Field Trippin' - Contemporary Art Style

This past week, we headed out with our buddies to The Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art. We'd never been there before so we weren't sure what to expect. We were really going to take a photo for the Sonlight catalog. :)

Imagine our surprise when we saw this totally awesome exhibit by Brian Dettmer.  Here's the down low on Brian.

Brian Dettmer is an internationally renowned sculptor who uses outdated, mass-produced books as the medium for his craft.  The artist carefully slices through books such as old encyclopedias and medical guides, revealing words, patterns and images. Individual ideas and thoughts are separated from their original context and rejoined to allow them new possibilities of meaning. What is left behind is a stunning, visual prose.

Art from books... ha ha ha ha ha!!!  It was amazing. Except for the part where I couldn't take any pictures. Boo, boo, double and triple boo. Good Grief!!! I can take pictures at the Met or of the Declaration of Independence. But not here. I'm not one of those ding bats who uses the flash. Ever. I know how to use a camera.

So we didn't get our shot, and it would've been perfect, and I don't have much to share with you except for this photo I borrowed from the website. If you get a chance to check out some of his stuff, do. It was wonderful.

There was also some bizarro tarot card exhibit. Besides the fact I'm not down with tarot cards or what they represent, it was really complete junk. A few beautiful drawings,  a lot of I'll just throw this down on a 8x10 piece of paper and frame it, and a touch of inappropriate. We rushed through that with a few words on the occult and what the Bible has to say on the matter.

There was a rather neat Art Lab where the kids could make their own art. They had pages of old books for them to create art in the style of the Mr. Dettmer and several other activities. They had a lot of fun creating and then hanging their art in a museum like a real artist. That was pretty cool.

We managed to get some shots for our photo shoot outside. And while we were there we got in a little nature study too. Nothing like multi-tasking while out and about. I didn't get the shots as I'd envisioned though. They were too busy reading the books to pose "properly." Brats! lol

What interesting places have you been to recently?

Road Trip: HEAV

So me and my bestie, Andra, road tripped it to Richmond for the annual HEAV (Home Educators Association of VA). Sans children.

We love our kidlets but, I'm not going to lie, we drove the entire 90 miles with a huge grin on our faces and a weight lifted off of our shoulders. Yay us!!!!  We were super excited!!

Why did we want to go?

To get the heck out of dodge and have some fun. And we were dying to meet Mr. Demme and Canadian Andy. You might know him as Andrew Pudewa. Yes, we know he's not Canadian. :) But the nickname popped up and we just can't seem to get it out our our heads and we're keeping it. So there! And there is a Maggiano's Little Italy restaurant in Richmond. To. Die. For. Just go. Worth every penny.

The Duggars were also going to be there and I thought about trying to convince one of those bigger Duggar girls to come be in charge of my much smaller and quieter jurisdiction. :) It would give them a lot more free time. lol As long as they're not afraid of needles.

We arrived, well before our appointed check-in time. Not a problem because my hubby has a lot of Marriot Rewards points. Flash the card, get in early. Woot!!  Everybody at this Marriot (Downtown Richmond Marriot) was super nice. We're talking Chick Fil-A nice. In fact, when I told one employee that he said that, it was the best compliment that he'd ever gotten. lol

Day 1

Preparing for High School

Our first stop, Preparing for High School. We decided to get that out of the way early so we're not scrambling the summer before those kidlets are actually ready for high school. Topics covered: Developing a Plan, Record Keeping, and Transcripts.

I am happy to report that we are both on top of it. Most of what she'd covered what exactly what we'd figured.

Interesting things we did learn:

*You don't necessarily have follow your local school districts plan, although it's not a bad idea.

*Colleges look most closely at 9th-11th grade. By the time your senior year rolls around you've most likely already started applying for college so they won't really get a chance to see those grades unless maybe they're unsure about you and want to see how you're doing this final year.

*They don't usually look at your middle school transcripts so be careful about taking too many classes too early. Those credits might not count the required amount of credits in a given subject. For example: The college of your choice requires Algebra 1.  Your student takes it in 6th or 7th grade. That credit might not count. By 8th grade you'd probably be alright. (I sure hope so. We're slated for Algebra 1 in 8th grade barring some math catastrophe.)

*Watch out for too many pass/fail grades. Some college assign the lowest passing letter grade to a pass. Which mean that even though your students aced the class with complete knowledge and understanding, they might only be given a D if that's the colleges lowest passing grade. Yikes! This should be reserved for subjects that are more subjective and difficult to grade. Like art.

