Our Week with another Pumpkin Patch Trip

It's been a busy week this week!  We went to another pumpkin patch with friends.  The high school had Open House.  Luke had a visit from the Regional Center.  And I went to the doctor for travel meds.  Somehow, we still managed to get our schoolwork done!

This time, instead of taking 8 kids to the pumpkin patch, I got out with just my "class."  Three is a great number of kids to homeschool.  When it was Brianna, Eli, and Jack, we had a blast.  While the dynamic is very different with Jack and the little girls, I'm hoping we can enjoy it just as much.

These two are great together.  I'm so incredibly blessed to be their mommy and get to see what a close sister relationship looks like.  I'm so glad they have each other.

And nothing slows them down!  Hay pyramid 3 times taller than the grown ups?  Bring it on!

The patch that we went to this time had "sandboxes" of corn for the kids to play in.

And a giant pillow jumper.  Jack was running with a pack of homeschooled boys around his age, so I don't have many pictures of him, but he was having a great time.

After the corn maze and our picnic lunch, we did the hay ride.

There's Jack!  By the end of the hay ride, all the boys were standing (on the floor, not on the bales!) and "surfing" since they'd noticed the driver wasn't paying attention or telling them to sit.

After the hay ride, the kids selected their pumpkins.

Jack and Katie found theirs quickly.  Hannah was a little more selective.  She wanted a small pumpkin that was not bumpy and had a stem.

Many of the pumpkins were very bumpy, so she had a hard time finding just the right one, but eventually settled on a lopsided one she could barely carry.  I don't think I want to watch her pick out a Christmas tree!  (Good thing we have artificial ones.)

We've learned about birds, and fish, and now we're working on reptiles and amphibians.

This week, we finished our Squanto book.  Jack and Hannah have been taking turns reading aloud.  As slow and painful as this can be sometimes, I really think it's good for them, and I'm going to have to come up with a way to continue to incorporate it.

There was a little craft where they cut off boarders and glued two pages together and then folded to make a sampling of the New England Primer, a schoolbook from colonial times.

Listening and following directions can be a challenge sometimes, but we eventually got it done.

I came upstairs and found a spontaneous game of Ancient History Memory going on, so I grabbed the camera.  Jack was surprised at how well Katie was doing.  I'm embarrassed to say, I don't think she's ever played memory before.  Must be time to get the Very Hungry Caterpillar game down and let the girls play.

Luke had a haircut this week.  We finally had our appointment with the Regional Center to get his file reactivated.  (We closed it in April when he left, and started calling them in August when he came back.)  Hopefully he'll start getting some respite services next month.

Our art project from the DVD this week was Op Art.

Hannah loves doing art, which makes it more fun.

We managed to finish Week 8 this week, so we're just one week behind in History and Science now.  Bible and art, we're not on a rigid timeline for.  Handwriting, spelling, English and math, we've been keeping up with.

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Koru Naturals Hair and Skin Care

We got a lovely package of goodies to review from Koru Naturals!  Some of you may remember when we reviewed their Shampoo & Conditioner and Emu Oil.

This time around, we received the Argan Oil & Sandalwood Hair Tonic, the Manuka Honey & Propolis Soap, and the Skin Clear Creme.


Up first, we have the skin creme!  I was initially ambivalent about the idea of reviewing a skin creme, since I normally use nothing on my face.  I'm a low maintenance sort of mama.  When we received it, the weather was quite warm, and Brianna opened the creme not thinking that it had been in the back of a brown truck all day long.  It was liquefied and she sloshed a little of it on herself as she opened it.

Seeing that it contained honey, I was rather surprised by the lemony smell this creme has.  It smells wonderful and feels nice when I rub it on my face.  It leaves my skin soft, too.  I like to apply it after my morning shower.

The skin clear cream comes in a 4 ounce jar and has a second inner lid and a little application paddle, to help keep impurities out.  Brianna and I have been using it for 6 weeks, and the level of the creme has not dropped noticeably, so I imagine it will last quite a while.  The Skin Clear Creme sells for $19.20.


The honey & propolis soap smells nice, too.

It's cute, too, with a little bee embossed on the top, reminding us of the honey and propolis ingredients our friends, the bees, make for us.

The bottom side is a milky off white color.  This soap is moisturizing, and left my hands soft.  It sells for $7.90 and would make a nice Christmas gift.


The last item is the Argan Oil & Sandalwood Hair Tonic.  Reading the ingredients list is very reassuring.  Every item is an oil.  No chemicals or unpronounceable unknowns.  Some are very familiar, as they are essential oils I have.

I love that it only takes a dribble to achieve results.  This 4 ounce bottle will last me ages.  At $12.20, that's a good deal.

I wash my long hair every other day, and a few drops of this oil leaves it tangle free, manageable and smooth.  It doesn't feel greasy or dirty the second day, which can happen when I use "stuff" in my hair.

I have used argan oil in my hair for a few years now, so I noticed a different smell to this product than what I was used to.  Not unpleasant, just different.  It took me a couple days to realize that must be the sandalwood oil.

We have enjoyed all the things we've tried from Koru Naturals so far, but I have to say, my absolute favorite is the emu oil.

I hope you'll take a moment to poke around the Koru Naturals website and see all the great products they offer.  You can also connect with them on Facebook and Pinterest.  To read what other Crew families have to say about various products from Koru Naturals, please click the box below.

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Write Through History

We got to review Write Through Early Modern History - Level 1 - Manuscript from Brookdale House.  We received the ebook version, which sells for $22.95.  For those that prefer physical books, the paperback sells for $30.95.


I've mentioned the Write Through History series here on the blog before.  We used Write From Ancient History last school year as a supplement because it worked so well with our study of history, but we really only scratched the surface of what this versatile program can do.

