench. Daddy and I have both been helping Monkey and Bug build things. They pick out a project and locate all the pieces we'll need step-by-step. At this point Daddy and I do most of the actual building, but we'll be working on that. Right now it's a good exercise in sorting, counting, and following directions, not to mention the cool toy they end up with! (Goose supervises and chews on the construction supplies).


Aunt E!



Aunt E came for a few days' visit on her way home from a friend's wedding/fundraising trip. Monkey and Bug have been keeping her busy! They've been reading LOTS of books, including seemingly endless repetitions of If You Give a Pig a Pancake. Monkey and Bug nearly have it memorized (as does Aunt E, I'm sure!). E is a missionary/professional musician, who, much to the entourage's delight brought her clarinet with her.

 Even Goose was mesmerized by the impromptu concert. E also let the entourage peruse her sheet music collection and pick out what piece they wanted her to play next. At some point Monkey and Bug hunted down their recorders in order to play trios with E. They even insisted they have sheet music too, so they would know what notes to play. For a while E played familiar kids songs by ear; although Bug confessed to me afterwards that her recorder didn't play softly and it didn't really play the Itsy Bitsy Spider like E's did.

Library Day

We came home with these books this week:

If You Give a Pig a Pancake

Freight Train

Snowballs!

Fox in Socks

Finger Rhymes

The Shapes We Eat

The Ants and the Grasshopper

Potential favorite Christmas memory of the year:

We turned on Nutcracker music earlier this week, and Monkey and Bug started ecstatically dancing around in circles in front of the Christmas tree, breathlessly explaining to me that they were Christmas angels dancing to show people where to find Baby Jesus.

Advent Begins!

At our house, the first Sunday in Advent means turning up the Christmas music, putting up the tree, and decorating the house! We pulled out the two big Rubbermaid containers of Christmas decorations, and I'm pretty sure Monkey and Bug thought it was Christmas morning already as they opened boxes and unwrapped decorations. In addition to the random Christmassy things, our decorations involve about a dozen Nativity sets, two of which are extremely kid-friendly and currently strewn about the living room. Obviously, we've been talking alot about THE Christmas story instead of Santa Claus now that baby Jesus keeps popping up everywhere at home. 

Monkey and Bug were incredibly excited about getting the tree up; Bug had been telling me for days that she "so, so, SO wanted to set up the Christmas tree." Instead of a traditional Chrismas tree, we do a Chrismon tree--all the ornaments are white and gold handmade Christian symbols. (Want to know more about Chrismons? Click here.) Of course, the entourage helped decorate the tree, which means most of our Chrismons are now at 3-year-old eye level.(Goose wanted in on the action too: We wouldn't let her touch the Chrismons, but she kept trying to hang her pacifier on the lower branches.) I try to add a Chrismon to the tree every year, and this is the first year that Monkey and Bug were capable of making their own Chrismons to add to the tree. I kept it super easy and understandable: I cut epiphany stars out of stiff white felt and let the girls paint them with gold glitter glue.

We actually don't have an Advent calendar going, much as I'd like to, because at this stage I think it'd be confusing: We're celebrating Christmas twice with different sets of family, and neither celebration is going to occur on Christmas day. We still have lots of fun Christmassy projects planned for this holiday season though!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Preparations

part of the flock of hand turkey place cards

We started one last Thanksgiving project at the beginning of the week--hand turkey place cards. We did the tracing and coloring onto notecards, I started cutting, and then in all the excitement of family and food we completely forgot to finish and use them! Oh, well, maybe next year.

This week instead of involving the entourage in housecleaning, our next door neighbor, Miss N, offered to let them come over to play with her daughter, LA, on Tuesday morning, so I could actually get everything done before our extended family arrived. Our girls love LA, and they started begging me to take them next door from the moment they got up that morning! They had a grand time playing with LA, sharing snacks and all her toys, and soaking up some Spanish. (Miss N is from Mexico, so she and LA are biligual. Monkey, Bug, and I had a long conversation the other day about different languages, talking about how they ask for something--"water, please!" how LA asks--"agua, por favor!" and how Goose asks "Waaaaah!") AND our house was completely clean, top to bottom, all at the same time! I took a few moments to just admire it before sending Daddy to pick up the entourage.

The gang's all here!

This year we had Grandma, Granddad, Uncle N, Aunt A, and A's friend from college here for the holiday. Monkey and Bug love having the family here: More people to build with blocks! More people to play games! More people to read books! In fact, they were so busy playing with everybody that they didn't end up getting involved in all the cooking on Thursday (usually they love helping me cook). Goose still has some anxiety about all these "strange people" in her house, but she had mostly warmed up by the end of the visit. In addition to the full-scale feast, this side of the family's Thanksgiving traditions involves going for an after-meal walk around the neighborhood, then coming home to pies, apple cider, and board games. While they were here we also went for a more picturesque walk along the canal. We got to see kayakers (including a father and son team who were just getting in the water and let us get a close look at the kayaks), turtles, a comorant, and lots of dogs.

