My sweet Bee's Homeschool Journey. We are both excited to take this road. We love that we get to hang out and cooking to our schedule, crafts & more field trips. Plus she gets to experience life that many don't working with Special Needs.

Monday, January 27, 2014

Math

Ok so growing up I loved math and rocked it. But teaching math is a whole other world. Having a student that is also good at math but fights it. We found some chat videos for math and they are great but without a math curriculum to go with its very difficult. Going to really put a lot of work into finding a fit for her this week.

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Love But Wish I Had

With a daughter who loves art of all types, music of all types & movement of all types there simply is not enough to keep her supply going. She draws at least 2-5 pictures a day. Paints often and creates amazing pieces. She wants to learn to play an instrument so much and sings everyday to any song that comes on the radio. She dances & tumbles as if she was born to do this. I love the passion of her heart. I wish I could simply supply her with all that her simple heart desires but hope that her passions grow in her each and every day. But do think from now on all gifts will be in the form of art supplies & music.

She's my artist to the soul!!

Monday, January 6, 2014

Getting back to school

Well things won't be the same getting back to school. I got more hours for my job and as this is a good and bad thing it really messes with homeschooling. I am not looking forward to my 10hr days to come. I really need to find more crockpot meals that's forsure. So as I will be working 3 days a week now, two of those will become homeschooling at night days. And then that leaves our other two normal during the day. And Bee still goes to HSA one day a week. I just really have to plan my weeks out on Sunday evening that's forsure. But I have been wanting to get more strict with myself anyway.

But this will help our family as Dan's hours are just 40 now with a placement change in his job and we had been living off the overtime.

But we are going to just slowly work on things this Thursday & Friday night with reading & spelling & maybe a math game.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday season ours was very busy. Few things I would have changed but really all & all it was wonderful. 

Much love!

Monday, December 9, 2013

Holidays & Homeschooling

Things seem to be really crazy. I'm just running around all over the place we get some subjects done somedays and somedays we just don't. The cool thing is that it's okay because we have plenty of time to make it up later on, we get out of school at the end of the year later than others. We just make getting ready for the holidays part of homeschooling, baking and house cleaning and learning what real life is about. Not just 1 Plus 1 equals 2 or how to spell holiday it's about learning what the holiday means to the family, to friends & to ourselves.  Hope your days are filled with loved ones and lots of Christmas Cheer. Christmas Carols are playing and decorating is happening! Baking at end of week. Simple Cookies is all we have this year which is hard cause we love baking all types of cookies. But taking what we have and are blessed we have it!!

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Liberty Kids

  Hailey has a hunger for history. Her favorite President is Abraham Lincoln. We got a great deal on Amazon and got the full series of Liberty Kids for $5. So each day we watch one episode and then after that episode is over we have a discussion on what took place. When they talk about something that she recognizes she just lights up in excitement with knowledge.

  Watching White House Down last weekend and listening to the daughter on it, I saw that being Hailey when she's a little older. I just need to keep feeding her with knowledge. This is another amazing thing about homeschooling.  We get more time to feed what they love not just what's required.

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

We Got it!!

Wow so she fought me almost daily to do any math. As math has always been a natural for me, it was driving me crazy. She wouldn't even try. If you asked her out load she would tell you with no hesitation. But to do any written or advancincing work she would shut down. So I changed up how and what we do. And now we do skip counting with CC and we do drill worksheets broken up and she is now flying through it. Still looking at mammoth math to see if that will work. But she was even excited that something that had taken her an hr to do half of took her only 9 minutes to do today. Yeah so happy for her (& me hehe).

