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Mimi and Big Daddy came to visit on Friday. While we didn't get as many pics as we would have liked (probably because so much time was spent doing other things LOL), here are some!

Before they arrived, upstairs making Mimi's bouquet--of pens!

Air Hockey tournament with Big Daddy:

The results??

He is LITERALLY jumping up and down here:

And because this one was too funny to pass up--glad I got out there in time for a pic!:

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Well, I finally bought what I needed to make hairbows. Actually, I HAD the findings and wire and glue gun for this, but they got lost in the move. Jeffery is going to clean out the garage on his vacation, which means I'm sure they will turn up (plus, I bought more, so that will definitely make them turn up, right? ) but in the meantime, I'm so so so happy to be back to making boutique bows! And you know, honestly- once I have the ribbon and wire cut, I can make three of these in less than 10 minutes. So, they are not at all difficult, and "fancying them up" is pretty easy, too! Just takes creativity!

I've also started making beaded jewelry for myself and my three girls, and you can see pics below.

Hairbows:

This was made to match the necklace (which I did NOT make, and now cannot believe I spent $12 on, EACH!! (so, $36), last Christmas. Well, they did have a letter charm on them, but in hindsight, that does not make them worth $12 each for plastic beads with no real rhyme or reason. I suppose since we bought them at Disney, it should be no surprise, though.) Anyway, at least she now has a hairbow to match it LOL

And here is some of the jewelry I did over the weekend. Didn't get a chance to get pics of everything, but here is some at least:

Earrings and bracelet set for the twins (I am still working with my camera on focusing on what I WANT it to focus on. Stubborn!!):

Something I made my other mother in law:

The earrings to match:

Grandma and the kids, right before they all headed out to Sea World, leaving Jeffery and I child-free! (and Mimi, there are the shirts! LOL)

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Tuesday evening, we were driving home from taking the twins to their dentist appointment and noticed that there were not one, but TWO rainbows...and on top of that, they were both whole rainbows! Oh, and we were "following" it, and it turned out, as we pulled into our neighborhood, that the rainbow was right over our house! The children were tickled pink, and wanted to go outside and take pictures. Unfortunately, I don't have a panoramic setting, so I had to get it in two images. :(

Anyway.

Here's a random morning of school. Lexi is leading in songs and hymns here, and then some shots of morning work being done........or, NOT being done, by my daydreamer Loralai.

Horrible blur on this one :(

She SHOULD have been doing her Handwriting seatwork page, but alas, my daydreamer needs constant "reminding".....

And here is a video--I hope it works!!

(nevermind--it didn't work. Getting the youtube link....... )

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So, the other day, Lexi pulled a drawer out a wee bit too hard and smashed her big toe. *shudder* I haven't had time to blog about it til now, but suffice it to say it was rather..........gross. I also learned that evidently she is a bit queasy at the sight of blood because every time we had to change the "dressing" (a couple band-aids, at that point), her lips would lose color and she would look ....not great... and tell me she feels ready to faint. I would lay her down while I worked on her dressing, Abby would run and get hera cup of ice water and a straw, and that was how we spent Saturday morning, every couple of hours. Fun times!

Eventually, when it seemed to keep bleeding, I called the Ped., who suggested we go to urgent care. Had x-rays done and saw the doctor, who assured us she had not broken anything, and that he just wanted to bandage her up (rather than drain her toenail *shiver*), and in a few days she'd be fine. Well, for the last 24 hours, she has gone without her bandages, and is doing very well!

Below are a couple snapshots of her foot :

A close-up view of the doctored up foot:

Also, yesterday (Wednesday) afternoon, while Daddy was cooking out, the kids had some backyard fun. Below are some pictures of Noah attacking his sisters with the hose :

Ah, to be the only boy and the youngest sibling.  

These pics make me laugh, but they also warm my heart. It is such a blessing to have a houseful of children.

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A conversation this morning with someone (online) made me think other people might be wondering the same thing about our choice to use the public school, temporarily, twice.  (For that person, this will, for the most part, be a repeat, since I am lazy and decided to just copy/paste/edit LOL.)

