United States

Since we school year round, we kind of take a little break for the month of December, doing only math, reading, and grammar. I decided to take this time to catch up on my blogging.

As you may know we are doing Explorering Countries and Cultures, with My Father's World.

And our first stop was America: 

The kids enjoyed "arriving" and having to stand in line to stamp their passports. They were then seated in the "travel agency" living room where the TV is connected to the laptop for easy viewing, and we all watched the powerpoint on America that I put together.

We then listened to the Wee Sing CD, and played follow the leader, just as the Navajo children do. The children really enjoyed hearing the little Navajo boy speak in his own language, as did I.
We read and leaned about the Navajo, and enjoyed some of their legends, along with other Native American legends.

                        

We found an awesome book about types of trees and their leaves, and they enjoyed looking up all the leaves in our yard, and the neighborhood. We even went to Nana's in the country to collect lots more.

  We did a color the world colorsheet.

Which happen to be the Great Smokey Mountains, right here in our back yard. This precented a great oppertunity to discuss some of our state geography and history.

  In art we chose to stick with our Navajo subject and created some sand art. FYI, this is not a project for perfectionist, which we learned with Princessa doing it. She was not happy with her final project, even though I gave her the praise she/it deserved. Although, she was not happy with the outcome, I think all the children had fun with the project.

 This is the first year we "do" art, I can't believe what we were missing out on. We will deffiantly be adding more art and I am also considering adding art history with Erica's art curriculum.

We ended our visit to America with a family night, we ate homemade chili and hotdogs, and watched an old favorite, Angels in the outfield.

                                                 And that was America with Our Days at CA!

Book Basket Friday

Ok So I am late posting this, but when am I ever on time ;) We have finished up Mexico but we are taking a week off from ECC because of Halloween on Monday, instead we are going to do a little unit on Halloween, then we will pick up on Canada the next week. I thought I would go ahead and post the Canada books so I am head and not behind!
Remember my list is our basket, recommended and what we found to supplement  the recommended  ones, you may want to preview some of them before adding them to your stack. Good luck searching, and thanks for reading with us here at Our Days  At CA!

Canada the Culture *
Canada A to Z
Canada Major World Nations
Many Nations an Alphabet of Native America
 M is for maple: a Canadian alphabet
My Arctic 1,2,3 *
Immi's Gift
Wolf Island
Goose's story
The Magic School Bus Meets the Rot Squad
The Magic School Bus Food Chain Frenzy
Flat Stanley's the Intrepid Canadian Expedition
Anne of Green Gables *
Anne of the Island
With Pipe, Paddle, and Song



* recommended by the Hazells

Pre-School?!

We are doing pre-school with a boost!,this year.

Lady Jey is 4 and will be 5 after the cut off date, so she has another year before she would be mandated to attend (in the PS system). I will be using this year as a kind of a see what we can do year, if that makes since. I have never taught Kindergarten before, Princessa attended PS, and I am in a "I CAN DO IT! (maybe not) mode". Lady Jey is a very difficult? child, and is very emotional when she can not GET things, so we will have to see where it goes.

We did a little last year, so I am not just throwing her in. She actually did good beside my fear, it just did not interest her long. We used and will use again LOTW. Although some of the themes did not hold her interest, hence the collections I am creating. We will use the alphabet tree every week weather I use Erica's curriculum, or the themes found elsewhere such as Carisa's, Michelle's... or others. I will just have to remember that I can not give into her, and that this is a "real" school year for her. So to keep her interest this year we have found some FUN things to do with her lessons. Here are some of those.

I will post throughout our year on how things are going. I am also trying to get Lady Bells involved, but that is a whole different "post"

Apple panadas

This is a great, an easy substitution to apple pie. When you are cooking for 6 anything simple is greatly appreciated!

Apple Panadas

ingredients

2 cans of crescent rolls (we use the large ones)

2 apples cut up into 8 equal slices (use your favorite)

2 sticks butter melted

2 cups sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

1 tsp. cinnamon

10 oz. yellow soda (Mellow yellow, Mt. Dew... just use your favorite)

1. preheat to 350

2. roll cut apples into crescents. fold ends up so apple is enfolded completely.

