Favorite Things #5

Got a reluctant writer?  I would be willing to guarantee that these Staedtler markers will change that.  NAYY (no affiliation, yada, yada...).

What I like about these is they come in wonderfully delicious colors although it seems the Germans forgot that purple is a basic color.  They will wash out of most fabrics (think: all the benefits of a Sharpie but without the permanency).  Also, they have a great tip that is virtually indestructable (I still like to have my own set though because I'm a control freak like that).  The package even states that you can leave the lid off for days and they won't dry out.  Hmmmm...may be a good selling point but I don't know that I'd go advertising that to children.  Anyway, the IE in me loves that the barrel also has an "ergonomic triangular shape for effortless writing".  At least that is what the package states but it IS true.  Plus the design of the plastic box is ingenious and oh so loverly.

I plan to start a family journal this summer and we'll use these to write in it with.  I have intended to do the family journal thing for the past 2 summers but we never seem to follow through.  I am really going to try to keep at it this summer.  I will even try to post about it in the future.  When Ms. Priss was in public school, the counselor (who was an amazing lady) hosted a workshop about keeping family journals.  The person presenting the idea said she got sick with some type of cancer and that became the only way she could communicate with her tween/teenage sons.  That gave me chills and sold me immediately.  She said it was her favorite thing to do to sit and leaf through those little pages of golden history.  I challenge you to start and keep up your own family journal.  Don't make it hard, don't overthink it, don't try to make it too structured or fancy. Just get a regular old spiral bound notebook (you can choose a pretty one, though) and have at it.

By the way today is the first day of our official summer break!  Woohoo!!!!

Favorite Things 3 & 4

A new revelation I've had is these magazine files from Staples.  Staples is proud of these little puppies.  But they're oh-so worth it.

First let me show you this:

Nice, but a bit messy and unweildy and UNLABELED.  These are all of my foreign language materials. (They're sitting there on the shelf without a magazine file because I haven't gotten one to put these books in yet).  See how they're just kind of hanging out in the bookshelf and there are even some smaller books that are trying their darndest to wedge themselves in the back of that bookshelf?  They are bookshelf deviants.  Bad, bad books.  I just heard John Rosemand speak about disciplining kids..."Kids are bad." Hence they need controls and limitations - boundaries, so to speak.

Well, enter exhibit A.  Staples' magazine file holders (except mine are in the lovely clear variety....available in the stores but apparently not online).

Language Arts and Geography all grouped nice and neatly and I intend for them to stay that way.  I drive a hard bargain in my house.

See here...the items I use "Everyday" - nice, neat, and compactly stowed.  Order is a beeeeeautiful thing.

Do you see the inferior predecessor to this lovely design?

While still nice and functional...they just don't cut the mustard.  See how tall the fronts are?  Retrieving items from these types of racks is a pain in the you-know-what.

And finally all of this leads me to one of my all time favorite tools (for applications that extend well beyond our homeschool realm), my label maker.  I use it everywhere in my house.

If you don't think labels will make your life better just bet me.  And I aint a bettin' kind of girl.

Favorite Things Series 1 & 2

Pdub, which has become one of my new favorite blogs recently had Heather from Oh My Stinkin' Heck do a guest blog post on the Necessities of a Homeschooling Mom.  It got me to thinking, I have a lot of necessities (that's a hard word to spell) so I thought I would start a series...one or 2 a day of my favorite things.  You might recall I posted some of my favorite things a while back.  Well, I realized I have a lot more.  I'll post them not necessarily in order of my favorite (but somewhat).

So without further adieu the first thing would have to be my laminator.

But you must stock yourself with plenty of supplies to make it fun.  Did I just type that?  Can laminating be fun?  I need to get a life.

I have found some of the best prices at Oregon Laminations.

Another of my fav's are loose leaf ring clips.

I use these for all sorts of applications.  But I want you to note the difference here in how much bookshelf space a 3-ring binder takes up versus how much space the sheets held together with the rings.  Amazing, huh?

They are great for holding together spiral-bound booklets.  This is so much easier for photocopying purposes.

They can hold tags together.  This is what we did with our Bible memory verse copywork this year.

Laminated too!  Hey!  That's 2 of my fav's used in one application.  We call that a 2-fer.

More tags held together.

WHAT are those workbox tags doing sprawled all out on the floor?!?  I get no respect....no respect...

These are a few of my favorite things

Here are more images of our workboxes in action. This is Lil'Bit's third drawer of the day. She opened the box and found everything right there for her.


She worked the page. Yes, by golly, that sheet's laminated and yes I am a "professional" homeschooler! And thanks to Ruth Beechick I can now happily ignore that little red line under the word homeschooler. ;0) For more details scroll down to the Weekly Language Tip, here. This is a great newsletter if you don't already get it.


She cleaned up
She replaced the items (sometimes she'll even put them back where they came from instead of back in the drawer which makes Mommy really happy). Then she took the #3 tag off of the drawer and placed it on her "grid". One drawer down....


By the way, I love this wonderful stuff. I use it for lots of things. It is much better than the blue stuff in my opinion.
It comes off of the walls much better - not pulling the paint off - yet still holding well. Here it is holding up coins to represent the number date. That's some more of Marcy Cook's ideas. I use her Primary Today Is the Day for Numbers at this link. This book lists number facts for each day of the school year plus all the ways to show each date with United States coins (e.g., 5 is the number of Great Lakes for March 5th, 12 is the number of Reindeer for December 12th, etc..) Later in the month it seems like we simply use money more often to represent the number date. I don't always follow her list, if you can believe that. Sometimes I make up my own to fit our situation or use another item/representation that I think would be more meaningful to my girls. I can't tell you how much this visual has helped me, too. If I am writing a check I pretty much always know the date because of this little mnenomic device.


And one other thing I use Plasti-Tak for is to attach the The "Work With Mom" tag because that varies each day from drawer-to-drawer and it seems a little overkill to have 2 velcro buttons on EVERY drawer.


This is drawer #6 - some physical activity for the day.




And after 15 minutes of working on this she got it. She hasn't been able to do it until today (the first time in her workbox).

This is what she found in the next drawer. We love these little journals. This was one of the best birthday gifts we've ever received. I love those gifts that keep on giving. And the workbox system ensures that we regularly keep with it.

Finally - her last drawer - more Marcy Cook math Color it On the 30s chart slips. We love these!


Also, I couldn't live without a timer. We use them for practically everything. I even send them sometimes to play at the neighbor's house with this one around their neck. Anyway, I keep them all in one drawer so there's one always handy.


That's all for now. I always enjoy others' ideas so I just thought I'd share some of my favorite things today. Workboxes, plasti-tak, Marcy Cook, This Is Me Journals, and timers...good stuff.