In hindsight I do not know what I was thinking, putting them in public school, but at the time(s) it seemed to be best with what we had going on (moving). Funny, both times they went were immediately following a move. Perhaps that is the common denominator.... I *think* that, at the time, I was just sort of "using it to our advantage." It is there, our tax dollars fund it, why not use it *for a time* so we can get everything together...is what I mean. Same thing I think about ANY government assistance, by the way. We are not fundamentally opposed to government assistance. Do I believe that the government has any business educating its citizens, beyond the basic 3R's, though? Nope. 

I had even intended on sending them one more year, but after we saw what we did, coupled with their request to return to home schooling, we decided to figure out a way to "get everything together" and home school. Granted, we knew it would be temporary both times we sent them--we just did not think this last time would be THAT temporary. Again, we have used public school twice now, and both times have been the same laundry, different day. No more. Mark my written word: I will sooner enroll them in Abeka's DVD academy (if a situation warranted that) before sending them to public school again.

And by the way--even if we were opposed to government assistance, that would not make us hypocritical (since we have used some of it in the past, years ago, when we needed it). Rather, it would mean our views have changed. Sort of like, yes I have tried illegal drugs (as a teen), but clearly my views on that have changed, and I will absolutely speak out against those. I will never understand how changed/more informed viewpoints mean someone is a "hypocrite" to some people. Hypocrisy is when you speak out against one thing, while *simultaneously* doing just the opposite (if I spoke out against pornography and later went upstairs and watched it, for instance). It is NOT when you have done something previously, but now can look back and see the wrong in it, and speak out against it. Actually, having "walked a mile" gives one a head start in speaking against something--you understand *why* people may be doing what they are doing. As Maya Angelou has said, "When you know better, you do better."

And that's all I have to say about that.

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I'm sorry, I know I am jabbing at my own political party here (hey, I never claimed to be Palin's #1 fan), but this was too funny to pass up--particularly after what I just got done saying about Palin.

Thanks Bobby! LOL

www.todaysbigthing.com/2009/07/23

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"When you are the president of the United States, you don't start a sentence with, 'I don't have all of the facts' and end it with, 'but the Cambridge police acted stupidly.'"---unknown (because I didn't catch the name of the person who said this)

So, has our president now learned that he cannot stand up and just say anything have it go unnoticed? To clearly state that you do not have all the facts, yet the Cambridge police acted 'stupidly' does not bode very well for him.

And then there was the bit about how he was "speaking from where he came from" (growing up as a black man, I'm assuming is what was meant). Seriously? Um, he is the president of the United States! He is supposed to be able to *rise above that*. I will not deny that racism still exists (and is PATHETIC, unBiblical, and just completely wrong on so many levels). But really--he is our president. If he cannot rise above this (after all, I assumed that was part of what he wanted to change in this country--with a black man as president?), then ........all I can do is shake my head.

Of course, in his defense, it must be reiterated that the bit about how he was 'speaking from where he came from' did not come from HIS mouth. It came from someone else, speculating.

Now here is where I get to give my opinion on all of this: BOTH parties acted poorly. Both Crowley and Gates could have done better. I understand where both were coming from, but both made choices--in the moment--that, well, could have been different. If someone shows you their ID and proves that they are the owner of the home, then clearly they have a right to be there. On the other hand, it would help to cooperate with police, which would have made this yet another night in Cambridge, and not national news. Suppose there *were* two men breaking and entering his home and Gates was unaware of this, and Crowley simply said, "OK, thank you sir, have a good night," and after Crowley had left, Gates was mugged and harmed. THEN what would the out cry have been????

And to clarify- I am not "anti-Obama." As I say myself, "He won. Get over it."  However, I don't agree with a lot of what he is trying to push. I teach our children that we are to respect our president *because* he is the president, though we may not agree with him. We do not turn the tv off every time the president comes on to speak. Quite the contrary, we listen to what he has to say as often as we can. And then, if we do not like what he has to say, we fight--we write letters to our members of Congress, we make phone calls, we make sure that everyone we know is made aware of the facts surrounding his agenda (and not just the half-truths he often states--that is, when you can even get him to answer the question).

