HOLY TADPOLES!

So our tadpoles hatched - my goodness we have A LOT of them! Free shipping or delivery (and advise on raising them!) if anyone wants some! LOL I think there might be about 150 or so. Why, oh why, did I get so many?? When I got the egg sack from my Grandma it did not look like THAT many. I seriously have a TADPOLE FARM now. Brenna thinks it is the coolest thing tho. I guess in a couple days I will transfer some to the big tank. Maybe we will have to take a trip to our local park and let some go in the lake because I do not think my tank is big enough for them all.

Family Vacation

Brendon, Brenna and I are taking our family vacation the week of August 19th. We are going camping! I am so excited about it and am really looking forward to it. We are going to a pretty big, popular place about 5 hours away (not saying exactly where cuz this IS the Internet - I have my blog set as private but you never know...). We have been planning it for the last week and I have so many lists going - I like to be prepared! :) Brendon and I used to go camping a lot before Brenna was born and have not gone in so long. Brenna is finally old enough I think to where it won't be so stressful. She is so excited and can't wait to go. I will post with pictures when we get back!

Update on our Tadpoles

Well I gave away all my goldfish that we had in our fish tank (they are very messy fish and not good to have in an aquarium) - took them to Mom and Dad's pond where we got the tadpoles from. So now I have converted my 10 gallon aquarium into my tadpole/frog habitat. We only have 9 tadpoles left from the 30 we got. During my first water change I lost a lot of them but I now have it down to a science. The nine that we have are thriving in their new tank and it looks like they should be getting their back legs soon. After their back legs come in then the front ones develop and soon after that they get their lungs and become cute little frogs. :) The rock that is sticking out of the water in the tank is for the frogs to climb on once their gills are gone.

We have yet another tadpole project going on besides this one now too. My Grandma has a pond in her yard as well and she spotted a bunch of tadpole eggs the other day and asked if I wanted some. So now we are "hatching" them! It is pretty interesting to see the eggs change from perfect little circles into tadpoles. Right now they are tiny, squirmy and bean-shaped and they should hatch in a day or two. I will leave them in small containers for about a week or so and then transfer them to the aquarium. It is all really neat to watch and Brenna just loves having them and is learning a lot. Here is a picture of the eggs - it didn't come out very well but Brenna insisted that I post it anyways. You can see some of them pretty well.

Well I will post about them again when we have frogs!

Tadpoles!

Brenna and I are now the proud owners of about 30 tadpoles! My Mom and Dad have a nice pond in their front yard and every once in a while a frog will decide to litter it with eggs and then Dad is overwhelmed with hundreds of tadpoles. This time Brenna and I decided to 'save' some of them (most don't survive the doom of Dad's big net!) and raise them until they metamorphose into tiny frogs, and then of course we will release them into the yard. What am I going to do with 30 frogs!!?? :)
So this is officially our first science lesson about frogs and their metamorphosis. I will have to come up with some kind of chart or maybe even keep a daily journal that Brenna can dictate to me about about the changes they make. I have already looked up and printed some things off the Internet about taking care of tadpoles and it seems pretty simple. Right now we have them all in one container but since there are so many I will have to separate them into two or they will start to eat each other! Once they get all four of their legs you transfer them to another container that has rocks they can climb onto. And when their tail is gone that is when you release them. They eat all sorts of things too - fishfood, flies (time to clean my window sills! haha), and the best thing they say to feed them is lettuce. Who would have thought!

Brenna is so excited and says that she is their new Mommy. I reminded her today that we are not going to be able to keep them when they become frogs and she nodded and said that she knew. So we'll see when the time comes. Right now they are in her room on her dresser. She will be in charge of feeding them and help me change the water when needed as well. I will post pictures as they change. I think this is going to be a pretty cool project!

Making a Quilt

So Brenna has been entered in her first quilt show! It will be in September and her and Grandma are making a darling little quilt together.

Dea Jae came down last week with her sewing machine and her, Kastine and Brenna went shopping and picked out material (Kastine is making one as well). Brenna, of course, got all shades and patterns of purple. On five of the blocks (out of nine total) Brenna drew pictures with crayon on white material and then Grandma ironed it to set the colors. They sewed some of the blocks together but ran out of time before Grandma had to go back home. She will be back the end of August though and they will finish it then. I will definitely post a picture of the finished product.

