Amaze your son by teaching him how to make milk chocolate slushies. :)

Soak your feet in cold water.

Play with a toad.

Watch family movies together.

Build minions.  :)  Play with them.  They are fun to balance on doors, stack and kick/knock over, and to give names. :)

Play with a bunny.

Wrap a cold cloth around the back of the neck.

Turn on lots of fans.

Eat slushies.   Consider making these ones.

Put no pressure on yourself to accomplish anything.  Succeed.  :)

The lad and I like to read books together.
We have some we read at breakfast, some we read during the day and a bunch that we read at night.

In the morning we are reading though the Warriors, a dangerous path.   We are also going through "25 Truths" by Ed Douglas.  At this time we also read though our devotion from "keys for Kids", this devotional can also be found on-line here.    The last book we read at breakfast is "the burgess bird book for children".

Reading this book has inspired us to put up a bunch of bird feeders.   We have one just for the grackles (mostly to encourage them away from our other feeders), two small ones for finches, and others for sparrows, jays and other such birds.  It's been rather fun watching the birds.  We've met ground birds, sitting on a perch birds, bully birds, shy birds, juveniles, adults, male and female plumage, and so much more.  It's been fascinating. 

"MOM!  Come quick!  What bird is that?"

Sometimes we know from our reading, other times we need to ask qustions like we did this morning on facebook, and yet other times we search through the birds of Canada book that we have.

Throughout the day we pick up one of the books on Canada that we have.  Both are old, been through the wringer a time or two books, but they are interesting reading, though not always factual.    It teaches us discernment and the ability to just enjoy a good story as they are both written in a story format.

In the evening we do the bulk of our reading.  We've just started reading "the island of the blue dolphin" on the advice of more than one Summer Reading list for boys person from the Schoolhouse Crew. 

We are also reading "the treasure seekers" by E. Nesbit, another book about Canada..this one being a factual book.   Also a book on polar regions (we've been reading 100 facts about ______ books lately).  The lad has a primer he needs to read one page in every night except for weekends.  The book we are reading currently is called "yawn and dawn".   Then of course we have a devotional book we've been reading.  I do the scripture, the lad reads the prayer and learn from verse.  I picked this book NOT for the devotional content but for the fact that I can read something, and the lad can read something.      We continue also to read through a Kids Yearbook type of book.... it's a bunch of facts interesting to children.  

It's good to read together.  I'm continually amazed at how many words my son knows how to read now, and yet how he struggles with some simple ones.  I know that over time it is coming so it's good.  it's just one of those lovely parts of homeschooling that I so enjoy.  :)   Good books help!

Free Curriculum Links.  These links are for full lessons – not just worksheets & activities.   Have fun learning with your kiddos!!

Grammarly.   Grammarly is an automated proofreader and your personal grammar coach. Correct up to 10 times more mistakes than popular word processors.

Homeschool for Free.  Welcome to my binder! These are the free resources I've found while browsing the web. I will be adding to it as I find new sites, so bookmark this page :-)

As an aside

A couple of posts I want to read over again.

Books for boys.  Some of these we've read, others look intriguing.

Homeschool Carnival.  I"m one of the links, others look interesting.

I received a copy of this book from Booksneeze so that I could review it.  There only requirement is that I read it and let folks know what I think about it.  :)   So that's what I am doing today.

This handbook is just that.   It's a nice sized book you can take up in your hand with short chapters for easy digestibility that give you ideas about how to raise your children up in the eyes of the Lord.

It is packed full of ideas to encourage parents to look to the heart when raising their children, not just to actions.

There are 50 chapters with titles such as "Look for heart moments", "transfer responsibility for change to the child', "use correction to challenge the heart", "how to pray for your kids", "firmness doesn't require harshness" and so forth.

The book begins with this thought "You're holding a book of ideas.  As parents, we need all the ideas we can find.  Each child is unique, and the same tools don't work with every one.  ... The suggestions in this book will help you be a better parent.'

I have to admit to some skepticism when I first asked to review this book.  I had read a number of positive reviews about it, but some parenting books well.. let's just say that in the long run I wouldn't recommend them.   This book is designed to help parents examine what they are doing, and then look to the heart of the child, not just to their actions.    For THAT reason I recommend this book.   Our goal as parents is to raise children up who think about what they are doing, and who want to follow, who want to please, the Lord God himself.

This book just helps you think about how to do that with your child.

So as you parent keep some principles in mind.
1. Pray.  This is where you begin.
2. Build upon a biblical foundation.   The bible really is the authority.
3. Think long term.   Daily interactions are part of something bigger.
4. Remember what truly is most important.   So try to be strategic as you parent.
5. Watch for variations on a theme.   We are raising children to be fit for life.
6. Focus on the heart.  