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OK, so finally, here it is. And those who have been asking since we moved, you better be looking!! LOL

I took these a little while ago, while the rest of my family is sleeping. Plus, since today was my weekly-Saturday-detailed cleaning, well, it would be a good time to take pics (not that anyone is going to be looking at the baseboards, inside toilets, tops of dressers, or ceiling fans......but, yanno. )

We will start from the bottom, up. Pretend you just walked in the door LOL

Here is the downstairs bathroom. Nothing fancy, but I do love the pedestal sink. Adds a nice touch. (Notice the InStyler on the thingie above the toilet. It does not work NEAR as well as my Chi flat iron, in case anyone has been wondering about that product!)

Now, we will walk around the playroom/family room. And lest you feel sorry for my darling children, thinking they have no toys, look at the BINS BINS BINS! The first photo even has my stock-pile of bins, lol. And rest assured that in the kids' bedrooms, since they have walk-in closets, they are loaded with bins as well. And toyboxes.........

That's an air-hockey table on the wall, not a desk. Not sure why the kids insist on keeping a chair there, though......

The living room:

The other side of the living room...............and so begins the pictures of CLEAN, FOLDED clothes that need to be put away (notice the hamper in the corner).

The kitchen....

I had a picture of the pantry, but realized it looks awful with the tupperware disorganized, even though everything else is fine... but suffice it to say it's a large, walk-in pantry.

The girls, all nestled in bed....

Noah's room. Notice the bed is empty. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm....................... (you will find out why in a moment).

The supply closet that is between the kids' rooms. This is where I keep ALL of my homeschooling items that we are not currently using in the classroom. It is right off of the classroom as well, so the location is perfect! (Also doubles as the linen closet, since that is, after all, what it really is LOL)

The children's bathroom:

Our room....................and lo and behold, why, it's Noah!!  (snuggled in bed with his "best buddy," aka Daddy )

The other half of our bedroom..... and the loveseat I move Noah to when I go to bed. LOL (And yes, there you will find *more* CLEAN, FOLDED clothes, in hampers and bags even.  

Now you will not wonder why my closet looks so........bare (and the childrens' closets do as well........)

(ok wait- someone used that Tigger towel and threw it on top of folded clothes!!! Nevermind... moving along........)

Part of our bathroom......

The other half.....

And through the bathroom you have our master closet---nearly bare........... (you aren't wondering why, though--at this point, you already know, remember?)

Standing in the other corner...........

And, there you have it. Our home. I LOVE our home! It is in baaaaaaad need of decorations (hate plain, white walls and no head/foot board), but we love it. Jeffery says we'll stay here until the landlord is ready to sell it LOL We just might end up buying it--but then, we just moved in March so I am in NO MOOD to be thinking of moving again!! Although, we do live in a "cookie-cutter" neighborhood, so we could easily find this exact same floor plan hmmm across the street.........at the end of the road........and every 4th house LOL

No pics of the backyard and lake, because it is dark out, but it is large and boring without the laughter of children running around it anyway.

Thanks for stopping by, and have a good night (I know I will, because I'm ready to hit the pillows--church in the AM, if Lexi's foot is ok. OH ......all this blathering on about the house and I forgot to tell you about that. Well, if you're on Facebook, or I cared to text you about it today, you already know, so I guess I don't need to get into it. She's doing well, now, though. )

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So, because it came up in a discussion tonight (on a homeschooling board), I took a look at our local public school's (the one the girls went to for a month last year) website and school supply list for "back to school."

there are school supply lists for things you MUST buy for each class. Here is a copy/paste of the Kindergarten one for the local school, for instance (emphasis mine, and ALL of the grades are like this--well, different items of course, but the bolded part):

Socialism at its finest!!!   (though I do believe they are allowed to label the backpack)

I just added up the above items, assuming you had a girl, and NOT including the cost of a backpack. Also, buying the el-cheapo brand stuff that is in WalMart's "back to school sale" aisles.

Total came to $40. And that is NOT including a backpack, or accounting for having more than 1 child in school. Goodness, if you had 3 (like I would if I were sending mine) you'd be looking at $120 PLUS a backpack each (min. $45 for 3, but of course be prepared to buy another at some point, IME), PLUS school clothes (which around here are uniforms, yes, at the local public school, but even if you got away with clearance sales at regular stores, kids go through clothes SO FAST in school).

