A short clip of horse riding lesson

Katherine is riding a new horse, Cassie. This is a young horse with a lot of spirit and one who loves to run. Katherine thinks this is great. This is not a very good clip, but one I had to work with.

Dissecting a Cow's Eye

Ok. For all you scientific types out there...here is the ultimate. Dissecting a Cow's eye.

The Houston Science Museum has several, one hour classes on different types of dissection. Katherine and her friend Hunter were in a group of about 25 students. One eye per pair of budding scientists.

The instructor was very good. Knew how to handle kids. She needed a little help with some late-comers and so I jumped up to assist. I ended up putting my (glooved) hand into a five gallon bucket of cow's eyes to retrieve the necessary items. I got the shivers just typing this as I remembered the feel.

They separated the cornea, retina, lens, pupil. retinal nerve and (?) muscels that control the movement of the eye. Pretty spiffy!

Nutcracker Ballet and Band Concert

Katherine and Grace dressed up "to the Nine's" to attend the Houston Ballet performance of the Nutcracker Suite. It was truly outstanding. Costumes were amazing. Scenery and sets were out of this world with actual "snow" falling during one of the scenes. Can you tell that these two girls like to Put on the Ritz?

The other photos were of Katherines Beginning Band Concert. There were some 85 students in the band, many who didn't know which end of the instrument to blow into at the beginning of the Fall. We meet the director (at one of six locations around the north of Houston) once a week to have small band instruction and practice. Katherine practices 25 minutes a day. We had one Combined Band practice before the concert. The Video is of a number that featured the flute section. Skip to My Lou!

Christmas Actors

Our church does a drive-through Life of Christ called Celebrate Christmas. Katherine was an angel this year and Dave a shepherd in the same scene. Dave is in the foreground. Can you see the angles in the back? Katherine was the upper left angel.

Here are their pictures as the cast photo was taken before the evening started.

Fanny Farmer and Fractions

The Amazing Story Of Fannie Farmer

By : Katherine Kelley from the Fundamentals of Math Book

Fannie Farmer was born in Boston on March 23 , 1857. She was paralyzed at the age of 17, preventing her from going to college. She cooked a lot to prevent herself from being bored. She became a really talented cook and 11 years later when her health improved, her parents insisted that she went to the Boston Cooking School. She graduated in 1889 and became the assisting director, then two years later, became the director.

Fannie introduced standardized measurements at the Boston Cooking School . She taught her students to use fractions and mixed numbers. In 1896, the school untroduced those measurements into The Boston Cooking School Cook Book.

Fannie became paralyzed again in 1908, but she still cooked. She had published six cook books by the time she died on January 15, 1915 in Boston.

Hawaiian Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday on the Big Isaland of Hawaii. . We stayed in a condo, nice, but who wants to cook and do laundry on vacation? Ha. The meals were fun, but the highlight of the trip was swimming (soo many different pools and waterfalls) and field trips to the other side of the island that had volcanoes, waterfalls and lush vegetation.

It seemed hard to adjust to the time change. Only 4 hours difference, but we were up way to early in the mornings and dead tired at 9pm. Katherine always insisted that she wasn't tired at all. :-) Many mornings Dave and Katherine were up drinking coffe at 5am. Katherine's had LOTS of sugar and creamer. smile.We saw many new and beautiful birds and plenty of mongooses (mongeese?). Dad, there were soo many different, georgeous plants that I gave up trying to take pictures of them all!

Searching for Leonoid Meteors

Katherine and I read about the yearly event of the Leonoid Meteor Shower that was to be entertaining us on the night of Nov 17th. We looked before we went to bed, but the moon was bright and we saw nothing.

Katherine set her alarm for early in the morning. I heard the back door open ay 5:30. She was out with the dogs and a flash light looking for stray meteorites. When I joined her we saw two more, bringing her grand total to 4.

It was cold and windy. We left the driveway and came back in...me to get back under the covers and she to get the dog brush and she finished the early morning hours brushing Yetti and feeding Chance dog treats.

This picture is a borrowed one. "Our" metoers were more like small shooting stars!

Veteran's Day TV Star

Big D was awarded to Good Neighbor Award in North Richland Hills on Veteran's Day. Here is a picture of two special people taken in DFW at the beginning of October.

If you would like to see the TV short clip of Big D and the babies he rocks...click on the link below.


http://www.wfaa.com/video?id=10724388&sec553117

Love Carol

Katherine meets Alanna

It was a wonderful day. Katherine and I did some school both at home and in the car on the way to Meagan and Michael's. School goes well and quickly when there is motivation to be done.

We arrived just in time to be able to hold her and rock her to sleep. She sleeps much easier and better than her mother did when she was that age. Katherine sat on the couch and held her, worrying each time she had a little wiggle or squirm. "What does she want? What does that mean?" Hard for a 12 year old to understand some things don't MEAN anything.

