week #12 -- end of Autumn Semester!

It's hard to believe that our Autumn Semester is over! Time just flew by. I got a lot of my goals for the semester accomplished: I established a formal movement circle and curriculum story time, which we did at least three mornings each week. We established a firm weekly rhythm, including outings and organized classes. There are few things I did not introduce that I thought I would -- weekly crafts being at the top of that list, so that is the first thing I will add to our Winter Curriculum. But the autumn weather was just SO wonderful this year, that it seemed a shame to spend more time indoors than necessary. The world was out there asking for exploration, and we went forth and explored! This photo is from this week's Friday Excursion to our favorite park.

This week began the 4-week homeschool classes Intersession. J is taking chorus (he taught his class our family meal blessing song during this week's class!) and is participating in an African Drum Circle. Here are the boys in the circle, with J's buddy T. sitting between them. Zoo Boy actually participated in the first half of the class, then suddenly burst into tears and said "but I only wanted to watch!" Silly kid! So he came and sat with me for the rest of class. He's been showing a lot of interest in J's classes lately and says that when he's 5, he'll take classes too. We'll see! Right now he'd rather spend his museum time chasing around with his two little buddies, M. and N. I'm guessing once they're old enough for classes, Zoo Boy will want to still be with them, and hence will agree to participate. That's how I got him to agree to watch the Drum Circle -- both of his friends were also in the circle. J really likes the Drum Circle and has been singing the chants all week.

In addition to the homeschool classes, J also took part in a class called "Fantastic Fish" at the museum, where he created a fish print and a magnetic fishing game, in addition to listening to stories about fish and doing some other fishy type activities. There was an opportunity to sample tuna fish also. (Funny aside, before class, the instructor asked all the parents if it was OK if the kids ate tuna. I told her if she managed to get him to eat tuna, I would buy her a really big, expensive Christmas gift!) Later that night, J told me that he did NOT try the tuna. Drats.

At home, the boys spent a lot of their free time setting up elaborate train track configurations and running their trains over them (non-motorized wooden Thomas Trains). It's funny, it's been at least a year since they've shown any real interest in the trains, not sure what motivated them to dig them out and play with them now.

This week's curriculum story was the Korean folk tale about the Tiger and the Persimmon (adapted by Enki Education to better meet the young child's needs). A tiger mistakenly thinks that a baby is more afraid of a dried persimmon (the tiger not knowing was a persimmon was) than a hungry tiger, and a thief mistakenly thinks the tiger is an ox and 'steals' it, making the tiger think it is caught by and will die at the hands of a dried persimmon. VERY funny tale, and it really captivated both of the kids. Our Special Storytime story at the fireside on Friday night was an Enki Education nature story about goose migration, entitled "The Mournful Goodbye". It was a long story, but both kids enjoyed it, particularly J who got quite involved with the story, flapping like a goose where appropriate and pretending he was the various animals that we met along the way. It's the first of two parts -- in this first part, Little Goose migrates south to a new home with her family. The second part is read in the spring, it's about Little Goose's return to her original home. This story was a perfect end to our autumn semester!

This week Zoo Boy surprised us by suddenly showing an interest in artwork! He found this little fuzzy poster and markers set amongst our various art supplies and asked me if he could do it. You betcha, I said! He spent quite a bit of time coloring in the picture and took quite a bit of pride in the work when he was finished (not completed, but a far cry from the quick scribble and "I'm done" that usually ends a foray into art for him). You'll note that his grip on that marker is pretty rudimentary -- this comes from an almost complete lack in any interest in writing or drawing to this point. I have no doubt that with practice this will come along, and I plan to work on some pre-writing/drawing activities with him this winter to strengthen that pencil grip. Also interesting, he's using his left hand here. He switched back and forth between both hands during this project. We've not noticed any sort of handedness preference from him yet, although he definitely has some tasks he prefers to do with one hand over the other (but both hands seem to be used equally). I've read that handedness usually become apparent when a child is around 3 yrs of age, so I'm wondering if Zoo Boy will be ambidextrous like his great-grandfather was. J is pretty capable with his left hand as well, but is dominantly right-handed, which has been obvious for several years.

And this is what greeted us this morning -- snow! For the second time this season, but this time I am officially declaring it Winter! I know, I know, the Winter Solstice isn't for another few weeks. But calendars be hanged, it's only about 10 degrees out there right now, and there's a winter storm warning posted for tomorrow afternoon -- it's WINTER I tell you!

