3/26/16

Shakespeare - To read or not to read?

Ever since starting this homeschool journey a few years ago, I discovered Charlotte Mason. I began to read her books and she talked about doing Shakespeare with your children. I was so intimidated because I don't ever remember doing shakespeare during my school years so I had no idea were to begin! Until Leah Boden did a scope on how she does Shakespeare and she made it look so simple and beautiful. So I decided to dig in and go for it. (If you don't follow Leah on Periscope and go do so now! She has so much wisdom, specially in the Charlotte Mason method.)

A couple weeks ago we started reading a Midsummer Night's Dream from Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare for Children edited by E. Nesbitt. You can get it used on Amazon!

I didn't think my kids would be into it all! (I thought it was going to be a bunch of gibberish language that we wouldn't understand) I grabbed the chalkboard because I wanted to write all the main characters names on there for us to remember, and started reading reading the story. While reading we would draw arrows of who was in love, and all these obstacles that kept coming up in the story. Now they beg me to read shakespeare to them!

So if you don't know where to start watch Leah's scopes , there is a part 1 & part 2 so make sure you watch both. Also find out if they have any live performances at a park or somewhere near you and go and watch it! Even if you haven't read the stories/plays, you can watch it and then read the story!

Have you read Shakespeare?

3/25/16

Do you BuJo ?

So Ive been hearing about Bullet Journaling for a while now, and Im starting to get very intrigued. Usually went I get ideas, want to brain dump, come up with fun projects...I grab a sheet of paper and start writing them down and guess what Im left with? a bunch of papers everywhere and then I forget about them.

Heather from Wellermommablog.com did some awesome posts about the BuJo system (bullet journaling) and I think Im in love!

She's did a few scopes recently and you can watch them on https://katch.me/wellermomma

Bullet Journaling helps her stay flexible, BuJu Basics: How to begin, and another called BuJo Basics: Index and Calendars.

Im so excited to get start and keep all my thoughts in one space.

Necessities to get you started:

A bullet journal (I ordered a graph one here) you can also order one from bulletjournal.com

Pretty pens - I love Staedtler Triples Finalizer Pens also I love Sharpie Pens

Also ZealousMom did an awesome post on the Do's and Don'ts of Bullet Journaling that I found very interesting and of course she came up with a group board on ideas on journaling here.

How do you keep organized? Do you BuJo?

3/17/16

Poetry Tea Time

Since my children were little, specially since my first born was a girl, we have enjoyed Tea Time. It was a special time we got to enjoy together (while practicing our manners) and talk about our day. We owned a few poetry books and we would work on memorizing them but I never thought of incorporating it into our tea times, until I discovered this amazing company, Brave Writer. Julie Bogart came up with this incredible idea of Poetry Tea times and since then we have been doing it weekly.

Now we try to carve out some time once a week (we try for Tuesdays) to make some yummy treats and some tea (sometimes cocoa, or lemonade...depending on our mood), set the table and grab our poetry books, you can even light some candles! The awesome thing is that it can be as simple as you want it or you can go all in.

Now don't go thinking that Poetry Tea Times are only for girls, I have 2 sons and as long as you have treats and a few silly poems (Ooey Gooey) they will be there! Today we made these tasty Almond Flour Donuts by Comfy Belly, so simple to make and the kids thought they were so special.

Give it a try, I'm sure you and your family will love it!

Here are some of our favorite Poetry Books: