Sonlight Core H Week 3B Nov. 21-27, 2016 Thanksgiving/Hunting/Travel

Sonlight Core H 

Week 3B  

Nov. 21-27, 2016

Thanksgiving/Hunting/Travel

Gobble, Gobble!

Hello Friends!

I'm behind typing this up, so I am having to look at my calendar to get it all straight. We spent most of the week at our old home in Indiana, and spent lots of time with Giz and Grampy. 

Quick, rough review of the week, then our homeschooling accomplishments:

Monday:we did lessons, went to the library and packed.

Tuesday: focused on more packing, cleaning, and loaded up the van--when Dh came home we drove to Indiana (arrived 11:45pm).

Wilbur got a deer, and we watched it get 'cleaned.'  It is always fascinating to see the inside of a deer, and I took lots of pictures. Dh used the tractor to hoist it up the tree.  This tractor has been running the family farm for decades, and is Grampy's pride and joy!

Dh on the 1945 "WD45" Allis Chambers tractor

Wednesday: Dh and his buddy, Wilbur hunted (am and pm) and Wilbur got a deer.

Being a one-income family, we rarely splurge on anything; but each year we go all-out and order a New England style Thanksgiving feast to share with Giz and Grampy.  

Thursday: THANKSGIVING, no hunting, eating lobster, clam chowder and clams.  L working on a red & yellow knitted scarf.

Giz and Grampy seem to have fun with our different Thanksgiving.  They had never had a lobster until I came around!

Dh and Dd have had a wonderful time together this past month, with lots of 1:1 time.  I'm so glad they like each other so well, they are two peas in a pod!

Friday: Dh hunted with Dd, and by himself in the morning.  Dd and Dh did their annual shooting time together.

Dd put up some fun targets to shoot at with her .22.

All together for evening games of UNO.

Saturday: I got to hike around by myself and take pictures of trees and the old cemetery on our land.  

I'm going to make a separate post to share some of the pictures I took from our cemetery soon. It is a historical gem--1700's and 1800's, Civil War graves from men that served in the Indiana Infantry...

Dh hunted, Dd worked with Grampy burning brush piles, and we all got together for evening games of UNO.  We really enjoy playing card games with G & G--they sure know how to crack us up!

We love coming back to the farm, though it makes me really sad to think we don't live here anymore.  It really was a lovely home.

Sun. we got everything back in the van and headed back to Michigan.  Dh didn't get any deer this week, but the buck he had shot two weeks ago was processed and we got to take it home with us.  

Our woods with all the fall leaves down.

A migrating flock of European Starlings passing through--

There were five big groupings of River Birch planted up the road, but we think the drought we had 3 summers ago caused two groups to die off.  Many of the spruce died, but the White Pine have held strong and grown well.

Just about all the trees you see in these pictures are tree's we planted.  It would be interesting to know just how many plants, trees, bulbs, bushes and flowers we have planted here.  Many have already grown and died, or were cut down.

Homeschooling Accomplishments:

Bible: 
Gideon by Patricia Shirer

I'm working on "Gideon" bible study, for my Sunday School class, and enjoyed one section so much I thought I would share it with Dd this week.  The section was on "How to Live Like A Christian." 

Micah 6:8 (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary.  I really recommend a good commentary to get so much more understanding out of your bible study. )

 He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.

And what does the Lord require of you?

To act justlyi and to love mercy

and to walk humblya j with your God.

1 Thess. 4:3 (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary)

For this is the will of God, your sanctification:[a] that you abstain from sexual immorality

1 Thess. 4:11-12 (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary)

and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.

Eph. 6:6 (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary)

Obey them not only to win their favor when their eye is on you, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from your heart.

Matt. 22:37-38 (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary)

Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’[a] 38 This is the first and greatest commandment.

Mark 12:30-31 (I like this one better than Matt. 22:37-38) (read with both our bible and then with our Believer's Bible Commentary)

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’[a] 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[b] There is no commandment greater than these.”

What excellent advise and such a good grouping of bible verses for us to look at HOW the bible tells us to act.  As a Christian I get so upset by hearing fellow Christians using their words to say mean things about fellow people.  It pains me hearing them pick on one or two sins in particular, as if those sins are worse than other sins.  I was very glad to have this bible study remind me of the basics---and how we all need to focus on mercy, kindness, and loving behaviors.

Our aim is to:  

*act justly and love mercy

*WALK HUMBLY with GOD

*abstain from sexual immorality

*lead a quiet life

*Mind your own business

*work with your hands

*win the respect of outsiders so that you will not be dependent on anybody

*Obey those in authority over you, as if they were Jesus

*Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind---first and foremost!! LOVE, be kind, be humble, mind your own business!

I had a hawk flying above me on my walk.

