Garden Progress: Fall Decorating

The neighborhood is getting decked out for Halloween and the kids are really into it this year.  So we pulled out the Halloween Party leftovers from last year and got busy decorating our house too. 

The daisy bushes have been blooming for about 2 weeks now.  It is a great last hurrah for the landscaping before it gets too cold. I love hearty perennials!!

Sew Special: Frozen Costume Part 2 - Anna's Cape

One costume complete.  One Sven the reindeer and one Kristoff to go!

Sew Special: Frozen Costume Part 1 - Anna's Dress with Appliqued Embroidery

This Frozen Halloween costume has been a serious endeavor.  Lots of hours and lots of planning and thinking through how to replicate things.  I did not use a pattern, which added to the level of difficulty, but also has the nice side effect of making it a perfect fit (not just according to some pattern's measurements).

 I learned a lot about sewing & machine applique in the process and I think I might be ready to do a small applique quilt some day soon. Maybe something like this or this? Haha. Kellie makes amazing applique quilts!

I wanted the skirt to be longer than most patterns were making it and also to keep the embroidery close to the hem so that it did not look so disproportionate for little girls.  I still have to do the cape, but Aunt H loaned me a pattern for that so I expect it to be much quicker to finish.

Recommended Reading: Kids Historical Fiction Books

My favorite genre of books has always been historical fiction.  Now it is a pleasure for me to share them with big sister A.  We recently discovered Karen Cushman.  In the last week or so we read/listened to 3 of her books:

1. The Ballad of Lucy Whipple -- About a young girl whose family moves to California as part of the gold rush. A well written story that gave a clear sense of place -- like I was there looking around myself.

2. Rodzina -- This was my favorite of the 3 books. The story about the kids on the orphan train just sucked me in and pulled me right along. I loved the author's notes at the end about where to go to find out more information about the actual orphan trains and other examples of similar occurrences. And of course the fact that the main character is Polish and longs for cabbage, beets, and piroshki was not hard for me to relate to.

3. Will Sparrow's Road -- About an English boy in the 1600s whose father indentures him to an innkeeper in exchange for free ale! Similar to the first 2, it is another wild adventure of a child looking for "home".

I also read The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath this week. Another work from the "Recommended Classics" list and not what I expected at all. It is about depression from a first person perspective, but not depressing to read.  I think it could help people understand mental illness a bit more. The fact that the author committed suicide later in life makes the story at once more compellingly real and also more sad.  It is more like a non fiction autobiography in that way. She changed the names, but was writing from her own experiences. 

Family Schooling Summary

Here are some samples from more co-op school lessons.  Big sister A studied the water cycle last week and wind this week:

 We are in charge of teaching Joy School this week.  The theme is "the Earth is Amazing" and my units were on seeds and plants in particular -- one of my favorite topics.  We went out to gather some things for the lesson and found 2 fuzzy caterpillars.  Which the kids are now calling "caterpickles" since they heard that in a book recently.

All the kiddos love going out to see the chickens, so we included that as part of our lesson on the Earth today.

 Looking in the nesting boxes for today's eggs. We had to close it up and give Felicity some privacy since she was trying to lay and egg right then.

 We also did two crafts relating to seeds and plants.  The first was a seed collage.  Big sister A grouped her seeds by type and wrote the name of each.  The others were much more free form.

We used bits of my succulents and little jars to make terrariums. I hope that everyones plants will root properly.  Here are the ones that sister A and brother M made.  I was not sure whether the kids would like this activity, but they loved it. Each one selected several of the cuttings and happily poked them into their jars of dirt.

I made a larger version as an example and to replace my orchid (previous occupant of the large jar) which died after about 5 years... It only bloomed twice, so I don't feel too sad.

 Succulents are such great plants, so undemanding, productive, and easy to share clippings of.

Big sister A and brother M started their "Bedtime Math" Club last week.  

It is free, kind of a pilot project for the non-profit group that is trying to get kids excited about math.  There are tons of cool lessons and activities on their website. This week, they used different numbers of glow sticks to make shapes. Here they are hiding under the table so that they would be able to see the glow better. 

Brother M was not as enthusiastic about it as A.  He mostly played in other areas of the Discovery Room/library.

  Looking at how groups of smaller shapes can be combined to make larger shapes. 

Sew Special: Tunic Sweater and a Scrappy Quilt

I've been working on this little eyelet tunic sweater off and on for about a year now. The yarn is very fine and so it was rather slow going and I would set it aside whenever I got bored.  It took so long to finish that I had to make some adjustments to the pattern to make sure that it would not be too small. 

I finished this little cropped vest awhile ago, but could not settle on the right buttons for it. The yarn is a mixture of hemp and wool and gives it kind of a rustic look.  I think it will be a cute fall maternity item over some of my shirts.

I also started on this year's scrap quilt this week. In contrast to last year's Ugly Quilt, I had a lot of scraps that go nicely together this year.  (Probably a result of my goal to focus more on making clothes for myself). I am not sure what size it will be, but I am hoping to make it twin or full so that it can be used on the kiddos' or guest beds. 

Family Schooling Summary

For FHE this week we went to a playground that is about a mile from our house. Every time I go there I think, "we should come here more often".  But it is huge and there are usually a lot of kids there, so watching all 3 kiddos by myself seems too risky. The kiddos had a blast! It is fun to see their progress on the parts that were hard for them last year. 

Parks around here have so much cool stuff -- like this pogo stick ride.

We did a lot of reading this week (per usual), workbook activities, joy school, soccer classes, dance, and co-op school.  Our little old house seems to offer endless opportunities for creating these "reading nests".

The kiddos have each been doing a bunch of fun activities at their co-op school.  Here are two examples from the "Art as Science" class and "My Amazing Body" that big sister A is taking.