Grandson #1 (and more!)

1*

Best Event of the week. 

KB and Mr. V welcomed little Samwise to the family! 

*2*

Lots going on in the blogsphere

Interview with a Homeschool Mom

School Year in Review

5 Common Topics 

Map Memory and 5 Common Topics

Check out more articles on Classical Ed at Trivium Tuesdays

*3*

The Garden. It's straw bale this year because Flower got obsessed passionate about a book. Then, Dr.Dh stepped in and crafted a watering system. We're calling it our Mission to Mars look. It's pretty amazing. Stay tuned for a step-by-step post about the straw bale thing. 

*4*

Beside the garden, Flower is obsessed passionate about sculpting. Here is part of her "heart" collection. Some are "gardens"- some are themes- like the water lilies at 12 o'clock and the dolphin at 6 o'clock. The picture does not capture just how lovely and detailed they are! 

*5*

The kids got their scripts for Shakespeare Camp, happening in July this year. Commence memorizing! This year it's Much Ado About Nothing. 

Between now and then we have 2 practicums, 2 more conventions and the beach. A different one this year, but for those of us landlocked deep in the heart of the Territories, practically any beach will do. We heard about Airbnb from friends of ours who are hosts and as a result we are renting a house for way cheaper than hotel rooms. Haven't heard of it? Use my link HERE and we BOTH get travel credits! Win/Win!

*6*

Feeche is "home" for the summer and working, taking classes, writing, spending time with a certain girlfriend and generally here to eat and sleep.Cub is busy with piano (Math is Motion -a recently released Classical Conversations music theory curriculum- really spoke to him!), karate, reading everything he can get his hands on, Geometry and spending hours and hours and hours outdoors. We super love summer!!

Oh, and have I mentioned Studio C? Good, clean fun!!

*7*

Cause, ya' know... 

KB says, "He has your lips." One of my best features! Can't wait to snuggle this little guy! 

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

Best Day Ever

This girl made Memory Master last spring (way back in April). 

It was hard work and her courage waned a bit mid-year. We told her she could pick a reward (within reason) if she made it. She chose a day at the Omaha Zoo (which rocks), stipulating that it had to include the Bros. Feeche gave up a day of first week of college week-end fun and Cub gave up Ballroom Dancing and DQ with his peeps to make sure Flower got her wish. Best big brothers, evah!

So yeah, 5 months later we finally all had a free week-end to go! 

Do you see the Monkey in the Middle? 

And the tall kid?!

We left sorta early to meet Lynn and Paul, friends from Seminary, for brunch. 1/4 century old friends are some of the best; love them! And they promised to make it up to our place for more Gun Fun before Thanksgiving. Which totally made Cub's day, but makes us all happy. They are readers and thinkers and love to travel, learn and eat good food, so we never run out of things to talk and laugh about. 

And then 5 hours at one of the best zoos in the country, with perfect weather. It was absolutely glorious out and we took turns at exhibits together, breaking up and going separate ways, some of us sauntering, while others speed walked to the last couple of places before we closed the zoo down. 

We tried a new place for dinner; Cheddars, which is always dicey, given food issues and a few unnamed people who like to stick to the tried and true. Phenomenal service, huge portions of yummy, healthy food and did I mention the great service?! (It's near the mall on 92, sit in Mark's section). 

Such a fun, fun day. I asked Flower if it was worth the hard work AND the wait. 

Totally. 

And now back to your regularly scheduled crazydays programming. 

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

Mid-August Alert

Mid-August. I am not sure what happened to the last 2 weeks, other than super busy at work getting all of my students re-enrolled and curriculum purchased, getting ramped-up for CC Challenge and marinating in all of the fantastic Tutorials and learning opportunities CC provides (Wowza. If you want to get yourself some amazing Ed training, get involved in Classical Conversations), getting TM's spiral bound, and kids notebooks organized,  gathering resources and getting engulfed in a laminating frenzy, taking down barbed wire fencing, hauling gravel, working on the brick walk, landscaping, and doing my summer purge from the recesses of the basement and attic. With all of that, I have not done any super cool large crafty projects, or read a novel, and the attic floor isn't done, meaning neither is the attic. And kittens. Seriously, they are way too super cute.

So, yeah. Blogging. I've had a lot to blog about but no time to do it in. I did resign, again, from the TOS Crew. I am super bummed about this, because I L.O.V.E. the Crewbies and all of the amazing behind the scenes opportunities, not to mention the obvious, but I spent the spring/summer behind on every.single,darn.thing I was involved in and I am too much of a control freak to live there long. Sanity and all that, is a wonderful thing.

