1+1+1=1

Raising Rock Stars ~ Thanksgiving

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 20:37:00 +0000

We took a week off and did an evening of Thanksgiving ;-) to help the boys prepare for the week ahead! Krash was a bit sick so it was a simple, short family night. Here’s Daddy reading the book, Let's Celebrate God's Blessings on Thanksgiving…

Pac Man and I worked all week coloring this project to surprise Krash during family time! I got the pieces and idea from www.edHelper.com, which is a paid subscription site. I was a member a few years ago and let the membership go, but now that Pac Man is older I rejoined, it’s worth the $20 to me.

I laminated all of the pieces and used a glue gun to hook things so we can use this over and over again at Thanksgiving. I am not very crafty, so this really impressed my husband when I pulled this out!

We also shared our special Thanksgiving Bible verse with the boys from Songs for Saplings. They recognized it from listening to the cd all the time, but had no idea it was the verse specifically for Thanksgiving

Resources used this week:

www.edHelper.com ~ (about halfway down the Thanksgiving page, called Pilgrim Puppets)
Thanksgiving Books (from our theme bookstore)
Bible Memory Verses
Songs for Saplings CD

Visit the Raising Rock Stars Webpage to download your own notebook pages and to see links to previous Rock Stars posts! Please read there or here before you add your link.

Hazelaid Giveaway!

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 04:33:00 +0000

How cute is her necklace? Almost as cute as she is ;-)! Head on over to see my latest giveaway, and enter to win!

Tot School

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:24:00 +0000

~Krash is currently 42 months old~

** links to all toys and books are at the bottom of the post

Learning Toys/Trays…

I was shocked and amazed when Krash asked to do Perler Beads and proceeded to complete the entire heart by himself (with a few *fixed* by Mommy). It is now waiting to be wrapped up as a wonderful hand made Christmas gift for some special family member!

He continues to love his latches board…

This awesome shape truck is from Ikea, he loves it!

Fun with our letter puzzles (cheap-o from Ross last year)…

Krash chose these markers (both sets) from the weekly treat basket (a part of Accountable Kids ~ which I am trying to find time to write a post about, but in short we love it), he drew TONS this week…

Of course Jolanthe visiting was a HUGE excitement for Krash, he LOVED her! She showed him patterns on his Unifex cubes…

…and sang songs with him while he played with his instruments. I believe the wipers are going swish-swish-swish…

He noticed me working on this puzzle with Pac Man and insisted in doing it too. It took a tad bit longer to do it with Krash ;-)

Pac Man took an impromptu trip to the library with Daddy and came home with a few surprise books for K, I caught him like this as he read to himself…

Noah’s Ark continues to be a big deal around here, he LOVES this hand made toy and has played with it for hours this week!

Alphabet…

Our letter was Tt, so we made trains, inspired from here.

He also dot-painted a T is for Turtle, which we got from Confessions of a Homeschooler!

iTouch Learning Fun…

We love Shape Builder! Krash plays this one a lot and I love it too, it is great for visual discrimination, fine motor skills, and also teaches great vocabulary! He is given a white shape with random puzzle pieces to drag to the correct spot. Once the pieces are all in, the image appears (see photo on right for the letter I for insect). It then says the word and often *does* something cute. You can see this and other apps we love here on our website!

Recess Fun…

He was coloring with chalk on the wall and was so stinkin cute, but refused to let me take his picture ;-)

Life {FUN} School…

Krash got to make some new friends and explore the great outdoors all in one day! He absolutely LOVED Miss Jill’s house and all of her children! He got to do many of his favorite things, like play hide n seek…

Roll down a BIG grassy hill…

and RUN…

...and run...

THANK YOU again Jill for hosting us and having such lovely children for my kiddos to play with, they loved every minute of their time at your house!

Mommy’s Favorite…

Amazon.com Widgets

Are you wondering where to start with Tot School? Read here!
Read more about Tot Trays here
Visit Totally Tots!!!
Want to see more Tot School posts? Click HERE
Visit our Tot School Webpage HERE
Visit our Tot School Tools store HERE

If you have a tot (approximately ages 1-3) at home, join in the fun and share what you're doing with your tot! Here's how to get started if you're new... If you've never read this: Go HERE 1st for more details- please do (this is still linked to the old website for now)!!! Then if you have any ideas you'd like to share, link up your exact post to MckLinky (if you have questions about how to do that, let me know in a comment or email-links to homepages will automatically be deleted).

When you add your name(blog name) to MckLinky will you put your tot's age (in months) after it, like this: 1+1+1=1 (41 mos)? I think this will help new readers a lot as they look for ideas for their specific aged tot!

If you are NEW will you please leave a comment letting us all know so we can be sure to visit you?

There was a great suggestion for us all to add our tot's bday month/year to the list. If you would like to do that, I would be glad to add it to those of you who comment here with this info. Just put your blog name and then the age like this (6/06). I will add it to the webpage!

It’s all worth it.

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:32:00 +0000

I have been blogging for years. Publicly blogging for over 2 years now, and have had a more private blog for over 5 years. This blog was my first public blog, and I NEVER could have imagined what God had in store for me here! As many of you know, hours and hours are poured into this blog and my online life in general and I have always seen this as my ministry for this season of my life. I love doing it and am thankful for the many blessings that come from it and for the ways I can serve others by sharing my gifts and talents.

