We made a funny face lunch today. It was so easy. My son, A., finished his "schoolwork" before the others, came into the kitchen and said he was hungry. So I asked him, "Don't you want to help me make lunch?" He grated the carrots, added canned corn, salt, vinegar and olive oil to make the carrot salad (the hair) and toasted the English muffins. We added the tomato for the nose, soft boiled eggs to go on the English muffins for eyes and added avocado for the mouth (picked from our tree--one of the benefits after surviving the heat and hurricanes in South Florida). We have made other lunches like this. They are so easy. We just look to see what ingredients we have, and begin to create the face on a plate. The kids seem to eat more vegetables this way, too!

Here is a funny face from last week.

 This year we are following A Well Trained Mind's recommendations very closely. We are doing Ancient History (with Susan Wise Bauer's books), Math-u-see for math (the kids LOVE math now, what a great program!), biology for science (this year we'll study animals, the human body and plants); we are starting with insects (we planted a butterfly garden) and have

watch a caterpillar

transform into a chrysalis

and 10 days later into a Monarch butterfly.

The kids were fascinated.

Observing the butterfly come out of her chrysalis.

For history and biology the kids listen to me read aloud, we might watch a video on cosmeo or look at something under the microscope, etc. they dictate and copy/write into their note books what they have learned, I use the "writing strands" for writing with M. (5th) and A. (3rd), Explode the code for A. and S. (1st), McGuffey readers (they are wonderful) and Abeka phonics and hooked on phonics. I also use First Language lessons by Jessie Wise for the younger two and The Oridinary parents Guide to Teaching Reading. M. is reading chapter books in English and Spanish and all 3 kids are doing Spanish with cd roms. I think I am going to start "building with diligence" by Rod and Staff with M. for grammar, recommended by Susan Wise B. in the AWTM. I also have the boys memorizing poems and doing copy work and dictation.  We have a piano teacher come into the home and all four of us take lessons (including me! )

A. is playing golf and S. takes ballet and tap. M. is not interested in any sports classes, so we have him excersize on his own, like in our pool or bike ride. They take an art class for homeschoolers once a week, for an hour and a half and a science class for h.s. once a week for 2 hours. We study from mon-thurs and take fridays for fieldtrips. thursdays is park day where we meet other homeschoolers. And weekends are full of many playdates.

What a great year we are having so far! The kids and I feel all so much more organized and relaxed. We are really following the Well Trained Mind. THANK YOU Susan Wise Bauer and your mom Jessie Wise! We love what we are learning in Ancient History    and the kids enthusiastically share with their Papa in the evenings all that they learned that day.  The kids have gotten into good study habits, get done pretty quickly and we have the rest of the day to keep learning and playing. My middle son, A., started "school" at 9 am, finished at 12:30, ate lunch and since then has played golf in the back yard (he stopped once he realized a golf ball AAAALLLLMOST hit our livingroom window!), started a sewing project (a boy doll), flattened a penny with a hammer, and looked at paper under the microscope, now wants to start make a truck out of an oatmeal container, and its not even 3 pm....yeah homeschooling!

We have come a LOOOONG way and we are doing so much better with our son's OCD. My husband, my eldest son and I attended the OCD conference in Atlanta in July and it was awesome. It was a very well organized, wonderful gathering of the top researchers, psychologists, psychiatrists, OCD suffers, parents, families, authors, etc. There were worshops for everyone, including an excellent children's program. We heard Elizabeth McIngvale (The Nation's OCD spokeswoman) speak. We learned a ton about OCD and came away feeling excited and empowered to help our son live with OCD.

He is doing great---99% OCD free (after a long and hard winter).

An update since my last entry:

We finished up the school year well. The kids did fine with the IOWA testing and everyone "graduated". We then went on a nice family camping trip to Blue Springs, Florida, where we enjoyed the natural springs that Florida offers. From there my husband flew home and I drove on to North carolina where the kids and I enjoyed 2 weeks at Eagle's Nest Camp (I taught Arts and Crafts and they participated as campers).

Now we are enjoying 7 weeks on Whidbey Island, Washington. My husband just flew back to hot Miami after a nice three week vacation. His time off with the kids and me included boating, sailing, crabbing, hiking, fishing, deer, fox and eagle sightings, wine tasting, farmer's markets, carpentry, hammock swinging, reading, trips to the library, puzzles, games and lots of family time!

We will fly back at the end of August to officially open up our "Villabella School" in early September.

Occationally I get those "worries" about teaching 5th, 3rd and 1st grade. Especially 5th grade to my "tween". I LOVE homeschooling and know it is WAAAAAAAAAAAY better than most schools but still, sometimes I feel over whelmed by the thought of it all. One step at a time...

