Why Outside

So, why do we participate in the 1000 Hours Outside Challenge (link is to their Facebook page)? Well, once you realize that the average American child spends somewhere around 1200 hours a year with their faces in some sort of electronic device or eyes glued to the television you begin to remember that when you were a child you spent most of your time outside of school ... well, being outside. Somehow along the way we've lost this. Instead of sending the children out to play in the yard or in our neighborhoods we simply allow them to turn on the TV, flick on the computer or tablet, turn on the game council and completely veg out!


Not only is this not healthy because they're most likely snacking during that time and not burning the excess calories so you end up with over weight children ( check out some statistics ) but we're also not nourishing their minds and letting them expand their imaginations. Oh, sure, those games are entertaining, TV has become everyone's standard past time, and information is no farther than a click away on most electronic devices. My children would actually ask, prior to us starting this challenge, to go outside and play and if the weather wasn't what I had predetermined to be perfect I'd redirect them to an inside activity.

Then I learned about the 1000 Hours Outside Challenge and it opened my eyes! This is the fourth year (I believe, it could just be the third) that we've done this challenge. The goal is to get at least 1000 hours outside during the course of a year. That averages out to be something like 20 hours a week of outside. And yes, I can hear some of you now ... but, we have homework to do after school (most non-homeschoolers and some homeschoolers) there's no way we can get 20 hours outside during a school week! But you can get some hours no matter what your afternoon activities are. 1000 hours seems like a GIANT goal but it can be reached. We even passed the goal one year.


The first year that we started the challenge everyone started on Labor Day and ran until the following Labor Day. That year I didn't make 1000 hours because we had such a harsh winter that I literally could have been harming my children since the temperatures that winter here in Michigan were well below zero even before the wind chill. Even still, we did spend time outside that winter ... building snow forts, igloos, and sliding down the mountain of snow at the end of our street. 

The dates to start have varied since that first year but I still go from Labor Day to Labor Day (it's easier for me to remember). And some years we make the goal, some years we pass it, and some years we fall short. But it gives us a goal to work towards and ensures that at least some of the time we won't all be on our electronic devices. I keep track of the hours we're outside each day in a notebook and post our new year to date totals (along with our weekly total) on our Facebook page each Saturday evening between 6-9 PM depending on the time of year.

And since we started this you'd be amazed with what my children will find to amuse themselves outside with. Of course that's changed as they've gotten older as well, but at least they're outside each week for several hours. They're enjoying nature and learning about it. They're spending less time on their electronic devices (which seem to accumulate more each year) and certainly less time in front of the television. We've gotten rid of cable because the only time of year we'd even really use it was winter! That's a hidden money saving bonus that we hadn't thought about at first! 

Just give it a go. Start whenever you want. Strive for even five hours outside each week and watch your children bloom.

Easy Menu

Well, for this week I'll again be posting our menu. Nope, not doing it every week because some weeks I don't know day to day what we'll be eating because I have no intention of planning anything out. And, yeah, this week the menu could change pretty easily depending on what we're in the mood to eat.

Friday - pork chops, rice, and mushroom gravy
Saturday - baked BBQ chicken, butter noodles, and corn
Sunday - split pea and ham soup
Monday - chili dogs and mac and cheese
Tuesday - breakfast for supper: turkey bacon, scrambled eggs, and pancakes after catechism class
Wednesday - chicken wraps
Thursday - leftover night where we eat all the leftovers we haven't already eaten for lunch the next day
Friday - pork chops, green beans, and buttered noodles 

As you can see there's nothing special about this week's menu. We're not even using Thanksgiving leftovers because we didn't bring any home from Grandma's house this year. My freezer is completely stocked with chicken, pork, fish, and a bit of beef. OH! And an extra ham because this month hubby found two hams on sale for under $20 each! We rarely eat beef anymore but I do have a beef roast in the freezer thanks to a buy one get one free sale again this month. Our main staples are chicken (due to the price), pork, and fish. I'd give you a recipe for this week but really there's nothing that requires a recipe and our split pea and ham soup varies each time we make it.

Here's hoping you have a wonderful week full of yummy good food!