*Some electives might be better suited as extra curricular activities. Colleges love extra curriculars. Make sure you have some. While the many years of piano lessons might make a great elective they might make a better extra curricular. If you list the piano lessons on the extra curricular sheet you can also list any awards they've one, performances they've done, etc. Think about what will work best where.

*AP over Honors is generally the best way to go. The short of it is that AP classes will be easier for you, the parent, to deal with. Less hoops, widely accepted, no waiting to have your honors program approved.

This last part is common sense to me but, since she made a point of bringing it up, I'm going to share it. Don't lie about what your student knows. It will bite you on the hind end. Saying that your student is a math whiz and then having them fail the math section on the ACT/SAT is a dead give away. Nobody likes a liar. And it makes all homeschoolers look bad.

Pig Out!!!

The last thing we did, after perusing the vendor booths, was head to dinner. Our first mistake. Eating too much bread. And then our flatbread appetizer. The cheese on it was sooooo yummy! Which lead to our inability to finish the delicious Chicken Florentine. OMG! Soooo good. There wasn't even a hope for dessert. We brought it back with us so we could eat it later.

If you haven't been to Maggiano's Little Italy. Go. With at least four people so you can get the family style service. Do not eat for two days prior to going. And wear stretchy pants.

Day 2

The Four Deadly Errors of Teaching Writing

Canadian Andy is in the house!!!!  Super excited. IEW's writing program has revolutionized our homeschool. In the area of writing.  And science. And any subject that might require writing assignments or taking notes.

I'm happy to report that I do not commit all four errors. Only 1.75. Shew!

Best Tidbits:

*Teach editing skills separate from their writing lessons. Asking a child to edit their own work is dumb. If they could've done it right the first time they would have. Edit it for them and give it back so they can make the changes. With your mouth shut. Spare the lecture.  Note their mistakes so you can bring them into your editing and grammar lessons at a different time.

*Expectations based on age are ridiculous and set children up for failure.

*My child's best IS good enough. And when she doesn't give her best, forgive her and move on.

*There's no such thing as too much help. They'll let you know when they don't want it. And when they don't, step back.

While the session was about teaching writing, it really served as a reminder of what a blessing homeschooling is. Not every child gets to proceed at their own pace until they really know the material. That is HUGE. I love I don't have to rush my girls along because I have some test looming over my head. Okay, I do have a test looming over my head but I don't care about it. It's no more than a $25 nuisance. (That I need to order and administer soon so I can appease "the man". Oops!)

I'm sorry that I wasn't able to get you a better picture. We had grand plans for photos with Canadian Andy but we ditched them because he was hacking up a lung. Next time. They'll be epic!!

If you ever have a chance to hear Andrew Pudewa speak, jump on it. He is a wonderful speaker and has fantastic insight to more than just writing. 100% awesome. Love, love, love him. I can't wait to hang more with him next year. You know, when he's healthy.

Can You Really Learn Art Online?

Darned if I know. Painful, painful session. The speaker, while very sweet and a talented artist, was a yawn. And the session was a big (boring) push for his online art academy. I'm not ashamed to admit that Andra and I wrote notes back and forth like we were in highschool. Just keeping it real.

That's what we get for letting Andra pick. ;)

Elementary Algebra Taught Concretely

Mr. Demme, Mr. Demme, Mr. Demme!!!!! I love him. It's true. I told him so right in the middle of the session. If you happen to order the mp3, you'll hear my declaration. We love the man so much we skipped the Duggars keynote to go to his session. It was the right choice.

He's everything in person that he is in his DVDs. Silly, funny, brilliant, thoroughly enjoyable. I am now a lot smarter. And I did pretty well in college algebra. Factoring trinomials the MUS way. Brilliant!!!!

His best bits were a lot like Andrew Pudewas. His top three tips for math education:

*Move at the child's pace.

*Teach where they are at, not based on their age or some misguided idea of where you "think" they
should be.

*Parental involvement. This should be easy for a homeschooler but sometimes parents leave their kids to a DVD and their own devices.

Can't wait to start teaching algebra. But we'll wait a year or so. lol

Combing Classical Education, Charlotte Mason, and Unit Studies with a Biblical Perspective

A great, big commercial for My Father's World. We walked out.

