Our 8th Week of School

This week's co op art project won't be finished until next week, and Eli asked me not to post the in progress shots until they're finished.  

As I said last week, still loving the new grammar program.  I'm considering adding All About Reading for Jack.  I'd love to hear from anyone who's used it!

Being that it's October, I thought it was time for a pumpkin craft.  Eli used a mix of red and yellow paints... applied with his finger.

I decided to brush on glue and water soaked tissue paper for mine.

Jack painted his with a brush.  The craft kits came from Oriental Trading Company.

Eli decided once his paint dried that it wasn't quite orange enough, so he went over his with tissue paper.

The finished pumpkins are hanging in our school room window.

We're in the process of reviewing treasure hunts!  This has been a lot of fun, and in this week's hunt, the boys were asked to draw...

...dragons with 4 heads!  Eli's dragon heads all have different functions.  And the farthest left one is a bearded dragon.

Jack's dragon seems to be a distant cousin of an earthworm.

 Miss Brianna has been dying to cut her hair, and finally got it done this week.

We started a new batch of water beads.  I always think I'm making these for Katie, but everybody in the house ends up playing with them.

This was a total pin flop.  I saw something on Pinterest about putting water beads into water balloons for a stress ball and thought we'd give it a shot.  It also mentioned freezing water beads for summer play.

Turns out freezing water beads is a bad idea.  Ah well, live and learn, right.

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A Lady at Willowgrove Hall book review and Kindle #giveaway

Today's book is A Lady at Willowgrove Hall.  This was another book I ended up finishing at 2 a.m.

I need to resolve to stop reviewing the second or third book in a series when I haven't read the prior books.  I enjoyed A Lady at Willowgrove Hall so much that I needed to pick up The Heiress of Winterwood and The Headmistress of Rosemere, the first two books in the series.  Fortunately, I do enough non-emergency shopping on Amazon that their new "no rush" shipping deal, where you get $1 book credit each time you don't need your Prime order in 2 days works out well for me.  I had some book credit saved up.

The title is more meaningful that you would think at first glance.  Cecily doesn't think she's a lady, yet her actions at Willowgrove Hall show her to be one, as she faces trials with poise and dignity--most of the time!

Cecily is a woman with a Past.  A past that comes back to haunt her when she takes a position at a faraway estate and finds... Mr. Moreton, whom she has not seen in 5 years, but who knows her secret.  The one part of the story I thought could have been written differently was when Mr. Stanton finds out her secret.  In the era of the story, purity and virtue were very important, and I feel the author glossed over the issue with a "love conquers all" attitude.  Still, I enjoyed the book, and I'm looking forward to reading the first two when they arrive.


Award-winning author Sarah E. Ladd examines how to escape the clutches of a tainted past in the final installment of her Whispers on the Moor series. A Regency-era novel, A Lady at Willowgrove Hall cleverly shows that even though our pasts may be shameful or painful, God can take the darkest personal histories and turn them into the brightest futures.

Celebrate with Sarah by entering her Kindle HDX giveaway!
One grand prize winner will receive:

• A Kindle Fire HDX
• A Lady at Willowgrove Hall by Sarah E. Ladd

Enter today by clicking the icon below. But hurry, the giveaway ends on November 2nd. Winner will be announced November 3rd here.


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Pan For Gold!

July 4, 2014

When we went to Nevada over the summer, the kids got to pan for gold.  Eli, in particular loved it, so when I saw the Pan For Gold review opportunity, I knew he'd be excited.

I was right!  I used the kit as the prize for a treasure hunt I did with the boys, and they were really excited when they found it.

The Pan For Gold kit comes with a gold pan, tweezers, magnifier, 2 bags of enriched dirt, a large piece of fool's gold, a nugget bag, a vial, an activity booklet, and an Adventure Guide.

The boys didn't waste any time getting right into it.  They set up a tub of water and opened the first bag of dirt and poured about half in the gold pan.

Jack had to inspect the dirt.  Notice that there are ridges on one side of the pan, to keep the gold from sloshing out as you swish the water over it.

Eli was our first prospector.  Although the kit is designed for ages 6-12, my 13 year old enjoyed it.

Jack watched attentively, waiting for his turn.

While they're busy panning, let me tell you about some of the other kits Discover With Dr. Cool has to offer:  Dinosaur Dig, 2 Shark Teeth kits, 2 Gemstone kits, 2 Fossil kits, Real Bug Dig Kit, Discover Amber, Glow Rocks, Geodes, Fossils, Grow Your Own Crystals, and a Volcano Science Kit!  Whew!  That's an impressive line up of hands on fun!

