October Celebrations

October is, without question, our favorite month of the year. 

We have so much to celebrate in October!

Like our 9th anniversary.  Wow. 

And Casey's birthday.  He's officially old, so someone really nice made him this from-scratch chocolate cake.

With a baby on her hip at least 80% of the time.  I had to throw that in there.  I like the sympathy vote.

Of course, there were other things (besides food) to celebrate.  Like pumpkin patch visits.

And costumes to be worn.

This costume brought to you entirely by my husband.  He has been plotting this baby for several years.  Of course, this year, we were one too many to go as just the Incredibles.  Fortunately, Livvy didn't mind taking on the role of Syndrome.

So, something interesting we discovered while out and about?  When you dress as the Incredibles, people will talk to you as if you are the Incredibles, and stop you often for photos. 

Oh my goodness, it's Mr. Incredible!  Can I get a photo with you?  My daughter loves your movie, it's her favorite!  

That one definitely caught me by surprise. Of course, the kids completely loved it.  I'm pretty sure they thought they were actual celebrities by the time our day at Boo at the Zoo was over.  Maybe it was because we had all the genders in the right order?  Or because we came complete with Jack-Jack?  I don't know.  But, it was pretty cute to have little kids running up to us in sheer delight.

The adults who came without children to pose for photos?  Well... that wasn't quite so cute.

We also stayed up late to enjoy a fun Family Night, complete with glow sticks, flashlight tag and smores.

We got really excited about the first snow of the season. 

It wasn't much, but ooooh, we do love the white stuff.

CC Cycle 3 Week 1: Columbus

So, I have a confession to make.

This is our first repeat cycle with Classical Conversations.  Although I very fervently believe in the process (and I do), I wasn't exactly sure what our first repeat cycle would look like.  After all... the last time we learned about American history, my kiddos looked like...

....this.

Oh my.  Blast from the past, right?  

When we began CC, Leah was four and a half and beginning kindergarten.  Logan was just two, and little Livvy was all of about one month old.  Back then, I was extremely impressed by the incredible acquisition of facts, retention of dates, and advanced vocabulary CC provided.  

But.  Three cycles?  The same three cycles repeated for the next seven years?  Would it really work?

As we began this week, it took literally three minutes for my faith in the Classical method to be confirmed.  Because, my kid?  She knows this stuff.  She doesn't remember it all, exactly, but this information is definitely in there.  

It was so much fun to see the marked difference between Leah and Logan - who learned everything together last year at roughly the same pace.  Logan is going through this information for the first time, and I have to go slow, pause often and repeat many times (which is perfectly normal.  This is the foundational part of the Classical process, and he is doing an amazing job!).

What is so incredible, what I had heard stories of but had never yet witnessed for myself, is the incredible growth that happens as they go through the information again.  Leah hears it once and has it because she remembers this information from three years ago.  It's CRAZY!  AMAZING!!  And most of all, delightful.  Such a joy to bear witness to this beautiful learning process. Because she has the vocabulary down, we can begin to go deeper and explore topics with dimension and enthusiasm. 

This week's focus was on Columbus, who, I'll be honest, we've read rather a lot about in the past.  So, although we refreshed our memories on the basics, we didn't spend a ton of time on him and focused our attention instead to what life was like as the first colonists began to build their lives in the New World.

This week's reading list: 

This Country of Ours by H.E. Marshall: The Adventures of John Smith

Story of the World: Columbus

Roanoake: The Lost Colony by Jane Yolen

Paddle to the Sea Ch. 3

Burgess Animal Book by Thornton Burgess

The Adventurous Life of Myles Standish by Cheryl Harness

Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by Edith Nesbit: Two Gentlemen of Verona

Winnie the Pooh by A.A. Milne

Poetry: When We Were Very Young by A.A. Milne

Composer: J.S. Bach (Becoming Bach by Tom Leonard)

Picture Study: Mrs. Noah Smith and Her Children by Ralph Earl (1798)

We are focusing our attention on one virtue per month.  This month, we're learning about Respect.  They've defined it and memorized a Bible verse to support the virtue.

This week, we identified and practiced some ways that we can show respect in our actions, and read about how even wolves use respect as an important part of their pack dynamic.

Since it was our first week back with CC, we set up the science notebooks I created for them.  Each week, they'll do a brief reading and activity to reinforce our science memory work (which focuses on anatomy and chemistry this year).

It's so fun to watch the little things that kids enjoy.  Coloring and getting to decorate their science notebooks with stickers took so much longer than I'd anticipated, because they were so excited and took such care in their work.

When they had at last adequately beautified their notebooks, it was time to get down to business.

As my pre-writer, Logan is practicing cutting and pasting his together.  

At 7, Leah reads through the information for us and can write her own answers. 

And, of course, my little Livvy, hard at work.  The ways in which she keeps herself busy as we do school are truly a wonder.  Someday, I'll have to do a post on what she does while we do school.  It's pretty impressive in its own right. 

The two big ones also watched, with alternating disappointment and awe, the Disney movie Pocahontas.  Awe because, well, it might be one of the most astonishingly beautiful movies Disney has ever done.  And the soundtrack?!  It wow-ed us.  Having read several accounts of  both Pocahontas's and John Smith's life, the plot line left something to be desired.  

BUT --- the fact that they recognized and discussed that all on their own?  I'll take it!  

Sunny Days

It has been another wonderful summer for our family.  I can never seem to come to grips with how fast summers go.  June and July just flew by, it seems before I've even had a chance to keep up.  

I have to cop to being excited, though.  The last two months have been incredibly busy.  Nearly every day has had something in it... which is why I am so eager to transition into August.  Although there are a few things on the calendar, our August schedule is so much more relaxed.  We have three whole weeks almost entirely to ourselves. 

To savor moments like these:

4th Fun

If you've been around here a while (or know me at all...), you know that holiday and family traditions are among my favorite things to cultivate inside our four walls.  

It is my firm belief that, though we inherit history, we also create it.  In between the menial tasks of dishes and laundry, it is this calling that keeps me pushing forward: to set in motion a narrative that fills the heart and souls of my children; a narrative that will bring delight in times of joy, and echo in their minds at the moments when they most need direction.  A narrative of heroes and home and life well lived that can be gladly handed down.

And so our narrative begins.  It is a legacy of red-white-and-blue pancakes and crisp bacon, eagerly anticipated. 

Of crafting during a reading of the Declaration of Independence.

Of patio lunches and lemonade in the shade, while John Phillip Sousa's works blast their patriotic refrain. 

Of backyard obstacle courses,

and potato sack races.

A legacy of love, hugs and laughter.  A holding place for all that is beautiful, holy and worth having.  

"The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life." - George Eliot, Middlemarch

It is worth recording: this was my favorite Fourth with miss Livvy Joy.  Oh my.  Her enthusiasm and awe were palpable.  Her sweet little voice laughed and rejoiced with pure wonder at each explosion in the sky.  The colors, sounds and textures overwhelmed her in the most beautiful ways possible.  

Oh that we should all experience life that way!

Plus, life is just sweeter when there's a baby to share it with. :)