Still On-Board!

Every year, around February, I'm ready to chuck my curriculum and start over with something completely different.

Every year....EXCEPT THIS YEAR!

Yes, I know, it's not really February yet...still....I am so thrilled with how our new approach to schooling and our new curriculum is working out. Everyone is learning, everyone is happy, everyone has time to pursue their own unique interests and grow in their own special way. We can take time out of our regular curriculum to make something, go somewhere, do something, learn something else....and not feel like we're "behind" or that we now need to "make up" that time.

But, because it is still almost February, I have started to think ahead for next year. Here's what I'm thinking

• I like the My Father's World curriculum, and I'm really glad we purchased it and used it. 
• But, I find myself consulting the lesson plans less and less, as we have just established our own rhythm and routines.
• I don't think I need a purchased curriculum package for next year.
• I do want to keep the "family learning" plan going, where we study our main theme together, and then each child completes work on their own level, and does their own studies for math and reading.
• Sweetling has already studied all the standard periods of history at least once in her school career....except for recent history. 
• I think next year, we will study The History of the Twentieth Century together as a family. We will cover the last two decades of the 1800's, all of the 1900s, and the first decade of this century. I think we will look at spending two or three weeks on each decade. 

I've started doing some preliminary research to see how feasible this would be. I decide to start with....ta, da...ART. Because really, if I can't find or create good art projects, the whole thing is a wash, right? (I'm kidding, I'm kidding....sort of....)

I went to Deep Space Sparkle first, cause we loverred the African Art package we purchased. Deep Space Sparkle has a whole slew of project ideas inspired by artists. I'll have to sort through them and figure out when each of these artists painted. You know I'm just heart-broken at having to do some art research.

I also found some media images of art by decade. I'm absolutely capable of getting books from the library about specific artists or genres and then generating our own art projects.

In short, go art :)

Facebook Friday...on Saturday (again)

And again, don't bother reading this if you already follow me on Facebook.

Jan 8
I'm feeling singularly unmotivated to run on a trampoline this morning.

Jan 9
Toa of Boy used his half of an Amazon Christmas gift certificate to buy "Worms: BAttle Island" for the wii. This afternoon he made his first custom weapon and named it "dead ray". Peace on earth indeed.

Jan 10
3.565 today. Things I have learned 1) I just need to suck it up and run on saturday, no matter how lazy I feel. 2)Eswin stands secure in his family distance record. 3)My status updates were more enterntaining before I stated running.

Jan 10
Does anyone know if Jungle Jim's sells ostrich eggs?
--Yay! So far our African menu has ostrich egg omelet, meat on a stick, samusas (ground beef pockets), luku (chicken and hard-boiled egges in a tomato base sauce), and sweet balls (like donut holes). No, we aren't going to make this all at one sitting, but spread out over the next two weeks. Assuming that there is a time when the road are clear so I can go get the groceries we'd need for it.

Jan 10
I'm not really sure why cleaning up a bedroom and getting jammies on should involve battle noises and combat sound effects, but it still got done in a timely fashion, I'm not going to worry about it.

Jan 11
Check out what's for lunch today. I'm using colby jack instead of cheddar and velveeta, cause I need to use up some of this cubed colby jack.

Jan 11
I'm snuggled under a penguin blanket and I'm not coming out till bedtime!

Jan 12
It's 12:30 and we are all still in our jammies. Also, my little boy seems to think its lunchtime. Huh

Jan 13
We left meijer this afternoon and I happened to look down and notice that Toa of Boy was wearing one brown boot (his grandma's) and one black boot ( which turned out to be his sister's). Where were Toa's boots? In Sweetling's closet, of course.

Jan 14
Going to the Jungle. :)

Jan 15
Sweetling and I ate dragon eyes at Jungle Jim's yesterday. I'm still waiting for my new special abilities to kick in.
--dragon eyes are a fruit, about the size of a grape, with a hard outer shell. you peel off the shell, and are left with a squishy grey juicy thing, a little like an unpeeled grape, with a large black pit in the center of it. I found it a little less sweet than a grape, and not worth the effort of extracting it from its shell. Susan found it, and I quote, "disgusting" because of its color, texture, and general aptness of the name.

Jan 16
L-A-Z-Y spells LAZY

Jan 16
"I'm going to sleep now, Hazel-rah, and Frith help you if you say I'm not." --Bigwig from Watership Down by Richard Adams.

Jan 17
SmoQ doesn't have a combo platter. That's OK, we solved that by ordering FIVE entrees for 2 adults and 2 children.

Jan 18
Haven't read the last couple chapters of our Beth Moore book BUT I do have a cup of hot chocolate so....to Bible study I shall go!

Jan 18
Can someone please tell me how it is I can go into walmart to get TWO things, and walk out with $60 cart of stuff?

Jan 18
Last night, I solved a medium sudoku in about 30-40 minutes. Today, I've been spinning my wheels on one puzzle. I have 11 number solved, about 40 unsolved, and I'm wondering why I ever thought this counted as "fun".
--HA HA! I did it. I can now go to bed and rest easy, knowing I have defeated another sudoku.

Jan 20
4.048 this morning. I called Toa of Boy in so that he could see how close I came to his record of 4.140. Toa's response, "Not close*enough*, Mommy."

Jan 21
4.215 Beat THAT, Toa :)

Jan 21
Dear Cincinnati drivers, please do not stop halfway up a snow and ice covered hill. It took me an hour and 45 minutes round trip to take Mom to work this morning in Blue Ash. AND I get to to it again this evening. Joy.

Jan 21
I shall have to paint my fingernails before church on Sunday in order to disquise what a terrible 'bruised' color I have just dyed them

Jan 22
The top of my toaster oven is just slightly convex. I'm sure it was designed this way to make it impractical for the consumer to store items on top of it. What the level-headed engineers failed to understand was that tired clutter freaks such as myself don't really care about practicality when desperately searching for a spot to stash a dirty casserole dish when the sink, dishwasher and stove top are already full.

