Muffin Tin Monday

Our first MTM!!!  :)

In the tins: chicken nuggets, ketchup/bbq sauce, cheese stars/cutout, carrots/ranch, watermelon, strawberry/banana kabobs with blueberry stoppers.

Their muffin tins were the same except for their little fruit kabobs. Each had one with their names and one with a favorite. Thanks to my swap partner again because this was SO fun!!

The boys LOVED it!!  They asked if every lunch could be a muffin tin meal! :)

My job for Sunday family dinner with the inlaws was to bring the fruit salad.  To make it a little fun for the kids, I added some fruit kabobs to the bowl using some picks from my swap partner.  They LOVED it!! :)

Flat Stanley!!!

The boys and I signed up for a Flat Stanley adventure on the WTM forum boards last month.   We received our mailing list this week so I had the boys sit down to color their own Flat Stanley to be mailed.  We included a little bio of each boy and some info about our state.  We dropped the package into the mail this afternoon so our Flat Stanleys are now headed to their first destination....California! 

To simplify things, we will receive pictures and information via email from each family as our Flat Stanleys travel the USA and even abroad.  As we receive emails, we will print the pictures and info, and make a Flat Stanley scrapbook!! 

We've talked a little about where we'll take the other families' FS for pictures as we receive them.  We have some fun local places to take each family.  Besides those, some places the boys suggested were our library, the swimming hole (those paper Flat Stanleys will be screaming "YIKES"!), our Tuesday pizza lunch place, co-op classes (later this fall), sports practice, and the park.

I don't think the little boys quite understand the concept yet and my oldest is just a tad bored by it.  (but he's at that age where a LOT *bores* him.  I think he'll enjoy it as well once we start receiving emails and pictures.)  *I* am very excited about this project and can't wait for our first email and package!!  :) 

{Btw......I failed miserably with photos!!  I just plain forgot to take pictures of the boys' Flat Stanleys before mailing off the package.  We'll include them in our scrapbook when we get them back at the end!!}

Muffin Tin Monday Swap!!!

Last month the boys and I signed up for the Muffin Tin Monday Swap.  We had fun picking out some things for my swap partner, Arwen, and got it all mailed off this past Saturday.  I decided that I'm not sure which is more fun.....waiting for the package from my partner or waiting for her to receive our package!

On Monday we received a package from my partner.  Now we were asked to give a wish list and since we are new to MTMs, I suggested maybe a *starter package* of some sort.  I was BLOWN AWAY by the contents.

 

*A muffin tin each for my four boys

*cookie cutters

*Dino sandwich cutter

*mini and regular size cupcake holders

*little pirate swords

*party picks

*chopsticks (this got a huge "YES" from my oldest!!)

*heart shaped sauce holders

*little hors d'oeuvre forks

*CUTE HANDMADE Lego muffin "coasters" (I think she called them something else but I can't remember!! lol) to decorate the bottom of muffin tins!

*TONS of HANDMADE food picks personalized with my children's favorites: sports, Go Diego Go, cars, LEGOS.  

*a ziplock bento box for my oldest

*BONUS basketball craft for each boy!

*and BONUS craft ribbon for ME!

Below are a couple close up pics of the handmade items.  The last one is a little blurry.  My camera battery was running low.

I canNOT wait for the next MTM......our first!!!  

Thank you SO much, Arwen!!!

easy peasy lemon squeezy bird feeder.

I made this bird feeder earlier today.  I have three more bottles so the boys can make their own and either hang in the yard or gift to someone.

2 liter bottle

bird seed

string or yarn

stick

Cut two good sized holes in the bottle (I made rectangles and then rounded the tops just for fun).  Poke two holes for the stick right below the big holes. Add the string to the neck and tie to a tree limb.  Add bird seed.  Sit back and watch! 

We put ours up this morning and already had one new visitor.  Gabriel, in his excitement, scared off the poor bird though!

If the squirrels start getting into it, I'll poke a hole in the middle of a plastic plate (from the dollar store) and string onto the top of the bottle.

A little nature study...in our front yard.

We live in a small town that is {apparently} full of critters to enjoy.  This weekend I thought I'd take some pictures of a few little guys who love our front yard.  The idea is to get my boys interested in nature study without forcing it on them.  If I show an interest, they will begin to show an interest. 