I must say though, that God has blessed me beyond my wildest blogging dreams this past week. He has brought real LIVE friends into my life! Many of you reading are women I know by name and consider great online friends, and I was blessed this past week to turn 2 of those online friends into REAL LIVE friends!!!!!

First, I got to meet my Totally Tots partner (we are running the blog entirely as a team now), Jolanthe from Homeschool Creations (& No Ordinary Moments)…

Her husband was on a business trip in my area and she tagged along so we could meet! She came over on Monday and hung out with us for part of school (stay tuned to the Tot School post on Sunday), and she stayed throughout the day and evening, not leaving until 10:30pm…we had so much fun! We spent hours in the sunshine on my back deck like this…

We hashed out many Totally Tots things (big changes going on over there soon), and then had tons of fun just being friends. We went to Ikea and Target together and had a blast. We truly are two of a kind and I am so thankful God used this blog to bring us together. We have been online buds for over a year now and it is so nice to now know her in real life…love you Jolanthe.

As if that wasn’t good enough, I got to meet yet another wonderful friend I met online, who I have also known for close to a year! Jill from Forever n Ever n Always lives about 45 minutes from me and I have been trying to get my kids up there to visit for months now and it has just never worked out. With jolanthe being here, we just knew we had to make it work! Jolanthe picked me and my kids up and we drove up to Jill’s house for the day on Wednesday!

What a joy it was to meet her beautiful children, all 8 of them!!!! My 3 absolutely had a blast and have asked me many times since then when we can go back to Miss Jill’s house!

We enjoyed one of Jill’s healthy lunches…

We had a blast outside on a beautiful fall day! My inner city kiddos didn’t know what to do with all of that green open space!!!

Jill’s kids loved Ladybug, it was so cute to see her sweet face just light up for each of them…she’s a very friendly baby so she loved all of the attention she got…

Jolanthe didn’t have her 4 kiddos with her, but she had a great time playing with all of the rest of the kids, we had plenty to go around!

Thank you God for these two women you have brought into my life, and for the many others I know from my blog(s). It amazes me still that my blogs have led to these wonderful blessings!

Lapbooks ~ Dinosaurs

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 02:13:00 +0000

Pac Man completed his dinosaur Lapbook recently, he did it along side of Krash’s Dino Tot Pack. It was fun to teach him, and learn alongside of him! We used these 2 books; What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs?, and God Created the Dinosaurs of the World (Sticker and Coloring Book) as our guides for learning.

The entire lapbook was from Homeschool Share and I am ever so thankful for the awesome templates and information provided there for free! We didn’t use all of the templates they provided and did a bit of a modified lapbook. We learned SO much though, it was wonderful!

Raising Rock Stars ~ Abraham & Sarah

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:00:00 +0000

Bible Story… Abraham & Sarah

Daddy read the Bible story from our Read-n-See DVD Bible…

I couldn’t find anything online I really liked so I made our own printables for this lesson. They were very simple, reinforcing the simple facts of this story…

Love Krash coloring so intently here…

Krash had fun putting the star stickers on the Bible verse sheet, and on himself…

Resources used this week:

Abraham & Sarah Coloring Pages
Abraham & Sarah Books (from our theme bookstore)
Bible Memory Verses
Songs for Saplings CD

Visit the Raising Rock Stars Webpage to download your own notebook pages and to see links to previous Rock Stars posts! Please read there or here before you add your link.

Tot School

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 19:43:00 +0000

~Krash is currently 42 months old~

** links to all toys and books are at the bottom of the post

Learning Toys/Trays…

The How to Build an A book was put away but he asked me for it again, so of course I said, YES. What I didn’t realize, is what he had in mind to do with it {which had nothing to do with letters}. He asked me for the tape. I must admit I hesitated for a bit, but then thought-what damage can he do? I handed the tape over and he got to work…

Much, much tape later, I realized what his goal was…to make the square stand up! I had to help him a bit, but finally after much hard work, he achieved his goal and was SO happy! It was fun seeing him work hard to learn how to use the tape!

We got a “new” set of stacking cups from Nanee, who got them at a consignment sale for super cheap…he loved them! Who would’ve known a different version of the same toy would still be new to him! This is the first time he has attempted to put them in size order by himself like this!

Another consignment sale find, a cool magnetic transportation book, he played for so long with this…

Zoobs continue to be a favorite around here, K asked me to use the guide to build him the Luna Rover, it was a tad difficult but I succeeded and he was thrilled!

He had to match the colored ping pong balls into the correct colored craft cup…

We played with his geo sorter, actually working on putting them in the proper order this time…

Then we let our pilgrim walk up and down the steps…

Cutting, cutting, and more cutting…this boy loves to cut…

Thank goodness he loves to vacuum up his mess just as much as he loves to cut…

Coloring the entire Aquadoodle mat, again. I tried to interest him in sponge painting (see bottom right corner of the pic), but he wasn’t having it.