(FWIW, the older grades' supply lists come out to about the same, in some cases more money, so for the sake of discussion, just sticking with the Kindy list.)

Perhaps this would not be so bad if the supplies you buy were for your OWN child, but they aren't.

 For homeschooling!  Oh--and the supplies I buy are for *my children*--not others.

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I must say, I am so, so, so happy to be homeschooling again. It just feels so "right" for so many reasons. As I have said before, we have tried public school twice, and it has been made very clear to us that we are a homeschooling family.  (That's a soapbox for another day, though. )

It is also a very good feeling to have finally come up with a schedule that works for us LOL You can see the schedule below. I am not a fan of scheduling for babies, but when your children are older, I think they work wonderfully for family dynamics of all sorts. I had to figure out how to fit in working, exercising, cleaning, and homeschooling (since I refuse to homeschool past lunch), and have discovered that the key to sticking to our schedule is staying off of the computer so much.  'Tis true--I was addicted to Facebook, message boards, email, the works. But I have a life to lead, and cannot spend all of my time on the computer--as fun as it is haha!

I have had a couple people ask how we manage to fit all of it in, stay on top of housework, run errands, etc. So, I'll answer those questions now:

First, I work from home as an editor. So, the times you see in our schedule designated "work" for me simply mean me curling up on the sectional and working, or possibly upstairs in the classroom at my desk, as I am now. I am NOT coming and going from the house at those times. Second, the children have "zones" that they are each responsible for keeping up on a daily basis. For example, Abby's zones are the kitchen (we all help w/that one though by doing our part, such as taking dishes to the sink, etc.) and straighening up the classroom. Lexi has the family room/playroom and living room. The younger two have zones as well. The children are to keep up with their zones on a daily basis, such that by Saturday, they are rewarded with a movie of their choice (along with their daily allowance, which we keep pretty minimal, since the idea is more about working together as a family and less about $$$). While they watch their movie, I go through the house and do all of the deep cleaning/chemicals. I should not have to spend more than an hour doing this (our house is 2400+ sf, afterall). In order to keep it that way, though, they must stay on top of their zones. Basically, that is ALL I should have to do. And since they keep up their zones on a daily basis, it has seemingly been taking anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes for them each day. So, that's 5-10 minutes of work per day--not a big deal for them. Two days a week, I am doing the laundry (now that we are caught up), just as before, and the older children sometimes help with folding (they all love folding towels!) and they put away their own pj's and everything other than regular clothes.

Because we do not send our children to school, we are able to take advantage of getting nice clothing in all places, and their clothes do not wear out CONSTANTLY (like they did both times we sent them to school--drove me crazy, because I pay good money for their clothes LOL!!)  We also do not have to spend money on ridiculous "school supply lists," full of household items, and none of which we are allowed to label! I looked at the list--when it was handed to kids on the last day of school--and went, "Seriously?? Are you kidding me? If I buy crayons, glue, erasers, etc, they are not for 'everyone'--they are for my own children!" (Socialism at its finest, ladies and gentleman!) I do, however, take advantage of the cheap-o school supplies at WalMart (well, only what we'll use in our homeschool that year) and stock up my supply closet!!

So, that's the jist of how it all comes together. Jeffery does grocery shopping one day a week for me (I HATE grocery shopping, and since he is a manager at a Publix, well, it works out perfectly LOL) Dinner is done by me, but he'll wrap it up if I'm working and trying to finish something up.

I have also been asked about pictures of our home since we moved here (in March), but I have not had the time to take them. Maybe I will do that tomorrow.  For now, I'm gonna go downstairs and fold some more laundry, eat dinner, and possibly come back upstairs and do more work (since Jeffery will be going to bed soon, I'm sure), or just veg on the computer, since I don't seem to do much of that anymore  hahaha!

