First Day of School 2013

We started school on Tuesday, August 13, 2013. Rosemary began second grade and Ben began a strange mix of PreK and Kindergarten. His summer birthday makes things somewhat more interesting. We went with a Tuesday this year for our first day since we’d been out of town the week before and used the Monday as a day to get ready for the week.

We counted down to our start day on our chalkboard door. I painted this door in the spring and it made a huge difference in our school day…no more lugging the IKEA one from Charlotte’s room every day. I just need to find something to hang on the wall to hold the chalk and erasers.

Before coming back home from the condo, we stopped at Barnes and Noble and I picked up the kids’ first day of school books. I think it’s become our tradition to get new books on the first day of school. We did it last year, too.

We were finishing up the latest Magic Tree House book, Hurry Up, Houdini, when we started the school year. Rosemary really was excited about the accompanying magic trick book. If you stop by our house, you might just be treated to a little magic show now.

Ben is a big Magic School Bus fan. Since we’re studying astronomy this year, we got him the outer space book. Unfortunately, since Janet is one of the characters in the book, he wasn’t too thrilled. He did, however, really like the pop-up space book.

Charlotte and her Richard Scarry book

Ben looks troubled here, but he was really quite enthusiastic about the start of his day.

So excited about their first day!

We kicked the day off with our bell and pledges. Since we don’t have to leave in the mornings on a regular basis, I’m excited to be consistent about our morning routine that includes singing, praying together, reading, and doing our Bible lessons.

Singing and dancing to start our day.

We did the rest of our work at the table. Here, Rosemary is working on her math meeting strip. I found a place online where someone pre-typed all of the information that goes on a Saxon meeting strip and sells them for only a few dollars. I think that it was the best money I spent this year. Meeting strips are actually getting done! (Saxon 2 and Saxon 3 strips are available here).

Ben enjoyed playing with the pattern blocks.

While it was a full first day, it wasn’t a hard first day. Everyone had great attitudes and it felt like a good, natural start to our school year.

Second Grade Curriculum for Rosemary (it’s not as overwhelming as it looks since we don’t do everything everyday)

• Saxon Math 3 (4-5 days a week)
• Life of Fred read-aloud (about 1-2 days a week)
• XtraMath.com (3 days a week)
• First Language Lessons Level 2 (2-3 days a week)
• Writing with Ease Level 2 (4 days a week)
• Zaner Bloser Handwriting 2 (2 days a week)
• Explode the Code 5 and 6 (2-3 days a week)
• All About Spelling Level 1 and 2 (4 days a week)
• Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading (2-3 days a week)
• Sonlight Second Grade reading list (4-5 days a week)
• Abeka Phonics Charts
• Story of the World, Middle Ages with Activity Guide (2-3 days a week)
• Bible Study Guide for All Ages Level 1 (4 days a week)
• Family Time Fitness (when it happens) :-)
• Apologia Astronomy with co-op (read chapter and do notebook page, 1-2 days a week)
• Art and Music with co-op (each once a month)

PreK and Kindergarten Curriculum for Ben

I’m still figuring out the routine with Ben. He wants to do so much more than I have planned for him to do! I’ve got to find the rhythm and the right level. Right now, he’s really enjoying whatever math, handwriting, and Explode the Code work I give him and just wants to keep going. He’s also taking off in BOB Books, but is more reluctant to work through the Ordinary Parent’s Guide, which is tougher reading and less interesting to look at since there are no pictures.

