Almost Christmas

Here we are almost at Christmas and the homeschool dining room shows it! We have been working on money and Smith child #2 is able to count by 10's and by 5's up to 50 and can recognize all the coins and read "at", "an", and "am" words and in sentences. So, we are well on our way! We are doing December Celebrations this week and learning the different ways everyone celebrates the Holidays. Next week we are taking a break for Christmas. I finally found an outline of what my kids need to know by the end of each grade up to 5th grade. Now I know where I am at and where I need to build onto curriculum wise and where I am already ahead. Its not as easy as I was hoping to find. I just couldn't find a curriculum base that I really liked and fit Smith kid #2. So I made my own from an awesome library resource with a homeschool room and the online resources that are out there for FREE! I already had filing cabinets set up for preschool year 1, preschool year 2, and pre k. I had themes for each week and built what they needed to know before kindergarten up through the years. Made a folder per week of everything I would need so when it came time to get the year started I would just pull the hanging file month out, and make copies of what I needed and put it in a file I have set up for a month of school work in my homeschool cabinet in the dining room. When I decided to start homeschooling for all grades I found a huge 4 drawer filing cabinet and just built off the themes I already had in place for preschool and I got up to 3rd grade. I had to change some themes as we went up in grades as they seemed too simple and I want to challenge them!

Sorry for the lack of pictures, we are going through a lot of changes and I haven't had an opportunity to take very many during school time. You would think I would have a little more time since the homestead has slowed down, but no....this is when we get all indoor projects done.

First post

I am new to homeschooling and have only been doing elementary homeschool for about a month. I am a mother of a larger then average growing family and have been doing homeschool preschool for almost 3 years now. I live on a growing homestead as well. Looking to get away from the modern way of doing things and going back to a time where things were family oriented and not all about everyone for themselves or sole survival. Anyways I am writing this because I would like to track how I grow as a homeschooling mom and see how I progress....so a diary of sorts and hopefully along the way I can help a person or 2. I believe in God and am a Christian woman. I want to be able to enjoy the land God has given me by being more in tune with it and to enjoy the children He has given me all the time and teach them the ways of the Lord......no school can help me with either one of those. So, my husband and I decided to homeschool.