My favorite thing to do when I have a few minutes to cruise around online is to search over at etsy.com. I never search for things I need but for oddities. It’s fun to see just what others have created with in a theme and I am often in awe of the creativity.

My favorite shoes for outdoor work are my Ariat boots. I’m still breaking them in but I’ve so happy to finally have a solid pair of boots to go muck out the buildings. Now I just need a good pair of wellies.

My favorite egg basket is a bucket. I’m still hoping to get a proper wire egg basket but in the meantime my little plastic bucket is doing a fine job. My poor wicker basket is worn at the handles and had to be retired before it broke completely.

And now I’m wondering what is your favorite lighthearted book to read again and again?

Today we visited two of our libraries to return overdue books and to pick up more things to read.

Today my children practiced riding bikes or more precisely practiced attempting to ride a bike.

Today we counted the goose eggs in the nests we found (15 if you were wondering).

Today my youngest ran around the house four times to “practice” his running to he’ll get fast.

Today my oldest dragged out his roller blades to skate on our newly snow free yard.

Today we butchered a few chickens and the boys saw real body (chicken body) parts.

Today my oldest worked on his math at 7pm.

Today my youngest practiced his math with Grandpa.

Today my boys came outside a 8pm to help me get the eggs out of the duck enclosure.

Today my boys ran around in the dark while we talked about the moon phases.

What was your today like?

We hit music via piano for an hour a week with just lesson but are closer to 6 hours when we include practicing and our other music activities. Through piano lessons the boys have both covered a healthy portion of music theory. This year Jr. has begun working with different keys and even transposing his pieces to a different key. In actuality his understanding of music theory outstripped mine this year! I am thankful to have found an instructor that gently challenges not only his playing but also his mind. LilB is still well within my own musical understanding but that doesn’t take away from the fact he’s able to read music and knows many musical terms (such as forte, crescendo and allegro etc). Primarily we focus on instrumental music but I’ve also taken some time this year to introduce childhood songs. We learned several this year like Old Dan Tucker and Tisket a Tasket. I’m always looking for new songs to teach them if you have any favorite suggestions!

Art is a weak area in terms of formality yet we crank out craft activities weekly. Our walls are a testament to the experimentation with art mediums. We work mostly with paint and paper crafts. I have yet to find a good resource for clay. Though we have worked with several of the brands available at the local craft store.  The formal art history and instruction will come too but for the moment I’m just occasionally pulling out some of our art books to admire the paintings, sculptures and what not.

A couple of our resource books are:

Usborne the Children’s Book of Art: Internet Linked.

Story of Art (admittedly this one is more for me at the moment)

What are some of your favorite Art resources?