the first day of school

we have decided to homeschool... we are taking it a year at a time and evaluating it based on each child and what is best for them and our family.
but that doesn't mean we don't take first day of school pictures... it just means we get to ride our bikes afterwards. and have another cup of coffee instead of jumping in the van all crazy like.
may i present to you-- a kindergartner.
or something. we are pretty much on first grade lesson stuff. but she is barely 5.. so i don't know what that makes her.
a student.. with a cute new outfit. :)

and grayson had to check his shades in the door reflection before he was ready but once he was-- watch out.

his coolness is tangible.

lucienne finds most all of their antics quite amusing.

grayson never likes her to feel left out though.

this is the face ari makes when i say-- make a cute face!

um.. not really. (?)

i have to resort to saying funny, silly, strange things that can make her genuinely smile. and dude-- i am running out. i don't know how many more animal sitting on a something combos i can come up with....

'what if you saw an elephant sitting on a house?'

this is tough stuff...

for our first day of school she wanted to learn about the water cycle. so amongst other things, we learned a funny song about condensation and precipitation and all the other 'a-tion' words and made a cloud in a jar.

for those that would like to try this at home-- you get the jar full of very hot water and let it sit in there for like a minute-- then you pour the water out except about an inch or two. you then light a match and stick it in the jar to heat the air and then just let it fall in the water. quickly cover the lid with a bag of ice or frozen veggies... and watch your water cycle begin... it was a very productive fun day at 'school'. :)

i love her enthusiasm for learning.

that is our goal with this homeschool adventure. i want her to thirst to know. to wonder.. and then go find out. to see that school doesn't contain learning.. learning is life. so far so good.

it makes my heart swell when she has a question about something and then says let's go find out about that. when she talks about margaret mead, nellie bly and helen keller like they are her friends.

right this minute she is 'playing school' with grayson. they have a pretend centipede out and they are studying it and labeling it and drawing pictures of it and she says later we will talk about it's natural habitat. :)

i am still in the midst of figuring out how to inspire her to do things that are hard. so much comes easy to her that the things that don't easily frustrate her. she gets clamped down, sticks her lips out and says 'no i won't do that. '  i don't know how much to push those things... it seems the more i push the more she refuses. i can't open her brain and force her to do those things.

but she has to learn perseverance.

to do hard things.

to keep at it until it's not hard.

unfortunately i am not very good at that either. i tend to not want to do stuff that i don't want to do.

i know-- shocking.

i think maybe there is a lesson in there for me too... bonus. :)

welcome to 'school' ari!

“The purpose of learning is growth, and our minds, unlike our bodies, can continue growing as long as we live.”

Mortimer Adler