Here’s what I found one morning when I walked downstairs and found all four of his siblings sitting around eating breakfast, watching TV, with Dad in the family room right behind him . . . Yes!  Those are gum wrappers and he has eaten at least 8 pieces as fast as he can. 

Moms, does it ever feel like you’re the only seeing person in a family of blind people?  Why does no one else notice the 2-year-old scarfing down gum as fast as he can, until Mom comes downstairs?!?

So, how do I keep this little guy busy?  I enlist him to help me in whatever I’m doing.  He sits on the counter when I’m making sandwiches, catches the papers off the printer when I’m printing worksheets, draws circles while the other kids are writing, and anything else I can think to keep him busy. 

Here he is helping me hammer a little turtle stamp into some soap I made.  Only afterwards did I shudder a bit when I realized I’d just taught him how to use a hammer.  Eeek!

How do you keep your toddler(s) busy during a homeschool day?

photo by tomeppy

When the kids’ bedroom floors are covered with toys and I’ve got a painful imprint of a lego on the bottom of my bare foot, I vow to never buy another toy until the kids can take care of the ones they have.

What should I buy for gifts instead?  With birthdays coming up, I could really use some good gift ideas that AREN’T toys.  I’d love to find some ‘educational’ gift ideas that will keep my kids busy playing and learning, instead of toys that end up on the floor or stuffed under the bed.  Is it just wishful thinking?

Here are some ideas that have worked for me in the past:

• Board games – these have a cupboard, so they don’t contribute as much to the toy mess, and they get the kids playing and interacting together.  Some of our favorites are SET, Sequence for Kids,  Apples to Apples Junior,  Monopoly Junior,  Carcassonne, and Zingo.
• A Mini-Vacation.  A night at a local indoor waterpark was a hit for Christmas one year.
• A Microscope – We’ve really enjoyed our “My First Lab” Microscope.
• Snap Circuits - an awesome electronics board with projects and real circuit pieces easily manipulated by kid hands.

What about you?  Is there a ‘non-toy’ gift that your kids really enjoyed?  I’d love to get some new ideas.  Please share in the comment section. 

Thanks!

You have some great homeschooling blogs and ideas.  Would you like to share them with Homeschool Bytes readers?

I’d like to encourage more discussion and add new ideas to Homeschool Bytes by inviting readers to contribute a few guest posts. 

You would keep all rights to your article and are encouraged to link to your blog/website.  Networking like this is an excellent way to share what you know and bring more readers to your own site.

Ideas for articles are:

• Curriculum Reviews.
• Homeschool How-To articles.
• Online resources and websites.
• Homeschool Life Ideas.
• Activity Ideas.
• Homeschool Co-op information.
• Parenting and Household Tips.
• Any other good idea you have

If you have an article in mind, or one already written, please email me (Misty) at turtlebalm (at) gmail.com with your idea and/or article.

Thank you!

I’m trying to do a Blog Tune-Up and I need your help - would you mind if I pick your brain for a moment?  Could you take second and write me a quick comment on what you think?

I started this blog last August in an attempt to

1. Share some of the homeschooling resources, ideas, and tips I’d come across day to day. 
2. My other hope was that the blog would develop a sort of community feel with parents commenting, giving feedback, and sharing their own great ideas and suggestions.

I feel like I’ve been trying to do #1 most of the time, but #2 hasn’t really happened.  When I look at my blog traffic, most of it comes from search engines, which means people are looking for a certain topic, find one of my articles, read it, and then move on.  Not very many stay or come back to read new material.

So, I thought that maybe I could do a better job meeting your needs and encouraging your feedback and involvement if I asked you what I could do better.

So, I’d love to read a comment from you about:

• What you like about HomeschoolBytes.
• What you don’t like or isn’t really of use to you.
• The kinds of posts I should write more of.
• Challenges you/others have homeschooling that I could address.
• Resources you need help finding and would love some ideas about.
• What you think I could do to make the blog more inviting for readers to comment and come back daily to read.
• Any great ideas you have!! 

I’ve always been impressed with how much homeschool parents know, and how helpful they are.  So, if you have a second and could help me out . . . Thanks in advance for the good advice!

I hope you enjoy the site, leave comments, and send me your homeschool tips and ideas.

The real title to this post should be: “Why Would A Busy Homeschooling Mom Of 5 Kids Under The Age Of 8 Be Crazy Enough To Start A Blog?”

So, here is what I was thinking:

1. To save a few trees and share great homeschooling information with friends.

I’ve been homeschooling for a while, and have uncovered a lot of great resources in many different areas. When I’m talking to fellow homeschoolers, I’ll mention a website, a curriculum, or a good place to get a deal, and invariably they ask me to repeat myself or jot the info down on whatever scrap of paper I can dig out of the diaper bag.

Also, our house is cluttered, and I hate all those little bits of paper floating around the house. So, I try to keep everything on the computer – it takes up less space. Plus, it is much easier to search a computer directory than to dig behind the entertainment center where a stack of post-it notes got blown when the kids ran by with blankets over their heads being ‘ghosts’.

So I want to put everything in one place with this blog. So, less clutter, and when I want to share with a friend, I won’t have to dig for crumpled Post-Its and use the pencil with a half broken lead I found buried in the debris of our minivan’s floor. I’ll just have to direct them to my fancy new website. . . Oh, and I’ll probably have to spell ‘Bytes’.

“Homeschool Bytes?”

“Yes, like the computer bytes, as in little packets of information.”

“Bites?”

“No, not bites with an “I”. I know that’s what it sounds like, but it’s a homonym . .”

“Homonym?”

Ok, maybe crumpled Post-Its aren’t so bad after all.

2. To create a one-stop shopping for homeschool info.

I don’t know about you, but getting 5 kids in and out of car seats limits our shopping trips to one store, or two if it’s a life-or-death sale. I know I really love and appreciate it when I can get everything I need in one store, and I’d like to be able to do the same with homeschool information.

I know, with the huge amount of homeschool information and resources out there, it would be impossible to put it all in one place. But, I’d like to at least try.

And it’s all about the ‘bytes’. I don’t have time to read through the oceans of information out there and really appreciate resources that condense it all and just give me quick, to-the-point ‘bytes’ of useful information. That’s my goal here – useful, and occasionally funny, bytes of homeschool information – everything (Ok, many things) you need to know, all in one place.

3. To collect information from all of you.

If there is one quality of homeschooling parents I love, it’s your pursuit of knowledge and willingness to share and help others. You sacrifice every day to help your children get the best education possible, and love to help others do the same.

So many of your conversations with each other are full of tips and helpful advice:

“I just found this great book. . .”

“That curriculum worked well for my daughter, but I found that my son was able to do better with . . .”

“I’ve found this technique keeps me from screaming at my kids at the end of the day . . .” J

So, I am hoping to create a place that homeschool parents can contribute their expertise to the community as a whole, and we can all benefit. Please add your comments, advice, experiences, and even frustrations, so we can all benefit.

Here goes – We’ll see how it turns out.

Misty

P.S. Reason #4: And for my entrepreneur side, if this were to make a bit of money on the side somewhere in the future, I wouldn’t be opposed to the idea. It would help me brush up on my homeschool math skills, after all.