Large Family Homeschool Life – Week 34 of 2021

It’s the end of August, and we are longing for a little Autumn as we learn about the 13 Colonies, Baroque music, and trees!

Read all of the Large Family Homeschool Life posts HERE >>

MONDAY

Ty was up at 4:45 am to do PT (“physical training”) with his ROTC cadets. When he got back home, we had some coffee and yogurt on the deck. The coffee we’ve been drinking lately is Cinnamon Creme – probably because I am longing for Autumn and the cinnamon reminds me of cooler days to come.

Before school, I put away the zucchini relish I canned this weekend. Our basement pantry is starting to take shape, and I am already seeing the benefits of having a bigger amount of food of hand – less random trips to the grocery store!

Melia is at my mom’s to work on driving hours for her license, so I texted her the reading assignments so she can keep up with where we are in school. We’ll still do Morning Time without her, but at least she will be able to stay concurrent with where we are in history.

We started school with our usual Bible lesson from GrapeVine Bible Study. We are in Acts now and talking about the persecution of the early church. This has been a really great survey of the New Testament for us!

READ >> GrapeVine Bible Review

We read in Making Thirteen Colonies. We are learning about Plymouth, so we added Cape Cod Bay and Plymouth colony to our maps. We also read in The Second Mrs. Gioconda.

Micah is having trouble with Phonetic Zoo, so I got him set up on Reading Eggs Spelling to see how that goes for him.

He also worked on Math 7 in Teaching Textbooks, read a book I assigned from Tapestry of Grace, and did a lesson in his new Graphic Design class.

READ >> Review of Graphic Design With Canva Homeschool Class!

Creed (8) and Garin (10) worked on Handwriting and Science, and Creed read his newest book in Phonics.

Aspen finished her latest Phonics book and has been working 2 pages at a time in her math.

Mercy finished her “E” book in Rod & Staff and is excited to be on her last book in the series! (We are not going to do the extended version of this series, but instead move her into our traditional Kindergarten curriculum.)

Find all of our Homeschool Curriculum selections below >>

After lunch, I did Desert Guide with the 3 youngest kids.

You can buy these Guides separately like we did, but I’d recommend you purchase the full curriculum – Nourishing Nature – and get ALL of the Guides for a lower price! The only reason I didn’t do this is because I purchased the Guides as they came out and didn’t wait until all of them were published because I didn’t realize they were going to be a full curriculum. Live and learn!

For Desert Guide, we read a lovely book – Arctic White.

We also did some fun exercises. Aspen loves to exercise, so she became the leader and encourager for the group! And then, the kids made “yarn trees.”

While the little kids were doing their Desert Guide activities, my 10 and 12 year old boys made a Paw Patrol World for their little siblings to play with when they got finished with school.

The super cool playmat is from Amazon!
I bought it last year as a birthday present for Creed.

I love to see what my kids come up with after school work is complete! I don’t let them watch TV until 4pm, so they have plenty of time to play and imagine.

READ >> How to Set Screen Time Limits When You Homeschool

I decided on Dorito Taco Salad for supper tonight because I have some hamburger that needs to be used up. Keian (15) is going to cook while I mow, so he and I can go shopping after dinner for new jeans for him and pick up a few items I didn’t get at Aldi yesterday during my weekly grocery shop.

I have been working on stocking up my pantry with about a 3-6 month supply of food. It just feels like a good thing to do with the ever-looming threat of inflation and winter on the horizon. I’m basically using my Weekly Pantry List (from the post above) to buy a little extra of the things we already eat each week.

While the kids watched the new Paw Patrol movie, I planned their next Nourishing Nature unit – Tree Guide.

Then, I shredded 20 cups of zucchini for more zucchini relish and 4 cups for my Decadent Large Family Zucchini Bread. This stuff is soooo good!

TUESDAY

Went to WW this morning. I’m down 1.4#. I am gaining and losing the same couple of pounds it seems. I’m pretty content with where I am right now, but I know I should probably try to lose 5-10 more pounds.

