Back to School and Our Trip to Mainz

Well, we made it through the second week of home school. The girls seem to be doing well. A lot of what Kinadie and Kara are doing right now in Math is review from last year. My focus with Kinadie is spelling and reading. I would like to put her ahead with her reading and create some intrinsic motivation for her.

Kara does well with reading. We are working on making sure she reads directions and not to rush through assignments. She is overlooking little details in her lessons. Over all she is doing well. This year I would like to find a balance between where she is at academically and making sure not to overwhelm her. She is very smart but at the same time she is only 6 and I want to make sure they all enjoy learning and knowledge at the same time.

Kaylee Jo is doing well with her letters. She is writing her name and working on her fine motor skills. She loves to paint so we've been painting letters and numbers. Right now we're doing a letter a week and making an animal puppet to go with each letter. We've done Annie Ant and Billy Bear. At times she gets restless so I've been letting her play in her room or letting her play on my phone. I've found a lot of free apps that help her write so she is still learning in her off time.

I think our favorite lessons are the science and history lessons. We've learned about evolution and creation. I was able to visually teach them why we are creationists. There is a plan and purpose for everything. Each part was made with tremendous detail. Oh how He delights in His work!

We did a fun lesson in history about fingerprints, All About Me, family, and community. The girls learned who they are and their purpose in a family, community, and the world. Our fingerprint lesson was a fun game of "Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?" The girls had to look and compare fingerprints from our fingerprint data to the fingerprints found on various items from the pantry. Of course Kaylee Jo was the little cookie thief! Ha! Here is Kaylee Jo's All About Me presentation.

This week we looked at plant and animal cells in science and were able to create Jello versions of our own plant cells! The girls were able to remember some of the parts of the plant cell. They enjoyed creating and we talked about how detailed the cell was and each part of the cell was unique with a specific job to do for the plant.

I am so grateful for this opportunity in my life to keep the kids at home. Many thanks to the wonderful husband I have that goes to work everyday to make sure we are provided for. We enjoyed this 4-day weekend taking off from school so we could spend all our time with him. Our Labor Day weekend was spent with some sausage balls and his Ma-ma's banana pudding. I think I have finally got her recipe. We enjoyed it with the girls and reminiscing about being at home. Oh how we miss you all!!

We also played some tennis and taught Kinadie a few tennis moves. Kris is a great coach. Maybe we can get a tennis team going this summer. I know it would be fun. Kinadie seemed to take an interest to it.

The following day we tried our hand at taking the train to Mainz. I had looked up a Mexican food restaurant that had good reviews. Mexican food is hard to come by here in Germany. The owner of this restaurant, Mexico Lindo, is from San Antonio. However, I'm not sure the cook was from Texas. It was good but it just isn't like home. I'll need to come up with a good enchilada recipe (hint, hint...Brittney Alonso). ;o)

We had fun on our first train. The girls enjoyed the ride. We'll have to go somewhere new next time now that we know how the train system works. We had full intentions to going to Frankfurt today but we are at home enjoying the last day doing a bunch of nothing. Tomorrow it's back to work and school. So until next time!