Write Through Early Modern History combines grammar, spelling, and penmanship with history.  As children listen, read, write and copy fascinating historical passages, stories, and poems, they're not only learning about the history presented, but they're also learning language arts at the same time.

I like that there are so many options not only with using the program, but also in selecting the book that best fits your students.  First, you choose a time period.  For us, Early Modern History matched up best with Exploration to 1850, the year we're at in our history curriculum.  Then you choose a level.  I felt Level 1 would be best for my 3rd and 6th graders.   The levels are designed to be flexible, so it's more about ability than about age or grade.  Then you choose manuscript or cursive.  We selected manuscript, since one of my students prefers it.  Emphatically.  Lots of options means you get the product that is right for your class!

The table of contents is presented like a timeline, so you can easily select the passages you want to compliment what you're learning about in history.  We're learning about early colonial times, so we read passages that would compliment that, such as Pocohontas.

I like that I can print just the pages that my kids need to write on, and read the stories and poems directly from the computer.  This page shows Hannah's copywork from after we read the Pocahontas tale.

These books pull from a Charlotte Mason approach to learning, which includes narration.  I had not used narration in my homeschool before.  The idea is that you read a passage aloud, and then your students write about it in their own words.  What I discovered is that this is a real challenge for Hannah.  I don't know if she's having a hard time listening, or if she's not understanding the vocabulary (remember, English is not her first language), but she has difficulty with this task.

She enjoys the copywork, however.  Hannah is pretty excited about learning cursive, and asked if she could do her copywork in cursive.

This book also gave a name to "studied dictation."  We've been doing this with our spelling program, but I didn't know it was called something specific.  It's where the teacher reads a passage, a piece at a time, and the students copy it exactly.  As I said, this is how our spelling program is done, so we are already familiar with how to do this, and most times Jack and Hannah can write sentence by sentence with me only reading the sentence once or twice.  Some of the more complex sentences need to be read again.  The book allows you to break it down even further, if need be, but I want to keep it very clear where sentences start and end so they get the proper capitalization and punctuation, and that's hard to grasp when you're chopping a sentence into phrases.

I find the Write Through History books to be very meaty, and full of options as to how you use them in your own homeschool.  The teacher's guide offers you a couple of suggested ways to use the book, and of course, each family can tweak it to what suits them best.  There's easily a year's worth of work there, regardless of how you choose to implement it.

You can connect with Brookdale House on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and G+.  Crew families reviewed a wide variety of products from Brookdale House, including other Write Through History books, as well as geography and Spanish resources.  To read those reviews, please click the box below:



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The Crimson Cord

If you like historical fiction, you'll enjoy The Crimson Cord: Rahab's Story, by Jill Eileen Smith.  I was selected to review this book for Family Christian, and was pleasantly surprised at how much it brought the Bible to life in my imagination.

This book tells the story of Rahab, the woman who helped the Israelite spies, and in doing so saved the lives of herself and her family.

Honestly, I'd never given Rahab much thought.  In the Biblical account, she's referred to as "Rahab the harlot" or "Rahab the prostitute."  I mentally dismissed her.  And yet, the author has created a scenario where her circumstances are not entirely her fault.  Obviously, this is a fictional tale, and one needs to be careful not to rewrite history in our minds, but I really enjoyed the way this book made the time period real for me.

In the story, Rahab stays with the Israelites after Jericho falls.  Her family decides to go to Egypt, and it's yet another loss for her when they leave without saying goodbye.  As the story unfolds, we see events in the book of Joshua unfold through Rahab's eyes.

Interestingly enough, the sermon I heard at church after finishing this book mentioned Joshua and the ripple effect Achan's choice had on the Israelites, which was part of the story.

One of the things I appreciated as an adoptive mom was the way Rahab was allowed to become part of the tribe.  And not only a part of God's chosen people, but one of two foreign women included in the lineage of King David, and ultimately, the lineage of Jesus.  Our God is a god of inclusion, which warms my heart.

Interwoven into the account of Israel claiming the Promised Land in The Crimson Cord: Rahab's Story is a friendship and romance that springs up between Rahab and Salmon, one of the men she hid in Jericho.  It was slow to unfold, as Rahab needed to better understand the God of Israel and forgiveness and redemption, and Salmon struggled with Rahab's past.  Redemption is a beautiful thing, and I was moved to tears more than once in this tender tale.

Author Jill Eileen Smith has written more than half a dozen fiction books about the women of the Bible.  I look forward to reading some of her other works!  You can connect with her on Facebook and Twitter.

Family Christian carries a plethora of books and gifts, including almost a dozen types of Christian fiction.  You can connect with them on Facebook and Twitter, too.

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Not School Pictures

I mentioned last month that one of our photographer friends was in town doing photo shoots and so we were having "school" pictures taken for those of us who are not in school.

I have a wall with a row of frames for all the children, and I like to keep the pictures fairly updated.

Jack hadn't had a new picture in a few years, so there's quite a difference between this and the previous picture.

Josiah's last school picture was freshman year, so again, quite a difference.

Katie's current wall picture is one I took of her in February, so it's pretty recent.

Luke's school picture from last year was horrible.  They left him in his wheelchair and then photoshopped part of it out.

Hannah's school picture last year was the first one that I actually liked, but even so, it's nice to update them annually when the kids are little.

 Paul and I, the keepers of the chaos.

Paul and I with the China kids.

And just the China kids together.

This looks like it could be a family picture, but we're actually missing several people.  It's not even a household picture.  But it is a good "weekday" picture, since these are the people you might find at home during school hours on a weekday.

And here is the whole family:

I look at these faces and I feel Greatly Blessed indeed.


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