Wednesday, May 9, 2012
More Parent Well Being
Christine, of the Welcome to my Brain blog, has a great post today called Permission to Like Yourself. As a nerdy homeschooling parent of 2 brilliant little boys, I find that academics are always the easiest part of our day. I love to learn. They love to learn. I'm good at helping them learn mostly because they effortlessly. It's the other parts of parenting that scare me, the parts that every parent, home schooling or not has to do, raising a child of good character. Accepting, liking, and loving ourselves seem to me to be the basis of all of that.
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Sleep, sweet sleep
I've never been a good sleeper. I love to stay up late and sleep
late. If I have to get up early, I've always liked to have a nap in the
middle of the day. This worked well at certain times in my life. As a
homeschooling mom, however, I don't have much time for naps. My
children are too young for me to really feel comfortable shutting the
door to my room and having a real nap. The best I get is a light doze
in the living room, where I can hear them playing and know if they open
the front or back doors.
I went on vacation with my husband. We had a cabin with east-facing windows (no curtain) that streamed bright light into our bed early every morning. We hiked all day. We went to bed early. I felt awesome.
I came home and didn't want to go back to my old schedule of staying up late every night, dragging myself out of bed each morning, and dragging myself around all day, drinking coffee and diet soda continuously.
So, I haven't. After the children go to bed, I get in bed with my Kindle, and I'm asleep before 11 PM. I realize that isn't early to some people, but it sure is to me. And then I get out of bed at around 7. I find I'm needing to set my alarm for 6:45 to do this because I just don't wake up well. (Probably may be an ADHD-type thing.)
The word on sleep deprivation and metabolism is pretty bleak. I've been reading about it for years. So what if I leave emails unanswered or chores undone? So what if I have to make activities while the children watch and help, rather than having them all ready? It'll be a lot easier to do anything the next day if I get enough sleep. Also, chores can be caught up on, but sleep is extremely difficult to catch up on. When sleep deprived, I am so much more snappy and grumpy.
I've been feeling that my sleep deprivation has been holding me back with my weight loss, as I've really struggled to see any changes on the scale these past few months, despite modest eating and exercise changes. I know I've built up muscle, and my clothes fit better, but it hasn't translated into any weight loss. I did see a slight loss about a pound, coming back from vacation, which I think was due to lack of stress, increased exercise, and better sleep. I ate plenty, including dessert (homemade cookies or brownies and S'more's trail mix!) twice a day.
Anyway, there is no other way that I know of to help myself lose weight while remaining completely imobile, other than getting enough sleep.
I went on vacation with my husband. We had a cabin with east-facing windows (no curtain) that streamed bright light into our bed early every morning. We hiked all day. We went to bed early. I felt awesome.
I came home and didn't want to go back to my old schedule of staying up late every night, dragging myself out of bed each morning, and dragging myself around all day, drinking coffee and diet soda continuously.
So, I haven't. After the children go to bed, I get in bed with my Kindle, and I'm asleep before 11 PM. I realize that isn't early to some people, but it sure is to me. And then I get out of bed at around 7. I find I'm needing to set my alarm for 6:45 to do this because I just don't wake up well. (Probably may be an ADHD-type thing.)
The word on sleep deprivation and metabolism is pretty bleak. I've been reading about it for years. So what if I leave emails unanswered or chores undone? So what if I have to make activities while the children watch and help, rather than having them all ready? It'll be a lot easier to do anything the next day if I get enough sleep. Also, chores can be caught up on, but sleep is extremely difficult to catch up on. When sleep deprived, I am so much more snappy and grumpy.
I've been feeling that my sleep deprivation has been holding me back with my weight loss, as I've really struggled to see any changes on the scale these past few months, despite modest eating and exercise changes. I know I've built up muscle, and my clothes fit better, but it hasn't translated into any weight loss. I did see a slight loss about a pound, coming back from vacation, which I think was due to lack of stress, increased exercise, and better sleep. I ate plenty, including dessert (homemade cookies or brownies and S'more's trail mix!) twice a day.
Anyway, there is no other way that I know of to help myself lose weight while remaining completely imobile, other than getting enough sleep.
Thursday, May 3, 2012
Pick Your Own
My boys are pretty familiar with the life cycle of plants. They have planted many a seed and harvested many a vegetable, but it's always good to get out and see things growing. I did talk with my son about how the strawberries in grocery stores are shipped 3000 miles from California, even though we have strawberries growing right here.
A fun and educational experience. I love anything that gets my indoor boy outside. The same farm offers peaches each year, and they also sell seasonal vegetables. I am going to shop there more now that my boys are a little older and easier to cart around.
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Unit Study: War
Well, Bee has been obsessed with war and weapons for some time. He only wears camo shirts, which I think it cute, and it makes clothes shopping for him very simple.
