End of One Thing Beginning of an Other

Hey everyone. I hope this holiday Monday finds you all well. Over the past weekend Emily and I wrapped up the Farmers' Market Season with a vendors' picnic. We had enough food to feed an army and lots of fun. Besides providing the hot dogs and buns, I took orzo salad and Water Gate salad. For those of you who have never heard of Water Gate salad, it is a beautiful and light dessert which is quick and easy to  make.

Water Gate Salad

2 boxes instant pistachio pudding

2 containers whipped topping

2 cans crushed pineapple

2 cups miniature marshmallows

1 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

In a large bowl mix whipped topping and dry pudding mix. Once the pudding is thoroughly mixed in, add both cans of pineapple juice and all. Lastly, stir in marshmallows and nuts. The mix will be a little thin but once it is chilled for an hour or two it will thicken back up and have the consistency of  mousse.

Emily and I also have a solid week of home schooling behind us now, and it went well. She is loving Spanish which we are doing online through Duolingo. I assign her 75 points of homework a day, but she is going above and beyond and doing 100 plus points. For a child not usually self motivated, this is a wonderful thing.

And I wrapped the week up with two books perfect for back to school. The first was Sounds All Around a 1st level Science Let's Read Aloud Book. The books is wonderful right from the start with fun end papers worth looking at for more than a second, to the highlighted vocabulary words describing sounds and the body parts we use to create those sounds and those used to hear those sounds, illustrations that help carry the story along, and fun activities to wrap things up. While good for any child, this book would be especially nice for young home schoolers.

The second book I read was Over On A Mountain Somewhere in the World which takes the reader through each continent. Pay special attention to the illustrations by Jill Dubin who created these wonderful works of art from textured papers. This story involves counting and the story can be sung to the tune of "Over in the Meadow" which makes it a perfect book for pre-schoolers.

Well, that about wraps it up for this week. Join me next week, same crazy time, same crazy channel. Also be sure to drop by Literacy Musings Mondays for more great blogs as well as my personal website Fun With Aileen where you will find more on reading, writing, and my very own chapter and picture books. And finally, you can find me on twitter if you want an extremely brief glimpse into my days.