Changed By Love

Passport to the World

Feb.3,2011

Here is a fun opportunity to study countries of the world together with friends while earning chances to win a copy of a great new book.

Come join us at Christian Home School Hub for this fun study.

For 26 weeks we will be traveling to 26 destinations around the world, exploring and sharing as we go. Our itinerary will follow Craig Froman’s newly published book, Passport to the World, which is an A to Z guided language tour. Each week of our journey, 1 traveler will win a copy of Passport to the World, compliments of Master Books.

Here’s how our journey will unfold: Each week, a ‘ticket’ will be displayed at Christian Home School Hub showing the week’s destination. We want to find as many educational websites, activities, crafts, recipes, worksheets, etc. as we can about each destination!

To earn entries into each week’s drawing, all you need to do is share what you’ve found in the ‘Destination Share Box’ at the portal at Christian Home School Hub. Each web link, craft, recipe and activity you share with us will earn you an entry into that week’s drawing! There will also be other ways to earn entries each week, so watch for those as well!

I’ve already seen some great pictures of sites in Armenia and learned a little bit of its history just by doing some searches for this week’s ticket. And Craig Froman’s blog has some great Geography activities, too.

Lynda Ackert of the Christian Home School Hub has even developed some neat activity pages to help us study and report on what we discover along the way. She graciously gives us these pages for free at the portal here.

So come along with us on this learning adventure and get a chance to win a great Geography/Social Studies book.

Science for Snowy Days

Feb.2,2011

Garrett is demonstrating how the moon moves around the Earth and the Earth moves around the sun. We got this from here. It’s an extensive lesson plan. I used pages 26 and 31 from the appendix. I may go back and get some more from it.

The planet page that he colored is page 31 from the lesson plans I mentioned above.

We read this book to learn about each planet and see how to color each one. It’s from a Christian viewpoint.

I saw an opportunity for copywork, so I seized the moment! I wrote about the amount of time it takes the moon to go around the Earth being a month, and then had them copy it on our story paper. Then they each drew a picture at the top. Lots of skills being used on one assignment.

They did a good job of copying. Their handwriting is improving, and I was able to help with some problems they were having.

Fiona loved the drawing part!

Garrett is enjoying drawing a lot more than he used to.

We made this booklet last week about Snowflakes. We started it the same day we made our snowflakes. We got it from Enchanted Learning.

As you can see, Fiona enjoyed drawing in the Snowflake booklet, too.

We only made one booklet, and Fiona did most of the copywork, so I will let her keep it in her notebook. But I made sure that Garrett knew the information, too.

I did some kitchen science and made my second batch of bread (ever in my life!) I explained a little about how the yeast works, and now Anna is a bit squeamish about yeast being living organisms and moving around in her bread. Sigh. She likes Science, but she is easily grossed out. She’ll just have to get over it.

She worked on her Science alongside us at the kitchen table. She’s using Apologia Exploring Creation with Physical Science. She’s studying the Earth’s atmosphere.

The twins and I already studied that from A Child’s Geography by Ann Voskamp. But she’s getting into it in just a little bit more detail. 🙂 She’s studying for a test right now. She had her iPod on, so she could drown out all the noise we were making.

It was a good Science day for us.

We have been enjoying our Science studies during this SNOWY weather we’ve been having.

A Little Longer by Jenn Johnson

Jan.31,2011

Hear God’s heart cry for you to spend time with Him.

Stuffed Animals Show Up in Strange Places

Jan.30,2011

I walk into the bathroom and what do I see?

Christmas 2010 - Jan. 29, 2011 015 — One of those strange things I was talking about.

Christmas 2010 - Jan. 29, 2011 016 — He is creative, whoever *nobody* is.

I made my first loaf of homemade bread ever! It turned out great. We all ate a whole loaf in no time flat. I actually made two loaves. It’s a good thing because I wouldn’t have been able to take a picture of it. I was too slow with my camera.

First Bread 003 — I know who did this one! Kelsey wanted to give Chef Kirby credit for making my bread.

First Bread 004 — Kelsey again - she called this *getting up on the wrong side of the bread*.

New house in Pennsylvania 375 — I still don't know who did this. Or why.

First Bread — Patrick tells me this is our guard dog.

Christmas: Joy Comes in the Morning

Jan.30,2011

Christmas 2010 - Jan. 29, 2011 002 — A beautiful white Christmas. It even snowed on our Christmas Day!

Kelsey and I worked together to create a Christmas ambiance on Christmas Eve. The sights, the sounds, the smells – we turned off the lights and lit our cinnamon and apple pie-scented candles, turned on the Christmas tree lights, played the Charlie Brown Christmas CD and kept everything calm and peaceful.

We even enjoyed the aroma of fresh bread. I baked my first homemade dinner rolls on Christmas Eve. They were delicious!

Christmas 2010 - Jan. 29, 2011 021 — One of the four ornaments I bought from Kim Ketring at her Etsy store. They looked so nice on our tree!

Kim’s Etsy store is here.

Christmas 2010 - Jan. 29, 2011 008 — We're so thankful to have our home, our candles, our Christmas decorations, a peaceful place to rest.

Kelsey has learned some Christmas songs on the keyboard, so she played them and I sang them with her. Then we sang several Christmas hymns, all having the theme of Jesus our Savior being born in a manger in Bethlehem and the angels singing and Salvation coming to the world through Him.

Then came CHRISTMAS MORNING!