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Jun. 2, 2008

Summer Break is Here!!!

Wow, where did the school year go? We just finished up last week and are now on our summer break. We should have plenty to do. Anna has several 4-H projects, Paul is in mini 4-H and just complete a model on Saturday that he will exhibit. The library reading program just kicked off and everyone has been reading, reading, reading. Caleb's current favorite book is Biscuit. He's just now starting to get the hang of it, but hopefully by the end of the summer, I might have THREE readers!! How cool would that be? He's at least more excited about learning now than he had been.

Today I decided that one thing we are going to do, from 1:00-1:30 is quiet reading time and then we will play games. I took a peanut butter container (empty and clean of course) and put games on a piece of paper. Each day we will take turns drawing a game to play. There were about 15 titles, all educational and games that I am willing to play. There's also several programs at the library that I want to attend. The theme this year is "Catch the Reading Bug!" so the programs are bug related. Then at the end of June is VBS at the church where we participate in our homeschool co-op. The theme is Power Lab and it's science related, so it should be really good. Over the 4th of July, we will be traveling to Wisconsin for a family reunion, the Lord willing of course. I about fell over when I filled our van yesterday.

One other thing we've done recently is put in a garden. It's the first one here in our new house and we had to fence it to keep the deer out. I think I crammed about as much as one possibly can into a 6'x30' space. We've got lots of compost, so hopefully everything will do well.

I've been a terrible blogger and hopefully can get back to this a little more regularly. Between just being busy and then computer problems, it's way too easy to get behind.

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Apr. 17, 2008

Busy, Busy!!

One doesn't realize how much they rely on their computer until it is no longer working. We have still been without our desktop for the past 3 weeks. Sharing a laptop computer is not fun, and not having all of the programs one would normally use it not fun either. Jason finished our taxes on the 15th and realized he could not print them out without hooking up the printer to the laptop. Finally he borrowed someone else's computer so he could get Quicken off of our desktop for me. It took me about three hours just getting everything up to date. Anyway, between all of the computer problems, we've been super busy at our church helping. Jason painted the church office last week and needs to finish it up this weekend. Last week we were also given some "new" furniture. The first piece is a secretary desk that we placed at the top of our stairwell. It holds all of our mail and a few misc things. With the way technology is these days, it's a piece of furniture that was probably used a lot more years ago, but hey it looks nice.

The second piece was a desk. We got rid of our old desk that I wanted to get rid of years ago, but it housed so much STUFF! it was a challenge getting things rearranged, but on Sunday I moved files around and cleared out a file cabinet, so things are a lot more organized now. Anyway, our friend Angie, she worked in an office that recently had the employees start working from home, So she was responsible for finding new homes for the furniture. A nice oak desk was donated to our church along with several file cabinets, bulletin boards and a bookshelf. We were given this desk:

Anyway, as you can see, they are nice pieces.

As for everything else, we have a few more weeks of school left and then will take a break. We have one week of co-op left. I had to laugh the other day because the kids have been using the microscope that they got for Christmas, Paul decided that he wanted to look at his urine and took a sample. The only reason that I knew what they were doing was because they were talking about it when I came down the stairs. Pretty interesting stuff going on around here.

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Apr. 4, 2008

Weekly Review....

Well I've not been on the computer much because our desktop crashed a week ago Tuesday and having to share dh's laptop is not ideal. He was hoping to get out desktop running again, but had to wait on parts from a friend and today he put everything together and nothing. So I'm not sure what his next plan is. Thankfully he knows somewhat of what he's doing, but I know it's frustrating when things don't work.

On another note, we put our cat Rajah down last Saturday. It was a hard weekend and I still find myself forgetting that he's gone. When I'm working in the kitchen, I keep thinking "Rajah, do you want to lick the plate?" When we first knew that Rajah didn't have much time left, we were talking about getting a kitten, but after prayer and thought, I really felt like it's not what we are supposed to do. My father in law and two brother in laws are allergic to cats and so the chance of them ever being able to stay with us when they visit is zero. So I really feel that we shouldn't do anything right now. The kids were upset the first few days, but seem to be doing well. I think it was harder for Jason and I since we'd had Rajah for almost 13 years.

School has been going well. We are currently doing a bean sprout experiment. We have beans in the window, closet, refrigerator and in an open area to see how well they all sprout. We have two co-ops left and the planning for next year is all finished. Paul has discovered books by Thornton W. Burgess and has been enjoying them. We've also been watching our plants come up outside and last night we planted some spinach seeds. Not sure how well things are going to do, we've seen deer prints in the yard.

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Mar. 21, 2008

Weekly Report!

Well we took a spring break this week, and it's been pretty busy. Tuesday we had a field trip about electricity put on by Tipmont REMC. It was a very good presentation. Wednesday we met our friends for a free breakfast at Chic-Fil-A. There is one more week of that and I think I'm going to be glad when it's over. Yesterday we worked around the house. Today we need to go to the library and get a few groceries. Tonight we have a Good Friday Service at church. I am baking cinnamon rolls this weekend for our church Resurrection service and I will be busy most of the day tomorrow with that.

