A Flexible Schedule

"Are you done with school yet?" 

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Has anyone else been getting this question lately?  If you have a well-structured curriculum, and are not easily distracted from it, then you are probably at least almost done; if not, you know when you will be "done."  
On the flip side, if you are more like me, let's say "flexible,"
if you've changed curricula in the middle of the year, 
if you find it hard to stick to a set schedule,
if you take field trips and count them as school days, 

if your kids are crazy busy with a sport or two, 

if your children have a knack for finding stray animals that need your attention;

or any of the above, then you may not even know what it means to finish a school year.  
Since we are in the middle of our current curriculum, and we cannot continue through the summer as if it isn't summer, I've adopted a lighter plan for this time of year. 
What are we doing?  
Math - E is working through the Life of Fred books (currently on Farming); and Z will work through his Horizons 4;
Language Arts - they are both working on Language Lessons for the Very Young;
Handwriting (which gets pushed aside through the year) - E is working on Can Do Cursive and Z is on Cursive Success, both by Handwriting Without Tears; 
Reading -  I found some great logs and book report forms here. 

Art - E had wanted this Artistic Pursuits book after seeing it at a convention last summer, but only made it through a few lessons. 
Typing - This is more or less on an as-desired basis, but it's on their lists.
Science- another optional activity.  I found an online science summer camp from Supercharged Science.  The teacher offers quite a few free experiments if you want to check them out. 
Bible - I received my first issue of Thriving Family magazine by Focus on the Family this month, and in it was this summer bible devotion: Around the World in 60 Days.  It looks like just enough to get our days started on the right track.   

 So I'd have to say we aren't done, just doing things differently. 

Home-made Prints

This school year we have been using this edition of Artistic Pursuits for some of our art lessons.  I chose it because it is based on a history of art masters and because of the variety of art projects.  
So far we have done plenty of watercolors, tried some fresco drawings (on spackling paste), made a papier-mache model, mixed oil pastels, and now printmaking.  I think I've enjoyed the printmaking the best.  
I ordered a simple brayer and printing ink from amazon.  

Speedball Printing Ink (Water soluble!)

 

We used a 4 inch Speedball brayer (or roller)

On our art day we read the two lessons related to printmaking which happen to be lessons 17 and 18.  The artist focus was Albrecht Durer (1471-1528).  The format for all of these lessons consists of reading a brief description of the artist and how he became an artist  followed by an art project in one of his media in the first lesson, and then a picture study of one of his works followed by another project in the next lesson.  We usually do both lessons on the same day and then choose one of the projects to do. 

E is rolling her ink onto the wax paper.

Z is etching his design into the ink with the leadless end of a mechanical pencil. 

After making their etchings, they pressed a piece of paper onto the inked wax and made these beautiful monoprints.  (It's a monoprint because you can only make one print; you cannot re-ink and make another copy because you'll lose the etching).

Z's basketball player

E's stuffed animal tea party

While we've enjoyed some fun art times using this Artistic Pursuits volume, I have to admit I don't think we really learned much about the artists.  The artist lessons were too short to pique our interests in any of the artists.  That might be because it's written for early elementary students and mine are just past that stage.  Again, we have enjoyed exploring a variety of artistic techniques.  I think we have to go a little deeper into our artist studies next year to get even more out of our art times.