Jan 24
stuck at waiting for the van to be done and I forgot my soduko book :(

Jan 25
I've noticed that Window's Office has completely hidden the "help" menu in their applications. Granted, it was only dubiously helpful before, but now its completely hidden

Jan 27
Our school day has been interrupted because the large number of plush students are having difficulty settling down and focussing. They are, in fact, currently debating who can "count to purple backwards."
--Ah the joys of active children. Last night during homework time dd had to set up the dining room like a classroom; complete with a white board to write on. And we had to go through all of her assignments like she was the teacher.
--I can count to purple backwards. 635nm, 615nm, 580nm, 535nm, 488nm, 463nm, 415nm. That would be the wavelengths of red, orange, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and purple (as seen in any rainbow).

Jan 27
Here are my options for this evening--1)blog about homemade gift exchanges 2)fold laundry and watch extreme makeover home edition. Decisions....decisions....

Jan 27
Every year I lose a pair or two of stretch gloves somewhere in my house. Where do they all go?

Jan 28
4.676 WOOT!

Jan 28
has anyone made soda bread from scratch? I want some homemade bread to go with dinner tonight and I'm out of yeast.

Jan 28
It has been determined that Irish soda bread might be an acquired taste.

Perfect Pie Crust

This is, as close as I can remember, how my Mammaw taught me to make pie crust. Of course, Mammaw never measured anything, but I think these measurements work. The following amounts will make enough for two 9-inch crusts.

Double Pastry Crust

2 1/2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
3/4 cup shortening
1/3 cup ice cold water

1. Sift flour, then measure. Trust me, it makes a difference.
2. Thoroughly stir in 1 tsp salt.
3. Cut in about 3/4 cup shortening. Dough should be crumbly--which means if you squeeze some in your hand, it should mostly hold together, but then break apart easily when touched.
4. Swirl water around in a cup of ice, then measure out about 1/3 cup. The water should be absolutely ice cold.
5. Add water to dough while stirring. Don't add the whole cup at once, because you might need a little more or a little less than 1/3 cup. Dough should form a ball without getting mushy and sticky.
6. Turn dough out onto floured surface. Divide into two equal portions.
7. Flour your rolling pin, and begin flattening one ball of dough. Roll out just enough to make a very thick, mostly flat oval, then pick up dough, reflour surface, and turn dough over. Otherwise your dough will stick like crazy to your board. You might need to repeat this step one more time.
8. Roll dough to desired thickness. Some people like thicker crust; I roll to fairly thin crust.
9. Press into pie pan. Then roll out second crust.

For a single crust, pre-baked shell---generously prick bottom and sides of crust with fork and bake in 425 oven for 10-12 minutes. (note--failing to properly ventilate crust will result in your crust bubbling up. If this starts to happen, stab it with a fork again!)

For a single crust, UNbaked shell--press dough into pan. Fold edges under about an inch. Pinch and twist to create a fluted edge. (No, I don't have cool pictures. I don't usually think about putting things on my blog when I'm cooking.) Pour in whatever filling needs to bake in the pie crust and bake according to that recipe.

For a double crust--press first dough into pie pan. Roll out second dough. Put filling in pie and top with second dough. Turn edges of top dough under the edges of the bottom dough. Pinch and twist to seal and create a fluted edge. Gently cut some slits for steam to escape in the top crust. (My Mammaw used to create a stylized image in her steam vents....a tree, an initial, a dove, etc.) For a fruit pie, you can sprinkle on sugar or a cinnamon sugar mix on to the top of the pie.  Bake according to recipe directions.

 Coming soon.....pot pie!

Making Memories: Gift Exchange

I know the holidays are over BUT that's part of the point of posting this now.

Each year, we get together with a small group of friends sometime in January, well after the holiday season is over. During the holidays, we're usually pretty swamped, and its difficult to squeeze another activity onto the calendar. After the holidays, we can get together and spend the better part of an afternoon and evening sharing a pot-luck meal, playing games, and exchanging gifts.

Yep, that's right. Exchanging gifts.

Now, before you groan, thinking that we just got finished with trying to get gifts assembled for everyone on a big long list....let me tell you that this gift exchange is no ordinary gift exchange. (We originally called our gift exchange a Christmas Consortium.....but we no longer hold this at Christmas, half of the participants are Muslim, and Gift Consortium just doesn't have the right ring to it.)

Here are the rules to our gift exchange:

1. You may not buy anyone a present.
2. You should try to give something to each person.
3. You may make a gift, re-gift something of your own, or gift another item you previously owned. (Baked goods and other consumable items are welcome.)
4. You may buy some materials to make a gift with, but we set a limit on how much money you can spend on supplies (we've usually gone with around $2-$5 per present on total supplies).

That's it!

We've had, through the years, many fun and memorable gifts following this system. When we were in college (yes, that's how long we've been doing this), gifts ranged from ziplock baggies full of Arby's sauce packets to large sheets of bubble wrap to painted coffee mugs. One year the Jedi made a favorite dessert for everyone in the Consortium. I was eating triple chocolate cake for a week. Now that we are older, the adults exchange presents, and the kids exchange presents.

This year, I totally took advantage of the fact that we are homeschoolers, and encorporated making our gifts into our school curriculum. Did you know that tie-dye is a fabric art form that flourishes in West Africa from Cameroon to Nigeria to Liberta? We were, co-incidentally, just finishing up our unit on Africa so.....

Sweetling made hajibs for the two girls in the Consortium.

Toa of Boy made t-shirts for the two boys.

We had also just read Galimoto and discussed the art of making things out of found objects. It wasn't a galimoto, but we made duct tape wallets for the other kids as well. (I sent out an email to the other mother and asked for her kids' favorite colors. We used that information to plan the colors for the both the tie-dye and the  duct tape wallets.)

