Molly's Musings

We made trees to count down the day until we go to uonvrsol. (Universal) We are driving to Florida on Thanksgiving day to see family. Then we will go to Orlando and unpack and then have some more fun. I want to ride the roller coasters with Connie and Daddy. I want to go on One Fish, Two Fish. Maybe we can go to Curious George and get wet. I love that place, especially when the bucket pours on us.

I'm learning subtracting in math. We played a game with our Latin words today. We talked about Carthage in history. After school we are going to Walmart and the library and maybe go out to eat (we're not eating out-Mama says.)

I've been raking leaves in the back yard. Bram helps. And then we jump in them and we play house in them. Then when we come inside, I have to take a bath. Awwww.

That is it for now. I need a snack.

Back with Belle

Hey everyone. Belle is back to talk with you about my life again.

This week we didn't do much, but there were a few exciting times. Yesterday I had my dress rehearsal for the play I am in. The actual play is today. I am so nervous, but very excited. My dad was off today because of Veterans Day. This weekend we have lots of soccer and football games (not our football games but our teams ) and some fun with family. We made Thankful Trees in school the other day. We wrote things we were thankful for on a paper leaf then we will take them off each day until Thanksgiving. Some of the things I wrote were family, pizza, superheros, football, Aaron Murray. You know just the usually girl things.

Now I am almost finished, but I still have a few things to say. I want to thank all the people that served in our armed forces. Also I want to say it's 11-11-11! Also, I want to say Happy Birthday to one of my favorite people........Aaron Murray. I hope everyone has a good Friday and a great weekend. I'll see you next time on Back with Belle. :-)

Living with Lucy

today is Bram birth day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We're celebrating it on Sunday with the Danilovichs .

Last week we were sick i did not have to do school one day then.

Today we have oaks . we are making peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Yesterday we went to the food co-op where they give away food with brownies. we helped sort food that we brought. We ended up with 190 cans. We're having a can food drive for them if you want to donate.

*Footnotes from Mama: Just to clarify, we toured the Gwinnett County Food Co-op that distributes food to families in the area. They don't give away Brownies, we toured with our *brownie* troop. :-) And our troop *is* hosting a canned food drive if you're interested in donating.

Catching Up with Connie

Well I had a lot of fun, corny openings but my mother, no scratch that, my prison guard, said I couldn't do anything fun or I would have to rewrite it. So this is my opening: Hi.

So as you all know, life in my household has been... interesting. We have all had some little bug going from one person to another slowly claiming all of its victims. I was the 2nd to last person to get it, and I also had it real quick and simple. I got sick just for the night and the next day, with the help of some drugs(medicine), I was all better!

Continuing on the sickness I have a small complaint because my family won't take me seriously. So the day I got sick was Saturday. A weekend. Everyone else got sick on a week day and got to skip school! Yeah you read it right, they skipped school! And guess who had to go ALL the way to the basement and actually do school everyday. ME!

So Halloween was the other day. It was fun. I was Cleopatra, Belle was a guy in a suit, Lucy was Wonder Woman, Molly was a witch, and Bram was Frankenstein. We went to the church to Trunk or Treat but it was very crowed so we kinda ducked out of there real quick. Then we also went to our Aunt's neighborhood to Trick or Treat and that was a lot of fun because she has a real big neighborhood. The worst part of the night was when some old woman called me a princess, yeah that kind of made me mad.

Musing with Molly-October

Poor Molly typed up an entire blog post but it got deleted when the Internet just went out. And now we have to start over, which isn't good news for either of us. :-( She's going to skip the typing/phonetic part this time and just dictate instead.

It is raining today but I have soccer practice. I hope it does not get cancelled. I like soccer.

I went to the dentist yesterday. I have no cavities. The toothpaste didn't taste very good. I STILL haven't lost any teeth. The dentist said I don't even have any that are loose. I counted to 100 for the dentist because Math is my favorite subject.

Belle is sick. It is annoying.

This week I have a new spelling. In Story of the World we read about Chin and his father who lived in ancient China. We had a contest with out Latin words today. I lost. Connie and Belle were playing, too. I am the only one that got a 100 on the math tests yesterday. I can't remember everything I talked about the first time. Can I go now, Mama? Is that enough?