Joining up with I'm an Organizing Junkie for Menu Plan Monday.

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Thanksgiving Week

Over the weekend the bottom dropped out temperature wise around here. We went from the high sixties to the mid forties! So, in between bouts of playing outside the campers watched a lot of Pokemon and I crocheted while warming back up. Friday it had been nearly 70* outside, Saturday it was down in the 40s and snow was blowing around with the wind gusts, and come Sunday we actually had a little snow accumulation to go along with those wind gusts with the temperature (before wind chill) at 36*. Only one of us didn't have a scarf this year so I made up a quick scarf for Daddy. I also finished a preemie baby set to give to a friend in the coming weeks. The weather also had everyone's sinuses acting up again. Every year at the season changes we go through this, sometimes for just a week and sometimes for much longer. Here's to hoping that the weather makes up its mind quickly and either stays warm or cold for awhile. And while I'm not a huge fan of snow and cold, since I know it's coming anyway ... why not just let winter start?



Important side note: Sometime over the weekend ECJ decided to do the salt and ice challenge and severely wounded his right hand. His entire palm, while not blistered, is burned! This is NOT a good challenge for kids to try! I thought I should let all of you know because I had no idea about this challenge until the day after he did it! He never complained about the pain and Daddy was the one to notice his palm. Then ECJ began to complain about the pain. We've been treating it with burn ointment and bandages at night while allowing it to breath during the day. (Who came up with this stupid challenge to begin with?!?!?)

Monday we had a pretty good day homeschool wise. There was a few moments of "snarkiness" during the period of time that we had ECJ helping YCJ with math, but other than that book lessons went smoothly. Online lessons were breezed through as well. Then I broke out some new DVD's from the library for science and history, they're from the Schlessinger Library DVDs. Here's the link to one of the DVDs for the history of the US government that I found on Amazon. The prices for these are reasonable and the content is great. Each DVD is around 20 minutes long and they have several different topics in both science and history. They've been well received by the campers and they actually learn from them. So, if your local library doesn't carry them you might want to invest in buying some (no, I am not an Amazon affiliate ... so I get nothing from you buying anything from there if you use my links).

On Tuesday we had a pretty full day. Lessons were done with little to no complaint and more DVDs were watched (from the same series). Cooking and cleaning was done along with (you guessed it) more crochet. Of course this was after a night of Peanut sleeping between Daddy and I due to a nightmare, and Daddy and I getting very little sleep. Needless to say much coffee was consumed during the course of the day and we made a concentrated effort to keep our cool. The afternoon was spent decorating for Christmas. The tree is up and decorated, the village is arranged, stockings hung, and outside lights as well. Some years we wait until the first of December and other years we decorate right around Thanksgiving. The only thing that isn't out yet is the glass nativity scene, that won't be put out until Sunday (right in the middle of our dining table and the pumpkins there now will be put away until next fall) when Advent starts this year. Baby Jesus won't be added until Christmas eve. Hmmm... perhaps I should crochet an Advent wreath for the table...

Wednesday the campers were getting excited for Thanksgiving, which will be at Grandma and Papa's house again this year. It wasn't hard to keep them on task for lessons but they were definitely more antsy in their seats. Book lessons, computer lessons, and watching of DVDs all happened this day. Isn't it just a coincidence that the history DVDs had to do with Native Americans and the early settlers and immigrants? It's almost as if someone (I don't know who) planned it this way! Since the DVDs are only about twenty minutes long each they really do grab the attention. 

Thursday. Thanksgiving day! Turkey day! We all got up after sleeping in a little and went about our day pretty normally until around noon when we began getting ready. The drive to Grandma's house is about an hour from our house and there wasn't any bickering to be had (minor miracle there!)! Everyone had a great time visiting with family and eating Grandma's turkey and stuffing, everyone agrees that she makes the best stuffing. And after such a large meal and another hour long drive home we were all ready to rest and relax.

I'm writing this before I head to bed Thursday night. Tomorrow is another day. More lessons to be had because we only took the one day off this year since we'd pretty much had about two weeks off just recently (no book lessons = off school since the campers don't count online or hands on learning as school). It's been a full week! And as I sit here typing I just wanted to say thank you to all of you who take the time every week to read these wrap ups. I know that we usually lead a pretty boring life since we're homebodies for the most part and I really appreciate the time you take to read my blog each week!

