Exciting News!

I've been invited to try Time4Learning for one month in exchange for a candid review. My opinion will be entirely my own, so be sure to come back and read about my experience. Time4Learning is an online educational program that can be used in many ways including as a homeschooling curriculum or afterschool tutorial. Find out how to write your own curriculum review for Time4Learning.

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The Corn Maze

This past week we saw it all. Flus, colds, karate, archery, and corn maze. No stone was left uncovered in our quest to have a life full of adventure. The corn maze was a beautiful excursion from the everyday bookwork. Unfortunately it also was the first time I left my son alone. He was too raspy to bring out in the cool fall air. He contented himself with hours of video games. Boy life is tough. The farmer who runs the corn maze sure thinks of everything. Selling pumpkins, gourds, and squash to the public, he also grows Christmas trees. Throughout late summer his farm is open for wildflowers walks and tours. Hayrides, sleigh rides and a small petting barn are also available. He really out does himself every year making up the corn maze. This year's design was a brain. His map was a little tough to follow, cough, cough...seems some of the other kids had no problem though. In the maze is a sort of stamp scavenger hunt you are to complete before exiting...well we didn't finish. We only had found five of the six punches after racing through the maze for an hour and half. Tired, hot, I had overdressed for the occasion, and feeling slightly claustrophobic I was relieved to find our way back out.

 

We hope you enjoyed your trip to the farm with us!

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Homeschooling and Life

The most unforgivable part of being the lead organizer of a major event has always got to be the forgetting of one tiny detail. That one tiny detail is inevitably not so tiny in the big picture. For weeks I was organizing and planning our huge homeschool kick off party. It was planned down the last minute detail including the camera. Do you know what happened. No I didn't forget the camera...I forgot the camera card. I could seriously kick myself. So much work went into the making of our own pencil shaped pinata, so many sweet little kids took turns bashing it, 70 guests and no camera! Games a plenty, with laughter around, and no camera. Food galore and prizes to take home, no camera. Friends old and new, no camera. Oh kicking oneself almost seems lacking. Well the party was a huge success despite my picturelessness. The week here has started off with my dd being sick with a cold and flu. So she missed her second karate class. Luckily one of the other mom's was nice enough to pick up my ds so he didn't miss out. He sure is loving the class. Tonight he is off trying out an archery class. Which amazingly I discovered is free of charge and supplies the equipment! I think it is going to quickly become a family favorite as they hold the class twice a week all fall and winter. Brownies, junior girl guides was missed because of dd being sick. She was okay with that though as they were painting. After all the painting she did for the art show she was alright with having a wee break. Of course next week is the Canadian Thanksgiving holiday on Monday so that means both Brownies and karate will be cancelled. I have been busy posting great Canadian Thanksgiving resources this week on my facebook blog. If you haven't already stopped over be sure to so you don't miss out. I also am going to be working on Halloween printables for kids in the middle grades as part of our next themed blog printable hop later in the month. Be sure to stop back in for those.

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Okay so I am not perfect.

It has been brought to my attention that as of late my grammar and spelling has been slipping. If this is so and I can see it is please bear with me as I am really overworked lately. Time is short when I finally get to update my blog or make my little captioned pieces. So sometimes...things get missed...sigh I know its small comfort for the grammar police, however it is what it is. I shall continue to try to improve all of that as best as I can when time allows. Again my apologies.

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Whew..

It's been a tiring weekend. With the kids art show being hosted on Friday and Saturday we spent a lot of time getting it set up, attending to it, and then of course taking it all down again. After getting everything put away I am just exhausted. As everyone knows though us mom's rarely catch a break. Today we had to rush out, to beat the crowds, to grab some new pants, the kids start a karate class tomorrow. Then it was time to write up the newsletter for the homeschool group here in town. Thankfully I planned ahead and had some submissions from other hs mom bloggers. It made it slightly easier. Of course even with the easy route some work is involved. I used picmonkey to edit all the art show pics. Here they are :)

 

My pics are pretty awful I admit I am NOT a photographer. Also our camera lost a lens and we stuck it back in but it hasn't been the same since.

Now that the show is over we can focus our attention on the next major event happening next Sat which is the Homeschool Kick Off. It's been a lot of fun planning, organizing, etc... I am keeping my fingers crossed that we have good weather as regardless it is outside. The only shelter we will have is pretty small if it decides to rain. I think I may be singing "Rain, rain, go away," under my breath all week.

Of course I can't tell you the nitty gritty of our kickoff as some one might catch wind of what's up and ruin the surprise of it all. I can say that it is going to be jam packed with games, prizes, food, and fun. With 67 people scheduled to come it's gotta be BIG! One day at a time I believe the old saying goes. So one day at time it is. Karate tomorrow. I may just have to take my camera if everyone doesn't mind my 'talent' behind the lens. Who knows with enough practice I may just improve my skills.

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The blur of the week.