For Morning Time, we did GrapeVine, followed by Music Appreciation (Baroque Period) from Music in Our Homeschool.

Then, we read from Our Island Story which gave a British perspective of the Pilgrims journey to America. I really like this book and I’m glad I went ahead and purchased it for our history lessons!

We did a quick tidy up of the house because Keian has a friend coming after lunch. Then, I sent everyone off to their individual school work.

Creed read in his latest Phonics book – a rhyming story of Pharaoh and Moses to reinforce the “ph” and “ed” sounds. We also had to update his Teaching Textbooks app before he could go on to his next lesson, so that took a bit of time.

I marked the math problems Aspen needed to do in her Horizons Math workbook. I do not require all of the problems and gauge which problems the kids need most based on how well they’ve been doing.

READ >> Does My Child Have to Do ALL of the Problems in the Book?

We had a quick lunch of chicken noodle soup and mashed potatoes. Keian’s friend came over and brought eggs from their chickens and I gave him zucchini relish since it was his mom who gave me the zucchini.

I watched some news and then the 8 year old and 10 year old asked for jobs they could do to earn money for their community money jar. I had been wanting to move some tubs with clothes and camping gear around, so I set them on that task. It was a VERY big job, and I am so glad they took care of it for me. They were paid handsomely!

The exterminator showed up to check for termites and spray for spiders and stink bugs. We were able to stay in the house while he worked since he only sprayed outside and in the basement and garage.

For dinner, I made Chicken Fajita Bowls and Granny’s Pineapple Upside-Down Cake.

Keian and I never made it to Walmart last night to get his jeans, so we went tonight since it is his Special Night and we needed to pick up his special food. He picked out a couple of tapered Levis and paid for them himself – the benefits of having a job!

We ended the evening watching Little Dorit on BritBox!

WEDNESDAY

Ty was up for PT again this morning, but came back home to shower and pay bills. We had coffee together on the deck, and then I got individual school started with the kids because we have friends coming over near lunch time. Most of the kids got through all of their individual school work before our friends got here.

I put chicken in the crock pot for Chicken and Dumplings for dinner tonight.

My friend brought 3 of her boys to play with my 4 boys. We have been friends with this family for 10 years and most of our kids are the same age. We were barely able to get the boys to stop playing for lunch time. We had sandwiches, apples, chips, zucchini bread, and cheese ball.

After our friends headed to the city to visit their oldest son/brother and his new wife, I sat down and wrote an email containing Week 32 and Week 33 of our Large Family Homeschool Life posts. I had gotten a bit behind with sending out emails!

Then, I took the 15 year old to Youth Group, and when I got home I decided I was too tired to cook and I wasn’t in the mood for Chicken and Dumplings anyway, so I put the chicken away and fed everyone leftovers. I’ll probably have Keian make Chicken and Dumplings tomorrow for dinner when Ty and I go out for date night.

After dinner, I cleaned out the jelly shelf. There were a lot of old jars I wasn’t willing to feed to my family and all of this year’s bounty that I had the boys help me move to the basement storage where it is cooler with less humidity. I also moved the last of the zucchini relish down there. I’m feeling pretty good about what I’ve got put away so far!

My window washing pole came today, so despite the insane heat outside, I decided to try it out on a few windows. When the weather cools, I’ll wash all of the windows inside and out and clean the screens as well. They desperately need it!

I also received these wooden boxes for a decoupage project we are doing in school. (you’ll see those in action next week!)

We have several handicraft projects coming up, but a couple of them need to wait until Melia is back home because she is getting an Arts & Crafts elective for her high school graduation requirements.

THURSDAY

Ty got home from PT at the college and we had coffee and breakfast together. We talked about when to have our End of Summer & Back to School Picnic. Years ago, we started doing an End of Summer Picnic to say goodbye to the hot weather of summer and usher in our favorite season – Autumn!