Back with Belle

Hello. This is Belle again and a lot has happened since I last posted. The best part was that my birthday was last Thursday! I am finally 12!!!! Yeah! I had my cousin spend the weekend at our house. We had lots of fun. We went to the movies and saw "Captain America." Loved it! I also got some really cool presents! My parents got me a cardboard cut-out of guess who.......Captain America!!! He is like six feet tall and sits in my room staring at me. He is so creepy, but I love him! My brother, Bram, got me a Captain America necklace and my sister, Lucy, got me Marvel squinkies. My other sisters Connie and Molly got me a bow and arrow (because of my favorite superhero Hawkeye.) I am getting better at using it. I don't miss every time! My dad says that all my presents were meant for an eight year old boy. He was so right. Although my cousin did get me some girly nail polish and foot spa which I LOVE! Also my mom is taking me out to get clothes soon. I have had a great birthday but it is not over yet! I still have two more parties left! Everyone says that I don't have a birth day, but a birth month. Hahaha! Thanks for listening! I'll be back next time on Back with Belle! Bye!

Living with Lucy-October

I am learning about skip counting by 3's in math. I am learning of the creation of the earth . My favorite subject is Latin . Amo Latin. (that means I love LATIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) We have done 51 days of school.

Catching Up with Connie

Well, it is me again, Connie! Mom says I'm the weak link when it comes to blogging (which is weird, me being the best writer and all) so she has assigned me a topic. (Which is WRONG! She tells us to write about whatever we want and make it from your heart but then she says, "Write about school. NOW!") So writing about school is exactly what I shall do.

Math- I'm passing math! It is actually my strongest subject! I'm doing pre-algebra and I'm passing! With flying colors! But sadly, if math is my strongest subject we know I must not be doing great in everything else.

Science- For science I go to a class. Like a real class, with real people. It is a school for home schoolers. I go every Thursday for an hour and a half and it isn't as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, it is pretty cool. The kids are cool, the teacher is nice and the labs are REAL fun!

Literature- Literature has always been my favorite subject and this year is no exception. I have read poems and short stories and Treasure Island. Now I am reading a book called, "A Day of Pleasure" that is a biography of a little boy who grew up in Warsaw.

History- My worst subject. I am not good at history. It has always been one of my weakest subjects. We are learning about Ancient Greece and Rome. We have learned about Caeser and covered a little of the gods, which is something I really love, but this history is only doing a little. But that is OK because mom has also assigned a more in depth unit study on Greece.

Well, thats all I've got. I'm sure mom has changed, like, half of my own words, so if I sound really intelligent, it isn't me.

Oh, HAPPY ROSH HASHANAH!

Footnote from Aimee: I didn't say she was the weak link in blogging, just that she didn't spend as much time as I would like. I only changed a couple of things, mostly commas. :-)

Molly's Musings

Molly writing: in math i am learning adding. in science i am learning about eggs.

Molly dictating:

In Latin today I learned the words "adoro","ambulo", and "libero". In history I learned the story of Joseph from the Bible. I did sight words book. I read "Cool Cat".

Back with Belle

Hiya! It is Belle again! I am back to tell you more about my life. Let's go!!

Well, this past week was quite.....um, what's the word I'm looking for? Busy? Yes. Fun? Yes. Boring? YES! (only during school) Also we had lots of family time!

Last Thursday Connie and I had our first classes at the "school". Well the school for home schoolers. I had a drama class and Connie had a science class. My class was so much fun. We played and acted like fools! Like I said, FUN! On the Friday after that we had the first GSU football game. My dad and my grandpa took Connie and I to it! It was also awesome! Then on Labor day weekend we watched Georgia make fools of themselves in football and on Sunday we went to my aunt and uncle's pool. It was so refreshing! Then my dad was off of work Monday and Tuesday so we did school, then on Tuesday went to the mall. On Wednesday Lucy and Molly had soccer practice then Connie and I had a class at our church, (Like a youth group), my first. It was lots of fun. It was only for middle schoolers. Skipping some days and going to this past Saturday, we went to the second GSU football game. This time my mom and my dad brought Lucy, Bram, and I. We yelled and screamed and laughed. But the best part was eating funnel cake!! Then we went home and watched Georgia make fools of themselves again in a football game. On Sunday, Connie and my dad built a shelf for my mom then we watched the Falcons make fools of themselves on their football game. After that we watched X-men with my dad. It was awesome! Getting ready to watch the new one! Haha! Well, I had a fun week! Oh, almost forgot! The tenth anniversary of 9\11 was yesterday. Our family was crying lots and I hope everyone who had someone in that tragic time is doing alright. Okay, this was fun! I'll see you next time on Back with Belle! :) Bye!

