Creating with Adobe Premier Pro

So I made this video last year for a Christmas gift for some family members and thought I would finally get around to sharing it here. It took many weeks to make. I first had to find a song, gather and capture all the right video clips. Edit the clips' speed and duration, remove sound, and then decide where each clip should go in the song. It was trial and error from start to finish. But it was fun and I plan to do more soon.

Proud parents of a new baby....

Ferret!!! Yes, apparently, Daddy thought we didn't have enough ferrets. He got me a new little baby girl for my birthday. Her name is Pepper and she is a doll at 9 weeks old! Just a little baby and so energetic and playful. LOVE HER!!

More on workboxes....

I thought I needed to show some better close-up shots, so I'm posting about workboxes again! I have rearranged the schoolroom and the workboxes are now under the whiteboard...





Here is a close-up of my 3-year-old son's workboxes...



Examples of what would go in a 3-year-old boy's workboxes???
Legos
A book to read with mom
Playdough
Color Wonder
Scissors and paper with curvy lines to cut
Lacing beads
Stickers and paper and a couple of crayons
Math manipulatives
Blocks and a small toy dog with instructions to build the dog a house
Magnetic letters (only the ones that are in his name) and a magnetic tray with instructions to spell his name
Pom poms and tweezers and cups
A bowl of dry beans with funnels and spoons
Moon Sand
Toy cars and empty paper towel tubes
An easy puzzle
An old workbook and a pencil for him to doodle in and feel like he's doing school
Cup of water and paintbrush and a wall
Magnets with paperclips, nuts, bolts, and some non-magnetic things to get him thinking
An educational computer CD

Plenty of stuff to keep him busy from day to day while big sisters get their work done. And by the way, they are REALLY getting their work done these days! The 8yo has told me repeatedly how much she LOVES this system over any other system I've ever implemented. I think they will probably take their workboxes with them to college, hee hee!

Moving on....

This is a close-up of my 6-year-old daughter's schedule strip..



I have made many, many activity cards to go on the strips... Here they are in disarray... There are velcro dots on the back of these. They stick right onto the schedule strip...



And here are my "Note from Mom" cards. These are laminated so I can write on them with a dry erase marker and reuse again and again. When I need to give specific page numbers or other input, I just use one of these and it greatly eliminates the extra questioning while I try to work with other children.



This is what the children do with their finished numbers and activity cards. When they finish a workbox or activity, they remove that card from their schedule strip and put it on this number grid..



And finally...

Here is where their completed work goes. If it's too big to fit in these drawers, then it goes in a large bin sitting next to the drawers..



Many of these ideas and resources came from the workbox yahoo group. If you are interested in setting up workboxes in your homeschool, I highly recommend joining the workbox yahoo group! http://groups.yahoo.com/group/workboxes/

That's it! That's our workbox system in more detail. And have I said how much I LOVE how it's going?? Tune in next week when I'll blog about our portable workbox system. We take our portable system to the library three days a week while we wait for daughter #3 at her Autism school. It's too far away for us to drive back home, so we take school to the library! FUN!!! The kids LOVE doing school at the library!

The Birthday Boy!

My only boy is now 3 years old! Look what he got for his birthday....



It's just a small battery-powered bike, but his sisters are certainly learning to stay out of his way!



And just a little interesting FYI... This is the first time I have EVER had a 3-year-old and not either been pregnant again or had a newborn! Wow!!!

More Workboxes!!

Jo-Ann's is having a fabulous sale on these 10-drawer carts and I just HAD to have them! I bought two and saved $80!! Wow!!!!!! The sale runs thru Aug. 1st. Regular price $70.. Sale price $35! Wow! And I also received a teacher discount! An extra $10 in savings!

So I combined my colorful drawers from my Mardel cart with the clear drawers from the Jo-Ann carts and got THIS.....



Each child is now color-coded with their favorite color! Notice the pencil boxes and timers on top of each cart.. Also color coded! FUN!!

I've Got the Workbox Bug!

I'm finally on board with the workbox craze.. I've spent the past two weeks putting it all together. I even moved my school room from a tiny office downstairs to our FROG (Finished Room Over Garage) room upstairs. I must say I am very excited to get started this Monday!

Here is my desk area...





And now to the workboxes...

I found this rolling cart at Mardel's 20% off sale last week. My two older children will use the drawers on the cart and my two youngest will use the clear bins stacked on top (five each.. for now). The cart was originally priced something like $94, but I got it for around $80. The clear bins can be found at Wal-mart for around $3.50 each.



And here are the schedule strips. They're hanging on the side of a file cabinet at the end of my desk.



Here are a few more pictures of our school room.. And yes, a lot of my school furniture has come from thrift stores over the years. I only buy from thrift stores or I will sometimes buy new if it's on sale. My brown teacher's desk in the pictures up top came from a small public school sale out in a small town near us. It cost me $25. The preschool table and chairs in the picture below retails for $60, but I found it at a thrift store in perfect condition for just $15! My husband made the large whiteboard for me a few years ago.







Here is my idea box.. I'm on the workbox yahoo group and ideas are constantly coming through.. I've had this little file box sitting in my kitchen for a year or so with the intention of filling it with recipes.. I needed a way to organize all of the ideas that were flying at me at once, so I went and grabbed this box and my labelmaker and got to work! (I'm not a very good cook anyway!)





I found these colorful timers at Wal-mart. I got one for each child in their favorite colors. They were $3 each.



And for those of you who made it this far.. You get to see what lies beyond the school room... It's ferret land! Yes, our ferrets have their own little nook just off the school room. Major distraction potential, but I do have "play with ferrets - 10 minutes" cards to put on the schedule strips, so maybe it won't be too bad (wishful thinking!).





That's all I have for now! I still have to print and hang the number grid pages for finished workbox numbers.. I'll probably do that tomorrow and then I'll try to get that up on here as well. I'll be sure to post on how this system is working for us in a few days!

It finally happened...

I knew this day would come. My fearless 6yo daughter finally broke a bone. I knew it would happen eventually.. She stood the mini trampoline up on end, leaned it against the wall, then climbed up and sat on it. Brother came and gave it just a little push. This little push sent her sailing! She tried to catch herself with an outstretched arm... The force was too much and it broke right at the elbow. She is in a splint for now, but Monday she will have a cast.