Art: my new lifesaver!

Abigail: completely in her element...she's a happy camper!

Audrey An: a little shy about it all.  a little sensitive. a little hesitant. but it's all okay in the end...

Americans, Chinese, Aussies, Koreans, Vietnamese...love it!

experimenting with mixing colors

Today, was the result of many months of trying to find a group for my girls in which to be a part.  It's been a little difficult to find our "niche" in the home school world out here so I decided to start one of our own.  They were SO excited, and we were thrilled to have such a great group who were interested in joining us!  David and I really want this school year to be different for the girls in lots of ways, and I feel like I'm making some good progress in getting them involved in some extracurricular activities that will help shake things up a bit from our last semester.  If I can get a bit more mobile and closer to the areas where we spend most of our time that will help us tremendously, and we're working on that!

Their first lesson was shading light to dark and mixing colors.  I liked it when the teacher asked, "Is it okay if we get a little messy? I'd like to bring in some clay and other things.  I might take them outside to do some landscape sketches, too."  AH, yes...It's perfectly fine with me!  That to me was the sign of a good teacher who's been at it for awhile.  So, I really think this is going to be a lifesaver- for ALL involved.

Audrey An had a tiny melt down though.   When the teacher redirected her to use crayons instead of the oil pastels she took that as being in trouble, bless her heart.  Her heart is so sensitive to any correction or redirection (or perceived discipline), and we've really had to work on that lately. The teacher made the comment to me, "Oh, you've only had her two years?  You all are still trying to figure each other out aren't you."  I had to think about that for awhile.  Yes, I totally forget sometimes that she's not been in our family since birth (it seems as though she has!) and part of her insecurity about "doing things right" is partly in her blood, partly in her adoptive family blood (!), partly that she's just 6, and partly still trying to measure up to Abigail.  She's constantly checking to see how all the others did it.  She desperately wants to fit in, make sure "she's ok", and needs lots of affirmation.  We worked through her little melt down, exchanged lots of hugs and kisses and I gave her the stamp of approval on her art.  Now, granted, part of the "redirection" was because little energizer bunny (who has great difficulty sitting still for very long and listening to directions) had, in fact, not heard the directions.  Yes, we are working on listening ears (as well as her daddy...lol!!!).