This week's Family Storytime books were a good transition from Autumn to Winter: How Do Bears Sleep, by E.J. Bird; When The Wind Stops, by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrated by Stefano Vitale; and Home at Last -- A Song of Migration, by April Pulley Sayre, illustrated by Alix Berenzy (which probably would have been better to save until Spring, since it's mostly about Spring migration, but it gave me the opportunity to preview the fact that we'll be talking about migration again in the spring, and we were able to discuss where the animals came from -- their winter homes -- and how going to those homes was also migration, so it actually worked out well to use it now, especially in association with our Special Story this week.).

park outing

We had a beautiful late-autumn day for our Friday Excursion to our favorite park today, with our merry little band of homeschooling friends. I'm grateful for every nice day we can get at this point, as it's not out of the norm to have accumulating snow in November. I appreciate the large snowfalls holding off until after we actually end our Autumn Semester, which was today! What a great way to end a fabulous first "official" semester of homeschooling!

Zoo Boy does some pretend farm chores. He has a whole routine where he pretends to be feeding and caring for the various farmyard animals in the barn. Everyone else had wandered off to the pasture to see the cows, but he said he needed to stay behind to finish his work. Little does he know that he's in training for his future....

My boys check out the Pumpkin Cannon. We just today found out what it was, thanks to the Grounds Crew being hard at work cleaning up leaves before the snows hit. We're still not entirely sure how it's operated, but that didn't stop the boys from gleefully shooting off invisible pumpkins to parts unknown.

We all enjoyed looking at the various dried flower stalks and seed pod heads in the herb/butterfly garden. One of the boys in our group used one of the seed heads as a wand to grant us magic thoughts. One of the Mom's magic thoughts was about a lot of snow. I guess we're all preparing ourselves for winter's icy hand!

Inside the Nature Center, my guys did a bunch of pretend play with puppets. Playing for an hour or two inside the Nature Center is always the highlight of my kids' visit to this park.

the old gray goose

While I was working in the kitchen yesterday morning, baking the rest of the leftover turkey into pastry pouches so I could toss them in the freezer and have a dozen ready-meals for the coming winter, the kids were busy playing. They started in the living room, turning all of their stuffed animals and puppets into Pokemon (Pokemons? Pokemen? Pokemi?) with varying powers. ("This is Junior! He's a Companion Bird Pokemon! His power is pecking! His defense is flight!" "This is Killer Ground Hog! He's a Ground Hog Pokemon! His power is Killing!", etc) The game eventually drifted down the hall to the bedrooms, and for awhile I lost track of the story line.

Eventually they both came running back down the hall. Still playing, Zoo Boy said "Uh oh. Who's going to tell Aunt Rhoadie?" They debated for a moment then Zoo Boy said "Ok, I'll do it." Pause. "Aunt Rhoadie?" "Yes?" answered J in his best old-woman voice. "The old gray goose is dead," said Zoo Boy, with a very matter-of-fact tone. "Oh dear, that's just too unbearable," replied Aunt Rhoadie-J. J then picked up his harmonica (pictured here) and played a very mournful version of "Go Tell Aunt Rhoadie".

Here's a photo of the instruction booklet that J has been using this week to teach himself how to play the Harmonica. He's got quite a repertoire going, including, as you may have guessed, "Go Tell Aunt Rhoadie".

I suppose I could just leave the story at that, with a touching tribute to an imaginary dead goose. But lest you think that I'm managing to raise sensitive, thoughtful boys, I feel I need to tell the rest of the story....

After an appropriately respectful moment of silence when the song ended, Zoo Boy said "Well, it's dead. Let's go see what else we can kill!" And the boys ran gleefully down the hall. So much for sensitivity!

tagged! 7 random facts about me

My friend JamBerry tagged me for a meme. But I'm not linking to her blog, because it's private and most of you won't be able to get in anyway! Here's the meme rules:

1) Link to the person that tagged you, and post the rules on your blog.
2) Share 7 facts about yourself.
3) Tag 7 random people at the end of your post, and include links to their blogs.
4) Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

This fits in pretty well with my I-can't-think-of-much-to-blog-about theme lately, so here's 7 things about me that you probably could have done just as well not knowing:

1. I love filling out surveys. I'm sort of a survey-aholic. I'm not sure why, except that I really like to share things about myself, even if it's filling out bubbles on pre-designed consumer studies. Like "Ooh! Missy Numbercounter from the National Bureau of Random Facts wants to know how many bottles of shampoo I use in a year! Yes, I must share!!"

2. Speaking of odd things I really love, funerals is another one. Of course, I don't love the REASON necessitating a funeral, but I love hearing all about the life and times of the loved one, sharing memories with family and friends, and the camaraderie and support of being with others who loved the same person. It's all about the love! And that love doesn't quit when the person's body does. Feeling that person all around me is what makes funerals a really special event for me.

