Biophilia Explained

I recently read "Last Child in the Woods" by Richard Louv, and although I felt a push to get my body out in nature more, I still haven't succeeded much towards that end.  My children are a great example to me, and so I did agree to running around outside in the freezing wind last evening to do a Treasure Hunt that Toveli had arranged for Mother's Day.  But its still hard to get me out the door away from the kitchen/laundry/books/computer.  I admit to feeling soooooo much better after having spent some time out in nature, but I just don't respond well to even kicks to get me out the door.

Something I'm working on.

Anyways, here's something to speak to me (and maybe to you, too!).

Rainbows in the Day

The sun has been coming out and that is when I go out to play. After a little bit it starts to rain and the sun is still out. And then I start to look around in the sky. And if I don’t see any thing I go to the front of the house .And if I see something I run up to my house door and open the door and then I yell ”there is a rainbow.” And then all of the little kids come running out to see it. And if they don’t see it they say ”where is it.” And then I show them. so what do you do after you see a rainbow?

~written by our 9yod Toveli.  She wrote this as a blog post for a closed blog with other students, and she chose these colours to represent the rainbow.  I thought it was very creative, and wanted to share it with you.

Last Winter Birthday

Most of our family have Winter-time Birthdays, congregated between the last days of November until mid-March.  Toveli's was the final one of them....and she wanted to get her ears pierced.  So, that's what she got.

And she let Maret come along and get hers done at the same time.

It's helpful, because they can remind each other to clean them 3 times per day, and it alleviates some of the pressure from Mom to do the remembering (which stresses me out, because there are soooooo many things to try and remember).









On Saturday we had our best friends come down island to share a meal together.....but unfortunately I forgot to take photos!!!  But we had a good time.  The children went down to the river, walked to the 'gravel pit' (one of the 'visitors' named it that), walked their dog, ate too much, etc.  Us adults shared our hearts, books, ideas, computer knowledge.  We laughed and cried, and parted with hugs and "can they come back here tomorrow?" and wanting a date on the calendar of when we'd see them again.

Big sister, Rauchelle was here for the weekend too, but sadly had to go back today ;(  We always hate to see her go, but then that just means we'll be Soooo excited when she comes back again ;)

Toveli says "It was crowded in the house, some of us sat on the front deck to eat supper.  It was actually a really nice weekend.  I enjoyed it!"

Happy Birthday, Toveli!

Twinkle Twinkle (DPP)

Everette and I were invited for an impromptu chorus of Twinkle Twinkle.  Note that Anders is The Star which is a princess gown that Aunty Joanne sewed and he's holding it upside down.  Seems to work for an instant Star!

I was surprised by the (attempted) harmonizing going on here.

Hollyhock Doll

Last night Toveli and I shared a book "Priscilla and the Hollyhocks" by Anne Broyles, about a young slave girl on a Southern plantation, her forced march along the Trail of Tears, and a chance encounter with a white man she'd previously met who ends up paying $1000 in gold to adopt her so she can get an education and be part of a family with 15 other adopted children.  

From the book, Toveli learned to make a Hollyhock doll from the flower & a bud, and made one from a plant in our backyard.

 Bit blurry, but these were all taken by the Artist Herself.  Including the one she took of herself!

Lapbooks

I heard about making Lapbooks years ago from other homeschoolers, but we just never did them at all.   I guess I just didn't see what all the excitement was about, and the children and I were busy scrapbooking our life.

But I now have a new appreciation for Lapbooks, and I see a spark that has ignited an excitement in several of the children, particularly Maret who has been busy working on all things Horsey.

Inside this refolded folder she has several small reports on pedigrees, common horse names for the USA and the UK, the top 10 Race-horses, etc.

And the exciting thing is that she is self-motivated to do the research, do tidy printing, and work tirelessly on something that ends in a project she can hold and proudly share with others.




Gaelyn, needing more help from mom, has also accomplished a few Lapbooks.  Hers are actually more of a coming together of work she's already done.  I just put it into a Lapbook form so she can show it off in a more pleasing presentation.

Here's her book on Parts of a Flower, and includes some info on the need for sunshine and water and nutrients that she narrated to Mom. There's also a cross-word she did, and some flower pedals she drew for a little math practise, and several different types of flowers she coloured along with a diagram of a flower that she labeled the parts.
The rose below was partially covered over (on purpose) when I was printing it off so she had to try and draw in the other part of the rose as to what it would look like.

This was a flip-up book Gaelyn did to help her with the Days of the Week.  So sweet what she drew to help her remember the names of the days.  Hard to see for some of them, but let me explain.
Monday is a moon and stars.  Good connection between Monday and Moon-day.
Tuesday is a pointing finger.  As in "I am choosing some candies.  Choosing sounds like Tues....day!"
Wednesday has a picture of swirling wind.  Wed  ~~ wind.  Sounds close to me!!
Thursday gets a 3, because it starts with the same beginning sound, Th
Friday has challah, because we often celebrate the beginning of Sabbath with the traditional braided egg-bread, challah.
Saturday is a day of rest, right, and we sit on chairs.  Sat.....on a chair.
Sunday, no brainer.  You got it!  It's a Sun.

Gaelyn had (close to) tonnes of loose papers that she was doing copywork on from Draw Write NOW! books, and I lumped the farm and other animals all together in an accordion type thing.....



and now she can flip through her writing and see it like a book (that's actually taller than her when it's all pulled out).  She has some simple drawings she can look at, too.

I've unloaded of most of our scrapbooking paraphernalia, which was hard for me but I did it, and so now the Lapbooking is helping me feed the creative side of me.  And its giving a real boost to the children as they see their hard work being displayed, as if it is treasured.

