• Oct. 29, 2009
Update
We are having a great school year. We are using ACE this year and also workboxes. Bethany is reading...YEAH!
I can hardly believe that Thanksgiving is right around the corner. This year I am planning to do a craft each week to create a wonderful Thanksgiving atmosphere...mobile, table decorations, etc.
We read Jotham's Jorney last year and we will re-read it in November and then in December we are going to read Bartholomew's Passage.
Hope your fall is going well.
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• Nov. 17, 2008
Fall Delight
Hi All!
I hope you all are having a great fall day. It is beautiful here. We were driving the Natchez Trace Friday and the fall folliage was beautiful. Just look in your "backyard" and what beauty there can be found.
We are doing well with our homeschooling. The stars are starting to add up on the goal chart. I am so excited. My dd is finally reading! I was beginning to have my doubts there but the Lord saw us both through. I am a huge fan of the Astronauts to Zippers program.
Co-oping is going well also. We are planning a Thanksgiving party for this Thursday. Our crafts and reading is all in the theme of Thanksgiving. We are also looking forward to doing Advent this year. I went ahead and read Jotham's Journey before we read it together. I would recommend it to anyone. It is wonderful.
I hope you all have a wonderful homeschool journey this week.
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• Oct. 19, 2008
Wonderful Fall
I hope you all are able to enjoy this wonderful fall weather. There's just something about this time of year. It's not yet cold but you can anticipate the coming of Thanksgiving and Christmas. Wonderful time of the year.
This week went fairly well. We were able to co-op twice this week. The boys learned how to tie knots in ropes like the sailors did. I tell you what...those pictures aren't all that easy to follow. I was feeling a little tied up in knots by the time it was over. Monday we read about Christopher Columbus. That worked in well since it was Columbus Day.
The girls had fun with pigs and p's. We read the book "If You Give a Pig a Pancake." We decorated a pig and made pancakes. It was a fun story. The girls really enjoyed it.
DD finished her first book of Astronauts to Zippers. She is really excited about her new reading skills. I am too. Isn't it wonderful when their eyes light up when they learn something new.
I hope you have a great week. Enjoy your homeschool journey.
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• Oct. 11, 2008
Weekly Update
Another week has gone by and it was a very good one for us. We were able to do our lessons as planned. Isn't that something that doesn't come along to often. One thing we haven't been able to do for the last two weeks is co-op. Alas, I have had bronchitis again but I am on the mend.
This next week we will be studying what the explorers ate. I made hardtack today. All I can say is bless those poor sailors hearts for having to eat that. I think we will let the kids make some of their own next week. I also bought some dried fruit. You get to thinking about the way things were back then and get to appreciate our refrigerators and freezers for preserving food. All that salted meat and dried out bread just doesn't quite strike your fancy now does it?
On the animal front we had an adventure this week. One of our yellow kittens came up missing. I thought oh no the coyotes or owls have been on the prowl...but no. He decided to take a trip on my father-in-law's truck when he made deliveries. My cousin called and said are you missing a kitten. Why yes I am...needless to say that little kitten was glad to be home with his momma. Our big cats have been frog and rabbit hunting this week. I looked rather funny following a cat around trying to free a little bunny but I did succeed. Cat 0 Bunny 1
I ordered a book for us to use this December called Jotham's Journey. It's and Advent story. I am looking forward to getting it and planning our December studies. It has been out of print for a while. I hope to do more to celebrate the wonderful Christmas season this year. Last year I found so much wonderful information for Advent and didn't get to use it because I was sick from Sept. - Jan. with bronchitis. This year I plan to get to use all those wonderful ideas plus this new book.
I hope you all have a wonderful week. Get out and enjoy this wonderful fall weather. Aren't the trees beautiful this time of year and the nip in the air so refreshing? Bye for now.
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• Sep. 30, 2008
New School Year
Hi All
Hope you all had a great summer. We have been schooling for about 3 1/2 weeks. We are co-oping this year with another family who just starting out on the homeschool journey. We are using the Explorer's unit from Homeschool in the Woods. Great unit. It comes disc form and you can print it out as you need it.