Life with Lucy-September 2011

I had a project for the last few weeks. It is the Nile river. We made it out of dirt and grass seeds. It is already working. We flood it every week. The grass grows like the real Nile river. I had a math test.

Catching Up with Connie

Hello fellow people! It is I, Connie, here to tell you about my life!

School has started for everyone. Which is cool, because when we go places it isn't crowded. The mall is real fun when there is not many people there. People are there, mind you, but it is only tiny children and adults, and the kids who cut school. (just kidding)

So I have to go to school! Yeah, you heard me I gotta go to school. With people and everything! I only have to go for a science class, because Mom and Dad think I'll learn more from someone who understands science. Mom will rue the day she signed me up for that! I am so not looking forward to it. The science book is so confusing and is, well, BORING! The only plus to this is I get new clothes. Like it is back to school.

Musings from Molly

i have soccer practice. I bet it is fun. I got new shoes. I have a math test today. I did my math already. I only missed one. (Molly's typing)

(Molly's dictation) Today we made the Nile River with dirt, rocks, and, what was that stuff we used for the river? (Aluminum foil.) We put it in a tray and it's going to grow grass soon. We put water in the middle of the river and it overflows like the Nile River overflowed.

That's all I want to write today.

10% of the Year

Pictures: 1) Bram pulled a globe on top of himself and got a little black eye 2) A "help" note that was waiting at my desk when I came back from putting Bram down for his nap one day. 3) cave paintings 4) Lucy Clare and Molly playing with their new handwriting/paint bags




I remember our last year in public school, I counted down the days and would use percentages to remind myself of where we were in relation to being finished. When we hit 18 days this week, it reminded me of that first 10% that year and how both long and short the year looked like in front of me. Only a year to prepare for homeschooling but a whole year before we got to start.

We've had a fairly good 10% so far. It certainly hasn't been without a few bumps and bad days, but we seem to be getting into a good rhythm lately and settling into our new books and curriculum's.

The biggest changes have been how much more teacher-intensive a lot of our subjects are this year, especially for the younger kids. We've always dabbled in the classical theories of schooling, but this year, we dove into it with much more focus. So that means, lots of reading, lots of narration, and lots and lots of memorizing. So far Lucy Clare and Molly have mastered a poem each, about 25 questions in the Baltimore Catechism and 20-25 Latin vocabulary words.

History, as always, is my favorite subject. We're studying the Ancient World, and the Nomads, Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians are proving to be an exciting bunch. We've made cave paintings, tombstones for Pericles, Solon, and Draco, and built huts out of whatever we could find like the nomads.

Bram continues to add an extra level of organizational needs to our day, and although we love having him around, we can fly through work while he takes his morning nap. I know he's going to drop that nap soon, and I don't know what we're going to do then. When he's not napping, he loves to color, (which he calls "bubbles" because he insists we draw circles over and over for him) play dress up, trains, and little people. The girls take turns playing with him in the playroom, and can sometimes lay in there and read while he just plays around them.

Back with Belle

Hiya everyone! It is Belle again here to tell you about my life!!! FUN!

Well I had quite a busy weekend. On Saturday I went to church and then spent the night with my grandparents. We watched two movies that night and stayed up to 1:00 AM. On Sunday my uncle, aunt and cousins came over. We ate and hung out, then we went to the Monastery of the Holy Spirit in Conyers with them. On Monday we did school then went out with our grandparents for lunch. Now today we did school and Connie and I goofed off for awhile dressing Bram up, the picture above. After school my mom and Grandma are going to see " The Help " while our Grandpa watches us kids. Well, it was a busy weekend with a busy week ahead. I will talk to you later on Back with Belle!

Life with Lucy-August 11th

We are having a great school year. Connie did a project today. We got to watch the experiment. I had two tests today in history and math. I got a 100 in math.I got a piece of candy I am learning cursive. We are on day 16. Only 164 days of school left.I did the math. Tomorrow is Friday then the weekend .

