school is in session

once again, there is much to catch up on since my last post! so much has happened. summer was wonderful, as always, and i savored every moment of it. we have celebrated three birthdays- dillon turned 10 in june, david's birthday was in august, and micah turned 6 in september. we spent lots of time at our creek and the beach; visited friends and family in santa barbara; enjoyed some live music from soul majestic; the boys were excited to enter a couple things in the county fair and collect their various ribbons; we made our annual trip to the boardwalk and even ventured to a big water park over the hill; and last, but certainly not least, we welcomed our newest and most favorite little neighbor into the world, miss aviva sophia. i'm sure i've left out many things. our school year is now in full swing and our days are feeling very full! dillon is in fourth grade and micah is in his second year of kindergarten. through their homeschool program they each have one full class day , an afternoon of art classes, and LOTS of fun field trips and family gatherings, including the fall camping trip a couple of weeks ago at henry cowell state park. so much fun!
this is our sixth year using the oak meadow curriculum. in fourth grade, dillon is learning about local geography. we began this block by choosing an area of our property to build a topographical model of. he, of course, chose his favorite spot at the creek. the picture above shows the creek with the beach, cave and hillside. now we are learning about local animals and this week will be making clay animals to add to the model. we are on lesson 6 and he has just completed his second assigned book, "the search for delicious". the first book was "stuart little". these are both pretty easy for him; he is a voracious reader. for free reading, he's recently become interested in the hardy boys series. over the summer he finished the harry potter series and many of the warriors books.

here is micah, proudly displaying his letter a bread from his first week of oak meadow kindergarten. he has really been enjoying all the stories we read "for school".

class picture 2011-2012

micah happily awaiting his slice of cake at his birthday gathering at sky park