• Saxon Math K and 1
• Life of Fred read aloud
• Explode the Code, B, C, and 1
• BOB Books
• Handwriting Without Tears PreK and K
• Five in a Row (when we can fit it in!)
• Ordinary Parent’s Guide to Teaching Reading
• Apologia Astronomy with co-op
• Art and Music with co-op
• Story of the World, Middle Ages (along for the ride)

Our Ideal Routine

• Ring bell at 8:30am
• Pledges
• Prayer time – we’ve been writing down our praises and prayer requests so we can record how God answers them
• Music (we’ve been doing school songs and praise songs. Our favorites right now are 10,000 Reasons by Matt Redman, Build Your Kingdom Here by Rend Collective Experiment, What a Wonderful World by Louis Armstrong, and various Jack Hartmann songs)
• CNN Student News (just 10 minutes, keeps us up on current events…otherwise most of my news comes from Facebook)
• Bible (I am so enjoying doing this with the kids. We’ve been working through the story of Joseph a chapter at a time and they look forward to each new lesson. Rosemary has commented that she has learned so much more this way).
• Table work (usually just math, maybe handwriting or something else short)
• Snack (a scheduled snack time makes our day easier)
• Table work (writing, spelling, ETC, handwriting, FLL)
• Lunch (read Fred aloud)
• Wrap up anything we haven’t finished (SOTW, reading, XtraMath, but we really try to be done by lunch, even if that means a later lunch!)

So that’s the ideal day, which happens maybe half the time. Much of it depends on my diligence on getting up at 6:30 and making sure that I get my chores done before we start school without getting distracted with the computer. The computer is such a temptation for me…I think, oh, I’ll just respond to this e-mail, then it’s 20 minutes later! So I know that in order for our day to be smooth, I need to be disciplined. I have so far to go. I need to learn how to keep up with school, my quiet times, my co-op commitments, the house, and family and friends while still keeping enough white space in my life so that my introverted nature doesn’t go crazy.

I’m thankful to not have to get anyone to preschool this year. It really does give us more time in the day although we miss seeing friends at pick-up and drop-off. Our afternoons are full with speech, ballet, soccer practices and games, and soon Girl Scouts. We are also looking forward to co-op starting again. One thing that is nice about this year though is that most of our activities outside the house are scheduled on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It makes those days somewhat crazy, but having three whole days at home…that’s wonderful and we get so much done! And it gives us a day to run errands in the afternoon if needed.

So I have to say that the school year is off to a pretty good start. We all have our moments, but once again we are thankful for the opportunity and freedom that we have to enjoy this journey of educating our children.

Lil’ Miss Charlotte

This little girl is so full of spunk and personality. She came up with this whole outfit all on her own.

Week at the Condo 2013

To wrap up our summer, the kids and I met up with my parents for a week in Orlando at Grand Villas. Jonathan joined us for the last few days.

We intentionally planned a relaxing week, venturing out to IKEA and the outlets, but not many other places. We spent hours in the pool, visited with the Pates, and enjoyed some good food. When Jonathan joined us, we spent a day at SeaWorld.

This little boy is a fish. He’s not quite ready to pass the YMCA swim test (treading water for 30 seconds is tough!) but he’s swimming all over on his own.

Swimming with Grandpa and enjoying the ‘boat’ they made out of pool noodles and dive rings. Charlotte just went all over in that vest.

We were also able to watch Shark Week, which we wouldn’t have been able to do at home. They were fascinated.

Watching Shark Cam follow Large Marge.

The kids enjoyed seeing the sea lions. We also got our first ride on the new Antarctica attraction. So COLD!

Not sure why we had the stroller… :-)

These two kids were so excited to ride in the front of the train!

Charlotte tried so hard to pull the lever to ring the bell.

On our way back home, we headed over to Janey’s to celebrate Camille’s first birthday.

Tenth Anniversary Bahamas Cruise

On July 19, 2013, Jonathan and I celebrated our ten year anniversary with a three-night cruise to the Bahamas. We sailed on the Enchantment of the Seas, with stops in Nassau and Coco Cay.

We headed to Eustis to spend the night and drop off the kids on Thursday before driving to Port Canaveral on Friday morning. We boarded the ship easily and quickly then made our way up to the Windjammer to grab a bite of lunch. I think that most everyone who was already on the ship was in the Windjammer eating lunch as well. It was hopping!

While we were eating, they announced that our rooms were ready early. That cleared a good number out of the restaurant and when we finished, we headed down to find our room too.

We had an oceanview room on deck 4. Not huge, but it was comfortable and bigger than the room we had on our last cruise.