For my dd we are using Astronauts to Zippers. So far so good. We saw it at the homeschool show and were able to meet the lady who created it. Actually she was a teacher at the college I attended way back when...MUW.
DD showed no interest in school last year so I didn't push her over the summer. But she started doing copywork on her own. She was copying everything. So we started with Astronauts to Zippers and she is really going to town with it.
DS is using ACE this year along with the Explorer's unit. We didn't get to study the Natchez Trace last year so we are hoping to do that as well this year.
As a side bar our cat had 10 kittens. I never new a cat could have that many kittens. When they were born my mother-in-law was there and said she had never seen such a wad of kittens before. Six were delivered at one time. Wild times here at out treehouse school. Also our zoo has grown by 4 hermit crabs, 9 fish, 3 snails, 1 scorpion (not my idea) with a total of 15 cats and 5 dogs...eeeiiiieeeiiiioooo.
I hope you have a great remainder of the week and will be chatting with you more as the year goes along.
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• May. 21, 2008
Homeschool Conference
Hi All,
Hope this post finds you all doing well. My husband and I went to the MHEA conference this past weekend. This was our first one to attend and we had a wonderful time. I would suggest that if you are able to go to your own state's homeschooling conference then go. We were uplifted and inspired by all we heard and saw. I think the highlight was getting to meet Jeannie Fulbright, the author of the elementary Apologia science books. I was able to attend three of her seminars. She is a woman truly dedicated to homeschooling and she loves the Lord with all her heart.
We were surrounded by people who have the same calling on their lives...homeschool their children and raise them up to love and follow God. I told my husband that we weren't alone. The Mississippi conference was held at Mississippi State University in Starkville. The campus is beautiful and the weather was just right. I guess you can tell I really had a good time.
I came away refreshed and inspired. So please attend your state's conference if you can. You never know who you will meet or what wonderful jewel of information you take home with you.
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• Apr. 27, 2008
Hey All
I hope this finds you all doing well. Long time since last entry but we have been busy. We are getting ready for our last stretch. I am considering doing some during June and July. It looks like that would be a good time for nature studies and the like. Perhaps in these warm months we will do some in the Prarie Primer and hit that ole wagon trail.
Spring fever has really hit in our house. My dd doesn't want to stay indoors...new bike. We will do fine though. Hope you all have a good week.
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• Feb. 12, 2008
Beautiful Day
Good Morning,
We have finished our first full week using ACE and we are enjoying it very much. My dd loves the songs for animal sounds. We are getting used to the goal cards for my ds. We started out trying to do 5 pages but switched to 3 pages until he gets the hang of it.
I was so excited last night when ds brought hie new Zoobook about Pandas to me and wanted to read it to me as a bedtime story. I sat there amazed while he read away. He is 8 and an excellent reader. If your kids like animals you should check out the Zoobooks. They are really informative and fun to read. He can hardly wait until the next one comes in the mail.
The weather here is getting a little warmer on some days and it is just impossible to keep dd inside. She is my nature girl. You can tell when she has to stay inside for several days because she gets a little nutty. I'm sure alot of your kids are that way too. My dd is an indoor boy.
I hope you all have a great homeschooling week. We will keep you posted on how the ACE is going.
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• Jan. 15, 2008
Happy Tuesday
Good Morning All,
Hope you are having a great January 15th. It is cold here but a beautiful day. My dd turned 6 yesterday. Quite an eye opener. My "baby" is now 6. I am planning to go to a motel meeting for ACE Monday and order our new PACES and the ABC program. I hope they don't take to long to come in. Since we were in between some things I decided to take a mini-vacation until our PACEs come in. We will be homeschooling through part of the summer.
Do any of you homeschool the whole year? I was thinking about doing that and taking mini-vacations through out the year. We have been up and down with curriculum and trying to choose the best one for us. I believe I will stay with ACE. I need the order that it provides. I have found I am not much use at staying on track trying to use this and that. We will still do some projects such as lapbooks and the like just not as our main thing.
