Looking back

 I did this blog YEARS ago when the kids were little to track what they were doing and saying, their adventures, etc. The Kids are now 18, 17 and 11..Where did all that time go. Today somebody asked how I used to keep track of their learning, etc. well...here it is. I'm really loving going back and see what the kids did way back when. So proud of how far they have come and amazed how fast the journey was. Homeschooling for us is towards the end of the road. Really Just the youngest one left that needs my attention more. 

The oldest is looking at starting a job soon, last "official" year of high school and is starting college classes this winter. Not sure what they want to do right now for a career, but has some time to figure it out. 

my 17 year old is in her 11th grade year and after years doing abnormal psychology, criminal psychology, forensic science, etc. She's now looking at International business law, or possibly psychology..and researching universities in Italy, The Netherlands and here in our own state. 

my 11 year old is loving history and is a big structural and mechanical engineering brain. I can't wait to see what he wants to do!

I've sent a link to the kids, so they too, can read and see what they were up to when they were little. LOVE YOU GUYS!!

http://lb2dadventures.blogspot.com/2016/03/what-exciting-day.html

Our adventures yesterday! 

Quality issue

As you can see from the pictures we posted last time, the camera we used had a really red tint to the pictures. I emailed the company and they are sending out a new one to us as soon as they can. The customer service with this company has been wonderful! Looking forward to getting the new camera and getting it checked out before our trip! We have a working weekend this weekend then 2 weekends of fieldtrips, We will have the new blog and kids videos up and running soon!

it's been awhile...updates

We've had a lot going on. We are getting closer to our trip to visit Omi and Opa so that's taking up some time and energy. The kids are starting to work on their idea's for video's while we are gone and are wanting to do an updated and "new" version of their blog so I am slowly working on that with them as well. Then we had to put our dog down due to advanced stage lymphoma. The kids dealt with it pretty good. There were some tears and occasionally they get sad and talk about him. We are also trying to get caught up with other things and ended up getting 13 new baby chickens that a friend is hosting while they get their feathers in and can go out into the coop. We are down to 4 of our old ones and they are all over 3 years old now and probably won't be around to much longer. So we are working on taking down the chicken run and redoing it (hopefully will have everything ready before the new chickens come home).

We had some fun the last couple of weeks as well while having to traveling to Dr. appointments. The weather was pretty nice so we were able to go for a couple of short walks they discovered a few interesting looking mushrooms and saw a snake.

Then there was picking out our chicks and taking them to a friends house until they are ready for us..

They got to play with the baby sheep, see a newt, catch a frog, swing on the rope swing, pet a bunny and for Dominic it was a great day to find all of his friend Fred's trucks! Thanks Fred!

We had friends come and stay a week with us as well as having Omi and Opa visit in January. It's been a crazy year so far. The kids are all excited about the upcoming trip and have been figuring out where everyone wants to go. The list is getting pretty long! 

Anyway wanted to get people updated since it's been a while. I'll have lots coming up soon, and then our trip before to long as well!

WOW! Catching up!

So...yes, we've been busy again!

Arianna has had an initial evaluation with CDRC (Child Development and Rehabilitation Center) and was diagnosed ADHD (which we knew YEARS ago. lol), slight speech articulation issue (and we knew that, as both myself and her older brother went thru a year of speech therapy to correct similar issues) as well as Dyslexic/Dysgraphia/Learning diability.  It was very interesting process and the Dr's impression was pretty close to what we knew.

"She is quick to learn, primarily when it is visually related or when information is presented to her orally." and the assessment stated " the more difficult the questions, the more she pays attention and the more answers she gets correctly (he only went up to 5th grade level I believe). Then he wrote that She was very vocal and carried on a conversation that was much higher than her chronological age.

So we are going to be working with the school district for more testing and evaluating her. We did get a recommendation for Bookshare.org which is a site for free audio books for students with learning disabilities with printed text. You do need a formal diagnoses but it is a wonderful resource for those that need it.

We also got all three kittens moved home and that has been an interesting and fun process! Arianna's kitten ignores everyone except her. She will sit with Arianna a lot, which actually helps Arianna settle down and keeps her sitting! She'll sit there and pet cupcake thru out a short film, or a discussion over a lesson, etc. The only time cupcake visits anyone else is when Arianna is gone for a sleep over at her friends house.  Cookie, Kaitlyn's kitten, ignores us unless we pick him up. Then he will sit with us for awhile (where as cupcake will get away from us as soon as possible if we pick her up). Gumball should have come with a warning label. He likes to run down the hall, across the living room and launch himself onto your upper chest..Which causes a few cuss words on occasion because your not expecting it. He will also scoot as close to your face as possible to lick it then bite you..and he especially loves ears. He's also incredibly PERSISTENT when doing so!