While cleaning the schoolroom (results post to come this week!), I found this game, Cariboo that we had picked up at the consignment sale. I had no idea what it was and am so glad that I opened it up, it is excellent!!! One of my favorites for Krash’s age! I played with the boys for awhile and then encouraged them to play just together, it went amazingly well! Krash is learning to take turns and listen, and P is learning to be patient and understand that Krash isn’t 7, he’s 3 (I feel like I say that many times a day!).

Theme…Thanksgiving

We made hand print turkeys, inspired from here. Krash cut his own shapes for the frame portion, and I helped him a lot with the rest ;-)

K’s is on the left, Pac Man’s on the right…

iTouch Learning Fun…

This might not have been K’s absolute favorite game of the week, but Mommy sure loved it, and he certainly enjoyed it! It is a letter tracing game called i Write Words, and is by far the best I have found so far (there are a few different apps like this one). They have a free version so you can test it out, and the paid version is $1.99. You can see this and other apps we love here on our website!

Life School…

Krash went roller skating at the rink for the first time! He didn’t LOVE it, but he did great! He had more fun hanging out with his friends and pretending to play the video games!

Mommy’s Favorite…

Are you wondering where to start with Tot School? Read here!
Read more about Tot Trays here
Visit Totally Tots!!!
Want to see more Tot School posts? Click HERE
Visit our Tot School Webpage HERE
Visit our Tot School Tools store HERE

If you are NEW will you please leave a comment letting us all know so we can be sure to visit you?

Also, if you have not commented on my "Tot School List" post, please do ASAP so I can get the official list updated! Also ~ there was a great suggestion for us all to add our tot's bday month/year to the list. If you would like to do that, I would be glad to add it to those of you who comment there (yes again...sorry). Just put your blog name and then the age like this (6/06).

Behind the Scenes ~ 1+1+1=1.COM

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:30:00 +0000

The website is DONE (well close enough) and I am ready to publicly launch and continue to work on the pages that need updating. I couldn't hold off any longer, I was ready to get it public! I thought I would write a little navigational Behind the Scenes post to tell you what's on the site and how to get there!

First, the home page (partially shown above), is now www.1plus1plus1equals1.com. The blog will still be www.1plus1plus1equals1.blogspot.com, the website is an extension of the blog-2 separate web addresses. There is a link at the top of the blog that will take you there, that says 1+1+1=1 Website.

On the homepage I tried to link to a few main areas, also to a new about us page: Who We Are.

There are 4 main sections to the site, which can all be reached on every page using the top navigation menu:

Here's a few pages that might be searched for that didn't really fit nicely into one of those categories, but will probably interest some of you...

Calendar ~ The Homeschool Way
iTouch/iPhone Recommendations...For Tots, For Big Kids
What We Love (our toy recommendations)
Support (if you are interested in supporting 1+1+1=1 by shopping our affiliates)

I am really excited to make the whole thing public for you! Obviously there is bound to be a typo or two (probably many more actually) and a few links that don't work ;), would you be so kind to email me to let me know so I can fix it? I am not offended at ALL by this, if I spell something wrong-please tell me! If a link goes to the wrong place I want to know so I can fix it!

I am still working on getting all of the old Tot Books/Packs transferred over, so expect some of them to direct to the old site if you click on them. I am also not completely done with all of the pages, so more will be added and updated over the next few weeks. I also have a whole Behind the Scenes post coming about the new Calendar page, but I didn't want to delay any longer sharing the new site with you all!

Once the basics are done, I will then just continue to add things as I create them, I will let you know here when something new is added, possibly with a little website updates post each week or 2. Thanks for being such great readers and supporters, I appreciate you all so much-even those of you who I know are out there but I don't actually know!

Visit www.1plus1plus1equals1.com HERE!

Up For a Challenge? ~ Bridge Builder

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:18:00 +0000

When I saw Up For a Challenge I just knew I had to join in, for Pac Man's sake. He is a challenge kind of guy, and I was right-he loved the idea!

The first challenge was Bridge Builder, you can see other solutions here.

Now, I must say, I am not a challenge type of gal, so I barely even understood the directions. But, we eventually figured it all out. Although, at first I thought he was a genius, completing the task with 100 out of 100 points in under the time limit.

Here's the 1st bridge he built, which was eventually disqualified after I re-read the rules-duh-it couldn't touch the floor between the white circles. Like I said-I am no engineer.

He handled it well though (knowing he was getting attitude points), and got right back to work on the bridge with the correct directions...
He did manage to create a bridge...
But, it did not hold any weight, here is his expression when it collapsed!!

Thankfully Daddy had just walked in the door and was all about bridge building. He worked on it with Pac, and they failed a few times ;), then Daddy kept working (yup by himself)...not about to be beat by other homeschooling kids (who I told him DID create bridges that help weight). Daddy created his own bridge that held all 10 pennies...YAY Daddy-you get lots of points!

It was fun, next we're gonna give the Boat Race a try!

Voting has Begun!

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:53:00 +0000

I remember how it felt last year when I was nominated for the first time, I was blown away, shocked, excited and felt so honored! We were in the middle of my husband's cancer and I remember feeling so encouraged with the HSBA, which allowed me to focus and be excited about something ;).

I can't tell you what an honor and surprise it was to wake up this morning to see that I am nominated again this year and in several categories...THANK YOU!!!! We have no cancer, or difficult pregnancy going on this year, just a house full of God's blessings. It is a joy to add these nominations to the list of blessings!!!