Do any of you use the ACE program? I would love to hear from you and see what you think about it and how it is going for you. I hope you all have a great day. Take care.
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• Dec. 27, 2007
Planning Next Semester
Hi All,
Today we took down our Christmas decorations. We are taking the holiday until January 8th. I am getting ready to order the ACE paces for my daughter and son. I am going to do the Learning to Read...ABC's with Ace and Christi with my daughter. They use an animal, animal story and song for each letter. I am hoping this will help her remember better and make it fun for her. My son will be starting the 3rd grade paces. I am hoping to simplify with this program. We will still do some extra projects that will go along with what they are learning in their paces.
Please continue us in your prayers as we start this new program. I taught this curriculum when I lived in Tennessee in the early 80's. I was working for a Christian Academy. WOW that was forever ago. I am a late bloomer. I didn't have my first child until I was 37. But I am looking forward to this. I think working in the small workbooks will keep my son from being overwhelmed by the whole picture of the year and see his accomplishments as the paces are finished.
Have a great New Year. Here in Mississippi we have the tradition of eating blackeyed peas and fried hog jowls (thick bacon) for luck for the new year. We ususally go to my mother-in-laws for this. I don't know about the luck but it is a tradition for our family. A time to remember and be together. Hope you have a great family day and a wonderful new year.
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• Dec. 24, 2007
Merry Christmas
Hope you all are going to have a very Merry Christmas. We had my family Christmas yesterday at my mother's house and tonight we will have my husband's family Christmas at his mother's house. Tomorrow will be home family Christmas. This month of homeschooling has not turned out how I had planned so beginning next month/year I am planning some changes in style and curriculum. I have found that I need a more structured type of curriculm. We are planning to change to A.C.E. and see how that works. I love TOG and am still planning to use it when my children get a little older. We really enjoyed the Egypt unit. There are free sample units if you go to the TOG website. It is cold here this morning so I am off to get warm. Hot Chocolate really sounds good right now. Hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a great New Year.
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• Dec. 1, 2007
Update and Menorah idea
Hi All,
An update on our dd. She is still at home with us. I talked to the school and they were really understanding. The lady in charge is a dear friend of many years. We are keeping her out until January (we are keeping up with the work they are doing) and we will try to re-introduce her to the school then. If she still is not wanting to go we will go another route.
We have had a good November...no one sick...Yeah! We are still working on our dinosaur project. My ds came to me the other day and told me that he believed in Creation now. Wow what a moment. You know they really do listen even when you think they don't.
We had a great Thanksgiving and are now headed into the Christmas season. We will do Hanukkah this month. This will be our first time but I want to get the kids minds in gear that Jesus was a child once and He celebrated holidays too. I found the book A Family Guide to the Biblical Holidays by Robin Sampson and Linda Pierce which is very good explaining things and it has alot of activities. We are going to make the Menorah out of matchbooks. You paint the boxes on the outside anyway you want then you push it open about half way and paint a flame on the inside. You will need 10 boxes. You glue four single ones side by side and the the middle one is two boxes (one glued on the top of each other the top one will push open) then the next four are singles. You will have S S S S D S S S S (S-single D-double) and then when you "light" them you just push from the bottom and the "light". You can glue the whole menorah on a piece of construction paper or what ever board you want and hand it on the wall and the children can each have their own. I found match boxes for a $1 for 12 matchboxes. We will be making ours Monday and starting Hanukkah on Wednesday. Not really sure how things will go but what an Adventure. We will also be doing some Advent projects. Perhaps a small Jesse tree or just use our Christmas tree as our Jesse tree. I want this month to be something the kids will remember and perhaps even start as a tradition in our family.
Life is a great adventure that God has given us...an adventure to find Him in all things and bring others along for trip. Hope you have a great holiday season and that you find Jesus there.