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***edited to add--judging by the pictures here and the pictures from our co-op Christmas party, I am convinced that it is not my camera that is lacking, but rather that natural SUNLIGHT makes all the difference. So, you'll have to forgive the blur here....... bah.***

Well! Since the last time I wrote, we have moved, sent the kids to public school for the last 32 days, and I started working as an editor. That'd be the jist of it, but naturally there are a lot more details in between that! LOL

Let's start with our homeschool. As the title of the blog indicates, that is our "school name" (always has been), and we are now doing 3rd, 1st, and PreK! The kids are very happy to be in the next grade level, and I will do my best to randomly update this blog with pics. Come to think of it, I don't think I even posted pics of our Polar Express Party we did last year.  Well, new year, must update blog regularly!

So, this would be our "Family Schedule." Since we are "in the swing of things" regarding homeschooling, I figured I'd get these up, and you can see how our day goes. I will tell you, though, that only the "schooling hours" are die-hard must.watch.the.clock. The rest of it, ehh we're more "routine oriented," but if we don't stick to our schedule during school hours, we don't get everything accomplished. Being a task-oriented, list-maker that I am, this is VERY important.

(For those of you who are not familiar, SOTW=Story of the World, www.storyoftheworld.com)

So far, this schedule is working wonderfully for us (oh - and this is about the third version, because the first two had some "kinks" to workout, but I guess you don't know that 'til you actually dive in, huh?

Here are some shots of our classroom, finally organized and in these I believe the children were writing or reading:

Main shot from by my bedroom door (since our school room is our upstairs loft):

(and I have no idea why it looks so DARK outside, other than camera issues. Sigh.)

I HATE the glare from the window and the blur of the camera, but I wanted to show a shot of the most adorable window clings I got at the dollar tree--and of course you can't even tell what they are in this pic. *eyeroll*

In Story of the World, we have been learning about Ancient civilizations, nomads, and Egyptians lately. We actually started reading from this book awhile ago (for bedtime), but the kids LOVE this book, so we have incorporated it into our school day (I read while they eat their lunch) as History.

So, below is a shot of a "village" they created tonight while I made supper. Before you look, let me explain a few things, LOL. A "shaduf" was an ancient farmer's version of our modern-day irrigation systems. "Tarak" is a girl in the story (it bounces back and forth between informational material and a fictional story, to help keep children's attention and make it easier to understand). She carries a bag made of animal hide, in which she keeps lizards she catches. Also, we recently learned that the farmers built villages and then made walls (such as the wall of Jericho) around the villages. Oh, and today we discussed the Nile river and how farmers would dig canals from the river for the overflow, so as to catch their own "good water" (the "good water" came from the river, which brought with it silt, which is soil with vitamins and minerals).

OK, so now that that is out of the way.......... I just didn't want you to be lost when looking at the picture and go, "???" at the stuff to which the arrows are pointing!

One important detail would be that we started attending a new church, which our whole family just loves. It is www.chapelbaptist.org, and is wonderful for us.

In fact, first you will see some pics of our VBS from last week. Also, after trying public school not once but twice, we have decided it just is not for us, afterall. My husband never was in favor of it, but agreed, begrudgingly. The last school they went to was great, as far as public schools go. The first day I walked in, I was impressed. I LOVED their teachers, and felt like the principal really pushed the kids (in a good way) to achieve in their academics.

Nonetheless, it is still the same "public school experience" we had the last time, and that just is not for our family. (Add to the the conviction from God that my husband and I were both talking about, and it is just very clear where we are meant to be. Tried it twice, and here we are again. )

With that out of the way.... here are some pictures from our church's VBS last week!

I won't take the time to describe what is going on in each one, but they start with a couple shots of the kids in the rows while we were all singing some hymns and VBS songs, followed by Loralai and Noah's class, and then Abby and Lexi's class. Also, at the end the pastor was doing a song with them, so that'd be him on the floor in the front with several children LOL (later I will scan and insert my favorite picture of Abby and Lexi from VBS):

Apparently my camera sorta blurs when the pic is in motion  but you get the idea. They had a blast, and learned a lot at VBS!!

Well, that's all for now! Hope you enjoyed!!

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Today we had our co-op Christmas Party! It was a blast! I didn't get pictures of us doing the Secret Santa exchange, but I got pics of the kids doing all of the different 'stations' (there were 4). Instead of talking in between each one, I'll just say that there was a card-making station, a decoration station, a gift making one, and a Kindermusik station (that'd be the pics w/the kids playing instruments and Noah playing with scarves and on Daddy's lap for a parent-child part. The lady in the red shirt in those pics is the Kindermusik teacher....everything else is moms from the co-op).

