Fashion Sewing Party!

If you are a long time reader, then you might remember that we have three birthdays to celebrate the first week or so of June! R10, I8, and J5 will have birthdays in the next week and a half so we have begun to celebrate! Although it's early, we are already two parties down this season- to accommodate our friends' calendars and our need to spread things out a bit. R10 will be 11 on Wednesday, but we celebrated yesterday with her friends. I8 had a party on Saturday and I'll share about that as well.

Her theme this year was Fashion Sewing! And we invited the girls to bring their favorite doll or stuffed animal to make a skirt or really anything they wanted for it and to have a runway show when they were all finished! Fun stuff, right?

The invitation- we made them in a bunch of colors with different buttons, straps, and designs.

The purse opened to reveal a card inside with the invitation

The back gave some details!

Our design source- I LOVE this kit. I am a paper crafter after all!

Easy directions and ideas

Bags for the girls to take their finished product in- made mostly from fat quarters for ease

I found two machines going- R's is on the left and a friend brought another. Mine is off to the Bernina shop for a repair. I was surprised they had room for two on R's art desk.

The creation will be a dress for a doll- E is working on a sort of dress collar.

What a joyful mess!

I wasn't sure they'd gotten started, so I pulled away from adult conversation to see what was happening and if they were ready to begin. And this is what I found! Simply delightful!

E is working on fixing her mistake. She measured the size of her dress again.

R10's skirt- this is the unfinished version. Stay tuned.

Did I mention there are always boys at our house? Doing boy things? I invited one of the girl's brothers and they were loud having a wonderful time. I laughed at how quiet it would have been had they swapped houses for the playdate, but here J5 is making his presence known!

R is working out some extra bling for Kit's skirt.

E has made a slim dress for her doll and she is choosing some ribbon for the straps.

Another E is working on a halter dress for her doll Phoebe.

J made a doll sized pillow.

A seam forgotten...

Additions complete!

Phoebe is handmade including all she is wearing.

Another finished dress!

I think my favorite part of this party was watching the girls work together and on their own to create a sewn item. I somehow thought that they would need more help or guidance, but they just went to work and it was fun to peek in on them to check on progress. In the end, they were very pleased with their creations and we ran out of time for the official runway show.

Makes me think that a little sewing club would be great fun. I will have to think on this a bit. Of course there were the usuals...cake and presents and some time outside. She got some really cute things and I'm just sure Miss Bliss will share them over at her blog soon.

Yummy Math

Have you all seen the website Yummy Math? Their motto is:  

We provide teachers and students with mathematics relevant to our world today                      

                                                                  ... and it's delicious 

E12 worked on comparing night time vs day time severe tornadoes this week.

This is a fabulous site for finding some challenging math activities for E12. We did a lot of graphing of equations- lines and parabolas using this website. They have a steady supply of authentic, meaningful, applied math activities for middle school math.

This is a super living math resource. Go over and visit!

Field Trip: Life of a Civil War Union Soldier

We had the chance the other night to join some friends for an evening with a Union Soldier. Last year our kids did an extensive study on the Underground Railroad and the events leading up to the Civil War. Their interest fizzled somewhat on the actual war part. We'll visit that another time.

He told stories of a union private and the kids could have listened for hours!

His cap tells a story too- too much for me to keep up with but it tells which regiment he is from.

He has his gear around him and has considered his pack to be unnecessary. Our speaker became interested in re-enacting while homeschooling his own children. You never know where a hobby will come from!

The kids loved hearing about his gear. He had just come home from an engagement in Winchester, VA. Which led he and I to discuss Harpers Ferry and Antietam via C&O Canal tow path...I spent A LOT of time riding my bike there just after college when I taught school.

I also learned that R10 knows quite a bit about what a drummer's duties were during the war- all the reasons they'd play. One fact we didn't know was that a drummer would keep a record of the regiments movements on the inside of his drum. How about that! So interesting.

What a great evening we all had! R10 is anxious to read two books she learned about Tuesday night. And we have them already in our possession- The Rebel Yell and the Yankee Hurrah and Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. The first one is from the journal of John Haley a volunteer from Maine. It has a lot of dry humor and the kids enjoyed hearing snippets that evening. Team of Rivals is a book that was recommended and R told our speaker that surely it was a book she would love. Let's see if this holds true! I picked up the Rebel Yell book yesterday and ordered the audio book (because I couldn't find a print copy). While we were stopped out front waiting for E12 to come out with our book stash, the librarian was on her way in and asked if I really wanted just part 2 of that book. And then she pulled the print copy I couldn't find online so I'll be stopping back today for Team of Rivals. I love our village library!

So R10 is set for a little light summer reading...

Pill Bug Notebook Page

As promised, a glimpse of the notebook page the kids did on pill bugs. This one is R10's page. I was going to use a page that Barb at Handbook of Nature Study had suggested, but I was having trouble with the download that day. All is well now, but when a notebook page isn't available, I just go with it.

This one hasn't been spell checked!

We have been inundated with dr's appointments this month between regular dental appointments, my check ups, ENT appts, and some bouts with pink eye- which are still going on! So, our relaxed pace at home has not been normal these last few weeks.