Catching Up with Connie

So, I'm not allowed to say anything about being forced to write this, nor am I allowed to just talk about random stuff. I was told I had to write about one topic and stick with it. And between you and me, I thought I always stayed on track. Yes, I know my mind wanders quite easily, but I normally talk about one subject. (Usually)

So, my one subject will be...... school. I will recite a little poem:

SCHOOL

I stay at home

and work all day

I do math

and learn of ray

I read a book

called Treasure Island

A story with a good hook

I play with the baby

and listen to music

and play with paint, maybe

I get yelled at

for this or that

And at the end of school

I walk upstairs

Yes, everything in that poem is true. I am reading Treasure Island, I do get yelled at, I do play with the baby and I do listen to music. (To drown out the sibling's voices) School is going fine so far. Being in 8th grade is exactly what I sort of thought it would be.

Being 13 is hard, and as a result I get yelled at a lot. But a couple hours alone in my room makes me happy Connie again.

Musings from Molly

I am six. I am in first grade. Summer is over and we are doing school.

(Molly typed that by herself. We're working on key board skills and not phonics when we do it, though, so I helped her with spelling.)

The following is dictated to me by Molly:

My favorite is math. I love it because I'm good at it. School is fun so far. My worst thing is Latin because I have trouble remembering sometimes. I like reading books to Mama and I like tracing stuff. We all take turns playing with Bram. I like to play with the train tracks when it's my turn. I hope we learn about all different words that I don't know. I read a poem all by myself and I have to "rememborize" it. I know all of it now. That's all I want to talk about right now.

Back to Belle!

Hiya!! It is Belle again and we are back in school! Blah! It is my first year in middle school and I am doing okay. It is starting out tough because of Bram. He is always doing something bad! Sometimes he draws on my mom's stuff. Also he dropped the globe on himself today and he got a black eye. My mom was very upset.

The best part of homeschooling is the days we get to take off, like, we went to Six Flags on Monday with some of our friends. Also we get to eat good food and don't have to eat cafeteria food!! For lunch today I had a salad and baked potato. I would not have gotten that at public school!!!

My work has definitely gotten harder. For example I am doing my first year of biology. Blah! In math I am doing decimals and I am doing 7th grade literature. I have world history and a big religion thing. Oh! And I am taking a drama class starting after Labor Day! I cant wait!! Well, all my people are leaving me so I've gotta go!! I'll see you next time on Back to Belle! :-)

Life with Lucy

We are having a great year so far. No one got in trouble today. We had our first test in math today. I only missed one. We watched school house rock . I am almost done. Connie Belle have the baby to play with him. And mama is working with Molly. SO see ya later.

Catching Up with Connie!

Well hello there! I am Connie, and I am here, against my will, to tell you about life.

Well I had a very, very busy summer this year. We went on 3 vacations with the whole group and 2 with just me and Belle.

We went to Hilton Head like every year and to Sanibel which was new but awesome (as usual), we also went to Greenville for a cousins wedding. We did those with the whole family.

Me and Belle went to my Grandpa's lake for a couple nights which was fun, like always. My favorite part was the fireworks we saw for the Fourth of July. Then as soon as that trip was over we went to West Palm with my Grandma. We were there for 9 days. It was a new thing and it was very neat going through my Great Grandma and Great Grandpa's stuff.

One other thing we did this summer was become addicted to all thing heroes. We love anything and everything to do with Marvel and DC Comics. Belle and I have, in fact, become so addicted we have a couple of action figures. I think Belle's main reason for watching, is all the hot guys they cast.

I don't have anything to say about school except it has started and stinks already. :-(

Back to School 2011-2012

We had our first day back to school today and it went surprisingly well for kids that have basically been living in Fantasy Land for the last 9 weeks. What a wonderfully busy summer we had and I enjoyed every minute of it, but I sure am excited about getting back into some sort of routine again, too.

We have lots of fun things planned for this year and lots of switches in curriculum and plans. Connie and Belle are both in middle school, 8th and 6th grade respectively, Lucy Clare in 3rd and Molly is in 1st. Bram will tag along with pre-pre-school activities, mostly Montessori based, which I'm excited about since I didn't know anything about homeschooling when the girls were his age. He's going to be a fun experiment.

We've stayed with our Math program, the hand's on, manipulative based Math-U-See and will add in Life of Fred for Connie and Belle.

I'm very excited about History this year, my favorite subject, since we're studying ancient world history. Connie and Belle are using The Old World and America, a Catholic based text and Lucy Clare and Molly are starting the 1st year of The Story of the World, a very interactive, project based curriculum.

