Awesome God!! Look what He gave us today

Every year for umpteen years we have had Kildeer nests in our back yard. It doesn't matter where we live, the birds are always there.

They are migratory birds. I'm not sure when they leave our area, but I know they return in January. Early in the morning until late at night these "party birds" are out there squaking and running around. If you haven't heard one, they have a high pitched almost whistle voice that is very annoying when you are trying to sleep. They are actually beautiful birds with some awesome markings.

God knew exactly what these birds needed when he gave them their color. They make nexts on the ground usually by moving in some small pebbles and stones to camoflague the next. Their eggs are light brown with dark brown flecks all over.

If you come anywhere near a Kildeer nest, these birds go into action. First, they start squaking and fan thier wings and tail feathers out so they appear to be hurt.

To an unsuspecting predator, the bird seems easy prey, so they will follow with mouth watering. When the predator is far enough away the bird is miraculously healed and flys away laughing. The predator is at a loss for the bird or the eggs. If you see such a bird and try to find it's nest, you will probably not be lucky. Those eggs blend in so well they are almost impossible to see. Even if you have been to the nest before and know exactly where it is, you may still have trouble relocating it.

Well, yesterday it was beautiful weather so the kids and I went outside to work in the garden. We have a mammoth playset area with dark brown rubber mulch in it. There are some patches of over grown Bermuda grass that is still dormant. My daughter was about to enter the play area when Mama bird let out a screech. Both bird and girl were frightened. (Probably more girl than bird) I knew where the nest was now. I had caught her before she could fly. I looked and couldn't find it. Later, I had forgotten all about Mama bird when I found her nest. She wasn't happy to see me at all. I backed off after I saw she had already laid 4 little eggs. How sweet. Now if the cat doesn't get them before they hatch. I'll keep you informed on the babies if/when they get here. They are the cutest little things. The come out looking like minature adults, but much cuter. See the long pointy beak and those glaring red eyes. I couldn't help wondering what kind of damage that beak could do to a skull. She was very gracious to let me get so close to her to get her pix. Maybe she thought she was going to be asstar, and, well, she is (at least on my blog).

Kim

I Did It

It finally happened!!! Tyler read his first book all by himself and he did it pretty fluently. OK, it didn't just happen. He worked hard to get to this point. Reading has yet to be his strong point. I owe this progress to our new curriculum, Spell to Write and Read. You may have heard about it if you read one of my previous blogs. Tyler had to first learn cursive in order to write in his log book. His printing was awful, but the cursive is pretty good. We started that in July and by somewhere near October he could write in his log book in cursive. It took a long time because he is only 6 and a boy and those 2 factors alone should say enough. While he was learning to write, he was also learning his phonograms. There are 77 in all to learn. They are like magic cards that unlock spelling first with almost no exceptions to the rules. That in turn unlocks the reading. So far he has learned 120 words and we are spending the last few weeks of school reviewing the few that he had trouble with. I have also been having him read from the log book lists and timing him. The words were marked with the spelling markings that SWR uses. That is so helpful to see the phonograms. For example we would underline /oy/ in the word boy because it is a multi letter phonogram and /sh/ in the word ship for the same reason. That way when he sees it he will know to say /sh/ instead of /s/h/ individually. He has also learned the 5 reasons words have silent final E. Do you know them? I sure didn't. When he sees one marked he knows how to read it. We did it that way for a while, but then I took the markings away and wrote sentences with the words. He did well seeing the phonograms and sounding them out. Each time he read them he got faster. Today I pulled out the book No! No! Word Bird. It had words in it with the same patterns that he has been working with. I was shocked when he read the entire 31 pages. He was so proud and so was I. Not only can he spell the words and knows why they are spelled the way they are, but he can read the words. We will continue to read our lists and sentences I make from them. In a few weeks I will have him attempt another more difficult book written by Wanda Sanseri, the writer of SWR. It uses all 120 words he has learned so far and a few more. I really think he will be able to do it. It won't be long until he can read anything he wants

New Elementary Anatomy/Physiology Course

For those of you looking for the absolute best elementary science courses, Apologia has them. They are the Young Explorer series written by Jeannie Fulbright. We have gone through 2 of them so far and will start our 3rd in May. They are just awesome and teach science in a way that is exciting and easy to do. Jeannie has written each book prayerfully and each one is from a young earth creationist point of view. Recently Jeannie announced that a new book would be out soon, Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology. Below is her description of the course as posted on the Elementary Apologia Yahoo group. I also recently posted a story about the beginnings of this book. If you haven't read it, here is the link: http://ghomeschool.blogspot.com/search/label/anatomy