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Another Great thing about homeschooling

So made pumpkin butter overnight and had too much cinnamon in it so had to run to the store really quick and grab some organic pumpkin. So when I was at the store I noticed that roast were on sale so decided to grab a roast and some vegetables to make my family dinner and since I don't eat meat then I had to make me something for dinner too which ended up being Black Eyed Peas with vegetables in it. So getting a super late start to our homeschool day, the wonderful thing about that is now I don't have to stop early to prepared dinner as dinner will be ready whenever we're ready. Hailey got to enjoy her organic carrot snack while I was putting everything together so she was happy. :-)

Monday, November 11, 2013

Some of our favorite Homeschool moments

Random stop for a song & dance break.

We call this music class.  :-)

<3 my daughters heart for music!

Thursday, November 7, 2013

A bit behind.

So this year has been a bit all over the place. With Second grade we came into new adventures.

Hailey didn't enjoy Math at all so we have been looking everywhere to find a math program for her. Right now we are kinda all over the place looking for one still while we test them with her and just having her working in any math direction I can each day.

Time for Learning was no longer working for us so we had to move on.

Then we tried Easy Peasy. Which was ok but just didn't reach the levels of learning we wanted to reach.

So now we are in SchoolHouseTeachers.com and we really are enjoying it.

We are still dealing with Hailey's migraines often. So some days our breaks are longer and some things we teach with a video we can watch laying down.

She still attends the HSA and loves it. She has made some good friends. And they are at church as well so she see's them a few times a week.


Sunday, February 17, 2013

Spelling City

I am so excited to be reviewing Spelling City. Hailey has had a good start to spelling words but we are always looking for new words. And this website has some amazing list that we often don't think about. Like States, Capitals, Compound Words, but a lot more then those we forget about Math & Science lists. This website offers those and many more. They also have games to encourage learning, as well. Can't wait to start and give you a more in-depth review.

www.spellingcity.com


Have a wonderful day!

Saturday, October 13, 2012

I was born to Dance

Hailey is loving dance so much. This is her words "I was born to dance". Her teacher is also very happy with her.  Hailey has dancing during the week then she has recital practice for the Tri-Lakes Nutcracker. Hailey comes home and dances all around the house. And wants to show up early to dance hoping she can get on the floor before class starts. I am so happy that she has found something she loves so much. Music has always been in her from when I was pregnant with her. She came out finding that beat in any song that was playing.

So if you are looking for a place to dance DanceArt Academy is the place. The teachers are wonderful and they are always adding new classes.

https://www.facebook.com/DanceArtAcademyLlc

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Monster

Monster is in 5th grade and doing great. He is in the top of his class. He is in Tag & loves it. His teacher is amazing. Their class is the wolf pack. Perfect for Seth. I am looking forward to starting to volunteer in there. He tested very high on his scan tron. I am so proud of him. He will be in chess club. He still wants to be in sports but with his ankle and 3 sprains already he has to be careful.


1st Grade!

Well my Bumble Bee is in first grade. It has been a little tough getting going as we added gymnastics, a full day at the homeschool academy (which I love!!) & ballet.

She is still doing the Time4Learning. And doing really well. We also have a math log which we do calendar, weather, tally marks, a sheet for daily numbers with adding, subtracting, 1's, 10's, 10's chart, clock, coins, writing our date 3 different ways. We have also made a math lapbook which she loves for referencing. We have a siteword chart we created and she is flying through those as well. She is also writing daily with a memory work. We read daily and will be adding more reading each day as she is becoming slowly more comfortable with reading herself.

She gets to attend the Homeschool Academy. We love the program. She is getting PE, Music, Art, Lib., Science & Social Studies, Club (first quarter she picked Tea Edicate) She also gets field trips. She loves it she only goes one day a week and we really like the teachers. And she gets to learn a foreign language, she picked Japanese.The program is Rosetta Stone. We really love this program and we do it at home together. (So I am also learning Japanese as well)

She is taking Gymnastics at the HCEC. She loves this as well. Where she was able to attend for free as I volunteer in a different class this was a blessing.

