This past Thursday was a bittersweet day. My sweet niece MacKenzie is moving to FL next week, so today was the last day we got to spend the day with her. We enjoyed it, making a trip to the park and eating Chickfila for lunch, and playing around the house.

After a full morning, the kiddos went down for their afternoon naps and we got to spend a little bit of time together just hanging out, relaxing, and reading. Sometimes it’s not just the time we’re sitting and talking, but the moments when you can enjoy each other’s company while doing separate tasks that are great, too. I love those types of relationships.

Once the kiddos woke up, we heard thunder outside, so I knew we needed to find an indoor activity or two. So, I just LOVE that when that happens, I can pull out my Mother Goose Time supplies for the month and see what fun activities we can do. To think – using ‘school’ stuff to just play and enjoy each other. What? So neat.

So that afternoon, we pulled out the little colorful plastic keys that came with June’s Alphabet House theme box, and I did a few math challenges with Natalie that were included in one of the day’s lesson plans.

We also made little mops out of materials provided in the packet for Day 11, “Cleaning Up,”

although I refrained from adding the sand or dirt the activity recommended to the top of the Alphabet Sheet so they could clean it up. I wasn’t that committed to the activity in the middle of my office! But I did promise we could replicate the activity the next time we could go outside, so Natalie resigned from her pleading.

 

Peter watched on while enjoying his afternoon snack of popcorn. He quickly mimicked her play afterwards, playing with his mop so much that he quickly demolished it before I could get a good picture. Such is life with boys, I suppose.

We then moved into the kitchen to make our washing machines! What a fun idea! This came out of Day 12’s focus on laundry.

I have already started asking the kiddos to help me load the dryer on occasions that I’m doing laundry during the day while they are around, so it was fun to ask questions and see what kind of information they had been gathering from their experiences.

I pretty much had to make Peter’s completely, but he was able to load the washing machine with the items he wanted (all of the options provided) and then changed my design by wanting the plastic covering to be on the outside of his machine instead of taped to the inside, so I accommodated his request to give him a little bit more ownership in the design process.

Natalie needed to add lots of knobs and options to her machine (maybe an indicator of a desire for wanting the top of the line appliances in the future? Watch out, future husband!), and so we discussed what they were all for. She had some great ideas, suggested that maybe one button was for cold water, another for hot. We had never discussed the different temperature settings on our machine at home, so I was surprised that was something to came to mind for her. Not sure if she picked up that information from a TV show she has watched or what. I also explained the different speed settings on our machine as well, and how we select that depending on what we are washing and how dirty it may be.

I so appreciate the conversations that this curriculum has given us the opportunity for. Because on my own accord, it would not interest me or occur to me to talk to my daughter about everyday stuff like that, at least not in this season, but I love the holistic approach it provides so that as we incorporate more of her roles and responsibilities around the house, she’s also being informed of the purposes and functions of them as well.

We are Dave Ramsey, Financial Peace University people, and so it’s already in our plans this year to start incorporating Financial Peace Junior into our homeschool schedule. I’ve asked the hubs if he would be willing to take the lead on this extracurricular adventure. And so we’ve aleady started discussing the general ideas of what responsibilities we all have around our home, just because we’re part of the family (personal responsibilities like making up our own beds, cleaning up our own rooms, etc.), but how she will also be able to earn a ‘commission’ by taking on tasks that serve the whole family, like feeding our two cats in the morning. She has been interested in money for as long as I can remember, so it’s very important to us that we give her some good tools and help her approach it in a way she can steward her money wisely in the future.

So, all that to say, when shes’ a little older (and taller), laundry very well may be a task that she chooses to take on for some extra commission, and it’s neat to think that we’re laying the groundwork for that now, and hopefully giving her a new appreciation for the modern conveniences that we are blessed to have in our home. Although, as I type this, I am reminded of a conversation we had a few weeks ago where she informed me that she would be the one to do the dishes when she gets married, and her husband would do the laundry (the roles are reversed in our household), because she does not like doing laundry. So, there ya go. 🙂 Maybe we will start talking about the dishwasher next! 🙂

 

  As an official Mother Goose Time Blog Ambassador,
I receive curriculum in exchange for posting about our honest and authentic experiences with the curriculum.
Click here for more information on Mother Goose Time.

