The Art Champions!

And the first-place winner is...ARCHIE!
We are so proud of Archie for winning first place in the primary division of the Johns Hopkins APL Young Artists show for his painting entitled "Normal World." The announcer told him that if this picture shows his normal world, he must be a very happy little boy. Archie worked hard on his picture for several weeks, and we are so happy his efforts paid off. A special thanks to Memaw for teaching him to draw such wonderful people.

We are also proud of Grace for claiming an honorable mention in the K-1 division with her noodle art titled "Some Wheel Over the Rainbow." She also worked hard dipping each individual pasta piece into paint and gluing it. They said they had seen many rainbows, but this is the first noodle rainbow they had ever seen!

Draw * Write * Now, Grace!

I don't think I've ever loved a handwriting book as much as Draw * Write * Now! We just finished Lesson 1, and both of us are looking forward to the rest of the year. I wish I'd done it with Archie. I might still teach him some of the drawing. Grace draws chickens all the time now because she is so confident of her ability and pleased with the outcome.

Happy Mother's Day

Grace's preschool had a nice Mother's Day breakfast for us. The kids served us muffins they had baked the day before and presented us with homemade cards, place mats, and a flower. They even brought us our food. Afterward, we went to a local theater to watch a musical production of Frog and Toad.

Maple Syrup Fun!

One thing I love about my homeschool co-op is the field trips. Archie and I had a blast at the Oregon Ridge Maple Center learning about how they make maple syrup! I was so proud of him when the teacher asked (suggesting a big kid answer) if anyone knew what trees breathed out. His little hand shot up, and he spouted out the right answer (carbon dioxide) without hesitation! The tasting was pretty fun, too. I've decided I really like black walnut syrup.

Look at that grimace! Carrying the maple by hand in olden times would certainly have been hard!

I Have a Dream

Recently, I've been reading some Martin Luther King, Jr. books with Archie. I gave him an assignment of writing down his dream. Once I got him to get past, "I want a new race car," I thought he came up with a nice dream for the world. "I have a dream that nobody would get sick. I hope they stay healthy for Ever."

Grace is too cute. She has no clue what's going on and hasn't learned to see the world through race yet. Archie rightly decided it was not fair that black people and white people couldn't always go to the same schools. Grace got excited and interjected, "It's not fair. There needs to be schools for peach people, too, 'cause we're peach people." Guess that's what you get for always using a peach crayon in self portraits.

Frogs Are Green

Archie has been working hard for several weeks to prepare this little guy for the Frogs Are Green kids' art contest. Isn't he a cutie? I never really realized just how tricky a frog is to draw.

Welcome to our School House (and Maryland Life)!

After a busy week moving in last week, we're ready to begin this new chapter of our lives in Maryland. Hunt starts work tomorrow, and the kids will continue their home school. Thanks to grandparents keeping the kids the first few days of our move, we're almost settled. I'll post other pictures of the house as soon as everything is presentable. I got the basement done first.

Grandma bought the kids this cool school/playhouse. We have two chairs, a turned over crate table, and a lantern for a light. They LOVE it!

 Corner 1 of the basement school room:

Office Corner of the school room:

Corner 2 of the school room where most work will be done.

We can't wait to get re-started tomorrow!

Archie and Grace and the Coats of Many Colors

In our homeschool for history, we've been studying different ancient cultures which, of course, includes Jewish history from the Bible. We made life-size pictures of Archie and Grace modeling Joseph's coat of many colors. They love making crafts, and the book we're using has lots of craft ideas to go along with the lessons. Next up is a study of ancient Africa and India. We'll even get to China eventually!

Congrats, Hunter, on a SUCCESSFUL DEFENSE!

We never thought the day would come, but it did! Hunt finally defended and it was successful. He is only a few formalities away from a Master's in Electrical Engineering and, hopefully, only a few weeks away from starting his new job in Maryland!!! This calls for a big, family celebration!