When you read this book, remember that it is an aid, it's not infalliable, but it will help you think things through a bit as you parent.   I know it gave me an "ah ha" moment, and I'm guessing it will do the same for you.  :)

This year I inadvertently made things a bit tougher for myself.

I scheduled soccer (which is supposed to run til 430) and then I scheduled swimming.  NOW swimming I had tried to book for a Monday but that didn't work, so the only available days were Thursday or Saturday.  And I had forgotten about soccer at the time and was feeling pressured... so I went with Thursday ONLY to realize that I had slightly double booked myself.

So what ended up happening was that the lad left soccer 10 minutes early so we could get to swimming.

It ended up working out really well.

My mom-in-law, who is a marvellous lady by the way, would have taken the lad swimming if she needed to, but she didn't really want to.   She was delighted that she didn't have to break up her play day to take the lad swimming.   And it worked out for us as missing 10 minutes of soccer didn't really impact on the lad over much and meant we only had to drive to London twice in one week.  

Once I read a post from a homeschool blogger who mentioned that homeschool parents shouldn't segregate their children for playing sports.

I thought her opinion was quite valid as sometimes as homeschoolers we stick to ourselves too much.   We try too hard to just make a community for ourselves and shut off the "schooled" world.   Not particularly useful that approach I think in the long run as our children need to be able to cope with the world as well.

BUT all that said... I do put my son into homeschool soccer.  Why?
1. it's six weeks
2. it involves no weekends
3. there are no self-important groups
4. it's very manageable.
5. it's highly affordable

Is it the best soccer out there?  No.
But when you have a child who isn't particularly sports minded, it gives him a safe place to do soccer and to have some fun.

It's very much a parent run enterprise, with people of various levels of coaching experience involved.  Sometimes older teens help with the coaching, sometimes parents.   People bring different things to the field and the children need to cope with that.

Last week a dad coached and made the girls quite angry.   He had all the boys play forward positions and stuck the girls playing defense and then made the decision to tell them that they weren't switch positions with the boys at all.    I wasn't particularly impressed either but decided to let it be (and couldn't discuss due to commitments elsewhere) and after thinking about it, decided it was a learning experience for the children and nothing to worry on.  Also it was interesting to me seeing how the girls figured out how to deal with it, some of them played hard and watched the ball, others rebelled and decided to ignore the game.  

Other weeks we've had coaches let the children pick their team-mates so some children needed to deal with being picked last.  Other weeks the coach has needed to help out a weaker team.    It all works out    The children have different life experiences and figure out a way to make it work for them.

Edited in to add: Despite different learning/coaching styles and different life experiences I am delighted to be part of this homeschool soccer group.   The coaches surprise me sometimes with how they coach and more often than not, encourage me in my coaching/teaching endeavors.  It's interesting to observe what people do and how they do it.   Do somethings bother me?  Yeah, but then I do some things that also bother people, and I figure roll with it as much as you can.       That's the way it all works right?   Do the best you can, roll with the experiences you are offered, and learn from it.

I received this in an email and it made me laugh.  Hope it does you too.  :)

A cowboy named Bud was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture in Alberta when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced toward him out of a cloud of dust.

The driver, a young man in a Brioni® suit, Gucci® shoes, RayBan® sunglasses and YSL® tie, leaned out the window and asked the cowboy, "If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will you give me a calf?"

Bud looks at the man, who obviously is a yuppie, then looks at his peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, "Sure, why not?"

The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell® notebook computer, connects it to his Cingular RAZR V3® cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop® and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany... Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot® that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses an MS-SQL® database through an ODBC connected Excel® spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry® and, after a few minutes, receives a
response. Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet® printer, turns to the cowboy and says, "You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves."

"That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves," says Bud. He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on with amusement as the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car.

Then Bud says to the young man, "Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?"

The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, "Okay, why not?"

"You're a Member of Parliament in Ottawa ", says Bud.

"Wow! That's correct," says the yuppie, "but how did you guess that?"

"No guessing required." answered the cowboy. "You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked. You used millions of dollars worth of equipment trying to show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don't know a thing about how working people make a living - or about cows, for that matter. This is a herd of sheep.”

“Now give me back my dog.”

I do so wish I'd had the presence of mind to take pictures at our yard sale.  The lad was SO busy selling things.  He worked hard.  He did lots of good math, making change for people and just generally being a confident  young business person.  :)   Things went well.

Yesterday we worked on getting the rabbitry clean.
The lad helped when asked, and did well following directions.   We had a yardful of bunnies hopping around in exercise pens.

He also experimented with different ways to kill ants.  We have WAY too many hills of ant colonies around our house so we've been waging battle with them, trying to kill off the hills that are close to the house (as they've been coming in here looking for food instead of staying outside where they belong).

