Last day of School 2022/2023

I didn't tell Abi and Maddy when the last day of school would be, but they knew it was coming soon as we were winding down all of our subjects. On June 20, I set up our school room with the Last Day flag, a bunch of things from our school year to show what we have done and read. This year I didn't put out all the read-aloud, but I did put out their personal reading. I put out the binders of their work, and then bags with gifts to celebrate their hard work and the summer. 

When they came down, they were very excited to see it all laid out and to find out what was in their bags. 

It was so fun to spend time going through all of the things and talking about our year. My mom came over to look through their things as well. 

We always have donuts or something similar on the last day. I bought a few kinds at the store in the days leading up to the last day. We made a fun drink, and it was all put out on the dining table for my mom and the girls to enjoy. I also sent some home for my dad. 

They presented their last project, and the school year was done!

 

More March....

Maddy played in the snow a lot, because we have had a lot of snow!

She made a snowman of Roboppi from You-gi-oh!

This is the character... she did such a good job.

We had apple pie and banana cream pie for pi day.

And... finally, I finished the middle grade mystery book I have been writing forever. I made it to use as a course for Abi, so it has places for her to stop and solve codes along with the characters before the answers are revealed. 

 

A little bit of March so far...

 

All year long I look forward to participating in Middle Grade March. This is a pile of possibilities for the month. I am hoping to read more middle grade than just what is pictured, but these were the "for sure" books. So far, I have finished 5 of these 6. I also splurged this year and bought some MGM mercy. I have wanted a mug with books on it for awhile, so that just made sense. And I thought if I was picking up a mug, I may as well get a bookmark I could use all month long as well. 

Doug's mom gifted us those two yellow chairs. The only place I could think to put them is in our master bedroom/ library, and then they kind of looked out of place with the colors in our bedding. I decided to update. I got some new gold sheets, some new gold throw pillows, put away the black and white checkered ones, got out the gray blanket Doug's work gave him for Christmas, bought some matching gray pillows for the gold chairs, and voila! Our bedroom has an entirely new look. It actually matches a lot of my bookish decor (that you can't see in this picture) a lot better, so I am really happy with the results. 

For school the girls had to give a speech using a life experience. They both chose to also make a slide presentation to go with it. 

They did a great job. 

Terms 2 and 3 in school

Once we were settled into our new home we were finally able to do school in our new schoolroom. It felt like the first day all over again. 

I enjoyed having my white board again as I tend to enjoy going a little crazy on it during lessons. 

We finished up our history unit on William Wallace and my girls' ancestor Robert the Bruce.

I felt like the best way to teach about Dante's Inferno without reading the entire poem to them would be to draw the story on the white board. It was fun, but looks a bit crazy. 

We did a game when we learning about the Black Plague. Each bag had colored tiles in it and represented different towns. We played pilgrims going through each town. The color of tile we pulled out of the bag determined if we caught the plague or not and how many people we infected. 

Maddie's next project was Princess/ Prince and the Pauper. We read the Mickey and Barbie versions and then watched the Barbie movie. 

In science we switched to an energy unit. We read a book about Edison and kept track of things we learned about him. We also read a book about Tesla later in the unit to compare their stories. 

Maddie's next project was Hansel and Gretel. We read three different versions and then she made her own story as well as a candy house. 

We learned about a few different artists over the last few terms: Da Vinci, Michaelangelo, and Raphael. 

When we were learning about the Sistine Chapel I copied an idea I saw on the show Road to Avonlea and had the girls draw pictures under their desks. 

I loved reading this book about Joan of Arc during both terms. She was amazing. 

When we talked about the War of the Roses, they each took a side and used our castle blocks and this trebuchet they built with Doug (Da Vinci's design) to battle. 

We got out our bells again. 

Another few fun read alouds...

I made a mess of the board again when we were wrapping up our history unit. 

Then we had our end of term test. 

Maddie and I finished reading this book together that was part of her language arts. 

Last Friday they turned in their last work: Abi's unit 6 language arts and Maddie's Thanksgiving themed story and I graded their math... and then term 3 was done!

Now we will be on winter break until January! That's the fun of only taking half the summer off!