#i changed my answer format so it reads better woohoo

[watermelinoe]

I liked the style of X/Y but I don't think it'd fit a LoZ game. I have entirely forgotten the looks of whatever came after. A Link between Worlds was... I won't say ugly because I do like it but, different. It was clearly the new version of aLttPs style, and that alone was enough for me to like the style. And the Maiamai were so cute, the annoying little brats. Getting themselves stuck in hard to reach places and crying about it. (1/5)

i liked the x/y overworld look, but to me all the 3d pokemon models just have this... lifeless quality to them or something, idk how to explain it. tbh it’s weird bc it’s gamecube but i liked how the pokemon looked in pokemon xd: gale of darkness lol. they actually look like they’re solid and a part of the environment they’re in. maybe it’s bc nintendo hasn’t updated the 3d models in a while that makes them look pasted in to me, i’m not sure. again, i liked the albw overworld look (and it was cool how they did the slanted top-down perspective in 3d!), but i thought the cutscenes looked a little goofy bc of the character models. but yeah i love those maiamai, i would die for their annoying asses fdkjsghkf

I know there’s a map for LoZ1 in Hyrule Historia, I’ve used it before. My mom got me LoZ2 when it was rereleased for the GBA, I played once. I do like the odd references to the game, such as the names and ‘it’s a secret to everybody’ but my do I dislike the game itself. I was alive when the 3rd and 4th games were released but only just. My mom bought a SNES when I was like 5 and I've been hooked on LoZ since. It's been a while... (2/5) 

aww, it’s so cool that your mom got you into zelda! my first video game was pokemon sapphire on the gba sp (it was a blue one). my mom learned to play pokemon so that she could help me when i got frustrated :’) and now she plays animal crossing so i help her with that. i’m glad i played zelda ii bc completion and the references are cool, but yeah it was just like, too hard in a not-fun way, but in that how-did-that-even-hit-me way lol. i don’t play very “hard” games tbh (maybe hollow knight? idk if people find that hard), but with most newer games the difficulty is intentional and not caused by the engine being weird (cough super mario sunshine). i like that nintendo games are so accessible, that you can decide whether to take on additional challenges or not

If it was about making clear they were just infected they should have altered the first and fourth boss too, but they didn’t. I do remember people saying Goht and Gyorg were very difficult and with the time limit it was a bit of a hard task. Their dungeons weren’t the easiest either, especially the water temple was a maze. But the original battles were so much more fun because they were hard, so I’m still bitter. Also, nostalgia. (3/5)

i think that’s fair, to me the boss battles didn’t leave that much of an impression, but if i had grown up with mm i’d probably notice the difference. like, i get why they didn’t actually render all the friend areas in the new pokemon mystery dungeon remake, but for me i remember being little playing it and i loved going through the actual camps seeing my teammates. so just having a menu feels like a letdown. nostalgia’s a valid reasoning tool imo and it is weird that they didn’t change the first and fourth bosses

Honestly, I would hate for LoZ to go actually realistic. While I love the way the FFVII remake looks I can’t imagine LoZ like that. But if it’s Zelda I’ll play anything once no matter how ugly I think it is. Nintendo doesn’t seem to have any plans for a new console yet so we might be in luck. Personally I’d rather have SS or the Oracle games rather than TP but they do love TP the most. It’s already been released for three consoles so what’s one more, right? (4/5)

honestly same. i know some people really want it, but for me hyrule warriors is abt as “realistic” as i want zelda to look (and i thought the twilight realms looked really cool in that game. i’d just make them slightly less colorful for an actual tp remake). i’d like it if nintendo focused on remakes for a while during this pandemic... i could be wrong but i’d think remakes are less work than a brand new game from scratch. ss and the oracle games are so underappreciated :’( idk how they’d have to reconfigure the motion controls for ss but i’d love to see it in hd. and the oracle games could be combined somehow... we’ll see. that one picture of mario in shorts eating a watermelon made everyone jump to sunshine remake, we’re all so desperate lmao

For BotW, I do hope it won’t be the whole game with Link and Zelda. Part of the ‘epicness’ of the games for me comes from the whole doing it alone. I’d love for the dragons to play a bigger part, of even for their existence to be explained. Ganon looks a lot like the WW zombies though, and those are even worse than the OoT ones. So I’d really rather not. But yeah, pulling whatever he is now from wherever he is now will probably involve loads of redeads. Woe is me. - Pokenon (5/5)

agreed! i still really want playable zelda, and i’m mainly a zelink fan lol so i like seein em together, but having zelda around the whole time would kind of kill the vibe bc every two seconds i’d be like “look at how cute she is!!” so i’m curious how it’ll play out. i’d like to see parts of the game with them together bc the only other game that did that was spirit tracks (also underrated...), but i feel like they’ll be separated somehow. i definitely wanna see more of the dragons. and tbh it does seem like we’ll be getting some undead action, i’m sorry. u can do it, i believe in u

also this is unrelated but a question for ALL the nintendo ladies out there: who do you wanna see in smash?

