Friday, March 15, 2019

ARTistic Pursuits Volume 1 Review

ARTistic Pursuits Vol. 1

My kids love art!  They just do.  I love how easy ARTistic Pursuits Inc. makes art instruction for me with their K-3rd Grade Level, Volumes 1-8.  The kids and I have really been enjoying Art for Children, Building a Visual Vocabulary, K-3 Vol. 1.  This book has been a great introduction to watercolor crayons, color application, and paper cutting so far for my kids.  And even though it is geared for K-3rd grade, all of my kids (toddler - 9th) have been enjoying the methods and techniques as you will see in this post!  It's never too late to enjoy art and pick up techniques.

 This curriculum has book lessons as well as video lessons that are watched from DVDs provided.

DVD Instruction

The curriculum has a great materials page discussing all the materials needed throughout the curriculum.  

It also gives brand suggestions and recommendations.  You can buy the supplies as needed or purchase everything at once.  You can also purchase your art supplies directly from ARTistic Pursuits if you wish.  You can check out their K-3 Vol 1. Art Pack.  The book does a great job showing you the materials needed for each lesson.  Following each lesson is also prep instructions for the next lesson, so helpful!

Our art supplies for the first few lessons.

There are 18 lessons in this volume, 6 of which are video instruction.  The videos are short and engaging and really help show the students how to use the materials well.  They help reinforce and teach concepts.

Book Instruction for Lesson 1

Lesson 1 is a video lesson on how to make a picture using watercolor crayons properly.  You can choose some of your favorite items or items around your home for your picture.  I love that the videos are truly visual instructions.  My kids really enjoy them.  There is one page instruction for lesson 1 in the book but it is taught through the video.

Art Instruction DVD Lesson 1

F decided to make a banana

F using the Paintbrush to activate the watercolor crayons.

Finished work

D decided to make school supplies

I love that she is making a ruler.

A working on her drawing

A's dinosaur

B has been working through body systems in her Challenge program.

She drew a human heart.

The next few lessons are book lessons that do not have video instruction.  Each book lesson has several pages of instruction.  Lesson 2 was on composing people, animals, or objects in or outside your home.

A made a picture of our backyard shed.  This is before activating the watercolor crayons.


Finished work


Where A was sitting when she drew her work.


F made a domino


A closer view


C drew a picture of our Family Honor Plate.

Lesson 3 was a book lesson on adding imagination to your pictures.  It was so fun to see what the kids imagined!

B made music using food - look closely.

E working on her picture

E's imagination picture

D imagined herself at gymnastics on beam with her feet touching the ceiling as someone threw her flowers.

A's imagination picture with a cotton candy tree, jellybean bush, cake rocks, pie flowers, marshmallow mountains, a cookie sun and a Kit Kat river.

The second video lesson, lesson 4, is on how to identify and mix colors.

F and G loved naming the colors

The video showed how to mix colors to make new colors.

F working on shapes and mixing colors


F's finished page (age 5)

C working on mixing colors as well

E working on shapes and mixing colors


E's finished page

A's mixing colors with shapes page

 D's page


B didn't do shapes like everyone else but rather decided to mix colors into a picture Bible verse.

The third video lesson, lesson 7, is on construction paper cutting and how to make a collage using construction paper.  I love how creative the kids were in their creations.


Video lesson


E made a cake shop.


C made an ocean scene including some of the animals he has learned about in Marine Biology this year.


D wanted to do some of the planets.

B's paper cutting page

She took her inspiration from a book she is reading in Literature class.

A made a rose!

I hope I have given you an idea of how easy and fun this curriculum has been to use.  Remember, this curriculum consists of 8 volumes.  Be sure to click on the banner below to visit the Homeschool Review Crew blog to read more reviews of ARTistic Pursuits.

Kindergarten to Third Grade Art following History in Chronological Order {ARTistic Pursuits Inc. Reviews}

As you can see, we are really enjoying this curriculum.  We still have a few lessons to go before we finish.  I'm excited to see what the kids think when we get to use the oil pastels!

Crew Disclaimer 

Thursday, March 14, 2019

Happy Pi Day 2019!

Pi Day 2019

Happy Pi Day everyone!  I hope that you were able to celebrate today by eating some kind of pie!  Thanks to HEB we had several delicious options to choose from - we had chocolate pie, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, apple pie and cherry pie.  And of course, we still have a lot of Blue Bell ice cream in our freezer as well!  If you are in need of a dessert, feel free to come on over...

Mama's Jewelry Earring Review


Remember when I shared with you about Mama's Jewelry last December?  They have been designing rings for moms for 30 years and they are committed to creating exceptional mothers pendants, rings and earrings at affordable prices.  I was blessed with a $50 credit and I chose to get earrings for A, B and myself.  Dave and I gave the star earrings to A and B for Valentine's Day.  Yes, they make great presents!

A and B each received a pair of stainless steel star stud earrings.  These earrings are only $6.95/pair.

A in her earrings...

And B in her earrings...

A closer view

A closer view of the earrings.  I love that these earrings are super strong.

For myself, I chose the Nana Sterling Silver Princess cut Swarovski Zirconia Stud earrings, $24.95.

A closer view of the earrings.  They have a solid 14K gold post back which is awesome because my ears can be sensitive.