Not only am I honored to be nominated at all, but to be nominated for BEST and SUPER and Cyber BUDDY~meaning someone wants to actually meet me in real life ;), is a HUGE honor.

1. Best Homeschool Mom

5. Crafts. Plans & Projects

18. Best Cyber-Buddy

20. SUPER Homeschooler

22. Nitty Gritty

25. Homeschooling Methods

And if that weren't exciting enough, Totally Tots is nominated for Best Group Blog AND Best Curriculum Blog! Whoa...God is good, I am just glad that some of you feel this and my other blog have helped you in some way...thanks!

Before voting, click here to see the rules, then vote away!

Raising Rock Stars ~ Tower of Babel

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 11:00:00 +0000

Bible Story...Tower of Babel

Daddy began by reading the kiddos the story from a printed copy, since we didn't have a story book about the Tower of Babel. The best part was when Daddy demonstrated different languages, as you can see...

Of course we had to build towers as we reenacted the story!

We also looked at an image of a painting showing what the tower is thought to look like...

I helped the boys put together this Tower of Babel craft...

I made the boys this tower craft. They each had a stack of bricks (printed on cardstock), and created their own tower. Then we talked about the type of character qualities God DOES want us to possess and glued words representing those qualities on our bricks. We discussed how the people in the story were building a tower for THEMSELVES and we were building our towers for GOD! You can download the PDFs for the whole activity here on the webpage.

We colored our coloring page and mini book about the story...

Not pictured is a cute little song I found called "B-A-B-E-L" that the boys enjoyed singing with me!

Resources used this week:

Godly Tower Craft
Tower of Babel Craft
B-A-B-E-L Song and Tower of Babel Artwork
Tower of Babel story from Danielle's Place
Tower of Babel Coloring Page (scroll down to T)
Tower of Babel Mini Book
Tower of Babel Books (from our theme bookstore)
Bible Memory Verses
Songs for Saplings CD

Visit the Raising Rock Stars Webpage to download your own notebook pages and to see links to previous Rock Stars posts! Please read there or here before you add your link!

How Clean Are They?

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 01:33:00 +0000

Would you be willing to stick your face in my stack of clean cloth diapers? I would! Head on over to my latest giveaway to see my new favorite cleaning cloth solution!

Tot School

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:17:00 +0000

~Krash is currently 42 months old~

** links to all toys and books are at the bottom of the post

It was a short Tot School week for us because my mom came to visit on Thursday!!! We took the next few days off to just enjoy Nanee! Before Nanee got here, we did have some Tot School fun!

Learning Toys/Trays

Krash is finally old enough to actually play Leapfrog Bingo. We played the shape portion and he did really well!!!
A little fun with How to Build an A...
I made him a simple tray with wooden spindles (some type of sewing gadget my mom had), and colored chips...

ABCs...

K made a snake for the letter Ss...

Theme...Dinosaurs (last week)

This was our final week of dinos, we had a few things left to do! He worked with the make a dino shape puzzle from the Tot Pack...
We made eggs for our dinos...

Pac Man's on the left, K's on the right...

iTouch Learning Fun...

Yup, a new Tot School category has entered our home. Would you believe I had never even seen an iPhone OR even knew there was a such thing as an iTouch? My mom has a new iPhone that her work gave to her and we all played with it while she was here! This gadget was MADE for someone like me, I fell in love!!! Thankfully my mom decided to spoil our family near the end of her visit and combined some of her money with some of ours to make it possible for us to get this awesome treat!!!! I feel so spoiled and so do the kids, thank you Nanee! We got the iTouch since we have no need for the phone, and the iTouch does everything we were interested in. So, I will try to share Krash's favorite App of the week here, as we are having fun learning about all the neat things that are out there for kids his age!

His favorite app so far...

Blowfish

Thankfully this is a free one ;), and one I downloaded on a whim! Of the 10 or so we have so far, this is by far the one he loves the most! You'd have to see it for me to explain it, it kinda didn't make sense at first, but once I figured it out, we all loved it (including me and Daddy!). It's a great freebie!

Life School...

A little fall leaf raking...

Mommy's Favorite...

He found his beloved froggy boots, and decided to holster his bug zapper ;)

Amazon.com Widgets

Are you wondering where to start with Tot School? Read here!
Read more about Tot Trays here
Visit Totally Tots!!!
Want to see more Tot School posts? Click HERE
Visit our Tot School Webpage HERE
Visit our Tot School Tools store HERE

If you have a tot (approximately ages 1-3) at home, join in the fun and share what you're doing with your tot! Here's how to get started if you're new... If you've never read this: Go HERE 1st for more details- please do!!! Then if you have any ideas you'd like to share, link up your exact post to MckLinky (if you have questions about how to do that, let me know in a comment or email-links to homepages will automatically be deleted).

If you are NEW will you please leave a comment letting us all know so we can be sure to visit you?

Thanksgiving Ideas

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:49:00 +0000

Looking for some great Thanksgiving or fall ideas? Here's a few for ya...