Aunt A and Uncle N are both musicians and brought their instruments with them to practic (saxophone and trumpet respectively). After hearing A and N practice for a little while, Monkey and Bug were really excited that they got to push the buttons while A and N played. Discussion followed about how the trumpet had 3 buttons and the saxophone had LOTS of buttons. The girls also spent time figuring out the saxophones system (some buttons close multiple holes).

The family went home on Sunday while we headed to church, and life returned to normal. We're looking forward to seeing them (and the rest of the clan!) at Christmas.

Thanksgiving Projects

We had two projects plus worksheets this week. First, we made Pilgrim and Indian puppets out of TP tubes and the Mayflower out of a shoebox, paper towel roll, and piece of paper. Then we reenacted the story of the first Thanksgiving, using the two extensions of our sectional couch as England and America (I know they went to Holland before America, but we're keeping it simple, folks) and lots of plastic food for the feast. Many trans-Atlantic voyages followed. Goose tried to get in on the action too, of course, and she did eventually manage to rip the head off an Indian. Fortunately, the novelty had worn off by then, and the tragic incident did not result in a major meltdown.

Our next project was making turkeys out of construction paper hand and foot prints (discussion followed about how turkeys are like really BIG chickens and how we're going to cook one when Grandma and Grandad come visit).

The girls also completed a stack of Thanksgiving-themed worksheets (counting, matching, finding differences, pencil control). (A note: At this point, I don't usually sit them down and make them do worksheets. They have access to a file box full of worksheets, coloring sheets, mazes, construction paper and plain paper. They get into this box almost everyday, but the worksheets they tend to do in spurts. They'll whiz through a dozen in a day, then not look at them again for a couple of weeks.)

Library Day

We were back at the branch library this week, and I had an additional preschooler for our informal storytime on the floor of the children's section. A little girl about Monkey and Bug's age joined us in a rousing reading of The Cat in the Hat Came Back, accompanied by a lively discussion about appropriate house cleaning methods (Me: "Do we clean bathtubs with dresses?!" Girls: "NO!" "With soap!" "With sponges!") This week it was Goose who had a meltdown when I declared it time to go home: she was engrossed in a puzzle, but the rest of the entourage was getting hungry for lunch.

Books we checked out this week:

The Vegetables Are Sleeping
Quiet as a Cricket
The First Thanksgiving

M&M's Counting Book

White-tailed Deer (we saw a 4-point buck on our way to the library!)

The Pigeon Found a Hot Dog

The Mitten

I Am America

A Christmas Story (a retelling of the Christmas story from the perspective of a little girl, Mary & Joseph's neighbor; we've also been reading the nativity story in their kid's Bible)

Santa Who? (a history of Santa Claus from Bishop Nicholas to the current guy in the red suit. Santa is everywhere already! A note: We aren't going to have the entourage believe in Santa, as in the fat old man who stalks kids year round, then breaks into their houses on Jesus' birthday--sorry, I know he brings cool gifts, but that's just creepy. We still do stockings, but we talk about the St. Nicholas story and focus on Jesus birthday.)

Sewing Cards

At Bug's request we made new sewing cards this week (shapes cut out of an old cereal box, hole punch, yarn). Bug and Monkey let Goose play with/taste one of their old, beat-up cards while they played with the new, more complex ones. I love this activity because it also buys me a little time to work on my own sewing project (a cross-stitch at the moment) while the entourage is awake.

"Gym"

Daddy has started indepently studying Japanese swordsmanship and restarted practicing kung fu. As a result our garage has been cleaned out (hooray!) and a good-sized part of it cleared for practice space. The benefit for the entourage: it's enough space to ride trikes and play with outside balls now that it's getting darker earlier and getting colder. Monkey and Bug have been teaching Goose how to throw and roll balls.

Walking

Goose has progressed from taking 4 or 5 steps as a game to walk between Mommy and Daddy to walking 2 or 3 steps all on her own just to get from point A to point B. Yes, this girl is going to be running frighteningly soon!

Fingerpaint

This week we made fingerpaint. Monkey and Bug loved helping me pour in and mix the ingredients and choose the colors. (They noted that "it was like making food, but paint not food.") Next we took our containers of paint to the garden tub upstairs and turned it into a colorful masterpiece! Monkey loved this activity! Bug enjoyed enjoyed it for a little while, then asked (very urgently) to get out and be cleaned up, because (oh, the horror!) she was getting messy. Since I stripped the girls first, this made for super easy clean up. Goose was asleep for this, but since the paint is actually safe to eat, we'll get her involved next time.

Operation Christmas Child

We got a shoebox to fill from church that's due back this Sunday. So, this week we went to the dollar store, and Monkey and Bug got to choose gifts for "a little girl just their size whose Mommy and Daddy couldn't buy her presents." This also turned out to be a practice in math skills ("Yes, that's a neat gift, but will that 4-foot-long, plastic crayon fit in her Christmas box?" "Is it full yet? Do we have room for another toy?") Goose chose to sleep through this activity too.

Words!
Goose is slowly building her vocabulary. The word list now includes: Mama, Dada, yeah, and nana (as in banana. Sorry, Nana, I'm sure your name will come later). She also shakes her head "no" pretty emphatically.