Keynote Speaker, Jeff Myers on Why Kids Leave the Faith

Over an hour into the session, I was wondering if I'd ever actually get to hear Jeff Myers. Over an hour of my time wasted on the HEAV 30th birthday  celebration. HEAV is awesome. They have helped move mountains for the homeschooling movement. However, I came to hear Jeff Myers.
I spent the first hour flirting with an adorable baby boy across the aisle. I forever christen him "Carlos". I miss you Carlos!!

Jeff finally made it the stage. He was awesome for the 20 or so minutes he finally got. Unfortunately he didn't really get to go too deep into the topic. Boo! I did hear of a few books to add to my reading list.

Disappointing though.

On the Bright Side

Guess who we found on the way back to our hotel? Jim Bob, Michelle and some of the kids. There were staying in the same hotel. Jackson held the door for us. Bless his heart. Then we had to hurry him along because Jim Bob was hauling booty and poor Jackson was about to be left behind.

Michelle is a lot shorter than I expected. Pink was the color of the day. Those kids are even cuter in person. Even when tired and rumpled. Michelle was sporting a new 'do. And seemly just as sweet in person as on t.v.

Jinger, my Duggar of choice, was also there. They all looked tired and frazzled so I decided not to try and convince her to come home with me instead. I don't think Jim Bob would thought I was funny at that moment in time. (I am though. I really am.)

They had to bolt because they had another engagement the next day. It was time to pack and load the bus.  Drat! I wanted a picture of myself in front of the bus.

It was late. We were tired. We went to our room and ate cheese corn for dinner. Yum! Lemon cookies for dessert.

Day 3

Opps!

We were running late and missed our first session. Cat and Dog theology. Bummer. It looked great. We hear that Sonlight is considering it so that even intrigues us more. Loved the people at the booth and what we saw.

We had a leisurely breakfast with our favorite waitress, Arsonia. She's the bomb. She deserves a big raise. Love her!

Then we hit the vendor hall and did some shopping. Hit the IEW booth. LA complete.  Found some cute drawing books to go along with Mackenzie's history. Score!

 

I don't even want to talk about the Miller Pad and Paper store. Who knew paper could be like crack? Love, true love.... sigh.

The Hidden Gem

Next we hit How Art Can Transform your Child's Future put on by the Creating a Masterpiece company. We ran across this booth while shopping over at IEW the day on the first day of the conference. There were two kids at easels working on these beautiful pastel sunsets. I asked the dude at the booth how long they had been working on them. 15 minutes. How long have they been taking lessons with your company. They haven't they are just visiting the conference and we asked them if they'd like to try a lesson.  

Holy cow! It was amazing. In one hour they had the most beautiful pastel drawing that anyone would be proud to hang on their wall. Every hour they would have 2 new convention goers try the lesson. I was simply mind boggling at how beautiful and easily these were created. We came back to this booth a million times and stared in wonder. We looked at their display showing the work of 4/5 year olds that would blow your mind. Just check out some of the work.

 

Impressive, right? We were even more impressed after the session. We got to see Sharon's (the instructor) heart behind the program. We got to see her art work. We got to see what students have been able to produce after completing the various lessons. Amazing!!!

Each level includes 6 DVD lessons covering a different medium. She offers feed back via email or their facebook page. The family who runs it is just delightful. 

Each level is designed to last a year and is a great deal when you consider the cost of art lessons. At our coop we pay approximately $300/year and this year they completed 2.5 projects. The same projects they did last year. For half the cost my girls could be doing work like this. Both of my kids. This discovery made the conference for us. 

If you are looking for an art program that will give your child incredible confidence while producing beautiful art, this is it. 

Last But Not Least

We skipped the last session. There was nothing that really interested us. So we hung out by the MUS booth in anticipation of stalking waiting for Mr. Demme. We felt we really connected at our session and that he'd like to hang with us for a while. (We were right.) While we waited we helped Howie and Bill Manny (he did not look like a Bill) peddle their wares. Love you crazy guys! (I'm sure they thought we were the crazy ones. lol)

Naturally Mr. Demme found us to be awesome. And said to make sure that we posted this photo on his pages because it was his first photo bomb. He's been bombed but never been the bomber before. And now we're all the Three Best Friends That There Ever Was or, as Mr. Demme named our trio, BFF squared. He's our kind of people. Our children were so jealous. Ha!

The End! Until next year.

Review: See the Light Art Projects

Art can be an intimidating homeschool subject, especially if you ARE NOT artistic. Like me. ;)

Enter See the Light, a company who offers a variety of DVD art lessons. This non-artistic mom was super excited to be able to review Art Projects - Poppy Collage.