Here is a glimpse at one of our fun ‘freeplay’ moments this past week.

The kiddos were playing in the office with some of the manipulatives that came with our August Mother Goose Time box, Fables and Folktales. (Oh man, it is SO cute! Can’t wait to get into it next month)

Natalie decided she wanted to construct a tree (but of course, sharing with her brother meant she didn’t have enough for her grand design).

So we took some time that morning to talk about doing the best with what we have, not ideal situations, etc. Honestly lessons that the Lord has been speaking to me about pretty much all my life, especially as I’ve started working through my lovely perfectionistic tendencies, and so the kids are definitely getting the overflow of what I’m learning. I’m sure they are thrilled. 🙂

I joke, but it’s been neat to see how the mornings that we’re more relaxed with our schedule and agenda, how opportunities come up to address real life issues and encourage them towards certain character qualities that I pray they exhibit as they grow up – contentment, diligence, generosity, etc. So it’s been a good reminder for me to have a plan, but also to be flexible and available for the Lord to direct our mornings as He sees fit, within or outside of said plan.

Peter, well – I’m not really sure he had much of a design in mind. He just started making lines. Probably some sort of ant or bug line.

I had pulled out one of our shape puzzle while they were playing, wondering what they would do if I introduced something new.

Natalie started filled the hollow pieces, and Peter used the board to put in the same number of ‘jewels’ in each row. I was actually pretty surprised that he had a method to it. He wanted 3 in the triangle, and 4 in each square and octagon. So there ya go. Some method to his madness sometimes.

 

And then a bit later, after Peter had moved on to the next thing he could scavenge from the craft drawer in the kitchen, Natalie calls me over to talk to me about her spoons.

 

Apparently her spoons each had 4 jewels, which allowed them to talk. So they were all talking to each other. And then she decided that the jewels were making the spoons melt, while they were talking.
So I guess they had to finish up their conversation quickly before they disintegrated. (She’s a weirdo, but she’s my weirdo and I love her.)

It was fun to see their little minds and what they chose to do without my instruction. I’m sure they enjoyed the freedom, and I enjoyed watching their little hands create.

 As an official Mother Goose Time Blog Ambassador,
I receive curriculum in exchange for posting about our honest and authentic experiences with the curriculum.
Click here for more information on Mother Goose Time.

These are my two crazy kiddos on the way to the park to ride bikes today:

Natalie, aka “the Sweetness” (age 5)

and Peter, aka “little prince” (age 2).

 This week was a hard week. Nothing really significant, I just didn’t feel very well and with the heat encouraging us to stay indoors all day long, it just seemed like the days lasted forever. Can you relate? Some days are just long.

So, we decided to take a light week with ‘school’ and just hit on some fun activities that I had been looking forward to since perusing this month’s curriculum materials. I love that I’m using a curriculum right now that I look forward to, even if I’m not feeling well, and can tailor to our specific needs/conditions each week.

So I will just fill ya in on some of  the fun things we did this week with some of  June’s Alphabet House activities from Mother Goose Time.

Peter’s bin had 2 sets of ABC cards (lower and upper case) that had fun pictures on the opposite side of the letter, an animal or object that starts with the same letter. So I let him explore the letters one morning while Natalie worked on her RV shape sheet. This was something she had seen Peter playing with earlier this month, and I had promised she could go back and paste the shapes onto the picture.

We then got around to making our shape houses out of paper bags.

Natalie decided her house needed lots and lots of butterflies for the design.

Peter was pretty content with a door and two windows.

That made cute little displays for Daddy to see when he got home from work, and they had fun showing off their creations.

We also had fun making the crowns from the day themed on castles, each kid designing their own with the jewels that were provided.

This is the little prince after he wandered off to watch some TV.

So even though we didn’t ‘do’ much in terms of what I would consider a lesson plan or agenda, the kids had fun and we had some great conversations in the process. And for me, the relational investment of spending time with them while doing something we all enjoyed, that’s a win for me.

Hope you had a good week, too!

As an official Mother Goose Time Blog Ambassador,
I receive curriculum in exchange for posting about our honest and authentic experiences with the curriculum.
Click here for more information on Mother Goose Time.