The bathroom was tiny…and whenever we took a shower, we flooded the floor. If the ship was listing, we could tell.

Our luggage arrived while we were checking out the room. After that, we decided to give ourselves a quick tour of the ship before we had to go to the muster drill. We started at Deck 1 and worked our way up to Deck 12.

From the top of the Centrum, looking out over the pool deck.

One of my favorite spots, the Solarium.

After the muster drill, we changed into our swimsuits, grabbed our books, and headed to find some deck chairs in the Solarium. From here we watched the ship set sail. We relaxed here until it was time to head down to get dressed for dinner.

We ate in the My Fair Lady Dining Room each night at 5:45. We were seated with a family with two little boys from Scotland and a couple from Ocala. Coincidentally, Sharon, the wife from Ocala, has her accounting degree from UF, and her husband, Henry, graduated from the same high school that I did. Small world.

After dinner the first night looking down into the Centrum.

That night we attended the Welcome Aboard show in the Orpheum Theater and enjoyed that. And later we watched Admission out on the pool deck.

The next morning we slept in then got ready to grab breakfast in the My Fair Lady Dining Room. We were seated with a set of grandparents who were on the cruise with their four grandchildren. We enjoyed talking with them. After breakfast, we headed to the fifth floor to walk around a bit and see how things looked as we approached Nassau. It was an overcast and windy day.

See…it was hair-raisingly windy!

Paradise Island

When the rain started in earnest, we headed inside to watch the rest.

I spent the day on the ship. I’m not a huge fan of Nassau and Nassau in the rain did not sound appealing. So I found a quiet spot in the Solarium to read. Jonathan wanted to visit Fort Charlotte so he took a few hours to walk there and see that.

Jonathan really enjoyed the fort, although not very many other people were there. :-)

 

 

The cannon was aimed straight at the ships in the dock.

Our ship

That night was formal night so when Jonathan got back we got ready for our dinner. It was just us and Henry and Sharon that night.

The pool deck, and where we watched the movie on the first night.

After dinner we changed then made our way to the Orpheum Theater for the Haines’ Magic Show. My expectations for the show were admittedly low, but I have to say, it was amazing! I think we both really enjoyed it. We then stuck around for the Love and Marriage Game Show, which ended up being so funny. I think we were practically crying at some points.

That night was the midnight buffet (but it’s not called that anymore…I don’t remember what the new name is) so we stayed up to watch us set sail from Nassau and enjoy some food in the middle of the night. We danced a bit too.

This picture is so weird of us, but the only one we got that night on the pool deck.

The next morning we awoke as we were getting ready to drop anchor near Coco Cay. We could see the island from our window.

We got up, got showered, grabbed breakfast at the Windjammer, then caught a tender over to the island.

We arrived fairly early so we had our pick of the chairs. I really could have selected a less sunny seat, but I had a beautiful view .

We enjoyed the lunch on the island and met a gambler from Illinois and a pair of sisters from California.

Jonathan went snorkeling.

The clear water. I went out a few times to cool off. It was disconcerting though when the fish would just bump up against my legs.

We were some of the last to leave. When we got back to the ship, we went swimming on the pool deck since we had a bit of extra time.

We showered then got changed for our last dinner. I enjoy getting dressed up a bit for dinner. I kind of think that cruising is the closest that I’ll ever get to living like they do at Downton Abbey.

Everyone was back at our table again and we enjoyed chatting with the families there.

In the Orpheum Theater, ready for the musical show.

Later that night we watched a name that lyric game show and tried to see the last parts of the ship. We decided to just carry off our luggage the next morning rather than set it out so that saved us some time that night and the next morning. When we did get up the next day, we quickly got ready and packed, ate breakfast and were off the ship in no time.

In the car and ready to head home.

While we had talked about doing a trip to Europe, that proved to be a bit too ambitious for this year so we changed our plans and instead went with a cruise. Since we used reward points to go, the entire trip cost only $100…for parking, snorkeling, and an ornament. It was a wonderful time away celebrating the past ten years and looking forward to many, many more.