Gobble, Gobble...turkey crafts from Totally Tots
Fall Crafts from Totally Tots
Thanksgiving books we love from our theme bookstore
Our Thanksgiving Lapbook
Our Fall Lapbook
Fun Thanksgiving Crafts from Oriental Trading
Great ideas from Wisdom Begun-I plan to do more with Pac Man from these ideas!
Great ideas from Little Blots of Faith
Thanksgiving Lapbooking Resources (MANY) on Squidoo
Thanksgiving Printables from Itty Bitty Bookworm

We also have another Thanksgiving Crafty Corner post going up on Totally Tots next week!

From My Inbox

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Here's the latest batch of questions from my inbox!!! If you want to browse through past From My Inbox posts, you can find them all here!

Where did you purchase the bookshelf that display the trays?

Target...they still have them I think! It's a 9-square shelf.

Do the trays stay out the whole day? And are they at the kid's level ( for them to take at will) ? Or not?

The trays are in our schoolroom and available to Krash during "school time." Although sometimes I am more slack and if he asks me later in the day if he can go do Tot School, I grin and say yes!!! I think everyone has to find out what works best for you, your home and your kids!

How much involved during Tot School is Pac-Man? I read that sometimes he participates (more like a secondary player) and sometimes he's off somewhere else (doing his own work, something else, etc.)

He would love to be involved the entire time, and sometimes this is a battle. I remind him almost daily that he is not in Tot School, and he has 2nd grade work to do! But, I do let him participate whenever I can...when he is caught up on his own work and having a lovely attitude. Mostly he is sitting at the school table doing his work while I am on the floor with Krash for about 30 minutes a day. The other times they are together or I am just with Pac Man.

It's hard to find the time to devote an hour to him (19 mo. tot) during school time.... How do you manage this in your case? Do you do tot school every day? I think you do now, but back when Krash was younger did you do it everyday or just a few days a week?

When K was younger (we began Tot School around age 22 mos), I did it just a few days per week. It was harder back then to find the time to devote to just him.
Now we do TS every day, and it has become a part of our routine, he is 3 1/2 now though so it is much easier, also with Pac Man being 7 1/2 that makes it easier too.
I will begin the TS journey again with Ladybug who is 6 1/2 months right now...stay tuned this spring to see me go through the process all over again with her!

My first question is: what kind of things do you do with your youngest to work with her?

Ladybug is just 6 1/2 months and I do nothing (out of the ordinary baby stuff) to work with her and don't plan to until she reaches about a year. Even then, it will just be intentional playtime with her, which is all Tot School is, especially at that young of an age. Ladybug soaks in so much just being around us all day long!

Can you recommend a few options? I took a look at your Tot Trays and I feel a bit overwhelmed as I'm not very creative?

Go here and read my Where Do I Begin post! This is my best advice all in one place! ;)

How do you schedule in time to make these games? Do you set a goal to do one a week? How long does it normally take for each activity you create on average? I am just trying to figure out how much time I should schedule and trying not to overwhelm my self with great ideas!

I make things randomly. I like doing it, so it is not a burden for me. Sometimes I get on a big kick and make tons of stuff at once, sometimes I just make only what we need when we need it.

Question.... where do you store all this stuff? Is your school in the basement or at the kitchen table.... I am really wondering how to begin and where to "set up". :)

Our schoolroom is a small room off the back of our house. We live in a very old row-home in the city. I store almost everything in the schoolroom and we do school in there too. Sometimes we do use the kitchen table and the living room floor ;).

Do you still have Pac in the cyber charter school?

Yes, it continues to work for us. I get asked a lot about this and how we get Calvert for FREE ;). You have to Google (I guess) to see if your state is one of the 13 or so that offer free cyber charter schooling. If your state is one of them, you then need to find a list of the specific cyber charter schools and then check each one out to see if it might work for you. The state I am in has several and I have heard bad things about some of them. The one we use is AWESOME (very flexible and supportive of how I do things with Pac Man). Basically cyber schools are NOT all created equal!!!
As for Krash, I am not sure what I am going to do for him. Pac Man enrolled for Pre K, and with Krash I am not sure at this point what I am going to do, although I am leaning towards enrolling him and then adapting the curriculum to fit his needs, like I did with Pac Man.

Do you have a separate blog about the things you do with your older son? I love your ideas, but my son is closer in age to your older son.

No I do not, this is my only homeschooling blog. I write more about my tot because that is my area of "expertise" since I am actually educated as an early childhood-K teacher! I feel I have more to share in this area. I do write about Pac Man some, you can see all posts about him here.

Anyway....I am struggling with organizing a set 'calendar time' for my kindergartner. I have limited space and honestly don't want the huge obnoxious calendar I used as a ps teacher to be in my house. I have seriously thought about using a tri-fold foam project board for all our calendar stuff, but am just having trouble visualizing it and putting it all together. I'm very curious to see what you do for your calendar time. The biggest challenge I'm having is figuring out how my sons can see the date written each day. What do you do?

Ooooh I have your answer coming very soon! I have an entire homeschool calendar webpage that is almost done...videos, printables and all! I plan to post the link to the page in just a few days!!!

My question is do you keep an inventory of all of your tot tools and supplies? I am trying to make some kind of inventory sheet that lists activities, games, and supplies I own that I can use in workboxes, etc. I find that I forget about things I have! I would love to hear how you do it, and if you have a sheet or something to share, I would love to have that, too!:)

I tried to do this and it was overwhelming for me so I stopped. I have a pretty good mind about the stuff we have and try to organize it well. I do *forget* about things sometimes though-it's hard!