I wanted to do something special for Sunday morning and this is what I came up with: they are tiny baskets made out of a rectangle of foam that has been stapled at each corner, they are stuffed with tissue paper and candy.

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Mar. 19, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!!

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Mar. 7, 2008

Weekend Review.....

Wow, I just love it when a one of my kids says "I want to do more math!" That's what Caleb just did a while ago and so how can you say no. It's been another good week here. We had a fun break on Wednesday morning and went to Chic-Fil-A with some friends. Chic-Fil-A is offering one free breakfast entree per person on Wednesdays for the month of March. We might be checking that out the next few Wednesdays! We also had about 6 more inches of snow Wednesday morning, so our afternoon recreation has been playing outside. Today, we are going to a Purdue Convocation to see Beakman Live!We are blessed to live in a college town where performances like this are normal and they give a big discount to schools for the daytime performance. A $3-5 performance is much cheaper than $20 for each ticket. Anyway, it should be a fun afternoon. I've found that anything to do with science is usually a good performance, any "play" has not been as good. The rest of our studies are just moving along as planned.
Anyway, that's what's been going on around here this week.

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Mar. 5, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!!

Jelly Stone Park St. Louis MO

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Mar. 1, 2008

Weekend Review.....

One more week down. It's hard to believe that it's March 1st already. The year sure is just flying by and pretty soon it will be spring. The high tomorrow is supposed to be 55 degrees. A heat wave for Indiana this time of year.

We had another busy week. I've been trying to concentrate on Caleb's reading and tonight he came up and asked me what a few words said, (They were Chess words, he read "Pawn" himself, but wanted me to read "Rook" "Knight" "Bishop" and he could tell Queen & King by the pictures. It's a start, I think getting his confidence up is the main thing. Tuesday we had co-op. Paul had a presentation for his Book Club class and Caleb brought home a container of dirt from his Science class. Everyone is enjoying co-op this year and I've been busy with the planning part of it for next year. I'm not sure how much longer I'll remain on the board, there are quite a few issues with in the co-op itself and I'm getting a little burnt out. The good news is, I am going to do a light load for co-op next year and just teach a k-st grade Bible class. It should be fun and require minimal prep. Back to here at home, I've been working on Anna's multiplication facts, there's still a few that she has a hard time remembering, but is getting better. Thursday morning I was able to go over to our church daycare and help out there between 7-8 and then Friday afternoon after we were done with school we ran errands and went to the library. Paul wasn't going to get anything, but after finding some Poppleton books, he decided he would. I'm still trying to get him to want to read more chapter books, but he's just not quite there yet like Anna.

Well that pretty much wraps up our week.

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Feb. 27, 2008

What's on your desk? Meme

Audrey at

Home Learning Adventures

tagged me... AGAIN! :)

Here's the original Meme-er :)

"What's on your desk?

You can tell a lot about a person by the state of their desk and what they keep on it. So, share what's on your desk. You can take pictures, take an inventory, or do both. Don't have a desk? That's okay, just give us a glimpse into the space where you pay bills, write letters, grade papers, study, or work on the computer.

When you've finished your photos or inventory, post it on your blog and tag five more people to do the same. Don't forget to share the rules with those you tag and ask them to share their posts with you when they are done."

Ok, I keep my desk fairly tidy, I can't stand it messy. This desk came from my Dh's parents all the way from Taiwan when they lived there. It's served us well over the years and hold A LOT of stuff. I would really like to get something else, but dh always says that we wouldn't have room for everything then. Trust me, I would find room. Oh well, it really doesn't hold a lot of homeschool stuff, just mainly household type information. I am currently working on a daycare menu for our church and co-op planning for the homeschool co-op that I'm in.

So here's who I'm going to tag:
Tina in WA

kokotg

Cookie Monster

Lori

Meliss

on 2/27/2008!

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Feb. 27, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!!

Taken here
My dh is a painter, so we thought it was cool.

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Feb. 23, 2008

OfF TrAcK ThIs WeEk!!!

