The Weekly Wrap-Up: the One with Baseball, Frogs and Graduation

This week has been pretty full with an event nearly every day. In between events we are wrapping up the *loose ends* of our school subjects.

I have to admit, I'm just as ready as the kiddos to wrap up our school year. This has been a long, drawn-out semester and I'm looking forward to summer break.

Don't get me wrong though. I am eagerly researching curriculum for next year and am even already looking forward to the fresh start in the Fall, but I wouldn't be honest if I didn't say how excited about summer break I am. However, I do plan to continue some things throughout the summer. We'll be reviewing and continuing math, building thinking skills and, of course, reading lots of books. I'm also planning to throw in a unit study or two. What are your summer plans? Do you school throughout the year or take a summer break?

Here are some highlights from our week:

We took the kiddos to Springdale, AR to see The Naturals (minor league) play baseball. It was their first *real* baseball game and we had a GREAT time. I absolutely LOVE going to stadiums and ballgames and I think I may have enjoyed it the most of all.

(with *Strike* the mascot)

(did I mention that *our*... team won?!)

Mr. B had his K5 graduation celebration this week. He was pretty excited about his special day! You can read more about that here.

This morning we had a chance to attend a stage performance of Alice in Wonderland, Jr. with the local Academy of the Arts. We attended with The Princess' Girl Scout troop because two of her fellow troop members were in the production. Having friends in the play made it even more fun to watch~it was a lot of fun! I've been singing *Zippity Do Da* all day since:)

(The Princess with her troop~she is second from the left)

(Alice in Wonderland, Jr.)

And in more news about our frogs...

lots of our tadpoles are developing their legs! It's so much fun to watch them morph and change each day:) We're so enjoying our backyard *laboratory*.

This morning we were awakened by the loudest chorus of bullfrogs, toads, regular frogs and what-have-you that you've ever heard! And there were frogs all over the place! The kiddos immediately set about catching as many as they could. Mr. B caught a bunch that were swimming by using his butterfly net:)

And I guess that about wraps up our week. Hopefully by this time next week I can be blogging about how we're wrapping up our year!

This post is linked to The Weekly Wrap-up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

The Making of an Egyptian Death Mask

We are learning all about the ancient world this year with Story of the World I and loving it! We've been learning a lot about Egypt, of course, which is completely fascinating. Most recently we have studied the New Kingdom of Egypt, which includes the story of King Tut. So we decided making an Egyptian death mask in the style of King Tut's would be a fun project. First since it was too cold at the time to paper mache in the garage (it probably would have frozen instead of dried-ha) and it was too messy to do it in the house, we decided to pick up a couple of cheap craft masks at Hobby Lobby. Next we cut out cardboard shapes to complete the shape of the death mask, attaching them with hot glue. Vince even put a little detail on the *beard* with the hot glue per The Princess' request. Then the kiddos started to paint them with this metallic gold tempera paint. It worked okay for the cardboard, but would not coat the plastic of the mask. We thought maybe a second coat ...

Door Hanger Chore Charts

My kids have had a chore chart for a while. It's one of those magnetic boards and they share it. However, it's not by their rooms and often they (and I) forget to update it. Plus it's a little bulky. When I saw the concept of a door hanger chore chart on Pinterest, I loved it! It was compact, right there were the kiddos could see it coming out and going into their rooms, and it costs almost nothing to make. I headed over to one of my favorite stores: Hobby Lobby, of course. They have these little wooden door hangers for .79. I also grabbed a couple of packets of decorative buttons for $1.99 each. I already had the clothes pins and the paint so those cost me nothing. I began by painting the door hangers (I used tempera paints because that's what I had). Then I grabbed a fine point Sharpie and the clothes pins and started writing chores on them, making sure to write them correctly so they will ...

Fun With 4th of July Crafts: Part 3

I love my new patriotic front door wreath!! I had fun putting this together, although I must admit this is more of an adult craft than one for kiddos. I was inspired by this article in Family Fun magazine. I didn't have quite everything I needed for this one, but all I had to purchase was a few sheets of scrapbook paper and some double-sided tape. Then all I had to gather up were some scissors, regular Scotch tape, a ruler and some cardboard. First I cut four (5"x 6") pieces of each paper. Then by placing a piece of double-sided tape on one of the short ends of the papers, I rolled them into cones, pressing the seams together well. Then I cut a 10" circle out of cardboard and began to stick the cones on it. I used another piece of double-sided tape to stick the cones on, arranging them in a circular pattern. Next I used regular Scotch tape to attach them on the back to the back of the cardboard. After getting all the cones on, I was ready for my centerpiece. He...

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