If I missed your question, and haven't replied to you in an email, please feel free to email me again! I try my best, but I am a scatter brain sometimes with too much going on!!! I hope these answers help those of you who sent the emails and anyone else who might have had the same ?s!

Again, thanks to all of you who read here, and send me kind comments and emails, I really appreciate your thoughts and SO wish I had the time to reply to each and every one of you.

Christmas Lists are Starting...

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 04:11:00 +0000

I know I'm not the only one thinking about what we might get the kiddos for Christmas this year (or ask the grandparents to get), and actually I have gotten quite a few emails and comments asking what I would recommend for YOUR kiddos!

So, as a part of my new website, I created a page showcasing our very favorites. They are in no particular order, and not sorted by any certain category. I went through almost every Tot School photo I had, and many other photos to see what I KNOW are the very favorite items we own.

Here's a link to the new page, What We Love!

I was picky about what I put on the page, trying to choose only the items that are played with repeatedly and usually by both of my boys. I also chose toys that stand the test of time (for the most part), and mostly open ended types of things that allow for tons of creative play. A few things shown are learning toys that we absolutely love and use all the time, many items are just fun toys!

Have fun browsing through our suggestions and leave me a comment of a toy you recommend for my children for Christmas as I start making lists for them! At the bottom of the webpage there is a link to our family wish list *store* where you can see the beginnings of potential Christmas lists!

If you have any questions about anything on the list, or anything that you know we own that didn't make the list, feel free to ask!

I also get asked a lot how we have so many toys and school items...because this is all we ask for when birthdays and Christmas rolls around and we are blessed with family members who buy these types of things for our kids!

Raising Rock Stars ~ Noah's Ark

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 02:00:00 +0000

Bible Story...Noah's Ark

Daddy began by reading the kiddos Noah's Crew Came 2 by 2, which they all love!

Then it was time for a little Noah's Ark play time! We are blessed to have 2 toy arks. One is Melissa and Doug, the other is hand made!

I also set out ALL of our Noah's Ark books and Krash enjoyed looking through a few of them...
Then it was coloring time...
We always love coloring together, this has become a regular part of our Bible time each week!

After coloring time we watched the Noah's Ark story on our Read-n-See DVD Bible, and also enjoyed singing Arky Arky together! (also on the DVD)

Throughout the week we re-visited Krash's Noah's Ark Tot Book, but I forgot to take any pics of him with it!

**I will not be posting our weekly verse here anymore, as we are a bit off on my posts, due to the Halloween posts I did. I will leave the link below so you can always find the most recent printables which go up each Monday on Totally Tots!

Resources used this week:

Noah's Ark Tot Book
Noah's Ark on CPP
Noah's Ark Coloring Pages
Noah's Ark Books/Toys (from our theme bookstore)
Bible Memory Verses
Songs for Saplings CD

Visit the Raising Rock Stars Webpage to download your own notebook pages and to see links to previous Rock Stars posts! Please read there or here before you add your link!

Tot School ~ Pumpkins & DInos!

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:16:00 +0000

~Krash is currently 41.5 months old~

** links to all toys and books are at the bottom of the post

Learning Toys/Trays...

Krash loved his Play Doh tray! I put a pumpkin and a cross cookie cutter on it, along with some orange and yellow play doh. This kept him busy for a long time! We had fun making different shapes for the Jack O Lantern's eyes, nose and mouth.

Here he is sorting by shapes. I gave him 4 different shapes (from a Dollar Tree bucket of foam shapes), along with 4 little craft cups that each had a shape drawn inside (I drew them with a Sharpie). He did well with this as it was his first time sorting by shapes and not color!
Here he has a Styrofoam circle (AC Moore), 4 pick-up-sticks, some colored bracelets and mini tongs (from Target...in a bug kit we got). I had him transfer the colored bracelets to the matching stick.

Nothing quite as fun as cutting the Play Doh dude's hair, huh?
Pac Man taught K how to play Hyper Dash (this is a great game if you don't have it...good for Christmas!)

A bit of Connect 4 with Daddy...

The boys LOVE when our seasonal Little People toys come out. A favorite is the Mayflower!

He had tons of fun playing with his bristle blocks and peg set...

Theme...Dinosaurs!

Krash was a dino for Halloween!

I surprised Krash with a new Melissa and Doug Dino puzzle. He loves his other set like this so I splurged on Amazon for him!

We all worked together to color some sheet from Pac Man's dino lapbook...

We were inspired by Our Crafts n Things to make special dinosaurs...

Life School...

We got a special package from a great blogging friend, Julie, who is also a missionary in Hungary! K is in love with the pencil she sent to him!

We went to the pumpkin patch!!!!
He was such a big by running around and playing all by himself!

He even fed chickens!
We don't have leaves in the inner city, so this was a BIG treat...

Mommy's Favorites...

First this was my favorite...
then I thought it might be this one...
but finally decided on this one!!!