I have been so pleased with our earrings.  They are super cute and durable, which is great because apparently I am hard on earrings.  The girls and I wear them often.  I also like that we can wear them with casual attire or if we dress up as well - they are very versatile.

I love these pendants.

Check out more jewelry options, including the pendants above, from Mama's Jewelry by visiting http://mamasjewelry.com/.  Let me know what you find!

Disclosure: Thanks so much to USFamilyGuide and Mama's Jewelry for selecting me for this campaign.  I was provided with a $50 giftcard to Mama's Jewelry in exchange for our honest review.  All opinions are my own.

Sunday, March 10, 2019

Blue Bell Birthday Party - Happy 41st David!

David's antigravity M&M cake

Fork decorations

Blue Bell Ice Cream banner that I made with A.

The kids and I pulled it off!  We celebrated David's birthday with a fun, M&M antigravity cake and then we had a Blue Bell Ice Cream tasting contest with 33 different flavors of Blue Bell Ice Cream.  For those of you that don't know, David grew up in Brenham, Texas and has an affinity for Blue Bell Ice Cream.  David, A, C, and D were ice cream tasters while B and E helped me serve them.  We had a blast!  And of course, we have lots of Blue Bell Ice Cream to enjoy for awhile.

 David with his cake

With C, G, E and F

Ice Cream Testers

The ice cream testers started off round 1 with blindfolds and had to guess every flavor on taste alone.  In round 2 they were able to see the ice cream and taste it again.  For round 3, they were given all the Blue Bell ice cream flavor names that we had on hand.  Then, we went over the answers to see who guessed correctly.

We showed them these sheets for round 3.

Another hint sheet...

The sheet on the right was used to make guesses and notes for each tasting.

Here you can see David's notes!

So, what flavors did we have.  Glad you asked!  We served - Cotton Candy, Dutch Chocolate, Butter Crunch, Ultimate Neapolitan, Rocky Road, Pecan Pralines 'n Cream, Strawberry, Homemade Vanilla, Moo-llennium Crunch, Birthday Cake, Butter Pecan, Sundae, Rainbow Sherbet, Cookies 'n Cream, The Great Divide, Pistachio Almond, Bride's Cake, Raspberry Fudge Brownie, Krazy Kookie Dough, Mint Chocolate Chip, Cookie Two Step, Cherry Vanilla, Banana Split Sundae, Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, Naturally Vanilla Bean, Coffee, Chocolate Chip, Milk Chocolate, French Vanilla, Tin Roof, Banana Pudding, Rocky Mountain Road, and Strawberries & Homemade Vanilla.  Definitely a yummy party.

Thursday, March 7, 2019

Homeschool Complete Baseball Unit Study Review


It can be refreshing sometimes to try something new and C absolutely loves playing baseball.  He was so excited when I told him that we were going to dive a little deeper into his favorite sport using a Baseball Unit Study by Debra Arbuthnot from Homeschool Complete.  I received a physical copy of this three-week study about famous baseball players, the history of baseball and the science behind the game geared towards grades 4-6.  Homeschool Complete has several Unit Studies (K-6).  I have been using this with both D (grade 4) and C (grade 6).  This unit study includes lesson plans for all subject areas (Language Arts, Math, Social Studies, Science, Fine Arts, P.E., Character Development and Bible) as well as student workbook pages that reinforce the concepts within the study - hence the name Homeschool Complete.

I decided to put our study in a 3 ring binder

I made folders for the kids to keep their completed worksheets and pages organized.

The study has a list of suggested books to check out from the library.  I couldn't find all the books suggested at our local library but I found some as well as other books about baseball that I incorporated into our weeks.

I checked out several baseball books from our local library.

C and D working on their student worksheets

Learning about Casey At The Bat

Both kids really enjoyed researching the names of all the MLB teams.

C working on his baseball logo as part of art.

 C's Baseball Logo

 D's Baseball Logo

C working on his worksheets

Another view

 C looking at cheek cells in the microscope as part of science for the week.

 D looking at cheek cells

 Playing BINGO - the kids liked the numerous activities and games that were incorporated into our learning.

D's BINGO games


Playing Game with D

An example of the math section of a student worksheet


 Batting Practice

We finished this study right before C's 1st baseball game this season!  We all enjoyed it and I think this is a great example of how you can take a topic or interest and utilize it for study across all subjects.  I love that the planning work is done for you and that it is super easy to implement and teach.  I think the age level was right on target.  It was more challenging for D (4th grade) and easier for C (6th grade).  I feel that they both learned a lot.  I also felt that it was a great checking point to see what topics they were already familiar with and which concepts were completely new to them.  I would definitely recommend this program.

 C last night headed to his 1st baseball game of the season.

Be sure to click on the banner below to visit the Homeschool Review Crew blog to read more reviews of Homeschool Complete.

Homeschool Complete K - 4th Grade & Unit Studies {Homeschool Complete Reviews}

It was so fun to try something new with the kids and we all enjoyed learning more about baseball.  I look forward to checking out some of the other unit studies available from Homeschool Complete.  Let me know if you have any questions!

Crew Disclaimer 

Happy 41st Birthday David

David and I at our 1st house

Today, my husband and my best friend turns 41!  The kids and I have a super fun party planned for him on Saturday so stay tuned.  Happy Birthday David.  We are having Mexican tonight to celebrate you!  Hope you enjoy the oldie but goodie photo of us in our first home together.