The Start of School

At the beginning of the month we started "homeschooling".  I use that term very loosely because we do a very short story and activity Monday, Wednesday, and Friday...then we carry on with our day as usual.  I'm still trying to figure out how I really want to go about it all, but I like trying to start now.  It allows us this year to figure things out while both kids are still so young, then with each coming year we can build upon our lessons.  Everything we're doing is very nature based - no formal ABCs or 123s yet.  But the beauty of children is they don't need formal lessons to learn these basics.  They are everywhere around us.  Without ever sitting down for formal lessons, Jackson can count to 20 and Summerlin knows her colors.  Life at home with my sweet babies provides us with all the lessons we need.

This week we focused on the moon/stars, harvesting, and the upcoming "Harvest" moon at the end of the month. I snapped a few quick pictures while they were working on making stars for our moon and star mobile.

Yesterday we went to the pumpkin patch and "harvested" some pumpkins. They had a great corn maze, pumpkin ice cream, and a HUGE variety of pumpkins...and of course I forgot my camera. Big bummer because the kids were precious, as always. But here's a few shots of our collection!

The snake gourds on the steps and "once upon a blue moon" pumpkin on the bottom step are the fruits of our pumpkin patch.  We had three pumpkins start to grow, but two didn't make it.  This is our only one, but it's a beauty.  The snake gourds were Jackson's seed pick and I find them...interesting.  I'm excited to expand next year and try more varieties of pumpkins and different types of gourds.

The ones from the patch we visited yesterday.

All ready for fall.  And yes, there are differing politcal views expressed in our household.