Pumpkin Days

... with the Morgans.

Since we did it last year and then again this year, it's sure to become a yearly event.  How can you not celebrate the return of fall with seasonal crafts and pumpkin decorating?!

I would have taken more pictures but I was having as much fun decorating pumpkins, making plastic bottle pumpkins and toilet paper pumpkins.  Not to mention the shadow/puzzle tree and the scare crows.   Our house is officially decorated and ready for fall!!

Wordless Wednesday

I {Heart}...

Downton Abbey

I took the kids to the library last week and to my delight, they had the first season of 'Downton Abbey.'  I've been wanting to watch it since I've caught the random episode here & there. 

I'm only on episode 4 of season one but I'm completely hooked!  It's way better than the sci-fi shows I've watched with a certain member of my family...

I'm loving:

The Countess of Grantham - Cora Crawley

I love everything about her - she's classy, tactful, proper, modest, quite & soft spoken, a lady.  All things that seem to be lost in our society today.

Mrs. Patmore - The Head Cook

The things that come out of this lady's mouth is hilarious!  She has to constantly stay on Daisy -who is dreamy and tends to wander.  I always love when she's yelling for Daisy to get back to work.

I'm Disliking (because hate isn't a nice word is it?):

Thomas - the Footman 

Oh he's so obnoxious!  And I hate that smug look that he always has.  Never mind the fact that he's always causing trouble.

Ms. O'Brien

I liked her well enough until the typewriter incident.  Just watch it and you'll see...  She and Thomas are always collaborating to get Bates fired and he does a better job than the two of them combined.  Seriously, you just have to watch it to understand.

Columbus

Last week we spent the week learning about Christopher Columbus and his trip to the America's.  Hannah was very interested but I was thinking 'Why do we celebrate Columbus Day when he didn't even set foot in the United States?'  Regardless, we had fun last week and ended our lesson by making three boats and "sailing" them across the "Atlantic" (our bathtub.)

Poor kids...my boat making skills are dismal indeed but they had fun nonetheless. 

 It looks like it says 'Sista' but it says Pinta.

 The three ships set sail.

 Even Amos joins in the fun.

 Thankfully the real Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria didn't sink like our poor little ships did.  Amos decided to throw some "obstacles" into the mix.

Wordless Wednesday

School @ Home 2013-2014

The Clark School of Creativity if officially back in session.  We're always learning but for a few months each year we settle down to a home school curriculum and do the legal part of our learning.  You know, the part where I document daily the work the kids have done and twice during the school year present samples of said work to our accountability group. 

Samuel was so excited to start first grade this year.  He has been asking me daily for about three weeks if it's time for him to start yet.   Samuel will be doing My Father's World First grade work.  He'll learn phonic rules, basic addition & subtraction, as well as reading condensed Bible stories on his own.  Science will consist of a lot of outdoor exploration (think Charlotte Mason) with a few experiments here and there. 

Hannah has been excited too, but thankfully she hasn't asked on a daily basis to start school.  Now that we've started she hovers around while Sammy is working, waiting for her turn.  Miss. Hannah will be doing My Father's World Adventures in U.S. History (2nd grade.)  Obviously she'll be learning about American history and she'll finish her math workbook from last year.  We'll be adding an in-depth look at Science and beginning Spelling by Sound & Structure.  Hannah is an excellent at reading but terrible at spelling.  She learned to read by phonics so she spells everything phonetically. It makes for some interesting reads that's for sure!

I'll be sharing more of what we're doing - work, field trips, experiments, etc -so keep checking back!

Lately...

Sammy has taken off with reading.  He can sound out words faster than Hannah could when she was starting to read.

My kids are always crazy sleepers.  One evening Bobby went to check on the kids and ran back to grab the camera.  This is what her got...

It has rained so much this summer.  You can only watch so many movies and the kids are limited to 20 minutes for video games so we've found other ways to have fun.  We've played card games (the Fruit Ninja game is awesome!), board games and worked on puzzles.

Ellie has decided that she does love Amos after all.  Maybe it's because he's finally learned to pet her gently on the head instead of pulling her tail.  Or maybe it's because he sits and stares lovingly at her while she's eating her food.  Who knows.  But now that she loves him, he isn't as interested in her anymore.

This is what Amos does while I'm cooking supper. 

Samuel was grounded from the Wii for a week.  So he pulled out his Matchbox cars and rediscovered their awesomeness.  He sits forever crashing them together to see who will be the winner.  It's a game Bobby played as a kid and Sammy is obsessed with it.

Last but not least--
Hannah jumped off of the HIGH dive at OSP a few weekends ago.  Bobby took her out to the dock and she jumped off the low dive a few times.  Then I saw Bobby climbing up to the high dive.  I just assumed that he'd jump and then Hannah would go back to the low dive.  Nope.  She climbed up next.  I was so scared for her!  Later I took her back out and she jumped again!  She's braver than I am.  I don't have a picture though because we had to keep up with Amos too.  Hopefully next time we'll have extra hands so I can get a good pic.

 We live in such a beautiful place!

 Jumping off the low dive.

 Climbing up to the high dive.