Katherine was wide-eyed over several things: poop, umbilical cord and crying. SHe wanted to distract Alanna with a toy. Alanna would have none of it.

We all ate lunch, wioth Alanna in her car seat in a chair by her Daddy. Then it was time to feed. Meagan is supposed to really push the feedings because baby is a little jaundiced and they need the milk to clear the system of "jaundice yellow color" or whatever that billirubin stuff is.

I got to feed her the bottle. She was hungry, hungry. So nice to have a contented baby. She drank 2 ounces like it was nothing. Burped right on cue.

Then...the highlight. I got to bathe her for the first time. Meagan just wanted to watch and assist, to get the idea of things. Alanna doesn't like being open and un-swaddled. Cried hard for a short while as we dressed her again. But cuddled right back down happily.

As we left she was happily sleeping in her bassinet, play yard thing. Daddy was sacked out on the bed and Mommy was going to fill a few more bottles with breat milk. Contented family.

Katherine and Grace to Dewberry Farms

On Nov 8th, the entire KACH group was invited to go to the local Farm Amusement Park. Animals to touch and feed, zip lines, go carts, jump houses and mounds, a dark barn with 500 carved pumpkin heads to view. Goats climbed the high wires, geese demanded to be fed, a cow was there from a local commercial dairyman who had a mini milking station set up. (All the kids wanted to pet the cow). The corn maze was a highlight. Thankfully no one got lost!

We were there from 9am till 2pm, each of us getting one degree or another of sunburn. Tired and weary we were driving home and in the back seat the discussion turned to Adam/Atom and the difference between the two:

Grace: A friend of my Dad's is named Adam.

Katherine: No Not Adam, atom!

G: I said Adam.

K: No. Adam is made of atoms. Atom cannot be made of Adams.

G:
What are atoms made of anyway?

K: Hesitatingly, molecules, I think.

G: Well....what are molecules made of?

K: Ummmm (with help from mom) Protons, nuetrons and electrons

G; I like croutons.

With this string of conversation you can see where we adults struggle a bit to keep up. They are darling girls and do so well together as friends.

Nov 5 Alanna Elizabeth Davenport born

Is there anything more precious than a newborn baby? Don't think so. Alannaz arrived at 6:30pm on Nov 5th, weighing in at 7 lbs, 8 oz and 21 in. long.

She is a long anticipated miracle baby and went home with her Momma and Daddy on Monday the 8th. The new little family is doing well. Michael was able to take off time to be home with his wife and daughter to help with the settling in of a new routine.

She nurses well and sleeps well. Both Mom and Dad are tired, but catching up with cat naps.

Day two of her life she was a little jaundiced and had to go under the lights for a while. We think technology is wonderful. They have a blanket with the light built in.

Uncle Ross asks, "Why doesn't a little yellow skin and a blue light create a "green" baby?" Don't know the answer to that one Uncle Ross.

Grama is proud of Alanna and her Momma. Can you tell?

Science Lab AKA Kitchen

Science projects are a fun thing this year. Right now we are studying geology and the two different views of how the world began: Catastrophism and Uniformitarianism. Both are Christian...both have support from the scientific and Christian worlds. Interesting. This Chapter has a lot of experiments.

The picture on the right are alum crystals Katherine reformed in our kitchen. Pretty cool. Studying minerals. On the left, complete with safety glasses, is the young scientist at work learning about sedimentary rocks. (I promise to wash the jar thoroughly before using it to can next summer. Ha)

More Halloween pictures

These are some more Halloween images. Grace was dressed up as Taylkor Swift, a popular country singer. Both girls took another set of clothes to wear after the initial "walk-around" at the carnival, to be more comfortable. Dave and I ended up carrying the extra things around. Dave looked good with a pink guitar.

Notice the henna tatoos on Katherine's hands. The were just fake, but have stayed on for several days. Quite intricate.

We thought the huge spider was ultra creative. He was set up at the local pumpkin patch.

The camel rides are beoming quite the tradition at the grade school carnival. How appropriate for Cleo to ride a camel.

Halloween Festivities

This is Cleopatra of the Nile, AKA Katherine Kelley for two separate halloween festivites. We purchased the costume, but her coloring and long dark hair made her look like a natyural Egyptian.

Holocaust Museum

Katherine and 15 other Home Schoolers from the KACH group attended the Holocaust Museum of Houston on Oct 20th. The museum if one of a kind for our area and the docent who was our guide was wonderful, knowledgeable and knew how to speak to kids.

This is Katherine standing in the front of the building. The inscriptions on these cement blocks were family groups that were completely wiped out through the extermination by Hiltler. There are 6 pillars, like the one behind Katherine, each representing one million people.