Here goes!

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We have been up to SOOOOOOO much since I last blogged! And I am constantly taking pictures, thinking "this will be great on the blog....oooooh gotta get that..." and then what happens?? I never have time to blog! So tonight, real quick, I'm gonna blog, mostly with pictures from last month and this month, with very little talking LOL (I know!!) Mostly, I'm just trying to catch up, so I can perhaps stay caught up w/pics. Not to mention, since it's the holidays, there will be way more pics to come--what, with 3 holiday parties we're attending, 2 Christmas performances at church, a visit to see Santa yet, the Spectacle of Dancing Lights at H'wood Studios, and of course, CHRISTMAS! So, I must get caught up!!!!

Let's start w/the most recent happenings, our trip to the Gingerbread House. We go every year to the Grand Floridian (remember, we're only about 10 minutes from Disney, so this isn't some big trip just for a Gingerbread House LOL--it's a hop skip and a jump!) to see the Gingerbread House.........and to buy a piece!! Is it not the most delicious Gingerbread House you've ever laid eyes on?!?

Some of the edible goodies that can be bought at the Gingerbread House:

Jeffery, thinking "Dear God I can't believe we're spending $7 on a SHINGLE!! And another $5 for a small piece of Peppermint Bark!!"

Of course, the yummy shingle.......and peppermint bark!!

Now I must point out here that my honey saw just how much I LOOOOOOVED this peppermint bark, that he came home last night, while the kids and I were at church, and made me a nice big batch of peppermint bark JUST like this (sans the Mickey shape), and it is BETTER than this. Oh my! (picture forthcoming)

So, of course that was a day (the other day...Monday, I believe) that we decided to go to Disney. We were supposed to go the week prior with visiting family, but that didn't happen, and the kids (and Jeffery and I!!) were just itching to go, so we decided to spend Monday at Magic Kingdom. Ahhhhh the holidays at Disney are just soooooo beautiful!!

Here he looks like he's scared he's going to be in trouble with Minnie for trespassing.......

My hoodlum husband. What the heck was this??? LOL Actually, this was him trying to avoid the camera, and me sneaking and having it there and pretending to be getting a pic of the kids (which would account for the major blur) Surprise!!! *flash!*

He looks so "rough" in front of Minnie's House, doesn't he? LOL

And just having some fun on the Monorail:

Lexi, trying to take a picture of me at the same time (with the girls' camera). Guess who got their picture first???? LOL

OK, well, that's all for now! Now to stay on TOP of updating my blog! (and I know I took some pics of our Fall festivities but cannot seem to find it......so this will have to do! Here's looking forward to more fun pics to come, though! :) )

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I was recently asked this question, and I think it's a great question that deserves a straightforward answer.

We do grades and testing in our homeschool, mostly for me, so that I can see what areas we have mastered and what areas we need to work on. Certainly not because anyone is "telling" me that I "have to" do that (knowing me, THAT would get the exact opposite response ROFLOL)

A veteran homeschooling friend (former public school teacher--and oh how *many* former public school teachers I know who are now homeschoolers!!) of mine put it to me like this recently (and she's actually more along the 'unschooling' line it seems to me): In school, kids go day after day, and if they miss something, it never really gets taken care of, leaving some kids perpetually behind in certain areas, and they may never truly understand it, but on they go for the next 12 years, with 'gaps' in learning along the way (I can attest to this myself~plenty of things I never really "got", but oh well, we had to move on). In homeschooling, though, we have the opportunity and time to use tests and other assessments to be sure that we FILL those gaps--not letting anything go 'not understood'. We also have the opportunity to cater our homeschool to each individual child's best learning style, thus increasing the likelihood that those gaps get filled.