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Icky Sinuses

My portion of the free
yarn.

We had a wonderful weekend with lots of time outside and lots of movies. We also had a quick visit to a friend's house where I shared some of the yarn I'd been gifted for free on Sunday. Nothing major went on.

Monday Noni came out for a visit. We went shopping for some of the winter weather essentials you need in a snowy climate. Peanut got new socks (that's all that she needed). YCJ got new boots, new shoes, and new socks ... her feet went from a size 4 in June to a size 8 now!!! ECJ also got new boots and socks, as well as a new winter coat because his one from last year had ripped so it had been tossed out. We did some window shopping for Christmas, had lunch at McDonald's, and Noni bought each of the campers a tiny Nerf dart gun so that they could have mini battles. It was a fun day! But, Monday night Peanut came in and slept with us because her "throat felt funny".

Moragon in her service
vest that I made for
her.

Moragon on her hind feet
with Peanut hugging her.

Tuesday we didn't do lessons because everyone woke up with something wrong with them. Daddy and I both woke up with migraines. Peanut's sinuses had let go to where her voice was froggy, her nose stuffy, and her throat sore. ECJ and YCJ both where a little stuffy as well. It was a simple call to say, "NOPE, no lessons today!" Everyone simply relaxed and took some medicine. We watched movies and played video games. I picked up my prescription for Imetrex and battled my migraine back to a dull roar.



On Wednesday (after another night of Peanut in the bed with Mommy and Daddy) we did some quick lessons just to get back into the swing of things. English and Math were all that were done text book wise and some online learning to round it out a little. Peanut sounded even worse this day but said that she wanted to do some school.

So, on Thursday we all woke up a little late ... we slept in until 10 am! Peanut sounded a little better but her nose was still running like a leaky faucet, here goes the second roll of toilet paper in less than a week used to blow noses. We concentrated on English and Math in our text book and did our online lessons. Nothing very exciting happened because we decided to stay inside and relax so that we'd all feel better (couldn't just make Peanut stay inside especially when she insists that she is NOT sick).

I got a lot of crochet done this week, including a scrap blues baby blanket that I have no one in particular to give it to. Lots of Christmas ornaments  (7!) and work on December decorations for a wreath I intend to make and a table top centerpiece. Friday should look much like Wednesday and Thursday except for the fact that we'll be making a library run sometime during the day. 

It's lovely that we got some work done this week even though we weren't feeling good.

Here's two posts that I wrote this week:
The No Good (Bad days)
Homeschool Highway (Book Review)

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Joined up with Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers for the Weekly Wrap Up.

The No Good

Writing about the no good, very bad days that we all have from time to time today. Because everyone has bad days and I know that in most of my posts it looks like we just go along all sunshine and rainbows, lollipops in hand, singing like the Von Trap family. Yeah righ!

There are days that ECJ with his teenage hormones, ADHD, lack of impulse control, and general attitude gets the whole house in an uproar! He's downloaded something he shouldn't have, he's online looking at things he aught not be looking at, he's opened an account that he didn't ask permission to open, he's talking to people online who aren't really good for him to be talking to. Do you see the pattern with him? His main issue is the darned Internet and his electronic use. We end up dealing with why he can't talk to so and so, no he really doesn't need that account and just whose credit card was he thinking of entering to use it (really?!?!?), his report is due for Literature and Composition and he hasn't even cracked the book open yet. YUP. That's right. We have a teenage boy in the house. One who sometimes yells at his sisters to get out of his room and then complains the next day that they won't hang out with him. One who goes outside to skateboard with the neighbor kid and forgets to take his phone while deciding to skate down to the park without informing us. One who likes to push every boundary there is with Mom and Dad just to see what he can get away with today because you know some days it's just not worth the argument.