In return, Sweetling and Toa received books picked from some of the other childrens' favorites (Toa of Boy got "The Activity Handbook" which he is already picking activities from. Sweetling got a larger collection of favorite novels, which I'm sure she'll devour.) They also got some fun items, like a watermelon-scented pencil made from 100% recycled newspaper, a squishy monkey, and a plush monkey as "bigger than Peach Boy!"

Books were a theme amoung the adults too, since I gave out some books from my bookshelf, along with bookmarks for each person done in chalk pastels. (I realized on the way to the party that I hadn't photographed them yet, so the following photos were taken with the bookmarks on my hat, on my lap, in a moving car, with a flash that reflected off the plastic laminate I used to try to protect the chalk pastels. I made 5 beautiful bookmarks, but only 2 of the photos are any good.)

The Gentle Giant gave out artwork as well...here is the recipient of that art.

Other adult gifts included pocket knifes, still in their original boxes, given from the collection of a father who had passed away several years ago. The Jedi made "Absolutely Deep Dark" Chocolate Cookies from the Death by Chocolate cookbook.  I received a lovely angel statue for my collection and a beautiful warm wrap that I am snuggled in right now.

So how about you? Do you have a group of friend that you just didn't have the time, or the money, to get together with over the holidays? It's not too late for a Winter Gift Consortium! (And, it might be just the thing to chase away the dreary, cold days of winter.)

Wordless Wednesday

Mixed Emotions

I'm not sure how I feel about "Wonder Woman" as a result. Mostly because my concept of who Wonder Woman is, is solely based vague childhood memories of the tv show in the 70s.

Your results:
You are Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman 88% Supergirl 83% The Flash 75% Superman 65% Robin 58% Spider-Man 55% Green Lantern 40% Catwoman 25% Hulk 20% Iron Man 20% Batman 15%

You are a beautiful princess with great strength of character.

Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz...

Weekly Wrap-Up.....Through the Tall Grass

More on Africa. (I wanted to call the post "In the Tall, Tall Grass", but that is a title of an unrelated picture book, so I refrained.)

Science

We watched two Planet Earth episodes. I just snagged the series from the library, so we started the week by watching the first episode in the series, From Pole to Pole on Monday. Then watched Great Plains on Tuesday. I was worried that Toa might find them boring, but he was requesting more Planet Earth on Thursday and on Friday, so I think he enjoyed them. Equally important, he remembered and retained some of the information.

On Wednesday, I wanted to do something more hands-on for science, but didn't have the energy or time to track down an experiment or project. So we did a quick and easy review of what we had learned from the video. I wrote a few facts on the kitchen white board, leaving some key words blank. (ie...The tallest grass in the world is _______ _______ which grows in ________.) I did this while the kids were sitting at the table eating snack. They were enjoying coming up with the answers. After snack, I got out green construction paper, and drew lines along its length to divide each piece into 10-11 long strips. I told the kids they were each to write 7-10 facts about grass or grasslands, one sentence per strip. They could use any of the five fill-in the blank facts I had put on the whiteboard, or they could come up with their own. If they couldn't remember something, they could look through the non-fiction library books we had on grasslands.  I  also warned them that we would cut the strips apart after they had written, so to be careful to keep their letters to the center of the strip so that tails of p's and y's and such didn't get cut off.  (Sweetling elected to type her facts up and then send her green paper through the printer.)

After they had their collection of facts, they cut the green strips apart, and tapered the ends of each strip to make blades of grass. Then they glued their grass blades to blue paper. Voila, green grass facts. :)

As a side note, let me relate a conversation between Sweetling and our senior pastor which took place this week. Pastor had asked Sweetling how her school was going. Attempting to draw Sweetling into a more extended conversation, he asked her,

"Tell me one thing you've learned in the past four weeks."

Sweetling replied, "Grass grows underwater."

This probably wasn't the sort of response he was expecting from a young lady known at church for being intelligent and academically advance, but Pastor didn't miss a beat. He simply asked, "Really? How do you cut it?"

The Jedi then jumped in and, with a completely stoic face, answered, "Sea cows."

Moooooving on....

Art

I found an awesome PDF packet of African Art Lessons on Deep Space Sparkle.

The Jedi bought them for me, downloaded them, (noticed  in the process that all my school files were scattered throughout several drives and directories so quickly collected them all in one easily accessible place), and then set up the media center computer to display the pdf pages on the big flat screen in the living room.

In preparation for the lesson, I did some google image searches and found some nice pictures of the Maasai people and their clothing. While looking for images, I also found a really interesting blog post about a visit to a Masai village. We started our art lesson reading this blog post as a read aloud and looking at her pictures together. Although we had read a few books with the Masai, the blog seemed to make the Masai people much more real and more interesting to all of us. Maybe it was the link of blogging....since blogging is something I do regularly about our lives, it was easy for all of us to sit down and know we were reading someone else's blog about their life. It made a visit to a Masai village much more real and personable than reading about the Masai culture in a library book.

 After reading the blog post, and looking at and discussing the google images I had found, we started our art lesson on Maasai figures. We read through the illustrated directions in the packet and looked at the many sample photos of other children's art. We used the worksheet that came in the packet to practice making patterns using thin and thick lines. Inspired by a sample page of patterns in the packet, we made our own pattern sampler. (I'm not usually drawn to working in black and white, especially in such a stark form as permanent ink, but I was so enamored by the page of sample patterns that I had to try my hand at making my own. That's the real reason we added this step of the lesson....Mommy wanted to play with patterns.)

I took a break from drawing in my own sketch book to model drawing a Maasai figure on the kitchen whiteboard, again, following the directions from our packet. Then I got back to drawing patterns in my sketchbook while Sweetling and Toa began drawing and coloring their Maasai figure art.

They used colored permanent markers so that they could add a background wash to their art.

I'm really, really happy with how these pieces turned out and we're looking forward to doing another project from our Deep Space Sparkle packet next week.