Amazon.com Widgets

Are you wondering where to start with Tot School? Read here!
Read more about Tot Trays here
Visit Totally Tots!!!
Want to see more Tot School posts? Click HERE
Visit our Tot School Webpage HERE
Visit our Tot School Tools store HERE

If you have a tot (approximately ages 1-3) at home, join in the fun and share what you're doing with your tot! Here's how to get started if you're new... If you've never read this: Go HERE 1st for more details- please do!!! Then if you have any ideas you'd like to share, link up your exact post to MckLinky (if you have questions about how to do that, let me know in a comment or email-links to homepages will automatically be deleted).

If you are NEW will you please leave a comment letting us all know so we can be sure to visit you?

Featuring Apple Cheeks!

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 20:37:00 +0000

Doesn't Ladybug look cute? ;) I know I am a bit biased, but still...

Want to win something she has on? Head on over to see our latest review and giveaway!

Raising Rock Stars ~ The Pumpkin Patch Parable

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 00:03:00 +0000

Bible Focus...The Pumpkin Patch Parable

We had fun talking about Halloween again, and what it means for our family as Christians. I made the boys a coloring book based on the book, The Pumpkin Patch Parable, to help illustrate the meaning of the story for them.

First, Daddy read them the book (Ladybug was napping)...
Then we headed to the table where I told them the story again using the coloring pages I created for them. We all colored them together as we talked all about the meaning. Even my Dad joined us!

I also had Pac Man make a Memory Cross to illustrate the story, he did a great job!
It was a fun night, and we are all looking forward to bringing the lesson we learned to life when we select and carve our REAL pumpkins this week!

Weekly Bible Verse...
Songs for Saplings ~ Ee
We work on our verse every day during calendar time, and we also listen to the entire Songs for Saplings CD during recess at least 1-2 days per week!

Resources used this week:

Pumpkin Patch Parable Coloring Book (this links to the new website, I disabled the main navigation since the rest of the site is still under construction...you can get to the Halloween page though!) There are 2 options for the clean the yuckies page...one has a photo of Pac Man and the other is generic! Feel free to use either!
Christian Halloween Books (from our theme bookstore)
Bible Memory Verse, Ee
Songs for Saplings CD
More Pumpkin Patch Parable ideas from Totally Tots

Tot School ~ Life School

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 16:22:00 +0000

~Krash is currently 41.5 months old~

To say it was an off week would be an understatement! I had planned on having a normal week of school but decided by Tuesday to take a week off. One of our *children in Christ* got married yesterday. This is a young man who we met over 5 years ago while he was still in college. He grew up in the neighborhood we serve and soon after moving here he became a part of our family. My husband was the best man in the wedding and we did a lot to help prepare and to love on them during this time. It was a joyous occasion, and also one that took us completely out of normal routine last week during the final push to wedding day! So, Tot school went on hold, but Life School was in full force!

Theme ~ Dinosaurs!

We did have one day and just 2 pictures of actual Tot School, from our Dino Stuff!

Here K is matching up the dinos to the ABCs. This activity is for the episode called "One Smart Dinosaur" where the conductor sings the dinosaur ABCS. I copied the entire song and made little cards to go with it, both boys love it!Here he is working on 1-10, and also patterning...
Life School...

Nanee sent the boys an ant farm (oooh goody ~ I hate ants)...

Krash has a chore he loves (and I love it too), he takes the cloth diapers off the clothesline for me now!

Camping in the basement..

Krash, Krashing....and loving it!

Sharing with brother... (oooh my heart is melting, so glad I caught this on camera for proof!)

Mommy's Favorite...

A little taxi service with the Plasma Car! (don't forget to enter to win one! Winner will be chosen later tonight!)

Are you wondering where to start with Tot School? Read here!
Read more about Tot Trays here
Visit Totally Tots!!!
Want to see more Tot School posts? Click HERE
Visit our Tot School Webpage HERE
Visit our Tot School Tools store HERE

If you have a tot (approximately ages 12-47 months) at home, join in the fun and share what you're doing with your tot! Here's how to get started if you're new... If you've never read this: Go HERE 1st for more details- please do!!! Then if you have any ideas you'd like to share, link up your exact post to MckLinky (if you have questions about how to do that, let me know in a comment or email-links to homepages will automatically be deleted).

If you are NEW will you please leave a comment letting us all know so we can be sure to visit you?

Tot School List

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 22:30:00 +0000

I am working on the new website and am almost done with the Tot School page. This is my current list of all blogs that participate in Tot School (although I have not added any new ones in about 3 weeks). I will be doing some serious editing to this list, SO I need you to leave a comment ...

if your blog IS on this list and you are still participating in Tot School. Just say (or copy this), I AM on the list and I am still doing Tot School, the name of my blog is:
if your blog IS NOT listed and you ARE doing Tot School, please comment telling me that and give me a link to either your homepage OR your labeled Tot School posts (that is preferred). My blog is not listed and I do Tot School, here is my link:
if your blog is on this list and you are NO longer doing Tot School. We have moved on from Tot School, my blog is listed as:
if your blog is on this list and I have something wrong (spelling, name, link, etc.). Tell me what corrections need to be made in your comment!

I will be removing ALL blogs who do not comment here on this post, as a way of updating the list (as I know some of the blogs are old and no longer participate in Tot School), unless I know for sure that you are still a fairly regular participant!

