Formal is a Hit!

More pictures to come but I had to get Kyle and Cynthia's picture posted. All the kids had a great time and so did the adults who were helping, Bill and I included!
We started with everyone learning the Swing and Rumba basic steps. Everyone had time to practice with a partner and then we let them dance the rest of the night away. Even the reluctant boys had a great time which I was so happy about or I would have been in serious trouble.
We had a photographer get pictures of all the kids throughout the night so we will have plenty of great pictures in a couple of weeks so more to come!
The after party was a huge hit with video games, pizza, poker (?!), Just Dance, food, and all night fun. Not sure how much sleep everyone got but we didn't care since we went to bed!
Thanks to Owen and Jayme for providing a wonderful place to have our event, Owen for great enthusiasm and getting kids off to a great start, Kristi for helping kids create memories of the evening, Aimee for awesome food, and Cynthia, Kassi, Sam, Alyssa, Jenna, and Anna for planning a great night.
Thanks Lindy, Paige, Erin, and Grace for fixing my hair and getting me dressed up!

Tween Night Celebration

 What a great night for a party! It has been cold, icy, snowy, and everyone has been cooped up. Sounded like a great night to get all the teens together for a night of Wii fun and tons of snacks. Throw in a birthday and it knocked the evening up a notch!
Tween/teen nights are always a blast, what a great group of kids. We had almost 30 tonight and they all are pleasant, funny, and low drama (which is such a plus!). The xbox ran Call of Duty all night and the Wii had Just Dance. They got some serious energy out, Just Dance will do that to you. They went through an entire case of water and almost all the juice and soda.
Chas celebrated his 14th birthday with everyone tonight so we also had ice cream cake. Good choice since everyone was hot from dancing around! We had a quick round of "Happy Birthday" and everyone even cooperated for some group pictures. I try not to be too pushy with the camera during their events but I was able to coax since we were already gathered for the cake. Plus they will love having some pics of their fun nights together.

Sewing Fun

Lindy and Paige have wanted to learn to sew for years. Not being a sewer myself I have not gotten very far with this project. This session at co-op our piano teacher who is also a very accomplished seamstress is teaching a basic hand sewing class. Here is the project from last week where they learned how to do the blanket stitch. I see many sewing gifts in the future!

Website Up and Running....

Finally! Our co-op website is up and running! I have had a crash course on computer "stuff" and know a little more than I thought. I am so excited to see this site really help our group stay organized and get connected. I also hope in the future that we are able to save time, something all homeschoolers need!
So for friends and family who keep asking what I have been up to here it is:

The Learning Tree Homeschool Website

Spring Showcase

I have so many pictures from the last two weeks it is going to take me a week to get everything posted to share! We have been so busy but it has all been fun and school is getting done, just in more hands on ways. The co-op session is wrapped up and showcase was a huge success. We had 164 people attend (thanks to Bill who always does a head count!) which I think is a record high attendance. It is so great to see families come to support their students. Paige and Erin both played the piano, the girls were in a class song, but the star our family for the night was Kyle.

He presented his Battle of the Bulge speech that he gave earlier this year at Boy Scouts. He talks about the veterans that he has interviewed and finished up with a song written for the WWII vets "Before You Go". It is a wonderful  presentation and he did a great job on his speech. He will be presenting for our church congregation on Memorial Day weekend Sunday for all three of our services. He is just like his dad, loves to speak and does not get nervous at all. He also is very engaging with his audience and people really listen to what he has to say. Bill and I are very proud of what he has done with this project. It has taken on a life of its own and he has learned more than I ever imagined.

He also had a role in Hamlet of Claudius the King. All the kids in the play did an outstanding job and the set design class created a great set and props, I loved the crowns!

I would love to say that now that co-op is done for the school year that things are going to calm down but that is not going to happen! Things are as busy as ever with no end in sight, this is the new normal in the Miller house and I wouldn't have it any other way!

King Kyle and Queen Cynthia!

Cast of Hamlet

Helping Haiti

These girls are awesome! Last week at our Brownie meeting I suggested a bake sale to benefit a charity to help work on our Penny Power Try it. We talked about a couple of organizations that could use money and decided on Haiti. Then the girls got baking!
WOW! They had a packed table with every kind of treat imaginable. Our grand total at the end of the day was $93.41!
Great job girls you did a fabulous job!


Molly is looking forward to being a Daisy next year, she has watched her big sis AnnMarie be in Girl Scouts for the last 4 years.

