Hunter's first typed paper.

Hunter did his first paper on the computer today - he did GREAT!!  He did a great job on the keyboard. The title of his first paper is "Wise Wishes".

Had to include a picture of Hunter with his friends Connor and Jacob. They are the children of my best friend from college. We were able to visit them last weekend and had a wonderful time with them! Connor and Hunter exchanged DS games.

Hunter with Connor and Jacob in Racine, WI

Update on our travels - Family, Friends and Fun.



Hunter with his Uncle Tom

What a fun time we have been having. After two long days of travel we were happy to get to Grandma and Papa's house. Hunter will tell anyone who asks him that he is spoiled by his Grandma. At night he sits on the couch with his head on his Grandma and his feet on his Papa. The kids is happy as can be!

We've been so happy to be able to spend time with Uncle Tom, Aunt Karla, Kayla, Luke and Mary. We went to one of Mary's basketball games - it was a blast! Mary is an unbelievable basketball player.

On Friday we went to pick up Kayla at IU for Thanksgiving break. Hunter enjoyed hanging out in Kayla's room. After we picked up Kayla, we went to
 watch Luke's football game. It was 30 degrees outside - Hunter and I were

Hunter and Kayla in her dorm at IU.

 not used to the cold weather. I could not feel my toes by the end of the game. Hunter spent a lot of time during the game playing football with a friend he made. Luke's team won their game and are now headed to State!!!  We are really proud of him.

Luke after a great win!!

On the school front, we have been doing school during the morning. We discovered a GREAT website with  grammar videos. The professor in the videos is fabulous. Tomorrow we start another week of school. Terry gets in on Wednesday night - we are both excited to see him!!

Update on our drive to Indiana

We started off this morning at 5:00am - Terry left to catch his flight to Florida and Hunter and I left for Indiana. About 30 minutes into the trip, Hunter advised me I was in "Math Cab" (his version of Cash Cab). Yes I could win big money by answering his math questions: I have twenty Cocoa Loco bars and 10 of them are rotten, what fractional part is rotten? Hmmm.... Evidently the thought of winning pretend moeny really got me engrosed in the game because we missed our exit. I got the question right though!! 

So once again I had to call Terry to help get me back on track. He is very close to embedding a GPS chip in me so these situations can get resolved so much quicker!

We were back on track. Hunter and I switched to his favorite game - the coin game. I tell him how much money I have and how many coins and he has to figure it out. For example, I have 35 cents (where is the cents symbol on the keyboard?) with 8 coins. He could then need to answer that I have 3 dimes and 5 pennies.

We drove until about 7pm tonight and are now settled in the Holiday Inn. It has a swimming pool and spa. Hunter was very happy as he is really trying to excercise so he can get in shape to play tournaments for tennis. He did his push ups in the hotel room and then swam three laps in the pool. Now he is relaxing in the spa.

Originally Hunter tried to talk me into driving all the way to Grandma's house tonight. However, by the time we were about 10 minutes away from the hotel he was ready to stop. We look forward to getting tomorrow's trip knocked out.

Pictures from our trip to the museum.

I wanted to get these pictures of our trip to the museum up before we left out of town. The pirate exhibit was very good. We were not allowed to take pics of the exhibit so we had to settle for what we could get. Hunter was especially interested in learning about John King - a 9 year old boy who was a pirate on the ship that was excavated for this exhibit.

A really nice chemistry exhibit. I especially liked the Periodic Table for Elements made on glass cubes. Each cube contained something associated with the element - very cool!

A huge, gross bug!

The countdown for our trip.

Hunter and I are starting to get ready for our Midwest tour. Last week we started covering the British navigation laws and how they led to pirates. This weekend Hunter designed his own pirate flag. This week we are going to visit the Museum of Natural Science in Houston that has a real pirate treasure on exhibit. We are going to have to do this on Tuesday after we get the tires rotated and the oil changed.

This week for science we are going to make rubber balls. We are continuing to study atoms and elements. We also have some writing assignments to catch up on. This week we also start the "8"'s for multiplication.

Hunter is so excited for our trip I am a little worried he is going to have a hard time focusing on school.

I forgot to post a funny story last week. Terry and I had put Hunter to bed and we were sitting in the living room watching TV when Hunter yelled, "Mom......I just had a stroke!" It took me a while to assure him the pain in his chest was not a stroke - just gas.

Of course my son is going to LOVE science!

When I was in high school, I really gave my chemistry and biology teachers a run for their money. I was all attitude and had very little interest in science - barely paid any attention.  In college, I hardly got through my required biology class - I think I ended up with a "C". So it would only make sense that God would bless me with a home schooled child who loves science. Especially since he seems set on NOT following a curriculum. Instead he wants to select a topic to learn about and then leaves it up to good 'ole mom to figure our a lesson plan. 

Our topic this week is the Periodic Table of Elements. Why this? Well, there is a picture of the table on his science book; however, no information in his science book on it.

Today we discussed matter, atoms, molecules, elements and the scientist who developed the Periodic Table of Elements - Dimitri Mendeleev. By the grace of God I was able to find an amazing website which has videos with information on each of the elements- including some great science experiments. We watch the video on Hydrogen today.

I have some great home experiments which entail mixing different elements to see the reaction. One experiment will allow him to make his own rubber ball out of borax, cornstarch, glue and water.

Sumo Wrestling with Dad



Terry and Hunter Sumo Wrestling

 Last night Hunter had a chance to Sumo Wrestle with Terry. As you can see, Hunter could barely stand in his sumo wrestling outfit. Two men had to pick him up and move him because he could not walk. Dad won the wrestling match with ease. We had fun.

After having a school meeting this weekend, Hunter and I have made some adjustments with school. He thought we were going a little too slow in math, so we are going to combine some lessons to keep the pace moving a little more to his liking.

He felt grammar was going to fast. Just in the last 1 1/2 weeks we have learned the 7 possessive pronouns, 7 subject pronouns and 7 object pronouns. Put this together with the 49 prepositions we've learned and it is just moving a little too fast. We are going to take a couple days to sit back and review everything so he can retain what he has learned. Hunter is doing great in grammar so I have no trouble slowing it down a little for him.

He thinks science is just a little too baby. I will say that there isn't a lot of action involved in our science cirriculum. he wants to learn about the elements, etc... and we are still planting seeds to study how plants grow. I am tempted to take a break fro the cirriculum and spend some time learning about things that are interesting to him. Not sure yet how to work through this.

Cursive is SOOOO boring to him! Right now we are copying paragraphs in cursive for practice using the Abeka cirriculum - he really doesn't like it. Not sure on this one. I know I want him to be able to read cursive (which he can). How important is it to me that he can write in cursive?  I'll have to take some time to think about how we can make this a little more exciting for him. Soem things in life you just have to get through.

Everything else seems to be moving along well and we are both happy with the pace.