3. mix butter, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, and soda in large bowl and pour over crescents

4. bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Serve hot!

Deserts!

Here is a list of our recipes, for deserts. Again sorry for the post listings as soon as I figure out how to do a multi-level drop down menu I will repost them.


Apple Panadas

Horchata (rice milk)

This refreshing drink took the place of milk in my children's diet whenever they refused to drink milk. Even now they still enjoy it.

Homemade Horchata

ingredients

1 cup rinsed long grain rice

1/2 a gallon of water

2 Cinnamon sticks broken in half

1/2 cup sugar

1. in a large saucepan combine water, rice, and Cinnamon sticks. set aside for 4 hours.

2. after 4 hours bring mixture to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes. allow rice mixture to cool.

3. puree rice mixture in a blender until smooth

4. finely strain mixture leaving only liquid. Add sugar to taste, chill and serve over ice.

Drinks

Here is a list of our recipes, for family friendly drinks. Again sorry for the post listings as soon as I figure out how to do a multi-level drop down menu I will repost them.

Horchata (rice milk)

Mommy's Pozole

Ok so I know different families have "their" own recipes for family dishes. And since we are studying Mexico on our trip around the world with MFW, I thought I would share some of our family recipes with you guys.

Mommy's Pozole

ingredients

1 small bell pepper

8 ounce bacon chopped

1 tablespoon bacon drippings

2 pound pork loin, cut into stripes

1 medium onion diced

10 cloves garlic minced

1 can green chilies

2 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 bunch chopped cilantro

8 cups chicken broth

2 cans diced tomatoes

2 29 ounce cans of white hominy drained

optional garnishes

cabbage

radish

avocado

tosados

1. cook and stir the bacon in a large pot over medium heat, until it begins to crisp. Drain keeping 1 tablespoon of bacon fat.

2. heat pot to medium high and add pork stripes. cook stirring periodically until browned. remove pork and reduce heat. 

3. stir in onion and garlic, cook until onion has softened and beginning to turn brown. 

4. stir in the bell pepper, green chilies, cumin, chili powder, salt and cilantro. cook for a few minutes make sure mixture is complete mixed together.

5. pour in the chicken broth and diced tomatoes. stir in the bacon and pork stripes, bring to a simmer. reduce heat cover and simmer 1 hour.

6. stir in the hominy, recover and continue cooking until pork is tender.

serve hot with or without optional garnishes.

Main dishes

Here is a list of our recipes, that would be considered main dishes. Again sorry for the post listings as soon as I figure out how to do a multi-level drop down menu I will repost them.


Pozole

Taco Casserole

Cilantro Lime Chicken and Salsa


Shrimp Creole

Calendar Printables

I am in the process of making calendar numbers and month titles for our calendar. I will link them as soon as each is finished. Sorry I am not able to make one post for each, but I still have not figured out how to make a multilevel drop down menu. If anyone can lend a hand, please leave a comment.

Months/Numbers

January
February
March
April                                                             
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December

Extras/Activities

Season cards
sight word cards
number cards
color cards
shape cards

Our Calendar

There were so many wonderful ideas from great websites about pre-school calendars and activities, we ended up borrowing from different websites. Here is a picture of our calendar and activities.