Math:

Hark! We decided after two years of struggling with three different curriculum's for Algebra I, we would take a break and try Math U See: Geometry.  This week she completed Lesson 1 and Dd is very excited to try something different and is hopeful again:

1 A, B, C, D

I found this nest by the farm house---not positive what kind of bird made it? a robin??

Sonlight Reader 1:

The Iron Peacock by Mary Stetson Clarke: Completed

Sonlight Reader 2:

Madeleine Takes Command by Ethel Claire Brill: Started

Fun Book:

The Martian by Andy Weir: In Process
This book puts such an emphasis on getting math and science down, and Dd has said it makes her want to improve in those subjects do to this book... I just love it when her books encourage her to be a better student/thinker.

Audio's this week: 
*lots of driving and audio's this week!
With fourteen hours of driving, I dug into our audio closet for some good audio's that had American history stories and found four stories.  Dd and Dh had to finish up the audio they were already listening to, The Hatchling, but after that we started the audio's I picked.  The Secrets of A Civil War Submarine story was very "non-fiction" and a tad dry, but very interesting.  I, personally, learned a lot I didn't know a lot about the H.L. Hunley sub before, but now I do!!!  

1) The Hatchling by Kathyrn Lasky: Completed (5:30 hours)

2) Secrets of A Civil War Submarine by Sally M. Walker (2 hours) 
Amazon review: 
On February 17, 1864, the H.L. Hunley made history as the first submarine to sink a ship in battle. Soldiers on the shore waited patiently after seeing the submarine’s return signal. But after several days, the ship had failed to return. What had gone wrong? In 1995, after over 130 years of searching, the H.L. Hunley was finally found buried off the coast of South Carolina. Follow author, Sally M. Walker on a fascinating journey through the workings of the famous submarine, its voyages, and the difficult obstacles that were overcome to recover, excavate and conserve the ship. 

3) A Week in The Woods by Andrew Clements: Completed (4 hours)
The fifth-grade Week in the Woods is a beloved tradition of Hardy Elementary, where Mark Chelmsley (the Fourth) is pretty much killing time before his parents send him off to an exclusive prep school. But then Mark realizes the Week might be a chance to prove to Mr. Maxwell that he's not just another of the slacker rich kids the teacher can't stand.

We are already Andrew Clements fans, as we have read his works before, and figured this book, like his others, would be fun!

4) Gingersnap by Patricia Riley Giff: Completed (3:30 hours) Very Good story set during WWII.
Goodreads review: It's 1944, W.W. II is raging. Jayna's big brother Rob is her only family. When Rob is called to duty on a destroyer, Jayna is left in their small town in upstate New York with their cranky landlady. But right before he leaves, Rob tells Jayna a secret: they may have a grandmother in Brooklyn. Rob found a little blue recipe book with her name and an address for a bakery. When Jayna learns that Rob is missing in action, she's devastated. Along with her turtle Theresa, the recipe book, and an encouraging, ghostly voice as her guide, Jayna sets out for Brooklyn in hopes of finding the family she so desperately needs.

We are fans of Patricia Riley Giff, and this is another one of her books that really touched our hearts.

5) Story of the World Early Modern Times---completed disc one, disc two not working...ugh.

6) Stella Bane by Anita Shreve: Started--WWI story (1 hour, so far)
Goodreads review:
When an American woman, Stella Bain is found suffering from severe shell shcok in an exclusive garden in London, surgeon August Bridge and his wife selflessly agree to take her in.  A gesture of goodwill turns into something more as Bridge quickly develops a clinical interest in his house guest.  Stella had been working as a nurse's aide near the front, but she can't remember anything prior to four months earlier when she was found wounded on a French Battlefield (WWI).  In a narrative that takes us from London to America and back again, Shreve has created an engrossing and wrenching tale about love and the meaning of memory, set against the haunting backdrop of a war that destroyed an entire generation.


Music:
Dd did most of her playing with Giz and Grampy, and I didn't keep careful track---she did some alto and tenor sax, piano, and flute---about 3 or 4 hours total.  Plus, our library had the piano music for Pride and Prejudice, and she has been playing my favorite songs!!!!!!  We had never thought of seeing if the library would have sheet music for the piano!  How cool is that!

Busy Hands:

Crocheting scarf: she did a lot of this--6-7 hours or so
shooting guns--target practice
burning brush piles
helping Giz in the kitchen...

Games with Giz, Grampy, Dh and me:

UNO two nights in a row, and she beat us all, at least once.

I love our woods!

Hunting/Hiking:

She hiked off in the woods with her Pappa, and read her Kindle out in the blind!  I think they each had fun in their own way!  She finished her book, The Martian out there.  This was a really nice week, and it was great to have some more special time with Giz and Grampy! 

See what the bucks do to our trees...quite the rub!

This area we call 'the BIG woods' as the canopy is so high and you can really see the deer, turkey, mushrooms, or anything so well.

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