Sage's Turns 5

Cards Drawn by His Friends Alexis and Olivia

Making Sugar Paste Acorns

Cutting Out Sugar Paste Letters For His Cake

Our Pieces Are Drying

Playing With Marshmallow Fondant

An Acorn With A Face By Sage

Our baby is 5! He requested a Chip and Dale rainbow cake for his birthday. He currently loves Chip and Dale, rainbows, pink dolphins, collecting stuffed animals, Kirby's epic yarn, peaches, cooking and baking, swimming, bike riding, money and candy. His birthday was spent eating crepes made my mommy, playing with friends in the park, reading Captain Underpants books, watching lots of Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers, opening presents and having a sundae at White Spot restaurant. We also celebrated on the weekend with some adult friends, a remote control helicopter present, rainbow cake, yummy food cooked by dad and Adventure Time episodes.

Knights and Castles

Guild Wars

Camelot Jr. 

The love of castles and knights continues. Here are some of the things we have done lately...

- watched a video on how to make a real sword

- watched videos on sword fighting- vikings, knights, samurai

- read books about knights, castles, battles 

- had a battle with knight figurines which they also use as chess pieces

-played Camelot Jr. - a puzzle game using blocks

-played Guild Wars- a video game which we learned about different types of weapons and armor and learned Roman numerals

- looked at our family Coat of Arms and talked about shield crests

- played the board game Dungeon where you use your hero to battle monsters

- fought with foam swords and shields and used bow and arrows

- watched Lord of the Rings and talked about warhorns

Pink Dolphins

Watercolor by Sage

Favorite Stuffed Animal

Play Dough

Card From Cousins

Sage loves pink dolphins ever since he saw a stuffed animal one in a shop in Alaska. At the time we wouldn't let him get it since he had already bought three other stuffed toys. He kept talking about it and how he wanted one for his birthday. His cousins sent him one along with this card and information about pink dolphins.

We learned that they live in the river not the ocean. They are more gray when young and turn more pink as they age. They eat crustaceans, crabs and small fish. They live in South America- Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, Columbia. They have a hump instead of a fin on their back. We watched some videos of them as well on Youtube.

Unschooling

We are homeschooling using a blend of different methods- child led learning, montessori, and unit studies. Though I'm not ready to switch over to unschooling, I do find some aspects of it appealing. Such as letting go some struggles over control, having them learn naturally and follow their bliss, not worrying so much, and giving them time to explore what they love in depth instead of cutting it off at a certain time. There will be days filled with lots of activity and days filled with little, no disciplining and more learning. No bribery or systems of rewards. More cooperation and working as a family unit rather than a hierarchy.

The book about unschooling says that if children are allowed as much screen time as they want then they will use it a lot some days and not at all on other days. There will just be a period of adjustment where they binge on it if they have had it restricted. We limit screen time to early mornings before the adults wake up and one hour before dinner time and it has to be chess or educational. Lately it has been all chess so I've instituted that half of the time be educational.

We watch one new educational T.V. show per week and if they decide they like it, they may watch it for educational screen time. We have seen Cyber Chase, Berenstain Bears, and the Magic School Bus so far. But the book mentions that T.V. shows we deem as non educational can have educational values and lead into conversations and research into a variety of topics.

Am I ready to let go of having a schedule yet? Should I have them help with chores when they want to because they want to and not as a rewards system? Shall I do away with timeouts? Shall I treat them more like regular people as opposed to children? These are some of the questions that come to mind when I consider unschooling. I think I'm ready to dip a toe in the waters but not to jump in just yet.

Chess

On the Disney Wonder Ship

Quiet Time

Check Vs. Mate

A Chess Drawing

Dagan picked the game of chess out of all the toys in the toy store in Juneau, Alaska. Since then, he has become more and more interested in the game. He wakes up early in the morning to play chess on the computer. His favorite game is Check vs. Mate. It is  a game where you can change the pieces to look like a regular chess board or one that's magical. He likes to play the puzzle games as well which help with chess strategy. Sometimes he will play chess online on other sites. When we are unplugged, he plays chess with his brother or his dad or even against himself.

We watched the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer and then talked about Bobby Fischer, competition, and good sportsmanship. Dagan draws many pictures with chess pieces in them. We borrowed some books as well. We have studied chess history learning that it originated in India and then became popular with the Arabs then spread to Europe. Dagan is a good sport. If he loses, he doesn't get angry but instead looks forward to playing again. He will often try to  help his opponent out. He surprisingly beat an adult friend of ours at a dinner party.

Artist of the Month: Van Gogh

This month's artist we're studying is Vincent Van Gogh. We talked about his self portraits and about why he may have cut off his ear. We talked about still life and landscapes. We looked at many pictures of his paintings. I took out the tempera paints in bright colors and set them on the table along with some brushes thinking we were going to paint self portraits or maybe landscapes but the boys had their own idea and decided to paint pinecones they found at the beach instead thus incorporating nature and bright colors like the ones Van Gogh used.

Sage's Watercolor of a House Inspired by Van Gogh

Weekly Baking Project: Cherry Pie

Pie Dough

 

 Fresh Cherries

Sage Pitting Cherries 

 Sage Making the Pie Lattice

 Looks Like the Book

A Slice for Tasting

The little pastry chefs are at it again. This week Dagan chose cherry pie. We used two types of cherries- fresh bing cherries and sour cherries from a jar. We tasted the two types of cherries and concluded we like them both. The fresh cherries were firm and sweet but the sour cherries were a bit tart and soft. The contrast made the pie taste better than if we had just used one cherry.

For the crust we used a mixture of butter and shortening. The flavor of the butter makes the crust taste good but the shortening makes it easier to work with. We talked about the importance of keeping the dough cold so the crust will be nice and flaky. Flavorwise it was one of the best pies I've ever had. But I was a bit disappointed in the texture as the recipe called for tapioca and not all of it dissolved in the syrup leaving it a little blobby. 

Sage did most of the lattice by himself and pitted all of the cherries. I'm always amazed at how comfortable he is in the kitchen. He even uses adult knives now with supervision. Dagan enjoyed mixing up the pie crust dough with me and rolling it out.