So, our yard. Booyah, baby, is totally beautiful. The front looks like a yard, complete with bushes and wildly colorful flowers. We even have a few eggplant tucked in- though we would have had more if Cub hadn't gone into over-zealous-weed-the-garden-mad-man-frenzy at one point. The east side, where the fire-trucks went through, is grassy and park-like, after 4 years of dirt hauling, leveling, grass seeding, weeding and mulching. The west side now has a bricked in landing spot by the back-door, and defined garden beds. A zillion miles of barbed wire is down and rolled in the farther-out pastures, along with tens of yards of chain link, rolled and gone and dry-rotted fence posts out. It's a bizarre feeling de-constructing pens and fields as the craftsmanship from 90 years ago is a bit different than today; i.e. built to last, and it feels like we are vandalizing history. And yet, barbed wire. 'Nuff said.

Birthday season is upon us and we kicked it off by taking Feeche and friend and kids to see Tim Hawkins live and then out to Hu Hot (which, as much as everyone else loves, I don't; the things we do for love). Tomorrow is the actual day of, then mine, then KB's, then Dr. Dh's. Had a blast sitting next to each other at Tim Hawkins laughing so hard our faces and stomachs hurt and looking at each other, saying, yeah- you do that, watching Cub and Flower and Feeche laughing with abandon, after a long and heart wrenching season. Laughter is medicine for the soul.

In other news my brain is crammed full of of 5 Common Topics, ANI charts, Declensions and more. And this week is the county fair- longest running county fair in the Territories, y'all. Good, clean fun. This week-end will be crammed full of a project Dr. Dh has spent every single free (and some of them not) moment on. It's good, good stuff, in a world gone a bit crazy. Dr.Dh is a visionary, which is a combo of memorizingly cool and a wild ride down Mosquito Coast.

School- not starting till September 1, so summer is still happening. Sleep overs, swimming, books and lots of drawing going on around here. History of the Renaissance World, Pride and Prejudice in print, and Agents of Shield and Indiana Jones on the queue. Yeah, I live with a teen-aged boy. He goes to the gym with me, takes out the trash and weeds my garden, so can't complain too much. Flower continues to nurture her Dick Van Dyke obssession; we like Dick but Morey's the Man.

How's your summer going?

Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

Beach, Baby!

 

It's the beach, right?! Of course we're happy! 

Sand, waves, the salty sea air!

Pictures taken over a few days...

 Dr.Dh and the kids went to plenty of other site- seeing spots as well. 

Getting pictures, however, was not on the list of things to do. 

This is the boy (granted, he got home from Shakespeare Camp at 10 p.m, we put his clothes in the wash and we left the next morning straightaway) who made comments the entire trip such as,  "I hate the car." 

At the beach, "Yeah, totally worth it!"

They take off running. Shark attacks? No problem. 

(actually they were farther north than we were). 

  One of Flower's goals this year was to make it to the ocean. 

(I'm still not sure how this goal came to be?) 

The Chesapeake did in a pinch, but barely compared to the real thing. 

She was happy, happy, happy to find her little self ocean-side!  

Dr. Dh and I honeymooned on the Outer Banks 30 years ago. 

Not quite the Outer Banks, but it was great to get close enough with some of our favorite people in the world! 

Of course there's wild-life. Feeche dug until he had a crab in hand. 

'Cause even though it's pitch black out, there is still sand and water.... 

...which is always cool to float in!

A working light-house on the beach we frequented.

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

Volleyball!

A couple of cool homeschool Moms that we know got together a few years ago and started Wednesdays at the Park, learning and playing Volleyball. The season officially started today and it couldn't have been more perfect weather! The littles play on the playscapes, the Jr. Highers worked on skills and then did a couple of scrimmages, and the older crowd jumped right into playing games. Amanda brought Popsicles and fudge bars for 40 to celebrate J's birthday, which was a perfect addition to a late spring evening at the Park, complete with babies on blankets and dogs on leashes.

To top it all off, we saw hot air balloons! 

Guess where you'll be finding us once a week throughout the summer? 

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

The Play's the Thing; All Month Long

It's Drama Camp week month 'round here. Our dishwasher repair man (whom we see so often, we are on a first name basis with), who also has teens, demanded to know WHY on earth we would encourage drama in our adolescents. Let's just say it's going to happen anyway, so we channel it, right?! Of course right!

So, Cub is deep into Joeseph and the Coat. Sing, sing, sing. It's all GREAT. I am so thrilled that Julie (the amazing, talented Momma who puts this all together every year) had the chutzpah to tackle something of this magnitude. This has included musicians, directors, choreography, costumers and more. Woot! So, they've been practicing the music for a month and this past week stepped it up to start working on blocking. Then, this coming week, they are going to practice 4 hours a day until Friday, when the grand pombah-performance will be.

