Bunny Ears

I guess I mean this to be mostly a homeschooling blog, if only because that is the main thing that I am doing with my life right now—homeschooling my older two boys.  However, as I explained in my last post we are on a one-month hiatus from formal ‘lessons’, so even though I probably should be planning lessons for next month or searching for new materials to use when we get back to it, instead I’m ‘obsessively obsessing’ about my latest craft crush, the Lovey Blanket project from Deborah Moebes’ Stitch Savvy.  I first encountered this project while searching ‘Lovey Blanket’ on Pinterest (because lovies in general are my favorite thing for babies).  I was thrilled that her book was available from the interlibrary loan system, and when it arrived at my local library I happily dove right in.

Well.  It’s a beautiful project but the written instructions, the step-by-step photos and the pattern all leave much to be desired.  I love the final result so much, though, that I’m determined to make do and push through, and figure it out on my own with the hints I can manage to glean from her instructions.  So far I cut out the fabric and made the ears.  As it turns out, when I cut the fabric according to the pattern and sewed the ears using a 3/8” seam as the instructions told me to, I got ugly little skinny ears with no voluptuous ‘flop’ to them.  I’m going to try again, and now I wonder if I should cut all the pieces for the head bigger so that he doesn’t come out with a skinny, ugly little head. 

Here are the ears, my first attempt:

Their Own Thirst for Knowledge

When I started reading about homeschooling years ago ( when Primo was a toddler) I gravitated right away toward eclectic, middle of the road methods, and definitely *not* unschooling.  Over the years that hasn't changed-- though some of our friends and many of our friendly acquaintances would describe themselves as unschoolers, the idea of 'child-led learning' just doesn't work for me.
But.
Even though I'm happy with so many things about the way we do 'education' in our home, I wish the boys would get more excited about learning.  They tend to be cheerful and compliant when it comes time for lessons, and they are sometimes enthusiastic about particular parts of our routine (science experiments, history and science lessons that one of them reads and then teaches to the other, taking turns reading Latin stories aloud).
But.
We are avid readers in our family, and we spend a lot of time at our local library.  I make good use of the 'interlibrary loan' service offered by our region's libraries, and yesterday was not unusual-- there were 10 books waiting for us at the check-out counter.  Said each of the boys in turn, "Are there any fun books waiting for us?"-- meaning novels, recently published middle-grade novels about fantasy or funny situations.  8 of the 10 books were about Christopher Columbus and other explorers, and I had taken great care to choose interesting, high-quality, and in some cases beautiful books.  I felt a little crushed when the boys asked about 'fun' books.  After nearly 6 years of homeschooling, don't picture and activity books about explorers count as fun?  What can I do to awaken in them their own thirst for knowledge?
There are glimmers of light at the end of this tunnel.  Several months ago the boys chose a book called Stronger Than Steel about scientists looking to replicate the properties of  spider silk.  On this recent trip to the library I brought home two science-themed books, one of them called One Minute Mysteries: 65 More Short Mysteries You Solve With Science and I found Primo reading it over his dessert later that night.  It wouldn't have to be science, I'd be happy with either of them taking an interest in anything that has to do with the real world-- really, almost anything at all (I'm sure there are exceptions, I just can't think of them at the moment).