Just an Update

We really haven't been doing anything really exciting lately. The library thing is over but we have still been going and checking out books about once a week. Actually we need to make it over there today at some point.
Brenna has had three playdates in a row this week. Tuesday and Wednesday she went over to Erica's house (her 2 year old teacher from pre-school) - she has two kids that are 5 and 9. Brenna has a great time playing with them. Yesterday she went over to Grandma Dawnie's and played with one of the little girl's that she tutors. I told Brenna that today she is ALL MINE. :) I really miss her when she's gone. Not sure what we are doing this weekend. I know that we will go to the beach Saturday or Sunday - that will make it five weeks in a row that we have gone.
Next week Grandma Shore will be in town and will be staying with us. I am seriously NOT saying this to kiss up to my mother-in-law (HAHA!) but I really look forward to her coming down. For those of you who don't know her, I am a very lucky girl to have a MIL like her. :)

So Brenna has been doing much better with reading and tries to read anything she can - signs, stuff on the computer, things on tv, ect... I found her in her room the other day reading one of Brendon's books, "Tiger Woods - How I Play Golf". She is all about learning to play golf and Brendon said that he is going to get her a couple clubs and start taking her. That will be nice for them to spend that time together. I have tried to play golf and I am just not that coordinated and I get very mad. :) So maybe I will go just to take pictures.

Well I hope everyone has a good Friday the 13th!

A couple passages from a book that I wanted to share....

I am reading this book right now called "Homeschooling - Take a Deep Breath, You Can Do This". It is a great book and is written by a Mom who home schooled her kids for many years. There is a chapter in it called, "The Good Stuff Most People Won't Tell You". It lists about fifteen wonderful things about homeschooling. One of them really stood out to me and I wanted to post some it for whoever is interested.

"Your children will grow up knowing you better than their traditionally schooled friends know their parents

We always know best those we spend the most meaningful time with. When my children were traditionally schooled, they had a very long bus ride in each direction. By the time they got home, rested, and did their homework and chores, there was barely time to play, much less have family quality time.... My children spent more time in school than they did at home with me doing what I wanted them to do each day.
I began to see that their teachers had more influence over their values and ideas than I did. Since I was responsible for the way they turned out, I was concerned. By the time my children came home from school, they were tired. They had been with other people all day long and just wanted time alone. They didn't want to think or have serious discussions. I began to feel I was losing control of our relationship simply because we didn't have any time together.
As your children get older they will begin to develop different ideas that don't always match your own and they will spend more time away from you. This is natural and healthy. However, removing your influence from your child too soon can be dangerous. The popular view is that children should develop their own beliefs, and this is true...eventually. However, a child needs some sort of foundation for the building of beliefs to be placed upon. ..... The best way to give a child values is to spend time with him and to let him see how you live your life. You act in a way that reflects what you believe, you talk to him about things that matter and you tell him about you, your life, and your choices. Your child will know you better because he has spent meaningful time with you, learning, serving and growing together. This builds a family that can last forever. That's a benefit that makes every minute worthwhile."

One more thing that I came across in this book was something that somebody once told me when they found out I was going to homeschool. They said that Brenna needed to experience the "real world" and deal with bullies and all that classic 'kid stuff'. Well I don't think this would have stood out if that had not been told to me and I just wanted to share this too.

"People will try to tell you that learning to cope with bullies is just part of life. So is teasing or name-calling. Think carefully about your adult life before accepting that. Do you intentionally put yourself into situations where you will be abused? When you are an adult, there are laws that protect you from being picked on in the workforce or anywhere else. Adults aren't supposed to take it - only children are. Does that make sense?"

Ok, I guess that's enough for one post. haha! I just think this book is great and wanted to share some things. Thanks.

