Christmas - Homeschool Fun

So, how many homeschool Mom's out there love the holidays because you feel every cookie made, decoration created, present wrapped, can somehow be categorized as "school!". It was craft central around here and I loved it.

First stop was gingerbread men. This is one of those activities that a mother hates but does only because she knows how much kids love decorating cookies. These poor men were so gooked up with frosting gel and M&M's that I'm sure I heard little gingerbread screaming in the background.

Here's Quinn helping with the baking while wearing Spiderman swim trunks. Tis the season!

I had no idea a child could decorate cookies and 'rock' at the same time.
Next stop...a paper tree. Believe it or not, the kids came up with this idea and then Mom and Dad provided the technical assistance. We have this blank wall in the family room that was screaming for some attention. The kids decided it needed a Christmas tree.

I think I was trying out soap-making that evening so Roy took it upon himself to create a design for the tree. We were all doubtful on its success but he definitely proved us wrong. The tree was adorable. We even put presents under it when it got closer to Christmas.

My special project this winter was the Snowman garland. Simon and Quinn were the helpers this time. I think I'll leave this one up all winter.

We had so many plans for the holidays that kept getting messed up with either weather or illness. We had hoped to get to the Zoo lights and to the Gingerbread House display at Franklin Park Conservatory. The only place we did manage to get to was COSI. The kids and I had fun that day. I love this picture of all of them there. They actually look like the love each other!!

This COSI guy was great. He got right down on the ground with the boys and showed them an experiment to explain shooting stars. Very cool. Finally a demonstration we hadn't seen before.

"Mom, the dog ate my homework!"

Well, Liam can now honestly say "The dog ate my homework." The story begins on a Monday morning when I went to grade Liam's math homework from the previous week. Lo and behold...no homework. Well, needless to say, Liam was not very forthcoming about what happened to his math homework. He tried many excuses as to why his math homework wasn't in the folder, and yes......please try and and hold back the shocked look on your face....he even tried "the dog ate it" excuse.

After about 3 hourse of denial, he finally came forward and told me the truth. He didn't do the homework! For a whole week! Well, being the stearn Mommy I am, I had him do a whole week's worth of homework in one day. To Liam's credit, he got it all done in a timely fashion.

Later that night we all left that house for a few hours. We came back to this.

After all the hassle of dealing with this homework issue, to come home and find out that a dog really can eat your homework.