And she started Ballet at DanceArt Academy this summer for a camp she loved it and started class. She loves it!! She also will be in the Nutcracker this coming Dec. practice starts for that in Oct. as well as regular class. She is so excited she will be a Snow Flurry & A Flower Bud. She told me today she was born to dance. She loves it and catches on very fast. We are both working on our posture its great we remind each other to stand pretty.

I will be keeping up more regularly again now that we are starting to settle in to our routine. I am very blessed to be having this chance to teach my daughter.

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

End of Year is Coming

So the end of the year is coming and she is fighting every day. We have been so busy. She is missing her brother so much and I really don't know what to do. I try to add breaks. I know next year will be so much better with adding out of home classes. And we are also going to find a new church that she can connect to again. She misses that so much. Of course that is still at least 2 wks out. She needs friends again. Her few that she has never are able to visit. But in the mean time her grades & testing are amazing. I just need to get her to hang in there until we are done. I really need to spend this summer reading & writing with her. Hoping brother will help with that with his passion to read. And then plan out next school year this summer the the option of things to change but I think with me steal learning what I am doing & teaching & her seeing me not just as mom but as teacher too. So we are really learning together.

Art & Music are her two favorite places to be. And space, planes & science . So trying to work around those things making her love other things.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Daily Readings for Daughters!

We found this book and it is part of our daily reading. Young girls need to be guided daily to live in the light of God. We should present ourselves in His light. As we look around at the clothes in stores and then look at what we should be doing well thats tough. I love that this book is teaching Hailey that these are the directions she should look to see herself as pretty and not that the other things out there are what make her pretty. She loves it and feels good by hearing this each day.

I love that my daughter is growing up looking to God to guide her. This is not a direction I had growing up.

You can find Sheila Walsh at this website...
http://sheilawalsh.com

The other Daily Reading is a little butterfly told me by the brave girls. Reading these to her every morning make my heart warm. They are amazing, enlightening and guide her to love herself and feel good about everything she is. When Hailey went to public school kids were kids, Hailey felt like she had no friends. Even the one girl she called her good friend treated her bad. Was mean and hurtful daily to her. As a momma bear I was not happy. But when I found this blog I knew this was great!! Since she is now home-schooled she is not having the hurtful days but as we all know life has a way of showing these hurtful things randomly so I want her prepared for them. So check it out and share these with your little girls! It will mean the world to them as they grow up.

you can find this blog at
http://bravegirlsclub.com/

And the last is http://operationbeautiful.com/
I have wrote on Hailey's bathroom mirror and then her dad & I also made a dry erase board with all these saying for Hailey & I to read everyday. Some of the sayings say.

You are so totally worth it!

Don't let the world change you, your beautiful!!

You are such a beautiful blessing!


So just remember to share with your girls today how much God & you love them!!! Its worth everything!!!!

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

In Need of Writing Ideas!

So this last few weeks Hailey has decided she no longer wants to write. I have tried copywork, I have tried create a sentence, write a story with sentence starters. I am ready to pull my hair out. She will cry, throw a fit and just sit there refusing to write. I finally found a Story Scrambler and tonight after going through the fit & refusing she finally started writing. So hoping we will get back on track. If any of you have any other ideas I would love them!

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Time 4 Learning

Well Hailey has been working with Time 4 Learning for a month now. She loves it. She refers to the animals as her friends. She tells me about what she is learning. She still likes ABC learning more then Math. I think it will take us longer to find a love for math again if we ever do but she likes Time for Learning lots better then standard math. So I am happy with that.

She loves the fact to that after she has done her lessons for the day she gets to go to the play ground and that is where she can use internet games for more learning. Lets not tell her its still learning time ;-). But she loves it. Wakes up many days asking if she can do her work. If you ask me this is a darn good learning system if the child is asking to do their work.

I am so happy as a mom new to home schooling to have found this option. And its not just for homeschooling, I could use it with my son for just extra learning or review during the summer months. How great is that! It also has quizzes & test. It logs time spent on each subject and time spent on the section in each subject. It keeps a daily long. This way I can go back review what she needs more help with or what she has done well with.

