I have been neglect this holiday season. A bit vacation to Florida and the holiday season creeping up upon us makes little time for blogging.
Today is Solstice. 4 Days to Christmas. AND we get to experience Kwanza this year thanks to our awesome friends. One of these years I would like to experience Hanukkah.
I am keeping this short but hope that soon a photo update will come soon.
In the New Year my hope is to get more on the homeschool ball but I say that every year ;)
My recommendation of the season is - Check out The Thomas Jefferson Hour (free) podcast found on iTunes. I am in love. My brain is so happy.
A few years ago for the Monkey;s fifth birthday a friend gave us a burned copy of a cd by this fella Billy Jonas. We fell in love the kids and I did with this fella. The Bean's favorite song is Lean on me and the Monkey loves Mount St. Helen from the album What kind of Cat are You? (the title song is brilliant also). I love his perspective on the world and the wonderful messages in his songs. On super crappy days I like to listen to the song God Is In from the album Life So far. That whole album is great for my crappy days (and good days too). This album is not so kid centric but good for all to listen to (minus one song with a heavier message later in the album, still with a good message). We are having a lego morning with a side of Billy Jonas' album Happy Accidents (and yes I did pay for it ;)
With life being so busy it is hard to keep up with posting our daily fun. Last Tuesday was another Kidtopia week. We had the 7 crazy boys and one brave girl wielding hammers and nails and remarkable no one got hurt. The leaf pile seemed to be more dangerous but it may have been the large metal rakes we armed them with...hmmm. Anyway the kids made lanterns and as an added activity they mixed Ground Dragon Bones, Unicorn Urine and Tears of Demon for an explosive experiment. As always a wonderfully chaotic afternoon with some great ladies and crazy kids and a little drama thrown in just to make things interesting. (the drama among other things was the random baby that was in our care for this time slot - she was a trooper in the chaos)
As most of you know over the years we have tried many a curriculum. What we have found is that we are not curriculum folk. Monkey is not even a workbook / work sheet kind of guy which I can appreciate. The Bean on the other hand is turning out to be quite the workbook lover.
She would pull the Monkey's old workbooks off the shelf and plop down to do them. Her own way of course never being one to follow the rules. She is getting to the age though where following the instructions is getting a little higher on her list. She is finding it gets better outcomes although not always as wonderfully creative. Just last night she went on about how ridiculous it was that numbers had to face a certain way because you know what number it is if it is backwards or forwards. She does have a point.
In my search for good workbooks, which I have been looking for for years, I came across Miquon for math and Explode the Code - Getting Ready for the Code for reading at the suggestion of a friend. I was skeptical but briefly browsed through it at my friends house and went home and made a Rainbow Resources order.
The order came and last night while the male folk plunked down for an action packed documentary BBC's Walking with Dinosaurs Disc 1 (which they have watched numerous times in the past decade and there is a story of this particular series in relation to my honeymoon that I will share later) the Bean and I went to her room to try out these new workbooks and THEY WERE GREAT! She loved them, I found them not overwhelming as I usually find workbooks - I am excited. So, minus the Bean stabbing a pencil through her jeans almost resulting in a hospital visit, we had a great impromptu night of homeschooling.
Through the Belle Isle zoo in Detroit there are monthly homeschool field trips. This past Thursday we went to Kensington Park for a hike and to talk about dog facts. It was a great day. Victoria, the woman who runs the field trips really knows how to work with the homeschool crowd and she really knew her stuff. She had dog skulls, we looked at dog tracks, dogs were welcome on the hike, she talked about coyotes and wolf packs and the history of their diminished populations, and we even strayed off into leaf galls, sassparilla and other ingredients of root beer and wooly bears. A good day in the wood.
Thiswas my find today at work. It was in the lending library and it is awesome. As most of you know I am usually eyeball deep in birth and love to talk about it and think about it. Now I have another angle to talk to my kids about it. We are a biology family so this is super cool and very up our track. The second animal (out of 14) that they talk about it the African Elephant, the Bean's favorite animal (and hopefully my next tattoo - shhhhhh don't tell)
Crust: 1 c. White Flour 1 1/2 c. Whole Wheat Flour 1/3 c. Sugar Dash of Salt 1/2 c. Chilled Cut Up Butter (2 Sticks) Cold Water
Mix everything but the water in a mixer or by hand. Add water until it barely sticks together. Turn out on a solid surface. Make into two large balls and stick in the fridge for a half hour to chill.
Filling:
This is a little less measured so be flexible and play with it.
With some olive oil in a pan (I use my large cast iron skillet and fill it with ingredients so I can just stir the cream sauce in carefully when it is all done) on medium heat add a few cloves of minced garlic and diced onion (one large or two small). Heat until translucent just starting to brown. Add meat. Cook until brown and strain (spoon out) excess grease but leave a little. Add veggies, frozen or fresh. Stir regularly until cooked. I like corn, green beans, spinach, cauliflower, broccoli, carrots, and celery. Add a little salt and pepper and herb of your choice. I LOVE thyme with my pasties. Set aside off heat while you make the sauce.
Sauce:
This is out of the Betty Crocker’s New Picture Cook Book circa 1961. It was my great aunts and it is awesome. Although I do find myself adjusting many of the recipes it is a great platform. This is the Cheese Sauce recipe found on page 387. I double it. Here is the single recipe.
2 tbsp. Butter 2 tbsp. Flour 1/4 tsp. Salt 1/8 tsp. Pepper (I use more) 1 c. Milk 1/2 c. - 1 c. Shredded Sharp Cheddar (Betty suggests you also add1/4 tsp dry mustard, I don’t)
1. Melt butter over low heat in a saucepan. A wooden spoon for stirring is helpful.
2. Blend in flour and seasonings. Cook over low heat, stirring until mixture is smooth and bubbly.
3. Remove from heat. Stir in milk. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Boil one minute. Makes 1 cup.
4. Stir in cheese to white sauce.
Construction:
Mix cheese sauce with filling. Taste and adjust seasonings to your liking.
Take dough out of fridge. It may be a bit hard but throw some elbow grease into it and star kneading it a little bit so it rolls out nicely on a floured surface with a rolling pin. Roll out until it is pretty thin but you can still pick it up without it ripping. Take a bowl for medium size pasties or a drinking glass for smaller pasties as a cutting device. Place bowl/glass on dough, push down and twist. Repeat.
Transfer circles to ungreased cookie sheet. Place some filling in the center of the circle. Top with another circle. Press down edges. Fork the edges. Poke holes in the top with fork.
Place in oven. Again not an exact science, cook until the bottom of the edges are just turning brown.
Pull out and let cool a few minutes before transferring to a flat brown paper bag to continue cooling.
Repeat and Eat.
Note: They are amazing with a side of my tomato jam!
For the past three years we have been invited up north by wonderful friends for the Fall Getaway at the All Seasons Resort on Carp Lake just outside of Michigan City.
This year we were able to go since I am not on call. Unfortunately Big Daddy came down with a cold last week so we decided to divide and conquer - he stayed home with Monkey while I went up north with the bean. I must be honest I was super bummed they weren't coming up especially since Big Daddy was in Chicago last week for a reptile show but the Bean and I had a great time.
I took limited photos because we were too busy relaxing. Later I may link to photos of the popcorn field we went to and all the squash we bought but for now I have these memories from this great weekend. Thanks KK and Nat!
"Good Day Citizen!"
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