Calendar

activities

   Our calendar we got from the dollar tree, and actually comes with 2 calendars. The September title also come from the dollar tree in a pack with the other 11 months, although they will probably never be used because I decided to make my own, good thing they were only a dollar! The apple date cards are from Nest Learning. The foam clock hanging beside the calendar is Princessa's calendar activity and came from the dollar aisle in Target, LOVE those dollar deals.
The black poster board above hangs just under our calendar and holds all of our mourning calendar activities.  This is were we "borrowed" from many of the talented moms who also blog, a BIG thanks to all of you!
   The my name space came from Erica, I am sure, over at COAH sorry I can not find the exact post it came from. This activity is for helping Lady Jey recognize, write and spell her name. The one on the board is on regular paper, and taped to the board. She has an exact copy of this page that is on card stock for durability and laminated for reuse. Every mourning she has to write her name for me, first and last. Once she gets this down I will then cover up her name on the board and make her write her name from memory.
   The memory verse activity is part of Erica's Letter of the week curriculum, and includes one verse for every letter of the alphabet. They are a little hard for her to remember, but we just read it everyday and by Friday she can at least remember half of it.
   The color of the week and shape of the week are for both Lady Jey and Lady Bells. The color cards are from 1+1+1=1, although they do theirs by the day, we do the same one all week. The shape cards are from the website TLS.
   The letter of the week on the purple background goes along with our letter we are learning with both little girls that week. Not sure where I found these, but there are thousands of websites that offer printable alphabet flashcards.
   The what is the season is for lady Jey and Princessa to learn the seasons and when each starts and ends. You can find my season cards under our printables
   The word of the week card is Lady Jey's sight words, we made them with the Monkeys because she LOVES them. You can download them under our printables. After making these for her, Carissa over at 1+1+1=1 posted about her you can read curriculum, we immediately joined the members sight, for a small fee which goes to a GREAT cause. Can't wait to be able to use them!
    The what is the weather like, yesterday, today and tomorrow, along with the weather graph you can see off to the side came from COAH. I made 5 copies of each type of weather cards and hole punched each and put them on key rings and hung them from tacs under each day of the week, not my idea but came from Mama Jenn's site. I also got her idea for the make the date activity and days in school, which are Princessa's activities.
Well that is our calendar activities, thanks for joining us here at our days at CA with our mourning routine.

Book Basket Friday

We are off to Mexico on Monday, so as promised here is the list of books we have found for our book basket. Again these are books recommend by the Hazells along with those extras we have found to supplement them. Remember you may want to preview some of the books, like the day of the dead books. We chose to add these in because it is a part of our heritage.

Cinco de Mayo: Celebrating Hispanic Pride
Festivals of the World: Mexico
Holy Mole!
Cactus
life in the desert
Scream shop: Day of the dead
Time Warp trio: Me oh Maya Celebration
Alejandro's Gift
Way out in the Desert
Clementina's Cactus
Spotlight on Mexico
Manana Iguana
Musicians of the Sun
The Legend of the Poinsettia
Erandi's Braids *
Hill of Fire *
Manuela's gift *
The Tortilla Factory *
Deserts *






* reccomended by the Hazells

Strawberry shortcake JINGO

I have finally finished the JINGO game for Strawberry Shortcake. This one has been an on again off again project. I have to say it turned out beautifully and Lady Jey can not wait to play it!

JINGO!!!

 Again I offer it to you guys for a small donation, but ask that you do not share the link with anyone.
If you have a blog, please post about the game and link back to us here
When you submit the donation be sure to include in the email which game you are wanting, if you donate for one I will include two, so include the free one in your request. You will have 7 days to download from the provided link, check your spam folders if not received within the 2 days. After the link is expired I will not send another link, except for reasons of my own fault. You can also leave a comment here on the blog as to what game you are wanting, after donating.
As always thanks for letting us be a part of your days here at Our Days at CA.

Book Basket Fridays

We are finishing up the introduction weeks and headed into North America. I was happy that I found a lot of the books on The U.S that the Hazell's recommended, but I added to our list because the kids would have them read in a days time. Remember my list is what we found to add to the recommended  ones, you may want to preview some of them before adding them to your stack. Good luck searching, and thanks for reading with us here at Our Days  At CA!

Book-basket for United States weeks

(3-4)

ABC USA- Martin Jarrie
America is
WOW! America
Happy birthday America
America the Beautiful
The United States, state by state guide
Scrambled states of America
Smart about the 50 States
7 natural wonders of North America
Lands and Peoples of North America #5
Kids around the world cookbook
The Kingfisher Student Atlas of North America
The Atlas of World Cultures: Brunetto Chiarelli 
How to make a Cherry pie and See the U.S.A *
Greetings from 50 states *
Lentil  *
When I was young in the mountains *
Betsy and Tacy go over the big hill *
The Rag Coat *
The Hundred dresses *
stone fox *
across America on a emigrant train
meet the American girl books
Nate the Great, San Francisco Detective
wild, wild southwest: junior explorer series
Geronimo  Stiliton #37 race across America
Charlotte's web
Stella: fairy of the forest
Lost in the woods
Who lives here? Forest animals
Life in a Deciduous forest
Nature hide and seek: Woods & ForestsTrees: Illa Podendorf
The Navajo: Alice Osinski 

* recommended by the Hazells

Book basket Friday

Ok, so I realize it is not Friday, nor is it the beginning of our study with the introduction weeks in MFW ECC, but I decided to go ahead and post this late just in case some of you may be starting late.