Cooking

We made two recipes from Cooking the African Way this week. On Friday night, we made samusas. The fun thing about samusas were that we needed to go to Jungle Jim's to get egg roll wrappers. Jungle Jim's is a field trip in and of itself. When we walked in the door, we found a brain chair machine. I, obviously, don't know what it is....it was an old movie prop, and pictures had to be taken in it.

From there we chuckled at the singing corn (who was pretty corny), saw the big cheese, ate dragon eyes and ugli fruit, waited for Elvis to sing, listened to a cereal band, purchased delicious chocolate truffles and strawberry shortcake, were grossed out by shrink-wrapped hogs' heads, spied the hidden treasure of Sherwood forest, walked under a fire truck, and completed a whirl wind tour of Europe. We were successful in finding egg roll wrappers, but alas....Jungle Jim's no longer carries ostrich eggs.

The samusas were not as delicious as we had hoped. We found ours to be a little plain.

BUT, the shish-kabobs we made on Saturday night were a huge hit.

And no, the term shish kabob isn't an African term, but "meat on a stick" was in our cookbook, so....we felt justified in going for the shish kabobs.

Literature

Our favorite books this week were the Anansi stories. Sweetling and Toa spent a good amount of time trying to trick each other into saying "Isn't that a strange moss-covered rock?" Neither were successful. Equally enjoyable were Anansi and the Magic Stick and Anansi Goes Fishing.

Sweetling also went on an elephant reading binge. Elephants have always held a special place in her heart, so we did a lot of reading about elephant families and elephant life.

Mommy liked the Kenya ABCs as a nice introduction and overview of the culture of East Africa. Both children felt it a bit elementary for them.

If You Should Hear a Honeyguide has beautiful prose and illustrations, and is a rather remarkable "true story" of the honeyguide birds of East Africa.

And, we read Masai and I on the day we did our Maasai figure art.




Math

Last, I want to share a cool math game Toa and I played to practice his multiplication facts. I found the rules for this domino multiplication race. We used a tape measure to measure out our 3' race track and marked the start and finish line with masking tape on the living room carpet.  We put all our dominos face up in between the two race tracks. And then, the game was on.(Follow the link to read the rules. it will make much more sense than me trying to explain it.) Toa was unbeatable. I tried to win, because I did not want to go down to a seven year old, but I couldn't pull off a victory.

To read what others did this week, check out Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers. 

True Story: Brussel Sprouts Are Secretly Delicious

I got this email from my sister this week. I am, with her permission, printing it in its entirety. I used its subject line as the post title. Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

I decided, on a whim, to cook brussel sprouts because... you know what...there's no good second clause to this sentence. I didn't have a real because. I had never cooked them before, so when I passed them in the grocery aisle at their dirt cheap price and their nutritional facts starting running through my head, I slid those bad boys right in the cart.

Dresden, who is normally a very gracious companion on my culinary adventurers, looked at me and the sprouts with the sort of grieved horror (then resignation) normally reserved for unfortunate hospital waiting rooms. "I bet they're secretly delicious." He was unimpressed by my weak rhetoric.

So last night, we were snowed in and there was a distinct lack of easy dinner options in our fridge. I whipped out the sprouts. 20 minutes later, the picture is what I put on our plates. I caramelized them in 2 tbs of butter with an entire red onion, a healthy dose of cracked peppercorns, a little salt, and finished them with some drizzled balsamic. On the side, I served seedy whole grain bread (its delicious, full of pumpkin and sunflower seeds that leads the nuttiest, most robust trail through your palette) with roasted heads of garlic and herb (thyme, oregano, sage) butter. It was DELICIOUS!

Sprouts turned out to be one of my wiser decisions. OM NOM NOM!

Love Bomb,

Me

I also received a helpful email from her with a link to an article about food label info. This was after a conversation in which I revealed that I neither knew the difference between trans fats and other fats or soluble or insoluble fiber, nor did I have any idea which ones I should care about, and which ones I should avoid. Ironically, she had called me the day before for help and advice on how to break this info down for the group of 24 five to eight year olds which she is teaching. I think she quickly came to realize I was not going to be the font of wisdom and experience she was hoping for.

It's a shame, cause if she had needed a good recipe for deep-fried Snickers bars, I could have totally hooked her up.

Wordless Wednesday

Weekly Wrap-Up.....Into Africa

We started our unit on Africa this week. Usually, I like to post a wrap up at the end of a unit rather than each week.....but I didn't post one at all during December....so it's been eons.

We started our mapping and geography with just the countries of southern Africa, and we only used this countries for our geography matching game at the end of the week as well. (Mostly, so that Mommy wouldn't be completely embarrassed at her utter lack of knowledge of African geography. A famous family quote, from my teenage years, which arose during a game of Trivial Pursuit is: "Name a city in Africa. ANY city in Africa." That about sums up my prior knowledge of the land and places of Africa.)



Literature

Our library shelf is packed with books which we've begun reading together. We started out the week with an old favorite, Why Mosquitoes Buzz in People's Ears. This book is from Toa's private collection, and is a much loved story, with a separate blog post all of its own.

Another hit with Toa of Boy was Never Smile at a Monkey. Though, this one was all about how dangerous and poisonous certain animals are....and was much less of a hit with Sweetling.

And, what would a study of Africa be without a collection of Ananse tales? To begin, we read A Story, A Story. This book does have a "Sky God" in it, which I consider part of learning about other cultures and religions, but I want to mention it so that other homeschoolers are aware of the fact before reading it aloud to their younger children.

We haven't delved into the bulk of our non-fiction books or our chapter books, most of which I just picked up from the library on Friday afternoon, because I didn't get on the computer to request an inter-branch transfer and hold until Monday afternoon. We have several promising chapter books for Sweetling to pick from for her literature reading for the next couple of weeks. But, I don't like posting about a book till we've read it ourselves.

Art and Music

Since we spent the first part of the week learning about facts, landforms, cultures, etc...by Thursday I was ready for something fun and creative. We spent a good part of the morning listening to and singing along with the African children's songs from our Wee Sing around the World CD. We played a fun hand clap game along with one of the songs and Mommy teared up at the Zaire lullaby.