3. That said, however, I've been to one funeral that was just awful. Not that the ceremony itself was bad. I just had trouble accepting the death of this particular person. Jim was a former supervisor of mine, who had left the state's Wildlife Biology division to become a Conservation Officer shortly after I left that job. He and I had a unique relationship -- we shared an office, and nagged each other constantly. The bickering was nearly constant, and extremely amusing both for us and anyone within earshot, but anyone could tell it all came from a place of really caring for each other. He called me the nagging wife he never had, I called him the bratty child I never wanted. Jim was shot and killed by a hunter (who was hunting illegally after dark) while on duty, 9 years ago last week. I hadn't seen him in several years and felt extremely guilty about not staying in touch. The combination of guilt and mourning and general shock left me a mess for weeks. I sobbed through the extremely enormous State funeral, and the graveside ceremony afterwards, and pretty much continually for several weeks. I haven't hunted since.

4. Speaking of that, and trying to lighten the mood a bit, I worked for the State's Wildlife Division on and off for several years, after which I went into the Veterinary Technician field, where I worked for more than a dozen years. However, prior to all that, I worked as an Environmental Educator for several state and town environmental conservation programs and even a fairly large Science Museum after graduating from college.

5. My major in college was Wildlife Management. Among other jobs I held while at school (I was working 6 different jobs simultaneously during my senior year), I worked at a research facility where I bottle-raised deer fawns, took care of coyotes and bobcats, and followed radio-collared animals through the woods to record every bite of food they took. I also worked at an Aviary where I cared for a countless variety of waterfowl from around the world, and studied Aspergillosis (a fungal infection) in Eider Ducks. Wildlife Management was a VERY cool major.

6. Ok, getting back to the random: When we were young teenagers, my brother and I each had a bedroom in the basement of my parent's house. At bedtime many nights, I'd sneak downstairs ahead of my brother and hide somewhere in his room. Then, after he was settled into bed at night and just about falling asleep, I would leap out and scare the living daylights out of him. Good times....

7. I've been a life-long New England Patriots fan. Ok, ok, I know that's not news to anyone. But I don't think the rules of this meme say it has to be NEW facts about ourselves! And this is SUCH a good year to be a Patriot's fan. For those of you not keeping track (and if not, WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU?????), "we" (don't you love how possessive sports fans are of their teams?) are undefeated so far this year, and look to remain that way straight through the Superbowl (which will be "our" FOURTH Super Bowl title this decade). Everyone credits super-coach Bill Belichick and our totally rockin' record-breaking Quarterback Tom Brady with the success of the team in recent years. But I personally know it's all due to the birth of our own lucky charm, J. They sucked before he was born! And now they're unstoppable. What else could it be?

And now onto the other rules of this meme. I need to tag 7 people. SEVEN. I couldn't even think of 5 that hadn't been tagged before the last time I did a meme. Seven just ain't gonna happen -- I don't even read 7 blogs! So I guess I'll stick with my old stand-by and say, sorry, I'm going to break that rule. If anyone WANTS to do this meme and hasn't been tagged yet, you are more than welcome to consider yourself tagged by me!

scenes around the farm

Funny thing about blogging -- if I'm doing it daily, I've got too much I want to write about and have trouble deciding what to include and what to leave out. But when I'm not here typing away every day, I start to lose both motivation to write, and creativity to come up with something interesting to say (or at least something that's not a complete waste of time to read). Unfortunately for all of you, I'm in the latter mode these days. So I figured I'd just throw up some pictures from around the farm the last couple of days and see what I can come up with.

First photo is our two boys and their rapidly growing Pig. I think one of the reasons I don't seem to take as many photos this time of year is that the boys look like this -- if I didn't tell you they were mine (and they weren't, you know, pictured on MY blog), these could be any two kids anywhere. Well, the pig might be a dead give-away. Of course, the other problem is that I have trouble digging my camera phone out from underneath my dozens of layers of clothing when I see something picture-worth. By the time I finally finagle it through the maze of pockets and holes, the Kodak moment generally has ended. Combined with the fact that we're just not outside as much this time of year as we are the rest of the year, it means a serious lack of outdoor pics through the winter months.

Here's The Map Man working on one of our seemingly never-ending fencing projects. We're putting the top 3 boards on our 4-board paddock fencing. The bottom boards went on the day before we picked the pig up, because pigs have a tendency to want to dig out of their pens. Not so with this little porker, though, (who can be seen giving The Man a hand...er, um, snout?..with his project) -- she seems perfectly happy to hang out in her own little world with her chicken buddies and the occasional pony that sticks a head in for a visit, so long as we visit her three or four times a day to offer some food and a good back-scratching.