Book basket for introduction weeks

(1-2)

Dora's World Adventure

Two-can first Encyclopedia: A First Atlas

Lands and peoples #5: North America

What a Wonderful World *

The Whole Wide World question and answer book: Ashley Bryan

My Granny Went to Market

The Kids Around the World Cookbook

Gifts
Everybody Cooks Rice
DK's The Most Fantastic Atlas of the whole wide world
Let's Eat! What Children eat around the world
The Atlas of World Cultures:  Brunetto Chiarelli
Say Hello
Homes Around the World ABC alphabet book
Around the World in 80 days
DK's book of baby animals
Thank you, World
DK's My Sticker book Atlas
The great animal search *
Know it all animals: Hugh Westrup
Celebrations! *
Me on the Map *
Children from Australia to Zimbabwe
Usborne's Stories from Around the World
How to make an apple pie and see the world *
Usborne's people around the world *

                                OUR FAVORITES

* books reccommended by the Hazells

book basket

     I don't know about you guys, but when I first got the TM for MFW ECC, I was excited. Here was a complete book of lesson plans I did not have to sit and write out, even though I tweaked it a little to fit us, and added some things in, like the highlights top secret. Although when it came to getting things ready for the book basket, our public library was scarce on the books referred by the Hazells. So I spent most of the summer trying to find books at our library to fit in with each week. My kids LOVE to read, sometimes I think it is all they do, so I had a job ahead of me.
     When I finally finished I was happy with the results, so happy that I thought I would share my hard work with you guys. So each lesson I am planning on posting a what's in the book-basket the Friday before we start a country, in hopes that it might help someone else out there. Good luck and thanks for reading with us here at our days at CA.

MFW Power Points

As promised, I have made a separate page to find the MFW power points more easily. Here are the links to the ones I have already completed along with the ones yet to come. I hope you can use these in some way in your studies of MFW_ECC.


America
Mexico
Canada

Brazil
(panama, Venezuela)

Norway
France
Germany

Kenya

Saudi Arabia
India
China
Japan
Russia

Australia

Antarctica

Scotland

From main room to bedroom

We decided to move the "classroom" from the main room to a bedroom at the last possible minute, but that is me, constantly changing my mind and doing things last minute (been praying about that one!). Doing this has caused us to push back our starting date, but hey I am not on anyone's schedule, don't you love homeshool!? Anyway I have decided to post some before and after pictures to give you guys a peek into our first official classroom.

                                                                        BEFORE!

Yikes!

In this mess, if you can find them, is our school table, bought at a garage sale for 5 dollars! and color coded (we color code EVERYTHING) chairs from Target on clearance last year for three dollars, I LOVE clearance!

After some organizing

This corner is my desk and the tot and pre-schooler's shelves. I tried to do this in one night, always the procrastinator, in the mourning it still looked like this! Well at least everything got labeled!? And look I found my all important thumb drive with my LOTW files I had been missing "miraculously" on the floor the next mourning, oh, how things grow legs around here!

Same corner

                            

                                                                  FINALLY ORGANIZED

Here is our classroom finally clean and organized! Here you see our wonderful table big enough for 4 and me at the head to teach. the closet outside the door is used for our art supplies. The cubes on the left are again color coded and contain the kids fun box things, free read books, and library books. along with our math, science and Bible cubes. SO MANY cubes, and a place for EVERYTHING!
The pink workboxes on the side belong to Lady Jey, I have not set those up completely, hope to be done before the school year is out!

Here is the right side of the classroom and the one which gave me more trouble. Our table finally cleared off and repositioned so all 4 children have room to sit. In the back corner you see Princessa's workboxes and in the opposite corner is Prince's which are blue. My desk is in the front and ready to start my school on Monday (please pray for me to have enough time and energy to do ALL there is to do!) Then beside my desk are two shelves, again yard sale finds!, which house our text books for the year and all the goodies for tot and pre-school.