I've never been extremely interested in war myself, but I am trying to support his interest. The cool thing with learning about war is that there is ton of other history that goes with it. He's going to a war reinactment summer camp(!) for child his age. Also, his dad has been reading him Band of Brothers before bedtime. I assume that my sweet husband is editing any inappropriate parts, but I don't know for sure.
He's obsessed with the documentary America: The Story of Us. He's allowed to watch TV (especially documentaries) when he gets up before everyone else, and he's been watching this over and over. We're also starting Ken Burn's The Civil War, which I find fascinating, but so far, he thinks it's boring. I'm hoping he'll start to like it, because my husband would like to take him to some nearby battlefield sites, and the background would really enhance the experience.
But frequently with Bee what I think will be great isn't, and he tends to find his own way, which is often much more interesting than anything I ever would have thought up.
I've never been extremely interested in war myself, but I am trying to support his interest. The cool thing with learning about war is that there is ton of other history that goes with it. He's going to a war reinactment summer camp(!) for child his age. Also, his dad has been reading him Band of Brothers before bedtime. I assume that my sweet husband is editing any inappropriate parts, but I don't know for sure.
He's obsessed with the documentary America: The Story of Us. He's allowed to watch TV (especially documentaries) when he gets up before everyone else, and he's been watching this over and over. We're also starting Ken Burn's The Civil War, which I find fascinating, but so far, he thinks it's boring. I'm hoping he'll start to like it, because my husband would like to take him to some nearby battlefield sites, and the background would really enhance the experience.
But frequently with Bee what I think will be great isn't, and he tends to find his own way, which is often much more interesting than anything I ever would have thought up.
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
January Homeschool
Maybe I'll try updating this blog monthly with items of interest. We'll see how that goes.
We have 2 days a week where we have no activities scheduled, and 2 days a week with afternoon activities. And Friday is our free day, as long as we've been working well all week. We either play games or go somewhere special. This serves as a great motivator for Bee to do his work.
Anyway, I decided to try making one of our long homeschool days a "language day," where nearly everything we do is reading/writing related and the other day a "math day," where everything is math except for Bee's 15 minutes (or chapter) of silent reading a day. This seems to be working out beautifully. I was feeling that our days were too crammed, and I'd rather spend a long time on each assignment and let Bee get as much out of it as he wants than chop things up and have to finish the next day.
On the math front, the program TOPScience: Get a Grip, for grades K-6 program is still really enjoyable. We use it once a week. If we do anything too much, Bee tends to get bored. I need to add some different containers for Bug to play with. I've also had to buy more lentils, since Bug makes such a mess with them. In fact, the floor in the computer room has a lot of lentils on it right now.
Bee hadn't worked much with the concept of rounding/estimating before, but it's something that kids his age are expected to learn. For some reason, we struggled with it a bit (probably because it's boring). This online game has helped a lot:
Round Off.
I bought the book Games for Writing by Peggy Kaye, and I've started using some of the ideas. The main difference is that I'm encouraging Bee to dictate writing to me, rather than trying to make him write so much. This way, he puts his very creative ideas into words, and I get them on paper for him. His thinking is so much more advanced than his ability to write. He's been writing more too. He likes to write me emails on the iPad, mostly about products he wants to buy. The important thing is that he's writing! We do one collaborative creative writing a week, at least one writing a week where he writes pretty much whatever he wants (he can choose a prompt or make up his own), and we do spelling and/or dictation sentences once a week, where we focus on spelling, handwriting, and basic punctuation. It seems to be working.
Materials we are using for wrting:
1) I'm a Writer! (And I Didn't Even Know It), Grade 2 by Teresa Domnauer
2) Rory's Story Cubes
I also signed Bee up for Explode the Code Online, to help him with phonics. It's a bit repetitive for him, but I'm seeing some good results in his spelling. It's good for 15 minutes once a week.
Also once a week, I give him a word ladder to do from the book Daily Word Ladders: Grades 2-3 by Timothy V. Rasinski. I think these are good for problem solving and cementing in Bee's brain how each letter functions.
We started our "History of the Universe" unit (history and science in one). We read Born with a Bang by Jennifer Morgan and have been watching How the Universe Works on Netflix Instant. I've certainly learned a lot!
We have 2 days a week where we have no activities scheduled, and 2 days a week with afternoon activities. And Friday is our free day, as long as we've been working well all week. We either play games or go somewhere special. This serves as a great motivator for Bee to do his work.
Anyway, I decided to try making one of our long homeschool days a "language day," where nearly everything we do is reading/writing related and the other day a "math day," where everything is math except for Bee's 15 minutes (or chapter) of silent reading a day. This seems to be working out beautifully. I was feeling that our days were too crammed, and I'd rather spend a long time on each assignment and let Bee get as much out of it as he wants than chop things up and have to finish the next day.
