Our little lady's birthday fell on Father's Day. Daddy (and Grandpa) are super chill and had no problem letting her day shine bright. We kept gifts really, really simple with some homemade cards, a paint-with-water book, and homemade play dough. And Emilie was thrilled with everything! Her own request for the day was blueberry cheesecake. Emilie ended up liking the whipping cream and berries that were a "side" to the dessert better than her cheesecake, which she scraped all the blueberry pie-filling off and kindly offered to someone else. The cheesecake was delicious!

At three, Emilie is sweet and sour. We've been laughing of late at the drama of little girls. She whines and cries and flops on the floor, but she'll squeal with delight and offer her fake little laugh to make everyone happy. 

Emilie's favourites include singing "Hold My Girl" and "The Cat and the Hat" (Daddy's own composition) with her Daddy, reading The Cat and the Hat (which she calls Duh Hat and Duh Cat), playing play dough, cooking and baking with Mommy, watering flowers, outings to the park and grocery store, and all the simple little things of life. We're quite enjoying the funny things she says - three is a great age for laughs! 

More than anything, Emilie is looking forward to being a big sister. She loves babies with a passion! Seeing babies is the highlight of any outing for her. For a long time, she's told us that we're having twins because she and I are both having babies, apparently. More recently, her bear has become her baby of choice and she often takes it to bed to nurse. 

Emilie is a feisty little girl, always ready to defend her cause with screams against a brother who just won't listen to her. But she's a little tag along with most of the boys' games, ready with her gun and a "pow pow" to get right into their more serious wars. Emilie is special friends with John Paul and calls him her "buddy boy". Often she'll give him crushing hugs if he's sad or hurt and when he comes to see her after her nap she wraps her arms around his neck. 

This little princess keeps us on our toes with her antics and drama, but she's everyone's little favourite. We're excited to see her in her new big sister role and growing up while three.

Homeschool Notes: Year-End Review

Today is our official last day of school!

Joseph was presented with his end-of-school year gift at lunch by the principal. It's not every year that he gets such a great gift... Daddy just happens to like buying discounted Rider jerseys and Joseph's not complaining.

 

We celebrated by making ice cream in a bag and having root beer floats. It was a hit!

 

This is a doozy of a post, but I've enjoyed looking back at our year to see where we've come. Next year is going to hold some big changes for us: a new baby, a new student, the principal taking a paternity leave (to learn French, not homeschool his kids!). I'm sure some things will become much lower key, and we'll probably spend a lot more time sitting around reading. It's going to be a whole new experience! Maybe I won't even have time to blog. 

But just to take a look back at 2018-2019...

Morning Basket
Joseph learned 5 poems this year: "The Owl and the Pussycat", "Stopping by Woods", Psalm 100, "The Duel", and "Land of Storybook". John Paul and Emilie each recited some poems with us on occasion as well.

We all learned a few new hymns: "Now Thank We All Our God", "Attende Domine", "Christus Vincit", "Hail, Holy Queen" and other liturgically appropriate hymns.

Since March, we read aloud some more Winnie the Pooh and are still reading Jean-Claude's Island. This year we've had fewer read-alouds altogether, probably because Joseph easily reads chapter books himself and because of our picture book intensive social studies course.

 

We halfheartedly tried to keep up some musical enrichment (i.e. listen to good songs, learn the composer, etc.), but it was one of those things that got put to the side too often. What we did do was great!

Language Arts
Joseph has come a long way this year with English. His spelling has improved, with the help of a fairly rigorous phonics/spelling program. He learned the basics of cursive handwriting. The most difficult aspect of language arts is by far the writing process. Thinking of, planning, and executing writing projects is such a steep learning process - one that will continue for years and years. He's an avid reader and usually on the couch reading from 6:30am (or whenever he gets up) until it's go time at 7:30am. Many hours each day are spent reading. 