For science, usually our weakest subject, we're trying a new program for Lucy Clare, Focus on Science, and Molly will tag along on most experiments, while she continues to read age-appropriate science books as her core work. Belle is going to tackle the Biology program that Connie did last year, and hopefully we've learned a lot by the end of last year and won't have the same frustrations we started out with. Connie is going to take a General Science class at Summit Academy, a homeschool enrichment "school."

We're switching to a much more classical approach for Lucy Clare and Molly's grammar with First Language Lessons for both of them. Connie and Belle are taking a year off of traditional grammar and will use Daily Grams each day to keep up review, and build grammar lessons into much of their writing and their literature programs, Lightning Literature.

We're all working on the Baltimore Catechism this year, as well as the Gospels of Mark and Luke, and a reading comprehension book of Saint Xavier (Belle) and Saint Joan of Arc (Connie.)

Molly will continue with Explode the Code and Hooked on Phonics. We'll do Fallacy Detective and all 4 girls will start/continue with Latin, as well as vocabulary and spelling. Lucy Clare will learn cursive this year (hopefully.)

100 Days of School

Since we have some time off for the summer (even though the kids are already whining that we have the shortest summer of anyone they know) I thought I'd catch up on some of the activities from the last few months.

We celebrated the 100th day of school on January 20. We did lots of fun activities. This is Lucy Clare and Molly making necklaces out of 100 fruit loops.





Bram REALLY liked this project when it was finished.



We all worked on a poster with 100 people we knew. The girls took turns naming and then writing a person down. There wasn't much rhyme and reason to how they thought up people so we'd have to regroup frequently to remember family members in order or "sets." They kept skipping around between the different families and then friends.

Catching Up With Connie

Hiya! It's me Connie! Well, I have not written in a LONG time. (I blame Mom) Since I wrote last, life has been good, nothing to complain about. We went on a trip but Belle already wrote about that so I get to talk about school.
School has been OK. My grades did dip at one point. I was not doing well at school, I was on very thin ice with Mom. Every day after school I would get the same lecture. It went a little like this,
"Connie, if grades don't get better you will go back to school!" said Mom.
"But I don't want to go to school!" I said.
"Then improve your grades!" Mom said.
Every day I would get that lecture. Some days it went longer and it always ended with, "Improve your grades"
Then we discovered two things, if I work upstairs and listen to my music I do pretty well at school, or at least better than I was. I have not been threatened with public school in quite at bit. The one thing that is not so great about listening to my music is that I have to listen to Mom always saying how much she doesn't like me working with music. She does NOT like the music I listen to. I like rap and she hates in SO much but my grades are doing pretty well so she puts up with it.

Biltmore with Belle

Hey. This is Belle. I know we have not posted in awhile, but you can blame my mom for that.
A few weeks ago, for my Grandmother's birthday, we went to, The Biltmore House! It was so exciting!
We woke up that morning around seven 'o clock and got ready to leave. We went with our Aunt Lisa, our cousin Jillian and of course our Grandma ( and all of us ). Connie and I rode with Aunt Lisa and Jillian. It took about 3 and a half hours to get there.
When we finally got there, we took a few minutes to take pictures of the house from the outside. You are not allowed to take pictures inside the house ( even though we snuck a few ). We also took one BIG family picture in front of the house.
When we went inside, it looked amazing! The furniture was so perfect and there were paintings everywhere!!!!! The dinning room look fit for a king! The library was so big. I have never seen so many books at once in my life!! After a few more rooms we went upstairs. The stairs were very curvy and there were a lot of them.
There were so many bedrooms. Of course for the family, then a lot of guest rooms. After we were done upstairs we went to the.......... basement! It looked like a dungeon. There was a room with paintings on the walls. My favorite of the whole house was the swimming pool! It had no water in it, but it looked like it was 20 feet deep!
After we looked at the house we went to get a snack then looked at the gardens. We all posed with statues. It was so funny. Even Grandma posed!
After that, we went to a little village. It was so cute. We went to a petting zoo. Bram thought it was so funny that he could touch the animals. We walked a little more then went to eat at a place called " Cedric's Tavern ". The Vanderbilt's dog was Cedric. I ate fish and chips and tried new things! When we finished eating, we headed home. We got there around 9 'o clock. It was such an awesome trip!

Thanks for listening! This is Belle, signing off! :)