At the Library

Geez, I don't post for about three weeks and then I post three days in a row! :) Hopefully people are keeping up with me and my sporadic blogs. :)

So I just had to share something funny that happened at the library on Monday. Brenna and I went for our tri-weekly library day and Monday they did not have the story time or anything (not sure why?). Well I didn't want to waste a trip to the library, since we were already there, so we turned in our books and proceeded to look for more to take home. With Brenna this is a very long process and takes forever! She is very picky about the books that she chooses. So we finally get a stack of about 15 books and make our way to a table to "decide which books are good enough to check out" *eye roll*. It's very cute...really. :) So we are there at the table and Brenna sees this baby who is smiling at her and making noises. Of course she wants to go say hi and asks me so I tell her that it is okay. I do not have a problem at all with her going up to people and making conversation as long as she is with me - and she knows this. She is a VERY friendly little girl. The baby is with her Mom and her other little girl. After introducing herself and talking with the older girl, the Mom asks her what grade she is in and of course she goes on to say that she will be in Kinder and that her Mom is going to homeschool her. The Mom looks at me with a big smile and tells me that she is going to homeschool her oldest as well and proceeds to gather her things and come over to our table. As this was going on I overhear the conversation between Brenna and the other little girl:

Brenna: "So how old are you?"
Girl: "I'm 5 years old."
Brenna: "Wow! What a coincidence! I'm 5 too!"
Girl looks at Brenna and then looks at her Mom with wide eyes: "Wow Mom! This girl is really smart!!!"

Oh my gosh, it was HILARIOUS! You really should have seen the look on that little girl's face when Brenna used her "big word". To be honest, I felt very proud. :) I guess me speaking to her like an adult and doing the 'word of the week' thing really pays off. :)
Anyway, it was nice though meeting another homeschool Mom. We talked a little and she asked me all kinds of things about homeschooling. She had not done much reading about it and had just decided to do it so all of my studying really paid off just in that one conversation. I think I might have over-whelmed her a bit. haha! We exchanged phone numbers though and will get the girls together to play and we can visit as well. It is so nice meeting other Moms who are going to homeschool. Someone told me not too long ago that the library is probably a really good place to meet other parents who homeschool - especially once school starts and you go during school hours. With Brenna being as friendly as she is I am sure that we will meet tons of new people. :)

Getting Prepared

Wow! It's already July! I am still getting my ideas and thoughts together for the upcoming homeschool year. I have come up with a lot of brainstorm ideas on things that I want to do with her and things that I need to purchase as well. I am not getting a whole lot this year - I can utilize so many materials that I already have. My Mom was a 2nd grade teacher for six years so you can imagine how many cool and useful things I am getting from her! :) The things that I really want to get is a year pass for the zoo and an endless supply of art supplies. Some of the things that I have written down as well are:

• learning to tell time (she's already learning the hours and can recognize when it is exactly 2 or 4 o'clock - just need to work on minutes)
• 
  
• work on writing letters correctly and then advance to words
• 
  
• choose an animal to study each week for science (can also lead into Social Studies with studying the country they are from)
• 
  
• plant a small garden for science including flowers and vegetables
• 
  
• addition, subtraction and simple measuring for math (she knows the concepts, just needs to practice more)
• 
  
• study holidays for history


• start learning and identifying States
• 
  
• creating a "Chore Chart" to learn more about responsibility and working together as a family (yes, that is the 'neat-freak' in me coming out! haha! But she has to learn at some point, right?)
• 
  
• play Mad Libs to learn what nouns, verbs, adjectives and adverbs are
• 
  
• continue working on her reading


• start keeping her own journal - good for pre-writing skills and developing sentence structure (can tell me what to write until she learns to write herself)
• 
  
• start including her in cooking
  
• lots and lots of art projects!!

There are probably many other things that we will come across that I just have not thought about yet - but it's a start. Besides, she is so good at asking lots of questions so she will give me ideas as we go and take the lead with some things as well.

It was pretty cute last night - Brenna was watching some show with Brendon and one of the kids was speaking French. So then she proceeded to go around the house pretending to talk in French. I told her that if she really wanted to learn French then we could get her either a DVD or computer program that would teach her (kids this age pick up other languages a lot quicker then adults). Then Brendon went and got the globe and showed her where Europe was and then where France was. He went about it very well and first located Texas and then our city and showed her how far it was from here to France. He told her all about Grandma Shore living there for a year when she was younger and that led to showing her where Australia was because that is where Grandma is right now. So you see how that all happened? She learned something new at 9pm, right before bed because she instigated it by pretending to speak French. You just have to take advantages of opportunities like that when you are homeschooling. We could have elaborated on it but considering the time it had to be a very short lesson. Things like that happen all day long at our house though - that was just one example.

