When I was filling out the profile information, there was a question about what our homeschooling style is.  I pondered it for a bit and finally chose eclectic.  I guess that is my term for not sticking truly to one particular style.  LOL  Actually, in my heart, I believe the most in the methods of Charlotte Mason and this is how we begin each year.  But in my reality, I have a baby toddling around and sometimes our schedule gets crazy and we start to get behind on our readings.  Then I have guilt!  Plus, I have a couple of kids here who love the color/cut/paste activities and we need to add those in. 

So I've decided that for November and December we would take a break from guilt and just schedule in a lot of color/cut/paste learning and do things differently for a while.  We are having an absolute blast with lapbooking units from Hands of a Child!  We actually started the last week of October doing a Bats unit with my 4th grader and a Pumpkins unit with my 1st grader.  They learned a ton about their topics and had fun being crafty to boot.  More!  More!

So this month we've been working on a Pilgrims unit and a Thanksgiving unit.  We've really dug in deeply to our Pilgrim study and have been able to tie in our math and writing to our topic.  Next month we are going to do a unit on the Symbols of Christmas and another one on Katy's Big Snow Day.  I can definitely see the appeal of the Unit Study homeschool crowd. 

So this got me to thinking...  Should we set aside Charlotte Mason for a while and just go this route?  I don't think so.  The richness of the literature and the short lessons and all of the other reasons I believe in Charlotte Mason's methods are still there.  But we love the crafty lapbooks!  Why can't I strike a balance here?  So my goal for our Christmas break is to take what we need to do next in our Charlotte Mason studies and add in the crafty lapbooks along-side.  Coordinate the two together.  I'm going to have to be a little more deliberate and organized for a while until I get a good feel for how this works.  But I've decided we should have our cake and eat it too!