 

Math
We focus a lot on Math. Joseph completed a few addition/subtraction speed programs with an online site called XtraMath. We're hoping to keep this up during the summer so he doesn't lose his math skills and because it's really quick each day. He also did lots of grade level math: skip counting, place value, multi-digit addition/subtraction, carrying/borrowing, counting/adding/subtracting money, basic fractions, comparing fractions, plus all the shapes, concepts, graphs, measurement, etc. The last month or so, he's been working on beginning multiplication and so far really enjoying it!

Social Studies
Around the World with Picture Books, Part 1 has been my favourite of our school programs this year. We probably took the more intensive side of this course by doing everything, but it could easily be adapted to a simpler study. We really, really enjoyed studying various countries from Africa and Asia, as well as Antarctica and Australia. The boys are excited to continue with the next segment, on Europe and South America, next year!

Of the many books we have read the last couple months from Africa, these 3 stand out. They are all true stories or based on true experiences of children living in poor villages who work to make a real, tangible difference in their own lives and the lives of those around them. It has made for really good, thoughtful discussion on our life and the lives of others, hard work, and needs vs. wants

 

Some examples from Joseph's notebook:

Our most recent culinary adventure from Around the World was foods from Kenya. Apparently, they love to drink Fanta in modern Kenya - the boys did not object!

 

We also studied Canadian Geography, primarily focusing on provinces/capitals, major landmarks, borders, etc. 

Finally, the boys really enjoy listening to The Story of Civilization audio books. This is usually a quiet time activity and so I've missed out on most of it, but they're getting a taste for cool history and loving every bit of it. 

 

Science
We are finishing up the Apologia Astronomy book throughout the month of June. We began the textbook after Christmas because we had so many ideas for science this year. I feel like it was a year filled with tons and tons of science and we've loved every bit of it. Lately, Grandpa Millette has been coming over almost weekly and trying out new experiments from two kits we own, bringing along battery testers and other cool things for the boys to work with.

 

Science is, hands down, the boys' favourite school subject. I don't know if you can really call it a subject around here because nearly every day some "science" is being attempted. It's a way of life for little boys!



We made a Solar System with modeling clay. We have also been getting out to the library's different innovation nights lately. Joseph made a super tornado at the last one.

Music
Last night was Joseph's final piano lesson for the year and he performed a little recital for us. We can't believe how far he's come this year! (Unfortunately, I can't seem to upload any of the little videos I took).

Art
I always feel like art gets a little bit of a side-line, but then I look around our house and realize that my kids are just doing art all the time - like science, it's just a way of life. Some recent paintings in the Tingatinga Painting style from Tanzania and a few drawings taken from Art Hub for Kids videos.

John Paul's Elephant (Mom drew the elephant)

Joseph's tiger

Joseph's fire engine

John Paul's double-decker bus

Physical Education
Our favourite year-end event was a homeschool track and field day held on a family's farm in the area. The boys had a TON of fun! As you can see, they could use some work on their technique in the high jump (haha!).

Joseph wrote up a little story from the event, so you can read all about it:

  

Track & Field Day

It was my first track and field day. And almost 45 kids went there. There was long jump, throwing, high jump, and racing. I won the long jump. It was 4ft 8 1/2 in! I was good but I didin't (his spelling) win any of the throwing. After that there was high jump. I didn't win but I got up to 35 in! After that there was racing. I won the 25m, 50m, and 100m races! For a couple days afterwards I was sore. Next year I hope I win the racing again.

May Crowning & Pro-Life Walk

  

picture of some of the walkers

We finally got around to our May Crowning of Mary on May 31st, feast of the Visitation of Mary to Elizabeth. I discovered that in the old Church calendar (before Vatican II), it was the feast of the Queenship of Mary. The tradition of a May Crowning suddenly made tons of sense.

The kids are always exciting to buy and gather flowers for Our Lady's crowning. We sing a song, crown Mary, say part of a Rosary, and eat dessert. Simple and fun.

We attended our regional pro-life march on the weekend too. Thanks to three young families (including ours) and some of Grandma Millette's catechism kids turning up, the average age of the crowd was significantly young - definitely the youngest we've ever seen in the area.