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We missed out last year…and we almost missed again this year…but we made it to the patch before it closed {thanks to a reminder from a friend}.
We got up and outta here early this morning…before the heat of the day moved in…
The kiddos did an awesome job…and not one complaint was heard :)
Now, what to do with our big bowl full of juicy, red strawberries…
And some silly fun too!
Ds9 in front of the Babe Ruth Museum during a trip to an Orioles vs. Nationals game at Camden Yards.
Ds4 enjoying a snack at our final Truth Squad meeting before summer break.
Memorial Day fun ~ with popsicles…
…and parachutes
Helping Grandma celebrate her birthday!
Spending time with Great Grandpa…
…and Cousin Mandi ~ visiting from the west coast.
This soothing CD contains 13 different songs, including Amazing Grace, Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing, Showers of Blessing, and We’re Marching to Zion. You can see a full listing of the songs on this CD on this page.
My husband and I especially enjoy Celtic music. We found the sounds of flutes, bagpipes, fiddles and harps on this CD to be quite soothing. We also enjoyed the mix of instrumental music {instruments only} and vocals. And my kiddos loved to add their own vocals to the instrumental music…especially when one of their favorite hymns was playing, Amazing Grace :).
Amazing Grace: Celtic Hymns & Blessings made the perfect background music for dinnertime prep and eating…its soothing musical arrangements and crisp, clean vocals seemed to calm the chaos that can sometimes ensue around dinnertime in our home :).
More Information
Discovery House Music is part of Discovery House Publishers…a publishing house that was founded over 20 years ago. Discovery House Publishers desires to “produce resources that feed the soul with the Word of God.”
Amazing Grace: Celtic Hymns & Blessings is available for purchase from the Discovery Music website for $9.90 {regular price is $10.99}.
I received this CD for free from Discovery House Music in order to provide an honest and unbiased review. I did not receive any further compensation for this review.
I recently had chance to review another great item published by Apologia ~ Read for the Heart:Whole Books for Wholehearted Families by Sarah Clarkson.
I love how this book is organized. The first three chapters provide an introduction to both the author and why reading should be an important part of ours and our children’s lives.
The fourth chapter tells us how to use this book and is aptly titled “A Roadmap for Using This Book”.
The rest of the chapters in Read for the Heart contain booklists for different genres of literature. In these chapters Miss Clarkson provides detailed book lists and book reviews for books that she recommends be on your bookshelves. Each book review includes the author, date of original publication, awards received {if applicable}, illustrator {if applicable}, general age category, a short review, and cautions regarding content {if necessary}.
Each of the books contained in these lists are books that Miss Clarkson has either read personally or books that come highly recommended by trusted sources. Sarah also cautions that there are many “…excellent, classic books” that are not included in Read for the Heart:
The books I list are mostly the beloved companions of my own childhood. Your reading exploration may begin with the books listed here, but there are hundreds more waiting for your discovery.
Miss Clarkson also includes a number of helpful appendixes at the end of Read for the Heart. These appendixes provide booklists of Caldecott Medalists, Newbury Medalists, G.A. Henty titles, Landmark History titles, and Trailblazer Series titles.
My Thoughts
I am a booklover myself, and I endeavor to create booklovers of each of my kiddos. I sincerely appreciate Sarah Clarkson’s heart for reading, and it definitely shines through on the pages of Read for the Heart.
I enjoyed the way Miss Clarkson wove stories of how books affected her childhood into the pages of Read for the Heart. Her writing quickly drew me into the book, I had a really hard time putting it down :).
The way that this book has been organized makes it quite simple for me to pick it up and quickly find a booklist that matches my needs, whether I am searching for a wholesome and fun picture book to read with my 4yo, looking for a new family read-aloud, or preparing a booklist for history and biography titles to add to our history studies.
More Information
Read for the Heart is available for purchase on the Apologia website for $17.00.
You can access a preview of the table of contents and a sample chapter from this page.
I received a free copy of Read for the Heart in exchange for my honest, unbiased opinion of the book. I did not receive any further compensation for my review.
I recently received Considering God’s Creation published by Eagle’s Wings for our family to try. Considering God’s Creation is a creation-based science curriculum that takes “a creative biblical approach to natural science” and it was written to be used with 2nd to 7th graders.
The authors of this award-winning science curriculum {Susan Mortimer and Betty Smith} are homeschooling moms who originally created this curriculum for their own children.
Considering God’s Creation covers the following topics:
Our Experience
The package I received included a 128-page Teacher’s Manual, a 270-page consumable student workbook, and a 23-track cd.
The consumable student workbook isn’t just a bunch of fill-in-the-blank pages. Most of the pages require kiddos to do something {cut and paste a little book, play a game, do a bit of detective work, etc.} The authors recommend that each child store their completed pages in a notebook and from what I have seen so far, my kiddos will have a very impressive science notebook when we have completed Considering God’s Creation.
The 128-page teaching guide is very straight forward and easy to use.
My kiddos absolutely love the audio CD. The songs on the CD are very simple, yet catchy and they help cement the information that we are learning in Considering God’s Creation in my kiddos’ brains.