One thing that I am trying to decide on is how I am going to do our school calendar. Some homeschoolers follow the public school calendar, some do year round with 3 weeks on and 1 week off, others do school 4 days a week. I am not too concerned about it this year but next year when we start a structured curriculum I will need to decide how I want to do it.

There are just so many details that I still have to iron out. It is going to be a learning experience for the whole family - but one that I am really looking forward to!

Books, books and more books!

So I FINALLY got a library card a couple weeks ago and Brenna and I have been stocking the house with new books every week. They are everywhere and I love it! Mine, of course, are all homeschool related (I just can't get enough information!) and Brenna has been getting a combination of 'easy readers' and fun books for Mommy and Daddy to read to her. She is getting so much better at reading and is slowly finding a love for it. She is still somewhat stubborn, gets very frustrated and will only read when SHE wants to but I am not pushing her. Like I said before, I don't want to make her dislike reading or make it seem like a chore. She will, in time, discover the beauty of being able to pick up a book and curl up and get lost in the words. But until then I tell myself, she is only five. :) And for a five year old she is doing better than I could ever expect - I am very proud of her. When I see her reading I almost (ok, so I have!) get tears in my eyes. I really could sit and listen to her read all day long.

We are still going to the library a couple times a week for the Children's Reading Program and she gets to do crafts and watch puppet shows and listen to story time. She loves it and so do I. After all of that we will go and pick out our books and then she LOVES to sit at a table and we both quietly sit and read our books for about 20 minutes. She just thinks that is the coolest thing and she looks like such a 'big kid'. :) There are only a few more weeks left of activities there but we will definitely do it again next summer.

On to another subject... We went to the beach again yesterday for the third weekend in a row. This time Aunt Jenny and Uncle PJ went with us and we had so much fun. Brenna did some more boogie boarding and Daddy got brave and started taking her out further and further to some bigger waves (with me supervising and staying close to her). She could still touch of course - it stays pretty shallow the first 30 yards or so. That little girl held on so tight and rode them in all the way! She is getting to be a pro at it. We will be going to the beach again next weekend - we just have way too much fun to NOT go! Our goal is to try to go every weekend this summer and hopefully beyond that too. It is a very inexpensive way to have a good time. :)

Well I am off to read books with Brenna before it is time for bed. I will post again real soon. :)

My Little Girl is a Reader!

So Brenna and I went shopping with Grandma Dawn a couple days ago. Grandma likes to buy Brenna stuff whenever we go and this trip it was a new book. Brenna got to pick it out from about a dozen 'Easy Readers - Level 1' that they had and of course she fell in love with a SpongeBob book. She was so excited and asked if she could look at it while she was sitting in the shopping cart. So Mom and I are looking at stuff and all of a sudden I hear Brenna reading this book out loud. I glanced at it to see if she was making up words and was shocked to see that she was reading it word for word! I mean, I knew she could sound out a lot of words (and has many sight words memorized) and she has read a couple books with my help (pointing to each word helping her keep track of where she was) but never has she held a book and just READ! I was so proud of her! :)
For about the past 6 months or so I have been trying to make her read books at bed time to practice but she absolutely refuses most of the time. So I wasn't going to push it and just figured that she would start reading when she was ready. Well I guess all it takes is to let HER pick out a new book that SHE wants to read (why didn't I figure this out sooner??). So I guess what I will start doing is going and buying her a new book about once a week and letting her pick them and just telling her, "Okay, if you want to know what the story is about then YOU are going to have to read it to find out."

She was so proud of herself and received so much praise from Brendon and me.

WAY TO GO BRENNA!!! :)

Fun at the Beach

Today Brendon, Brenna and I went to the beach and we had such a blast! We had not been in quite some time - in fact the last time I think Brenna went was when she was three. That's pretty sad. Well after today though we are definitely going to start going more.

