Back to Preschool

Last Friday we had our Meet the Teacher at preschool. This year, Coleman will go on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Jonathan will go on Wednesday and Friday. Here they are with the sign out front. You can see Jonathan was not too happy about being in his stroller. He very much prefers to walk everywhere, and he makes his preference known.



Coleman is in Ms. Sharon's class! We are very excited to have her again, despite the picture below. And Jonathan has Ms. Darlene. This is our first year with her, and she seems very sweet. He had a great time playing in the room. There will be three little ones in her class on Wednesday, and four on Friday. And just for the record, Ms. Darlene was the only one smiling in the picture below.



After we left the school, we met Gigi and Papack at our favorite lunch place, The Collegiate.


Coleman's first day was Monday. Here he is with his brand new Batman backpack and lunchbox. He had a great first day! There are nine boys and girls in his class. One of the other little boys is named Cole. When Brent and Coleman were talking about his day, Coleman mentioned that he had a new friend named Cole. Brent said, "So there are two Coles in your class? How about that?!" Our child looked over the rims of his glasses and said, "I'm not Cole! I'm Coleman!"
A little brotherly love before heading off to school.

This year Coleman gets to come out in the carpool line at the end of school. He was very excited! He said his favorite part of the day was playing on the playground with his friends.



Today was Jonathan's first day of school! Here he is with his new Brown Bear lunchbox. As soon as I asked him if he was ready to go to school, he ran to the door panting excitedly. I asked him, "Are you excited?" He said, "I excited!" I have no doubt that he was. On Monday when we dropped Coleman off, Jonathan cried and cried because he didn't get to get out and go to school.


We dropped Coleman off in the carpool line, and then Andrew and I walked Jon Jon into his class. He wanted to walk with his backpack on. He waved and said, "HI!" to everyone he met in the hallway.

When we walked in, he shrugged his backpack off just like his brothers do. I can't think of when he would have seen them do this, and it completely caught me off guard. Such a big boy thing from my baby yahoo. He smiled and said, "CHEEE!" for one last picture before I left. He cried just a little, but then got busy playing and reading books.



We took cupcakes to Coleman's class today, and while we were in Coleman's room, I heard a familiar, "Mommy!" I looked down and there stood Jonathan! Ms. Darlene was right behind him. They were heading down the hall toward the playground and he either saw or heard me and came right on in to Ms. Sharon's room. He was quite sad to have to go to the playground without me. But I watched him through the window and he had a big time swinging. When Andrew and I got ready to leave, I snapped a quick picture of him playing.

Ms. Darlene said he had a good day, and he had a sticker on his hand when I picked him up. He walked with his backpack on to the car, holding Andrew's hand and mine. I asked him if he had fun and he said, "Have fun!" He talked about his day all the way home. I can't wait until I can understand what he's saying. I think we're in for another great year!

Happy Birthday Coleman!

We celebrated four years of Coleman Joe today! Here's a quick look back at him on or around his previous birthdays.

One Day Old - 2007

One year old - 2008

Two years old - 2009

Three years old - 2010



Four years old - August 23, 2011

We celebrate big around here, so we'll be partying 'til the weekend. Lots of Coleman posts coming up!

The Lake - Part "The End"

Though this is the last post for our lake trip, I'm posting about something that happened the very first night we were there. Andrew and Coleman love to fish. As soon as we finished supper, they headed down to the dock with Brent to see what they could catch.



It didn't take too long for Andrew to catch one! He was so proud that he did it all by himself. Later in the week he caught his first bass. Big excitement! He hooked and reeled it in without any assistance. I wasn't on the dock when he caught that one, so we don't have pictures to share, but I know he will never forget it.

If you have more than one child, you know that once one of them does something fun, the pressure is on until they all have the same experience. So after Andrew caught his, I focused the camera solely on Coleman to try and capture his first catch. Last year he had fun just casting and reeling, but this year he wanted to catch one for himself. So we waited and waited. And waited some more. It got dark, and in July you know that means we were out late waiting on that first fish.

Brent and Coleman almost caught one several times, they felt the bite and jerked on the line to set the hook, but that fish got away every time. We think Coleman was trying to catch the wiliest fish in the lake. He (the fish) got the bait every time! Finally, they felt a bite and this time. . .





SUCCESS!!
Oh how proud he was and how relieved we were! The boys still watch Bill Dance from time to time and so Brent said, "Now Coleman, Bill Dance always kisses his fish," and held the fish out for Coleman to kiss. We thought he'd know Brent was joking and back away. We were wrong.


The last thing I want to remember from our trip this year was our visit to Bell's Restaurant. All my life I have seen Bell's as we drove through Toccoa for various reasons. Growing up, Papack ate Sunday dinner there almost every week. The sign says they have 'Georgia Fried Chicken.' We tried to go last year, but they were on vacation the week we were there, so we missed out. This year, we were all hoping they would be open, and they were! We ate dinner there before our movie on Tuesday night.


It was delicious. I decided to see about the chicken. It was a good choice.


Here's a picture of Coleman just before he fell out of his chair.


And we had a group picture made with Mrs. Bell. She's not any relation to us, but we would gladly claim her.
We had such a good time on Tuesday at Bell's, that we went back on Friday before bowling. We had a great week, and were so glad Uncle Roger and Aunt Mer Mer could join us this year. The boys are already looking forward to next summer's trip.

