Eloise turns SIX

Elo turned six at the end of May.  Just when we think she can't get any cuter, she does! At six she is caring, hilarious, creative & adventurous. She relished in being celebrated over a long weekend with multiple "parties" & was (understandably) a little sad when it came to an end. Here she is on Memorial Day, her last day of being five.

Nearly the whole Ellis clan spent the day at Auntie Deb's & Uncle Joe's house. It was beautiful outside & other than lunch, that is where we spent our time. Fishing poles were out & fish were easily tricked by those wiggly worms.

Eloise was adorable when she caught her first fishie!

Speaking of wiggly worms...

Eloise & Gaga dug up about a million & one worms from the flowerbed on the side of the house. So much digging went on I think they found a good 25 of those slimy things.

Uncle Mike was there & happens to look very similar to my Dad. The boys were killing me when they would be playing with Mike then stop to ask "are you Uncle Mike or Paw Paw?" I imagine this will be a problem for Valentines down the line as they spend time with Uncle Owen & Uncle Anson ;)  Those names sound weird, ha! Anson was all about fishing until they actually caught a fish! There was a little squealing, hiding & then running.

Uncle Mike finally convinced them to come back & have a little lesson about catfish.

Later on they caught a big one...he was VERY concerned & acted like it was a piranha.

Back to the birthday girl. She requested brownies for her birthday treat & they were delicious. She opened a few gifts to find a new Sequence Game to practice letter sounds, a charm bracelet that included Texas & Florida charms, a metal detector or as O&A say a metal "protector," & a box filled to the brim with art supplies. She'd agree that she made out pretty well ; )

Just a few other snapshots of the party animals....

GGran joined us along with my cousin Zak who just graduated from college & Keaton who is home from college for the summer. I like his drive-by pose with the brownies.

A little funny- Uncle Mike brought a cooler full of an assortment of Root beer, Sarsaparilla & Crème Soda.  Our children rarely have soda yet acted like we let them drink bottle after bottle. Each had a full beverage with their meal in fact, Anson had a full crème soda FOR his meal. I saw him two other times with a new drink & strangely enough Uncle Mike was in very close proximity. The last Crème Soda ended up smashed on the stone steps down to the water & Anson was a sad, sad boy. We were shocked he fell asleep that night ; )

Baby brother only made it into one picture since he took a 3-4 hour nap...must be nice!

The day before Memorial Day Eloise's & Charlotte's friends Lucy & Sarah joined us to party. We hit up the bowling alley, a pizza parlor, Tiff's Treats for a snickerdoodle then back home to get crafty. It was super fun. Right when the party-goers pulled up I heard a horrible scream come from Charlotte & as I turned around I saw her hands over her mouth & tears streaming down her cheeks. Rob quickly escorted her inside to find that Eloise had basically knocked out Char's tooth with her arm! Poor girl has only lost maybe two in a normal way while the rest have been knocked out in physical altercations with siblings. Eloise was sweet to her & once she was okay, we were on our way. Uncle Kyle joined us which made our birthday date even more fun.

Bowling was a first for these four cuties & they (embarrassingly) scored within ten points of me. They were funny trying on those germ infested shoes & figuring out how to roll a ball down the lane. I showed them a "Granny-shot" & it seemed to help them up their game. Maybe I should have tried that.

There was SO much giggling & constant chatter. It made us grown-ups laugh. We have friends that have six girls....that's got to be giggly! New York style pizza hit the spot.

Arlo distracted the girls with his cuteness & "pay attention to me" laugh while they painted picture frames. It was a fun afternoon & all slept well after all the activity.

Eloise's special day fell on Tuesday & she woke happily to decorations and a yummy breakfast. Her jammies unintentionally coordinated perfectly. I like Anson's hat in this picture, ha! Actually, that may be Owen.

She loved the coloring book that Charlotte bought for her. I love their sweet hugs.

Eloise blew out all six candles before devouring cinnamon rolls & sausage balls with the rest of us.

Both sets of grandparents joined us for lunch.

Daddy surprised his girlie pie with a beautiful bouquet of flowers. Her eyes lit up when he came around the corner.

The parties came to an end & we headed to Kingwood. It was a whirlwind much like my speedy labor & delivery with her.  We look at her & picture that round little baby face but can't deny that she is a little girl. A little girl that brings much joy to our Nest.

A year in review- 1st grade & Pre-K - 2015-2016

I sat down to record our learning adventures for the past school year only to find that I never recorded the previous year! Yikes! I promise I was teaching our children ; ) That was about the time we were moving into our new house & all know how crazy that can be. Now sit back & let's see if my brain medicine is working...can I remember what happened 1-2 years ago when I can't even remember to move the towels from the washer to the dryer? I'm guessing this may cut right to the chase in most categories.

For the 2015-2016 school year Charlotte took on 1st grade & Eloise wiggled & giggled her way through Pre-K.  We were part of a Classical Conversations Community near our home & met weekly on Mondays. We filled the other four days with practicing the memory work presented on Mondays along with some reading, writing, math & a LOT of playing. Arlo was born about six weeks into the school year which certainly changed how our daily routine looked. I had made a tentative calendar beforehand that had us mostly "on break" for that first month. We still attended our Monday classes but the rest of the week was super low key. In fact, a lot of that year was that way out of necessity & because it was just what the girls needed!

