Caramel, Clay, Scrabble, and Siddhartha

For first-time visitors: My 13yo son, Lu, and I have been homeschooling for five years. This year, Lu wanted to start a goat farm. He got his first goat at the end of last November, and now has six goats - three of which were born here, that Lu delivered himself.

Having goats means waking up very early to milk the goats, many hours of grazing on the mountainside behind our house, coming home to make cheese (we are getting LOTS of cheese), keeping their water bowls full and clean, and occasionally cleaning the goat pen. So, Lu is a very busy boy.

Just look at that tired little face. 

It's around 9:30am when he's done making cheese, 

he's already been up and at'em for 4 hours, 

and it's time to start school.

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We've been playing Scrabble over breakfast almost daily. 

Lu has now beaten me a few times and suddenly LOVES the game :)

I'm the family Scrabble champion, so this is a pretty big deal,

and I'm thrilled to finally have some real competition!

 After breakfast, it's time for reading.

Lu is currently reading Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse.

We had a blast sculpting this week,

it was so much fun!

 I'm not very artsy/craftsy, 

but I think my purple Mama goddess came out pretty awesome :)

And I love the combination of these two <3

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One evening Lu decided he was going to make caramel out of 10 liters of milk that had accumulated. He started at 4pm and continually stirred the milk until 10pm. It wasn't until about the last hour that we could actually start seeing a change in color and texture. He says we'll have to eat it slowly because he doesn't plan on doing that again for at least another year! It was a helluva job.

Other stuff we're doing that I didn't get pictures of this week: 

Geography review - capitals of Americas, Europe, and Asia

Documentary series "Journeys to the End of the Earth"

Dance improvisation class with other kids

Music composition with Garage Band

Making a poster of the Periodic Table

Guitar practice

Algebra

And that's about it for this post! No insightful ideas on how to deal with teen-agers (but please do pass them along if you have any :) No step-by-step activity descriptions. No book reviews or analysis of our homeschool style. Just some of the cool stuff we get up to with the freedom that comes with homeschooling.