On the math front, the program TOPScience: Get a Grip, for grades K-6 program is still really enjoyable. We use it once a week. If we do anything too much, Bee tends to get bored. I need to add some different containers for Bug to play with. I've also had to buy more lentils, since Bug makes such a mess with them. In fact, the floor in the computer room has a lot of lentils on it right now.
Bee hadn't worked much with the concept of rounding/estimating before, but it's something that kids his age are expected to learn. For some reason, we struggled with it a bit (probably because it's boring). This online game has helped a lot:
Round Off.
I bought the book Games for Writing by Peggy Kaye, and I've started using some of the ideas. The main difference is that I'm encouraging Bee to dictate writing to me, rather than trying to make him write so much. This way, he puts his very creative ideas into words, and I get them on paper for him. His thinking is so much more advanced than his ability to write. He's been writing more too. He likes to write me emails on the iPad, mostly about products he wants to buy. The important thing is that he's writing! We do one collaborative creative writing a week, at least one writing a week where he writes pretty much whatever he wants (he can choose a prompt or make up his own), and we do spelling and/or dictation sentences once a week, where we focus on spelling, handwriting, and basic punctuation. It seems to be working.
Materials we are using for wrting:
1) I'm a Writer! (And I Didn't Even Know It), Grade 2 by Teresa Domnauer
2) Rory's Story Cubes
I also signed Bee up for Explode the Code Online, to help him with phonics. It's a bit repetitive for him, but I'm seeing some good results in his spelling. It's good for 15 minutes once a week.
Also once a week, I give him a word ladder to do from the book Daily Word Ladders: Grades 2-3 by Timothy V. Rasinski. I think these are good for problem solving and cementing in Bee's brain how each letter functions.
We started our "History of the Universe" unit (history and science in one). We read Born with a Bang by Jennifer Morgan and have been watching How the Universe Works on Netflix Instant. I've certainly learned a lot!
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Holiday Crafts
We're trying to do a lot of holiday crafts. I love crafts, but it's hard to get around to doing them (deciding what to do, picking out materials, sitting the kids down). So, I've decided to focus on seasonal things (mainly Christmas). I very much prefer crafts that are low-preparation and uncomplicated! My boys do too!
Here's what we've done so far this season:
1) Leaf collage: This is a great craft because it can be done with children of many ages, toddler and on up. I uesd clear contact paper on both sides. I actually used this craft at a homeschool park day and set it up for all the children to do. I spread out a vinyl tablecloth on a picnic table, and masking taped the contact paper down for the children to work on.
2) Popsicle stick stars and snowflakes. These are also fun. We painted the sticks with glitter patio paint and then glued them the next day. Bug loved this. Bee insisted on painting his sticks with watercolors and fastening them into a house. Which was fine--he always has to come up with his own way of doing things!
3) Paper chain! Ours is 25 feet tall, and we plan to put it on our christmas tree. Bee made most of it, but Bug had fun helping too. We used scrapbook paper. I have tons of extra scrapbook paper. I cut them into pieces 6 inches by one inch with my paper trimmer and taped them together.
4) Some foamie ornaments. A little cheesey, I know, but Bug loved making them.
We need to make tons of ornaments for our tree this year to fill it up!
Here's what we've done so far this season:
1) Leaf collage: This is a great craft because it can be done with children of many ages, toddler and on up. I uesd clear contact paper on both sides. I actually used this craft at a homeschool park day and set it up for all the children to do. I spread out a vinyl tablecloth on a picnic table, and masking taped the contact paper down for the children to work on.
2) Popsicle stick stars and snowflakes. These are also fun. We painted the sticks with glitter patio paint and then glued them the next day. Bug loved this. Bee insisted on painting his sticks with watercolors and fastening them into a house. Which was fine--he always has to come up with his own way of doing things!
3) Paper chain! Ours is 25 feet tall, and we plan to put it on our christmas tree. Bee made most of it, but Bug had fun helping too. We used scrapbook paper. I have tons of extra scrapbook paper. I cut them into pieces 6 inches by one inch with my paper trimmer and taped them together.
4) Some foamie ornaments. A little cheesey, I know, but Bug loved making them.
We need to make tons of ornaments for our tree this year to fill it up!
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Get a Grip
We have started working with TOPScience: Get a Grip, for grades K-6. It is a set of puzzles that teach math and science concepts through measuring lentils. I think it is quite ingenious. Bee, my second grader, is really enjoying it. Bug, my preschooler just enjoys pouring with the lentils. The great thing is that they can work on it together. It came with all materials, so all I had to do was glue on labels and make copies of the answer sheets for Bee. I can save all of the materials and use them again when Bug is Bee's age. I plan to try many more sets from this company.
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