SL Core H
Week 18 May 8-14, 2017
Time: Middle 1700-early 1800's
Time: Middle 1700-early 1800's
Driver's Ed Week 2/4
Another eventful week, a fox entered our lives, in a bad way! Thursday morning I looked out the window and saw a scared, obese, new-to-me, obviously-not-homeless (wagging belly gave that away!), orange cat. Hesitantly, the cat and I stared at each other for quite a while before it walked off. Looking back, I understood why it looked so scared. About ten minutes after the cat left, I looked out again and saw a young, small, also-orange, fox! Oh my! I was actually very excited to see it! I don't think I've ever seen such a cute young fox. I ran around the house, from window to window watching it. If I only knew then what I know now...that that fox was going to wait all day for me to let my chickens out in the late afternoon for their 30-50 minutes of grass eating and foraging. I use to let them out 'free-ranging' for hours, but after Zeus's attack I've started a more cautious approach. I stayed out with them for a bit, then came in to do a few dishes. Dd yelled out, "fox! fox! fox!!!" and I went running! Panic, chaos as I opened the sunroom door, and literally ran into the screen door, pushing the whole door out and onto the deck without stopping until I was out in the yard, stomping in every direction looking for the offender. I ran all the way off our yard to the road and never did see the fox, so I returned to our yard to gather all the chicks back to the coop. There was one chicken that never moved, so I figured she was safe where she was and went after all the panicking chickens all over. When I went back to her, I then noticed she was heaving for breath, and her eyes kept rolling back. I knew then and there that she was dying. I was sick thinking I was going to loose this wonderful chicken, all because I let the chickens out on the same day I saw that fox. You would think I would have kept everyone, but I was naive. I literally would have fired me, if I worked for me! How could I leave those chickens out alone, even for a minute, when I had seen a fox that very morning?!?! I was so exasperated with myself. Later, Dd had the bright idea that we should call our injured chicken, "Foxy" after her run-in with the fox. I put her in the garage, with food and water, and closed things down for the night as Dd and I had our "Strings Group" at church. I know the members thought I was crazy as I included praying for my chicken in our opening prayer, but I was so worried and know the power of prayer. Well, long story short...with TLC and time alone, our wonderful, "Foxy" has improved each day. After 2 days I finally had the nerve to pick her up and look for any injuries, only to find one small area that the fox must have hit with a tooth. I thought it was going to be a puncture wound. I saw one drop of blood on her when I picked her up after the attack. But, whatever the injury was, it must be healing with the Lord's help!
Barred Owls:
The past three weeks the owls, a couple, have been hanging out around our house. It never fails that as soon as I let the chickens out into our yard to forage I will hear one owl call out to it's mate. Of course they had been quiet all day and I wrongly thought they were at someone else's house only to find out they are still with us. This week I literally chased one out of a Mourning Dove's nest beside our house, and Dh chased one out that was trying to get into the Phoebe nest on our deck. They are very active and trying hard to hunt lately; they must have a nest of their own that they are trying to satisfy.
Driver's Education:
Week two accomplished, and Dd is driving us around. She is doing very well, but the extra driving required to get to the classes is very hard on me. I feel like our days are just piece-meal and I'm not getting the normal things accomplished that we normally can. I am SO glad that we don't normally keep this kind of hectic schedule! Plus, I feel like all this hopping around hasn't help our morale either.
Book Making:
You just never know what new thing Dd is going to make, and this week it was making books. She did the first one for herself, and then the second one was for her friend, Addy. Addy's birthday is this week. She found some video's on how to make books at YouTube.
Garden:
The seedlings we planted last week are starting to sprout! This week we went out to the spot I found in the woods that had such good humus. This time Dh drove our truck down there so I didn't have to use the wheelbarrow! We figured that must be the spot where the previous owners, who owned horses, must have picked to dump their horse manure. I'm so glad we found it, as it has had years to break down and become great planting soil for us to use.
http://fleurdelisacademy.blogspot.com/2017/05/lecture-notes-homeschooling-high-school.html
High School Prep class- that I attended this week:
In Indiana, there was a class you could pay for to hear great info on how to prep for high school---how to make transcripts, prepare for college, or work, or vocational schools, testing.... I never could get into one of those classes, so was SO happy to see the Homeschool Building (where we have our band classes, hs square dances, hs library, hs Resource Store...) hosting a class for just this purpose! I will type up my notes in another specific post soon but wanted to share that I had attended. These types of classes so a great job of aiding self-reflection and questioning how well we are doing at our home educating. To be honest, I know we are NOT meeting our potential! Not at all! I could go on and on about our weak areas, but I still think that no matter how poorly I would grade my teaching I still think I am providing a much better learning environment for my daughter than any high school. I think we would still be having days where teen attitudes are making learning extremely difficult, but I know (mostly) on how to back up and try things at a different angle to work with our specific issues. And I always come back to the fact that when I graduated high school I remembered so little, except for all the friends and athletic teams I enjoyed. I hope Dd can remember her friends too but with hopefully more academic material and a LOT more biblical discernment than I did! If all else fails, she will now her bible very well!
