Sewing sisters!

Sewing with your sister is "sew" much fun!!

 Especially when you are still in your Pj's!

What have you been up to lately??
Smiles The Torrents'

Valentine's Day Craft - getting back into the new school year!

 

Hello there!! WOW what a new year! Happy Valentine's Day to you all celebrating LOVE and relationships and closeness. We had a lovely day yesterday, making it a family affair with me cooking every one's FAV meal - Roast Chicken with Apple Crumble. YUM!! Then my hubbie and I watched a romantic comedy movie and called it a night! Leading up to Valentine's Day the children and I put together a cute door wreath! I found the idea HERE and with the girls help it was made in just an hour-ish.

 (This photo was taken by Sapphire! She was VERY excited!

 Note my fun, bright necklace, handmade by Sapphire earlier in the day during Maths!

Also note that my son looks like he is in "PHONE" land..... mmmmm)

Sophia got busy covering our "X" in washi tape (Zeke cut out the hug and kiss for us) and Esther, Sapphire and I covered the "O" in crumbled up cardstock that we had spilt to make it thinner! (we couldn't get any tissue paper at our local shop and time was ticking to get it done!! Always a good idea to make do with what you have!!)

We stuck the letters to some ribbon and hung it up!

 

 

 LOVE IT!!!

So with hugs and kisses being sent from our front door (soooo excited that I actually have a front door I can hang stuff off!) we shared the love. Looking forward to sharing more with you all soon, until then
Smiles The Torrents'

The beginning of another term

We kicked started our last term for the year.... can you believe it!!?? WOW term 4!! There has been much going on with our home up for sale and open homes and viewings and holidays and 3 birthdays in there too!

 

 

 

 So it felt really good that the little girls and I had some special learning time before everyone else was up!! We did some flash cards, magic 100 words - the Golden words Esther is learning and even a spot of nature study! I have these cool maths cards that we also had some fun with.

 

 

 

 

Of course the older children did eventually get moving so they were doing their spelling, English, Maths and bible verses. After lunch Esther and Sophia had some media time, they are currently watching The Sleeping Beauty Ballet on You tube. Other than a few "moments" during the day it was a pretty great start to the last term of the year!
Hope your school time is going well,
Smiles The Torrents'

Planning our homeschooling year 2015 (and a painted snail)

It's the last days of the holidays and the last days of planning to get done too! I've been busy getting journals organized, calendars written on and charts completed.
This year I'm going back to Five in A Row with my little ones (this way Sapphire can enjoy the family read time too!) and focusing on Tasmanian History for our main unit study for the older ones. Sophia has chosen horses to study about and we will be looking at A Year on our Farm picture book by Penny Matthews and Andrew Mclean each month learning about what happens on a farm throughout a year.
We're starting a new Maths program and introducing walks as part of our daily learning and exercise.
I'm looking forward to seeing how the coming weeks unfold as we get into the groove of it all.

 Sophia found this snail after some wet weather we had, 

she happened to be painting at the time and so decided to give the snail a renovation on his home!!

Hope he didn't mind!!

Smiles The Torrents'

Bathroom reno on a budget {part 1}

I'm not sure that too much book work has been done this last week to ten days but I do know that the children have learned about plaster, studs, frames, plumbing and what is involved in renovating a bathroom!

Zeke and Hannah really loved destroying the walls in preparation that's for sure!!
Smiles The Torrents'

Tea Party Thursday and Poetry!

 

This year we are doing something a little different each and every Thursday!  My wonderful friend Carli has been doing Tea party Tuesday for years and I've always loved the idea so when I saw it HERE I was keen to jump in and make it a part of our week too!
So we all chose a poem (the older ones need to copy it into their Poetry book) and we sit around our finely dressed table, drinking tea from my special porcelain teacups, eating the yummies that Sophia and I have made in the morning!!