We spent the afternoon doing art and craft projects. I, foolish mortal that I am, let each child pick out an art/craft project of their own from our Global Art book. Which meant our small kitchen table was completely covered in supplies and mess and works in progress.

Animal Sculpture
Sweetling made an elephant sculpture out of found nature objects and natural craft supplies I happened to have in storage in the garage for wreath making. Of course, this also meant that Sweetling went on a short expedition in our back yard to collect many of the other items she would need. And, not knowing what she would need, brought in a small plastic tub of things which she, under my direction, dumped and spread out on the table to look through. (And many of which went into my wreath-supplies storage tub in the garage after Sweetling finished her project.) Sweetling was pleased to accomplish her project without needing glue of any kind.

Here's how to make your own animal sculptures:

•  Decide in advance an animal you'd like to make. Look at some pictures of that animal and talk about the forms and shapes which comprise the animal's body. What things in particular really make that animal stand out from other animals? To represent the unique character of your animal, you will need to be able to find objects which clearly represent those unique features. (Ie--a giraffe's long neck, an elephants ears and trunk, a monkey's long curled tail, a lion's mane).
• Go on a walk and collect as many interesting objects as you can find. Remember you will need something large for a body and small things for eyes, ears, noses, limbs, tails. Remember to look for the items you need for your animal's unique characteristics.
• At home, practice assembling your items by just holding one or two items in place and get a 'feel' for how your animal will come together. Are the unique characteristics the most prominent feature of the animal? You do not have to be precise with your sculpture, you have to convey the 'meaning' or the 'defining characteristics' of the animal.
• Once you are satisfied with your choices, use hot glue (with adult supervision) or find some other means of holding your sculpture together.

Basket "Weaving"
Toa of Boy made a colorful "woven" basket...using fabric squares and a paper-mache technique. So, while one side of my kitchen table was covered with twigs, pebbles and sweetgums, the other side was covered in puddles of glue. In retrospect, this was perhaps a dangerous combination, but forethought was never one of my strengths, and it all worked out fine in the end. (Of course, toward the end of the project, there came a conversation about 'what's for dinner?' that tried my patience...but...hey....)

The basket turned out really nicely, and Toa had very carefully co-ordinated one color scheme for the inside of the basket....

And another color scheme for the outside of the basket.

We had pre-chosen a container to use as the form of the basket such that the basket would be the perfect size and shape to hold napkins. It now sits on my kitchen table as a napkin basket, which is something I've been wanting to get for a long time.

Here's how to make your own colorful basket:

• Cover your work surface with a plastic dropcloth. We use disposable party tablecloths from the dollar store.
• Decide on a function for your basket. Will it be a pencil cup? Hold dried flowers? Be a home for all your silly bands? 
• Once you have decided on how you will use your basket, pick a container of an appropriate size and shape for your baskets function. (Note, the container does not become part of the basket.)
• Turn the container upside down on your work surface. Completely cover the container with plastic wrap. This step is needed so that you can easily separate your basket from the container once the basket dries.
• Cut squares, approximately 2 inches on a side, out of an assortment of fabrics. Be mindful of a color scheme as you choose your fabrics. 
• Mix equal parts white glue and water in a small dish.
• One at a time, dip each fabric square in the glue mixture and squeeze out extra liquid by pulling the fabric square through two fingers of one hand.
• Immediately lay each fabric square on your form. Generously overlap the edges of the fabric squares and very gently smooth down any corners or edges that curl up.
• CAUTION--the first layer of fabric will become the INSIDE of your basket. Place fabric RIGHT SIDE DOWN on your form.
• When your form is completely covered with overlapping fabric squares, begin making a second layer. This will be the OUTSIDE of your basket, so this time, place your fabric squares RIGHT SIDE UP.
• Lay down some plastic (we used a plastic grocery bag) in a safe location for your basket to dry. 
• Find some small items (we used empty glue bottles) OR use a small rack to keep most of the edges of your basket elevated from the plastic of the drying surface. (So it can drip dry instead of sitting in a puddle of its own making.)
• Very carefully transfer your basket to its drying spot.
• Allow basket to dry for 2-3 days. 
• After it is completely dry, remove basket from form. Discard plastic wrap. 
• Use a pair of sharp scissors to trim up the rough edges of the basket.
• Voila! Be careful not to get your basket wet or try to use it to hold or carry heavy items!

And now, not specifically African, but fun anyway....

Math

This year has been a "let's enjoy math again" year for Sweetling. As part of that, our math for the year has been reading about math and doing fun math puzzles and interesting problems. Recently, we've been having fun with the book, Math for Smarty Pants. We are in the geometry section at the moment.

What did the Mississippi acorn say when it had grown up?
"Gee, Ah'm a tree!"

For a couple of days this week, we were challenged to find all eleven ways that a flat paper shape, made of six squares, could be folded up to make a cube. To begin, I cut out a bunch of one inch paper squares. (I asked Sweetling to figure out how many we would need, if there were 8 shapes we needed to find---the book gave us three of the shapes as examples---and each shape used six squares and we each wanted to construct all 8 of the shapes we were looking for. This wasn't a challenging problem for her, but it was a nice, practical mental math exercise.)

At first, we just had fun arranging squares on the table. When we had found a configuration that looked like it would fold up to make a cube, we taped it together and tried it. (Note, I had these stored in a plastic baggie. When I took them out to snap a picture, one square stuck to the baggie and escaped my notice. Can you find the shape that needs a square? Can you tell where the square could go to let the shape make a cube? There's several correct answers to this.)

We were each working separately, and trying not to look at the arrangements the other was discovering. At one point, we looked up and noticed we had both just "discovered" the exact same arrangement. Neither of us had taped down yet, so I asked if there was a way one of us could change her arrangement just slightly so that they weren't exactly the same. We discovered that this could easily be done by moving just one square one space.

