Author Archives: Charity Hawkins

Chapter Book: Winnie-the-Pooh & Boxcar Children

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“I hate Winnie the Pooh!” was my son’s comment when I told him I was putting in that CD at bedtime. He’s eight, you know, and he’s way too old for such babyish things. But, that was before he heard it.

 

 

This is the real thing, the original from A.A. Milne, not a watered-down Disney version.  A friend recommended this audio version to me and it’s great! The British actors are just perfect for the voices and it cracks the kids up!

I tried Pooh before, and it was always over their heads. I think age 6-8 is just about right to understand that world of childhood that Milne describes, and to actually get the jokes. I know I tried it earlier with my kids, like ages 3-5, and they had no interest whatsoever. Anyway, I bought this on Amazon, but maybe your library has this version.  Here’s the
link for the info. Judi Dench and Stephen Fry are two of the narrators.  I also really like Milne’s book of poems Now We are Six, but I can’t find my copy currently. I think my kids are at the perfect age for it, so I need to go figure out what I did with it!

I’ve requested  These Happy Golden Years from the library, but haven’t gotten it yet, which is fine with me because I’m feeling a bit ambivalent about Laura growing up and getting married. Laura! You were just a five-year-old sitting on pumpkins in the attic in Wisconsin! You can’t get married yet! So, while I wait on the library copy and adjust to the passage of time, we also started The Boxcar Children.

I’ve been feeling neglectful of my children lately, and missing that snuggly reading time. Every time I tried to get everyone to cuddle up on the couch, my toddler would start squirming around, cracking skulls, flinging himself off the back of the couch, and lots of other really restful, peaceful activities. So, I’m going to try to have a thirty-minute Tea Time with my six- and eight-year old during the toddler’s nap time. Yesterday it went really well and we read four chapters of The Boxcar Children. They were begging to keep going!

I’m trying to get my eight-year-old son hooked on a series of chapter books. I don’t think he’s quite ready for the Hardy Boys or my dad’s old Tom Swift; I don’t really love the Magic Treehouse series, though I know many do; so maybe this will be a good one. We’ll see. Any suggestions for good boy books are appreciated!

In other news, can I show you the cutest thing ever?

Rainbow socks. My two-year-old likes to wear them as knee socks. And, in order to see their stripey-stripeyness, we must roll up his pant
legs so he can see them. Very Important! And, it turns out, I love the whole ridiculous outfit! Those chubby knees poking out are just begging to be gobbled up. I think I’m dressing him in lederhosen from now on.  You think I’m kidding.

I haven’t discussed this with my husband yet, but I’m sure he’ll be on board.

 

And, look at that baby! Doesn’t that make you
want to just buy some red knee socks and go backpacking in Austria with your
kiddos? Sigh.

Spring really makes me want to live in a mountain village in the Alps. Or go on a train ride through the misty English countryside. Does this happen to other people? Sometimes it seems nearly impossible to just stay still.

Have a lovely rainy spring break, friends!

Laryngitis

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Does it seem like when you’re in a hurry to get out the door, your kids suddenly become deaf? And forgetful? I’ll be barking out
commands, trying to shove my children through their Morning Chores as fast as possible, and I’ll go in to a bedroom and find someone staring into space, “What?
Oh, sorry, Mom!”  Argh.

I realize I only have three children, but trying to keep them each going at their own, individual tasks, like brushing teeth, seems an exercise in futility. Does it take everyone else twenty-seven hours to brush teeth? We have to find the correct toothbrush, then one needs help opening the lid, (another kid is outside trying to find their shoes that they forgot out there the day before), then the toddler refuses to open his mouth or stop talking so I can brush his teeth, so I have to put him crying in the crib, then I have to
make my six-year-old stop talking so I can do the second pass on hers, and two years later we are finally done. It’s ridiculous. And, it’s not as if I can just ignore the teethbrushing  and just let them take a swipe at it themselves because one of my children had  FOUR CAVITIES the last time we went to the dentist! (Thank you, I’ll put that Terrible Mother medal around my neck now.)

So finally I’ll change the toddler’s diaper, everyone will manage to get clean clothes on and locate two matching (usually) shoes, and we are off to run some errand (or go get a cavity filled). It’s kinda been my fault lately, all these extra errands. Most of them have to do with the book, like mailing out review copies, or going by the post office, or some other errand I should have done on Friday afternoons but didn’t because I was working on trying to figure out Facebook.  So, despite the fact that Mom’s the crazy one dragging everyone all around town, I’m the one that gets all bent out of shape.