Some things we have been doing include finishing up our school year and planning our garden. This year we are participating in the heritage garden club through 4H and our theme this year is sunflowers. We've also designed a small herb garden which we're pretty excited about. We decided to just do these two plantings and we are hoping for some success! I will share with you our sunflower garden plans in a bit. We haven't done any planting because Memorial Day is just about upon us and believe it or not, it's not safe to plant before Memorial Day where we are. I know many of you are well into your gardening, but the growing season is short and it's just about time.

Speaking of notebook pages, I thought I'd share here that Debra at NotebookingPages.Com is having her birthday sale for just another few days. I'm not an affiliate, but I do have a membership which I just renewed with this great sale and let's just say, I won't have to worry about a source for notebooking pages for a long, long time!

I am hoping to take the kids out walking at the nearby plantations to have a look at some blooming plants tomorrow- before a dentist appt. Probably a great opportunity to take along some watercolor pencils for some sketching. Have you done any spring nature study this season?

Nature Study: Pill Bugs

Nothing like a small crustacean crawling across your playroom floor to bring about a great homeschool lesson! While J5 was playing the other day, he found a bug making its way - I'm guessing to some place dryer than where he came from. The amount of rain we've had this spring is staggering. Our ever-inquisitive boy decided to catch him. I offered up a box and from there it snowballed.

E12 helps J5 to secure some grass and rocks for the pill bug's habitat.

R10 offers a flower- always concerned with the artsy environment!

The finished habitat- note the rock with water on it so he can sip and the "rotting vegetation" in the corner.

Once the kids had placed the pill bug in its new home, I told them they need to find out what he eats and what sorts of thing pill bugs like. Everyone had a turn and did you know that Pill Bugs eat rotting vegetation? Out the door they went and in came some leaf matter.

Great resource for nature study in general is the One Small Square series- in here we found information about pill bugs on the "Litter Bugs" page. These books have super illustrations and J5 loves to spend time looking at all the different levels in his own backyard.

E12 learned that pill bugs are only true rollie pollies if they curl into a ball. Otherwise, I guess they are posers! But I couldn't tell you what kind. This one rolled up, but he was tiny. Must have been fairly new in the world. It's a shame he found his way to the desert known as our carpeting. Pill bugs are the only crustaceans that live outside of water as adults. We learned all kinds of things about our friend and of course we did a nature journal page. Should have gotten a picture. We used a page from NotebookingPages.com. I'll come back and add that I think. It's late and I haven't posted since Thursday so it's time!

What a great lesson today and all because I said yes to a bug pet for the day. Our little bug was a bit too manhandled or else he succumbed to the ill-effects of desert travel. Either way he only lasted the day. However, today he found a larger one and freshened up the habitat.

Stay tuned for a fine journal entry and more information on pill bugs!

The Queen Bee

While the big kids were enjoying a day at the school house, J5 and I took off for home where we had a nice morning together doing some Reading Made Easy and playing games. His reading lesson (I should say lessons because he is just blowing through them since he can read it all so far) had a story about a queen bee and her work bees. After we ate lunch, I took him to our local science center for a bit of fun and you'll never guess what we saw! Bees! (pardon the phone pics)

J5 checks for the queen bee. Where could she be?

Terrible phone picture of the hive- we went again yesterday between dr's appts and the other side has a lot more bees!

And finally the perfect sentence to follow up on our lesson.

We had such a fun time together. I love being a member here because if we have to wait things out in town (and it's not cold and flu season!), I can just drop in for a while and have some fun with the kids.

Field Trip: 1892 School Day

Today the three older kids had a visit to a local one room school house. We've been participating in this for a few years, but last year they were doing some renovations to the schoolhouse. This semester, in preparation for the big day, there was a co-op class and I8 took it as his second class. He loved it. On Co-op Night, he and the other students were able to recite all kinds of poems and sayings from 1892 including the Gettysburg Address. They did a great job!

During the semester the kids made silhouettes, learned what boys and girls wear and made their own flags.

They made a map of the US in 1892 and made lunch pails and napkins for taking lunch to and 1892 school.

The teacher shared stories from books used then.

These flags turned out really well! They used just the right amount of stars.

Lunch is ready to go- no plastic (except for the water bottles- I cheated on that one) and not even peanut butter which was scarce back then.

Our pupils ready for a day at 1892 school

The kids gathered out front this morning. Aren't all those dresses sweet?

The schoolhouse is octagonal in shape. The original house was a four sided wooden structure which burned down. They rebuilt it in brick so that it would not burn.

A good time was held by all, but the weather was a disappointment for sure. It is cold and misty/rainy/foggy today and all week so the kids were inside for recess and lunch. Reportedly, it was COLD inside the schoolhouse and the stove was broken- no heat! You would think this is not an issue in May, but it is!

Fashion Design

R10 and I have been to a few university fashion shows recently, which I'll report on very soon. In the meantime, these are the gowns she and her friend designed using her little doll sized dress form the night of the Civil War Ball. Enjoy the creative spirit!

This one is my personal favorite!

Next year these girls will be attending the ball themselves. It will be fun to see what design they come up with in the end. I will surely report on what they wear!