I can't believe how much time has past since I added anything to my blog. 

For the most part, I didn't have anything great to write about.  I am had several months of just being a wife and mom.  I love my job, but I think that it would be boring to read about.  ;-)    Also, my husband went back to school online so the computer is being used almost every night by him.   This really limits my computer time, which is something I wanted to start doing anyway.

God's timing is so prefect.  Just this week, I came across a ladies blog that mentioned they were starting a co-op at a church here in Gaffney.  I emailed her and found out there were only 7 spaces left.  We took three of those spaces.  Starting September, we will be part of a co-op here in town.  We have yet to meet any homeschooler that lives within a hour of us, so we are pretty excited.  We are simply people that get excited with little things.  ;-)

Well, I have a math lesson that I have to teach before school is done, so I had better get off the computer. 

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I want to say right at the top here, I don't have anything great or important to say today.  Continue reading at your own risk.

We started back to school today.   We really had  a good day.  We got school done completely, we had time to sit and read library books and we did a 30 minute quiet time.  I LOVE quiet time.  I have to get them back up to 1 hour, but 30 minutes is better than nothing.  The time goes so fast.

On top of school, we got 5 baskets of laundry folded, I cleaned the carpets in the front room and still had dinner on the table when hubby came home.

Because of the mixed up schedule with visitors and traveling since Thanksgiving, I really got out the habit of being prepared to make dinner.  We ate out a lot when we had visitors and when we were on the road.  I need to sit down and create a menu for the upcoming week.  Having a plan for the meals makes my life so much easier. 

Well,  I guess making a menu would be a better use of my time right now, so I am going to log off for now.

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I don't really have much to say, but I wanted to update my blog.

We are back home from our trip back home to Michigan.   It was wonderful.  

We were able to catch up with some friends and family and we even got to go to the Sunday morning service at our church.  It still feels like home.

I was able to spend pretty much the whole day with my best friend -- drinking coffee and eating cookies.  Our kids love to play together and they get along great.  Our husbands also enjoy each others company.   It felt so good to be back in her kitchen and catching up on the past year.  In some ways, it feels like we have been gone from Michigan for years and in other ways it feels like we never left.  Thanks Julie for being such a great friend.

2007 is here already.   We had a very quiet evening here at home last night.  All 3 kids stayed up to bring in the new year.   Tomorrow is back to our normal routine.   Hubby goes back to work and we all go back to school.

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We are officially on Christmas break.  Today is laundry and packing day.   We are all excited and looking forward to seeing some friends in a couple of days.  We are taking 2 weeks off from school.  I hope we don't forget everything while we are gone.  We had a little trouble coming back from the 2 weeks break at Thanksgiving and taking another 2 weeks off so soon concerns me a little bit.  But not enough to take school books with us.

We will be reading "Farmer Boy" by Laura Ingell Wilder on the road.  We are able to get a lot of real aloud books covered while in the car. 

Since my last post, I have calmed down a bit.  The world has their way of celebrating Christmas and we can chose how we celebrate Christmas here.  I have to remember that I can't change the world to be like me.   Actually, I would chose for the world to be like Christ and not like me at all.  I am not the one to model.  I just have to be at peace in my heart that we are celebrating Christmas in a way that honors Christ and his birth.    I am just very disgusted with the whole buying and spending money thing.  Next year, we are going to start early and make gifts for family members.  Less money spent in the store for gifts that no one really needs.

Merry Christmas,

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Is anyone else really sick of all the "Happy Holidays" stuff?  I know that I am.    The whole season is just about money for the stores.  They go so far and to not allow there employees to say 'Merry Christmas'.   They are really pushing it too far.  I understand that not everyone celebrates Christmas (and most that celebrate it miss the real meaning), but come on.  It is not a Holiday tree, but a Christmas tree (and many other examples).     

Also,  I can't believe the Christians that have changed it to x-mas.  Does it take that much time to write 'Christ' in Christmas?  Why are Christians crossing Christ out of Christmas?

This year, I am more into the real reason of Christmas than before.  I don't know why this year is different.  I have always loved Christmas and the focus has always been Jesus' birth, in our family.  But,  in years past, I have also spent a lot of time buying (and worrying) about getting the right gifts for everyone without spending to much. 

This year is diffenent for me, internally.  I have no desire to shop for gifts for anyone.  I just want to be with family.   I want to spend time together reading Christmas stories, listening to Christmas music and making Christmas cookies. The kids and I have played music that focuses on Jesus' and his birth, forget the Santa Claus stuff, I am not interested.

It is interesting, but the kids have changed this year also.  The kids have not asked for 1 thing for Christmas this year.  There has been no Christmas list from them.   

Well, I just had to vent.   I will step down from my soap box now.

Merry Christmas,

Kerry

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I can't believe that is has been over 2 weeks since I blogged anything.  The days go by so quickly that it makes my head spin.  I can't seem to get everything done that I need to do and then there is really no time for the 'want-to-do' things.

We just finished week 15 of school.  It feels good to be this far into it. We even took 2 weeks off for Thanksgiving.  Last year, we had finished 12 weeks when we stopped for Christmas.   Staying on top of school sure reduces the stress.  It is nice to be able to take time off and not feel so far behind.

