What does you community have to offer?

So far this summer, our family has attended two annual events that we had never experienced before.  The first was a benefit car show that the main street of our town was closed down for.  The cars lined the street and folks walked around to admire the vehicles and ask questions.

Hubbie was especially interested in all the chrome shining.  The girls were interested in two small drag race cars.  Of course, you can't attend an event without getting a treat! Homemade Ice Cream was the deal of the day.

The next event we visited was an annual celebration of a local community's history.  This particular little town started in one location but due to progress, was forced to relocate to higher ground.  It was rainy the day we went but they had an indoor museum that was amazing.  I'm sorry we had never visited it before.  I hope to go back again during this school year.

Display celebrating local war veterans.

Old Time Farm Equipment

Example of farmhouse living room

Both of these events were free for us to attend.  We only had to pay out of pocket for any food or souvenirs.  By the time we bought ice cream, a couple hamburgers, and two yo-yo's, our out of pocket expense was probably only $10.  Not bad for two days of family fun and learning along the way! 

First Day of School 2015

We decided to start our classes this morning.  We have transformed a spare room we had into a small classroom.  It is above our garage so while it has a restroom, internet, and the amenities of the house, it is separated enough to cut down on distractions.  The kids really enjoyed helping clean up the room and setting it up for learning.

Abigail will be starting Teaching Textbooks this year.  She went through lesson 1 and did well.  It will take some getting used to on her part because she's accustomed to using workbooks.  I hope she'll adjust well but if not, we can always go back to book learning as we have the text book that came with the program.

We celebrated today by making pizza for lunch.  The girls love getting to help make pizza.  It turned out very yummy!  We used the dough recipe from the Dining on A Dime cookbook by Tawra Kellam and Jill Cooper.

We are all looking forward to continuing our lessons tomorrow!

How most days felt while homeschooling this year!

The kids are really good at Minecraft so I've tried to learn how to play.  This is how I feel after trying to figure that game out!

Garden Journal

Every year I write in a journal to document which varieties of seeds I start.  Here is a page from this year's entries:

I have the date started, variety, number started, abbreviation used on the cup, and the seed source.  This has really helped over the years for looking back and seeing what worked well and what didn't do well.  It has lots of dirt stains since I write as I plant.  I love my little garden journal!

Spring is here!

Spring has sprung on the homestead and we've started turning our attention to getting the garden ready.  Hubbie has plowed the garden area and we are waiting to get someone with a 5' tiller to work up the soil more.

Hubbie also repaired our greenhouse for another year of service.  This poor greenhouse has been pieced back together numerous times but it's ready again!  This year he had to add a door as the zippered door came apart last year.

He also helped set up some better shelves for all my baby plants to rest on.  It's nice having extra room to work.

I bought some different soils at Lowes the other night.  There was top soil, mushroom compost, and garden soil.  The kids and I put some from each bag into a tote and then used their small hoe to mix it together.  

We started plants on 3/9/15 and they are coming up really well.  I had germination problems last year but this year things are going well!  We hope to be blessed with a great harvest all summer/fall long!

We have chinese cabbage, regular cabbage, tomatoes, peppers, melons, zucchini, squash, okra and brussel sprouts going so far!  We're trying lots of varieties of our favorite veggies to see what works well and some tried and true favorites.

The kids are really enjoying helping play in the dirt.  It's great having them by our side while we grow food!

Way too late of an update!

We've been trucking along on this homeschool adventure!  Things are going well.  We've learned somethings that work and somethings that do not.  Here are some highlights:

Painting:  We bought some paint at Walmart and a set of brushes at a tool store for minimal expense.  I set the girls up with pieces of multi-media paper taped to the shower wall and with paint in egg cartons.  It works really well and cleanup is a breeze since the paint is water soluble.

We made a great recipe of No-Bake Healthy Snack Balls.  Ingredients were: one cup oatmeal, 1/3 c. Honey, 1/2 c. Peanut butter, 1tsp. Vanilla extract, 2/3 c. Coconut flakes, and 1/2 c. Ground flaxseed. Mix in stand mixer until well combined and form into balls. 

Both girls learned how to ride their bicycles without training wheels.  This was a big step as they were both afraid of falling and had tried to talk their way out of learning for quite a while.  Once they finally tried, it was no time before they were peddling all over! 

We've also been taking Karate as a family.  We're really enjoying learning martial arts and the time we get to spend with the others in class is a big plus.  We already knew most of the people there but have enjoyed getting to meet the others.

More updates and hopefully a better job keeping updated soon!