Fiesta!

Our Fiesta was a big hit today! We made taquitos, Mexican rice, and refried beans, and we had a taco bar with chips & salsa. And since no party is complete without ice cream, we had some of that, too! We had a total of 16 people here! We set up a display area where we put some books about Mexico, our tissue paper flowers, geography notebook, and passport. We had to show our family and friends what we've learned so far and this was a great way to do it. Some of the kids (and adults) enjoyed looking through the books and I think they were impressed with the passport and notebook. All in all, it was a great fiesta! Even so, I think our next few celebrations will be low-key - this was a lot of work!!! I'm exhausted!

This is the tin punch project.  We had to use aluminum flashing found in a roll at Lowe's and we couldn't get pencil to show up so the kids used permanent marker.  We didn't even attempt to get the marker off.  Emily likes hers the way it is.

Off to MEXICO!!!

We started off with some turbulence and the landing was rough, but since the kiddos heard about a fiesta with a homemade pinata, the trip took a turn for the better!

Handing out the passport was a fun activity. I'm so glad MFW includes that in the materials. We'll begin our art project (the pinata) tomorrow. The kids are very excited about this, and I am too. I hope I have all the supplies! =)

Our week began with some challenges, but we worked through them and seem to be back on track. ECC takes a while, so it's a big change from last year's Adventures. There is a lot of reading and writing. The good news is that there has been very little complaining about that this year! Last year, we struggled through the language lessons at first because it was such a chore to write. Now, most of the time, Emily just accepts it, does it, and moves on. In fact, some of the dictation actually makes her laugh!

This week, our prayer focus is for the people of Cuba. I got to break out my photo album from my mission trip to Cuba back in 1998 and share some personal stories with the kids. It took extra time, but we had fun flipping through the album. And since we are learning about deserts in science, we discussed our family trip to the Mojave Desert a few years ago where we saw many Joshua Trees. The picture above is one of the many I took on that trip!

The K program is moving along nicely. Katie is learning very quickly - we are actually doing about double what's on the schedule. She'll start 1st grade some time this year; looks like it will be sooner than I first thought. She is like a little sponge, absorbing everything right now. We are working on K Lesson 10... W-w-waterfall. We have an abundance of stickers, all in a pouch (the "sticker pouch" as it's been called for years), so for the tactile activity, I had Katie write a capitol W and lower case w on a sheet of paper and then place stickers on top of the letters. She loved it! How simple! During that activity, she said "I love school!" Who wouldn't when you get to use stickers?!!