Craft Hope Project 23

I have been wanting to have a craft group to do one of Craft Hope's projects for a while now.  Craft Hope is a blog with a major impact. Blogger, Jade, has projects regularly and tens of thousands of crafters make things and send them in to be dispersed all over the world. 

So, finally, when Project 23 came out, I decided to get together with some of my MOPS mommas and have a mini sewing party. This project was for pillowcases dresses to be sent all over... to a school in Jordan, an orphanage in Costa Rica, Tanzania, and more.  We came together for gumbo and snacks and got to work.

We had 6 women and 4 sewing machines going at a time!

In the end, we made 11 dresses ready to be shipped! We tried to make a wide variety of sizes, following this amazing guide of sizing info and more. 

We hope this spreads some love to 11 little girls!

Homeschooling: CC - Cycle 2 - Weeks 4, 5, and 6

I am late posting what we did for weeks 4 and 5. We have a busy week and weekend ahead of us, so here is what we've been doing and what we have planned for the week.

History

Week 4:

The Magna Carta and the Hundred Years War. Blaine colored while I read.

Week 5:
The Hundred Years' War, Joan of Arc, and the Plague (age appropriate discussions with some sword fighting play involved).

Week 6:
The Renaissance!  Specifically, we are learning about Shakespeare, daVinci,  Copernicus, and Michelangelo.  I plan on elaborating a little on each of them throughout the week and coloring these as we go.

I'm going to show Blaine this virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel. Something fun that I am planning on doing is taping some paper to the bottom of our junior size table and laying on our backs to draw and color.

Geography: More puzzles!

Week 4:

European Rivers (printable)

Week 5:
European Cities (printable)

Week 6:
European Mountains (printable)

English: Cut and paste activities each week.

Week 4:
Nominative Pronouns

Week 5:
Objective Pronouns
<temporarily down>

Week 6:
Possessive Pronouns

Art

Week 4:

Abstract art. We classified things into 2 categories. Real or abstract. Obviously there are more categories than these 2, but for a 4 year old, these 2 will do for now. We took a field trip for a lunch date to see my oldest friend, Martine, and check out some artwork in both her condo and her gallery.

Blaine said this one was his favorite.

Week 5: Perspective
I made this cut and paste and we talked about horizons, vanishing points, and shadows.  We put the people on the sidewalk appropriately and shaded where their shadows would be according to the sun's position.

Week 6: Final Project Week
We combined the last 5 weeks of our fine arts skills and with his tutor's leadership, Blaine drew this owl mom and baby! I'm so proud of him!

Math: Skip Counting 

Week 4: 7 and 8

 Week 5: 9 and 10

 Week 6: 11 and 12

Science:
Every week we did some worksheets that I downloaded from C3.

Week 4: Natural Cycles - Carbon and Oxygen, Water, and Nitrogen 

Week 5: Reactions to environmental change - Adapt, Migrate, and Hibernate
Something funny I have to share... This week we talked about some funny things like how Daddy shaves his hair short in the summer because it is hot and how Paw Paw Chuck grows his beard out in the winter to keep his face warm. 
Week 6: 6 forms of pollution

Latin

Week 4:

We repeated last weeks 1st Conjugation Imperfect Tense exercises (here)

Week 5 and 6:
1st Conjugation Future Tense cut and paste (with handwriting practice)

MOPS!

I am so excited that MOPS is finally starting again. MOPS meets every other week for 2 hours. There is free childcare provided, breakfast, coffee, speakers and small group discussions. I joined this amazing group of women when Blaine was 1 and I was 3 months pregnant for Vivienne.  I was desperately searching for companionship with other moms.

I cannot express enough how much this group has changed my life. It was scary going through struggles of motherhood alone.  Exhaustion, postpartum depression, breastfeeding issues... you name it. MOPS has given me a support system that every mother should have. They have brought me dinner when I had a newborn. They have held my babies when I felt like I was about to cry or pass out.  They have helped with birthday parties. They have gone grocery shopping and running errands with me to help lend a hand.

If you're interested in joining - we have 2 different MOPS groups - night MOPS for working mothers (new this year!) and day MOPS for stay at home mothers.

Night MOPS starts tomorrow night from 6:30-8:30 at someone's home, so I won't be posting the address.  If you would like to attend, please get in touch with me and I'll send you the information!

Day MOPS starts THIS THURSDAY from 9:30-11:30. For more information - feel free to get in touch with me or click here.

Who wants to see an alligator?

MONTHS ago my mom asked us if we wanted to go to the Instagator Ranch in August to see baby alligators hatching. They took my nieces and nephews when they were younger and were dying to take Blaine and Vivienne. So since booking our reservation, every time my mom saw or spoke to the kids she would ask, "Who wants to see an alligator?" And both the kids would raise their hands and excitedly yell, "meeeeeeee!!" We like building anticipation in my family. 

So the day finally arrived and we made the trip to the north shore to check it out. Instagator Ranch is a really cool operation. We spent some time hearing how they got started. At one point, alligators were nearing joining the endangered species list, but because of Instagator and other similar establishments, there are now more alligators than people in the state of Louisiana! The people of Instagator fly out over the marshes, locate alligator nests during June, collect the eggs, and bring them back to the ranch. Here, they hatch the eggs in August and release a percentage of the alligators back to their nest's area once they reach four feet long and can defend themselves from predators. 

We took a tour of the ranch and got to see different sized alligators and feed them. 

We were able to hold some that were probably about 2 feet long (mouths taped shut) in a pool. Vivienne got a kick out of grabbing them by the tail and pulling them closer for me to pick them up. She wasn't the least bit afraid! Louisiana girls are natural alligator wranglers.

 We hatched FIVE baby alligators in our hands. This was a little weird. It consisted of breaking the hard outer shell and helping them break through the thick membrane, an act the babies could surely do naturally without our assistance. It was a little icky, but very cool!

This was such a fun experience.  We will definitely be going again one day! If you plan on visiting Instagator, make sure to go during hatching season and reserve an egg!