Our CC History

I was introduced to Classical Conversations back in 2009 at a local homeschool curriculum swap.  I was "that" mom.  You know, the one with a genius three year old who was checking out curriculum so she could start formal schooling at a young age and graduate her child by age 10.  I mean....that's normal, right?  ;)

So, here I was checking out curriculum.  It was my first glance at real homeschool methodoligies and books.  I had no idea what I was looking for, but I wanted to see it all! There were two ladies sitting at a table with no impressive display, just some photo copies on yellow paper.  I almost kept walking.  I mean...really, don't you know you need a flashly display to draw attention.  However, my sweet friend Teri (who was also an overachiever) was with me and insisted that we stop.
 This is all I remember.
*Classical (this Must mean music...shoot...I don't know anything about music...but you KNOW my child Will!)
*Conversations (Hmmm....not sure what to do with this, but OK)
* $13/week for 2 1/2 hours of time (WOW!!!!  That is WAY cheaper than the 15-20 bucks I was considering spending on half an hour of dance or gymnastics)
*Music class (I mean...of course, it says Classical in the title)
*Ages 4-12 (Yeah, well....uh, you know...my three year old is REALLY well behaved, and smart, and she's super obedient, and she even knows her alphabet and can count really high.  I'm sure my three year old would be JUST fine! )

However, the ladies at the table insisted that she must be 4 and that I should wait a year.  Disappointed...I mean, big, FAT, Disappointment is how I felt.  I walked away, with my head hanging, clinging to my yellow photo copied paper for dear life, trying to figure out what I would do now.

**I should note that just a few minutes later someone unreleated to CC walked up to me and asked how old my oldest was.  When I told them three (with a big cheesy grin) they said, "What are you doing here?  Your kids are to young to homeschool."  This broke my heart and totally embarrassed me.  I never went back to another one of those meetings....even as I progressed in my homeschool years.  It almost ruined me for homeschooling, but I suppose that could be a different post altogether.  I just want to say....Don't say that to someone.  It's not nice.  It's discouraging and not true.

Soooo....fast forward to the following year.  I tried my darndest to get my 4 year old into a local CC group.  I had a really hard time contacting the director (even though I knew her), and by the time I got a hold of her, classes were full.  Guess what I felt again...Big, FAT Disappointment!  I mean...my daughter was FINALLY FOUR!  Don't they know how long I waited?!?!

A few days later, I got a hold of the director for the Ft. Myers community and she invited me to visit.  I drove almost an hour (I mean...I was dedicated!).  We walked into a class with not a single idea of what CC was or what to expect.  To be honest, I walked out almost as clueless as when I walked in.  Lucky for them, they were in week 8 which meant they were learning Tin Whistle...or else I would have been wondering where the music was (I mean, this is classical, right?)

After far to much conflict in my own head (when I make decisions I act like I can never undue them), I made the life changing choice to enroll in this strange program.  Truly, I acted like I was signing my life away...weird, I know.

So, here we were, finally in a Classical Conversations community, listening to crazy sentences about history, science, math (skip counting?), geography, English grammar (wait...I thought grammar was grammar, but they were calling this subject English grammar,and the whole half hour "New Grammar", I was so confused!), and Latin!  Latin!  I've never taken Latin!  My daughter is going to be Sooooo smart!  I watched children give presentations, we did science projects that I thought were weird, played some games, and oh yeah, those crazy little people blew in those tin whistles (where do I get one anyway?)

Looking back on myself 4 years ago, I'm sure I looked as confused as I was...but...I was loving it!  I mean, this is IT.  This is what I want to do!

Reviewing something :)

By the end of the year, I finally figured out the routine, but never understood the madness to the method.  That is...until I attended Practicum.  I had no idea what Practicum meant.  I don't think I could even remember the word most of the time.  All I know is that it was amazing and opened my eyes to words and methods I had never heard about before.  The funny speaker lady (who I later figured out was the Amazing Betsy Leslie) told stories about coo-coo clocks, shared her family's homeschool journey and introduced me to words such as trivium, grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric.  By the end of the 3 days, I actually had a pretty good understanding of what those words meant!  Finally, I "got it", and I was SOLD!

learning to trace

Excitedly, I entered our second year of CC, this time in a brand new Naples community.  Ready to tutor, to encourage my friends, and spread my roots deep into the beautiful foundation we were building for our children's education.  Until, a fast decision, and God's hand quickly moved us to Tampa.

Impromptu park date with CC friends to practice memory work

We moved over Christmas break, and within 15 months of starting CC,  I was already in my third community.  Sad to leave my friends, but eager to make new ones, I tried not to "rock the boat" to much in my new community.  However, I obviously have a hard time sitting on my hands, and I'm always working on more self control over my words and actions. We finished out the year with a friend or two after a fairly quick move to a place we have never been before.  It was working.  I signed on a tutor the next year, hopeful that I wouldn't have to move communities again.  I mean, I had yet been able to stay in community for an entire 24 weeks.

A beautiful celebration cake made by a very talented mom!

By the end of the this third year, I was feeling the Lord leading me in a change but I wasn't sure what it was.  Another tutor in our community had recently become a Support Manager and was sharing with us about the need for more communities in our area. There were people pulling their children out of school, but receiving very little or no support in their homeschool adventures.  I started praying.  After some discussions, I decided to go ahead and walk through the process of applying to be a director.  I mean...they could have said no ;)  .....