Brenna just loved the waves and actually learned how to boogie board today! I was so proud of her. Brendon would take her out to where the waves were breaking and wait for a nice big one and then give her a push. She would hold on to that board with her little hands as tight as she could and ride the wave the whole way in! She would go a good 30 feet and then fall off the board and yell, "Wipe out!" I tried a couple of times to do it but I just wasn't as good as Daddy at letting her go just at the right time. When I was out there with her though she would look behind her while she was waiting and tell me, "Mom, that wave has got my name written all over it!" Oh I laughed so hard! She is such a funny little girl. :) By the end of the summer she will probably be going out there and catching waves all by herself.

Homeschool Meeting Delivers Big Relief! :)

So my friend and I went to a homeschool meeting Tuesday night. The Homeschool group here in town organized it. It wasn't a huge turn out (it was their first year doing it) but I did get to meet and talk to a few people. I didn't really learn anything new that I already hadn't read in a book or on the Internet (people have no idea how much stuff I read!!!) but it was very reassuring to actually listen to a PERSON talk and tell me these things instead of reading about it.

I think the best thing I got out of that meeting was a one-on-one conversation that I had with a homeschool Mom of six years with four children. She came over to introduce herself and asked me how old Brenna was. We started talking about Kindergarten and I found out that she had a degree in Early Childhood Education so I proceeded to pick her brain. :) I told her about my plan of not getting a curriculum for Kinder and I thought she was going to tell me that I was crazy. After going on about my reasoning (Jenny just recently informed me that it seems like I am always trying to explain myself and that I have to stop - need to work on that I guess) she told me that what I was going to do was perfect. She said that Kindergartners need FUN stuff to do and pretty much validated my thinking on the whole issue. So I feel much better about that now and a lot more confident in my decision about curriculum. I came home and told Brendon what she had said and I think it made him feel a lot better as well and we are on the same page with things now.
One thing I did learn that I did not know (ok, so I lied about not learning anything new *haha!*)was that you really can't determine a child's learning style until they are about seven or eight. I just recently bought a book on different learning styles (The Way They Learn - How to discover and teach to your child's strengths) and have been struggling to identify what type Brenna is - auditory, visual or kinesthetic. So now that I know it will be a couple years before I am able to really determine I can relax a little.

So Brenna and I have been trying to stay pretty busy this summer. I ended up not enrolling her in summer gymnastics because it was outrageously expensive and had all sorts of fees involved. So we will wait until September and she will start with her combo class again. I am trying to get her to start karate - she's been talking about it for months. A couple weeks ago I told her that I would call the teacher and see if she could go that day (she can go once and try it before I sign her up) but all of a sudden she decided that "karate is for big kids" and she didn't want to go. I know she is a little apprehensive about it. She has always been that way - very afraid to try new things, but once she does it she loves it. I am a lot like that too - I wish she were more like Brendon when it came to things like that. So maybe I can see if we can go and just watch a class and she might feel better about it. She likes to take baby steps. :)
My Mom was so sweet and signed Brenna up for the library summer program. I had no idea they were doing it. So now we are going three days a week to the library and they do crafts and have story time and puppet shows. They show a movie every Thursday and we get to take our blankets and pillows and camp out in the auditorium with snacks and watch a movie, so that is pretty fun. They said that parents don't have to stay and that you can just drop the kids off but I have not felt very comfortable with that and have been staying with Brenna. There are just so many kids there and not very many adults. There are quite a few parents who stay though so I don't feel too much like Mrs.-Over-Protective. :) She likes that I am there with her too.
Brenna will also be taking private swimming lessons this summer for two weeks with one of my Mom's friends so I am excited about that. Again, she is unsure of it and doesn't seem too excited but I told her that it is something that she HAS to do and that it is very important to learn how to swim, especially since Grandpa Kim has a boat and we go out on it quite a bit and spend lots of time by the water (she ALWAYS wears a life vest on the boat though!).

Well I have been on the computer long enough. Brenna and I are going to play a couple board games and maybe attempt to go outside and play, depending on how bad the mosquitoes still are. They have been horrible since we got all that rain a couple weeks ago.
Till fingers and keyboard meet again.....

Pictures from our trip

Here are a couple pictures I wanted to share. We went to visit family last weekend and had a wonderful time. The first pictures are of Brenna with her Great Grandparents, GeeGee and Smitty. We also saw Great Grandma Carol, Great Grandpa John, Aunt Susie, Uncle George, Ashley, Aunt Barbara and David. I posted a picture of all of them as well. Ashley graduated from High School and we are all soooo proud of her!! This was the first time that Brenna met Uncle George and the first time I had seen him in about 7 years.