The field trip lasted 2.5 hours and there was not a single "I'm bored. When can we eat? Do we have to stay here?" heard among the kids. How refreshing.

The main message of the museum is to reminding us all to be UPSTANDERS! People who stand up and speak when they see injustice being done. Katherine and I have had several good discussions stemming from this trip.

Beautiful cool day for riding

Katherine has been taking western lesson for a year and a half now from local riding instructor, Joanne Whitherspoon who has Tennessee Walkers for her students to ride.

Until today, Katherine has been on her steadier, older mounts Molly and Dancer. But this was a sort of graduation day. She got to ride Molly's daughter, Angel.

Katherine does very well with riding. She controlls the horse nicely and is working on giving consistent commands to the horse, both by voice and by legs and reins. Bothg of them are happiest when they are loping (the fasted gait so far) and I think Katherine would lope for the entire hour if the horse could endure it and there were no 0ther skills to learn.

We ride every Monday. The scheduled one hour is always longer. Joanne has taken them to a nearby golf course that has been purchased and renovated for pleasure riding. What fun.

Halloween Cleopatra and Meagan

Another trip to Meagan's doctor gave us a chance to show off our Cleopatra costume. She looks beautiful in it. There will be a costume judging constest at the local elementary school and she hopes to enter. They also have a carnival. This may be the last year we are allowed to participate, but she is anxious to go with Grace, of course!

Megana is 36 weeks along here and we are anticipating Alanna to arrive any time now. Meagan has her hospital bag packed and all is ready at home. Now...to just get through the arrival process!!

Michael came home for lunch this day and so we were able to get a shot of him also. Notice the baby blanket on the couch behind him.

I don;t have the spacing element of these pages down yet. Can you tell?? ha.

Beautiful Fall Day. Friends visit.

What a delight to have time in the day to visit with other homeschool friends.

Amy and Hunter Atwood stopped by today after Hunter's piano lesson and we moms had some time to chat and the kids climbed trees, fed and admired the cows and horses, ran with the dogs and played in the fort. Hunter remarked that "He would like to have a farm someday too!"

Amy and I are both first year homeschool moms and so ther was much to talk about. Things that aare good. Things that are difficult. Things that are a wonder! She is a most enthusiastic, positive person and I like to catch a little of her "spark"!

We also saw this HUGE moth resting over our back door. Don;t know what kind it is, but certainly is content with all the comings and goings through the door.

Some Mornings are a little Wacky

Katherine has been much distracted thinking about Halloween costumes for the upcoming holiday. I banned talk about costumes until further notice. To subtly remind me that she was still thinking about it...she came down this morning in her hotdog costume from last year. Klondike wasn't just sure WHO had him???

School got off to a little later start this morning. Smile

Spelling Test Given by Dad

Dad arrived home early on Friday and was able to give Katherine her Spelling test this week. I made her look up and smile. She does very well in spelling, even though the words are hard. Some of the words this week: facetious, garrulous and timorous. I only knew one of these three. How about you?

Meagan Visit and Doc Appt

One of the neat parts about Home School is that we get to take it with us. We loaded up some books and things and headed for Meagan's house and a 1pm doctor appt.



Katherine worked on Reading, Math and Science. When we got there, Katherine was allowed to joing us in the room and saw Baby Alanna playing with her fingers and sticking out her tongue.


Meagan looks good. Still bed-rest-assigned, but looking forward to getting the OK to start "moving about" in another 4 weeks.

Paper-Proverbs and Prayer

We generally start the day by reading the headlines and interesting stories on the paper. Katherine always checks the graphs and statistics printed at the bottom of each USA section.

We have had some very good dcussions about current events and how they got to be an issue at all. We are currently praying for the miners in Chile and Amrican hikers in the Middle East.You can tell that the paper is pretty much "unhinged" by the time she gets through. Ha.

A Look at the room

It was always the case, even now, that the "room" had to be set up before the teacher (me) could start thinking clearly about what to teach, how to teach it and how to make it easy for all of us. Some folks call it "nesting." and I think they are right. Thought you might like to see what our classroom looks like.

The first week of homeschool

We did it. We jumped off the public/private school wagon and started 7th grade with homeschool. Excited (both of us) and a little nervous (just the teacher) we embarked on a full curriculum of many subjects, new curriculums and a lot of enthusiam. Here is a picture of Katherine on the first day of school. Notice the tiara. It added alittle sparkle to the day.

We dedicated the dining room as our school room., installed a large whiteboard and posters on the walls. Katherine has a work area and I have a work area both with computers. We are close to the kitchen for easy access for the working/eating day.

World History, Math, Science, Bible, English and Reading are to Core subjects. Spanish, Spelling, Health, Flute and PE are the extra subjects. Our daily schedule always starts with flute practice. I am going to try to include a video of her practicing. Let's see it it works.? Nope...just a picture.