Weekend with Yaya

Last weekend, the kids and I spent a few days with my mom as Jeremy got some work done.  We had a really nice time.

Nicole got to spend the morning at the hair salon, and even received a $5 tip!  After a quick lunch with daddy, the kids and I went back and got to get our hair done...all four of us!

Hannah spent an hour picking out her hair style of choice.  This is what she ended up with :)

Nicole got her hair trimmed and it looked beautiful.  Nate got a handsome trim, and I got my grays colored and hair layered a bit.  I could not believe those children were so good at the salon for so long!

Then, we had a yummy pizza dinner at Doc's on Bonita Beach.  My parents have made this restaurant (and their pizza) famous :)

We ended our day visiting a friend of my mom's who offered to let the kids look at her horses.

The girls LOVED this!  You could tell that they were nervous about feeding the horses, but they did a pretty good job.

Then, Ms. Leah let them ride the horses.

It was basically just a walk up and down the driveway and around the yard, but it was fun for them.

Ms. Leah said that "I am in trouble" because of how much fun my girls were having.

I on the other hand, tried not to touch the horses because I am afraid of them.

Nathan got on the horse and stayed on for a few minutes before asking to get off.

Not the week I planned

Today wraps up week 2 of our new school year.  With a 3rd grader, a 1st grader, and a pre-k4...it's been interesting to say the least.  I have struggled to find balance in our home education, probably because I'm trying to do to much and I compare myself to others far to often!

Week 1 really only showed one day of school work, Monday.  I don't even remember it, however, I am pretty sure we stayed on a good schedule.  Then the rest of the week hit and all of my obligations took over my life for a few days.  To be honest, I was quite disappointed in this first week, and was ready to just give everything up.  Thank goodness for prayer, a loving husband (who I actually saw very little of that week as our paths seemed to criss cross), a quick trip to Naples and weekend with mom, friends, and chocolate.  I'm not sure what we did that week, except that I spent an extraordinary amount of time on the computer.

Week 2 was not looking much better and I was truly becoming stressed about what to do.  We had workers at our house on Monday (that story is really long, and has not come to end, so it needs to be left untold at this point!).  Anyway, as my kids were running around and they were trying to work one of the workers said, "So, do you homeschool?"  Embarrassed, I looked around and said, "Yes....but not today".  He laughed and we actually had quite a nice conversation about homeschooling.

Our first day of CC came on Tuesday.  I was full of nerves and peace (is that ok?  I don't know...I was anxious about how everyone would do, if the parents would like it, how I would juggle it all, etc....but also really excited about the new year).  The first day was wonderful.  I could not have asked for a better group of tutors, or sweeter group of families.  A few kinks to work out...but all in all, a wonderful 1st day!  Ahhhh.....peace.  Yes, finally.

So, we spent Wed-Friday pretty committed to our schooling.  The kids have completed their notebooking pages for the week, Nathan started speech therapy again, we did a science project and lots of reading.  I'm pretty happy.

It was still hard though.  I felt like my entire day was taken up with school work.  Hannah and Nate need far longer than I anticipated for their reading program, Nicole needs one on one attention for spelling & Math, so does Hannah.

 I'm trying to listen to each of them read for 10 minutes a day as well.  I feel like I am schooling all day, then trying to find time to clean the house, cook, and enjoy them.  I just loose sight of what my end goals are sometimes.

Our science sentence for this week was the four types of tissues.  So, we tried dissecting a chicken wing again.  We did this 3 years ago as well.  I was more fun this time around.

Making observations about their chicken wing

Hannah found evidence of feathers in the epithelial tissue

Connective Tissue (this is what grosses me out the most, bleh

Ha!  I Love this one!  It looks like she is grossed out, but she was having a great time.

I think she is pointed to a shiney ligament

Muscle tissue that she seperated

Dinner is Served

Nicole has been on a mission lately....a mission of learning.  Truly, this little girl has a thirst for knowledge and experiences.  She loves to learn.

She has been working on her skills in the kitchen lately.  She has been proficient at making oatmeal ( on the stove) for a couple of years now, has mastered making brownies (including taking them in and out of the oven).  She has followed recipes to make home made chocolate chip cookies, and oatmeal raisin cookies.  She has saved her own money to buy her very own kitchen tools (measuring spoons and a vegetable saver).

However, last weekend while visiting with friends for a few hours, we stumbled across a kid's competition cooking show.  The youngest was 9, most were 12-14.  She was inspired.  I knew a week of cooking was in our future.

Last night she cooked dinner for us, and it was all her idea.

She wanted to make chicken, with gravy over rice and steamed broccoli.

I watched and offered a very light assistant's hand....but she did most of the work.

Nicole seasoned and cut the chicken.

While the chicken was cooking in the skillet,

she started chopping the broccoli.

 However, this became tricky for her, because had to learn to remember to check on the chicken and stir it up occasionally.

Once the chicken was done, we put it on a separate plate and made a roux for our gravy.  We used the same skillet because it would have lots of yummy flavor stuck to the bottom.  She melted the butter, added some garlic, and then 1/4 cup of flour for the roux.

Once the flour was browned, she added a can of chicken broth and whisked it to make a delicious gravy.

While the gravy and chicken simmered, she cooked up the rice and broccoli, then finished the meal off with a roll.

Nicole plated the food for dinner.

It was delicious and everyone's plate was licked clean.  The kids had to ask Nicole for permission to be excused, and then give her a kiss on the cheek.

Great job on dinner!