So yesterday the lad was going around bleaching the ant hills.   He used the leftover bleach water that I used for cleaning the rabbit water bottles.

The lad has also been quite busy lately taking care of his mice and hand taming the youngsters.    It keeps him busy.  I am hopeful that we can sell some of the offspring fairly soon.   Looking for a mouse as a pet?  :)   We have some ready to go. :)

Today we are going to see the movie "Epic" in the theatre.   Dad's going away for a week so we thought this would be nice time together.

So that's our past couple of days.  Tomorrow I hope to get some schooling done again.   We don't do heavy over the summer, but we do accomplish some schooling, usually something every week for a day or two.    We focus on field trips, nature study, do some math, reading and music.  

Every year I do a big yard sale.  Yes.. I have lots of stuff.. people give me things, I buy cheap auction boxes, and then I have a large yard sale.  It's fun for me.  I'd love to own a small shop and just sell things.  Meeting new people, training people how to be good employees, ..it would just be fun.

ANYWHO... Since it is yard sale week things all revolve around that theme.

To that end.. yesterday the lad helped me do some book sorting, and we dried some cat nip to sell (this is his project).

Today we're baking/cooking.  So he's reading recipes, following directions, learning how to measure and compare and all sorts of lovely things.  AND we are working toward the end of making some dollars at the yard sale for buying important things like microscopes (me want) and skylander giants (boy want)

Cream together
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter
1 tsp vanilla

Add one egg and beat well.

Separate bowl mix together
1.5 cup flour
1.5 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp grated lemon peel
1/4 tsp salt

Mix dry ingredients into wet thoroughly.

Cover the bowl and let chill for two hours.

Shape dough into small bowls and roll in cinnamon sugar to coat.
Set cookies, one inch apart on a greased cookie sheet.
Cook at 350 for 10 minutes until edges are slightly browned.
Cool  slightly on pans and then remove to racks to finish cooling.

Verdict: These cookies are a HUGE favourite in our household.

Mix together
1 cup flour
1 cup instant oatmeal
1/2 firmly packed brown sugar
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt

Add
3/4 cup butter until the mixture is all crumbly.

Reserve 1/2 cup of the oatmeal mixture.  Set aside

Press into a 9 inch square GREASED baking pan the main part of the oatmeal mixture.

Cut up enough apple to cover the mixture well.  (the recipe called for six apples but we only needed three).
OPTIONAL: 1/4 cup sunflower seeds sprinkled on top
Then sprinkle on the reserved oatmeal mixture.

Cook in a 375 oven for 40-45 minutes.
Cut into squares and enjoy either hot or cold.

Verdict: not bad, not great.  DO NOT eat after having something sweet as they then taste like they are lacking something.  On their own, they are good.

Cream together
1/2 cup butter (recipe called for shortening which we don't have)
1/2 cup firmly pressed brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Beat ONE egg into the butter mixture

Separate bowl mix together
1 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Stir into the butter mixture.

Add one cup chocolate chips.

Drop by the teaspoonful on greased cookie sheet (we use baking sheet or parchment paper).  note: these cookies spread when cooking.

Cook for 10-12 minutes at 375.

This is our first time making this recipe. 
They come out crunchy if you don't watch them closely.

Verdict: these are okay, they are best slightly undercooked.

Cream together
3/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar

Add
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract

In separate bowl
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt

Mix into butter mixture

Add
2 3/4 cups rolled oats
1 cup raisins

Drop by teaspoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven, or until golden brown. Cool slightly, remove from sheet to wire rack. Cool completely.

Verdict: these are good.  They are very typical oatmeal raisin cookies. :)

I'm starting a review of a product called Circle Time.  It is a product put out by Preschoolers and Peace.  I have to admit, I always thought of circle time as being a little kids thing to do, and not of what we do here at home as being a circle time, but according to the book I received, the time I spend reading and doing devotions in the morning with my son would be considered Circle Time.  SO what we do in our circle time is
1. do devotions.  We use Keys for Kids.
2. read a book of the lads choosing: currently reading Warriors a Dangerous Path
3. The Burgess Bird Book for Children.

Sometimes when we read we come across surprising to us ideas.  This morning our surprising idea came from the Bird Book.   The idea that birds have whiskers.   The birds are the whip-poor-will and the Chuck's will's widow.   I know of the whip-poor-will, but the other was a new bird to me, but I never knew they had whiskers.  Like who thinks of a bird having whiskers?

So found this picture (below) over here.  Can you see the whiskers on this Chuck's Will's Widow?   Neat huh?   If you browse pictures you can also see the size of their mouth.   My lad was quite impressed with how well they camoflage on the ground as well.