I’m yapping at them to hurry, and every glazed-over look and bickering with each other seems to add one more straw to my already aching back. I know the final straw is coming. (I realize I’m the camel in this scenario, but that’s how it is.) March is a bad month for me with my husband’s accounting busy season, and I start feeling behind, and overwhelmed and like a terrible mother (see cavity count for proof) and then, I seem to just be constantly snippy and impatient with my poor kids. Yesterday I told my husband that the kids and I had to get back to our usual routine, so the kids knew what to expect and hopefully would be a little more efficient with those basic things that tend to drive me nuts, and I really wanted to try to be more gentle with them.

And God usually helps me out with that by giving me laryngitis.  At least once a year, sometimes twice, I have a sore throat and can barely  talk. Last night my throat started feeling scratchy. And today, it hurt to talk.

Forced niceness. Forced lack of yelling. It’s a good thing. Today I had to whisper to the kids, or say something one time, then wait for them to obey. I’d softly say, “Lie on your back, so I can change your diaper,” then wait. It hurt too much to repeat it. Of course, my two-year-old would say, “NO!” or “I clean!” and run away, so I’d scoop him up and put him in the pack n’play. No telling him eighteen times, then angrily putting him in.
Just gently and kindly, I said, “You didn’t obey Mommy.”

When I had to correct my eight-year-old about something, I had to listen to him tell me about it. I couldn’t lecture him. And you know what, he didn’t need it. Turns out, he could tell me exactly what he did wrong, why it was wrong, and what to do differently next time. Who knew?

Later, I sat on the couch and listened to my six-year-old daughter telling me about squid because I couldn’t interrupt her.

My two-year-old came over when I was making a smoothie for lunch and asked what it was, and I had to kneel right down, look into his sweet eyes and whisper, “smoothie.” “Smoothie?” he whispered back, his brown eyes sparkling, as if we were sharing some deep secret. How many times do I stop, kneel down and look into his face during the day? Not a lot.

There was still a little bickering today. But not nearly as much as usual. I have to wonder if I snap black clouds at my kids in the morning, then they answer back with grumbling thunder, and before we know it, we’re flashing lightning at each other and the whole family gets caught in a downpour.

So, today, I was so very thankful for the reminder to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. I want to do that; I want to be a gentle, kind mom, I really do. I just get so much in a hurry with my plans and ideas that I forget to slow down and listen. I forget to stop, look into my children’s faces, and speak softly to them.

Today, we all yelled a lot less. Maybe I’ll try tape over my mouth every now and then.

Prayer for this week:

Proverbs 31:26 She opens her mouth with wisdom, and on her tongue is the law of kindness.

 

When Life Gives You Hailstorms, Make . . . a Big Bowl of Hail?

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hail coloring page(sort of) > http://scijinks.nasa.gov/_media/en/site/rain/hail-formation-large.jpg

“Hail! Hail!” I screamed, and we all made a mad dash. Not indoors, no, but to the garage to get boots, umbrellas and (my kids’ brilliant idea) protective headgear. Because how often does it hail? Maybe once a year, if we’re lucky. It’s quite the event.

 

And what do you need for hail gathering but a snorkel mask, bike helmet, and a really big bowl.

 

 

 

 

 

 

My sweet little ducky baby. He was very serious. He needed a spoon.

 

 

“What are you going to do with all that hail?” I asked my seven-year-old.

“Show it to Daddy when he gets home of course!”

Of course!

I thought this would be a great science lesson, but I can’t find hail in any of our science books! Here’s a pretty good diagram though. http://scijinks.nasa.gov/_media/en/site/rain/hail-formation-large.jpg I’m hoping to have them color it at rest time, and I’ll explain it at dinner. We’ll see if that gets done.

Have a lovely day friends! Hope you’re enjoying the weather wherever you are, hailstorms or not! :)

 

Gardening with Young Children

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Here’s my guest post today over at Like a Bubbling Brook…
(Those aren’t my kids at the top of the post over there, by the way.I think the blog host used a stock photo.)

Planting a garden is a great way to teach kids about healthy food, how plants grow, and the spiritual lessons of God bringing a harvest. March is just the time to begin!

It’s okay if you don’t know anything. Go to the nearest farm store (preferably one where they actually know something, not a big home improvement store), find a man in overalls, and he’ll help you. The people at farm stores or nurseries are usually very knowledgeable. If you don’t have a farm store or nursery, you can try a university extension office for seed planting charts and people who know something.

Just start; you’ll figure it out as you go. It will be a fun adventure and you’ll know more at the end of the summer than the beginning! Think of the fun you and your children will have learning all this together!  Read More >

(And if you read the book, you’ll see some of the irony of this post, but that’s just my life. I have a sometimes-fresh-from-the-garden, and sometimes McDonald’s approach to dinner. Sorry.)

