{"id":16600,"date":"2016-02-23T14:22:57","date_gmt":"2016-02-23T03:22:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/?p=16600"},"modified":"2017-03-07T14:12:08","modified_gmt":"2017-03-07T03:12:08","slug":"homeschooling-so-far","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/homeschooling-so-far\/","title":{"rendered":"homeschooling so far…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"2016-02-18_0031\"
\ndearest Pixielove,<\/p>\n

today you officially turned 6 months away from turning 4 in August. at your age, many have gone to pre-schools. but i made the brave decision of staying with you and choosing to homeschool you myself. you might wonder why?<\/p>\n

because i didn’t wanna miss it. and when i say ‘it’, i meant everything! all the fleeting moments. all your ‘firsts’. all the times when i gasp in awe at you. and yes, even all your meltdowns count, too. and i believe more in the idea of learning real daily life experiences and skills, absolutely at your own pace, with having all the freedom\u00a0of discovering anything, making mistakes along the way, follow your own interests , meet anyone at all ages\u00a0and be flexible with all\u00a0of our time together (like having\u00a0beach trips and nature trips any time our hearts desire). because i know someday you’ll hit that age when you’ll be on your own so while that’s not happening anytime soon yet, i love us to savour these days while our circumstances allow us to be able to homeschool you,too. and above all these, i hope you’ll become a strong thinker, learner and doer by having\u00a0the biggest influence from me and your Papa. eventually, you’ll build your own strong character and true\u00a0independence so we want to foster that naturally with time.<\/p>\n

we don’t really have a perfect blueprint\u00a0how we go about our days and that’s the beauty of it all because we are never on a hurry. we wake up \u00a0as early or as late. I prepare breakfast while you wait on your pink chair or playroom doing whatever it is you want to do first. or sometimes i let you crack the eggs for our omelette, too. or we bake muffins or cookies for snacks together. we sometimes sing along our ukelele even while we’re eating. then we head out to water our lil kitchen garden. one time, i showed you an earthworm and we stared at it as it wiggled and wiggled back into the ground. how amazed we both were! “Look Mama, I see the worm’s bobot.” (bobot for butt)\u00a0<\/em>you’ve learned how to sow seeds now and enjoys pulling carrots out when they’re ready for harvest. when we’re done with gardening, you go about free playing in the backyard, chasing little bugs or just running around. before lunchtime, we pick up specific activities like painting or writing\u00a0letters. i let you watch kids or\u00a0documentary\u00a0videos too, recently you’re fascinated with ‘Walking with Dinosaurs’ via netflix. the way you remember those dinosaur names is seriously funny! we still have naptime wars time to time but i love that you always prefer that we read aloud your favorite books before you eventually nap in the afternoon and before bedtime. our late afternoons now usually involves biking around neighborhood and exploring places.<\/p>\n

homeschooling you is going to be a commitment i’m willing to take for as long as you’ll love it too. we have another 2 years more to enjoy these times before we decide later if you want go officially to primary school like all the other kids do. i may not always\u00a0know what i’m doing, too (parenting and homeschooling at the same time) but that’s okay coz we are both learning. i have to say sorry for the times\u00a0when Mama loses my patience and at my wit’s end. truth be told, i’m learning more from you really.<\/p>\n

all of life’s battles will always be worth fighting for…because of you.<\/p>\n

loving and growing along with you always,
\nMama<\/p>\n

p.s.\u00a0here are some photos i’ve gathered recently. some snaps from instagram. i wish i have more photos together of you and me in these shots so you’ll also remember me more too in these moments when you look back at them.<\/p>\n

\"2016-02-23_0001\"it’s been about 5 months since we started our little kitchen garden and it’s been the most rewarding thing we look forward each day!<\/p>\n

\"2016-02-18_0025\"you’ve grown so so so tall, you sure can reach the freezer by yourself. bad news if there’s ice cream there.
\n\"2016-02-18_0026\"counting and identifying colors while we bake…
\n\"2016-02-18_0027\"you helped me build our funny little Christmas tree from twigs and branches we picked out from the backyard. you told me, “Mama, i love our tree. it’s different!”<\/em><\/p>\n

