Feb. 18, 2006 - The Saturday of Snow and Ice
Yes, that's actually a first for us... in a long time anyway. The rest of the winter up until now has been incredibly warm ~ quite often in the 70's. It was odd to come out of Kainan's game last night and have to have Dh scrape the windshield!
Anyway ~ because of the wether, I had to cancel my mom get together to watch the Creating the Balance video. 
I spent a good portion of the day trying to plan out our menu for the week ~ trying to incorporate the dietary things that I want to implement for everyone. Healthier, more natural foods... even more whole grains, more proteins, and less refined/processed anything. That was certainly a challenge on a tight budget! Any ideas out there for inexpensive healthy stuff? Recipes? Any tips? (Other than planning to cook from scratch for pretty much everything... and that still doesn't appear to be cutting it... but at least I can start heading in the right direction anyway)
So ~ that just about sums up my day. That, and reserving library books for school next week.
Jan. 9, 2006 - Productivity
Well, I ended up with almost all of my Saturday list done, but SUndays only got about half done. I'd forgotten Sprite was babysitting, so we had two extra kids all day, and I'd invited friends over for dinner at 5:30... So, needless to say, once you get church, lunch and grocery shopping out of the way, there isn't much time left in the day to do much else!
Anyway, today we have a birthday party to go to in the middle of the day, so I'm hoping I can still find some semblance of order int he school day. Actually, we only have to take Abyni and drop her off... so it should be too bad. I'll probably just leave the other kids here watching one of their science videos while I run her over there.
So that's all for now ~ I actually have my school stuff all planned out! Yay! And I'm going to wake up the kids early... so maybe they'll start getting to bed a little earlier and give me and Dh a little more uninterrupted time in the evenings. I could really --use that right now!
Jan. 7, 2006 - Sunday "To Do" list
Because I keep forgetting that I want to get this done:
*Sew up kitchen curtains!!!
*Paint more trim around girls room OR paint kitchen cabinet doors if they got sanded.
*Have Kainan do the math and figure out how many words I can fit around the wall border/perimeter.
*Have Dh adjust bench under boys bunk so I can finish the wall there.
*Get out matt cutter and matt & frame Pictures
*And something else I keep forgetting... which I will remember at 11:59 Sunday night:)
BTW ~ The sand the cabinets for extra computer time is still on today!
Jan. 7, 2006 - Saturday "To Do" list
Things I'd like to get done today:
*Organize and write/type out lesson plans for two more weeks.
*Reserve any needed library books (Find reading books for boys!)
*Clean downstairs bathroom thoroughly, including mopping
*Clean girls room (with their help) thoroughly and vacuum.
*Clean upstairs bathrooms with kids & vacuum
*Finish one full layer on tree
*Clean hard to reach/missed spots (under couches, etc) in kids cleaning areas
*Do at least two loads of laundry to finish
*Change newspaper in dresser (to rid of "old" smell) I actually just gave up on that... and the smelly horrible dresser is going to the garage. It smelled WORSE than before all the baking soda.
*Find some way to organize Dh's clothes without his dresser
*Open windows and air out house when it gets warm
*Clean in garage a bit if time.
*Have Kainan & Sprite deep clean in kitchen, Jaedin spot-mop, Paris clean mirrors, Abyni dust.
Have kids sand kitchen cabinet doors... to earn extra computer time.
Jan. 5, 2006 - Almost time for school
I have my planner pages made and printed out ~ and note for planning all done, so now all I have to do is put the info into the chart and I'm ready to go next week with an "official" schedule. This week I'm just doing general inventions and whatnot ~ introducing the subject, and starting out with some new books.
We're starting school at 9:30 (and I have been up by 6:30 two days in a row!) and I plan to move that up to 9:00 by next week. Then we can be done earlier, and I can get other things done.
My wrists are hurting me again, so pretty much all I'm capable of doing is folding alundry and planning school stuff. Yay. I'm not thrilled, since there is so much physical stuff I really need to be doing, but I'm not willing to completely lose the use of my hands either.
Anyway ~ off to school!
Jan. 4, 2006 - I managed to get in the mood (and school got DONE!)
I spent 30 minutes this morning organizing my next school unit, (actually, for the most part, making a chart to fill out with Konos stuff for each day. So all I'll have to do is open up my folder and "go" for the day. ) I thought it was pretty cool.
So when I went back to open it up again, it was in some weird file format and won't open. GRRR!
I'm glad I didn't spend any longer on it!
Anyway ~ I found out today that the grocery down the street does money orders, so I only had to go right around the corner to pay bills today! YAY!! I am very much anti-driving/leaving the house lately. Now that we have a "me" house, its become even more so. I think I could just curl up and stay home for a month if someone occasionally came to visit.
So, in addition to a FULL school day (we even did math AND history!) I paid bills, started organizing school unit for the next few weeks, and got a pot roast started for dinner. I am refusing to paint today, since my wrists are obviously pretty worn out. I don't want to end up gimpy for another month. I will go up later and do paper mache some more (yes, yet MORE layers) and finish scheduling out some more school. Other than that, I am going to relax. Maybe do some scrapbook stuff.
School Today:
MegaMath subtraction
Archimedes (individual reading & narration)
Cheaper by the Dozen (Readaloud) ~ Was hilarious today, I had tears in my eyes I was laughing so hard...
Copywork (Thank you letters to Uncle Denver & his family)
Bible time
Spell It Deluxe &/Type to learn (one or both, depending on each childs time available)
Reading (independant) I need to find some different books for the boys. Paris is actually reading a book she got for Christmas, the "Three Cousins Detective" book/series. I'm letting her read it mainly to get her started on the series, then she'll have to read that on her own.
Jan. 4, 2006 - I am sooo not in the mood
It is really time to finish organizing and planning our school thing. Ugh. I am not in the mood. I have reserved (and picked up now) most of the books that we have from the library for our unit. I have found and picked out devotional topics, etc. I have NOT however planned out a daily schedule, activities and such.
With the big move, the end of November through December was jind of hit and miss... I think we did a lot, it just wasn't strictly scheduled, and certainly wasn't all planned out in advance. I didn't particularly care for it. I really want to get back in the groove and do things properly this month... this semester.
I have had out my binder and notebook three times now and I just can't seem to even think of what to do. I am not feeling inspired, and it seems to just make everything harder.
I suppose what I need to do (knowing me) is make a chart type thing on Word and use that to fill in the blanks and the schedule. I do so much better with that. I think I'll set something up liek that today.
In addition, I want to make a new schedule. I've started getting up earlier. Before 7:00 (WOW!) so I want to move our school day up a lot. I'm going to start getting the kids up 1/2 hour earlier this week (8:30 instead of 9:00) and next week I'll start waking them at 8:00. Then we can have school started by 9:00.
So, I guess I'd better get busy.. all that talk has inspired me:)
