It's the most wonderful time of the year. . .

Well, almost. I've almost finished ordering all our homeschooling materials for the first half of the year, packages are arriving, apple-picking season starts in about two weeks, and the promise of crisp fall weather isn't too far away.

I'm organizing like crazy--we're trying a new system that's supposed to help with time management and encourage more independent learning. I joined the Workboxes yahoo group, which has tons of free information and lots of files available to peruse and print, and made a quick trip to IKEA for a couple of Trofast systems to help us get started. Will post photos when everything is in its place.

And I found a great resource for ideas and free Montessori printables today: MontessoriMom.

How are everyone's back-to-school or -homschool preparations going? Are we having fun yet? ☺

Impostor

This friendly visitor was too small to be a Monarch, so E. and I are pretty sure was a Viceroy (Limentis archippus). Plus it has the black line across the hindwing that distinguishes it from the Queen of Butterflies.

Book Sharing Monday 17 August

Quentin Blake's Tell Me a Picture is a new favorite in this house. The book was published to accompany an exhibit of the same name at London's National Gallery from February through June of 2001. This delightful book was published in the same year by National Gallery Company Limited, and published in the U.S. in 2003 by The Millbrook Press, Inc., now a part of Lerner Publishing Group, which also publishes Brian Cleary's Words are CATegorical grammatical picture books.

The artwork featured in the alphabetically-arranged book are pre-21st century paintings by artists such as Avercamp and Hopper, as well children's book illustrations by several artists. There is much to see in each work of art, but one of our favorites is Paolo Uccello's circa 1460 painting, Saint George and the Dragon:

Quentin Blake is well-known for illustrating many of Roald Dahl's zany chapter books and many other books, as well as authoring his own books for children. He was appointed the very first Children's Laureate of England in 1999.

Book Sharing Monday is hosted at Serendipity--head on over and see what other people are reading!

Playing around with iMovie

(Video fixed--uploaded the wrong file the first time.)

Hemaris thysbe, or the Clearwing Hummingbird moth, likes hanging out at the butterfly bush in our yard. I tried out iMovie for the first time with footage from outside today.

Playing in the background is "Strange Days," sung by Beoga on their cd, The Incident, as otherwise, the not-so-sonorous sounds of the neighbor's weedwacker would have been apparent.