I am extremely pleased with this science curriculum. I have been looking for a fun and easy-to-use creation-based science curriculum that I can use with all three of my kiddos…and I think I have found what I was looking for in Considering God’s Creation.
More Information
Click here to view sample pages from Considering God’s Creation.
You can also find links to samples from the audio cd on the right sidebar of this page.
The Eagle’s Wings website contains a very helpful FAQ page about the Considering God’s Creation curriculum.
You can purchase Considering God’s Creation {teacher’s manual, one student workbook, and audio cd} for $29.95 from the Eagle’s Wings website. Additional student workbooks are available on the website for $13.95.
I received this product for free in order to provide an honest and unbiased review of my family’s experience with this product. I did not receive any further compensation for this review.
One of the first homeschooling catalogs that I received when I was a wanna-be homeschooler over six years ago was a Timberdoodle catalog. Since then I have come to depend on Timberdoodle for honest and reliable reviews of homeschooling products and a large selection of fun and unique homeschooling items.
So needless to say, I was very excited when I was given the opportunity to become a part of Timberdoodle’s Blogger Review Team.
A Kid’s Guide to Drawing the Presidents of the USA is the first item that I am reviewing for Timberdoodle. This series contains 42 library bound {hardcover} books. Each 32-page book covers the life and times of one President, from George Washington to George Bush. I received How to Draw the Life and Times of Harry S. Truman to use with my kiddos.
In the first chapter we are given a brief biographical sketch of Harry S. Truman’s life. In the subsequent chapters we are given a more in-depth look at some of the details surrounding Truman’s life and times.
In chapter 9 we read about Truman’s transition from Vice President to President after Franklin D. Roosevelt died while serving as President. We are also given step-by-step pictorial instructions for drawing a 1944 presidential campaign poster featuring Roosevelt and Truman.
In chapter 10 we learn more about one of the important issues that Truman dealt with during his Presidency, the atomic bomb. In addition to providing photographs of both the plane that dropped the deadly atomic bomb, the Enola Gay, and the A-Bomb Dome Memorial in Hiroshima, this chapter also contains detailed, step-by-step instructions for drawing the Enola Gay.
Every book in this series also contains a timeline, a glossary of words, an index of subjects in the book and suggested websites that you can visit to obtain more information.
My Thoughts
My kiddos love to draw and they especially appreciate drawing books that contain step-by-step instructions for drawing specific items or scenes. The drawing instructions in How to Draw the Life and Times of Harry S. Truman were simple enough that even my dd7 was able to create a fairly accurate drawing of her chosen subject.
I think any book in this series would be an excellent addition to any bookshelf both as a history resource and and as an art resource.
More Information
The complete set of 42 hardcover books in this series usually retails for $1060.50 ~ but Timberdoodle is currently selling this set at an extremely discounted rate of $195…that’s a savings of $865.50!
Some of the titles from this series are also offered for individual sale for $9.95, but not every title is available to purchase individually.
The Timberdoodle website includes a number of sample pages from this series on their website. Their website also contains a very informative 2-minute video that introduces this series and offers a number of suggestions for using these books.
You can request your own copy of Timberdoodle’s free homeschool catalog here. This catalog is chock-full of information that is helpful to any homeschooler…whether you are wanna-be or newbie homeschooler {like I was} or a veteran homeschooler who is looking to add some new life into your homeschool.
You can also check out Timberdoodle on Facebook.
As a member of Timberdoodle's Blogger Review Team I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a frank and unbiased review.
In my life this week…
A friend of ours and her sweet baby girl were needed up this way for some family stuff this week, and we had the privilege of having them stay in our home. My dd7 has been praying for a baby sister for quite some time, so she was beyond delighted to share our home with these friends.
My boys were wonderful hosts also…they loved getting out their old baby toys and setting them up around the house for our little friend to play with. And I must admit, I also loved having a little baby around the house again..and her mama too {of course :)}.
In our homeschool this week…
We finished up one week earlier than planned…ds9 has two more books on his 3rd grade reading list to finish and I will continue with our read-alouds this summer, but everything else is done!
Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…
On the heels of a week of sunshine…we had a week of rain. It rained everyday, but thankfully not all day :) We spent most of our days at home visiting with our guests when they were here and getting schoolwork done.
Ds9 has a baseball game to play on Saturday, and a baseball game to attend on Sunday afternoon with dh. The two younger kiddos and I will probably do something fun while dh and ds9 are away but I’m not sure yet what that will be…
My favorite thing this week was…
Hosting our friends…I loved seeing my kiddos interact with our friends. All three of them were very sweet to the little girl and everyone had a lot of fun together.
Homeschool questions/thoughts I have…
One thing that I am grateful for when it comes to homeschooling is the ability for me to plan our school schedule. This year I planned for our schoolyear to finish up at the end of May so that we could enjoy the milder weather of June. I plan to begin our new schoolyear in mid-July which is just about the time that the heat and humidity of summer make it so that you want to spend most afternoons indoors reading good books :).
A photo, video, link, or quote to share…
This has been a week of rain…and a week of rainbows :). We spotted two rainbows on two different days ~ both were full rainbows that went across the entire sky…and the second one was a double rainbow!
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