Our First week home!

Well here I am ~ mother of four!! Very strange feeling really, and I 'm not quite sure what to do with all of these kids! LOL! I am definitely outnumbered now! But we have made it through this first week home alone and although it hasn't been all smiles, we did make it through with quite a few good times! All the kids have adjusted pretty well to Kemi's arrival and are all truly in love with their new sister! The most surprising was Niyi - he has not shown any jealousy at all and with him being so young we were getting ready for at least a few days of acting out, but there has been none! He is very sweet with his little sister and surprisingly enough he has been very gentle - for those of you who know my little man in real life 'gentle' is not the first word that comes to mind when thinking about him!

Kemi is now two weeks old and she is sleeping and eating well. Already she is holding her head up a lot more than before and she is beginning to really notice her surroundings. As for her temperament, she seems to be a pretty laid back kinda gal! As long as she has been fed recently she is quite content and she spends pretty much 20 hours per day asleep! The s are ready for her to be a little more interesting! You forget how much a newborn sleeps!

I have been so completely blessed by friends these past few weeks it has been very humbling. So many gifts, prayers, phone calls and meals have have been given to us and it has truly been a blessing! To all of my friends that have been a part of this time in our life we are touched and thank you all so much! It is always hard to be away from family at times like these, but you have all made this time a special one. You are all true 'family' to us - thank you!

So here are some more pictures of what we have been getting up to these past few weeks!

Lola with Kemi - she has been a great helper since we got home.

Tayo with her little sister!

I told you he is gentle!

Kemi in her bassinet doing what she does best!

Kemi with the men in her life!

I had to take this picture of Kemi on snuggled up after her bath!

...yes we've been getting some school done too!

...and Niyi is as busy as ever!
(Yes that is one of my shoes he is wearing!)

We had an amazing sunset the other night!

I have just discovered that we don't have any good photos of me with anyone - I will work on that this week! I guess I am always the one behind the camera!

Introducing...

Adekemi Gabriella Oluwafunmi Fadina

Our little bundle of joy arrived at 4:11am Tuesday June 17th following a very short labor of 1 1/2 hours! We are lucky to not have had her in the car!

Enjoy these pictures, I'll be back soon!
~ Louise

The Christy Challenge

Shauna is hosting her Annual Christy Challenge again and just like last year I plan on participating. This is a great way to try new authors that you might not know about otherwise. Last year I read a couple of great books as a result. This year I am planning on reading Lisa Samson's Hollywood Nobody and Lisa McKay's My Hands Came Away Red. I'll be reviewing these books as soon as I read them!
I would encourage you all to give the challenge a go - you never know you might enjoy yourself! Especially all those who think that Christian Fiction is full of fluff (yes I confess, I used to think exactly that!)

Plans for next year

I have finally figured out what we will be doing next year and have decided to take a leap into the world of unit studies. Now don't get me wrong we've dabbled before, but for some reason I've not fully allowed myself to use unit studies as our full school curriculum. I don't really know why but I seem to plan units as well as using our regular books - and then wonder why we can't get it all done (there are just not enough hours in the day!)
The thing with unit studies is that the kids really like to learn this way. They love doing lapbooks, they remember stuff we do so much more than when it comes from solely reading in a book and we all really have a good time. Why has it taken me so long to decide to do this?? Anyway we're here now and I am really looking forward to this coming year!

So with that in mind I have planned a years worth of unit studies from Homeschool Share's great database of literature based units. I decided to take the girls on 'A Trip Around the World' exploring all seven continents over the course of this coming year. I will also add in some seasonal studies as they come up and by the end of the year we should have learnt a great deal! We have Passports from here that we will stamp each time we enter a new country! Each unit will produce a lapbook - the girls most favorite part of school!
So here is the plan for our year of studies:

August ( I wanted to start the school year off with a few really fun units!):
Olympics Unit that I wrote for Homeschool Share.
Dinosaur Unit
Chocolate Unit (This one is for me!)

September:
Africa: Four units traveling through Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria, Egypt and Ethiopia.

October:
Asia: Four units traveling through India, China, Japan and Korea.

November:
A unit on Russia and one on Australia.
A study of Elections (to coincide with the Presidential Election).
A Thanksgiving unit.

December:
A Penguin Lapbook (as our study of Antarctica)
A Unit introducing N.America.
A Christmas Lapbook.

January:
A unit on Canada.
A Unit on the Great Plains and the Great Depression.
A Unit on civil Rights and Dr.Martin Luther King (to coincide with MLK Day)

February:
USA: Three units learning about Southwest USA, Hawaii and Native Americans.

March:
A unit on The Wild West.
Europe: England, France (Which will include a study of WWII) and Italy.

April:
Europe: Sweden
S. America: Three units traveling through Costa Rica, Mexico and Guatemala.

May:
A Rock Unit (this one is for Tayo - she loves to collect rocks!)
An Insect unit.
An Astronomy unit.

