why we homeschool

it has always been our intention to home school our children. before the

mister and i were even married we discussed homeschooling our children.

we were set on it, we were gonna do it, there was no questions in our

minds... until we actually had children. this little being came into our

life and everything we thought we already knew wasn't quite what we

thought. we started to question ourselves. is this the right thing for her?

how will this affect her when she's older? is she going to feel different?

sheltered? what about friends? and on and on and on. it was mainly me

(the over-thinker). i started to second guess our decision mainly because

i felt alone. none of our kid friends were taking this route. i had no

connection to homeschooling besides the fact that i had actually been

homeschooling the little miss from the beginning of her life.

(we all are home schoolers whether we like it or not, right?)

so, i spent the last year researching and preparing for this coming school

year. we have found a method that we think will be compatible to our

lifestyle and beneficial to the little miss. we also hooked up with a great

group that i feel privileged to be a part of. we officially started "kindergarten"

this last tuesday and here's how it went...

learning in nature

my students

our nature friends found this bunny tail at the beginning of our hike

crossing over the creek

running through the labyrinth

we found this half eaten craw fish.

the little miss needed to take this one home.

time for art - she drew the waterfall that we saw on our hike

i didn't get a photo of it, but that's okay because i like her drawing better

looking for a stick to use as a fishing pole

fishing in the creek

i like this.

i like nature.

i love homeschooling.

there's no doubts.

on the shelf

if you don't know this already we love books over here.

we have a lot of books and i keep buying a lot of books

and we just can't get enough books around here. we

will be starting our first official year of homeschooling

this coming week. our main "curriculum" consists of

reading, reading and more reading. to organize my

thoughts and our bookshelf i thought it would be

helpful to lump some of our books into months.

because we have so many books i put them into

catergories that i would like to go over with the

little miss through out the school year.

so this is what i did... i organized them accordingly,

stacked them neatly, tied them with twine

and attached a cute little tag i made with my new stamps

i just purchased. i'm pretty pleased with the outcome

and i feel a little more prepared for the school year.

my idea is each month we will unwrap a set of books

and place them in a basket for that month of reading.

of course, we have several shelves of untied books that

are classic and timeless and just need to be enjoyed

year round, but for now i am excited about my book

packages and i look forward to their unwrapping

throughout the year.

here's a few books on our reading list for this year...

beatrix potter collection

little house on the prairie

winnie the pooh series

miss rumphius

five little peppers and how they grew

one morning in maine

the jolly postman

families

mr. pine's mixed up signs

the story of babar

the little island

make way for ducklings

frog and toad

little bear

and the list goes on and on and on......

from our home to yours we hope all of you have a wonderful, successful school year.

my little fella

i stumbled across these photos today, while i was

preparing for another post that i did here. i took

these shots the other morning just after he and i

woke up. it's usually just the two of us for about

forty-five minutes until the rest of the fam wakes

up. these are some of my favorite times with him.

he is so sweet and funny and it's just a good time

for him. i couldn't help myself on this morning,

he was just being so cute that i took a gazillion

photos. here's a look into this little fella's

morning...

he's full of funny faces

and he always plays peek-a-boo

these serious faces usually mean he's doing this...

reading books

it makes for happy times and happy memories

i love this little fella

we all scream for ice cream

what better time for an ice cream party than in the heat of summer.

my original plan was to kick off this summer with a fun little ice cream

social for the kiddo's around the neighborhood, but you might remember

the beginning of my summer didn't go as i planned. i decided to post-pone

it and make it our end of summer bash. this week was actually the perfect

week for it. i think it has been the hottest week of summer so far and a few

of our friends will be starting school next week. where has this summer gone?

it feels like summer is just now beginning as it is coming to the end. i know,

i know - time flies. i'm glad we finally got to do our ice cream party. the kiddos

had a blast and i know my kiddo's loved to have some friends over.

here are some pics from our hot, but fun day...

we heart ice cream - really who doesn't?

some of our tasty toppings

the kiddo's set up a pretend ice cream shop of their own

just something fun to take home - scented ice cream bubbles

my little miss posing for me with the old fashion ice cream hat

the little fella is just like his big sister

here's a few details on how i set-up our party...

i first planned the date, which was originally going to be at the end of june.