Christmas is over but until now, we didn’t put our tree down yet. \ud83d\ude42
\n\"2016-02-18_0028\"oh how i loveeeee how your little curls have grown lil longer now!!! you share the same hairstyle\u00a0from your grandmas.
\n\"2016-02-18_0029\"\"2016-02-18_0030\"
\nyou are my queen of happy.\"2016-02-18_0032\"i am extremely proud how you’ve learned to love books so much. Sorry if Mama and Papa may get tired reading sometimes because\u00a0you are one persistent little lady and won’t stop exploring and reading a pile more once we get started.
\n\"2016-02-18_0001\"\"2016-02-18_0002\"\"2016-02-18_0003\"\"2016-02-18_0004\"\"2016-02-18_0005\"I manage to take the tripod out for a quick photo of you and me. Amidst home chores, this takes another amount of energy really but I promise I’ll take more time out for this because i need to remind myself, you can only be so young once.
\n\"2016-02-18_0006\"\"2016-02-18_0007\"That rare time when Papa can get home early when not busy at work. I quickly took it while you both didn’t notice. Priceless.
\n\"2016-02-18_0008\"\"2016-02-23_0007\"\"2016-02-18_0024\"Some warm days we spent in the backyard pool…
\n\"2016-02-23_0004\"We have a very serious relationship with the beach…so while Summer’s here, I won’t mind travelling a distance alone with you on weekdays, pushing a stroller and carrying a beach umbrella.<\/p>\n

\"2016-02-23_0008\"
\nUkelele sing-along\u00a0fill most of our days.
\n\"2016-02-23_0005\"
\n“Mama, can you buy me my own microphone!?”<\/em><\/p>\n

And so I did. found a inflatable one for just $2 and you’ve been the happiest and playing pretend your own singing show. Cracked me so much! Who knows you might just fulfill my other frustration of\u00a0singing dreams haha \ud83d\ude42
\n\"2016-02-23_0006\"here we did a little fun experiment with test tube vases, sun reflections and flower discoloration inspired from another\u00a0homeschooling blog.
\n\"2016-02-18_0009\"\"2016-02-18_0010\"\"2016-02-18_0011\"watermelon is love!!!
\n\"2016-02-18_0012\"\"2016-02-18_0013\"a glimpse of your playroom currently…
\n\"2016-02-18_0018\"learning arts.
\n\"2016-02-18_0014\"
\n\"2016-02-18_0015\"\"2016-02-18_0016\"\"2016-02-18_0017\"\"2016-02-18_0022\"\"2016-02-18_0019\"when not playing with blocks, you do imaginative play with your farm animals and dinosaurs.
\n\"2016-02-18_0020\"\"2016-02-18_0021\"whenever we can, you do and love\u00a0yoga routines too. looks like i really need to buy another yoga mat now because you have obviously taken over mine.
\n\"2016-02-23_0010\"the day Mama fully assembled\u00a0the front wheel, mudguard, handle bar, front brake, and childseat by myself\u00a0\ud83d\udcaa<\/u><\/i>\ud83d\ude01<\/u><\/i>\u00a0(yep just me!) and yey! finally back to my lifelong love of biking again!\u00a0\ud83d\udeb2<\/u><\/i>\ud83d\udeb2<\/u><\/i>\ud83d\udeb2<\/u><\/i>\u00a0and with you as my my co-pilot, you sure were\u00a0as thrilled as me! we have since been\u00a0cruising happy days together to whereever we wanna be!\"2016-02-18_0023\"\"2016-02-23_0009\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

dearest Pixielove, today you officially turned 6 months away from turning 4 in August. at your age, many have gone to pre-schools. but i made the brave decision of staying with you and choosing to homeschool you myself. you might wonder why? because i didn’t wanna miss it. and when i say ‘it’, i meant …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16632,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1161,1169,4],"tags":[543,911,912,905,891,779,366,907,908,909,582,906,910],"class_list":{"0":"post-16600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-aside","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dear-pixielove","8":"category-homeschooling-pixie","9":"category-lifes-musings","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-gardening-australia","12":"tag-kitchen-garden","13":"tag-letters-to-pixie","14":"tag-life-in-australia","15":"tag-lifestyle-portraits","16":"tag-motherhood","17":"tag-personal-family-blog","18":"tag-reid-cycles","19":"tag-reid-vintage-bike","20":"tag-sydney","21":"tag-toddler-life","22":"tag-vintage-bike","23":"post_format-post-format-aside"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/2016-02-18_0024.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16600"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17343,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16600\/revisions\/17343"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/josephinesicadphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}