These are humble beginnings, but I know the children will get more and more creative, and more skills to keep them tidy and well displayed.  Mitchell and I worked on the Months of the Year, and are now collecting information for one on Ancient Egypt.  Gaelyn will be doing one on the Provinces and Territories of Canada, and Toveli will hopefully do something about plants (the bug hasn't hit her yet).  Danaka is actually doing one on some Maths Formulas to help her remember them, and likely something on the Elizabethan period.

If you are interested in checking out Lapbooks, there's loads and loads of stuff online, some free and some not.

Go for it.  We are having a blast.

Our Princesses

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If Gaelyn was wearing blue I'd think she was Little Bo Peep!

Challah

Yesterday we had 3 of our favourite women come to visit us.........Grandma S., Aunty Joanne (from Cape Breton), and big sister Layne.  As a special treat Gaelyn and Mommy made challah.  The previous day we had read about Saskatchewan and growing wheat, and we read the book "From Wheat to Bread" and thought it would be a treat to share bread with our visitors.  Aunty Joanne loved to share challah with us when we prepared it for Shabbat in Cape Breton. 

So what?  if it wasn't Shabbat yesteday!!!!

But then Rauchelle called to say she would be visiting with us for the weekend. 

And viola!!!  Today it IS Shabbat, .......
and we have challah on the brain.  And thoughts of a twisted challah Rauchelle has been wanting to try since we made it in February while she was away in Manitoba.  But now..... there is Today.  Today we do the surprise challah for Rauchelle.

What's the surprise? 

Chocolates tucked into it. 

I know!  I know!!  I'm always tooting the 'healthy eating' horn.  But, I live it up sometimes too. 

And I LOVE Chocolate!

So here Toveli and I snuck in Reese's Pieces and Peanut Butter Cups. 

And what did Rauchelle think of all of it????

She thinks its Delicious.

Toveli Telling a Story

Shy Toveli put on a production.  It's been long in the making, due mostly to little siblings getting into the props and wreaking havoc day after day.  But tonight was the Opening (& only) Show, and mama must say that I was surprised at how confidently she spoke, how well she remembered her story-line.  For somebody who usually shy's away from being in front of people, she did AWESOME !!!

Here's part of the crowd that gathered.......


But I must say, Toveli was not the only show in town tonight.  There was definitely some side shows happening.....

  But listen for yourself.  Doesn't Tov sound confident to you?

Note:  the servant help came before the arrival of a baby!!  Sounds good to me.

Introducing Laars' Perspective

He likes the camera.

You can just see Tigger peeking out of a tent (applique) at the bottom of Laars' own jean pantleg

He LOVES Mama

What did I tell you?  He Loves Me!!

He loves cars, too.

Maret kept getting lower and lower to try and stay in the field of view!

This one got a little help from Mama, but I think he's getting the hang of it for a 3yo.

(ok, there were alot that got deleted.  Thank God for digitals!)

Granville Island

This afternoon we drove out to UBC to pick up Layne after her

morning of teaching ESL and we headed to Granville Island.  We found an organic grocer there at the Public Market and stocked up on Pink Lady's, nectarines, strawberries, cherry tomatoes and pears and sat outside by the marina in the sunshine and devoured our nutritious lunch. (Later followed by not-nutritious apple-fritters and a humungous raspberry bran muffin).

 We wandered thru the stores a bit, especially over at the Kid's Market where the Toy Store is, and listened to the Bucksters outside of Bridges and the Bakery.  I didn't see the magician but much of the family did, and from the crowd that gathered it was a sensational show.

We found another park for the children to play at for a couple hours in the city as we enjoyed some short snoozes and chatter before driving Layne back to her temporary abode and an evening for her of getting paid to watch a movie with the ESL students! 

New Looks

Anders got a mohawk.

Laars didn't

And Mitchell lost his.

While the boys did something with their hair, us girls did something with our toes and fingernails.

A New Look for alot of us.  Plain and simple.

To the Fort

In celebration of Banff National Parks 125th Birthday, some Canada Parks were offering free admittance today, so our family headed over to the participating Fort Langley Historical Site

where we spent 4 delightful hours and got ourselves some sore legs and very wet children.  Enjoy the pics.

An HBC (Hudson Bay Company) flag

A fun puppet show the children loved about Biodiversity and a spider coming to appreciate its own unique characteristics.

Children always love the animals.

Inside a soldiers' tent.

Inside a Cooper's barrel.

Inside a picture!

This hung on the wall beside a bed.  They would keep their candles in this metal box to keep the rats away.  After all, the candles were made (attractively for rats) with animal fats!

The fellow in the middle was a great story-teller, imagining he was the captain of some voyageurs traveling by canoe from Fort St James to Fort Langley with a portage at Hell's Gate. The guys on either side were 'acting out' what life for them might have been like being voyageurs.  Here they carry 100 lb packs of pelts on their backs, using straps around their foreheads.  Their bellies would be wrapped time and time again with fabric (up to 40 feet long) to help support their abdominal muscles to prevent ruptured hernia's and spilled guts!

Up on the fort wall, on a corner with a view of approaching Indians.

I think Gold Panning was a big hit for the family.

But Laars preferred to float 'boats' of bark in the overflow of the sluice box.

Anders enjoyed all the different furs.  This one was a grey wolf.  

 

This other fur was from a Timberwolf, much bigger.

The children almost always enjoy a coloring opportunity.  Here Maret and Tov are coloring eagle heads to make hats.

Another successful unschooled day.  Anders asked, "Can we come here tomorrow?"