This lead to a far more systematic system of exploration, which we embarked on the following day. Starting with the four 'sides' of the cube in a row and with the 'top' and 'bottom' of the cube both on the farthest 'side' to the right or left, we moved just the top one square over, and recorded the new shape. Then we moved it another square over, and recorded the new shape, etc. We had long since closed our book and put it away, so we decided to graph all eleven arrangements, since neither of us could remember which were the three examples given in the book. (Ok, Mommy couldn't remember them, Sweetling probably could have.) When we thought we had all the arrangements which started with four squares in a row, we moved to arrangements with three squares in a row.

This method was more thorough, but led to some shapes which were the same as another shape if you flipped it over and rotated it. (Is that a mirror image? I don't know.) Sweetling made that discovery, after Mommy had thought she had found all eleven shapes. It turned out that no, Mommy had only ten arrangements, since one was a mirror image of another.

Sweetling made the discovery of the elusive eleventh arrangement. (We had already found a tricky arrangement which had only two squares in the row.) if you'd like to try this at home, I'll give you a hint: The eleventh arrangement involved two rows of three squares, perpendicular to one another.  Even Sweetling had a bit of trouble getting this arrangement to fold up into a cube, and we resorted to taping it together, folding it up, then removing and repositioning a square as needed. (This, sadly, was the square that fell off an arrangement when I pulled them out of a plastic bag for a photo-shoot. And, if you really get stuck on finding all eleven, that's your second hint.)

To see what others have done this week, hop on over to Weird, Un-Socialized Homeschoolers.

Facebook Friday

AND its actually Friday, for 15 more minutes, booyah! (Once again, don't bother reading this if you already follow me on Facebook. I'm not *that* interesting.)

Dec 3
Sadly, the Christmas elves did not come and clean out my under-stairs storage while I slept. Sweetling says this is because the elves are too busy making sure the reindeer don't have a nervous breakdown, but she did volunteer to help me get the storage cleaned out so we can get to our tree decorations.

Dec 3
The good news is that we can now easily get to our Christmas decorations. The bad news is the entire office/school room downstairs is full of piles of junk I pulled out from under the stairs.

Dec 4
I can't find my pickle ornament. When I brought it home from amish country last spring, I couldn't get to the Christmas boxes to put it away, so I put it somewhere "safe". Now it's gone forever :(
---Sweetling made me a new pickle ornament, so now Christmas can proceed as scheduled.
---we do the person who finds the pickle gets to open the first present :) I told the kids that if I couldn't find the pickle ornament, no one would get to open presents....but no one believed me. And someone told me it was a German tradition, but I can't verify that.

Dec 5
Spent several quality hours with the toilet bowl last night. Aren't you grateful for the social media that lets me share these things with you?

Dec 5
Soda crackers are, in general, useless EXCEPT that I am extremely happy to be able to hold a few of them down.

Dec 6
Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes. I'm doing better, but now Sweetling has it :(
Besides soda crackers, jello, dry toast, and chicken noodle soup.....what can I safely eat? I'm *hungry*

Dec 6
New rule of thumb, if I'm too sick to drink hot chocolate, I'm too sick to leave the house. That's sound fair and reasonable, right?

Dec 6
I ate dinner, like a real, honest to goodness dinner!

Dec 8
who knows the lyrics from "Mystery of the Manger"? How does this end? "Matthew quoted prophesies that Jesus did fulfil. Mark wrote of the servant king who did the Father's will. Dr. Luke gave us the details of our Savior's birth. John would prove the Son of God would come to save the earth." And now here's the part I forget:
---The Gospels of Jesus were written down for me. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John just read them and you'll see. They're very different yet the same, united they proclaim, _____ ______ ______"
(Note, a good friend called me with the lyrics, but now I forget them again.)


Dec 10
Ah weekend, I love laying in bed till the sunlight is streaming in through the window. And yes, my weekend get to start a day early. Nyah, nyah :)

Dec 11
I want a bird bath. And a bird feeder. And an attractive lanscape for them to sit in. Also a labor-free vegetable garden and a greenhouse. And a gardener to keep it all looking nice. Got that, Santa?

Dec 12
No matter how many Ls I put in the word "chili" it never looks right. Chili, chilli, chiiiiilllliii, chilililee.

Dec 12
I cut a brownie, put it on a plate, hand it to Toa of Boy. He shakes his head no. I ask, don't you want a brownie? He shakes his head no. I put away the pan of brownies, put away the 2nd plate (for me), take the rejected brownie and go sit down. Toa says, "snack!" I ask what he wants. He says brownie. Is this just a plot to sabotage what little sanity I have left?
---Sadly...no. He honestly didn't want a brownie, until he saw you about to enjoy one, and this provided the reminder that, "yes indeed, brownies are good." It's the same sort of distorted human logic that dictates if you can't decide between 2 movies, and your spouse finally chooses one, instantly you will want the other. I think we're all just a wee bit contrary by nature, and have to fight against it to even survive as a species ;)

Dec 13
And a HUGE thank you to all who were out doing their "snow day" dance last night. No co-op for us.....sledding instead!

Dec 14
I'm thinking of taking a flame-thrower to my to-do list.

Dec 15
By 8:15, I was up showered, dressed, and had eaten breakfast, done my devotions, shined my sink, wakened my children, and had practiced my scripture passage and my dance for the Christmas presentation. My reward for this industrious now is folding laundry and doing school. Somehow that doesn't quite seem right.

Dec 15
Ok, my morning is now looking up. I got to put a banana sticker on Toa's forehead (I told him he had to wear it if he was eating the banana and that this rule was in the US Constitution and probably in the Bible too) AND I put an empty tissue box on his head as a hat. Life is good.