About See the Light

Their motto, See the Light: Drawing Children to Him.  This ministry seeks to show children the love of Christ while teaching them skills along the way.  The have a variety of products. The DVD art classes teach children a wide range of skills and techniques, beginner to advanced. The Art Projects provide a years worth of projects drawn from famous artists. Finally, the Bible Stories DVD's allow your child to explore the Bible through Art.

Your student will learn tons of skills, history, and vocabulary with scripture and biblical principles woven throughout the lessons.

Our Experience

We received the Poppy Collage Art Project. Mackenzie would be working on an abstract poppy in the style of famed artist Georgia O'Keeffe.

The DVD is made up of an introduction and four lessons. Designed to for the student to complete one lesson a week, each DVD provides a month's worth of material. The lessons included: The Abstracted Flower Drawing, Tissue Paper Collage Technique, Layering Translucent Hues, and Fine Details to Create Interest.

We started off with the introduction, where we met our instructor, Master Artist Pat Knepley.  We were given an overview of the project, a list of supplies, and shown how to prepare for the first lesson. So we gathered our (easy to find) supplies, cut out a lot of tissue paper squares and were ready for Lesson 1.

In each lesson Pat Knepley demonstrates that week's lesson all while weaving a fascinating tale of the artists life. She included a lot of art terminology and wove biblical truths throughout the lesson. After watching each lesson we would start creating. Pat Knepley's step-by-step demonstrations made this a truly painless process.

These projects are a super easy way for a non-artsy parent to include art, artist study, and art history in their homeschool. The lessons were short, interesting, and easy to duplicate. There was nothing about them that we didn't love. Mackenzie liked it so much she wants to do another one in cool colors to match her bedroom.  The worst part? Deciding which project to tackle next...

Be sure to see the other great See the Light products that my Crew Mates reviewed by clicking the link at the bottom of the post..

F.Y.I.

Website: http://www.seethelightshine.com/

Age Range: 10+

Pricing: $14.99

Virtual Refrigerator: Monet for Little Kids

Even the little guys can paint like Monet.  All you need is some painter's tape, water colors, and a book with some of Monet's art work in it.

I just taped a bridge shape onto paper and let her loose. Kayleigh had a lot of fun and I love the finished product so much I think I might frame it and hang it in our school room. Easy peasy.

Weekly Wrap-Up: The One Where I Apparently Missed Thanksgiving

I decided to do something different with the Wrap-Up this week.  I decided to post it early instead of late.  How's that for new and different?

It was a pretty alright week.  The worst part was when we were out looking for a turkey cookie cutter on Tuesday and couldn't find one.  Here it is, a week and a half before Thanksgiving, and I somehow missed the entire holiday.  I know my mind isn't as sharp as it used to be but I didn't think I could miss an entire holiday.

But the proof is in the shopping.  2 A.C. Moores, 2 Bed, Bath, & Beyonds, a Michaels, Walmart, and a Harris Teeters later, I had not found ONE, SINGLE, THANKSGIVING ITEM.  I wasn't just missing cookie cutters, I couldn't find anything for the holiday.  What's up with late?

On the cookie cutter end I found lots of Santas, snowmen, stockings, candy canes, valentine hearts, flowers, Easter eggs, footballs (closest thing to T-Day), and dog bones.  Because clearly dogs having cookies is more important than Thanksgiving.  They've also got more costumes than toddlers and more aisles than baby supplies but that's a whole 'nother rant.

I got a turkey cutter on my last shopping trip.  Of the 4 different holiday cookie-cutter packs, one of them had a turkey thrown in there.  Just one?  Maybe it's because Thanksgiving isn't commercial enough yet?

On the bright side, I now know that if I want Thanksgiving items I need to buy them in late August or early September.  I put that in my phone because I'll never remember that.  It's going to beep and remind me on August 25.

But, despite the never-ending shopping trip, it's Thursday and we're not only caught up with school, we're slightly ahead.  I am completely confident that we'll finish what's left of tomorrow's work tomorrow.  (Who wants to bet that something happens and we don't get it done?  It's probably gonna happen. LOL)

Here are the highlights...

Bible

We're reading through the book of 1 Samuel.  It's pretty much review, as she just studied it at church, but we're going a little more in depth.

Math

Mackenzie had her second unit test of the year and did great.  I believe she missed one and it has probably scarred her first-born, perfectionist self but I'm happy with it.  Her new lesson was on finding the area of trapezoids.