Heading into Pioneer Times

I am getting my co-op posting started a little late. We were on vacation when classes started and then the second week I didn't have time to take pictures so welcome to the third week! This session we are studying Kirsten Larson the American Girl from 1854, pioneer times. Lindy, Paige and I have finished reading the series and like the others we have read, loved it. Life was not easy for the pioneers, but despite the cultural barriers after arriving from Sweden Kirsten's family settles into American life.

We did a couple of activities last week. We used Sculpey clay to make heart pendants that we will be finishing this week. The girls got creative in personalizing their heart. Some have added their names to them, others made ruffled edges. We will be adding beads to each side to symbolize the friendship that Kirsten made with Singing Bird, then putting it all on a ribbon. The girls will then have a necklace like Kirsten to symbolize her Dad's saying of "keeping heart."

Mrs. Walton donned her pioneer dress and led the girls in making Swedish pancakes. They all love to cook so this was a hit. We added some apple topping for flavor since they were a little bland they turned out great!

We had a student who has the Kirsten doll complete with accessories. We were able to look at what pioneers would have packed for lunch and what their school supplies looked like.

We are off to a great start and have many more fun projects coming up this session.

Always partcipating, Erin is learning to make pancakes too.

The bucket and the dipper used for getting water to drink during school. We did this last week in our "pioneer school" except we dipped our cups into a punch bowl of water.

Tween Night Fun!

Tween night was a hit! The kids have a great time hanging out and talking. They play the Wii but that is all they really do as far as activities. No movies or anything else just the time and the place to be together and they take it from there!

Friday night we had pizza and snacks and with the warm weather kids drifted outside to hang out on the porch and patio. I had the makings for smores so we had an impromptu fire in the fire pit right before the rain. Everyone got their smores made and headed for cover!

It was a pleasure to host these kids!



Wii fun went on for hours!


Dance demos!

Smores brought my little ones out, they were not missing out on this! All the older kids are great with having some younger ones roam around!

It's A Wrap

Mackenzie, Lindy, and Paige enjoying the pizza party at co-op.

Today was the last day of co-op until the fall and it was a busy yet fun day. We had a great turn out for the pizza party at lunch, close to 120 people signed up and as you can see it was a very full room.

When I was loading my van up after classes I found this little party going on in the back of my van. They were all having so much fun talking and laughing I hated to break up the party but I still had things to get ready for tonight's showcase so we needed to go.

Our last fairy class was the best time! We made bird nest snacks which were Rice Krispie treats and then we created our Fairy Garden homes for our fairies (more on that in a separate post). The girls all liked making their treats.

Lindy and Claire mixing, mixing!

Paige and Emma working so intently.

We were then off to home for a couple of hours where I worked to finish the lanterns for the fairy gardens. When we returned for the evening the girls set up their posters for the interest fair. A new idea for the semester it gave students the opportunity to make a display about whatever interested them. Lindy chose to do hers on Juliette Gordon Low the founder of Girl Scouts and included information about levels of Girl Scouting, uniforms, and pictures.

Paige did her presentation on Amelia Earhart. She became interested in Amelia after learning about her in the Kit American Girl books. Kit's heroine was Amelia and the girls and I started reading biography's on her to learn more. The best part of these projects was how much the girls enjoyed putting them together. They did all of the work themselves except for some things they wanted typed up on the computer. The creative part and the ideas were all theirs. I am very proud of the hard work they both put into these posters.



Lindy took in her vest and old smock to share. She was so proud and stood at her table throughout the evening.



Paige signed her name coming off the back of the plane, she is so artsy!

Lindy and Paige both played a piano piece for the showcase. They both did a great job. Lindy had hers memorized.



Erin and Megan enjoying some snacks before the evenings end.

Fall will be here before you know it and all of the kids will have grown a foot and changed so much. We had a great spring session, it just keeps getting better and better.

Another Hit Tween Night

Our second tween night was another hit! The kids really had a great time visiting, playing Wii, and snacking. They have really had the opportunity to form friendships with their co-op friends. They are such a great group of kids, polite and courteous, fun to talk to, and just a pleasure to be around. So glad they all had such a good time!

Hanging by the Wii

Girls just want to have fun!

McKinley and Chas up to something!

When the Wii fills up with players the kids find Nintendo to play. As long as they have a controller in hand they are happy.

Those silly girls. Thanks Lindy for entertaining Erin, she had a great time.

Erin getting Green.

Mackenzie and Lindy had a great time hanging out and snacking!