MFW Week Four (Hot Air Balloons)

Here are some snippits from our week:

On Monday we went on a Hiking Field Trip on Mount Rose.  It was Labor Day, so daddy went with us!

Can you see Lake Tahoe in the background?

We hiked 2.6 miles up to this waterfall, then back down 2.6 miles...

~~~~~

Our memory verse is John 8:16.  Rose decorated this candle to help us think about the verse.

Rose has her Keepers At Home uniform on because we started Keepers Club this week.  :0)

~~~~~

We studied different native American tribes this week.  The wigwam craft, daddy did with her one evening...

 

~~~~~

This week one of the things we studied was the stars.  Out of all the many books that we read this week, this book really stood out:

Rose picked up the constellations fast and enjoys trying to find them out her window.  This book is going on our "to buy" list.  

~~~~~

On Friday we went on another Hiking Field Trip.  This time it was with some homeschool friends at Galena Park.   We arrived at the trail head early so Rose could do some nature study and nature sketching.  It was a beautiful place!

~~~~~

To celebrate a job well done in handwriting review our curriculum suggested eating Alphabet Soup for lunch.  Well, we do not normally eat canned foods, but this sounded fun. 

I guess our taste buds disagreed (they are used to homemade soups).  Neither one of us liked eating this canned soup.  It was gross.  Rose ended up eating a sandwich on some freshly homemade bread instead.

~~~~~

We ended our week by getting up at 4:30 AM to go watch the Reno Hot Air Balloon Races.  It starts off with some balloons doing a pre dawn show.  It was beautiful and worth getting up for.
(Chad was with us too...he is taking the photos)

  

After that, we watched to the sunrise.  Then at about 7 or so, the balloons started to inflate.

 

And then we watched them fill the sky....

 

 

Very, very neat thing to see!

MFW Adventures Week Three (Lake Tahoe)

How can school not be fun when you have a Field Trip to Lake Tahoe!  

Tuesday was the first day of school for the public school here...  So some of the homeschoolers decided to celebrate not being 'behind a desk' by going to Lake Tahoe.  (what fun!)

Man, It was beautiful!  Rose enjoyed meeting some new friends.  They swam, buried themselves in the sand, and even tried to catch crawfish.

Yes, I think we are really going to enjoy Lake Tahoe.

Science is one of Rose's favorite things....  We did some more experiments with air and water.

Here she is working on her ordinal numbers.

This was a fun craft - Jesus sun-catcher.  

We placed letters on wax paper, shaved some crayons and scattered them over the paper, placed another piece of wax paper on top, then Rose ironed the papers.  We then cut some construction paper and made a border.  She has requested to make more....so we probably will.

We had an additional outing this week.  Chad took us to the Sparks Rib Cook off on Thursday.  

Here we are enjoying a very delicious lunch!!

Rose enjoyed candy made in Italy

and cooling off in the fountains

Yes she loves to paint, in addition to our art curriculum, she loves to do additional painting, drawing and crafts.

She painted this picture on a canvas some friends sent her.

It was a fabulous week!  We continue to learn and have so much fun along the way!

Pyramid Lake

We are enjoying getting to know our new area.

We spent one Saturday at Pyramid Lake.  It is on a reservation and not crowded.  It was really beautiful.

Well once we arrived, we did drive off the hard sand and onto the soft sand.

Thankfully there were some nice folks down the beach that came and pulled us out.

Ahh, now on to the fun!

The water looks black but it is clear.  The sand was black.  We could see our feet while standing in the water.

We had a great time!

Homesick...

We really are enjoying Reno.  There is so much to do in town plus visiting Pyramid Lake, Lake Tahoe, taking up biking, hiking, etc.  We have been having a great time here.  We have been here a month but it feels longer.

Lately, I have been homesick.  Missing friends and family.

I would love to be at my parents farm right now.  My parents, sisters, niece and nephews around me...laughing, talking, playing. 

 My parents back porch.....probably my favorite place....

my mom, me, my dad  :)

Rose and her cousin Timothy goofing off

my sister Kristie

Chad's commute

Our apartment is 2 miles from UNR campus, so Chad bikes to work each day.  When we get a house he would like for it to be within biking distance, as well.
He doesn't want to buy a second car, pay for additional insurance, or pay for campus parking.  He likes the daily exercise of biking to work. 

Well Rose has been riding her bike daily as well.
She had her first big wreck, as you can see here.

MFW Adventures Week Two

Week Two was just as much fun as week one!!  We are both enjoying it so much.

This week we studied Christopher Columbus.  So we made a Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria fleet and sailed them across the Atlantic Ocean... aka the pool.
Rose had a lot of fun doing this activity with her ships.

Our science experiments this week were about air......

 water is pushing the air out of various bottles

She was thrilled to read to daddy from her Bible......

Rose and her new Bible...she loves reading it herself

This is how we go to the library.......(with a rolley cart!)

MFW Adventures Week One

We really enjoyed this week of school!  Rose was super ready to start back to school, so that helped a lot!

She was so excited Sunday night she could hardly get to sleep.

Here she is on Monday.  The first day of 2nd grade.

Probably my favorite from this past week was writing a letter to Rose explaining why we picked her name.
It was so precious to write this to her.

Rose's favorite thing was starting her time line.

This year we are studying US history.
The time line is up in our hallway and Rose is looking forward to people being able to see it when they come over.

On Monday we had a "red, white, and blue" snack.....Well, they suggested yogurt, but I thought I would make pudding as a special treat since we regularly have yogurt.  But I hadn't made pudding since before Rose was born and forgot that unlike yogurt, vanilla pudding is yellow not white.  Also, our blueberries look purple and I thought I had some strawberries, but didn't, so I used a red grape, which also looked purple.
So our "red, white, and blue" snack ended up a 'yellow and purple' snack.  But we enjoyed it very much and we pretended it was red, white and blue!   Which just added to the fun!

 Here is a picture of an experiment we did with salt water/fresh water.  She loves science and would be very happy if we did an experiment EVERY day.

Here she is doing Art.  She has a book and I have a copy of the same book.....we both do it together in our own books.   super fun!

Making a bracelet with an R (for Rose) to remind her that God loves HER.

Nature Study and nature sketching.....this is another thing we both do together.   She loves doing nature study.  Now that we are in the west and not the Southeast.....it is harder for me.  I don't know the plants here!  I need new field guides that pertain to this area.  

We did lots more, too, of course......maybe I will highlight some other areas next week.

It was a great first week of second grade!!