There are also days that YCJ gets hormonal and pouts, screams, and cries over any little thing that happens. There's one extra math problem today than yesterday, I've asked her to write the sentences in English instead of just the words that need changed, she's just feeling like we're all against her for no apparent reason. YUP. She's an eleven year old girl who is just learning how to deal with all of the hormones going through her body right now. One minute she enjoys playing with her little sister or older brother and the next she's screaming that they drive her up the wall. One minute she's all hugs and sunshine and the next she's like that girl from Exorcist . This is how her life is at the moment and it means that most days we roll with the punches but some days we want to throw a temper tantrum too! A lot of her frustration in school work has to do with her dyslexia and how it can make reading something simple into something really hard that day. Sometimes she's just over tired and wanting some more rest. And some days she doesn't care what the reason is we're all trying to get on her nerves and driving her crazy! We have times when there's girl drama going on between her and her friends in the neighborhood, so and so is being bossy ... or so and so won't listen to her ideas which are so much better! You get the idea.

Then it comes to the youngest member of our camping troupe. Peanut. Oh Peanut. She's highly functioning autistic and legally blind. Most days she's an angel with lots of ideas, plenty to show us, making us laugh and smile. But there are days when she just can't handle ANYTHING! She blows her top and punches her brother in the eye, yanks her sister's hair, screams at me ... only to minutes later be crying that she did that. It's all part of life with her challenges. Living life with autism on any level isn't just a challenge for the child it's a challenge for the entire family. What do you mean that you forgot your entire alphabet? (Yes, it happened and we spent last year going through everything from her preschool books up through first grade ... which is why she's in second grade this year and not last year.) It's a challenge to know what curriculum is going to work with her... will it be visually stimulating enough, fun enough, challenging enough, and yet still be able to be dropped for a few days if she goes into her bad days.

And of course you have us parents and the animals. Seriously there are some days that we really just want to scream until no sound comes out anymore. We're not saints ... far from it! Our children stress us out, confuse and confound us, drive us crazy, AND make us proud. We're a normal every day family. No there's no phone calls from the school administration to deal with if one of the campers acts up ... but there's late night conversations between teacher and principal (read mom and dad there) on what we need to change and what we can continue, should we really expect so much out of ECJ and just what was he thinking when he .... (whatever it is he did that week). We don't always agree, and a lot of the time we compromise. We hit ruts with our camper while pulling into what we thought was a comfortable campsite only to find out that it's not as flat and comfy as we'd thought.

So ... we don't always have a no good, very bad days ... there's not always a runt when we're going into our campsite ... and we're not always nice to each other. We're just like every other family out there. Unique with our own problems but when you look at the basics we're all really the same. It doesn't matter if you send your kids to a brick and mortar school, an online public school, school at home, or even totally crunchy unschool. We all have bad days and good days. It's in how we handle it that makes us who we are. Hopefully with a little gentle guiding all of our children can grow up to be well adjusted adults who can think for themselves and raise our grandchildren in ways that make us proud.

Homeschool Highway Book Review

* I received no money, promises, nor anything else for giving this review. It is my honest opinion, given freely. The link to the book on Amazon is right in it's title just in case you want to purchase it for yourself as she's re-releasing it!*

Homeschool Highway

By - Amy Dingman

Oh my God, y'all!!! This book! This book right here! It's awesome beyond words! Seriously I read this book in two sittings (well, technically two baths since as a homeschool mom of three I basically only get time to really read in the tub) and although I was pleased with how it ended I was left wanting more to read because it was just that good!

This is NOT a how to from A - Z book of homeschooling. You're not going to pick it up and know what your state requires (remember that all states have different requirements and laws and you should know what your states laws are), the ultimate 100% foolproof curriculum (there is no such thing y'all), nor are you going to find a schedule or set of rules to follow each day to make your homeschooling day perfect.

What you will find is the truth about homeschooling. As Mrs. Dingman puts it the pot holes in the Homeschool Highway (or in other words the challenges you'll face on your homeschool journey) and her suggestions on how to face them. She is truthful with how she presents herself as well, she doesn't sugar coat it ... homeschool is NOT all rainbows and sunshine. But, she reminds us that it is our choice to be on the highway ... we made the choice to homeschool, no one forced us into it.