As you can see from the pictures, Brenna got a haircut. It looks so cute on her and is much more manageable for our hot summer weather.

Another day

Well I have not posted in a while but things here have been busy. We are going out of town this weekend because my baby cousin is graduating High School - I seriously can NOT believe that. I remember when she was just a little bitty baby. Yeah, we all say that about someone though. I guess it is just part of life - but it makes me feel so OLD! It makes me feel old too telling people that my daughter is five. Sometimes I just can not get over how big she is now. I will go in her room at night and check on her (about 15 times!) and she is more then half of the bed length now - I guess I just don't realize how tall she is until I see her laying in bed. Sometimes I will sit on her bed to say good night and I'll practically sit on her knees when I am thinking that I am closer to her FEET. I am so ready for another baby! My "baby" is growing up so I need another one. ha ha! She is very ready to be a big sister too and talks about it all the time. Brendon and I have been trying for a while so we'll see what happens. My brother and his wife are expecting their first baby and I am just so excited to be an Aunt! The baby (a GIRL!) is due in September and I just can not wait for her to come. It has been so fun seeing Jenny get big and pregnant - I think she looks beautiful and fabulous!

Anyway, I have still been doing so much reading on homeschooling and have purchased a couple more books on Amazon.com. One of them is very good and talks about different learning styles. I am finding it very useful and full of wonderful information. I tend to get a little over-whelmed sometimes though because of all the information I am trying to acquire. I am the type of person that needs to know so much in order to feel that I will succeed in something and make the right decisions. I will sit at the computer sometimes and just read things about homeschooling for hours. And if I don't have much time then I will search for things and just save it to my Favorites and come back to it another day. I really don't think that I have felt this passionate about something in quite sometime. It makes me feel pretty good but it also drives me crazy at the same time. ha ha! Maybe I am doing TOO much and I just need to go with my instincts. They say that every family is different when it comes to homeschooling and that you need to find your own style and way of doing things. The first year is usually the toughest and then you kinda figure out what works for you.
I am going to a homeschool conference on Tuesday with my good friend who is homeschooling too. I am looking forward to that. It will be at the church here in town that has the big homeschool group that I would like to join. It will be nice to meet other homeschool parents and find out what they do during the year (field trips, lunches, ect...).

Well I have got to start packing - we are leaving this afternoon and it takes me forever to get things done before we go out of town. It all starts with a list (actually many!) and then I have to pack and then my whole house has to be clean. I hate coming home to a messy house.
Until fingers and keyboard meet again........

Dance Recital

Brenna had her dance recital yesterday and I am sooooo proud of her! She did great! It was so cute seeing her up there on stage. My Mom and I have been going to these recitals for a very long time (we always know someone who is in them) and it was so weird having MY little girl up there. I did not burst into tears like I thought I would though. I did start to tear up a little when she came out the first time, and I probably would have started crying, but one of Brenna's little classmates lost her tap shoe as they were all coming out on stage so that took my mind of the whole crying thing. ha ha! I felt so bad for her but she recovered nicely and did the whole dance with one shoe on. Everyone clapped for her which was nice.

There were quite a few people who came to see Brenna - Grandma and Grandpa, PaPa and JoJo and Nanny and Kastine. She was so happy to see everyone after the recital and was just grinning from ear to ear. She received flowers from Brendon and me and also from Grandma and Grandpa. The big red rose in the picture was from her best friend in dance class. I thought that was real sweet. :) We all went out to dinner afterwards and had a nice time.

Brenna is a little disappointed that there is no dance class today (she went every Monday) but she is excited to start again this Fall. I am going this week to sign her up for Summer gymnastics so she'll have something to do in the mean time.

Again on Curriculum....

After reading my last post I came to the conclusion that some people might assume that just because I'm not buying a curriculum this year I will not be teaching Math and Language Arts. The reason I am not buying one for Kindergarten is because Brenna is ahead of the typical Kindergarten level (not MY opinion - I have researched the things they do in Kinder) and is doing a lot of 1st grade level things. I am not starting a 1st grade curriculum because I don't think she is completely ready for that right now and like I said before, it would be very stressful for both of us. So we are kind of 'in between' right now which is what made me decided to not get either one this year.