The Lake - Part "Where Were We?"

Life has been pretty busy around here this month! I am very hopeful that tomorrow's post will be the end of our lake trip from July. Here is a sampling of our activities from the week that I haven't covered yet.

Jonathan loves to buckle anything that is available. He had great fun that week working on his booster seat straps over and over again. Then he discovered that the lifejackets had buckles. Oh happy day! Here he is "modeling" a lifejacket.

One night we took Aunt Mer Mer to see Cars 2. We discovered the best and tiniest theatre. Small town life - you just can't beat it.

There were breakfasts on the porch.


And lots of time playing in the floor with various relatives.



And one day Papack made the long round trip to bring Grandma to the lake. I was thrilled at the picture below. Everyone is looking at the camera and pretty much smiling. I'd say that's excellent for three yahoos and an octogenarian.

Happy Birthday Brent!

Brent's birthday was the same night as Meet the Teacher at the Academy, so we invited all the grands and greats to come celebrate. We had a cookout and then enjoyed our cake and Blue Bell.

This year Brent asked for coconut cake. We have quite a few coconut cake connoisseurs in our family, so I was feeling quite the pressure. My only other attempt at a from scratch coconut cake was Christmas a few years ago, and it was a ton of work and not so great. So this time I decided to skip the fresh coconut and go with a tried and true recipe using good old Baker's. It got good reviews from Brent, and no one left any on their plates, so I guess I've found my keeper recipe.




This year the grands and greats pitched in with us to get Brent some "very nice" tickets to a home game at Bobby Dodd Stadium at Historic Grant Field. We will be taking Andrew with us this year to his very first game, and we are all super excited. I think Brent would say he had a great day!

What She Said

I have heard that we will get many questions over the years about our choice to homeschool our boys. At a seminar we went to a few weeks ago, a veteran homeschool mom said to have a short answer and a long answer ready to give. I've been thinking about those two responses and what they would be for our family.

I read several blogs daily. One that I really like is Edie's. She homeschools her girls in Tennessee. This week she posted her answer to why she homeschools. There are a few things in her thoughts that differ from mine, but overall I don't think I could say it any better. I wrote and asked her if I could share her thoughts here. She very kindly agreed.

I could cite so many reasons why I continue to homeschool my kids.

Yes, it’s true that I LOVE learning. I love the opportunities to relearn with the kids the things I never learned very well the first time. And the classical model for education is beautiful. It’s rich in great literature, rigorous and demanding in memory work and reading and writing. It’s centered in history and is time tested as a proven way to raise leaders and independent thinkers.

I could tell you that I love teaching the faith to my kids. I don’t have to worry about them being indoctrinated with secular humanism. I can enculturate them with confessional lutheran teaching and practice and hand on to them the faith of our fathers.

I could tell you that I love our family centered life where we are not segregated by age or surrounded by peers. I love that the bulk of their time is spent with adults who love them and have their best interests at heart. I am thrilled when I see that their siblings become their best friends and they get to spend long stretches of time in the magical world of childhood play.

But all that is really a cover for why I can’t imagine doing anything else.

I’ve seen in my older kids that life is a vapor. You blink and they’re gone.

I grieve the time I lost with them and I don’t want to miss anything else.

This mothering is what I was made to do.

I want to do it to the fullest for as many hours a day as I can.

I hate to admit it but I think I’m just selfish.

I want their mornings and their lunchtimes and their belly laughs and even all their groanings.

I want the bike riding and the lap sitting and the hours and hours of reading together.

I want the crafting and the cooking and all the holiday shenanigans.

After 3 years, all the lofty reasons I started homeschooling can be reduced to this—-I just want them here with me.

For as long it lasts, I want their days.

And hopefully, we’ll learn some great stuff too.

Week 1 Wrap Up

We've had a great first week at The Academy! Here are a few pictures and notes about how we spent our school time this week. Here are two little monkeys enjoying the puzzle center.

Each morning Andrew starts off with a journal page. He chose his binder on our special day before school started. He is posing with his favorite page from this week: A picture of me. He always works very hard on his illustrations and his writing.

After journals, the pledge, memory verse, and devotions, we start on math. Here he is writing today's date on our easel.

We finish math and then they have snack and storytime. I have been so tickled at how quickly Jonathan and Coleman have figured out our routines. When I tell them it's time for snack and story, Jonathan runs to the table hollering, "Fish! Fish!" and hauls himself up into the chair. Coleman has enjoyed cheese popcorn and Andrew usually chooses a granola bar. And they all three eat quietly and listen to whatever I am reading.

After snack, they have some center time, and then it's on to Language Arts. When we finish reading, phonics, and language, Andrew gets a free center choice for a few minutes. This week he has chosen blocks every day. He cleans up his center and we finish out with either Science or History. The first day I tried to do both in one day, and decided that was too much. So now we do either one or the other, but not both.

Here is Andrew with his ocean bottle from Science Club. Coleman has loved this project, so I think we'll have to make one with him soon.

We also did a handprint canvas on the first day. I'm going to add his name and the date at the bottom. My plan is to do this for everyone's first day of Kindergarten. He is also holding a time capsule that we made and have stored in the top of my closet. We'll open it the last day of Kindergarten.

We got everything in my planbook finished for Week 1, so now it's on to Week 2!