Dec 15
There is just one moon and one golden sun, and a smile means friendship to everyone! There's so much that we share that it's time we're aware, it's a small world after all! (You may begin leaving your comments of thanks and appreciation now.)
---I' had forgotten abut that song! Thanks!
---This is when... you hug Uncle Al & Captain Wendy before you go through the gate & wave good bye!
---Thanks a lot. Now, I'll be hearing that song in my head for a week (at least)! ;0}
---When your kids are ready for YA novels.... there's a great scene in "Going Bovine" by Libba Bray where the characters become stranded inside the broken-down Small World ride at Disney-World-Land. Very Funny. But-- Your. Kids. Are. Not. Old. Enough. To. Read. This. Book. Yet.
---I don't know that song and I'm glad I don't because I'm pretty sure I hate it.

Dec 16
After baking cookies, pretty much continually since I got up this morning till around 11pm, I can totally understand why some people snap and start writing songs like "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer."
---We found her huddled in a corner, clutching a spatula, and endlessly repeating, "The chips... the chocolate chips... so many chips..."

Dec 19
Food highlights of the weekend: homemade Cinci-style chili, served w spag n cheese; Christmas cookies galore; The Jedi's pepperoni cheese ball; oranges; and, to top it all off, The Jedi's delicious baklava :)

Dec 20
Thank you for the beautiful annointed dance today. The Lord used you to do an amazing job!

Dec 21
Ah, my home is full of the blissful banter inspired by Nintendo's "divorce mode", which they maliciously hide behind the marketing label "multi-player".

Dec 21
forgetting to rinse conditioner out of hair does not result in a good hair day....just an FYI

Dec 22
Packing is no fun. Unpacking is even less fun. But road trips ARE fun, so......a packing I shall go.

Dec 23 (from mobile)
Rollin' rollin' rollin' ...my sanity is stolen, but all the gifts are loaded, up high. Rain or wind or weather, we're trapped in here together....

Dec 23
Lunch in Columbus, our fortune cookies read: Be daring-try new things. You will attract artistic and cultured people to your house. You can always trust your friends. And, Your home is a pleasant place where you draw much happiness.
FB friends, can you top those? I bet you can be more creative and more personal :)
---My friend John got one that was cut in half lengthwise. All it said was "cant win."
---I actually got one that said "Never smell the inside of a hat."

Dec 24
I'm super excited about Norad tracking Santa....the kids, not so much :(

Dec 25
Toa of Boy got a can of silly string in his stocking. Sweetling said, "Seriously???? Who's bright idea was THAT????" Nana's backyard now looks like something out of a Dr. Suess book.

Dec 26
Cold Stone for dinner: Hooray for Christmas gift certificates!

Dec 27
I was hoping on FB to whine about all the laundry that needs done. Instead, I'm stealing a quote a friend had up on her status.--
"For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others;
for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness;
and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone."
-Audrey Hepburn

Dec 27
must put down the sudoko book. Must get dressed, do laundry, vacuum and figure out what's for dinner tonight.

Dec 28
Today, laundry and art. That's right. I'm getting out my sketchbook and my chalk pastels :)

Dec 29
Ah, let the torture of haircutting begin. Anyone who feels inclined to call child protective services, now is your chance. Judging by the whines of protests coming from my little boy, an intervention is clearly justified ;)

Dec 30
Things that have puzzled me today--1) where sleepovers got their name, when so little actual sleep occurs. 2) How a rainy 42degree day in Dec seems balmy and to warm to wear a coat. 3) Just where did my Christmas vacation go? I need another week!

Dec 31
Sunny and 62....can it just stay this way till April?

Dec 31
Lucky you... I had one more shirt left in your size for the New Year's Day Virtual Race. Have fun!

Dec 31
Nothing says Happy New Year like deep fried Snickers Bars.

Jan 1
Toa of Boy has set a goal for himself for the coming year. His goal......to turn 8. We're rooting for you, buddy.

Jan 1
New Year's Day, Chinese for lunch. Our fortunes were: Mama-to remember is to understand. Toa-Today is a great day to learn something new. (His comment, "It's not even a school day!") Sweetling-Effort and courage are not enought without purpose and direction. Mine-Even as the cell is the unit of the organic body, so the family is the unit of society. I like mine the best.

Jan 1
Congratulations on your first run! You did great in the New Year's Day Virtual Race. Here's your medal... hopefully your first of many. Happy New Year!

Jan 2
Conversation I overheard earlier today:
Toa of Boy: I'm winning!
The Jedi: Really? What's the context?
Toa: Try to make Daddy not move.
Toa: Noo--ooo! Whooaaa!
Jedi: How's it going now?

Jan 3
wii fit says 2.801 miles in 30 minutes. I'm going to have a hard time giving up the tramp and hitting the pavement and the cold cold air. Plus, I like my virtual numbers. I'm sure my real numbers won't be nearly so encouraging.

Jan 4
‎3.364 If I geet a pair of running shoes this week, I want to go to Winton Woods and try the Harbor Loop Trail. I want to know how the Wii numbers will relate to actual numbers.

Jan 4
Sometimes I wonder if my left hand gets jealous of my right hand, cause my right hand gets to do so much more. Then I wonder if my right hand gets jealous of my left hand, cause my right hand has to do so much more.
---And both of them get jealous of your tongue because it gets to taste chocolate!!

Jan 5
A) 2.833 mi today. Strange, I feel like I pushed myself more yesterday. B) I like clikcking the "like" on others' status updates. C)Just finished watching "Expelled." Very well done.

Jan 5
Toa of Boy quote of the day: "That (referring to a story he was relating) makes Daddy 15% silly. I'm adding it up."

Jan 6
Kitchen tip for the day: If one forgets to mix the dry ingrediants into the wet ingrediants, one's pancake batter will be pretty runny.

Jan 6
Today is on the running schedule as "rest or cross-train". I think given those parameters, Zelda Wii counts baby.