In just nine short chapters she'll have you chuckling and nodding at nearly every page. It's insightful and helpful in more ways than one. Have that family member that continuously quizzes your children? She covers that. How about that feeling that you're failing because so and so down the road at the co-op has children who are fluent in Latin and have perfect penmanship? Yup, she covers that too. Feeling like a failure because you just need to get away from the kids once in awhile? That too is covered.

So, order this book (hard copy or Kindle) and grab yourself a glass of wine. Break into that secret stash of chocolate you hide from the kids and settle in for a good read. As Mrs. Dingman would put it (paraphrasing here), "Pull you Minivan of Awesome onto the Homeschool Highway and enjoy the ride."

Oh the Possibilities

Well, last week's weekly wrap up was rather short and I published it in the middle of the week. So, this week I'll pick up where I left off. Thursday and Friday we spent the days running errands and looking into possible houses to move into. Each house we looked at had something that we couldn't handle come into it. One house was so run down it would have been better demolished than tried to be rebuilt, we don't have that kind of money. The middle house we went to look at was beautiful, in a beautiful country setting, with almost everything we were looking for ... except their down payment was more than we're comfortably able to part with at this time. And the final house, looked for on Friday, had already been taken off of the market. So, this leaves us to follow our original plan of moving our current mobile home to another community, saving some money for the next 3-4 years, and then finally going house shopping again. We're not sure which area or state we're thinking of moving to when that happens but we're open to any and all options.

Saturday and Sunday we spent much of our time outdoors and some of the time watching movies together on Netflix with the entire family. Nothing out of the ordinary to talk about on either day but it was our favorite type of weekend. Low key and surrounding ourselves with our family with lots of giggles and tons of fun.

Scarf for Noni

Hat for me

So, what did we do during the week? Well, we took the week off of lessons. We're going to be trying a new schedule where we do 3 weeks on and one week off most of every month. That way we get some down time. Homeschooling year round gives us the option of doing this without running into any issues with hours of education needed. And we're still requiring reading and any reports or projects to be worked on those weeks. So, that doesn't mean they're really "off" weeks but more of an exploratory week in which we'll work on new skills, dive into new genre of books, get around to those projects we've been putting off no matter if they're house projects or individual projects. It seems like it'll be a good way to add a little unschooling to our homeschooling agenda. Provide more freedom for the campers to explore new ideas and things that interest them. Which means one of these weeks I'm sure we'll be building a volcano or a robot ... the list goes on and on.

This means that I'm not going to break the rest of this post down by days and what we did on each day. I might mention a day just for perspective but not a whole lot of each day we did x,y, and z. And as I bet all of you can guess I spent a good deal of time crocheting this week.

Monday we chose as our library day. Many many books were taken out along with many DVDs. Much of the week was spent watching videos, reading books, and looking up things online that interested each child.

Peanut's inspired art work.

YCJ's

ECJ's

On Wednesday they watched a DVD documentary series on the Italian Renaissance great artists of music and art. They then decided to draw pictures inspired by what they had just watched. It melted my heart to find them enjoying the art that had been shown. In my opinion the DVD documentary series was pretty dry and I thought they'd loose interest rather quickly but they did not.



Other than that, working on a few crafts, and watching some Netflix together it's been a really relaxing interest led week. I crocheted for more hours than I thought I would and am currently working on a service vest for Moragon to wear out when she's with Daddy. Buying them the right size from online when she weighs about 180 pounds is rather trying and expensive.

Ear warmer for
YCJ

Ear warmer for
Peanut

The campers played outside a lot this week too, even though it's been a bit chilly. Mainly in the 60s with gusty breezes. But, being the outdoorsy types they'd rather be out in the sunshine soaking it up than inside curled up with a book. The ground is too cold to sit on right now or I'm sure YCJ would have taken her new book outside with her to read while sitting under a tree as she did several times this summer. The local schools had a half day Thursday which meant that their neighborhood friends were all home early and could play with them and we've had a new homeschool family move in just down the street from us.