Driver's Education, and the transit there and back again three days this week, made our educational assignments difficult. Even though I didn't assign a lot of our normal subjects, she still didn't get a few areas completed. I didn't even put those other subjects on this post, but there were other things she was suppose to do and read that she didn't even get around to.
House:
I've been painting polyurethane on the Rec Room floor this week. I think I managed three coats this week.
Henna, Week Two:
Our lessons this week:
Church, Sunday School, Olympians Group (Volunteer 1 1/2 hours), Strings Group
Bible: Walking With Bilbo by Sarah Arthur
Chapter 13: Choose Your Own Adventure
Deuteronomy 30:15-20; Joshua 24:14-15; Psalm 119:26-32; Proverbs 19; John 14:15-23
Ch. 14: Stick to the Path
Quote from The Hobbit:
"Good-bye! Be good, take care of yourselves---and DON'T LEAVE THE PATH!"
Doesn't that sound so similar to what we say to our children all the time, to stay on God's path!
"The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose the easy way. But the gateway to life is small, and the road is narrow, and only a few ever find it." Matthew 7:13-14
Bible verses:
Proverbs 3:5-8; Proverbs 4 (she listed a bunch of lines, so we just read the whole chapter)
Ch. 15: The Unlikely Hero
"So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and steady, always enthusiastic about the Lord's work, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless."
1 Corinthians 15:58
The verses of this chapter:
Judges 6:11-16; Matthew 13: 53-58; Mark 12:41-44; John 6:3-13; Galatians 1:11-18
Audio/Audible:
The Complete Works of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
(20 hours audible, in-process)
History Audio:
Story of the World: The Modern Age by SWB
Chapter One: Victoria's England
History Read Aloud:
A Heart Strangely Warmed by Louise Vernon (in-process)
Sonlight had this scheduled as a Reader in one version of my IG, and as a Read Aloud in the other. Since it is on John Wesley, one of the founders of the Methodists, and church history, I wanted to read it along with Dd. John Wesley was born 1703-1791, born in England. This easy read covers our time in history as well as learning a bit about a branch of Christianity I didn't know well. Our main character was asking Wesley about what was the 'method' behind the Methodists, and was told that the goal was:
"Do all the good you can,
By all the means you can,
In all the ways you can,
In all the places you can,
At all the times you can,
To all the people you can,
As long as you ever can."
History Reader:
Abraham Lincoln's World by Foster (in process)
Dd LOVES this Reader!
Literature:
GREAT EXPECTATIONS by Charles Dickens
Ch. 23-29
I am loving reading Dickens with Dd. We are thoroughly appreciating every word!
Dickens DVD: Little Dorrit
Writing/English:
Music Practice:
http://fleurdelisacademy.blogspot.com/2017/05/lecture-notes-homeschooling-high-school.html
High School Prep class- that I attended this week:
In Indiana, there was a class you could pay for to hear great info on how to prep for high school---how to make transcripts, prepare for college, or work, or vocational schools, testing.... I never could get into one of those classes, so was SO happy to see the Homeschool Building (where we have our band classes, hs square dances, hs library, hs Resource Store...) hosting a class for just this purpose! I will type up my notes in another specific post soon but wanted to share that I had attended. These types of classes so a great job of aiding self-reflection and questioning how well we are doing at our home educating. To be honest, I know we are NOT meeting our potential! Not at all! I could go on and on about our weak areas, but I still think that no matter how poorly I would grade my teaching I still think I am providing a much better learning environment for my daughter than any high school. I think we would still be having days where teen attitudes are making learning extremely difficult, but I know (mostly) on how to back up and try things at a different angle to work with our specific issues. And I always come back to the fact that when I graduated high school I remembered so little, except for all the friends and athletic teams I enjoyed. I hope Dd can remember her friends too but with hopefully more academic material and a LOT more biblical discernment than I did! If all else fails, she will now her bible very well!
