HAPPY 10th BIRTHDAY

KARALINE OLIVIA

Homeschooling is still going really well. I am amazed at how well they are doing. Karaline has always really struggled in Language Arts but just took a placement exam after the first unit and scored a 97 on it! Karson is taking off in math like I could have never imagined.....as well as reading. Kolton went from not even having a concept that letters have sounds 2 months ago to sounding out 3 and 4 letter words now!

We are studying rural Appalachia through The Rag Coat, Ancient Egypt through The Story of the World (yes we have dragged this one out quite a while), and the Civil War through The Story of George Washington Carver. Karaline is choosing to do a project on Harriet Tubman on the side. We have several field trips planned for the next couple of weeks to go along with these topics too.

With all of that said, I am still not 100% pleased with our Math curriculum or Language Arts for Karson. I think I am going to buy Teaching Textbooks for Karaline and something different for the boys. I really want to try Right Start Math with the boys, but I'm not sure I want to keep up with all the "parts" that we would need. Something just keeps talking me out of RS math for the boys (but my head wants to jump right in). As for Language Arts for Karson, I am at a complete loss. I feel like he has the ability to really take off in that area, but I am not finding a program that allows him to do that.

HAPPY 14th BIRTHDAY KOLLIN

Well I updated my blog for Kemry's birthday and just realized I never wished my sweet Kollin a public happy birthday on my blog (did on Facebook though). So here it is......HAPPY BIRTHDAY KOLLIN!!!!!!!!!!! Their birthdays are only 1 day apart and it's always a very busy week or two because of that.

HAPPY 3RD BIRTHDAY KEMRY-PIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today our sweet baby girl is turning 3 years old. Her birthday party is next weekend so the poor thing has had to spend her day today running from soccer to ballet to grocery shopping to visiting relatives.....everyday norm. :)

The first picture we ever saw of her...she is 2 days old here

Kemry's 1st birthday

Kemry's 2nd birthday-ish ;)

TODAY- our big 3yr old!

This place gets buggier by the day! Karaline caught this HUGE dragonfly yesterday. The pictures don't even do it's size justice. It was at least 4.5-5in long with a wingspan just as long. Rarely do we get to see such fast bugs up close.

Don't look at her dirty fingernails...she was digging in the dirt right before she found it.

We started the insect portion of our science curriculum this week (Apologia Zoology 1), so we decided to "adopt" some Monarch butterflies and follow their life cycle.



We have several eggs that haven't hatched yet. They are so teeny tiny it's hard to find them.

We also have several caterpillars in different sizes. I actually think I got a picture of this one's hiney thinking it was his head. HA HA

We didn't realize that we also got ladybug eggs and larvae so we get to study the life cycle of a ladybug too! Here are the ladybug eggs. They are in clusters and much easier to find.

And the larvae are kinda gross looking. This one is munching on an aphid while I take the picture!

Here are pictures from our "nomad night" I mentioned in the last post.

Guess Kolton thought it was going to be cold because he grabbed flannel PJs. LOL I told them to make sure they were long sleeved because of mosquitoes.

NOMAD WEEK

This week we were studying nomads in history and had so much fun with it. We went on a nature hunt for things that the nomads may have used as paints for their cave paintings. Then we made cave paintings. We also made game bags just like the nomads carried and a hut they would have slept in (we cheated on this one). Then on Friday night the kids slept outside under the stars with daddy just like the nomads would have done. About 3am they burst in the back door soaking wet after a downpour. LOL Karson decided that nomads didn't move place to place looking for food. They moved place to place avoiding rain and thunderstorms.

Last weekend we also had a cookout with neighbors and a marshmallow roast. It was a lot of fun!

Kemry and the neighbor's daughter - this picture cracks me up! Are they twins or what?

Oh dear, what are we going to do with all her sass???? Her hitting 12.5 has been such a huge change for us.

Our sweet neighbor helping Kemry with her marshmallow

We also hit the pool again....Kolton showing me his wrinkled toes. Karly playing with our friend's new puppy.

This goes on NONSTOP

Then there's always a retaliation

ROFL

blowing up a beach ball...those EYES

John and the kids hit a baseball game. While I normally love this, mama needed a break so I stayed home with the other kids.

Playing outside after our school work is all finished