There it is! I have picked out specific book titles for each of these literature based units, so if anyone is interested in getting the full book list I will happily send it to you. They may change slightly as HSS is likely to add so many great units following the Back to School Blast contest they are currently hosting, but I hope to keep pretty much the same countries. I will only change a unit if the science portion of the unit is something I want to cover.
Talking of science, I thought I'd list what science and social studies (besides the obvious geography!) we will be learning over the course of this coming year.
Are you ready? It's a pretty big list!
Here goes...

African animals (a whole bunch!), rain forests, magnets, snakes, jungle plants,. air resistance, wood and paper making, the Human Skeleton, Oviparous animals (egg laying animals to you and I!), The Women' vote, Presidents, horses, Australian animals, taste buds, map skills, spices from around the world, the food chain, animal classification, hibernation, migration, The water cycle, kites and how they fly, silkworms, The Great Depression, Civil rights and the history of segregation, chemistry: states of matter, grasshoppers, ponies, Adobe houses, deserts and desert fauna and flora, Explorers, weather, celestial navigation, Lewis and Clark, endangered animals, map making, the history of the old west, shadows and telling time, bees and honey, WWII and the Holocaust, butterflies, sound/the ear, farm animals, conservation, poison frogs, volcanoes, rocks, minerals, crystals and gems, Henry Ford and the Model-T, the Solar system and astronomers.

Whew! Who knew so much learning could take place in one year!

Lola's Blog

Lola has been working on her blog recently, and is going to be doing lots with it over the summer (my sneaky way of getting her to work on her composition and writing skills!) so I thought I'd put a link here so all who want can view it! I've also added it to the sidebar to show when it gets updated...

Enjoy!

Enjoy the moment...

As many of you know I am pregnant - really pregnant! And of course with this stage in my life come many discomforts and lots of dreams about getting my body back (specifically, being able to bend in the middle again!). Well this morning was no different when at 4:15am I awoke again to visit the restroom for the, oh let me see now....100th time! I was plodding slowly around my bedroom, trying not to open my eyes, but having to to avoid tripping up, when I heard the Lord whisper to me, "Enjoy your day". Hahahaha! Yeah - great one God! Just what I need to hear after a night of tossing and turning in my bed!
But there it was - He said it, and then said it again! So this time I listened. Now, I know God is not into sarcasm, so I guess He was actually talking to me about something He thought important enough to tell me in the early hours of the morning. "What do you mean God?" I asked, and He told me that I have been wishing away these last few days waiting for my baby to be born complaining and whining about how I feel, all the while these days have been given to me as a gift to be enjoyed.
Recently I have alternated between resentment (at the non-pregnant world) and guilt (for not getting enough done each day) for the majority of the day. I have woken up each day with a plan of action, with ideas for things I must get done around the house 'before the baby comes' which gets put to the side each day as I get more and more tired. My children have been bearing the brunt of all this and living with a grumpy Mommy who just wants to be left alone and that of course leads me to deep guilt about what a poor mother I am being... I could go on, but I think you get the picture!
So I got up this morning and decided to spend some time praying about what God had spoken to me and with Him this morning all I felt was another liberal dose of His grace and love. Repenting of ungratefulness and impatience I am now free to really embrace today. "Enjoy your day" means to relax, to not put any expectations on this day, to be free to respond to His leading - wherever that takes me. It means to put aside all my plans and to embrace His. To let go of all my expectations and to respond to the Holy Spirit living inside of me. To really "be glad and rejoice in the day the Lord has made". Today I have laid aside all my plans and really want to just follow His lead.
So now as one of my little ones is getting up right now - I will use this time to snuggle him close and just enjoy today with him! As we wait for his sisters to wake I will avoid making plans and trying to do, do, do. Today I will just be!

In need of a schedule....

...Before my kids wear me out! We just don't function well without a schedule! Last week was our first official week off school and I spent most of it separating children and listening to moaning! So I brainstormed with the kids and this is to be our Summer Schedule for at least the next 8 weeks or so. I am hoping that this will be flexible enough to allow me time with the new baby, but also will give the kids the structure and activity they seem to so desperately need!
My schedules never have times next to them, as this really distracts us when we get behind. So rather it is a flow of what follows what - that way no matter how early or late we start the schedule we are able to stay on course...

Get up, girls - bath, breakfast.
Chores.
Devotional
Math
Handwriting
Outdoor play
Snack & Story time
Lola - Baby School*/ Tayo - Phonics
Tayo - Baby School*/ Lola - Astronomy and writing
Lunch time
Niyi - Naptime
Girls - Chapter book with Mommy
Girls 1hr BOB time (Books on Bed) Mommy alone! Yippee!
Snack time
Free time(Only 30 mins computer time each)
10-second tidy up! (You have to watch The Big Comfy Couch to get this one! But if the s want to call it a fun name then so be it!)
Get Dinner (girls alternate helping me)
Niyi bathtime

* Baby school - the name given to the 20 mins or so I ask one of the girls to take care of Niyi while I am spending time with the other. Tayo has taken this quite literally and is intent on 'teaching 'him something each day!

I'll see how this works - I can only hope the arguing will be reduced.