Teaching a Craft

Yesterday I taught the first in a series of classes on rubberstamping. I opened the class up to the girls in our homeschool group and we had a great class! The girls were all so sweet, well-mannered and so purposeful in their creations, it was truly a joy and a blessing in my life to teach them. Pictured above are two of the projects we completed - a Father's Day Card and a Tin with a crafted Paper Flower and little tag. The last project was a Mother's Day Card and I must keep that under wraps so it can be a surprise for the Moms.

Rubberstamping is a love of mine and I have so enjoyed sharing it with many women. I am so happy that I can now share this craft with the young girls in our homeschool group. I love Charlotte Mason's philosophy about teaching children a craft that they can grow into and use, for the rest of their life.

Summer Plans

I love the flexibility that homeschooling allows us and to help keep our schedule flexible during the school year, we continue to school through the summer. Our schooling though, during the summer, looks a lot different than the rest of the year. Our primary focus is Math and Reading, not just reviewing the past year but, moving ahead to new concepts.

So, this summer our plan is to continue working through our Horizons Math Workbooks. Devin is going to continue memorizing his multiplication tables and Lexi is going to work hard on getting a good understanding of money and time. I really hit the jackpot at the Used Curriculum Sale I attended when I scored a ton of used books and readers for the kids' summer reading list.

We will also continue our Nature Study this summer. Our focus being vegetable gardening. For the most part we are container gardening but, we are also planting two blueberry bushes, that already have blueberries on them.

Of course, we will also have fun lazy days at our pool and the kids are signed up for several camps that they are looking forward to -- so all in all I think we will have a nice balance. I am looking forward to a change of pace! I don't think summer can get here soon enough.

End of the Year

All of our End of Year excitement has begun. This past week all three kids had their last choir performances and Friday was our last day of classes at JFBC. As we wind down our year, with just a few lessons left in each of our books, I am beginning to plan for summer. More on our summer plan in another post.

Here are a few pictures from our week ...

Above: Lexi performing with her choir.
Above: Ava Mae performing with her choir.
Above: Close-up of Devin on stage for Camp Wallaballa.
Above: Lexi with her two wonderful teachers from this past year - Mrs. Brooks and Mrs. Woyce.

So much fun ... and much more excitement to come in the weeks ahead, including, Devin's RA Awards Night, Devin's last baseball game and awards and, the girls' Dance Recital.

Bunny Excitement

The kids were so excited when we rescued this adorable little bunny last night from a feral cat. Thankfully, it only had a small puncture wound to its leg and the rehab clinic feels it will make a full recovery and be able to be returned to the wild.

Of course, the kids had a hard time understanding why we could not make our new rabbit friend into a pet.

Spring Also Means Dance Recitals

Yesterday and today were recital pictures at our ballet school. This is one of the girls favorite times of the year. Neither Lexi, nor Ava Mae, can get enough of dressing up in their recital costumes. They also enjoy counting down the classes until dress rehearsal and recital. Such a fun time of year!

Spring Means Baseball and Planting

Today was a typical Spring Saturday ... Devin had a baseball game, my husband coaches the team, so the girls and I go to cheer on Devin and the team. This year one of the family's from our church, who we are close to, have their son on the team. It is fun to have friends at the games! Win or lose we always have a great time.


This afternoon we began our planting for the Spring. We missed out on planting our container garden last year, when I had emergency surgery at the beginning of April and was out of commission until May. This year it was high on my priority list of things we needed to get done. Today we planted tomatoes and sweet peppers along with a couple of containers of flowers. Ava Mae added her own touch to her flower pot and included some stray flowers which had fallen from their bush at the garden center we were shopping at.


I just love Spring! Cool mornings ... Warm afternoons ... Baseball ... Flowers ...

Impromptu Nature Study

Last night, while my two girls were playing in our backyard they discovered an injured moth. Lexi is convinced that a bird had gotten it and eaten part of the moth's wing. So, the moth has been living inside a bug cage since last night. It even went on a fieldtrip today to Lexi's Friday school class. I don't think it will make it much longer but, Lexi is doing everything in her power to help her injured moth including feeding it fresh flowers and sugar water.

Edited to add: We turned our moth loose last night. He was still doing well and we placed him on an azalea bush in our front yard.