The kids playing in the pasture. Really. They're down there. Under the pine tree. You see the little orange dot and the little yellow dot? There you have it. That's their favorite place to hang out, and I don't blame them -- it's one of the sunnier spots, it's set low in a hollow (more correctly called a "holler", although that's what I call what I do when I want them to come up out of the hollow...) so that there's a natural wind break. And it's as far as possible from watchful parent eyes while still being inside the fencing (which is the rule 'round these parts, no climbing over the fence and escaping, be it children or critters). What do they do down there in the holler all afternoon? Beats the heck out of me. That's the funny thing about allowing unsupervised time. It's unsupervised. They could be building a small weapons store down there for all I know. Or experimenting with gravity. Or coming up with a scheme to climb over the fence and escape.... The fact that there's a couple of chickens (the even-smaller red and white dots) and a cat (the tiny black dot) down there with them only adds to the intrigue.

I'm running out of mundane details of our lives to share, so I'll leave you with Annie enjoying a good roll in the pasture...




Or, actually, a picture of her AFTER the roll, whence she is covered from tail tip to whiskers with dirt. (Go ahead, click on the photo to get a larger sized version so you can se how truly filthy she is!) Life really doesn't get much better for a horse. Multiply that times 3, and you can see why I'm suffering from a raging case of horse-brusher's-shoulder.

vacation week

This past week was our Thanksgiving Holiday week. So we did a whole lot of what the kids are doing in this photo. Not much of anything in particular. (Although actually, if you were to ask them, they were doing VERY important work -- lying amongst scattered Pokemon cards and toys, each carefully studying the Pokemon guide book -- J teaching himself how the play the game, and Zoo Boy looking at all the great Pokemon cards that are illustrated in it.) No movement circle, no curriculum story, only one night of Family Story Time (and only because Zoo Boy insisted on it), no Special Story Time on Friday night. No homeschooling classes (they are between semesters). In fact, the only organized events we had this week were the Thanksgiving Feast class at the children's museum on Tuesday, our actual Thanksgiving Feast on Thursday, and J's Tae Kwon Do class yesterday morning.

Of course, we DID do other things. On Monday, we went out to the horse farm to meet Annie, who came to live with us later in the week (and is seen here this morning, settling in with Lacy in the pasture). Both kids got to ride her and we spent a good chunk of the afternoon visiting with and petting her, talking with her owner, and meeting the other horses and donkeys on their farm. On Tuesday we did a bunch of Christmas shopping, then spent the bulk of the afternoon at the children's museum. Wednesday we spent most of the day working on getting the house ready for guests, and did a bit of baking as well.

Thursday was of course Thanksgiving Day. We decided to start hosting Thanksgiving Dinner at our house a few years ago, when we realized that Thanksgiving is both The Map Man's and my favorite holiday. It seemed a natural that we should become the place to gather on the holidays. (I mean, other than the fact that I don't cook.... But I manage to pull it off every year. I considered sharing my secrets with you all this year, but didn't ever quite get around to it. Maybe next year! Or maybe it'll all just remain a big secret....) We've had a moderate crowd the last few years (both sets of our parents, my sister and her family, one of The Map Man's brothers and his family), and we're hopeful that our number of guests will grow as the years progress. After the turkey went into the oven Thursday morning, the kids and I made napkin rings out of cardboard tubes and silk leaves, then folded the napkins to go in them for an autumn tree sort of look.

Yesterday we continued the festivities at my parent's house, where my brother and his family joined the rest of us for some holiday camaraderie. The cousins had their usual bunches-o-fun playing together, and we all made our Christmas holiday plans together (which is what the rest of my family loves best, so we leave that pretty much up to them).

In the meantime, some of my Enki Education First Grade materials came in, so I'll be looking for time to start reading through the First Grade Teacher's Guide. I also need to put the finishing touches on my Winter Kindergarten Curriculum (which will include a few First Grade component for J as the semester progresses). This coming week will be the 12th and last week of our Fall Semester, and I'm excited about some of the additional activities I'm going to work into our Winter weekly rhythms.

letters to Santa

Bright and early Friday morning, Zoo Boy excitedly asked "Can we write our letters to Santa now?" The turkey hadn't even completely cooled yet....

But we set forth to notify the jolly old dude about what he should make for my cherubs. J didn't need (or want) any help with his letter this year, he composed and wrote it entirely himself, envelope as well. Zoo Boy opted to hire me as his own personal correspondence secretary (a job which paid off with a great big smile, some of the best salary I've ever earned!). He dictated to me a brief, yet heart-felt, letter:

"Dear Santa,

I wish for a Ugly Doll that is "Ice Bat".

Love,

Zoo Boy"


J's letter was equally specific and to the point:

"Dear Santa,

I want a
ZoobMobile
Car Desig-
ner Kit."

On the back of the page he added "Love, J."

Both kids included a catalog page, with their desired toy circled, to make sure that Santa knew exactly what they were talking about.

The Map Man took the kids down to the post office this morning, where they popped the letters in the mailbox, soon to be whisked off to the North Pole. Being the wonderful boys that they are, I have no doubt that Santa will set to work on their gifts as soon as he gets those notes. He's that kind of guy, Santa.