Daffodils and Saturday Mornings

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Daffodils. I mean, really. What have I ever done on  this earth to deserve daffodils? Nothing, that’s what. Don’t you just want to die when you see them, popping out in starry bursts of gold in the morning? Like exuberant children out for the day with their sunny party hats on. Like teacups
of light and glory.

They are dancing happily all over our neighborhood this morning, and then when I’m in line at the McDonald’s drive through (ahem),
geese fly honking overhead. It’s all too much. Spring just kills me. The Bradford pears would have been enough for the rest of my life, but every day there is something else.

The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows his handiwork.
(Ps 19:1)

Someday I’d like millions of daffodils in the yard, like when I studied in England and the bus would go down the street and outside was just a sea of yellow, rippling in the wind, and inside I sat in bliss.

So I gathered some up this morning and brought them inside and they look lovely in the finally-cleaned kitchen.

Next up: laundry.

 

 

 

 

 

Daffodils
by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:

I gazed–and gazed–but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

(I remember, this was one of my fourth-grade memory poems.)
I just looked it up and Wordsworth lived in England (I probably should have known that)so of course he had to write about daffodils. How could you not?

Happy Saturday!

Home

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I got this adorable apron from Pier 1 the other day and it’s hanging in my kitchen making me happy. I hardly ever go to Pier 1  because a) they have too much gorgeous stuff, and I end up wanting things I don’t actually need, like cute aprons, and b) it’s about the worst place in the world to go with small children. I really talked to my kids about NOT TOUCHING ANYTHING before we went in, and the older ones did fine, but I put my two-year-old down for like four seconds, and when I turned back around he had grabbed this feather-covered chicken and had white feathers sticking to his grubby little hands and a guilty look on his face. I offered to buy it, but the
guy there kept telling me they could write it off and it was no big deal, and I was very glad because it was, by then, a sort-of hideous $15 half-bald Styrofoam oval of a chicken. And I don’t really need one of those.

Anyway . . .  my apron. Got it. Love it. I’m hoping it will inspire me to make dinner, which is one of my goals for the rest of the year. I didn’t actually make dinner much last
year, and I think it would be a fabulous new hobby! My husband says he supports
the idea.

I’ve been working on the book like a crazy person, but there was a brief two-week window where there wasn’t anything I could do, so I was just waiting (which I’m not so good at), and I made gluten-free chicken-pot pie and let me tell you, it was delicious. I even served it on actual plates.  I took pictures. Of dinner. On plates. See,
don’t you feel better about your own homemaking skills?

I’ve had a thousand blessings a day around here lately, what with books being published, children turning six and eight (gasp!), prayers being answered, and plum trees bursting into bloom in the sunshine.  I’ve been writing down lists upon lists of
answered prayers and blessings. It’s all very exciting, and I’m enjoying it immensely
(Except for figuring out Facebook. That, not so much.), and thrilled at what God
has done and excited to see what He’s going to do with this book. But also, I’m
looking forward to having a few less things on my list. What’s been ignored a
lot lately is the heart of my home. I’ve been so busy, typing my little fingers
to the bone, that I’ve been blocking out all the non-essentials. Dishes, for one.

 

 

 

We’ve been listening to On the Shores of Silver Lake on CD, and I haven’t enjoyed it as much as the
other books. I kept feeling oddly unsettled, with that Ingalls family packing up their belongings and taking the train out West, leaving their sweet, cozy home on Plum Creek so Pa could work with the railroad. It didn’t feel right. I missed their home. I didn’t know where they would end up. Ma didn’t really like
the idea, but she went. It just seemed all wrong. I can’t remember what happens
at the end of the book, but tonight the chapter we listened to was when they
got to move into the surveyor’s house for the winter. It was a good, snug,
board house with supplies and even a trundle bed for Grace.  And, in this chapter, everything was right again. The family was together, settled, with peaches and saltines for dessert on their red-checked tablecloth, and Ma rocking idly in the rocking chair after
supper. For the winter at least, they were home.

Even in the midst of math clutter and play-doh placemats, they're beautiful, aren't they?

That chapter changed the tone of the book—to have a warm home and a contented mother. I feel better hearing that, and Laura felt better living it. So, I’m eager to get back there myself, to the heart of my home.  I’m humbled and grateful that God
and my husband were in cahoots to help me get this book done, so thankful for
all the friends who helped it happen, and amazed at how God has carried this
plan along. I’m looking forward to promoting the book this summer.  But I’m also looking forward to wearing my cute apron and making dinner.