Even though I am not purchasing a math textbook, for example, with worksheets and tests, does not mean that she will not learn any math this year. There are sooo many ways to teach things without the help of a textbook. Just having her help me cook and measure things teaches fractions; going to the grocery store and weighing fruit and/or sticking to a budget teaches math concepts that are way above Kindergarten level. When it comes to Language Arts, MadLibs (story telling game) helps teach nouns, verbs, adverbs and adjectives in a fun way - some of the stories you create are a hoot!
She is doing well with her reading and I feel that right now just reading books together is sufficient enough for a 5 year old. No need to make reading a chore or force her to learn more with a curriculum. If reading is pushed and not enjoyable then that could really turn her off to reading and this family has lots of bookworms so that would just be unacceptable! ha ha! :) We will be taking many trips to the library and checking out educational books as well as easy-to-read ones for her to practice.

I actually found a web site that really describes what I am wanting to do. If you have time and if you are interested then check it out - it's not very long at all. http://www.leapingfromthebox.com/art/kmg/kindergarten.html

Like I mentioned before, this year we just want to have fun learning and make our first year of homeschooling an enjoyable one.

Mommy? What's a.....?

My goodness! I did not think that my daughter was capable of asking anymore questions then she already had been doing for about a year. It seems like since she turned 5 years old they have doubled! It's everywhere - in the car, outside playing, in the house, when we are shopping - non-stop. And of course I do not know ALL the answers so I told Brendon that I have to start carrying around a little notebook so that I can jot down her inquiries and we can look them up on the Internet when we are home. Most of her questions are fairly simple and I can answer them right then and there with no problem but some of them need the help of GOOGLE! She can come up with some pretty tough stuff! ha ha! Thank goodness for the Internet! I couldn't imagine homeschooling without it. :)
We have been doing a "word of the week" for quite some time now, which has really helped her vocabulary (kudos to Grandma Dawnie for starting that). Some of the words she has learned (and uses correctly!) are monstrosity, tabernacle, zone, inquisitive, abstract, nocturnal and gaggle. She loves words and we will sometimes sit with a dictionary and she will chose a word randomly and we'll learn it. I also talk to her like an adult and use big words in our daily conversations. She'll interrupt and ask what that word means and I'll tell her. You can imagine how long our chats last sometimes! :)
I really do love it that she has so many questions (ok, it does drive me crazy every once in a while - don't let me fool you!). With her being so inquisitive though it is going to make my job as her teacher THAT much easier.

Some people have been asking me what curriculum I am going to use - there are literally hundreds to choose from. I have researched Kindergarten as well as 1st grade and had really thought about starting with a 1st grade one but my good friend pointed out to me that I do not want to make our first year of homeschooling too difficult or she will start resisting and it will be stressful for both of us. I know she is capable of doing 1st grade curriculum but I don't want to push her too hard. I will probably not get a curriculum this year and do 'unschooling', which is child-led learning. You can read more about here if you are interested - http://www.unschooling.com/library/faq/index.shtml Basically if she asks me a simple question about something then that will be our 'lesson' for that day (or week!) and we will learn everything there is to learn on that subject. The example I used when I talked to Brendon about this was this (he was kinda iffy)--- If Brenna comes to me and asks me about Egypt, for example, then we would get on-line and/or go to the library and check out some books and learn all kinds of things about it - maybe even do an art project and make pyramids. It started with a simple question - but it was a question that SHE asked. I strongly believe that a child learns more and retains the information better if they initiate the learning. Now, would she learn a lot about Egypt and be excited about it if I sat her at the table and opened up a text book and said, "Ok, now let's read this and then we will do some worksheets and answer some questions about what you just read" ? Probably not. She might retain part of the information but she would not get as much out of it as she would in the example above.
Now some people do this for everything and they never even purchase a curriculum - ever. I don't necessarily agree with that. I think when it comes to things like math, reading and writing then a curriculum is necessary. Next year I will worry more about a structured curriculum for the things I just mentioned but for this year we are just going to have FUN. :) It's Kindergarten for goodness sakes! :)