Raising Butterflies

I'm not much of a naturalist, but I figure I better beef up my science projects since we're going to be homeschooling. Actually, I think I had more fun with our butterfly raising kit than either of the kids (who also enjoyed it). I learned quite a bit, too. Our neighbor gave us a Painted Lady Butterfly kit for Christmas, but we had to wait for warmer weather to send off for our caterpillars so we could release them outside. It was really fun watching them climb up to the top of their little plastic cup, form their crysalids, and put them in the netted container to emerge. I was disappointed we never quite saw the exact moment any of them hatched but thankful that all FIVE of our caterpillars made it (including one Hunter and I were quite sure was dead).

 We also raised ladybug larvae. Did you know ladybugs like to eat raisins?

Singing the New Testament

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, First Timothy, Second Timothy, Titus, Philemon, Hebrews, James, First Peter, Second Peter, First John, Second John, Third John, Jude and Revelation!

5-4-3-2-1 BLASTOFF: Archie's Rocket Day!

Great space shuttle, huh? Bet you're wondering when NASA (no, SpaceX) is going to give me a job offer. Archie's class recently did a two week unit on space, which required children (oops, I meant parents) to build a massive space shuttle/rocket from a large cardboard box. I must admit I was feeling pretty proud of myself after pouring way too much time into this preschool project. Please note behind the keyboard workstation, there's a recycled from bottle tops control panel with a solar panel for (pretend) power on the back. High tech, right?

WRONG! Although Archie was pretty happy with his space shuttle which now takes up approximately 1/3 of the space in his and Grace's bedroom, this kid's rocket could not be beat. Not only does it look like a SpaceX replica, its insides feature a working LCD screen and light up electric control panel. If preschool is this intense, what will high school be like?

This is one half of Archie's class with their projects. (The other half made their space shuttles the next day.) I guess no matter how ours does or doesn't stack up, the important thing is Archie likes it.

Welcome to the World of Reading, Archie!

Archie has come a long way in a year. We've been working on reading for about a year now, and just last week Archie finally took off! We got him a Superheros easy reader from the library, something clicked in his brain about reading independently, and he's read that book about a million times now by himself. He's also willing to take on the challenge of reading other books to himself. He is a big fan of a Hot Wheels easy reader I bought at his school consignment sale. I never thought the day would come when he would be able to work through a book without me sitting beside him, but it's slowly happening! Grace is even enjoying listening to brother read!

Archie is getting a new Angry Bird stuffed animal for finishing all five levels of Hooked on Phonics, but more importantly he's getting the gift of enjoying a good book for life!

To see how far Archie has come in a year, click here to hear him reading last February.

Never Too Late to be Thankful!

So what if I'm a couple weeks late posting? I'm still thankful, are you? I'm really thankful this afternoon after the scare at Virginia Tech today. Of course, I'm terribly sad for the police officer who lost his life, but I am thankful more damage wasn't done. I paced around the house a bit this afternoon wondering what was going to happen next.

Archie's school Thanksgiving party was lots of fun! His Grandparents DeJ's joined us for the sing-along and feast. Archie's class was so precious when they sang "God Bless America."

Archie's teacher took this pic.

I snapped this one during the singing:

Grace, of course, loves any chance to go to Brother's school and was thankful for the drum!

Here is what Archie wrote in his class' Thanksgiving cookbook:

Grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Kay are coming to my house on Thursday. The other people are going to have turkey, but not me. I don’t like turkey. I’ll have ham. Aunt Kay is going to cook the turkey. She doesn’t put nothing inside the turkey because it is empty. My Grandma and Grandpa live in Blacksburg like me so we will drive together to Aunt Kay’s house. They live in Blacksburg really far away so I have my slippers all packed up to go. Oliver went to Africa, but now he came back. I don’t want to go to Africa because it is too far away. On the next Thanksgiving we will have more turkey. I am thankful for drums because they can make music. I made a drum at preschool and I am going to beat on it at our Sing-a-Long and I will beat on it at Thanksgiving and on my other drum at home, it’s just a play one. Archie – (Chief Gray Elephant)

Another boy wrote that he wanted to name his new baby brother Archie. I thought that was sweet although I don't think it happened.