 

It is really the most wonderful time and the children are thoroughly enjoying it!! YAY! Even last night as I mentioned to Zeke what we were doing tomorrow and that it was Tea Party Thursday he keenly made a fist and motioned it in the air with a excited "YES!"
Hope your Thursday is wonderful, perhaps it to might be filled with some Poetry and tea too!
Smiles The Torrents'

Back to our homeschooling routine!

  

 We are now into our third week of school! I'd like to say YAY but perhaps the best word would be.... OK!! It's not been that bad, you have to expect some feelings of "do we have to" or "I hate this!!" (introducing a new writing subject!!) I guess after all it's the first few weeks back!!

 

I am however having some fun with our unit study on Egypt and the new system we are following with only 20 minute lessons! This is going great!!
How is your week going thus far?? Any great things to share?
SMiles The Torrents'

Planning, planning, and some more planning for our Homeschooling year!

Over the last week and a bit all my "spare" time has been sitting in front of the computer searching and planning for this years homeschooling!! When the children are looking for me, they go straight to the office!! Then it's funny if I'm actually NOT THERE and the
"Where's Mum??" calls come...... just needed a quick ladies break!! hee hee

So what are we doing this year??? Well firstly I wanted to really try and plan the WHOLE year this time, I mean not just pretend to do it but really DO IT!!! My dear friend KIM is soooo super awesome in all her plans, it blows me away, everything is sooooo, well, WELL PLANNED!!! I want some of that, so some of that I'm trying to achieve!!!

I've looked for planners HERE and HERE
Then some new charts for the children HERE and HERE with lists of age appropriate jobs HERE
Inspiration as to how to ease into the new year HERE
Ideas on core subjects HERE

It feels good to be scribbling down LOADS of things and ideas and plans and crafts and seeing it all come together!! So before the week is out I should be pretty much there...... looking forward to that!
Smiles The Torrents'

Moon Phases with yummy Oreos

When you mix science with food you most certainly get the children's attention!!
I saw this fabbo idea of using Oreos to make the Moon Phases and so one morning we set to making our own.

 

 

 Hannah was wonderful in letting us know what shape we needed for what phase, Zeke and Sophia would try and carefully separate the oreos and Esther, well she enjoyed eating the broken ones!! hee hee :)

 

 

 

 

We lined them all up and then had great fun in eating them!!

How cool to learn in such groovy ways.

Smiles The Torrents'

Nursery Rhyme Unit study week #5 - Jack and Jill

Once you start a new rhyme it's amazing what you can take out of it! I never knew that this week we'd actually go and see an old well right HERE in Launceston! Sooo cool! I found some great activities HERE for the girls and we also went to a nice hilly park to play out the rhyme! The children LOVED acting out the rhyme and totally jumped into character. Zeke was Jack and the girls each took it in turns at being Jill.

Here is our Jack

And here are ALL the Jill's with Jack!

 

  Firstly we have Esther Jill and Jack

Esther Jill wasn't happy to roll down the hill so she met Jack at the bottom!

Next it was Sophia Jill....

Sophia Jill totally rolled down the hill, 

it was wonderful to see her get into it!

Now for Hannah Jill, let's all sing along now...

Jack and Jill went up the hill 

to fetch a pail of water

Jack fell down and broke his crown

(I Love Hannah's acting here, it absolute dismay in seeing 

her Jack tumbling down the hill)

 

 

and Jill came tumbling after....

(She pretended to roll down the hill so as not to get grass or prickles!

I love how she still made it look real, then landing on Jack at the bottom!)

Zeke said at the end of it that he was feeling quite sore and battered! After all he did roll down in the hill in wonderful style THREE times!! This last photo is one of my favourites from the day, the way Sophia is looking up at her brother with so much love and admiration brings the biggest smile to my face!

 

 After the roll play we headed to the Quadrant Mall where I showed the children the well we once had, right here in Launceston! It's really quite amazing to read about and a wonderful finish to our study for the week.

 

 

 

We are all having a great time of learning so far this term, there is certainly something in it for everyone!

Smiles The Torrents'