Library Day
This week we went to the main library, so we actually stuck around for storytime. The theme this week was dinosaurs, and Monkey and Bug got to make paper, stand-alone dinos. Monkey and Bug really like this libray because it has a puppet theater inside and a playground outside. (The downside of this library is that it's bigger and more crowded, so they and Goose can't have the freedom to wander that they enjoy at the little branch library.)

Books we checked out this week:

• Giraffes
• Berenstein Bear's Nursery Tales ("Goldilocks and the Three Bears," "The Little Red Hen," and "The Gingerbread Man")
• We're Going on a Bear Hunt
• Max the Music Maker
• How Long Is It?
• Why We Have Thanksgiving
• Yoga Bear (we actually renewed this one; it's a book of yoga positions for kids that we've really been enjoying doing)

Current and Ongoing Interests and Activities

Some topics and activities are ongoing in our lives, so here's an overview before I get into posts involving specific highlights. I'll try to do one of these overviews every so often as interests develop.
Animals: This interest is mostly pursued through Diego the animal rescuer. We usually watch an episode while we snuggle on the couch first thing in the morning, and frequently follow it up by searching for YouTube videos of the featured animal. Episodes usually inspire us to look for books about particular animals at the library and play games Monkey and Bug invent based on animal characteristics.
Music/Instruments: They have a number of instruments (bongos, drum pads, recorders, maracas, xylophone) that get pretty frequent play. Lately Monkey and Bug been requesting drum music, so we've been doing Pandora searches for music that's heavily percussion and watching drum solos on YouTube. They have an app on their iPods that gets them to identify instruments by sound. They pay very close attention to any instruments or choirs used in music at church. They also have a collection of kids CDs that we sing along to while we're in the car.
Arts & Crafts: Monkey and Bug do a lot of coloring (coloring pages, coloring on plain paper or the white board). They also like to practice cutting and gluing with construction paper, and I've been doing more organized craft projects with them. Goose is very interested in crayons, but at this stage she mostly tries to eat them. We're working on it. :-)
Reading/the library: Our house is full of books! We read lots of books together, and all three girls like to spend time "reading" books on their own. Monkey and Bug each have reading lights, so that at night if they aren't ready to sleep yet or get up too early, they can look at books. We're also regulars at the local library, so this blog will include weekly updates on what we're checking out.
The YMCA: We're there three days a week. I get to take exercises with other grown ups, Monkey and Bug get to play on a huge, foamy climbing thing and play with other preschoolers, and Goose gets to play in a nursery with new and exciting toys.
Military Homeschool Playgroup: A once-a-week gathering in which a bunch kids, birth to teen, are set loose in gym with lots of balls and occasionally hula hoops. Part of the afternoon involves an organized gym class for those interested, and the big kids are usually in and out between the gym and other classes (art, drama, etc.) All three girls love chasing balls around the court, and they get to have positive interactions with big kids who help/teach them instead of just running them over.
Church: We're there Wednesday nights for dinner, and Monkey and Bug go to choir and a Bible class (Goose is in the nursery). Sunday's involve Sunday school, and Monkey and Bug come with Daddy and I to "big church."
EVERYTHING: At this stage my life is a constant stream of answering questions about anything and everything. I try to answer as accurately as possible and am usually amazed by what they are capable of understanding and remembering.

The Intro

Why a blog?
It's an experiment in record keeping (which means it may fail to suit my purposes and suddenly stop--my apologies). We could be described as uptight unschoolers or really relaxed homeschoolers, so keeping records of the entourage's education isn't going to be as simple as writing down grades from tests or assignments. I'm trying to find a system that works for us before we actually have to start reporting to the school system. Another mom recommending starting a blog to keep track of highlights and current interests with little write-ups and photos and to share with interested friends and family what we're up to. My hope is update this blog weekly at least.

Why "the Entourage"?
Partly out of necessity, partly as part of our parenting/education philosophy, our daughters go with me everywhere--the grocery store, the doctor's office, the DMV. They usually get involved in the at-home chores too. At some point my husband (Daddy from here on) and I began referring to them as my entourage, and he even came up with positions for them. Monkey (3 yrs) is "the muscle," Bug (also 3 yrs) is my "hypeman," and Goose (almost 1 yr)  is "arm candy." (Any family members who need help figuring out who's who, send me a message, and I'll enlighten you.)

Why homeschooling?
Before we had kids Daddy and I assumed we'd send them to public school. Then in August 2008 two things happened: Monkey and Bug were born, and Daddy starting working as a teacher in a public school. Daddy very quickly became disillusioned with his job choice and the educational system in general. We joked about how our girls "would learn more if just didn't send them to school" (disclosure: the district we were in was facing a state take over, so we were looking at one of the worst districts). It didn't take long for the joking to turn to serious thought. We liked the idea of letting them learn at their own pace, allowing them to follow their own interests, and encouraging more freedom and creativity than they could have in a classroom environment. We also realized the homeschool lifestyle would work well with Daddy's new career in the military and all the traveling that can entail. So here we are!