Driver's Education, and the transit there and back again three days this week, made our educational assignments difficult. Even though I didn't assign a lot of our normal subjects, she still didn't get a few areas completed. I didn't even put those other subjects on this post, but there were other things she was suppose to do and read that she didn't even get around to.
House:
I've been painting polyurethane on the Rec Room floor this week. I think I managed three coats this week.
Henna, Week Two:
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| Dd bought some henna and has been going crazy decorating her feet, legs, hands, arms! She's having fun! |
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| Heather, do I prune the fig tree now? |
Our lessons this week:
Church, Sunday School, Olympians Group (Volunteer 1 1/2 hours), Strings Group
Bible: Walking With Bilbo by Sarah Arthur
Chapter 13: Choose Your Own Adventure
Deuteronomy 30:15-20; Joshua 24:14-15; Psalm 119:26-32; Proverbs 19; John 14:15-23
Ch. 14: Stick to the Path
Quote from The Hobbit:
"Good-bye! Be good, take care of yourselves---and DON'T LEAVE THE PATH!"
Doesn't that sound so similar to what we say to our children all the time, to stay on God's path!
"The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose the easy way. But the gateway to life is small, and the road is narrow, and only a few ever find it." Matthew 7:13-14
 |
| This is a Red-bellied Woodpecker |
Bible verses:
Proverbs 3:5-8; Proverbs 4 (she listed a bunch of lines, so we just read the whole chapter)
Proverbs 22:6King James Version (KJV)
6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
 |
| Check out this super small egg---not from one of our young chicks, but from one of our year old Buff Orpington's!!!! Weird! |
Ch. 15: The Unlikely Hero
"So, my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and steady, always enthusiastic about the Lord's work, for you know that nothing you do for the Lord is ever useless."
1 Corinthians 15:58
The verses of this chapter:
Judges 6:11-16; Matthew 13: 53-58; Mark 12:41-44; John 6:3-13; Galatians 1:11-18
 |
| Can you see the chickens foraging in the background? |
Audio/Audible:
The Complete Works of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
(20 hours audible, in-process)
 |
This is a Phoebe, and she (and her husband) have a nest on our deck with babies in it. The neat thing about Phoebe's is that they flit their tails up and down when they are sitting. Their call sounds like they are saying, "Phee-bee." |
History Audio:
Story of the World: The Modern Age by SWB
Chapter One: Victoria's England
History Read Aloud:
A Heart Strangely Warmed by Louise Vernon (in-process)
Sonlight had this scheduled as a Reader in one version of my IG, and as a Read Aloud in the other. Since it is on John Wesley, one of the founders of the Methodists, and church history, I wanted to read it along with Dd. John Wesley was born 1703-1791, born in England. This easy read covers our time in history as well as learning a bit about a branch of Christianity I didn't know well. Our main character was asking Wesley about what was the 'method' behind the Methodists, and was told that the goal was:
"Do all the good you can,
By all the means you can,
In all the ways you can,
In all the places you can,
At all the times you can,
To all the people you can,
As long as you ever can."
History Reader:
Abraham Lincoln's World by Foster (in process)
Dd LOVES this Reader!
Literature:
GREAT EXPECTATIONS by Charles Dickens
Ch. 23-29
I am loving reading Dickens with Dd. We are thoroughly appreciating every word!
Dickens Great Expectations (Christian Guides to the Classics) Item #: 056097
Besides this chapter by chapter guide, we are using the Sonlight vocabulary and questions with each chapter. This guide has been extremely helpful. I wish I had found more of these kinds of guides to help us dissect books more often, not that all books need to be examined this closely, but some, like Dickens, prove well worth the effort.
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| This was the first book Dd made this week, she also made a second book as a birthday gift for Addy. |
I'm making Dd wait to watch the newest BBC version of Great Expectations, but, I am allowing her to watch Little Dorrit (BBC, recently) that I love! Such an awesome version 2008 Claire Foy.
Sonlight Reader:
Betsy and the Emperor by Staton Rabin (in process)
GoodReads summary:
Fourteen-year-old English girl Betsy Balcombe and her family have an unusual houseguest: Napoleon Bonaparte, former emperor of France and the most feared man on earth. Once lord and master to eighty-two million souls, now, in 1815, Napoleon is a captive of the British people. Stripped of his empire and robbed of his young family and freedom, he is confined to the forbidding, rat-infested island of St. Helena.
The one bright star in Napoleon's black sky is Betsy, a blazingly rebellious teenager whose family is reluctantly housing the notorious prisoner. Betsy is the only foreigner Napoleon's ever met who is not impressed by him -- and Napoleon is more than intrigued.