We have had a couple of fieldtrips as well. One to the World forestry Center and another to the Portland Aquarium. and we have another fieldtrip coming up soon as well!

At the World Forestry Center





The girls and I had a Fire jumper competition to see who could "land" the closest to the fire with out landing in it...Kaitlyn won! She did a great job! Then the girls took a river trip...


We tried and tried to get Dominic to get in, but he was having none of it! at least until it was almost time to go. Then we did get him in and got a picture from the automated machine there.

At the Portland Aquarium...


Kaitlyn thought this guy was pretty cool! Then she discovered the rest of the place!




 They had a ball! One of the touch tanks has small sharks and stingrays. The girls were so excited to touch them while Dominic was very silly! He didn't want to pet them, but it was okay if they petted him! So he would put his hand into the water and wait for the stingrays to swim by and brush up against his fingers. Then he would laugh and laugh and laugh! One stingray came up and a little out of the water against the wall and splashed him which he also though was fun and he tried to splash it back.
After that we headed up to the IKEA in Portland and bought Dominic a little kids bed so we could finally move him out of his pack and play bed. So far he seems to really enjoy it! and While we were there the girls found their "dream" room. So now that we have an idea of what they want for their room we can start slowly moving in that direction!
It's been an exhausting time, but we are starting to feel like we are actually accomplishing things again!

FAQ..

I was asked if I found homeschooling easier than public schools..in some regards yes. I don't have to have them up super early and out the door super early. I don't have to do the pick up, parent/teacher conferences, fill out a lot of paper work, etc. but that just means I have to do everything..but at least it's more or less on our own schedule.
Are the kids always easy to deal with...um...No...but that's a given. Nobody is ALWAYS easy to deal with..and when one or more of your kids is not your typical kid. When your dealing with ADHD, LD's, Special needs, or any number or other things, each day has its own little challenges..Somedays are better than others..
Do I get time to myself...sometimes. I'm lucky enough to have a great friend who also homeschools her children and we sometimes take turns having each others kids over for a night...or two...or three....when we DO need breaks. I do try and get up before the kids in the mornings so I have a breather before starting the day..it's my "coffee and quiet" time..I like to have some time in the evenings as well and generally send the kids off to bed so I can wind down as well.
Do I ever want to send them to public school...as in today was horrid and why do I even do this? No. Do I want to send them to Public school if they want to go in? Possibly. If they know what they are getting into, and have thought out the pro's and con's and have an idea of WHY they want to go to public school vs. homeschooling  or schooling at home (public online school, charter schools etc.)
Will I homeschool thru high school? I have no idea. If they are fairly self motivated and have interests they want to pursue and are wanting to stay in a homeschooling or schooling at home environment I have no problem with that.
Do you expect your kids to go to college or university? Well, pretty much! Although if they want to do a trade school etc. that is fine as well! I do not expect them to stop with just a high school diploma.
What about socialization? Well, that's a fairly typical question of all homeschoolers. We have groups, clubs, fieldtrips etc..so yes, they get LOTS of socialization.
I would say those are the most typical questions I get all the time...along with..do you LIKE homeschooling? And YES, we like homeschooling...

throwing stuff together...science style..

So I promised a while back that I would kind of explain what I did for some of our classes. I'm starting with science because that's some of the easier stuff for me to throw together.

So this year the kids are doing a couple of different science classes but for the purposes here I'm throwing together their zoology stuff (we also have geology and marine biology).

The first thing I do is go thru their main book they are working out of, in this case it's the Sassafras Twins.

I got them the logbook that goes with it..

Then I got three other science books that I go thru and see which experiments and subjects go well with the first book above...

Then I look around the house and see what I already have sitting around that can be added to it as well..

Then I try and add it some fun stuff...

I also have a couple of others of the card games but this one works well with the first few chapters in the book. I look to see what kind of movies, documentaries or other programing we may have playing available on netflix, youtube, and Hulu that might go well with it as well as going thru their fun reading books and adding in whatever might go with which ever chapter we are on. Then I look at things in our area that might go well with it as well, field trips are the funnest part to take a look at. I do try and plan them according to the progression in the book. So for instance the first chapters cover the African grasslands so we might go to the cheap day at the zoo and head straight for the African animal exhibits. When we get to ocean animals (at the end of the book) I already have the 2hour marine boat tour and science class booked. We have tickets for the aquarium purchased already (Thank you Groupon!)! It does sound like a lot of work, but in reality it takes very little time (Other than the field trip planning since I do the field trips for a larger group than just the family, it tends to be the most time consuming).

Yes, I do similar for each subject they want to tackle. History,  cultural studies, etc. I will admit it helps that we (my husband and I) are avid readers and have a ton of books at home.  The kids also have a nice selection, but that usually takes me a little longer to go thru since I'm not always 100% certain what they have and where.