For now though, despite the busyness, I am so incredibly blessed. I can kiss my soft-cheeked children, get tears in my eyes at how they’ve grown, feel my heart dance every time I see snowy blossoms gracing the dining room table,
and rest in the beauty of home.

***

Family Song right now is How Firm a Foundation, verses 1 & 3. Love this video of friends in France with a new church and it’s on there.

How Firm A Foundation
How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in His excellent word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said—
To you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?

“Fear not, I am with thee, oh, be not dismayed,
For I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;
I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
Upheld by My gracious, omnipotent hand.”

 

How to Adapt a Lesson (Spelling / Phonics Hopscotch)

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You know those days when your weekly lesson plans just aren’t going to happen? A child wakes you up by puking into your bed and you need to go to the doctor; your sweet husband might, for once in his life, have something he’s asked you to do and since he’s virtually ignored (ahem) you feel compelled to do it; or, like today at our house, it might be such a beautiful sunny day that you don’t see how you could possibly suffer doing school inside.

I know discipline is important, I do, but sometimes I just have a hard time doing our boring old book lesson when the birds and the plum trees are singing to us. Usually we can be a bit flexible and still cover the material. One of my friends said once, “Oh, sure, easy for you to say. I have no idea how to do that!” Really? I thought everyone did this. But, other things come more naturally to her, things like, say, keeping a clean house or cooking dinner. To each her own.

I thought I’d share sort of the thinking behind this particular day. And I’d like to know, how do you adapt the lessons at your house for sun or snow?

Step One: What is the material we need to cover? Today with my second-grader, it was a spelling test. Normally, we do one spelling word list per week (this is the A Beka Spelling and Poetry book), and a test on Thursday where he writes the words down.  This lesson was a bit tricky— the difference between “au” words and “aw” words–so the orange sheet was a little extra practice at which words go in which column.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Step Two: Where are we going to be? 

Outside. I wanted to do something outside. It was sunny and beautiful today. So, how could I teach the material outside? I decided to make chalk squares with the letters inside.

 

 

The idea was: I would call out the spelling word and my son would jump on each letter in turn. We started out with he and his five-year-old sister holding hands, but then of course the two-year-old wanted to join, and things got a bit tricky. So we switched to them taking turns.

I called out a word, “Cause” and my second grader would jump on the letters to spell it out.  Then, of course the other two were left out, which brings us to . . .

Step 3: How can my other children be involved in something similar?

For my kindergartener’s turn, I called out a simpler word from the list, “Paws.” That was still a little too hard because of those tricky au/aw sounds. So we went to just letters. I’d say “Puh” and she would jump on “P,” then “ssss” and she would jump on “s.” Then, that was a bit too easy, so we made it a bit trickier by adding short/long vowel sounds. She’s been working on that lately.

Long I and Short I

So, I’d say “ih” and she’d have to figure out which letter to
jump on (short i). Then, she wanted me to throw a rock on one, and she’d jump on it and
make the sound, which was great too.
My two-year-old mostly ran around jumping on things. When I wanted to give him a turn, I said, “ssss for curvy curvy s!” and took him over to jump on it, and we all clapped and cheered while he beamed to the crowd. You’d think he just won an Oscar.

Can I just point out our shoe style? We managed to get to library story time and back before any of us noticed my little buddy had on mismatched footwear. But at least he had them on, and he did it himself!

This is the other great thing about doing school outside—basketball.
My little guy ran off to play basketball while the other two finished up their spelling/phonics lessons. Lovely. And, really, that’s school for him too, isn’t it? Large motor skills, eye/hand coordination. Perfect.

So, that’s how we adapted our lesson for outside today. The other times I’ve found it very helpful to adapt a lesson from a book are:

  • When a child isn’t getting a concept, ex. Fractions. We back off the books and go to Krispy Kreme and cut donuts into fourths, get a pizza and talk about
    eighths, etc. Approaching the same material in a new way really seems to help.
  • When my son (usually) is having trouble sitting still or writing. Especially
    writing. We have done math and spelling orally, jumped on the trampoline while
    spelling out words, and written letters with wet sponges instead of pencils.
  • When we have to double up on lessons. This week for example. I have two spelling lists to cover this week, so by turning one test into hopscotch, I might, might have avoided a mutiny when I announce another spelling test in two days. Last fall we doubled up on math lessons (because we switched to Saxon and needed some extra lessons to get caught up to their way of doing things), but I tried to make one lesson into a game, or hands-on activity at dinner time.