Here is our calendar activities, which I will go into more detail later. And our calendar is just above this.

Our book-basket for MFW sets on the floor below

See our what's in the basket post weekly

And last but not least, our Chicka chicka Boom Boom tree. To see how we use it check out COAH.

cheapest place found amazon

Well That's our classroom here at our days at CA hope you enjoyed the visit.

MFW

We have joined the Family! It took me a while to get us in, because silly me thought we had to have everything new, until I came upon the MFW curriculum swap group (should have researched more). Anyway we are in! We chose the traditional route and am going to start in Exploring Countries and Cultures. And like the TM says we are going to make it as fun as possible!
The days that we "stamp" our passports We are going to view a power point with landmarks and quick facts of that country, sort of as a touring video. Which will be followed by stamping the passport and "entering" the country.
So I will be posting the power points here, so I can find them, as they are completed. Fell free to use them in any way you see fit. If you do, please leave us a comment as to how you used them. Thanks for following us here at our days at CA.

Beach Theme

Alright so I know the end of summer is fast approaching, but here at CA we would like to hold on to it as long as we can. Although I was born literally on the ocean most of the children have never seen it, but they still LOVE the water and playing in the made man beaches around home.
Lady Jey asked last week if we could go to the beach so without spending the gas money to get there I made her a unit of "At the beach" MORE TO COME.....

AT THE BEACH!

Coming Soon... Mexican Desert, Fall, Veggies

A New Year: Restoring Faith Through Trails

Ok, so the school year is fast approaching, September for us. And I am everyday reminded of the unpleasant, heartbreaking year we had last year. So I am constantly praying that I can somehow make it through this year. While this stress and anxiety rule my life, right now, I am reminded of a song I have grown to love!!, in it says,” I should be strong but again I am depending on you... just hold me while I cry! “

With God's help everything seems to be getting easier, and I am always reminded of the good things, and blessings in my (our) life. But every now and then the pain comes back along with the struggles I am praying to get over. I know we should and need to put everything in HIS hands, but it is human nature to want to be in control. But what of these things can I truly control, and that is what I tell myself every day.

And so I question the things I do not understand,
   Why did he try to kill himself?  And I get the answer, you found your faith and I answered your humble prayer to get one last chance to witness to him, and I went a step further and brought him back from the brink of death, while the doctors gave him a 2% chance, I said get up and walk!

  Why did immigration take him when we needed him?  And I am answered, you again found your faith in ME, I took care of you and the children through the loving family of your church! I brought him back when everything was against your family and here he remains!

   Why did you bless me with twins and then take them from me? HE gives me the answer that although your pain here is great, I know what you can handle. I give you 4 healthy children to care for and love and raise in my will with the hope of more. I also give you the promise that your arms will not ache for long for your babies will fill them here in heaven with ME. And the reminder not to lose faith.

   Why do we struggle financially when we give what is yours?  I am answered with; do I not provide you a roof, clothes, and food to eat? I make a way for you every day and that is all I promised!

   So as a Christian I know the road may be long, filled with struggles and suffering, but my comfort is, HE already knows! In every heartbreak, in every sorrow, in every tear shed HE knows what is best! Though he does not promise the road will be easy,  HIS AMAZING grace helps me make it through every day. HE promises that my trials will only make me stronger, and through it all my faith has grown and I have learned to trust HIM more!

And so I pray that HE gives me strength, for I am weak. A weakness, I pray, that will not overwhelm. I pray that my faith will remain strong no matter the trials. I pray that HIS light shine through my weakness so that all who are watching, especially my children, see HIM instead of me, for I am nothing and HE is EVERYTHING!
And it is through the knowledge of answered prayers that I can even consider starting our new year!

S for StrawBerry

Lady Jey and Lady Bells LOVE StarwBerry ShortCake so I thought what better way to learn S and about fruits at the same time! I hope someone out there can enjoy this as much as us. It is filled with 75 pages of fun learning activities! Can't wait to use it with Lady Jey. So without further ramblings here it is...

ENJOY!!!

                                                                            
                                                                                                            Coming soon Beach Theme!!