Science

We're finishing up our unit on mating and eggs.  Some of the mating rituals had us in stitches.  This week she made a comic strip on a bird's life starting in the egg up to the point the bird has it's own clutch.  Mackenzie had a lot of fun being silly with it.

We also have a couple of experiments in the works.  The first one involves candling the changes that occur in an egg as it rots.  So that will be ongoing for the next couple of weeks.

Her second experiment was for her to design an experiment that will show  if an egg, a porous, object would absorb water.  She really surprised me by coming up with a great idea.  I was honestly expecting her to flip out and cry about how this was too hard.

She decided to submerge the egg in water for a week.  When I asked her how she'd be able to tell whether or not the egg absorbed anything she had 3 thoughts; She could weigh the egg before and after, measure the water level and check the difference after a week, or crack the egg open and look for water. She decided to go with her third option.  But then she wasn't sure she'd able to see the water so she added food coloring to the water.

I was impressed.  Especially after I checked the Apologia website to see what they did.  Her second and third options were the ones that were tested by the author.  A proud mommy moment.

Now we just have to wait and see if her hypothesis' are correct.

Social Studies

She's still doing great with geography.  We're using The Star-Spangled State Book and she still calls it fun.  The only thing she doesn't like about are the words she has to look up.  In a dictionary...GASP!

She read The Story Of Thomas Alva Edison  in history.  She was fascinated by all that he accomplished and thrilled that he shared a birthday with her little sister.

We also started discussing the reconstruction and Andrew Johnson's time in office.  Mackenzie was very disappointed with how the reconstruction was handled by the Radical Republicans.  I think she was really hoping for something positive about our history after the war and the treatment of the Native Americans.  But like with all things, you have to take the bad along with the good.

Extras

She is still doing awesome with her piano lessons.  Last week she started playing more than one note at a time.  She sounds great!

We started our composer study on Tchaikovsky.  I choose him first because we're going to our annual viewing of The Great Russian Nutcracker in a few weeks.  We really enjoy his music and Mackenzie has decided that her ultimate "piano goal" is to be able to play his Concerto #1 one day.

We've been slacking in our art lessons lately but we did 2 lessons from How to Teach Art to Children this week.  Her first assignment was to draw simple outlines of objects.

The second assignment was to create a shape design using felt shapes (circles, squares, and triangles) and then copy the design onto paper.  Now way was I making shapes for that so I thought I'd be smart and just grab the tanagrams.  Which would've worked great had I grabbed the tanagrams instead of the pattern blocks.  =o)

It was all great in the beginning.  She happily created her design and all was going well.  Then the drawing began and so did the meltdown which resulted in her crying under the table.  Copying the design with the tanagrams would've been simple, but drawing the intricate design she made with the pattern blocks was too much for my perfectionist first-born.

Eventually, she finished but it didn't turn out quite like we'd envisioned.  It was then I realized my error. LOL  Opps!  My bad.  She can laugh about it now.  Maybe we'll do it again.  The right way.  Or not.

And yes, I took a few pics of the meltdown.  I'm that kind of mom.  One day I plan on making a scrapbook filled with crying children. LOL

And that was our week.  Except for Friday, which hasn't happened yet.  The plan is piano, school, and a trip to the park with friends.  Yay!

Be sure to visit Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers and see how others fared this week.  That is, once the link-up is posted.  Sometime tomorrow.

“Antiqued” Flowers in a Vase

We finished school really early, before lunch, yesterday so Mackenzie asked to do an extra art project while the Wee Babe napped.   Something with flowers was requested.

So I found this great, and easy, “Antiqued” Oil Pastel Flowers in a Vase lesson over at Deep Space  Sparkle.

Art with Mackenzie is always interesting.  She wants to do it all the time.  However, there’s an issue with almost every art project.  She gets stressed over them almost every time. She expects her work to look like that of a “pro” or mine (so not pro) that she gets all uptight.   The joy drops right out of the bottom.

I’m forever telling her that she’s just like Beezus, from the book Beezus and Ramona, when she’s miserable in her art class.  You’re too uptight, just relax and have fun.  I hope one day she’ll find the fun.

At any rate, here’s what we did.

We drew a vase of flowers on a piece of white drawing paper using a DARK oil pastel.  Do you see her stressed out little face?

We colored the drawing in with colored oil pastels.  She’s finally starting to relax a bit.  But trust me, the drawing of the vase was a painfully long experience.

