Weekly Review: The Week We Enjoyed FALL!

We had a busy week and it felt like we were never at home!  Monday we had nothing on our calendar but we did have family come to visit and then the boys and I headed out hiking in the afternoon.  Tuesday the boys had karate and then we spent the afternoon shopping and running errands.  Wednesday the boys took an engineering class at the children's museum, Thursday we met friends in a nearby state and spent the day at their campground hiking and playing.  It was fun but I found us constantly rushing through our morning trying to get a bit of schoolwork done and lunches packed.  We rarely got home much before dinner and I found myself rushing around to get our cooler unpacked and dinner started.  It was fun but I was pretty tired each night!

Math:  Evan finished up his Multiplication book.  Alec started on his new math books and read through The Great Barrier Reef Using Graphs and Charts to Solve Word Problems, Amazing Animals Multiplying Multi-digit Numbers by One- Digit Numbers with Regrouping, and Denali National Park, an Alaskan Ecosystem: Creating Graphical Representation of Data.  Ian worked on a few more pages in his Key to Decimals book.  Ian, my husband and I played Yahtzee one night working on simple multiplication and addition skills.  The boys talked me into a trip to Toys R Us and had their own money to spend. They had to budget their money and balance it out with all the things they wanted to buy-- the perfect life lessons in money.  The boys also played Sequence Numbers one afternoon.  It was a pretty lengthy game that worked on addition and subtraction skills; Evan ended up winning and he was thrilled.

Geography:  We played Scrambled States of America and World GeoBingo.  We started putting together a large United States map that Evan had gotten for his birthday.

Spelling/ Language Arts:  Alec worked on two more pages in his Fun Spelling workbook.  Evan worked on a few more pages in his phonics book.  Alec, Evan and I all played a few rounds of Silly Sentences one afternoon just to pass the time; they love giggling over the silly sentences they create.  All three boys worked through another week in their spelling books (Evan once again skipped a week ahead since he knew the five spelling words before starting the unit).  The older two boys worked on another page in their English and Grammar books working with simple subjects. All three boys completed another page in their cursive books.

Reading:  Ian read The Lorax and Power Machines.  Alec read The Dragon's Guide to the Care and Feeding of Humans and finished up Spirit Animals Immortal Guardians.  We finished up Storm Warning and listened to another two disks in our book on CD; House of Hades.  Evan did a lot of reading too but all of his books were non- fiction this week so I listed them under science.

Art:  The boys made leaf resist paintings.

Life Skills:  The boys helped clean the whole house this week; even rearranging some rooms and some pieces of furniture to better fit.  Ian helped his father re-build a trailer over the weekend.

Science:  Ian changed his science fair topic to Solar Power and he started making a few of the projects from his Solar Power kit (we were missing so many parts and pieces from his remote control vehicle kit that he could only make two of the vehicles out of the 10).   Alec read 100 Facts about big Cats but only skimming through the book looking for facts about Ocelots, he also read a book called Ocelots and sat with me to type up a few facts for his report.  Evan read Parrots Over Puerto Rico, Sea Otters, and Life Cycles of a Frog.  Both Alec and Evan read Kate & Pipin; a touching story about a dog and a fawn that become friends.  The younger two boys took a class at one of the local children's museums focusing on Engineering and we spent a fun day playing with all the exhibits.

Evan is testing how sturdy his pillar building is

They held up to everything; including the basket!

Building a wooden dowel "house"

Physical Activity:  The boys and I went on a nice hour long hike one day this week.  We went  to a nearby chasm and hiked up and down all the rocks (using the marked paths).  It's always a lot of fun!

For once I went ON the sliding rock; I had not idea it was such a vertical looking drop! 

Alec and Evan started back at karate after a really long (more than) summer break.  Ian decided to sit out karate this year but spent the morning they were going to karate exercising on our elliptical machine.

We met some friends in a neighboring state and hung out at their campground for the day. My kids have never been to a campground since I am really not the camping type and we had a great day exploring the woods, the beach, the playground, and the camp arcade.  The boys had races, we enjoyed learning about nature, and it was such a perfect day. We usually only get to see these homeschooling friends once or twice a year and it's so great when we're all able to meet up and spend time together.

I didn't even know I took this picture! It was quite by accident but I loved it! 

How was your week?