First Day

 

It's the end of an era! Go out into the world and be great, sweet girls, but even more importantly be kind! Have a great first day at Parker! 

And a fabulous first day was had indeed! xo

Impressionist Inspiration

 

In which Grace creates her version of one of Degas' ballerina paintings during the eighth grade class' study of the impressionists. xo

A Peek Inside Grace's Main Lesson Book

 Since it's been awhile since I last shared what the girls are doing for lessons I thought now would be a good time to do just that!

Let's start with Grace's main lesson book from her anatomy block. 

As with most things, Waldorf teaches things so beautifully. From the way the material is brought to the children, to how the children interact with it, to the way art is brought in we just stand in awe. Honestly, I often think if I had learned material this way I would have enjoyed it so much more (and probably would have retained it better). 

On more than one occasion I told Grace "When I was in school we would have been given a worksheet and told to label it."

This drawing especially blew me away. Goodness, it's like textbook quality! 

Along with the gorgeous drawings she did wonderful descriptions of the various parts of the body that she had drawn. I didn't include those only because it would make this post even longer, but mostly because I was just really impressed with how beautifully her drawings came out! xo

The First Light Of Advent

 

Grace made this beautiful wreath out of greens from our backyard. This was the eighth graders art project this week and it came out absolutely gorgeous!  Isn't it stunning?!We are so glad that our girls have grown up Waldorf and that they have been able to continue with their Waldorf education this year even though I returned to full time paid work. We could not have asked for a better school community for them to be a part of this year! 

The first light of Advent is the light of the stones. 

The light found in crystals, 

In seashells, 

And in bones. xo

November Wrap Up

 Happy last day of November! It sure has been a whirlwind this month and I have spent each and every day planning (hoping?) to post in this space and then for one reason or another it never occurred. The big reason for my lack of presence here is due to my being on a screen all day (and some times many hours past "all day") at work. I find that by the end of the work day, whether that's at 4:00pm or later, that I need several hours away from the screen to decompress. As a result I am behind not only in blogging but in all things email, Facebook and Instagram. Between my working, the pandemic and the girls being "at" school our days look different than they used to. I have done a lot of reflecting on this over the past three (almost four) months and have come to the conclusion that even if I had not returned to paid work that our days would probably not be as "bloggable" as they were even a couple of years ago. Not being able to go places like we used to (due to the pandemic) has changed this space of ours considerably since March. The girls being older has changed this space considerably over the last lesson year. Us doing many of the things we've always done and me having blogged about it for ten years now has changed this space considerably over the course of this year too. I love having ten years of their life to look back on, and I am grateful for all that I shared here over the past ten years. I am hoping to be able to close out this tenth year of blogging with, actual (read: more than four posts in one month) blogging. My goal is to post something daily (or near daily) for the whole of December. We'll see if I can reach that lofty) goal. So, with that in mind, let's begin....

Grace's class did a geometry block that wrapped up in early November. They worked on creating the platonic solids out of clay as well as out of paper. The dodecahedron gave her a run for her money but she did it!  

One never knows where Gretchen will turn up next, but you can be pretty sure wherever it is is gonna be some place extra comfy! 

The hens look very proud of Grace's platonic solids (and so were we)! 

After geometry, Class Eight launched into a short story block. They read short stories, analyzed short stories and wrote their own. Grace chose to revisit a short story she had written a few years ago. The additions and revisions she made to the story were wonderful and definitely took it to the next level. 

Breakfast with the hens. 

Any chance this family has to make a Monty Python reference is going to be taken! Emma didn't miss a beat with this one! 

Thanksgiving wouldn't be Thanksgiving if we didn't make fancy hand turkeys, 

or if Emma didn't make cornbread, 

or if Grace didn't make cranberry sauce. 

This year Dave made a delicious (and gluten free) cranberry tart! 

While the turkey was cooking there was Lego building, 

and time spent with the hens, 

and table setting. 

Pre-dinner silliness. 

And the obligatory, pre-Thanksgiving family dinner picture. This is the smallest one we've ever taken. It felt weird not to be around this table with everyone but, as Dave liked to say to people "A Zoom Thanksgiving is better than an ICU Christmas." 

You can't go wrong with three desserts on Thanksgiving (even if it was way too much for four people)! 

The next night it was off to the Magic of Holiday Lights at Gillette Stadium. We all agreed that it would have been much more magical if there was snow on the ground, but it was a fun way to spend part of the evening nontheless. 

I took exactly three pictures. Two of which are here (the quality of the third one was terrible). 

Saturday morning after bootcamp my dear friend Sharon gave me this wonderful gift! Anyone that knows me knows how much I adore Mister Rogers! So much of what I believe as a mother and an educator has to do to growing up with the wisdom of him and his wonderful show. I am grateful that his show is one of the girls' favorites, and that even at their ages they still enjoy watching it. I could go on and on about how I wish that he was still with us (though I think things like Sandy Hook and the Trump presidency would have absolutely broken his heart) or how I wish that more of today's children were watching the repeats of his show rather than whatever it is they are watching today, but I shall leave that for another post. This sweet gift quickly found a home here on our desk and I am hoping to acquire a second one so that I can have one on my desk at work too (for the one day a week I am at the school building). 

Though we got our tree Friday morning, I decided to save this picture for last. It felt like a good one to end this month on. This is easily the earliest we've ever gotten the tree but with how things have gone with this pandemic we figured it was better to get it now than to wait and have all the trees be gone. Plus, it's time for the magic of sitting by the light of the Christmas tree.....Yes, it's a bit on the short side but we all knew as soon as we saw it that this was the tree that was meant for us. It's sweet and truly perfect and looks wonderful in the window. The cat, however, is a bit dismayed that she cannot sit as far underneath it as she would like. We'll have to see if we can do something about that. xo 

Lesson Kitty

In which Gretchen keeps a close watch on Grace during lessons. xo

Happy Clouds

Grace's main lesson yesterday was to complete a watercolor painting of the different types of clouds.  It looks perfect on our nature table and absolutely needs to be framed!!! xo

Happy First Day!

Another lesson year began today and the girls did awesome! We are so excited (and so grateful) that they girls get to be part of the founding class of Seasons of Seven Virtual (Waldorf) School! One of the requirements of the school is that all of the children who are part of it are enrolled with their local school districts as homeschoolers! It's the best of both worlds and a total answered prayer! When I returned home from work this afternoon Emma was hard at work typing up three paragraphs about courage (her first assignment from her class teacher) and Grace was working on her sky/cloud journal entry #1 (her first assignment from her class teacher). Dave and I were so completely proud of these girls of ours! Not only did they show an incredible amount of independence and maturity but they rose so beautifully to the occasion that we are just blown away! These girls of ours never cease to amaze, but today was one of those days that I will stand in awe of, and carry with me, forever. This is sure to be a year we will never forget! xo