Thursday, March 31, 2022

Homeschool - March






The kids visited Daddy and Grandpa at work and got to ride the fork lift.  They absolutely loved it.



We studied the rainforest and made diagrams of the different layers.


We sampled different foods that grow in the rainforest including pineapple, bananas, oranges, ginger, cinnamon, and coffee. 


For St. Patrick's Day we made the Ryan family recipe of Irish Soda Bread.  It turned out delicious!

Olivia got to spend some one-on-one time with Grandma Ruby last week. She picked a game (Hide and Seek) and Grandma picked a game (I Spy) and they made cookies together.  They both had a wonderful time.







We made this amazing rainforest diorama using a cardboard box, some paper towel tubes, paint, and some fake plants.  We made our own birds and filled it with animals from our collection.  It turned out so cool.  The kids and I really enjoyed learning about the rainforest!


Nolan made his own Superhero cupcakes and they turned out super tasty!


Nolan is finishing up his second session of archery class at the YMCA.  He is shooting more and more consistently and is getting closer to the center all the time.  I'm really proud of his focus and concentration and can't wait until warmer weather so he can try it with his bow at home!








The kids each choose a rainforest animal to do a report on.  Nolan chose tapirs and Olivia chose ocelots.  They both worked really hard using reference materials from our library and online to gather information.




Livi and Simon made a pretend bus out of an old cardboard box.  I love to see their imaginations at work!





We read a couple of beautiful books called, "We Are Water Protectors" and "The Oneida Song of Spring" about First People tribes who care for our land and water.  We wrote our own pledge of how we want to care for the earth and celebrated our beautiful world in a stunning book called "Creation."


One of my high school friends, Gabrielle, lives in Rhinelander with her three kids.  They are also homeschooling and we got together with her family and a couple of others at the Hodag Dome this week.  We hadn't been inside the dome yet, but it is super cool with lots of places to run around and things to do.  Our kids really enjoyed getting to meet some of the other kids.  Olivia actually knew Gabrielle's daughter Shaylee from gymnastics class.  We plan on meeting there regularly, at least until the weather is nicer outside!

Mr Tom favored this book at our library story times when the kids were little, so I thought it would be fun to revisit a classic.  We talked about cause and effect with this story and the kids loved it.  



We read the book, "Ish," and did an exercise of making less than perfect (or -ish) drawings.


The kids loaded Easter eggs with the pieces from our Alphabet puzzle and I hid them all over the house.  They had fun hunting for them and putting them into the puzzle once they were found!



Olivia has been working really hard in her Level Two Gymnastics class.  At the beginning of this session, she really struggled with her bridge, cartwheels, and hand stands but has improved by leaps and bounds over the last few weeks.  We've been practicing at home and it is so wonderful to see the pride she has in how hard she has worked and how far she's come.  Great job, Livi!

Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Roller Kids









Livi got roller skates for her 6th birthday.  She was so excited to get them, but the slope of our driveway coupled with no hand rail and the bumpy asphalt made it really hard for her to get the hang of it.  We've been using the gym at Trinity lately to run around and play with the Vadis girls, so we decided that maybe it would be fun to try skating there.  Livi took to it pretty quickly, as did Tati and Elsa, so we decided we NEEDED to have a disco ball (or 3) to make it extra special.  It wasn't long before Nolan was asking for skates too, so I bought him some with the promise that he would need to give it a good several tries before he gave up.  He found that falling was not very much fun and I found it was a lot harder to keep a hundred pound child upright, but he was starting to get the hang of it and have fun.  Simon really enjoyed riding on his scooter, as well as playing with the toys from the nursery.  We're glad to have a place to run off some energy during this seemingly endless Northwoods winter.