Planning

One of the changes I have made in the last 2 years is more planning for our homeschool year. I always wanted to be a fly by the seat of my pants kinda gal but that simply does not work well for our family. We tried doing the boxed curriculum where you just do x number of pages in each subject each day but that did not work well at all for us. So I embraced the planner.

First I do an overview of an entire year. I use the method described in the following video to map out our homeschooling year:



On this page I put all the info for birthdays and holidays plus field trips or any vacations we might take during the year. It also helps me to plan out breaks too.

I get my other planning pages from Donna Young. I gather up the curriculum I plan to do for that year and just write out some goals. Some science and history we use over 2 years. I typically plan 2 weeks out at a time. I use one of the weekly planners from Donna Young. I have bought planners but none have really suited our needs and I just end up not using it. This is all still a work in progress. Starting next semester I plan to do at least 3 weeks at a time so that I am looking forward to what books we might need to check out from the library. It also gives me more time to get a suitable substitute for books that do not work for us.

Homeschooling

During the school year I am blessed to be at home with my children learning right along with them. We have been on this journey for 7 years now. It has been trying at times but mostly it has been deeply satisfying. I feel like I really know my kids and the bond in our family is very strong. I would like to start a series of posts where I share about the curriculum that we choose to use. There are many different styles of homeschooling and I do not feel that any really describe what we do. I guess if I had to choose the closest would be eclectic. We use a lot of the resources provided by Ambleside Online. This is a Charlotte Mason/Living Books approach to teaching. I lean heavily on this method but like all things in my life I am not a purest. I also use some of the Waldorf methods of homeschooling and some of the classical stuff too. This year has been the first year that I have really spent time in prayer and asked God's guidance in our school year. It has made this year the best year so far. I am more at peace with my choices and the kids have gotten a lot more out of our school year than ever before.

Over the next few posts I will talk about the different curriculum that we have used over the past 7 years and what we are using now.

Knitting Olympics

This year I have decided to compete in the Knitting Olympics. You can read about it here. I will be attempting the Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn A. Clark. You can see some finished ones here. Now I just need to figure out how I am going to Homeschool 4 kids, keep the house clean, cook, do music lessons and Church activities while trying to knit an entire shawl in 17 days. I do like a challenge!!!!

Celebrate the Boy

Go Check it out at Made by Rae!!!

Goodbye to a Dear Friend

Nancy Deason Jenkins, 65, of Springdale died December 3, 2009 at Springdale. She was born September 15, 1944 in Rogers to Mauriece and Letha Dell Reeves Deason.
She was a member of Fellowship Bible Church of Rogers and she also attended First Baptist Church of Lowell. She had been active in Women’s Ministry Leadership at Fellowship Bible Church. She had done numerous workshops, speeches and classes for women of all ages influencing their lives forever. She was the founder of an Aid Organization for Chinese orphans with a missionary trip to Bejing. She was a member of Springdale Kiwanis Club. She was a 2008 candidate for Springdale Mayor. She was passionate about Springdale and its future. She did extensive advocacy work for homelessness, mental health and insurance reform. Nancy never met a stranger and helped countless people, touching the lives of many through the years.
Survivors include her husband Dr. Travis Jenkins of the home, to whom she was married June 24, 1963; Two sons Adam Jenkins and wife Mary of Lexington, Kentucky, Nathan Jenkins and wife Sara of Knoxville, Tennessee; one daughter Susanna Taha and husband Tarek of Rogers, Arkansas; two brothers Darwin Deason and wife Katarina of Dallas, Texas, Dale Deason and wife Beckie of Decatur, Alabama; one sister Donna Buck and husband, John of Elm Springs; five grandchildren Sarah Taha, Isabel Jenkins, Dylan Jenkins, Donovan Jenkins and Miley Jenkins.

December 2

Yesterday I managed to nearly finish a pair of longies. I did also manage to get rid of a huge trash bag of clothing and old shoes. It was wonderfully freeing. I look forward to throwing away more stuff. I did go through everything very carefully and salvaged anything that could be used for crafts or sewing projects. I also took out any clothes that could be used as rags or oil cloths. By the end of the week we will have a nice bag of items to donate.

My daughter is nearly finished with a doll that she has been making for the nature table. We will get that finished today and some pictures posted later.

Off to cook breakfast.

December 1

It has been a while since I posted anything. Turns out it is not so easy to homestead, homeschool and blog. But here I go again. Back in the saddle so to speak.

We are taking the month of December to finish up craft projects that were started over the past year. Or in my case several years. Today we worked on a nature table doll and are almost done with it. I also have several new projects that are simple to do for Christmas decorating. I had both my girls make lists of what they need to finish. I started a list but we do not have that much paper. I have way to many UFO's to count. I am hoping to overcome my startitis. I love to learn new things. So I tend to start a lot of new things. It is not that I never finish anything it just takes me a while once the newness wears off. I have started dolls, quilts, pants and skirts. This is only the sewing stuff. My knitting basket is another story. So I will be posting throughout the month the different projects that we finish up.

I have also decided to organize my entire house. I have no idea why but the bug to simplify always hits me hard this time of the year. Maybe it is a reaction to all the holiday shopping. I actually rarely leave the house from Thanksgiving to the New Year. Thank goodness for a well stocked pantry. Makes me get all excited about the seed catalogs. I think I will pop over to rareseeds.com just to dream for a bit. Feel free to join me.