 

Now you crumple the paper into a ball.  Don’t worry, it’s supposed to smudge the pastels a bit.  It’s a part of the “effect.”   Even a perfectionist first-born can feel confident in her ability to squash a picture.  Joy at last!

 

Now you smooth it out.   Nice and neat!

Now paint over it with a liquid watercolor wash in brown or blue.  (We used the watercolor paint in the tubes rather than liquid.  In burnt sienna.)

Let it dry and then admire the beauty of your creation.  All the earlier drama will be forgotten.

Weekly Wrap-Up

One month into grade four and we’re still going strong.  So far no major hang-ups or attitudes.  Even the Wee Tot has been relatively agreeable, for her, and we’ve managed to get school finished in a timely manner each day. This is one happy mommy.

Bible

We’re still reading through the Book of John and learning along with the original 12 disciples.

Math

We’ve moved on to dividing by 3s and 5s.  Division is continuing to go well.  And to think she was nervous about it.  Reviewing our multiplication facts all summer sure helped.

Language Arts

We reviewed dictionary skills, verbs, and diagramming  in First Language Lessons.  One of her new skills in FLL is proofreading and learning proofreading marks.  She likes being able to “check” mistakes in the assignments.

Spelling Power and Writing With Ease continue to go well.

Social Studies

Mackenzie finished reading Sing Down the Moon.  While she was very upset to, again, read about how horribly our country treated Native Americans, she was very happy with the ending. 

She is now reading Freedom Train, about Harriet Tubman.  That, along with our read aloud William Wilberforce, has began our study of slavery.

True to her nature, Mackenzie is horrified and feels some guilt that her ancestors would treat people so cruelly.  She has such a tender heart when she reads about other people hurting.

In spite of the difficult topics she is, at some level, enjoying the readings.  She said of our Wilberforce readings, “I’m glad that some people were willing to stand up and help.  This book has given us lots to talk about hasn’t it?”

We also started our Civil War History Pockets.  We started with pocket two, on slavery.

Science

We finished lesson two, on what makes a bird a bird.  We concluded the lesson with an experiment about what food birds prefer.  Basically, we needed two identical bird feeders, with the only variable being the type of seed in them.  We filled one with a basic seed mix and the other with just black oil sunflower seeds.

Much to our dismay, not one bird has approached either.  Not having a bird friendly yard is making this study a difficult one for us. LOL   There is nary a tree or a bush in our tiny yard to attract them.

Extras

We are continuing our artist study on Mary Cassatt.  We just love her work.  This week she did a notebook page on one of her picture studies.

  In honor of our bird study in science, we decided to draw and paint birds using a lesson from Deep Space Sparkle.  We opted out of the feathers because I didn’t want to dig them out.

Mackenzie starts piano lessons next week so we purchased a digital piano for practice.  She is loving that.  Not bad for a girl who never touched a piano before today.

She also started soccer this week.  It was alright.  I’m a little disappointed with the coach.  He’s a very sweet man and I know she’ll have fun but he doesn’t seem to know a lot about soccer.  Her coach last year taught them so much.  They did drills of all sorts, learned plays, and had a great time.  Her skills improved tremendously last year and I was hoping for the same.  Maybe he’ll surprise me, but I hope they’re playing more and sitting less next practice. LOL

And we enjoyed our last Water Country day of the season.

Be sure to check out the other wrap-ups over at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.

We won!

We were one of the winners of the L.E.N.S. black and white photo challenge. Woot!

Now to think of something with a "Sunlight" theme. Hmm....

And I forgot to post about Mackenzie's accomplishment. She entered an online art contest for homeschoolers and won two honorable mentions. Whoo-hoooo Mackenzie! Check it out! The next contest deadline is in November and the theme is America the Beautiful. All you need is you buddying artist/homeschool student and a flickr account.

Weekly Wrap-Up

It was an uneventful week here with not much to report. We hung with some friends but no big outings. We did, however, test out some of our new art supplies from A.C. Moore.



Have you seen A.C. Moore's line of store brand art supplies? Specialty paper, paints, pastels, and other artsy goodies for about $5 an item. I'm trying to be more purposeful about our fine arts studies this year so I was excited.

At any rate, we wanted to test out some of the goodies so we chose this project from Art Projects for Kids. (BTW, check out her recent post about her favorite art supplies.)

This will be our last official "third grade" wrap-up. Next week Mackenzie heads off to Xtreme Kidz Kamp with our church and the following week we start Fourth Grade!!! Woot!

Be sure to see what everyone else has been up to this week at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.