Don't get me wrong...the boys LOVE the great outdoors.  They go on hikes in the woods with Daddy, love playing outside, and explore well enough on their own.  I would like for them to show an interest in learning more about the outdoors I guess. 

Just taking the few pictures I did this weekend sparked an interest in a pair of robins that are repairing a nest in a tree in our front yard.  We can watch them from our front window in the living room. 

Here are a few of the pictures I took this weekend.  From top to bottom:  this silly squirrel spent most of the morning playing and fighting with another squirrel before taking off across the power lines.  That bird in the top of the tree is a Mockingbird.  The next bird is a Blue Jay...one of my favorites.  They are mean but very pretty.  That robin is one of the two who are working on the nest in our front yard.  The next picture shows the other robin carrying some *supplies* back to the nest.  Then the nest itself.  I can't wait to see if we'll have baby robins one day this summer!

Closing out the 2009-2010 school year! And the new line-up...

We like schooling year around with a lot of nice breaks in the mix.  When we complete a level, we just move to the next.  Sometimes we'll take a small break from the subject, sometimes not.  Just depends on how things are going.  Nathan finished up his math last month and asked to take off the month of May from math.  After such a challenging year for him and some major successes, I thought he deserved just that and he is enjoying his time off.

We're pretty much in the middle of everything else but science.  Between co-op and sports, we just never could get it started.  We WILL get started next week!!  (that's the plan anyway)

So our official school year will end this Thursday with Kaleb's kindergarten graduation.  He is SO excited!!  Our homeschool group usually has one every year and this year I am heading it up.  There are only three prek'ners and k'ners participating so we're making it easy and fun.  A trip to the park, pictures with a graduation cap and balloons, homemade personalized cookie cakes, and lots of playtime!

Then I will officially have a 7th grader, 1st grader, preschooler, and toddler.  :)

We're going to concentrate this summer on getting finished with SOTW 1, getting started with Apologia Botany, math, and reading.

The 2010-2011 curriculum line-up looks like this:

Nathan-
Saxon 76 and 87/supp with some MM 5 and 6
R&S English 5 and 6
(still considering Lightening Lit)
(still working on a writing program to supplement R&S English...maybe Writing Strands?)
Vocab notebook from literature, history, and science
French (independently)
Apologia General Science (SO looking forward to this!)
Apologia Botany (finish up with the littles)
Dig Deep and then I'm not sure where we'll go from there.

Kaleb-
MM 1 and 2
OPGTR
A Reason for Handwriting
FLL
ETC
Apologia Botany
Galloping the Globe (which will cover most of his art and science after Botany)

Gabriel-
OPGTR (very slowly....)
ETC primers
LeapFrog videos and games
Apologia Botany (when he wants to participate)
Galloping the Globe

Together-
SOTW 2
Keys for Kids
AO composer study, artist study, nature study, hymns, folksongs, etc.
The Learnables Spanish
Thinking seriously about doing 1+1+1=1's Raising Rock Stars bible study with the younger three.  If not, I'll have to find something else for them.

Is that all?  I think so.

I'm most excited about Nathan's science, Spanish, and Galloping the Globe!!  I am working hard at putting together books lists for each of the boys and getting the year all planned.  The best piece of advice I read (on a blog but I forget where....) on preparing for the next school year was to do all of the copying, organizing, and planning for the whole year during the summer.  Get it all done so there is no last minute scrambling and searching...or much anyway. I already got a head start!!  Every weekend I do a little more so that come July and our first day of the new school year, we'll be all ready to go!  I've also been working on getting our school room re-organized to make it work better for us.  Labeling, labeling, labeling everything!!

Our workboxes made it through the year with us although we went from file folders to these.  We will definitely be keeping them!  The fact is......we get SO much more work done when we are using our tweaked workbox system!!  Gabriel will soon have his own set of workboxes and I might even get some for Drake to keep his little tot tray activities better organized.

YAY!!  Our 2nd year of homeschooling is coming to an end.  Very excited to get our 3rd year planned and ready!

I'll get back to blogging one of these days.

Until then here is a glimpse at our spring.