Outside my Window
The thermometer on the back porch is not quite reaching 40 this morning. Can’t tell you how happy I am to have seasonal weather for the holiday! There will be fires in the fireplace this week.

I am Thankful For
You! Olivia and I have been trying out the samples from Writing & Rhetoric Book 1: Fable from Classical Academic Press. We have been really enjoying it and having a fun time discussing, talking about words and writing stories. Except with the big purchases I made recently (see below) there was no way I was asking my husband if we could buy more curriculum this year. And then I discovered it was sold on Amazon. And I have just enough affiliate dollars from last month to get it! Yay! Thank you so much for supporting our homeschooling by the purchases you make through our affiliate links like Amazon. Now we can keep on enjoying our new writing lessons.

I am Thinking About
The week ahead. I am so happy to have a break from many of our regular activities. I really hope to sneak in some reading and knitting and laying about in front of that fire.

From the Schoolroom
I am seeing the fruits of our labors. Mastery learning is slow going, but honestly it is worth the time and effort put in to it. It pays off. I was seeing it so much with Math U See that I decided to order All About Reading for the kids. Both programs use mastery when used as written. We are about five or six lessons in to AAR (depending on the kid — John is doing Level 1 and Olivia Level 3) and I can see what a difference it is going to make. Both are in a quasi-review mode with it. Some of the knowledge in the lessons is review, but other knowledge is filling in the gaps and cementing their skills — really cementing. Oh, how I am loving it. And so easy to use. I have changed a few things up with curriculum since the beginning of the school year, so I need to get an updated curriculum list up and a post about the changes.

From the Kitchen
You have to ask? Turkey, ham, peas, broccoli salad, dressing, sweet potato casserole, rolls, and pies. 🙂 All made by me later this week. (Ok, the dressing was made by my mom, because she is going out of town, and I just can’t do Thanksgiving without Mom’s dressing. Thanks Mom!)

Trending
May Themes and Resources

I am Creating
I am trying to cast on to make a felted bag for John, but so far have only gotten as far as the gauge swatch. Baby girl blanket still a work in progress, but I have been working on it during morning prayer so I am adding at least a couple of rows a day. I did knit a hat, which did not turn out well at all. My resident knitting coach couldn’t even figure out what the problem was, so she’s blaming it on the pattern. I heart her. One of the gals in town organized a knitting club. We all got together at Barnes and Noble this month to sit and work with yarn for a while. It was lovely. Oh, and I have another craft in the works that is not yarn related. Hope I get time to finish it this week, because I think you are going to like it.

I am Reading
How to Teach Your Children Shakespeare – Highly recommend. We are already working on the first passage. I would also like to do some engrossing fiction or memoir reading this week over the holiday. Any suggestions?

I am Praying
For a dear friend who lost her father. She drove to New York to be with her mom; her husband is here with the four kids. Please pray with me.

I am Listening To
Not much. The ones who are awake are upstairs. Mostly it is the keyboard, the fridge, the wind in the trees and the occasional request for apple juice.

Clicking Around
We are purging and cleaning around here (see below). One of my projects is sorting through the kids’ artwork for the past few years. I am trying to whittle it down to the smallest possible pile to keep. I am using Artkive to snap photos and store most of their creations.

How Do You Solve a (liturgical) Problem Like Maria?

Around the House
We are purging and organizing and moving things about. We got smart and hired our baby sitter to come for the day to fix meals for the kids and play with them. In the meantime we cleaned out the garden shed, attic, got a good start on the garage and a start on the upstairs room redo. Yay progress!

One of My Favorite Things
A fire in the fireplace. I’m so glad it’s fire season again. You can tell because that is the third time I’ve mentioned a fire in this post. 🙂

Plans for the Week
Tomorrow we are going to do a fall craft with friends, then we have guests! (Guests with a baby, how fun!) Tuesday finds us a co-op for some inexplicable reason, and then after that we are on holiday. We are hosting Matt’s family here. It will be a small, but cozy group this year.

A Picture
Our very first geocache from a couple of weeks ago. There were two at our location. We found one, but not the other. Such fun. We will definitely be doing it again.

Pin

Latest posts by Pam (see all)

PinterestSMS