Homeschool Mother's Journal: Valentines Day Edition

That's the only title I could think of, but we really didn't do anything to acknowledge Valentines Day!

In our homeschool... It was a fairly productive week, despite having days that didn't go quite as planned.  We moved on to new chapter in Astronomy, and I reminded the boys about the several observation activities that are ongoing that they need to remember.

Our history lessons were a lot more interesting this week.  We learned about the growth of factories during the early part of the twentieth century, and several that were mentioned are located relatively near us.  The food packing businesses we discussed included Utz Potato Chips, Quaker Oats, Hershey's Chocolate, and Birdseye.

And once again, the kids doodled while we read the lessons, so they each had a notepaper filled with reminders of the products and types of factories in the lesson.

    

We also learned about Detroit and how it became known as Motor City, and learned about Henry Ford. Landon happens to cheer for the Detroit Red Wings, so the Motor City lesson was a good one.

And our geography lesson was about the Black Hills and Mount Rushmore, which was really interesting.  I visited that area several times when I was growing up, and DH and I visited once before we had kids.  I sure wish our family could go there for a vacation, but it's a little far for a road trip to be practical, so I don't know when we'll manage it.

As usual, we went to co-op, and also worked on Language Arts, Math, and Art.

In other news... we had our final planning meeting for the grad ceremony on Tuesday night.  I think it will be a great evening of celebration.  Now... if only we could get Spencer to give us some workable ideas on what he'd like to do for the "Summer of Spencer" family vacation; or what he wants to do post-high school.

Helpful homeschooling tips/advice to share... it's good that homeschoolers can learn from one another, but we don't have to be just like that "perfect" homeschool family in order to be doing it right.

What's working/not working for us... It's not that it's "not working"... but our biggest challenge right now is divvying up the computer time during the schoolday.  Some days it works out great, and other days we are tripping over each other.  We have got to get a wireless router so we can at least access the internet from our other devices.  And should we find some surprise money that we don't know what to do with, we should get another computer or two as well.

Thoughts/questions I have... WHY is it so hard to find a kneaded eraser?  They cost less than two bucks, so it's not like a big costly inventory item, and you'd think that major arts and crafts stores like AC Moore and Michaels would have them in stock.  You'd think that, but you'd be wrong, apparently.  Because I've been in both of those stores multiple times in the past several weeks and there are never any kneaded erasers.  So Kennady is having to use the old one Spencer used last year, which is fine except that it is just about black from being used on charcoal and pencil drawings, and is no longer very "kneadable" either.  *sigh* Maybe this week Michaels will get a new shipment of them! LOL

One of my favorite things this week... a fresh snow - enough to make everything pretty, but not to mess up the roads.

A photo/video/quote or link to share... 

On the bookshelf...

• Love's Reckoning by Laura Frantz
• Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
• The Wolf of Tebron by C.S. Lakin

A parting shot...

This post is linked up at iHomeschoolNetwork - See if other homeschoolers did anything special for Valentines Day! (I bet a lot of them did!)