Just a Few Reasons Why I Love to Homeschool!

Here are some examples of why I love to homeschool:


The first reason is Homeschool Nature Classes at Indian Springs Metro Park. These three hour classes occur twice a month and are just chock full of great information and really fun activities. The naturalists do a wonderful job thinking of creative ways to teach all different areas of science to the kids. A few weeks ago the children studied Astronomy and visited the Planetarium. Afterwards they "visited" each planet individually and wrote and illustrated a guidebook of the galaxy. Their fun activity that time was to make Astronaut helmets out of empty milk jugs. Elijah loves being creative and I (unfortunately) do not do crafts with him very often so he had an absolute blast cutting, gluing, coloring and creating. Here are a few pics (from my camera phone) of the end results:

What a fun idea and what a huge amount of information Elijah retained because of the hands-on activities. He also had to write a short report about what each part of his helmet did, so we used that as an opportunity to work on his computer and typing skills. He was so excited to turn in his report to the naturalist today!

We were back at Indian Springs today and this time we studied dinosaurs. The class started with each child creating a casting of a dinosaur's tooth and claw. We made a huge mess with sand, plaster of paris and water, but the end result was something fun and hands-on that the kids could take home and later "unearth", if they wanted to. Once home they could continue their learning by pretending to be junior Paleontologists. Next we sat down to a VERY informative slideshow on dinosaurs, and finished up by doing a lifesize demonstration of the stride of a huge quadraped dinosaur (I can't remember which one!!!). It's one step equaled 15 of Elijah's steps! Wow, now that's a great way to put a perspective on things! The children were assigned some fun activities to take home with them to complete as homework and I know Eli is really looking forward to working on his sheets because of the excitement generated in class.


After we got out of class, Elijah and I were able to spend some time outdoors enjoying the beautiful spring-like weather. This is another of the reasons I love to homeschool - flexibility and spontaneity. You can view the videos below to get an idea of the fun we had:

Mourning My Loss

January was a very sad month here in the Autry household. There was a death in the family . . the death of our external hard drive . . . the location of all of my family photos and personal information. WAHHH HAAAA!!!! The loss has not completely registered yet or sunk in yet, but I know the pain and suffering has been great.

Gasp!!!

Sniff, sniff!!!

I am comforted somewhat in knowing that I have family photos up to March 2008 backed up on CDs, but everything else from March to December is no more. All our personal paperwork and saved files are adios, arrivederci, finito.

How does one recover from this? Well, I don't know yet, but I'll keep you informed. In the meantime, though, I am giving you all a homework assignment - go NOW and back up your photos and your files. "I already have them backed up on my computer, or on CD's" you might say. Well, my response is, so did we! Our external hard drive and CD's were our back-up, but obviously we put a little too much faith in hardware. Put your info on thumb drives. Put it on external hard drives. Put it on CDs. Make an extra copy. Make two extra copies and send one to a friends house. Take out stock in the CD manufacturer and buy an entire pallet of them from Costco. Don't risk anything!

Kevin is attempting to recover any files he can from our poor, lifeless hard drive as best he can. I'll let you know if there is any sunshine to report, although the diagnosis looks grim. Please pray for our troublesome hunk of plastic and metal! :)

Try These Snacks on Your Kids

I am constantly being tugged on by little hands and pleaded at for snacks by the boys throughout the day. Typically we will grab something small, but nutritious, around 10am and maybe something small to tide us over again around 2:30. With the idea of snacking so much throughout the day, it is important to me to supply my kids with healthy and smart options. I was starting to run low on new ideas, however, and I went searching the web for some fresh ideas to add to our ol' stand-bys. Here is an accumulation of options I have used and some new ones I found that you might want to try out on your kids next time they come a' askin'.

- sliced and cored apples (served with peanut butter, cheese or carmel dip)
- peeled and sliced oranges or grapefruit
- bananas (we like our cut into wheels for a little fun)
- grapes (fresh or frozen)
- lightly salted popcorn
- mini bagels (spread with jelly, peanut butter or cream cheese)
- homemade muffins (store bought are just too high in fat, preservatives, etc)
- dried fruit and nut mix
- breadsticks
- homemade sweet breads (pumpkin, banana, zucchini, apple, etc)
- crackers and cheese
- hard-boiled eggs
- carrots (plain or with ranch dressing)
- celery sticks spread with peanut butter
- cherry tomatoes
- cucumbers
- homemade pickles
- cheese
- all-natural fruit leather
- homemade cookies (try healthier options like oatmeal craisin, etc)
- pudding (homemade banana pudding is a personal favorite or ours)
- yogurt popsicles
- homemade granola bars
- beef jerky
- pretzels
- tortillas spread with cream cheese and finely chopped veggies (roll up)
- yogurt with granola
- homemade smoothies
- homemade milk shakes
- bread or toast (spread with jelly, peanut butter, honey or honey butter)
- crackers (spread with jelly or peanut butter)
- leftover pancake spread with peanut butter and honey (roll up)
- animal crackers
- pickled peaches or pineapples

I'd love to hear any additional ideas that you might have to add to my list, we are always looking to try something new. Please share!

Crazy Kids

I just had to post this fun video of the boys being crazy. This is what happens when the boys have cake and ice cream and are kept up past their bedtime. LOL. We were celebrating Kevin's Grandfather's 83rd birthday. It was a fun, crazy evening, as you can tell. :) Gotta love these boys!

Better Late Than Never, right?

This news is old to some, and I regret to keep the rest of you out of the loop for so long, but the ultrasound results are in, and . . . . . . it's a GIRL!!! Better late than never, right?

We are completely stunned, shocked and in awe of the news! Kevin and I were both sure that we were set to be parents to boys alone, but this new revelation has rocked our world! Pink! Who would have ever thought that we would get to buy pink?!?!

We absolutely love being Mommy and Daddy to our boys and think that we are particularly suited for raising boys, BUT we are completely optimistic and excited to try our hand at raising a little girl. There are so many differences and unique aspects to the feminine spirit. I am sure we are in for a huge learning curve. I just pray that God will give us wisdom and a deep understanding of this new little blessing, as well as for continued help in raising our three wonderful boys. Please keep us in your prayers!

The Great Christmas Tree Hunt

This past Sunday we upheld our annual tradition of cutting down our Christmas tree at Broadview Farm in Highland. We could go just about anywhere to get a tree at this time of year, but Broadview holds special significance for me because that is where I went as a child with my family to cut down a tree.

The weather was clear, but bitter (with a high of only 20 degrees) but we had fun regardless. The only one to succumb to the cold in the end was Kaden. He kept taking his gloves off and then wondered why his hands were hurting so badly. While Kevin carried the tree up to the checkout, I carried the wailing Kaden to the car to try to warm him back up. The older two boys enjoyed getting the twine and helping Daddy tie the tree to the top of the car.

I love holding on to these fun family times and I hope the boys will remember them with significance in the future as well. I am glad I can share a bit of my childhood with them, and I am glad Kevin doesn't mind being dragged out into the snowy cold either. :)

Even Santa was there!

Too short . . .

Too silly on top . . .

Just right!

Just too cold to have fun anymore!

Snow Much Fun!

The boys needed to get out of the house to burn off some extra energy, so as soon as we finished up school (and Kaden "napped"), I sent them out to shovel the sidewalks and have some fun.

Four inches of fresh snow + two couped up boys + 3 crazy dogs = perfect winter fun!