[oliviageorg]

How we Survived our First Day of Homeschool

We started Charlotte Mason homeschooling officially this August 2. Yay! If you have been following us--we actually started sometime around May.

It hasn't been easy but thanks to all the help and support from the Living Learning Homeschool community--we are confident this journey is going to be magical! Over the past few months, I have seen some key developmental progress in my homeschooler's intellectual, emotional/social, and relational skills.

Intellectually, Olivia can read better. She can read more challenging words--words with more than three syllables at the least. She has gained confidence in narration. She has also been able to retain knowledge as well as memorize prayers, songs, and verses, thanks to practice. She's also now able to tell time, understand the days of the week, and score using tally marks. But that's just a shortlist! I could go on!

Emotionally, she's become more expressive and empathic. She listens and pays attention. She's also gained some confidence. Most importantly, I think she's now realized that she's more mature now and that she can do things her own, that is why sometimes she complains when I do things for her or remind her to do things she has got to do.

Her relational skills have also improved. She now has more empathy and more patience. She's also developed more sensitivity to her surroundings and the people we live with together, including my Dad, her younger, as well as our house helper.

To see Olivia flourish is fascinating. And I could not be more excited!

How did we get here? How is it possible to transition from an online Montessori school to a Charlotte Mason-style homeschool? These are questions I'll try to answer in a separate post, but today let's focus on how we got to survive our First Day of Homeschool.

1. We Kept it Simple by Learning to Say No

When I started this homeschooling journey, I started to compile resources, online ebooks, guides, bookmarked pages, and of course, living books. I listened to podcasts, attended webinars, joined online groups, and made new friends.

I was armed with so many new ideas and wanted to do so many things!

But it got kind of unwieldy.

I know we like to think of ourselves as supermoms and it can be tough to say no. But the more you take in, the more complicated things will be for you.

So stop yourself from saying yes to more than what you can manage. Learn to say no.

Keep it simple by learning how to say no.

2. We Planned, but Kept our Schedules Flexible

As the saying goes, failing to plan is preparing to fail.

If you are a homeschooling mom of 3 and you don't have household help, you got to have a plan. If you have only 1 homeschooler, you still need a plan.

Having a plan helps you to keep your days organized. It gives you some sort of rhythm to follow.

A plan doesn't have to be perfect.

You have to make room for spontaneity and unexpected surprises. I know mothers like to be very much in control, but we have to learn to let go sometimes. If we fail to follow our plan, we can always pick up from where we left off the next day.

Don't sweat it out!

3. We Made it Sure We Were Having Fun

Charlotte Mason is about helping kids to develop their love of learning.

And that is what I want for Olivia.

So in the middle of our early explorations--when all we were doing were filling up Math worksheets (we did this every single day)--suddenly Olivia complains.

"I don't want to do Math."

That's not good. There must be something wrong.

Olivia was beginning to dread our lessons-- or at least she wasn't showing the excitement that I'd expected from her. It got me thinking--what can I do to make this exciting for her?

I stepped back and had to do a retrospective because what we had was not sustainable and fun.

I put myself in her shoes and tried to imagine what was going on inside her head every time we do our lessons.

I knew I had to change the approach and format of our lessons.

And so I started to incorporate games and added variety in our narration. For example, we would do pretend-play with her toys as narration instead of asking her to simply re-tell.

Also, every night Olivia and I make sure we talk about what happened during the day and give each other feedback, so we can improve on our weaknesses and faults--make our homeschool days better, happier, and more enjoyable.

Sorry if I didn't stay on point "How we survived Day 1" but for sure these tips would help you throughout your school year! I would love to hear your tips and suggestions. Would love to hear about your experiences.

Sharing here photos of Olivia's Day 1 .

Subject: Social Studies - Filipino History

Resources: The Fabulous Fiestas of the Philippines and The Myths and Legends of the Philippines

Keeping: Drawing of the Philippine Flag

Subject: Copywork

Resources: Cursive Writing by Schyrlet Cameron and Carolyn Craig and The Rhythm of Handwriting by Denise Eide

Accomplishment: We are done with all the small letters! Woohoo! And Olivia can already write her name in cursive!

Subject: MAPEH - Life Skills

Resources: Anything we can find :)

Activity: Olivia helped me bake cookies. She helped rolled the dough into circles.