Meet the Masters!

I am SO excited to have purchased a 3 year subscription to Meet the Masters via Homeschool Buyer's Co-op!   I've been interested in this program for a while, but I thought it was a little pricey.  So, when I saw that it was being offered at a deeply discounted price (45% off) at Homeschool Buyer's Co-op, I was quick to purchase it.


Our girls LOVE to study various artists, and I think this program will make it easier for me and more fun for all of us to learn about the different artists.

Here's a link to more info about Meet the Masters via Homeschool Buyer's Co-op.

Don't forget to put CHEERIOS as your referral code when you join Homeschool Buyer's Co-op (it's free!)...you'll get 500 BONUS Smartpoints, and I'll receive a small bounty.  Thanks!

This offer expires on May 7, 2012.

F Week

E(2) had F week a couple of months ago...

She traced the sandpaper letter f





She matched objects that begin with the letter F to the felt F





We went to the woods for feather hunt, but we didn't find any.






We flew like birds!
Loving the flower arranging sensory bin! We baked cookies and got covered in flour! E LOVES playing with her forest puzzle! She loves using her dot painters on these coloring sheets. Her favorite activity from her "F" fun pack was the growing fish in an aquarium ("tarium").

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Homeschool Buyer's Co-op

I'm happy to announce that I'm an affiliate for Homeschool Buyer's Co-op!!!  I've been very pleased with my purchases through the Co-op, so I was thrilled when they contacted me and asked me to be an affiliate.  So, what does that mean???

When you join Homeschool Buyer's Co-op simply put CHEERIOS in as your referral code.  You'll automatically get 500 BONUS Smartpoints, and when you make your first purchase, I will receive a small bounty.  Easy, right?

I will let you know periodically about programs that are offered at Homeschool Buyer's Co-op, and I will also review the programs that I purchase to use with my own children.

Also, it's FREE to join!

The Alphabet Stomp

While Elliott and I were in a hospital far away having his brain tumor removed, the girls stayed with their grandparents for the week (the longest we've ever been away from them...it was so hard).  They had lots of fun playing outside and playing school.  My mom found these large letter cards leftover from her teacher days, and they had fun learning with them all week.


One day after we returned home, I spread the cards out all over the floor of the deck, and we played "Alphabet Stomp!"  I called out letter names or sounds, and the girls found the letters and stomped on them.


After playing for a while, we put the letters in ABC order.


Then we walked along our alphabet path and said the letter names or sounds as we walked.


Lastly, O(5) and I had fun making words with the letter cards.



My favorite thing about this activity was that we did it outside!  I love for our girls to spend as much time outside as possible. They usually spend their outside time digging in the dirt and making various stews and soups out of dirt, sand, gumballs, leaves, etc, but occasionally we'll "play" school, too :)

E Week

We had fun during E week... (a long time ago...I'm so behind on these posts) We made an elephant puppet. E(2) named it Ellie.
She colored on hot boiled eggs with crayons. She and my mom made egg salad. E LOVES to cut eggs with the egg slicer, and she loves to eat egg salad! We had fun gathering eggs! She traced the sandpaper E. She loved painting E sheets with dot painters (she also loved painting her fingers and hands).

Kindergarten Activity Bag...Sight Words Beans

I put together this activity for O(5) a few months ago to take on vacation. It was super simple to put together.




I used sharpie marker to write sight words from the dolch sight words lists onto white beans.  Done!





The beans can be kept in a pencil pouch for "on the go" sight words practice.

Studying Degas

We studied Degas during February. E(2) loved painting a Degas coloring page with liquid watercolors (and when I looked away, she quickly painted her face...so funny).
We checked out Degas and the Little Dancer and have read it repeatedly. It's a wonderful book, and we all love it. We read Dancing with Degas. We planned to do a Degas art project, but that fell to the back burner after Elliott's brain tumor diagnosis. We'll get back to Degas and our project eventually...maybe.  

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Pattern Blocks on Contact Paper

E(2) and I had fun making designs with pattern blocks on contact paper about a month ago.  I saw this idea somewhere, but I have no idea where (to be honest, the entire month of March is like a blur to me, and the only reason I remembered this activity at all is because I came across the pictures in my dropshots account!)



We taped a piece of contact paper (sticky side out) to the glass door and got to work.  We had fun making boats and starts, and E made a "snowman."  I made the design in the center, and E said "that looks just like a mandala!"  Love my girl!

Homemade Moon Sand....FAIL!

Edit to add:  Our moon sand was great for a few days, and then it turned nasty...very, very nasty.  Don't make my mistake and use cornmeal instead of cornstarch...unless you only want it to last for a couple of days :)

The girls and I had fun making and playing with homemade Moon Sand last week. We made moon sand with O(5) when she was younger (probably 2), and it was really messy. This time we used a different recipe, and I liked it better. Here is the link to the blog where this idea originated. To make moon sand you need 4 cups of sand, 2 cups of corn meal (the recipe says corn flour, but we used corn meal...evidently I was supposed to use corn starch.  However, it worked out fine with the corn meal, and I like it better since we used cornstarch last time, and it was terribly messy.  I'm not sure how long it will last...I'll let you know), and 1 cup of water. We ended up tripling the recipe and adding a little bit of extra water.

The girls took turns pouring in the ingredients, and they loved mixing the dry sand and corn meal. I added in some mini construction vehicles, and we had a work site! I had fun playing with them, and O(5) asked "Mama, how do you know so much about construction?" so I must have done a good job of pretending! We were excited when Elliott played with us, too! They tired of the construction zone fairly quickly and started cooking with the sand...no big surprise there :)