We finished our first week of OCD therapy on Friday. It has been draining and hard; the doctors and others who have been through this process say the road is long but I am hopeful. Many have suggested that I put our younger two children in school while I take my oldest son to therapy...I say, no way! I know these suggestions are well meant, but I can't even imagine adding that stress to our current situation; i.e., buying school uniforms, making lunches, dropping off and picking up, HOMEWORK and the fact that I would have to pull them out of all the wonderful activites we are already involved in (sports, science class, enrichemnt classes, etc.) The great thing about homeschooling is its flexibility. I am not worried about the school my kids will "miss" this first month while we have to drive to therapy everyday; infact, I think by removing my younger two from our daily family life it would make the progress in learning to live with OCD even harder. The younger two have found great comfort in playing with eachother and our kittens. I think a "regular" classroom experience at this point would be traumatic for them (an me!) I'd miss them so!

That is the great thing about homeschooling, isn't it? We can be flexible. Just when I was about to start this blog with what we do in a "normal" day, everything became "abnormal". My eldest son was diagnosed with  OCD. We are very hopeful and have become well informed, well read and found support. This involves daily trips to therapy, 45 minutes away.

The days seem to blur with trips to the doctors' office(s)and therapy sessions for our son...Its all seeming to run together--I am trying to remember what day it is! Our homeschooling "schooling"  is on the BACK BURNER (I did flashcards with my youngest in the waiting room--doesn't that count as a day of kindergarten??)

Our regular routine went out the window, and, without realizing it, we have become "unschoolers"! Thats just fine. We are listening to the same Shel Silverstein tape in the car from  "Where the Sidewalk Ends" over and over...the kids are memorizing the entire tape and love the familiar poems. The most important thing now is the therapy and the help for the family. So, how does it all work? We are figuring that out along the way.

I am very hopeful and enjoy those small moments, like seeing my second son, who has recently learned to knit, knitting away at the doctor's office  and finding a yummy fudge candy store near the doctor's office, and laughing with the kids while we pick out a treat.

Good night!

Hello and welcome to my blog! I am new at blogging and thanks to a fellow homeschooling mom, I was able to start this page. My 10 year old son is excited to make his own page, too. So, let's start with a little background. We are a family of five: I am from California, my husband is from Spain and we have 3 kids, ages 10, 8 and 5. I was an elementary school teacher for 4 years, then became a "stay-at-home" when my eldest boy was 8 months old. We moved to Miami in 1999 and all 3 of our kids went to preschool. It was last January, 2005, my eldest son was in third grade in a "wonderful magnet program", when we decided to leave the public school system and try learning at home. Thank goodness we did! But, this was not an overnight decision. He had been happy in first grade, but by second grade he was becoming bored. He was in the "gifted program" and made the "honor roll" but his teachers complained that he was day dreaming. We spent our day rushing around, drooping off, picking up, changing uniforms, going to after school activities and cramming in homework. Often my son would ask me a really neat question, like, "Mom, what if a king had twins, and they were both the eldest children, who would become the next king, the first born of the two?' or a question about DNA or outer space, and instead of having time to discuss the questions and the possibilities, I would say something like, 'That's a really good question, but we don't have time to talk about it right now...we need to study your spelling words'. (He says I was meaner than that). Having been a teacher myself and loving the time I got to spend with my kids (I was always volunteering in their classrooms) I thought we should at least give homeschooling a try. Immediately WE LOVED IT. My son seemed to blossom. We went on the coolest foeldtrips, alughed a lot, hugged a lot, rwad a lot. I followed the same math and grammar lessons as he had been doing in school but for all the other subjectas we basically unschooled. I was determined to get my boy to love learning again. For the rest of the school year my middle boy remained in first grade and my daughter stayed at a wonderful little preschool. But our family loved homeschooling so much that I decided to homeschool all three kids in the Fall, 2005. After homeschooling my eldest, I could not picture my little five year old sitting at a desk all day for kinndergarten!

So, what was today like? Today was a "regular" day of homeschooling, from around 9-1 my 4th grader and 2nd grader did their "school" work (from a weekly schedule I type up on Sunday nights). My kindergartener has a cold, and she wanted to wash our cat, so we did that, then she did two pages of math, then she watched a video in Spanish. That kept me busy all morning. After spaghetti with tomato sauce for lunch (my kids do not miss the noisy school cafeteria!!), we went to our PATH park group at Salvadore Park in Coral Gables. This is a play group for homeschoolers which I started this year in my neighborhood so that my kids could play with and I could talk to other homeschoolers. Tonight I am going to my bookclub, a monthly gathering of women. It is a fun night out, plus it forces me to complete a book a month that has nothing to do with early childhood education!! This month we are going to discuss, The Turkish Lover, by Esmeralda Santiago. I like the book, it is easy to read and I thought it was an interesting and entertaining memoir.

Ciao!