Literary Tea

Olivia, Annabel and Grace had a literary tea at their school. They go to a Classical Christian home schooling school one day a week where they are taught their humanities.

You can imagine my excitement when I got the call asking if I had any tea sets. Oh yes, I have many.

It became quite humorous in China when something absolutely crazy came over me and I became obsessed with tea sets and squeeky shoes. I bought a lot of both. The last day we were packing up I purchased my last tea set ~ much to Skip's dismay. I kept telling him that each tea set would go to one of the girls as a wedding present, he'd say okay that is only five. The justification that they were for their wedding offered no comfort to him, the thought of five weddings sends the precious man into prayer. Suitcases bulging we were able to get home with all! AND now I had a chance to use them!

amelia's excitement

quinn has just learned to be content having been the only boy for so long

this only captures one second of grant's enjoyment

annabel the literary and ruthie

ashley, recently engaged and about to graduate from nursing school, standing next to quinn who was certain one day he would marry his favorite babysitter (he is hiding his disappointment)

olivia the tiny literary

grace the literary

the third fourth and fifth grade class

I am so proud of my girls and am very impressed by how they were able to memorize such long poems ~ I have a hard time reciting my home phone number and I have had the same number for over 10 years. They did a great job!

Summer Is Offcially Over

I am actually excited about moving into homeschooling. We started back on Labor Day; felt like the celebration was a perfect day to begin laboring over our studies. The kids felt differently. Skip had the day off, so he could help me with the little ones while we tried out our first day.

Grace and Quinn are my younger elementary students and Amelia and Grant are my preschoolers. I cannot tell you which group I love teaching more. I LOVE reading 100 Dresses with Grace! and Quinn's math is coming alive for him. Together we will study Countries and Cultures by My Father's World. This will be the second time I have taught Countries and Cultures so hopefully it will be easier. The first year was when I first began homeschooling (a great big blur).

Preschool is sweet! Amelia and Grant are so much fun ~ a big gigantic explosion of personality! This week is A week. Today they loved marching to "The Ants Go Marching One By One" . Grant kept saying, "Do again, Mommy! Do, again!" with a big toothless grin on his face! I love his little eye teeth! Yesterday when I pulled out the shaving cream, oh their faces! They played and played ~ giggling. The lesson was to practice writing their As, but I think the shock of me allowing such a mess distracted everything. The older children begged to practice writing their As too. I just responded, "the rules are no fun will be had by anyone over 4!"

My junior high school girls started a Christian Classical school that meets once a week. They go to school one day a week, get all of their assignments and report back the following week and had in their assignments. They are still home with me, but it is nice to have most of their teaching done by someone new. They are learning the important lesson of how not to procrastinate. They actually started school a few weeks back. I am very proud of how hard they are both working. The work is a lot more challenging than what they were used to. Annabel came home the first day of school and said, "Mama, Mrs. N makes learning so much fun!" (never mind I have been her teacher since 2nd grade!) With all that aside, it is going to be a year of growth for both of them ~ really for all of us.

I am very thankful to be able to spend this time with the children. I am learning so much about who God has designed them to be and even more about myself. Still cannot believe he made the all so different! LOL