A quick funny before we begin. We have all these magnetic letter tiles we use for reading & spelling. Charlotte left me a message when I was putting a baby to bed. It's so fun to see someone learn to spell & to offer such wonderful advice.

Let's start with Charlotte at 6 years ole & in 1st grade.  

One change I made to how I planned our day was to write assignments in a spiral bound notebook. I read a fantastic blog post on simplifying homeschool & decided to give it a try. Each evening I would take 5-10 minutes to write assignments for the next day. I (of course) use my Mommy pens that no one else is allowed to touch. As mentioned in the blog post, a benefit is that it sets up Charlotte to work on her own prior to us starting a new lesson. Even with Eloise not reading it is a quick glance for me to tell her something simple she can complete on her own. I also use this time to review the next lesson I will teach. Another benefit is that since I do this nightly we are not "falling behind" our plan. If it takes three days to get through the same math or reading lesson I just continue to extend our study of a specific part we need to get a handle on before moving along.  The girls like to check boxes....not sure where they got that from ; )

Here is a sample for Charlotte-

For Reading we advanced to  All About Reading- Level 2. Charlotte took off & flew through lessons with ease. I kept questioning whether or not I should skip lessons here & there but decided to stay the course. It was a good decision for us as it really solidified her understanding of all that was presented. She learned about the jobs of Silent E, contractions, homophones, antonyms, synonyms & grew in reading comprehension. I can't say enough about how much I enjoy this curriculum. It is open & go for me (just what I need) & has established such a strong foundation. It's easy to look back & recognize how helpful those earlier levels were as we are working our way through Level 4.

We also added All About Spelling- Level 1 that as advertised paired perfectly with AAR- Level 2. She learned how to spell words with short vowel sounds, plural & compound words, learned to segment words into two & three parts, practiced phonograms & identifying first & last sounds.  It may sound silly as a woman in her thirties that has been reading for many years but I am actually learning right along with her! I have learned more about why we pronounce or spell words a certain way. I find myself playing a game when I read longer words. I (like Charlotte) break it into syllables & put into practice what I taught : )

For handwriting she worked on writing her own sentences or copying something. She LOVES to write so this was a favorite part of her day. I must say I really like that last sentence.

and another she wrote on her own....."fart" meant "favorite" ha!

Nearing the end of the school year & weeks away from moving to our new house she recorded three things about her new house: having my own space, having my own bed & having lizards in my new house.

and by far my favorite....her own word problem "Anson had 8 gumballs. He threw up 6 gumballs. How many does he have left?"

She also perfected forging my handwriting. "Valentine" looks sooooo similar.

We started having a babysitter over once a week for a couple hours to play with the rest of the crew while Char & I went on a donut date. We took our math & reading lesson with us, ate too many donuts & made some sweet memories.  As far as Math goes, we started Saxon Level 2, made nearly halfway through then hit a wall, like completely loathed Math. It was time for a change which just drove me crazy since we spent the money as I was convinced it was perfect but in reality it wasn't for Charlotte at that time. After lots of looking & lots of advice from other mamas we settled on a curriculum called Math Mammoth. More on that in the 2016-2017 school year but the bottom line is that we love it.

Baby brother came in October & by the spring was already learning about telling time!

Speaking of time, we spend SO much of it within inches of each other. They like to be near me & Arlo. They like to pile on each other & whine that they can't see or someone is touching them while I read a book. It's just the way it is with five little ones! Reading a book is a great thing to fight over I guess.

Onto sweet Eloise who started the year as a four year old & finished at five. She was officially Pre-K age & started in the youngest class of Classical Conversations. As I write this two years later I can't believe how babyish she looks...what a cutie! There was a lot of playing & a lot of "doing school" because she was begging to be a big girl like her sister!

We practiced lots of counting & number recognition. This was a favorite game...

She learned to spell & write her name & also roll play-doh into the letters. I'm sure she (along with her brothers) ate a bit of that play-doh...why do they think it looks so yummy? She also loves to copy letters & a certain day she requested to copy her name, George Washington & of course "I love my Gaga."

Back to the numbers, she liked to identify the ones that matched. This is so helpful to be reminded of these fun things as the twins are headed into the Pre-kinder year!

Geography is always a favorite around here. Eloise jumped right into the daily tracing of the continents & partway through the year was able to draw this while glancing at the map next to her. Africa is an interesting shape!

It is a given that we are sick here & there & happen to miss our Monday CC day. With our weekly guide I am able to present all the new information they would receive in class & when I am EXTREMLY motivated we even complete the Fine Arts portion! This was a week where we studied perspective. What a fun little project! I'm pretty sure Lolo is missing her pants. That may have been the year she rarely wore them. Betcha can't do that at the Pre-K down the street, haha!

Owen & Anson's goal that year was to drive us insane & destroy anything we were working on....true story. They were being two & we loved them....it was a hard year though with a brand new baby & these two! Robby ordered a box of 50 Hot Wheels cars that were given one by one as a reward for good behavior when he arrived home from work. It helped sometimes & it sure made me smile to see them studying each car before making a decision! Most of the time though they were just causing trouble ....as any two year old should ; )

One of the many reasons we have gone the homeschooling route is to have lots of moments like this...

Charlotte surprised me when I returned from putting the boys down for naps. I love Scrabble, Spelling & my special girl.

Well I remembered more than expected, yay Mom!