Giveaway at 'The frugal homeschooling Mom'

Check out this link to register for an adorable kitchen apron and cookie baking set, thefrugalhomeschoolingmom.blogspot.com Just perfect for your 2-4 year old little girl to help mommy out in the kitchen! The artist is Barbara Gilligan you can find her work at her Etsy Shop mothernaturesnursery . Hurry offer is only good till November 19th.

Busy, busy, busy

We are now 46 days into our school year. Which surprise, surprise is exactly where I want to be! We are only doing a 120 day school year for kindergarten. The state of Indiana doesn't require attendance records be kept for kindergarten,, starting next year 180 days of attendance will be required. I decided to ease into it both for my daughter's sake and for my own.

I am also going to begin doing Tot School with Kay. Here is a link to the site that has to infohttp://1plus1plus1equals1.blogspot.com/. On this site are the blogs of at least 55 tot school moms. These are moms that are either homeschooling older children and need to have activities available for the tots in the house to work on. Or moms that are working to take time to have one on one time with their tot each day. I have found that I say "Kay go play" "You cannot be in here if you are going to be loud" and "I think I hear Dinosaur Train coming on". I want her to be excited about 'school time' also and am working to prepare activities to have on hand for her while Ann does hers.

Our Homeschool Room

I mentioned in an earlier post that I would put up some pics of our homeschooling room when I could so here they are.
I found this trapezoid table at the Goodwill for $13. It has desk drawers in 3 places and adjustable height. It is perfect for our current needs. Everyone had their own work space plus it is big enough for larger projects like finger painting, play dough and board games.

Right now we are doing a dinosaur unit for science. Ann has loved dinos since we went to the Indy Children's museum last fall. For this reason I decided to go ahead and purchase some cool wall decor to go with the unit. I got it from our local education store for $10. It has already been a great learning tool. Also pictured above is our calender center. We take a few minutes at the start of the day to discuss the weather, the day, and the month. You can see that I have a chalk board and a marker board. I had David put the marker board up high so that 2 year old Kay wouldn't get into the markers or erase the things I put on it. The chalkboard below is perfect height for both girls do use.

Our bookcase that we keep all of our current textbooks, home school books, puzzles, art materials, games, etc. I also keep some totes in the garage of things that we will use in the future. I try to buy things on sale or at thrift stores when I can.

Our art display area until I can get the bulletin board hung.Behind the door I have put up some of the 3M removable wall hangers. I hung large manila envelopes from them for additional storage.

We love our classroom area! We didn't have this last year when we did preschool, just worked at the table and it was very doable. However this works much better. It is nice to have a quiet area that is dedicated to school work. It is a room where the kids are allowed to cut and paste, paint, and play with play dough at any time. I also create in this room with my scrapbook and paper craft area on the opposite side of the room as pictured in an earlier post.

Homeschool Kindergarten Here We Are!

We are underway on our homeschooling adventure. Thought I would take a few minutes and outline what our weekly schedule looks like.

Monday
Reading- We read level appropriate books together
Phonics- Phonics Pathways (love this simple, easy to use)
Writing- I Can Write
Math-Math-U-See alpha
Science- Dinosaur Lapbook, Hands of a Child
Bible - Christian Liberty Press Book A (pretty lengthy lessons for this age, so we use one lesson a week and review throughout the week)

Tuesday
Reading- Ann reads BOB books aloud
Phonics
Math
Science
Health- currently working on an All About Me lapbook (address, phone number, my family etc)
Art- Baby Lambs art book

Wednesday
Reading- I read to Ann, books relating to other things we are studying, above reading level
Phonics
Writing
Math
Health
Art

Thursday
Homeschool Cooperative Classes
This semester- Sing, Spell, Read, and Write, Cooking, Game Time, Children's Choir, Dr. Seuss

Friday
On Friday mornings I host a women's bible study in our home so I am going to keep this day for review, any tests that need taken, and fun activities in the afternoon.

We complete all of our schooling between 8:30 am and 12 noon, with the exception of Fridays. I will substitute social studies with the science when we are done with the dino unit.

Zucchinni Recipes

It that time of year, the garden is in full swing. Green beans, broccoli, tomatoes, squash, zucchini, and squash and more zucchini and even more squash and I think you get the picture. So my freezer is absolutely full of shredded and diced squash. I have given it away. And we are eating lots of squash dishes and desserts. So I thought I would share a few of my family's favorites.

Pork Chops with Squash
1 t. salt
1 t. garlic salt
1 t. chili powder
1/4 t. coarse ground black pepper
a shake or two cayenne pepper
1 c. raw rice
4 pork chops 3/4 inch thick
1 1/2 c. diced tomatoes or 2 cans
1/2 c. chopped onion
1 c. water
2 c. thinly sliced zucchini or summer squash
1 c. shredded Mexican blend cheese

Mix salt, garlic salt, chili powder and pepper. Trim pork chops of fat. Heat oil in skillet; brown pork chops, seasoning with 1/2 of the seasoning mixture. Drain oil from pan. Add rice, tomatoes, onion and water. Arrange zucchini around edge of skillet and sprinkle with remaining seasoning mixture. cover and cooking stirring occasionally for 30- 40 minutes or until pork is cooked through and tender. Top with cheese and cover to melt cheese.

A friend of mine makes the above recipe omitting the pork chops and adding more veggies for a flavorful vegetarian dish.

Summer Squash Patties

2 c. grated summer squash (I use yellow crook neck)
1/4 c. self rising four
1/3 c. self rising cornmeal
1 small onion (I have also used a few shakes of Tastefully Simple Onion Onion)
1 egg, beaten
pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients together. Spoon out into hot greased frying pan. Brown both sides. Drain on paper towel. We love these extra crispy!

If you have any other family approved squash recipes, please share!

Feeling Crafty

Really enjoying the new craft area. It's amazing how a little bit of organization sparks my creativity. Here are some cards that I have made the last couple of days.

My darling Ann was feeling left our and wanted to make something herself so she picked out a project from a craft book- Princess hat.

My Cardmaking and Scrapbooking Obsession

Three CHEERS for my husband-

Hip, Hip, Hooray!

Hip, Hip, Hooray!

Hip, Hip, Hooray!

Thanks to David my crafting supplies are now in order. Isn't this a great peg board he made me??? He also made my work area. It's tall enough that I can stand and work on layouts, I find that I work better that way. Hopefully now that I am so organized I can start posting all of the wonderfull things I make here on my blogspot.

On the opposite side of the room I have our homeschool area set up. I wanted to post pictures of it as well but no where in my hometown sells HandyTack so that I can decorate my walls! So I will post those pics at a later time.