Sage Singing

Hosanna

How He Loves Us

Look What My Big Girl Did...

This weekend Jordan and her friend Grace donated their hair to Locks of Love. We went to the salon Friday night and they put their hair in ponytails, then we headed over to the high school track for the opening ceremonies for the Relay for Life. They had their ponytails cut off there. Jordan donated 14 inches and Grace donated 12! After that we headed back to the salon for styles and highlights. What fun! The girls (and I) had a blast. Saturday morning it was back to the salon to restyle their hair and add some makeup, and then back to the track for the closing ceremonies and showing off their new look. I am so glad the girls had a chance to donate their hair in a bit more personal way than just going to the salon. Seeing all the survivors leading the way in the relay was a real blessing, and I think it made Jordan really think about what she was actually doing. I am so thankful that we had a chance to do this and I am so proud of the girls for doing it!

Chemistry in Cooking

This week Owen been rowing Mrs. Katz an Tush for his Five in a Row unit. In our story Mrs. Katz is Jewish so we have been learning about persecution of minorities, immigration and also touched on the Jewish exodus from Egypt. We have been reading lots of books about Jewish traditions and customs. For science we talked about yeast and how the bread of Passover contains no yeast so it is flat. We also learned about the different properties of yeast and how it grows in things containing sugar. To demonstrate this we tried an experiment I found in the Five in a Row archives.

We used an empty plastic bottle, warm water, sugar, yeast, and a balloon.

We filled the bottle about 2/3 of the way full with warm water, added some sugar and shook the bottle so the sugar would dissolve. Next we added the yeast and gently swirled the bottle to mix it into the water/sugar mixture.

Then we put the balloon around the opening.

The kids were amazed to see the balloon expand over the next 20 minutes or so. Fun stuff!!

A New Coat for Anna

This week we have been using the book A New Coat for Anna to learn about patience, bartering, and a little about World War II among other things. The story takes place in Europe just after World War II. The main character, Anna, needs a new coat, but there is no money to buy one. Her mother decides to barter with some of the local merchants to have a coat make for Anna. They traded a gold watch for some wool, a lamp to have the wool spun into yarn, a necklace to have the wool woven into cloth and finally a teapot to have the cloth made into a coat. As a part of an art lesson on weaving, Owen made a placemat by weaving construction paper strips. As usual, Brandon wanted to join it to. ;)

Sage's "School"

Sage loves to play with the math manipulatives while we are doing morning lessons. This activity actually keeps her busy enough that I can usually get a math lesson in with Owen..yay!