    I really didn't want to get off track, and I really have no excuses! Life just seems to move so quickly sometimes and changes are always taken place. We've had two changes recently, one very exciting and the other one not so. So since I'm already off track, I wanted to blog about those two changes this morning before I get behind even further an not blog about anything!!
    The first thing exciting that's been happening is with our church. We've been with our small church & the same pastor for about 14 years. We have been known as the Nomadic tribe because we have never had a building of our own. Well that recently changed. Another congregation that had a building and 31 acres lost their pastor (he quit) and since we had done a few things in the past with this congregation, they called on our pastor for a temporary trial to see how things would go. After meeting with them for about two months, they asked us if we would join their congregation and church. Wow, what a change. It has been exciting and awesome to see God's hands in everything, now reality hits though and there are lots of little details to be worked out. They also have a Daycare & so our pastor has taken over helping get it on the right track. It has given a lot of our members new meaning and purpose though. Just today Jason is over helping to do some maintenance. Thankfully we live about four miles away. Anyway, that has been a big change in our lives and it has been exciting and will continue to be exciting to see how God works and grows the church.
    The other thing that has been a change that hasn't been pleasant has been with our cat Rajah, his health is going downhill. He's almost 13 years old and About two months ago he developed a limp that only got worse and he was losing weight. I finally took him to the vet and found out that he had pneumonia. The vet gave him a shot and told us to switch him to only wet cat food, get some weight back on him and bring him back in two weeks. He got a little better, but when I took him back two weeks ago, he had lost more weight. The vet said "I'll give you a freebie (shot) & bring him back in two weeks, if he doesn't gain weight then there's not much else we can do."   He also told us that there was a tumor in his right front shoulder, that's why he having trouble getting around and has a bad limp. (we could also feel the tumor and thought the same thing) He goes back in on Monday, he has gained weight, but his tumor has at least doubled in the two weeks and he's getting up to eat, use the littler box and that's about it. I hate to see Rajah go downhill so quickly. He's been such a loyal cat that I trust completely. He's been through bringing home all three children (and has grown to tolerate them )and he went from living in about a 900 square ft. house to last summer 1900 square ft. We had three cats at one point and with each child, the other two would start doing bad things(pooping/peeing.) Not Rajah, the only thing he did, when we brought Anna home from the hospital, he hissed at her. I know at some point we'll get another kitten, the kids have already started talking about it, but it doesn't make it any easier.   He's truly part of the family and will be missed. He is Jason's cat, he goes to Jason first and prefers Jason over anyone else. Anyway, I know change is part of life, but sometimes it's not very easy.

Taken several years ago!

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Feb. 15, 2008

Weekly Report!

Wow, another week has past! We made it through the week all healthy!!! I am VERY thankful for that. We had co-op on Tuesday and spent the week learning about the brain since that's what Paul learned about in his science class. Last night at the dinner table Caleb told us there were different kinds of clouds (something that he learned in his co-op class) We spent some time learning about Valentine's Day yesterday and made Molten Lava Cakes for dessert last night. Paul wanted to know if we were having heart shaped steaks for dinner! Today we're going to finish up our current read aloud and go to the library. We have math & writing to do first though. We better get started!

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Feb. 13, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!!

Thanksgiving 2006, visiting relatives.

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Feb. 8, 2008

Weekly Report! Friday, February 8th....

Well I wish I could say we got further along this week, but some of the kids have been sick. Anna wasn't feeling well Tuesday and so to rule out Strep, I took her to the Dr. She tested positive for influenza. Paul has been the healthiest. He finished his book White Bird and has also been reading the My Father's Dragon series and finished all three books. I'm trying to get him interested in some other early chapter books. He's been doing some independent paper airplane studies. Caleb has had a cold all week, but has still managed to do some reading work and math. The boys have spent extra time playing games, Go Fish, Life on the Farm & Sorry. Paul has been taking his deck of cards with him when we go out. Last Sunday I saw a group of boys playing Go Fish after church and Wednesday the boys were playing cards in the Dr.'s office.
Between resting and doing a light amount of studies, Anna has still managed to do some reading. I had The Daring Book for Girls on hold at the library that recently became available, she's been reading and along with her own library check outs. We've been reading Bed-Knob and Broomstick, by Mary Norton as our read aloud.

We started a lapbook on insects and I'm hoping to get it further along today. Next week I would like to do a study on Chocolate. There's just not enough time in the week to do everything that I would like!

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Feb. 6, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!! Dramatic Caleb

Caleb-Taken July 26, 2003, one of my favorite photos.

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Feb. 4, 2008

It's February ALREADY!!!

Oh my, I can't believe the first month of 2008 has already come to an end. It's February and it's our oldest daughters birth month. It's hard to believe that she will be 10 in less than a few weeks. Anna was supposed to be a March baby, but decided that she couldn't wait and was even born on grandmas birthday. I thought in honor of Anna, I would create a slide show of pictures through the years.

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Feb. 2, 2008

Weekly Report!

Here are a few things we did this week.
Anna has been reading about Betty Greene.
Paul has been reading White Bird for his co-op class.
We found a few current Ranger Rick's at the library. We used to check these out all the time before we moved and at our current library, it's harder to get them. Anna is wanting to learn about Chemistry, so I found a fun book called Periodic Table- Elements with Style! We also did an experiment from Adventures with atoms & molecules. We finished our Read Aloud this week, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basic E. Frankweiler. Everyone enjoyed it. Not sure what we'll move onto next. Our "big" project of the week was making a lap book for the multiplication facts.

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Feb. 1, 2008

Worked in school room...

The bottom pictures of our school room show it fairly clean. These pictures are what it looks like after a few months of actually using it. We had snow today, so all of the snow clothes are draped over chairs. We did a little bit of rearranging and this morning everyone was working on puzzles. Enjoy!

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Jan. 30, 2008

Wordless Wednesday!!

Taken in Midland, Michigan, known as The Tridge.

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Jan. 29, 2008

Happy 50th Birthday LEGO!!!!

Yesterday LEGO turned 50! Since I am such a cool mom and all of my kids enjoy playing with LEGO's, I thought that I would make a fun LEGO cake to celebrate. It was harder than it looked. The cupcakes did not cooperate and so they were shorter than I would have liked, but the kids thought it was cool anyway!

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