Anyway, this is one of the beautiful things about homeschooling, isn’t it? We can adapt  lessons to fit our children, and enjoy the lovely spring weather as well!

I’d love to know (once I tell people about this blog): How have you adapted lessons to fit your children or your day?

Chapter Book: On the Banks of Plum Creek

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  The Ingalls family has settled in Minnesota now, living in a dugout house, then in one with real wood boards! We listened to 2/3 of this driving to Oklahoma City and back for Capitol Day on Monday, and now the kids have finished it! They listen at night on CD, so I am always a bit behind, but I only have a few more chapters to go.

Oh my goodness, the understated courage of those people! Laura Ingalls Wilder is a magnificent writer, maybe my favorite. She calmly lays out the facts in her heroic prose, showing us Ma’s quiet courage and strength in the face of grasshoppers, blizzards, missing husbands, and droughts. She doesn’t hit you over the head with something, sometimes she doesn’t even say it, she just tells what the characters do and you get it. Some of my favorite understatements of the year from this book:

1. “A couple of hundred miles don’t amount to anything!” he said. – This is after the grasshoppers eat the entire wheat crop, Pa has no money to pay back what he borrowed for the house, and he has to walk 300 miles to find work to get enough money to get the family through the winter, all in his falling-apart boots because he gave his last $3 for the church bell. I mean, really. And we complain when someone cuts us off in traffic?

2. Then Ma said, cheerfully, “We have to take care of everything now, girls. Mary and Laura, you hurry with the cow to meet the herd.” – This is after her husband just left, walking, to find work, and she is left alone with her three children on the grasshopper-ravaged prairie. By herself. With no Wal-Mart down the road, and no way to even get into town.

3. She [Ma] warmed her hands, and then she lighted the lamp and set it on the window sill. “Why are you doing that, Ma?” Mary asked her, and Ma said, “Don’t you think the lamplight’s pretty, shining against the snow outside?”  – Um, yes, and also, that way it makes a light for her husband to see if he can find the house in the raging blizzard that is going on outside. Pa ends up burrowing into a snowbank and surviving until the blizzard is over and makes it home. (But Wilder doesn’t tell you this, she shows you. You get the feeling of being the mom, trying to be cheerful to not worry her children.)

My goodness! What fortitude those people had! So good for my children to hear, to realize how easy they have it. I love this pouring of truth and beauty into their hearts. That’s what any great book should do. We talked about this very thing at my last book club, and I think this is one requirement for a great book, for me anyway, that it makes you want to be a better, stronger person. And if it can show you someone as an example, all the better.

I love my children hearing how Laura struggled not to cry (with her only doll torn apart and her father gone) because it was “shameful for an eight year old to cry” and hope a bit of that sinks in. Not that they can’t cry, but my children tend to cry if someone looks at them the wrong way. We can do with a bit more stoicism around here. Laura and Mary bravely bring in the woodpile before an approaching blizzard while their parents are gone, and they have to, otherwise they will “have to burn up the furniture, and maybe even then will freeze stark stiff.” Sheesh. And my kids complain when I make them eat beans.

If you’ve never read On the Banks of Plum Creek, get it! Get it today! Get thee to thy library website, request it on CD, and listen to it the next time you get in your car! It’s one of the best.

 

 

If You Give a Mom a Recipe for Potato Soup . . .

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This is my recent guest post over at www.laughwithusblog.com (recent winner of the 2011 Funniest Homeschool Blog award by The Homeschool Post).


If you give a mom a recipe for potato soup and go on about how cozy it is with homemade bread on a blustery day, and that day happens to be the only snowy day the city has seen all winter, well the mom is going to go make herself some potato soup.

And if she makes the potato soup, she’s going to want some homemade gluten-free bread to go with it.

And if she makes the gluten-free bread, she’s going to have to use some extra dough to make donuts (because unless Krispy Kreme starts a gluten-free line, this is her only chance in life to have donuts).

This will be a problem because the kitchen will already be covered in puddles of melting snow and food coloring, due to earlier snow ice-cream lunacy. (An hour before, her seven-year-old, five-year-old, and two-year-old stood on chairs pushed up to the kitchen island, haphazardly tossing snow and vanilla and sugar into bowls, and, in equal amounts, onto the counter and floor, helpfully making cheerful comments like, “Whoops, someone will have to clean up this floor later!”)  More …

How Chores Build Children’s Character and Brains

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You probably know that giving your children chores teaches them responsibility and is good for your own sanity, but did you know it actually helps develop their brains?

Crafts and educational projects are fine, but your children can probably learn just as much by helping you clean the house.

Read the rest of my guest post at ICanTeachMyChild >