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So I decided to make the girls some hair ribbons to match their pumpkin shirts they are wearing to our co-op's Backyard Fall Festival tomorrow. While we're in that town, I also plan to stop by the pumpkin patch (that is one of our field trips for this month) and get some pics then, too. :) Pretty simple to make, once I decided how I wanted to make them, I think it took me about 5 minutes each! Not too bad. This ribbon was clearanced at Michael's (under their "Halloween ribbon"). You wouldn't believe how hard it is to find plain orange ribbon in the H'ween section LOL Everything else had witches or some kind of trick or treat thing on it. We just wanted plain orange, but this is kinda sparkly and the girls love it! :)

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Since someone asked what our day looks like these days.....

I did decide not to stick with the schedule we had earlier in the year, however, trying to just "do school between such and such hours" wasn't working either. For some reason, I *need* a minute by minute schedule, but I also need something that is flexible. I have decided that it's ok if our schedule doesn't look the same everyday, as long as what we have is working for us.

*edited recently because we are starting sooner, since I am not working as late anymore* 

8:30-8:45 Opening time (calendar, songs, on Mondays rotate helpers, announcements, etc.)

8:45-10:00 Language Arts

10:00-10:10 Break/snack

10:15-10:45 Bible

10:45-11:30 Themed Specials

11:30-12:15 Arithmetic

12:20-12:40 Lunch

12:45-1:05 Reading Groups & StoryTime

1:10-1:40 Spanish (Noah nap after Spanish)

1:40-2:00 Science & Social Studies

***Wednesday no Spanish most likely, since we need to have an earlier day on this day, because we leave around 4:15 for church.

The only thing that MAY change is that we bump lunch to the end of the day, we'll see. I moved Arithmetic to before lunch, because we always used to homeschool that way, and never really tried anything different until this year, but I'm finding that it's drudgery to do Arithmetic after lunch (we have had a full day already by then!) so we would rather relax with Reading, Spanish, and Science/Social Studies after lunch. :)

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This month (October) our theme in school is 'pumpkins' (how original LOL!!) I don't have time to do Specials and 'themed' stuff (since I want it to be a certain time during the day) I decided to "theme up our Specials" LOL So like I said, yesterday the 2nd graders assignment at the library was to look up some of the pumpkin books for me, and then pick their own book (that they are reading for BookIt) They did pretty good with this, a little slow since it was their first time, but yanno. So this is what we are doing (pics to come probably at the end of the month)

(and the pumpkin unit we are using can be found at www.teachingheart.net/apumpkinunit.html)

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Thought these were hilarious!!!

A Homeschool Family

You might be a homeschooler if....

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I know it's been awhile since I've updated this (a month?) Part of that is because I'm lazy when it comes to uploading pics to photobucket FIRST, then updating my blog. OK- really, all of it is because of that LOL

News on homeschooling: We tried to do the "unit study" approach. We gave it about a week, but in the end it just crumbled. The thing is, I was not willing to stop using Abeka for Language, Letters & Sounds, Spelling, Reading, and Arithmetic. Soooo that didn't leave much left for the unit study approach, besides Science/Social Studies. Well, given that, I ended up asking myself 'what is different about what we are doing?' We found that we do enjoy learning the things we were learning in our first unit study (Space Exploration).. but the children were asking me 'when are we going to do school' and saying that they didn't like *not* doing things the way we normally do. So, about the only thing I kept from that 'change' was that we 1) are sticking with starting school at 10am, instead of 8:30, and 2) we are not going by a minute-by-minute schedule anymore- school is from 10-2:30, and we do everything we need to do in that time-frame...none of this 'must be doing this at such and such time' stuff. That was stressing us out. We are ALL much happier to just know the school hours, and know the order of subjects, which is:

-Opening time (singing songs about the days of the week, season, month, calendar, the Pledge, and our current patriotic song, which, for Oct is the Star-Spangled Banner.)......and any news/announcements that need to be made (for instance yesterday we discussed the Book-It! program that just started this month, and we set our goals. 

-Language Arts... (everyone does Letters & Sounds from Abeka, and handwriting, and 2nd grade also does Spelling, Language, and morning reading from their Abeka reader...meanwhile I take turns rotating for individual grade level instruction)

-Bible....we usually take whatever papers they have brought home from Sunday School and I use my Bible curriculum to elaborate on those stories. This includes reading again from the Bible whatever they learned, and typically some sort of coloring or cutting/pasting/coloring activity, or a game, or acting out the story- whatever.