i decided to take advantage of all the fourth of july stuff in the $1 bin at my

favorite store (target - for those of you who didn't know), which led to my

color scheme of red, white and blue. i found the dixie land hats (that's what

i call them) and thought it would be cute to use them to decorate or put

party favors in. i ended up using them as a decoration for the post that held

the ice cream banner. (if you want to know how to make your own banner go

here) i then decided that it would be cute to have all of the kiddo's put on the

hat and take their pic. i might just do a post on those next, we'll see. of course

you can't forget the ice cream. i went with plain old vanilla. i figured that's

the safest bet with the little one's and besides they could doctor it up with

some yummy toppings. i bought chocolate and strawberry sauce, cherries,

sprinkles, m&m's, oreo's(crushed), frosted animal crackers, colored marsh-

mellow's, gummy worms and basically anything with sugar. i put these items

in some cute red, white and blue buckets from the $1 bin and they were a

huge hit. i put out a basket filled with all kinds of pretend ice cream and cake

supplies in the club house, so the kiddo's could play while we waited for all

of our guests to arrive. this too was a big hit. i always like to end my parties

with a little something for our friends to take home, so each guest got to choose

a scented ice cream bubble and a couple of prizes from a prize basket i made up

from left over birthday favors. it was a fun time had by alland i am looking

forward to next summer to do it again.

hope you enjoy the rest of your summer:)

lilly + the brothers/picnics in the park

i have been following this blog now for the last few months.

the writer is actually a new friend of mine and i started following

her blogs before i even knew her. i love the real life stories she posts

and the photo's she takes. i have laughed a number of times at some

of the things she's posted and cried a few times as well. she is a

wonderful writer that makes you feel like you can relate to a lot of her

experiences. you should check her blogs out here and here and as an extra

bonus enter her give away to get this:

seriously, even if you don't win this print, you can still consider

yourself a winner because you can add a new, cool blog

to your blog roll right? so do yourself a favor and check it out.

under $40 bucks

so, i've been thinking about the times when i could check out $40 bucks

and have that get me through a weekend at least, but times have changed

and $40 bucks comes and goes pretty quickly with two kids in tow. i've been

thinking about challenging myself and figuring out ways to stretch $40 bucks

with two kiddo's. my first challenge was the orange county fair. i know people

who go to the fair and drop a $100 bucks easily in just a few hours. though i

have never done this, it's the fair and it can get pretty pricey. now, i know there are

some elements of the fair that people don't want to miss like the food, really how

often do you get the chance to buy a deep fried snickers bar? but, this is something

i can pass up, which leads to my first tip on spending under $40 bucks.

tip #1. don't buy food at the fair. fair food isn't very good. it's greasy and gross

and you'll probably get sick. we usually eat before we get to the fair or bring in our

own food. tip #2. know what you want to spend money on. if you know and your

kids know you're only going to buy certain things you won't be so tempted to spend

money. i know when we go to the fair we will spend $10 bucks on photo booth pics.

it's my thing, we've taken our pictures here every year since the mister and i have

been together. i also let the little miss know that she can choose one thing to buy or

do for $10. tip #3. do all the free stuff first. there are so many things to do at the

fair for free, the gardens, farm, petting zoo, all of the exhibits, livestock

competitions, etc... hopefully the kiddo's will be worn out after all that

and forget about the games and rides.

tip #4. go on a donation day. the oc fair has designated wednesdays for their donation

day, which means they choose a certain type of item you can donate each week.

on the week we went it was books, which was great because i needed to clean

out my book shelf for the new school year. we donated enough books to get

four tickets. even though the kiddo's were free to get in i wanted the two

extra tickets because you get one free ride with every ticket. cool,

we got four free rides. tip #5. share. we all got a little thirsty while we were

looking around and the ice cold lemonade looked real refreshing, so instead of

buying one for each us, we just bought one and shared it. it quenched our thirst and

saved us $12 bucks. same with treats, buy one or two between your family and have

a little of each. with that i think i will say that these are my top 5 tips for spending

less than $40 bucks at the fair. if you live in or around the oc you have until

the 15th to check out it. here is a break down of what we spent:

lunch = $15 at in-n-out before we got to the fair

(includes our treat because we got shakes too)

parking = $2

(we parked across the street at the college and walked to the fair - tip#6)

admission = free

4 rides = free

photos = $10

lemonade = $3.50

face painting = $8

fun times = priceless...

the little fella enjoying the petting zoo before

we realized he was allergic to the animals

the gardens

photo booth pics

the little miss chose to spend her $10 on face painting

the little miss and the mister chose this as their free ride

it was worth it, she was super excited

i gave my free ticket to the little miss so she could have another ride

of course, we went to check out where my photo was displayed

not bad for $38.50 huh?

final project finished

we've had a lot going on over here lately and i have neglected my blog,

but i am back and excited to share our final project with you.

the clubhouse is finished! it turned out fantastic.

the kiddo's love it and we can't keep them out of it.

i always say to myself after we finish a project, "why didn't we do this sooner?"

needless to say it's a hit for our kiddo's and the neighborhood kiddo's too.

here are some photo's from start to finish...

we passed the super-girls inspection

we have walls

and a roof

and it's finished!

i love the colors, it feels so beachy to me

it's a hit instantly

the little miss talking on her pinecone phone

i love her imagination

and the little fella lounging on the "bed"

thanks to the mister for all his hard work once again.

we love you mister and all you do for us!