First Day of School

Today was our first day of school.  We started out the day by taking pictures of the kids.  Sugar Plum is beginning kindergarten and Tiger Boy started preschool.

After pictures Daddy took Sugar Plum out for breakfast as his mom always did on the first day of school.

While they were gone I got the table all ready for the day.

Here is a picture of our calendar and school wall area.

Sugar Plum had fun doing the calendar.

Tiger Boy coloring in his journal.

Sugar Plum drawing in her journal.

Overall it was a good day.  We worked through all the curriculum in about an hour and a half which is what it said it would take.  Sugar Plum liked doing it and is looking forward to more tomorrow.  I will be figuring out how to balance all that we need to get done with Sugar Plum while trying to keep Tiger Boy busy. Today he was climbing my back while I was trying to do a phonics lesson with her.  It made for an interesting time, but good nonetheless. I am looking forward to tomorrow too.

Ready

I am ready for Monday and the first day of our homeschool. I have been doing this for two years with preschool but somehow it seems so much more of a big deal with kindergarten.  I cried last night thinking about my baby starting kindergarten.  My husband looked at me and said perhaps I was crying because she is no longer a baby. That may be true.  She is growing up so quickly.

Anyway. I am ready.  Well, mostly ready I guess. We don't have a school room so we will do school in the kitchen and living room. I have a school wall that has a calendar, number poster and alphabet poster on them.  They have been there since last year, however I have new things to put up on our wall.  I am waiting to make those changes until the kids go to bed tomorrow night.  I want them to find the new things up on Monday morning and be excited for school.

I have all of our homeschool books on a shelf in my daughter's bedroom since that is the only place we have room for them.  I have decided to put the things I need each day in small rubber maid tub to have them all handy so I don't have to keep going back and forth to her room all day.

So, now I just wait. And wait.  And wait for Monday.

2010-2011 Curriculum

I am really getting excited for our homeschool to start on Monday.  We have done 2 years of preschool and Sugar Plum is ready for kindergarten.  Tiger Boy will be joining us for as much or as little as he wants. I also have some curriculum for him to do while we do our school work.

I will be using Little Hearts for His Glory as our core. It includes Bible, History, Science and Art. We will be going to story time at our library once a week. Sugar Plum will hopefully begin piano lessons in a few weeks.  She will also be taking swimming lessons at the YMCA.  We will be doing lots of reading aloud together too.

Tiger Boy- Preschool Year 1
Preparatory Curriculum from letteroftheweek.com
Comprehensive Curriculum of Basic Skills Preschool

Sugar Plum- Kindergarten
Little Hearts for His Glory
Happy Phonics
Singapore Math- Earlybird K
Teach Them Spanish-K

I have a little bit of prep work left, but we are mostly ready to go.  My husband is taking Sugar Plum out to breakfast on the first day of school just like his mom always used to do for him.  She is excited for the special date time with daddy.  Then we they get back we will start school.

(Almost) Fall 2010 Curriculum Clean Out

I am participating in the curriculum clean out.  Here is what I am giving away:

These are new-never used preschool books. I ended up with two copies each and so I am gladly giving them away to someone who wants them.

If you would like to win, leave a comment on this post.  For a second entry follow my blog and leave a comment telling me you did.

This giveaway is open to US Residents only and will end on Saturday, August 28 at 9 pm.

Make sure you leave a way for me to contact you.

Not Me! Monday!

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to < target="_blank" href="http://www.mycharmingkids.net">her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

This is my first Not Me! Monday! post.  I did NOT attend a youth rodeo this weekend to watch one of our youth group girls ride her horse.  I did NOT go thinking it would last only a few hours.  I was NOT there for over 4 hours to watch her for 24 seconds.  It was the best way to spend my Saturday and I was NOT bored out of my mind.
I did NOT let my kids play with playdoh alone so I could check my email.  My son did NOT try to eat it.  I did NOT let him spit it out before I tried to help him clean out his mouth.
This is all I can think of at them moment.  I am new to this so I will have to keep better track in the future to have more to write about.

Rodeo

So today I took my daughter to a youth rodeo.  This is not a normal activity for us.  I was going to see one of our youth group girls compete.  I had no idea what I was getting into.  I thought my daughter would enjoy it and learn some things while there.  I was told it started at 2 pm.  So we went.  We got there a little bit late and discovered it was already started and not like just few minutes late started like a long time had passed.  Oh, well.  I was just hoping we had not missed the girl we went to see.  My daughter and I found a place to sit on the hard ground on a hill overlooking the arena.  We sat and watched and waited to see Haley.  We watched little kids come in and take down a goat and remove a ribbon from its tail.  Then we watched big kids come in and hog tie the goats.  All this time waiting to see Haley.  Finally after TWO hours I called her mom to see what was going on.  She told me the event was next. Okay, so we sat and waited some more.  We got some water and a popsicle and 45 minutes later Haley came up to us riding her horse.  She talked with us and said she was going in a while.  Eventually we went and got some pizza.  This was after being there for 3 1/2 hours.  As we were sitting in the concession area eating I heard Haley's name on the loud speaker.  We grabbed our food and ran to the edge of the arena just in time to see her ride her horse in.  She did really good.  This was only the first of two events she was competing in so we waited some more.  After another hour of waiting it started pouring down rain, so we left.  It was a LONG day.  I was not expecting to be there for over 4 hours.  I am just glad my daughter enjoyed it.

First Post

As I write this it is 10 days until I begin homeschooling my daughter for kindergarten.  I have done two years of preschool with her and it was a huge success.  I am nervous and super excited.  I have always wanted to teach kindergarten and now finally have the opportunity to do so.  I am hoping to record my journey of how everything goes with her and with my son who will be starting preschool with us too.