This past week was crazy busy and it's only picking up speed. I spent a large amount of time preparing giveaways for our upcoming homeschool kickoff, organizing for the upcoming art show, and making decorations for the home.
The kids had easier schooling because of my busyness. They enjoyed working on finishing up their art projects, learning how to use Open Office writing, Microsoft Paint, as well as light math and English for the week.
I was super impressed with my daughter who has been the most difficult child to train to clean up after herself. I asked them both to clean their rooms the other day...you couldn't see the floor anymore. She usually dawdles and does little to nothing. This time she insisted I didn't enter until she said so. When I finally did and hour and half later she had tidied and cleaned so thoroughly that I thought for sure I was in the wrong house! Of course congratulation and adulation was in order.
I also have joined a facebook group that has blogging moms who create printables. Although I am new to making printables I have decided to share mine with you. It will take a while to get them all loaded on to the site here but I hope you find them useful in your schooling.
If you follow Adventure Hollow on Facebook then you likely have already seen our line of "You might be homeschooler if's" they are just fun to create!
I am also working on a line of "Public school is better than homeschool because..." A sort of tongue in cheek poke at the education system. If you have any suggestions for either please don't hesitate to leave it in the comments section below this post.
I will of course have photos of the art show to share with you next weekend and of all the great baking I will be doing throughout the week. I leave you now with our lineup in no particular order of "You might be a homeschooler if's"

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Freedom to Switch it Up.

 I can't thank myself enough for year round schooling this year. With busy events coming up I am thankful to be able to take the time needed to pull them together and lighten our school load without that niggling feeling of guilt.

 Also having used our 'new' curric for the past couple of months I have learned what is and isn't working. I discovered my daughter would likely benefit from the introduction of a more formal writing program to go with her Logic of English. Therefore I have her starting on Essentials in Writing as well. My daughter is decidely right brained and so I have set her math book aside that we were using. I opted to try Right Brained Math and it's EZ Times Tables. After learning it myself,  I have to say I am very pleased with her understanding of the material thus far. I am excitedly waiting for the already printed copy to arrive with the dvd. (Again printer ink is such a hog!) I am also thrilled to get cracking with our new computer curriculum from TechnoKids this week as well.

 We had a great day geocaching today and visiting a small local waterfall which was unseasonably full due to flash flooding we had here last week. The weather is really cooling off at night bringing us closer to frost already!

In other news last week the kids were working hard for their upcoming homeschool art show. I can't wait for it to be here so I can share all their exciting pieces with you my readers!

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Better Late Then Never!

Well here we are...I was going to blah blah about what I am doing...but frankly that can read like a grocery list. So rather then blahing to you all I figure I will just post what has had us busy this past week in pics. After all a picture is worth a thousand words!

Many thanks to Jenny Morris of Homeschool Swapping Adventures on Facebook

 for coming up with Geo Boxes!

The kids really enjoyed doing this and are busily coming up with ideas for their next geo box which is headed to Kentucky, USA! I admit I must research a bit before sending materials to Kentucky as I have no idea what they do and don't have there.

 Getting ready for the fall fair is starting to become an annual tradition around here. My daughter really enjoyed making this little fellow out of veggies we grew in our urban garden!

 Her favorite entry by far was the model pioneer village. She was struggling at first with the concept of pioneer. I have no idea why because we often discuss living in the past etc..I think just a new vocabulary word had her stuck. So thank you Laura Ingalls Wilder for writing your books. And thank you tv world for creating a great tv show off of her books that my daughter could relate to.

 Posters have been tough around here. Even though she didn't win I am very proud of her immense effort put into her poster this year!

 She was excited to win penmanship for the second year running.

 Shyness doesn't pay off is a lesson my daughter learned. At the fair they had a draw for elementary aged kids. She had to go into a little building and fill out her name and number to enter. "I don't even want to win!" She said to me nervously. Encouragingly I assured her she may feel different later so better to enter. He brother tossed in that she could always sell her winnings if she won. Grudgingly she entered the draw. Low and behold as we were packing up to leave she discovered she had won the second prize in the drawing. She gave a gasp. So thrilled and incredulous to have won anything.

 My son worked very hard at making his little Celtic civilization model for the fair this year and won 1st place.

 I have to say as a child the veggie animals were one of my favorite entries as well. So much fun to take veggies and pin together into an animal. In this instance they also included fruit for eyes. All found in our little backyard garden.

 The little Celtic hut was made out self hardening clay that you can find at Micheals. It dries very well overnight. The roof was made out of corn leaves.

 After much thinking he was pretty pleased with his creation.

The best sunflower head is one of the most puzzling entries. What do they judge on? Seeds? Color? Size? One doesn't know. But he was happy his was 3rd.

 The ribbons look nice hanging on a felt wall hanging outside if their rooms with other little badges and pins they have gotten.

 Always the crafter he was happy to get 3rd place again for his beaded bracelet.

 Second and third for brownies and unbaked cookies. Sure is hard to find a good unbaked cookie recipe.

30 attempts and a pile of crumpled paper later he was not doing it over.

So our week was full of fun and surprises.

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