An unexpected alliance is formed. And a remarkable friendship between emperor and girl spawns gossip and inspires Betsy to hatch a daring and dangerous scheme that could threaten both their lives and shake entire empires to their foundations.
Betsy and the Emperor by Staton Rabin (in process)
GoodReads summary:
Fourteen-year-old English girl Betsy Balcombe and her family have an unusual houseguest: Napoleon Bonaparte, former emperor of France and the most feared man on earth. Once lord and master to eighty-two million souls, now, in 1815, Napoleon is a captive of the British people. Stripped of his empire and robbed of his young family and freedom, he is confined to the forbidding, rat-infested island of St. Helena.
The one bright star in Napoleon's black sky is Betsy, a blazingly rebellious teenager whose family is reluctantly housing the notorious prisoner. Betsy is the only foreigner Napoleon's ever met who is not impressed by him -- and Napoleon is more than intrigued.
An unexpected alliance is formed. And a remarkable friendship between emperor and girl spawns gossip and inspires Betsy to hatch a daring and dangerous scheme that could threaten both their lives and shake entire empires to their foundations.
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| Black-capped Chickadee |
Math:
Khan Academy, 30 min per day
Wrote a book report, short, on her last Reader; The Broken Blade
Fun Reader:
I Like Him, He Likes Her by Phyllis Renolds Naylor
Art:
Bookmaking, Dd spent hours each day learning how to make books by sewing sections of folded paper together and then sewing those sections together. She made two different kinds of book covers--unique to each book.
Home Economics:
Average week, dishes, vacuuming house, tuna sandwich, made a Mother's Day cake and icing, pasta and meat sauce, chicken care...
Music Lessons:
Piano lesson with Mrs. March: 1-hour lesson (next week off)
Violin lesson with Christie: 30 minutes
Strings Group: 1-hour lesson
Music Practice:
violin, piano, ukelele,
(Her Alto Sax was in the shop getting a spruce-up)
Driver's Education Classes:
M,T, W : 4-6 pm (6 hours this week)
Driving with teacher: T & W: 2 hours each
Driving with parents: 2 hours (6 hours this week)
..........
So thankful to read that prayer is pulling Foxy through! And to see that Zeus (a previous post) is coming along so well. We lost one of DD's hand raised 'teenage' turkeys last week because the silly thing jumped the high fence into a neighbours yard - it houses has a hunting dog (insert eye roll).
ReplyDeleteHello Chelle! The power of prayer is amazing! This spring seems fraught with danger for our critters, SO sorry to hear about your adventurous teen turkey...oh, that must have been really horrible. Your daughter must have taken that hard. We have been wondering if we need to think about getting a dog that could help with protecting our critters, but not sure about the details of how and where to find such a dog. I know a lot of training would have to go into teaching this dog to protect, and not eat, our chickens, etc. Our Sophie isn't the least bit protective and generally has no clue that a dog would even helpful in these situations! I think Sophie thinks she is a cat, to be honest! I'm praying for you each day, and know your life has to be super busy now. Thanks so much for stopping in and saying hello! Sending you a big hug, friend!!!
DeleteGrinning at the comment about your dog Sophie ..... Leroy is the same, he's definitely part cat ;) He still thinks our youngest cat is his 'child' If you do progress with a protecting critter dog, I'll be reading with interest!
DeleteDespite the, understandable, sadness, Dd coped well with the turkey 'slaughter'.
We are a 'little' busy... our big project formally starts at the end of this month.
You're doing so well with getting your home and property done up/refurbished! Painting floors in NZ is not a common thing, so your efforts there really intrigue us. We have stained, or varnished wood/custom board/cork tiled floors here, but we've never encountered a painted indoor floor. Guess it'll just be a matter of time though (?)
TTFN ♥♥
Painting floors isn't common here either! It is just a cheaper way to have a super clean floor than doing tiling; which we can't afford right now. I'd love it to be a pretty tile in basement and hardwood flooring upstairs, but that isn't in our budget!!!!
DeleteIt's an excellent idea and one we may need to embrace ;-)
DeleteLove !! the pictures you've put up of the birds in your area.
If I were you, I would cut those fig tree stems exactly in half. So let's say they are 3 feet tall -- I would cut them off at 1.5 feet tall. I know it seems harsh and you will have no leaves (except down at the bottom) but believe me this will make the tree sprout and grow lots of foliage and the figs come on the new foliage. I would feed the tree too -- miracle grow or whatever you use.
ReplyDelete