God created humans in His image, and endowed us with a desire to learn about Him, about our world, and about ourselves. Studying God’s most marvelous and chief creation with Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology will give you and your students insight into God’s nature, imparting a greater appreciation of His amazing and miraculous handiwork. Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology is the sixth bookin the Young Explorer Series. Using the Charlotte Mason methodology, this elementary-level science curriculum gives students an introduction to the fascinating design of the human body. After briefly reviewing the history of the man’s attempts to understand the human body, students are taught about the highly complex, all-important cell. The book then discusses the main systems of the human body, discussing in detail the Skeletal, Muscular, Digestive, Respiratory, and Circulatory Systems as well as several others. The book culminates by tying it all together with the study ofGrowth and Development. Procreation is addressed in terms of DNA and genes.Throughout the book, students will have a wonderful time as they explore and learn with activities, projects and demonstrations that illustrate the concepts learned. They will dissect a chicken wing to learn about bones and ligaments, create a camera box to learn about vision, find their own arteries, veins and capillaries, build a stethoscope, investigate the genetics of inheritance, test their muscle strength, explore the five senses and much, much more.Throughout the course, students will enjoy adding illustrations of organs to their human body poster. They will also complete engaging and fun notebooking assignments to reinforce what they’ve learned.Throughout this fascinating field of study, you and your students will know that we are indeed, “Fearfully and wonderfully made,”

Jeannie

Snow Day!!!

Something Fishy

For Christmas, my friend gave me a fish tank. She had gotten a newer, bigger one, so I got her smaller one. I was pretty excited. I had had fish before, but I had never been able to keep them. I never knew how. Well, now I do, thanks to my friend. I have learned so much. First we got 2 albino catfish. They are cute and very active. They are always searching for food.

At the same time we also got 4 tiny little neon Tetras. They were also cool. There colors were amazing. However, they all died. Two got sucked to the filter intake and 2 just died. I think the last one died from a broken heart. He lost all his friends. So today, after checking all the chemical stuff in the tank and finding it fine, we got 5 new fish. We replaced the tiny Tetras with some bigger Bloodfin Tetras. They are white with red on their fins, ie bloodfin. They are very active also. They have no trouble with the filter intake. The picture below doesn't do them justice. It is hard to take a picture of fast moving fish from outside the tank.

Then we got one of my favorites, a Betta. Several months ago we rescued one from one of those tiny bowls at Wally World. He was red and we called him Red. He was beautiful, but we killed him due to ignorance. He is now fertilizing our apple tree. We loved Red and he was a beautiful fish, so we got another one. This one is blue. We call him Blue Ribbons. He looks like blue ribbons in the water when he swims. He is so cute, for a fish. He seems happy. I hope he makes a bubble nest soon. Red always made a bubble nest. That meant he was happy.

We will see how long we can keep these fish. I am very much a novice, but I have been researching and am learning. I'll keep you posted.

Kim

Christmas Fashion Show

Our Jesse Tree

Well, Christmas is over now and it is time to take down the decorations (at least it is at our house). As I was taking down the tree, I decided to take a picture of our other tree, our Jesse Tree. What is a Jesse Tree? There are several different answers to that, but the one I like the most is that it is based on Isaiah 11:1 - "A shoot will spring forth from the stump of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots" and is a way of teaching the Old Testament background for the Messiah, and showing how all of God's promises have been fulfilled. The Advent season is a wonderful time to reaffirm God's faithfulness, and the lessons of the Jesse tree help do so. I wanted each ornament on our tree to point to Jesus. That is a hard lesson. Some were rather easy, but some required much more thought and prayer. In the end it was a beautiful tree. My daughter loved the tree more than the regular tree. Each night(or every few nights, as the schedule permits) we would put on an ornament (or ornaments) and read out of the Bible and a bible story book. The story book took a long story and made it very short while keeping the main idea. We usually only read selected verses from the Bible, but sometimes the entire story came from it exclusively. This is a tradition we will keep and each year we will learn more and understand more as God opens our mind to his wisdom. Our list of ornaments came from http://ourjessetree.blogspot.com/ This lady has completely laid out the entire calendar with pictures of her ornaments. They are great ornaments, but you won't get them all in one year. It will take years of collecting to get them and that is great. It keeps our minds on the real reason for Christmas, Christ. Several ornaments you can make and we did. I did change one of her ornaments this year. Next year I might change more. I am seriously considering purchasing the devotional book from http://www.jesse-trees.com/devotional-book.html They also sell ornament kits, but they are pricey. I like the idea of making/collecting our own over the years. We printed out our own on cardstock as we needed them and just hung them with a hook. You can google Jesse tree ornaments and get lots of picture ideas.

Gymnastics Funmeet