In other news, the littlers will be starting drama camp THIS week, with 3 hrs of practice, 4 days, and the performance on the 4th evening. It's always a blast, the kids LOVE it, are so motivated, and look forward to it all year long. I'm directing Flowers group. It's a mixed up fairy tale, and the kiddos already have their lines memorized.

A week later, the high schoolers all convene up north for a week. And I mean a LONG week, of 6 days of 6 hour practices, culminating in a 2 hour performance of Shakespeare in the Park. This year they are serving up A Midsummer's Night Dream and Cub is Puck. He is at that awkward clumping stage in life, so I'm not sure how sprightly he'll be, but he is thrilled with the part!

And the cool thing is, it's all generally affordable because everyone pitches in and helps as much as possible and appreciates the privilege of It's great to live around so many talented people who share their abilities and enrich all of our lives.

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

Gun Fun

 

Friends, Paul and Lynn came up over Labor Day week-end and Paul brought guns- all sorts- to add to our paltry arsenal. Monday found us shooting, re-loading and shooting some more.

 

Pauls' #1 rule of shooting: Don't shoot the instructor.

Paul's #2 rule of shooting: Don't shoot the instructor.

Paul's #3 rule of shooting: Don't shoot the instructor.

Safety first. Ear wear, eye wear and a safety lesson.

 

Dr. Dh, Feeche and Cub were skeet shooting fools, hitting more than missing.

 

Skeet shooting victory!

 

Ground targets, including soda cans, shaken, and topping fence posts.

Bullets hitting metal posts make a very satisfying pinging noise!

 

Debris.

Worth every minute trash retrieval.

Lots of shells and iced tea consumed and a great time had by all. Lynn and I did take turns (love that handgun!) and then I introduced quilter Lynn to the joys of Pinterest. Pretty good of me, eh?

All of this after 2 non-stop days of fun at Family Camp. Swimming, hiking, canoeing, crafting and friend time!

photo courtesy of Jannell!

@Golden Grasses 2008-2013. All photographs, artwork and text are the property of the owner unless otherwise stated. Don't miss a thing! Subscribe to Golden Grasses and get our articles right to your inbox!

King Lear, Shakespeare!

 

The 5th Annual homeschool Shakespeare Camp delivered an outstanding performance last Saturday night!

 



Move over Rodgers and Hammerstein: It's the Caitilin and Ana Team! For the 5th Consecutive year, Ana and Caitilin have created an amazing Shakespeare experience for local homeschoolers- this year it was King Lear, Shakespeare! Ana is the production person behind it all; getting emails out, making costumes, co-ordinating times and place, getting t-shirts and making sure everyone is fed and hydrated.  Caitilin directs. Such a short sentence for such a big job. This year was not without it's challenges, last minute drop-out performers, hot temperatures and hot-headed high-schoolers. Not to mention that King Lear is not the easiest play in the world to get behind. Everybody is betrayed, maimed or dead at the end. Fun times! Six days of 6-8 hour practices, culminating in a 2 1/2 hour performance. It drew the largest audience yet, with lots of locals pulling up lawn chairs to join in the fun.

 

Both of my boys on stage at the same time. The King of France, Duke of Burgandy and King Lear; Shakespeare loves the nobles! We had 6 pairs of siblings in the play. Amazing talent!
 

Props and costumes are all made the week of practice.

(And this one's from Jannell : )

Cordelia is rescued by the good King of France (wait, is that an oxymoron?)
 

Doesn't Cub make an adorable King of France (that was in the prior scence), the evil Duke of Cornwall?

 

The wicked step sisters.

Oh, wait. They're sisters. I kept thinking Drizella and Anastasia every time they were on stage.

 

LOVE this shot! HAHA.

 

King Lear going a little mad.

 

This one's from Ana
 

Yep, he's going.

Sword play. But, of course.

 

No one dies quite like Mr. S- who also died as Banquo in MacBeth.
 

What's a tragedy without someone losing their eyes?
 

Ministering to the mad King.
 

Cordelia returns.
 

And dies.
 

Yep, she's dead already. Along with most everyone else, including King Lear.
 

T-shirt signing is all part of the show, right? King Lear, by Shakespeare. An intense tragedy, made all the better by our talented cohort of thespians!

Want to read more about Shakespeare or our amazing Bardologists?

 

the Tempest Roars

Bardology

MacBeth; Homeschool Style 

 

For more scintillating snapshots, stop by Ana's blog who has several posts of King Lear, Shakespeare and more on her blog!

And a  huge Thank-you and big hugs to Ruth, whose took all of these great pictures (except for the 2 by Ana)!

 

PicMonkey, LOVE.