Jan 6
One word game, cause I'm bored. Here it goes. Each person who replies can only add one word to the sentence(s). It should make some sense. Sweetling and I will start it. (we'll put an astrik in front of her word to keep it separate from mine.) First word--
Good
--‎*flowers
--bloom
--*during
--any
--season
--Of
--the
--year
--if
--because
--nothing
--else
--is
--good
--besides
--God
--who
--loves
--us!

Jan 7
3.489 thi morning. See, playing Zelda did improve my running. Toa of Boy racked up 4.140 mi in 30 minutes on the wii fit yesterday. He announced his numbers and called, "Beat THAT, Mommy!"

The Saga of "What's for Dinner?"

In Which Toa of Boy Has a Near-Death Experience without Realizing It.

The Setting:

The kitchen. The table is 2/3 covered with a cheap plastic disposable tablecloth, the surface of which is barely visible beneath an assortment of pinecones, sugargums, small sticks, dried grass, pebbles, and other found objects on one side AND piles of 2" fabric squares, empty glue bottles, lids to said glue bottles, scissors, an inverted bowl--half covered in glue soaked squares, a plastic container of watered down glue, and veritable lake of watery glue on the other side of the table. The third of the table not covered in a plastic cloth and filled with crafts holds an undead houseplant that has been neglected for too long, a bowl of fresh fruit which sits in strange juxtaposition next to its withered and brown neighbor, and an assortment of crafts and plaques which were gifts from Christmas 2009 and still haven't been hung on the walls. The counter, yes, single counter, is still covered in containers of Christmas cookies....most of which only have two or three cookies, but no one has gotten around to combining them. The stovetop is covered in plastic containers which used to hold the New Years Day Chinese food feast, but have now been washed and set to dry before being moved into storage to come out next December for use as cookie containers.

The Time:

 Shortly after 3:14 pm. I know this for a fact because at precisely 3:14 by the microwave clock, a certain young lady became uncharacteristically animated, exclaiming repeatedly, "Mommy, Mommy! It's three fourteen! It's three fourteen!" A bewildered Mommy finally figured out what the cause of excitement was....It was pi time. And Sweetling tries to claim she doesn't like math anymore.

The Events Just Prior to the Experience:

Sweetling had finished up her African elephant crafted completely out of found nature objects. The elephant had had is mandatory photo shoot, and had been relocated to the top of Sweetling's desk. Sweetling had not yet come back to deal with the hills of found objects still covering the table. Toa of Boy was just finishing up his "woven" basket. He was still dipping squares of fabric in the half glue/half water mixture and smacking them on the side of the inverted, saran-wrap covered bowl. I could tell that he was nearing the end of his patience, and being the kind, gentle hearted mother that I am, was coming to help him finish up. (After taking his picture of course.) Helping involved coming close to the sticky, gluey mess without letting Toa touch me or letting the sleeves of my sweater dunk themselves into the glue mixture.

The Near-Death Part:

Toa of Boy asked, "Mommy? What's for dinner?"

Mommy answered honestly, "I have absolutely no idea."

Toa: "What's for dinner, Mommy? What are our options?"

Mommy: "I have no idea."

Toa: "What do we have, Mommy?"

Mommy: "I don't know. I haven't loooked yet."

Toa: "Are you going to cook something?" (We've been having lots of leftovers this week.)

Mommy: "I. Don't. Know. "

Toa: "What is there to cook, Mommy?"

Mommy: "I don't know; I've been a little busy, and I haven't looked yet." (What is that about insanity being repeating the same thing and expecting a different outcome?)

Toa: "Well, you better hurry up with it, cause you have less than two hours till dinner time."

Wordless Wednesday

Running

It only took a couple of months to start losing all the benefits of nearly two years of Tae Kwon Do. And, lets be honest, I don't have the disciple to just exercise at home regularly. Why? Because its a) boring and b)lonely and c)hard work.

Oh, I start a new exercise "program" with the best of intentions. And I do it for maybe a day or two. Then I'm back to nothing.

Two things have happened recently which gives me hope for my future fitness level.

1. We got a Wii Fit Plus for Christmas from my sister. This was such an awesome gift that I shall not even call her a Smurf in this post. We've been on the Wii Fit Plus every day since we've gotten it. Toa of Boy works up a nice sweat on it. We had Wii Fit tournaments on New Year's Eve.
2. A friend organized a virtual New Years Day race on Facebook. I wouldn't have participated at all, but I had this new Wii Fit Plus which would time me and track my "distance" as I was running in place on the trampoline.

Guess what? Being in a race was fun.

Guess what else? I made a pretty decent distance, according to the Wii measurement in an easy twenty minutes.

Guess what else? I got a metal.

Guess what else?  A long time ago, back in the days before electricity, when I was in high school, I got invited to be on the women's cross country team by the coach cause I was "built like a runner". I turned the invite down cause running was difficult, I wasn't good at it, and it would cut into drama practice time. Since then I've wondered if I made the best choice.

Guess what else? I found a training schedule I think I can follow.

Guess what else? I have a friend who runs who's considering inviting me into a run/walk that happens to take place on my birthday. What a cool incentive that is.


Now, here are the drawbacks.

1. I'm a wimp and a wuss. I don't want to run outside in the cold, the rain, or the heat. This isn't an issue for now, when I'm content to be on my trampoline, holding a wii mote, and watching Extreme Home Makover. But it will be an issue when I decide to actually move outside and run for real.
2. I need to buy running shoes. Again, not an issue on my trampoline, but will be later.
3. I should buy a cool watch to time myself for alternate running and walking as I build up my endurance.
4. Races have these things called entry fees.
5. The first race I want to run/walk in is in eleven weeks. The training program I found is an 8 week beginners training, followed by a 6 week 5K training. That adds up to more weeks than I have between now and my first race. So, should I cut a week out of the beginning of the beginner's program and jump into the second week? Maybe. I'm crazy that way. On the other hand, its not like that would solve the issue.
6. This isn't really a problem, just a note. The training schedule I found starts on Monday as a rest day. That's not going to work for me. So, I'm making my first day Sunday as a rest day.