Right now as she is doing her math its great as she is talking to her friends on the computer to answer them. Warms my heart that she is learning with fun!

We will be continuing this program for sure. We hope that you find this program as helpful. If you do join please share my name as to I get a credit for sharing.

Friday, March 30, 2012

Art Show!!

So this week Hailey was entered into an Art Show for Home Schooled students. She was so excited. It will be on display at the East Libarary for all of April. Then there will be an Art Reception for all her family & friends to attend April 29th.

She loves her Art.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

Space, Stars, & Spring Break!!

So this weekend I found a great app for my phone. Galaxy Sky Map. It is so fun- it shows the stars, constellations, the planets all from the current point you are at. Hailey has a huge desire to know the stars just as I did as a child. So this is something great her & I will be able to share together. I am very excited.

As we have been started Spring Break this week we have not really done much as for our normal school work. But we still learn in the simplest of was in every day life. I love this part so much. Hailey is so super happy that her brother is home. He has read to her and just shared with her. They build things together. And today they have spent 90% of the day outside in the sandbox.

Happy Momma!

Saturday, March 17, 2012

Happy St Patrick's Day!

This is one of my favorite holidays for so many reasons. I love green, I love irish food & it has always made me think of my grandma Weeden as she was Irish. I miss her to pieces.

So this morning, Hailey woke up to a scavenger hunt for a pot of gold. She laughed & had so much fun with the fun messages the Little Leprechaun left for her. Then she had Lucky Charms for breakfast actually 2 bowls. Then we just made clover shaped pretzels for lunch. So much fun to be had today. We had our dinner last night of corn beef & cabbage with red potatoes. As our Sat Nights are busy.  =D

Then today another great thing was that when Hailey was in public school she had started to dislike math a lot. But this morning after she found her pot of gold she turned & looked at me & asked if she could do her math. I was like wow really ok sure. This is the program Time4Learning. I am so happy. She is doing so well & having fun learning again.

I am a happy momma!

Have a wonderful Green Day!

Thursday, March 15, 2012

I won!

Ok so I never win. Thats something my mom & Dan can do with ease, call the radio and win anything. I have tried & tried with no luck. lol So I was on a blog "Whimsical Homeschooling" to enter a contest and didn't give it a thought until yesterday when I got an email saying I won. It was not what I had entered to win. But it ended up being a wonderful blessing. It was a membership to abcteach.com and I have fallen in love with this place. Then lessons I have found, the crafts, every subject including sign language. YEAH! I am just so happy. It has been super fun researching and finding activities for Hailey to do these last two days. I have even found stuff that I can do with Donnie and Hailey at work. And they have fun!

~Blessings in Disguise~

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Spectrum Sight Words

Since before homeschooling we looked into fun was for Hailey to learn her Sight Words. We found that flash cards just were not getting the job filled completely. With Spectrum Hailey is using the sight words in sentences. She also works with writing and word hunts and reading. It is a wonderful way for Hailey to learn her site words and how to use them.

I really would love to share Spectrum Sight Words with anyone looking to Homeschool or to even just help in these areas.

Monday, March 12, 2012

Sign Language

One of things Hailey & I love about Homeschooling is we are learning Sign Language together. The library & you tube have been great sources for our learning. She is having a blast. I have always loved Sign Language since I was in 3rd grade. I really look back and the time I should have studied more. But now its very exiting to be learning with her.

=)

Friday, March 9, 2012

First Week with Time 4 Learning

Hailey really likes this math program. She is doing great with it also. She is still figuring out the Reading program but doing good.

She also found the playground which has many educational games for her to play & learn & the same time.

But I also found she gets a lot done in a shorter amount of time. We both like this a lot.