A Boys Life 4 Me

A Family Academy

A Large Room

A Mom Learning More Every Day

Adventures in Mommydom

Charlie & Henry Homeschool Ideas

Homeschooling Two Girls

Homeward Bound

Izzie, Mac & Me

Jacqueline's Jabberings

Memories are the Scraps of Life

My 2 Happy Homeschoolers

My Life on a Taffy Pull

My Quivers Full

Nifty Thrifty Mama

One Little, Two Little

Our Crafts n Things

Our Happy Hearts Will Never Roam...

Our Homeschool Creations

Our Homeschool Fun

Our Little Nook

Our Worldwide Classroom

Painting Bridges

Philly Five 4 Him

Platform 9 3/4

Princess w/A Half Price Tiara

Psalm One School

School in R Home

Second Star to the Right...

Seeking to Glorify

Sew Can Do

Spell Outloud

Spinners End Nursery School

Striving for Simplicity

Suburban Composition

Taking off My Shoes

The Adventures of Bear

The Fifth Street Palace

The Lives we are Given

Training Up My Children

Turning Ordinary Into Extraordinary

Wiggle Worm's First School

Wilson's Ramblings

Winding Road Academy

Top 5 Friday ~ Mom's Wish List

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 11:00:00 +0000

I am not a big participator :) in weekly carnivals/memes, due to lack of time, however I found a VERY simple one I like, that would give me a good Friday post for ya! (since I don't have another one and usually don't on Friday's)! This may be the only Friday I join in, but we'll see...you never know what a new week will bring.

I love short, to the point blog posts sometimes, and I also love knowing what other moms love, that is why I am joining in with Christy from Superheroes and Princesses with her new Top Five Friday's!

This week she's sharing her Mommy Wishes ~ I have a few of those too. No needs, just wishes!

My Top 5 Mommy Wishes...

My husband home more (a little less busy). He hasn't been home a lot lately due to a hectic ministry schedule right now. I miss him, so do the kids, and he misses us. I LOVE it when Daddy is home!! This is my #1 wish for so many reasons-the help, the joy, the fun, and much more! We LOVE Daddy!
A bathroom. As missionaries, we live in the inner city in a VERY old row home. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE our house-it is really cool and I feel very blessed. There are however, a few quirks about it that I dream of changing! One is the bathroom. We all (2 parents and 3 kids) share one tiny bathroom. We lived in a brand new typical suburban family home right before we moved here over 5 years ago and it had an awesome master bath-like most new homes do nowadays. I miss my master bath so much. We have a dream of saving $ and building a master bath onto our bedroom...we'll see!
Shelves. I love shelves, I want lots of them, I want them all to match and look pretty. I never can have enough shelves. Currently I am trying to convince my husband that I need just 1 more bookshelf for our school book storage...we'll see!
Less Stuff. I want a week or 2 to go through every area of my entire home and get RID of stuff. I have been doing this and we have decreased our amount of life-baggage significantly over the past 2 years or so. But, I am desperate to have the time to completely finish and know that every drawer and box has been gone through.
A Big Desk. I want one of those fancy wrap around the corner desks with incredible storage (something like this-although I could never afford to shop at Pottery barn!). I want shelves up the wall, big drawers with little storage compartments. I work on an Ikea desk, that is in the middle of my "closet." It is fine, I am blessed to have it, I just wish I could have a Mommy-office that ROCKS!

Wanna share your Top 5 Mommy Wishes (or anything else that you love right now)? Head on over and join up!

Dinosaur Tot Pack

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:00:00 +0000

It's done! I have been working on this Tot Pack for a long time now, trying to make tons of fun stuff for Krash! We are in the middle of using the pack right now, so you'll be seeing more of the dino theme in the next couple of Tot School posts! We are having SO much fun!

Download the Dinosaur Tot Pack Here!

*the Dinosaur Tot Pack webpage is standing alone without top navigation until the rest of the site is complete--hoping a couple of more weeks!!!

Moving on Up...

1plus1plus1equals1@gmail.com (Carisa) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:00:00 +0000

As our Tot School continues to grow, and now that it has been online for over a year, many of us have older tots that will soon be moving on up! I have recently gotten a few emails about the age range for adding posts to Tot School each week, and thought I would take some time to address this question!

The "set" age range for posting to Tot School is 12-47 months, however that range may vary a bit for differently abled children. Your 10 month old may be ready for some Tot School type stuff and that fine...feel free to link up early! Or, your older child may have special needs that make Tot School the perfect match for his/her abilities...that's fine too!

If you are doing Tot School type stuff with your child, feel free to link up! Tot School type stuff would be defined as...purposeful play to expose early learning skills.

What if your Tot is progressing normally and will be moving on around age 4? I then would ask you to switch your links to the Preschool Corner!

My friend and Totally Tots partner, Jolanthe hosts the next step - The Preschool Corner on her blog. She offers wonderful ideas and puts up a weekly MckLinky for all families who want to join together in home-preschooling!

I hope that helps and when you move on to the Preschool Corner, please let me know if you think about it so I can remove your blog from the Tot School blog list, and also so I can say farewell! Krash will be moving up to Preschool when he is 4, and I will begin linking up on Jolanthe's Preschool Corner then. Only 6 months or so and my Tot School posts will be featuring Ladybug!!!