I couldn't list for you everything the campers learned or didn't learn this week. Math was covered while cooking and grocery shopping, they read every single day, observed nature at it's finest while raking leaves with Daddy, crafted with Mom, and cuddled with the dogs. Some weeks you just need to hang back and let them be them. This was one of those weeks. We've had unschooling weeks where they've learned more, we've also had unschooling weeks where they've learned less. I'm glad we called one for this week, they enjoyed themselves and we were all able to relax and get some me time in between all of the family time.

A box of gifted yarn for me from a good
friend! Absolutely love it and I will
be making some preemie stuff for
a young lady I know who's baby will
be delivered at 29-30 weeks! Such a blessing!!!!

Don't for one  minute think that every second of this week was sunshine and happiness with rainbows. We're a bunch of strong personalities in this house and we often bump heads. Teenagers opening accounts that they shouldn't have and didn't ask permission about, dogs making themselves known along with a loud mouth cat, and the election! ECJ spent until about one am watching the news feed on CNN and Daddy stayed up to watch it all. I fell asleep shortly after one and decided to stay asleep until morning. I won't get into political views here but ECJ should be more prepared in four years to follow along with the election, and make an informed decision when it comes time for him to vote. It'll be the first year that he'll be able to vote and I am very glad that he took such an interest in it this year. He'll remember this election for a long time and so in four years, though we might not vote the same way, he'll make an informed adult choice when he votes and I couldn't ask for more.

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All Hallows Eve

With more drizzling rain on Sunday we started our week on a wet note. All weekend we'd enjoyed visiting with family, spending time outside, carving a pumpkin, and roasting pumpkin seeds. The rain on Sunday wasn't the downpour type of rain but the steady drizzle that quickly chills you to the bones if you stay out in it. So, the majority of Sunday itself was spent inside the house using various electronic devices and attempting not to step on each others toes while excitement mounted for Halloween.




Monday, All Hallows Eve, the day the campers had been waiting for. The past month and a half all I've heard about is Halloween. I had planned on doing a half day Monday and Tuesday, but in favor of having a longer weekend I lumped both day's lessons together. We didn't start until around noon and were done by two PM. The rest of the afternoon I had bouncy excited campers. We went trick-or-treating with our neighbors (who have been in the area for the past several years and know the best routes) around 5. I even dressed up this year. And ate leftover chili from Sunday night for supper after we got back home. With candy for desert you'd think that they would have been too hyper to sleep but they were all off in dreamland relatively quickly to my surprise.


Tuesday, All Saints Day, the day we've got catechism and our day doesn't end until after 9 PM and that's even without a ton of extra things. The lessons today were actually in the lesson plan for Wednesday (and I moved Friday's lessons to Wednesday ... giving us a four day weekend). Lessons were moved through quickly and all three campers are excited that next week marks the end of the first quarter grading for this school year. (That's only become important for my record keeping since ECJ began high school levels.) We followed one of our less healthy yearly traditions and allowed the campers to eat chips and candy for lunch that they got while trick or treating. Since we rarely buy candy throughout the year they are allowed to binge a bit during the holidays. The girls had a party like environment in catechism for All Saints Day and we attended one of the masses at our parish church. They fell asleep rather quickly after a busy, long day.

Wednesday after lessons we did our oozing pumpkin experiment that the kids have been looking forward to for over a month. Basically you take your jack-o-lantern and turn it into the container to hold your experiment. Then you mix some elephant toothpaste up in a jar that you set inside of your jack-o-lantern. After a few moments you should see your chemical reaction pouring out of at least the mouth of your jack-o-lantern. Hence the title "oozing pumpkins". The campers really enjoy doing this experiment and each time they retain more information about the chemical reaction than they did the previous time. We normally do this experiment outside because of the mess, but we again had that drizzly cold rain falling and so I just put one of my big square pans under the jack-o-lantern to catch the mess. 

Thursday and Friday are now lesson free thanks to a little lesson planning juggling. Thursday we are driving over two hours to go check out a couple of houses. We're contemplating moving and I'll let you know what we choose next week. We may or may not come home Thursday night so I'm publishing this Wednesday evening and I'll link it up to Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers Weekly Wrap up when I get home and can easily do it. I hope all of you had a wonderful Halloween and a great week homeschooling!

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