Looking forward to continue this program. =) Will keep you updated each week.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Can't wait to play this. hehe

Hug Freeze Tag
God loves each and every one of us very much. He gives us His love, and we
can also give it away to others.
A simple way we can show love to our friends and family members is by giving hugs. To begin, designate a safe place to play tag, either inside your home or in an open space outside. Choose one person in your family to be “it.” Her role will be to tag the other members of your family. Once she tags somebody, that person is now frozen. Once a person is frozen, he must remain that way until another unfrozen member of the family finds him and gives him a hug.
The game ends once the “it” person has frozen the entire family, or you feel it is time to select another “it” person.

Hailey's Art

Hailey is a vivid artist. She sees it and puts it to use. I love everything she creates. She has had no formal training. We just give her the tools and she does it all on her own. We will be giving her more mediums to work with. Like pastels, chalk, paint, and will be attending art events at any chances we can.

She also so is in choir and is growing with leaps and bounds, she has her first concert Sunday March 11 at 6:30 pm. So excited and she has been working hard to learn all her songs. As soon as all her class work is done she sings her songs, she goes to sleep singing her songs. I am so proud of her.

We will also be adding cooking to this creativity. She is very excited about this!

We are also looking for more outlets for her like Dance and maybe swimming. Just working out financial parts of these.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Time4Learning

I've been invited to try Time4Learning for one month in exchange for a candid review. My opinion will be entirely my own, so be sure to come back and read about my experience. Time4Learning can be used as a homeschool curriculum, for afterschool enrichment and for summer skill sharpening. Find out how to write your own curriculum review for Time4Learning.

4 Weeks into Homeschooling

Hello All as we are 4 weeks into homeschooling we are loving it! chalk is working on all her subjects she loves Social Studies & Science the most. And Art & Music of course. We just went & got her an easel to do her art. It has the chalk board, dry erase & paper. We will start working with pastels, chalk, colored pencils and painting. Social Studies has intrigued her interest of our presidents so we are going to be studying each one. Science is the earth science that she is most interested in we will start our small potted garden soon. We are reading American Girl & Little House on the Prairie and will be working with them in Lap Books. We will also be working with the Bear Snores On, Bear Feels Sick, and the other books. Math is still not fun so I am finding ways to teach her math that will be fun. Like Lego Math. =) I will be trying different curriculums until we find her match.

Our only wall we are really hitting is being around other kids. So working on finding homeschool groups to meet. But we are also doing Lib. trips, museum trips,  looking into dance classes, And roller skating saturdays. We are also very involved in Girl Scouts as she is a Juliette we are doing the city wide events instead of Troop events. But do hope when we move we can find a group in that area she can join.

I will be posting regularly. I'm excited to take this adventure with my bumble bee!

Slow-Cooker Vegetarian Chili With Sweet Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a 4- to 6-quart slow cooker, combine the onion, bell pepper, garlic, chili powder, cumin, cocoa, cinnamon, 1 teaspoon salt, and ¼ teaspoon black pepper. Add the tomatoes (and their liquid), beans, sweet potato, and 1 cup water.
  2. Cover and cook until the sweet potatoes are tender and the chili has thickened, on low for 7 to 8 hours  or on high for 4 to 5 hours (this will shorten total recipe time).
  3. Serve the chili with the sour cream, scallions, radishes, and tortilla chips.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Layered Taco Salad



1 small head of iceberg lettuce, chopped into very small pieces (the smaller the more they "blend in")
15 oz can black or kidney beans
15 oz can corn or 2 cups fresh corn
2 cups of shredded 2% milk cheddar cheese
1/2 red pepper diced
3 green onions chopped
half a pint of grape tomatoes, quartered -OR- 3 plum tomatoes, deseeded and diced
4-5 good handfuls of baked tortilla chips (blue corn chips are fun for kids), crushed in a baggie
1/2 cup lite mayo or lite sour cream or fat free plain yogurt
1/2 cup chopped cilantro
1/4 cup lime juice
1 t ground cumin
1/2 t salt

Combine the mayo/sour cream/yogurt with cilantro, lime juice, cumin and salt. Layer in bowl 1/2 the lettuce, 1/2 chips, 1/3 of the dressing and then 1/2 the beans, corn, cheese, red pepper, green onion and grape tomatoes. Repeat. Top with remaining dressing.