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• Oct. 29, 2007
A New Day
Hi All,
We have been really crazy and busy around here...sorry for the big gap in posting. I have been facing a problem and am still praying about it. My dd who is 5 has started a kindergarten in a local church. I planned to homeschool when she finished. Well plans do have a way of changing. She started last week crying not wanting to go to school...they had started beginning reading. I have battled this for over a week now and I don't see any good in keeping her in the kindergarten. She loves everything else but the reading. But there is no sense in her becoming so upset every morning. Please pray with me that I make the right decision.
We had a chance to attend The Great Passion Play in Eureka Springs this weekend. My ds who is 8 went. I think he became aware of alot of things this weekend. Before it didn't seem like someone real but now I think it does. He is a HUGE dinosaur fan so the Earth Museum was a BIG hit.
So we are starting a new week with perhaps two instead of one. I will be using ABEKA for my dd. We will be starting a big dinosaur project with my ds. In our homeschool group they are having a scientific collection contest. We will be entering his dinosaurs. He will be doing a display board, have a fossil dig, and have dinosaurs (toys) on the table in front of the display board. If you don't know about Display Boards and Draw and Caption you really need to check out Tapestry of Grace. I am also a big fan of Cindy Rushton and notebooking.
I am off for another busy week. Hope you have a great one as well.
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• Sep. 26, 2007
Finally Back
Hi All,
Sorry for the long break in writing. I have had bronchitis and then on to pneumonia. We did start school but it was a little late....September 12. We have been tooling right along though. We are studying Egypt. My ds has enjoyed working on the History Pockets. He has also done some Drawing and Captioning. I just feel blessed to be able to homeschool. We will be doing Egypt for another week and then we will move on to Creation and also dinosaurs. If I haven't mentioned it before my son LOVES dinosaurs. He has since he was about 1. People said he would out grow it. Oh no.....he now has about 400 dinosaurs. I am not kidding. He has some really nice ones that are made of leather (Christmas presents from loving aunt) but most are the regular size ones. I am off to work on school plans. Have a great day.
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• Aug. 20, 2007
Planning Week
This week begins our planning week. We will start school Sept. 4 so we are trying to get all things in order. We are planning to do some really great crafts for the Egypt section...Egyptian jewelry, mummies, and Egyptian heiroglyphics. Hope your schooling or planning is also going well.
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• Aug. 16, 2007
Found great books
Hi all,
I found the neatest books today to go along with Tapestry of Grace. They are the History Pockets. I ordered the Ancient Civilizations and the Ancient Egypt ones. They look like they will fit in perfectly with our timelines. I don't know if y'all have used a word wall before but they are a great tool to use. We use them in our children's church and I am planning to use it in our homeschool this year. We will also be using word bank cards.
One thing I am going to try to do this year is start small and build up. I don't know about you but I have a tendency to try to do everything and end up doing not much at all. I know my major goals this year are going to be working on math and language arts. The wonderful thing about TOG is that you can use history as a basis and build on that. My son is a HUGE dinosaur fan but we are having a problem with the million year thing. I found a book called The Great Dinosaur Mystery and the Bible. If I can catch his attention with dinosaurs and connect it to the Bible (Job 40-41) then he will find some more really interesting things there.
I hope y'all have a great weekend. I hope it is not as hot as it is here....102 degrees today. This Mississippi gal is not a big fan of super hot weather.
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• Aug. 15, 2007
Welcome to our Treehouse Academy
First of all I want to welcome you to our treehouse academy. The reason it is called treehouse academy is that our school room started out as a treehouse and then was turned into our school. 
Why not combine the fun of a treehouse with the fun of homeschooling? To me homeschooling is a grand journey and this year we are beginning the ultimate journey with Tapestry of Grace. We will begin our trip in Egypt and the amazing life of Moses (Year One Unit One). One thought on making it a true journey/trip is to make passports for the kids to stamp as they arrive and leave their destinations. My son is eight (LG/UG) and my daughter is five (LG). We will also be doing lapbooking and notebooking. School should be fun and not some boring thing to be indured. Again, welcome to our treehouse academy the fun begins now! 