In 2017, we did A Year of Playing Skillfully, and decided to do their Back to School Picnic at the same time as our End of Summer Picnic along with the Hot Air Balloon activity from AYOPS. It’s been tradition ever since!

READ >> Back to School Ideas for Homeschoolers

For Morning Time today, we drew Saul’s conversion in GrapeVine and then the kids made wigwams and teepee from oven bake clay as I read from Making Thirteen Colonies.

We finished The Second Mrs. Gioconda today! This book has definitely NOT been my favorite read aloud, and I am definitely ready to move on!

I had lunch in my room. I often do this to give myself a bit of a break from the constant hub-bub of the household.

Of course, there are days like today when I’m taking a break and one of my adult children calls or texts. Today, it was Blake wanting to talk about his new job, so I sat on the phone for a bit discussing adult things with him.

After that, I did Tree Guide with the 3 littlest ones. We started out by taking a Nature Walk to gather acorns from a neighbor’s sidewalk.

We brought the acorns back and counted and sorted them. We had 3 piles – complete acorns, ones without caps, and just the caps.

Then, we used brown wool roving (that I purchased from etsy a few years ago) to make acorns of our own for the empty acorn tops! This was such a neat project and I definitely intend to do more of these! (See the finished product below!)

I spent the rest of the afternoon planning A Year of Playing Skillfully.

After talking to the little kids, I realized Aspen and Mercy do not remember the activities we did because they were too little. I was focused on keeping Creed occupied at the time! So, I decided with this being my last go round of little kids, I should do AYOPS one last time!

A Year of Playing Skillfully starts in September, but I went ahead and put up the September Bible verse and let the kids taste honeycomb to go along with the verse. (It helps to have kids who work at a bee farm!)

AYOPS and curriculum from The Peaceful Press go well together, so I know I’ll be able to do both of them at the same time like I did in 2017 when I did The Peaceful Preschool and AYOPS. This time, we will be doing Nourishing Nature at the same time.

For dinner, I helped Keian (15) get the Chicken and Dumplings ready and we also made 2 vanilla pudding pies because I had some boxed pudding I needed to use up.

Ty and I went to a local Thai restaurant for Date Night. Afterward, we stopped at the supermarket for a couple of things and he got me some Autumn-ish roses!

That night, I read in my devotional – Jesus, Fill My Heart and Home and then worked on making some pumpkins out of a tattered quilt. This poor quilt is barely salvageable, but I think I can find enough good sections to make some small pumpkins using this tutorial.

FRIDAY

I walked a mile before our Friday House Cleaning. I got everyone started on their chores, and then repotted some of Megan’s plants. For years, I haven’t had a place for plants and Megan has kept her tiny succulents in her room, but last year, she ramped up her plant collection and we cleared a space in the living room for them all. She only took a couple back to college with her, so the kids and I take care of what is left. I must say I have missed having plants in the house, so I am enjoying her plant obsession!

In the afternoon, I worked on the blog. I finished the High School Curriculum post – the last of the homeschool curriculum posts that I will keep updated year after year here on the blog. It was a big job, but one I hope will serve readers well.

Then, I helped the little kids make an acorn snack from Tree Guide with peanut butter cookies, chocolate kisses, chocolate frosting, and butterscotch chips. They looked like acorns and all the kids wanted some!

We also glued the acorn caps we picked up yesterday on our Nature Walk to the wool acorn balls we made. They are so cute!

I got Keian started making Corn Chip Salad for dinner while I worked through some emails. They easily overwhelm my inbox if I am not diligent about paring them down periodically.

After dinner, I finished the first of the quilt pumpkins I am making. I’m pretty proud of it!

Ty’s Army buddy came over to stay the night because he’ll be working on the deck this weekend. We’ll also be meeting Blake’s girlfriend’s parents tomorrow! Now that’s a new adventure, my friends!

Read all of the Large Family Homeschool Life posts!