Chicken Roll Ups

Taco Seasoned Chicken Breast Chopped up
Mayo, Miracle Whip or Ranch Dressing
Spinach
Flour Tortilla

maybe?

Stuffed Pumpkin
• Easy Home Cooked Recipes
2 large potatoes
1 bay leaf
1 med onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tbsp butter
1 1/2 lbs ground beef and/or pork, mixed
1/2 tsp each cinnamon and cloves 
OR 1 tsp poultry seasoning
1 egg
1 10 inch diameter pumpkin

boil potatoes with bay leaf, peel and mash. Saute onion and garlic in butter until limp. Mix with potatoes. Cook meat until no longer raw, but not dry. Add to potatoes. Add seasoning and egg.
cut off top of pumpkin and clean out. Stuff with mix and replace top and bake at 350* for about 1 1/2 hours until pumpkin is very tender. Tent with foil if necessary to prevent over browning.
to serve, cut wedges top to bottom, stuffing will adhere to pumpkin shell...very nice presentation.

great idea 2 for 1

I do my tostada meat the night before - 

Dinner 1

1 1/2 lbs hamburger (or ground turkey) browned
taco seasoning
1 8 oz can tomato sauce
15 oz can kidney beans added at the end

I buy the tostada shells already fried. Add whatever you'd like on your tostada; cheese, tomatoes lettuce, dill pickles (yes, pickles!! don't knock it until you try it!!)

Night 2 - Hamburger soup 

Leftover meat/bean combo from the tostadas (you might want to do extra on night 1 so you have plenty)
1 can rotel diced tomatoes
1 15 oz can of tomato sauce
1 can of white beans - it was just what I had in the pantry
1 beef boullion cube dissolved in one cup hot water
I added three more cups of water
2 SAZON Goya seasoning packets

Cook all day low in the crockpot. Serve alone or with a grill cheese sandwich!!

This is very similar to the taco stew also just posted so it you are interested in stew and not soup, you could use your leftover tostada meat for that instead.

think I will try this too

T2 Tbsp of real bacon bit 
1 tsp garlic minced 
1 package of Hidden Valley Ranch salad dressing mix 
can of cream of chicken soup 
1 cup sour cream 
4 boneless skinless chicken breast 
Egg Noodles, prepared 

Combine the first 5 ingredients. 
Pour over chicken in slow cooker.
Cook 3-4 hours on high or until chicken is cooked through. 
Serve over hot noodles

Crockpot Gingerbread Latte

Crockpot Gingerbread Latte 
4 c milk (2% or lower is best to not worry about curdling)
1/2 c white sugar
2 tsp ground ginger
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup strong black coffee, or a freshly-brewed shot of espresso (per drink)

Put milk into crockpot, and whisk in the dried spices. Don't add the coffee. Cover and cook on low for 3 hours, or high for 1-2. The milk should be quite hot, but don't let it boil. Pour over hot coffee or espresso.

Optional: top with whipped cream
Note: Can cause serious sugar/caffeine high!

Pumpkin Spice Latte

Can't wait to try this---

Pumpkin Spice Latte
1 – 1 1/2 cups brewed strong coffee
4 cups milk 
4 tablespoons canned puréed pumpkin
2 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons vanilla extract
Whipped cream (optional)

Add coffee/espresso and milk to your slow cooker. Whisk in pumpkin, spices, sugar, and vanilla. Cover and cook on high for 2 hours.

Whisk again before serving. Ladle into mugs, and garnish with whipped cream and additional cinnamon. Add a cinnamon stick if you’re feeling fancy.