Both boys enjoyed their turns swishing the pan and spotting flecks of "gold" in the sand.

It takes attention to detail and hand eye coordination to sort through the paydirt after the bigger pieces have been found and pull out the smaller bits of "color" with the tweezers.

Jack particularly enjoyed studying the large nugget with the magnifier, and told me all about each nook and cranny.

Panning for pyrite was every bit as much fun as panning for real gold.  I think using this kit after our trip to a real gold mine over the summer helped to reinforce some of the things they learned there.

And the learning continues with the adventure guide, which talks about the properties of gold, gold throughout history, and the 5 big gold rushes of modern times.  There are some facts about pyrite, too.  Did you know it makes sparks when struck against steel?  I had no idea.

Pan For Gold would make an excellent addition to a California history study (or Nevada, Alaska, or South Dakota, for that matter!), but it's also great for studies of geology or Egypt or India.

The Pan For Gold kit sells for $14.95, but is currently on special for only $7.50.  At this price, you might want to tuck a couple away for birthday party presents.  You can connect with Discover With Dr. Cool on Facebook or Twitter to watch for specials on their other products.

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

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Apologia iWitness Books

You know a review product is a good one when you find yourself thinking, "Wow!  I wish we'd had this last year!"  And that's just what happened as we reviewed the iWitness books from Apologia Educational Ministries.

If you're like me, you think of the Exploring Creation series when you think of Apologia.  But Apologia is so much more than just science!


As you may remember, we're in our second year of a 4 year chronological history of the world.  Last year we made it up through Ancient Greece, and we've just hit the birth of Christ now.  Over and over, while reading Old Testament iWitness aloud with Jack and Eli, I thought, "This would have been a fabulous starting point for a study of history!"  Still, the material is fascinating all on it's own, regardless of what you're learning about.

Old Testament iWitness shows the transition from the scrolls of the Hebrew Bible to the Old Testament that we have today.  We learned that during this transition, some books were divided, such as Kings and Chronicles, of course, but even that the book of the prophets in the Hebrew Bible was divided into 20 books in our Bible.  The Writings became an additional 11 books.

example scanned from Biblical Archaeology

I love the way these books are laid out.  Each two page spread depicts photos and ancient document fragments overlaid with smaller "pages" of information in a handwritten looking font.  It's like you're reading someone's research notes.


We started with iWitness Biblical Archaeology first, and were mesmerized by it from the start.  We had some rousing discussions about the search for Noah's Ark, and our eyes all bulged in horror as I read that the shepherd who found some of the Dead Sea Scrolls took them home thinking he could make the parchment into sandal straps.  (We also mourn the loss of the Library at Alexandria, so maybe we're a little intense when it comes to books.)

Even though I was raised in church and attended a couple of Christian schools, I learned things from these books.  I particularly appreciated the way the author laid things out in a factual manner and let the reader make their own conclusions from the data presented.  You can read an interview with the author, Doug Powell, to get a greater understanding of his background and his reason for writing these books.

I consider these to be family books, rather than kids books, but the reading level is about age 11 and up.  Eli, age 13, said totally unprompted, "These books are cool!" while we were reading them together.  He was fascinated by the information about the Shroud of Turin, in particular.  When I asked Jack, who is 10, if he had a favorite bit to share, he said, "No.  It was all too interesting to compare... except probably where Jesus' tomb was."  He's referring to the Hadrian and Constantine spread, which shows the modern places believed to be the locations of Jesus birth, and his borrowed tomb.


New Testament iWitness comes at just the right time for us, as the book covers first century events and discoveries from that time period.  This book deals with how we got the Bible we have today.  While both OT and NT talk about how the manuscripts were painstakingly copied by hand, NT goes more into how and when the books we have in our New Testament were selected.

Each color, paperback book sells for $14.  Even though the books initially seem small at 64 pages each, they're chock full of thought provoking information.  We read them together a couple of 2 page spreads each day, and had plenty of ideas to discuss and ponder.

I was excited to see plans to continue the series with iWitness World Religions and iWitness Heresies & Cults set to come out in 2015.  I think my high school kids would enjoy these.  Brianna, who is 14, will be getting some world religions in school this year.  Since she's a voracious reader in her free time, I'll be keeping an eye out for the release of the new books.


You can connect with Apologia Educational Ministries on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or G+.  Read what other Crew families have to say about the iWitness books from Apologia by clicking the box below.