-Centers

-Activitiy Time/Specials (varies according to the day)

-Lunch

-afternoon reading....everyone is to sit down and read quietly while whatever grade level I have called over to me reads orally, and assessment is done, as well as comprehension questions. I also may read to them during this time.

-Arithmetic (similar to Lang. Arts in the way it 'operates'

-Science/Social Studies (mostly Science at the present time)

-End of day.....2:30

Progress:  

I intend on making up progress reports by next week (that will be our 6 week mark) but so far, this is the progress made:

Noah- knows all colors, shapes, can count clearly to 13, roughly to 20 LOL, writes his name, recognizes the letters from his name and some other letters, knows the sounds of several letters, counts objects, identifies numbers through 10, draws people with facial features and clothes, arms, and legs, "reads" according to the pictures in books.

Loralai- writing so many letters, knows all letters and sounds, can identify vowel sounds in words, can identify beginning and ending sounds, knows the vowels, reading blends, writing numbers, can count at least to 20 (probably higher but that's as far as our curr has gotten so far), writes her name and other family members' names, can copy any word, though some letters may be backward (such as "s" or "b/d")

Abby & Lexi- reading chapter books (currently enjoying the American Girl books and also some of the Great Illustrated Classics), writing paragraphs concisely, writing stories (1-2 pages front and back), cursive writing coming along great, adding double digits with carrying, subtracting double digits, adding higher dollar bill amounts, beginning multiplication, currently skip counting by threes, learning place value to thousands, rounding up numbers, measuring to the 1/4 inch, learning 20 spelling words per week (test every Friday for Spelling)............ you know, they can do so much more, but this is not a progress report, I have some lesson planning to do, and want to finish updating this blog with pics! I better stop rambling off everything!

AFA Science/Social studies- we are currently learning about animals and space, and Loralai is learning about community helpers.

Whew- that's enough for now!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

But we've been up to a lot lately! Let me try to start in chronological order....

Here's a shot from Loralai's 6th birthday- I made her the cake, and the crown is something she got to wear all day in school (I believe that was a Library day, but I don't think she wanted to wear it into the library LOL)

Here are some more school shots:

These are my daily folders. I try to have every day's planning, reproducibles, manipulatives, etc in the day's folder, so all I have to pull out is that day's folder, and my planner.

Some Art:

Apple Stamping...

Some Arithmetic:

A test going on for 2nd grade....can't recall what test that was (looks like Arithmetic):

Noah working intently on his Letters and Sounds (C's): (you see how he's scribbled on his nameplate?? That's why I bought packs of 30 something LOL)

Loralai working on her blend ladders: (I let her use my pointer for fun lol) (and this pic was taken at least 2 weeks ago- our pocket chart is way more filled with letters at this point haha)

An award Abby earned for good behavior in Centers one day: (What do I need for my birthday on November.....thats N O V E M B E R.... 24 (twenty-fourth)?? A new camera! This pic came out terrible! I debated including it, it was such a horrible pic, but I wanted to brag on Abby a little, so try to make it out if you can....)Anyway, she was the only one that day who I didn't have to remind to be in their center, so she got a certificate to pick a center of her choice, and choose whatever she wanted to do in that center.

Noah doing some computer stuff:

Oh, and we're using Loralai's hundred chart to count down to the 100th Day of school...there are star stickers in the corner of the numbers, this was taken about 2 weeks into school:

One day at the park for PE. We intended on going to the Sprinkler park with a friend, but it was closed that day, so we ended up on the other side, at the regular park.

OK..........now for some Disney pics!! :) (you knew you weren't gonna get through this w/o some Disney!)

Daddy has been taking the kids to Disney on his own a lot lately, at least once a week, while I work for a few hours during the day:

Here they were at some restaurant dancing with Cast Members and eating:

Some pics Jeffery took on Test Track:

A pic of Lexi on Mission Space when she went alone with Daddy the other night:

And sometime last week he took the kids to see En Vogue at EPCOT's Food & Wine Festival:

And that, my friends, concludes my blog update for today LOL WHEW!! :) Hope you enjoyed!!

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