Preschool Fun!

Archie loves preschool and who wouldn't with all the fun things they do. His school is called BUMP (Blacksburg United Methodist Preschool). He goes Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings. He is really sad on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings when he finds out it's not a preschool day. His teacher's name is Miss Leslie and she's an 18 year veteran. She actually babysat some of my best friends from college when they were little.

Getting ready to leave home on the first day...He told me he would be needing the car, but I opted to drive him :)

Archie got to bring in donuts, tomatoes and bananas for his birthday. Our whole family came for snack.
They have all kinds of interesting work.

Archie loved show and tell. He, of course, brought in his guitar.

They have several class pets and are always hatching monarch butterflies.

Archie Sings the Presidents

After much work, Archie has finally mastered the U.S. Presidents. He was so proud of himself when I made the recording this morning. Afterward, we took a trip to Target to buy his long awaited first guitar. He has wanted it so badly to take to all the free kids' concerts here, and I hope that someday he can learn to really play it.

Cat sat, sat, sat: Guess Who's Reading?

Archie's reading! I, of course, am really proud of him!

It started with the alphabet a long time ago. Then, we progressed to phonics games. I started these just after he turned two but gave up shortly thereafter because he wasn't quite ready (of course :)

We re-doubled our efforts as part of my New Year's Resolution to start doing school with Archie.

We made him his very own story book out of construction paper, and he has been learning one sight word a day.

Here's a sample page he can read:

Meanwhile, we were playing phonics games with alphabet blocks, magnetic letters, stickers, etc.

While he was making good progress, this was a ton of work for mom (and not necessarily the most strategic plan) so I bought him the 1998 Hooked on Phonics off Ebay. I love Ebay. Today I did the first two lessons with him. This is the first story (in video). It consisted completely of "at" words. The second story "Dan Ran" was a little more difficult because it combined "at" words with "an" words. He was really proud of himself when he finished.

I think we're good on reading for the day. Next subject this afternoon...Math!

Grace's First Day of School!

Grace started Mother's Day Out today. After dropping her off and running a quick errand with Hunt, I dropped him off at school and it sunk in. FREEDOM!!! I had freedom. This feeling is a first since Archie was born. Sure, Hunt watches the kids sometimes and grandparents are great when we're visiting, but now I can have freedom in a whole new way. Usually, I save someone-else-watching-the-kids time for something really monumental, but now I can use it for more ordinary tasks such as running to the bank or house-cleaning (or even blogging). Grace's teachers said she had a good first day despite a wipe out during Ring Around the Rosie. (I know, I know - dangerous game.) She's in the same class with Archie, which I think helped with the transition. He didn't even seem to mind having The Gracer tag along. She'll be going on Mondays and Thursdays. Here she is at the school sign, modeling her new outfit from Memaw.

Archie wanted in on the fun.

Archie on his first day of school in September. Grace started much earlier than her brother.

Archie's first day of school!

Today was Archie's long anticipated first day of school. Here he is in front of the sign. I think he was excited but maybe a little nervous. Daddy is coming with me to pick him up at noon. He has school on Monday and Thursday mornings. He kept asking me if Gracer was going to school, too. Fun times!

My Hokie opposites!

Meet Hokie Tall and Hokie Short! I thought Tech needed a little encouragement for the Maryland game!

Awww. Archie loves his little sister. How sweet!

Other than encouraging the Hokies, my inspiration for the post was Archie's education. I was trying to think of some ways to teach him opposites, and then I made this pic. Tall/short, big/little. Hey, you got it!

Archie is doing GREAT with his school. He now recognizes almost all of the capital letters. My goal is that he knows them all by tomorrow, and I think he's on track! He knows colors and basic shapes, too. He loves counting to eleven in Chinese, and he even knows a few characters like his name, car, on/off. The think I like about Chinese is there's no phonics. Once you recognize the characters, you're reading. For example, he can already read "get in the car, get out of the car" but he could never do that in English.