I am still working to get a schedule.  I have no idea why this is such a hard concept for me.     I have prayed and prayed about it, but anything I try works for only a few days at the most.   

It has been in the 70's for several days now.  I am so happy that it is almost Christmas and it is so warm.  We did have a very cold night last weekend and our pipes froze.  I didn't know that was a concern here in SC.  They thawed out in the afternoon sun.   

The warm weather is making it hard to get into the Christmas spirit.  I can't believe that we are leaving for Michigan in 6 days.  I hope the snow doesn't all melt before we get there.  We want to see snow for Christmas.  Then it can go away.

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Acutally, we don't have any idea what nomal looks like?  I don't think it ever happens here.  If it did, would we recognize it?  Something for me to think about.  :-)

All of our Thanksgiving guests have left.  Last week, we had my aunt come and visit us for 3 days.  She left before Thanksgiving, so she could spend a couple of days with her family in NC before heading back to MI.  

My aunt has been a public school teacher for many years.  After spending time a lot of time with the kids, she was very impressed with their education so far.  That was very exciting to hear. 

We had Thanksgiving dinner with just the 5 of us.  It was quiet and fun.  We put the Christmas tree up the same day.  We couldn't wait until the day after Thanksgiving, which is usually our tradition.  The kids did most of the decorating.  I loved that part.  ;-)

On Sunday, my parents came to visit.  They traveled from MI to GA and spent a couple days with my Grandma.  Then they came over here (to SC).  They left after lunch today.   The only thing that made their leaving okay, was that we will be at their house for Christmas which is only a few weeks away.

We had such a wonderful time.   With Grandma and Papa, we made sugar cookies, painted paper to use as wrapping paper and played, played and played. 

We also went to Kings Mountain Battlefield park.   I don't remember the proper name of the park, but it is a big history spot.  A huge battle for the American Revolution took place there.  The battle was a turning point for the war.  We just finished studying it in History, so it was really interesting.

That is a quick recap of the past two weeks.  Now it is back to school for two weeks until Christmas vacation.   

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I am so thankful for many things, but especially family and friends that God  has placed in my life. 

We moved to South Carolina last Thanksgiving weekend.  We spent Thanksgiving loading the two trailers with the stuff we needed to make a home here.  My parents drove down with one trailer and we drove with the other trailer.  We ate our  Thanksgiving meal at a truck stop.  I was surprised to find that the place was very busy and the food was not bad.  It is a Thanksgiving meal that we will never forget.   We arrived at our new home on the Friday after Thanksgiving.

Moving away has made us appreciate the wonderful friends and family that we have.  God has blessed us and taken good care of us.  Distance puts a strain on friendships, but it doesn't make them go away.  The stronger friendships that I have continued in spite of the distance.

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We all played outside all day on Saturday.  Had a great time and got some work done.  I thought the days of illness were behind us.

Well, they are not.  All day Sunday, Joshua and I were sick again.  Both of us are still sick today.  UGH!  I hate being sick.  Back to bed for me.

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I can't believe how much time has passed since I have blogged.  Several times, I have had thoughts about something but I tend to forget before I get the time to sit at the computer and write.   Also, I have spent less time at the computer the last couple of weeks.  I found that I can very quickly burn several hours of my free time at the computer when I would rather be enjoying my husband's company in the evening.

This week we have feeling under the weather.  The bug hit the family one at a time.  Joshua had a fever for 2 nights, then Julia, then me and last was Jessica.  So far, my husband has not been hit with it.  It was not to terrible, just enought to keep us home from activities and feeling like laying around all day.   The low energy was the worst part of it for me and it even slowed the kids down too.

I am on my way outside to enjoy the wonderful, beautiful WARM day that it is outside today.  I can't believe this weather.  Yesterday and today the temp is in the high 70's.  There is no way that I could enjoy this weather anymore than I am.    We are not in Michigan, that is for sure.  ;-)

Gotta go play in the leaves and sunshine,

Kerry

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We played at the beach for a long time today.  We had a wonderful day.  Myrtle Beach is not crowded at all right now.  It probably helps that it rained like crazy all day yesterday.

We got talked into attending a timeshare presentation today.  My husband has some friends that bought one a couple years ago and they love it, so we decided to go just for the "fun" of it.  We also got free tickets to the Dixie Stampede show tonight.  Julia loves horses so we thought she would love to go for her birthday.  Both girls really loved the show.  It was a good show. 

We kind of knew what we were getting into with the timeshare presentation but we were slightly curious.   My jaw is still on the ground from the price.  There is no way in the world that we were going to spend that much money.  Anyway, the kids enjoyed the kid activities while we listened to the presentation and we enjoyed saving over $100 on the Dixie Stampede show tonight.

Julia said that she had a good birthday.

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Today is Julia's birthday.  I can hardly believe that she is 6 already.  How true the Bible is to say that life is but a vapor.  The time with the kids is passing so quickly.

We are at Myrtle Beach, SC to enjoy the beach and to celebrate her birthday.  The kids were still up at midnight, so we sang happy birthday to her before she fell asleep.  It was wonderful.

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I am sitting here freezing.  I can't believe that it is this cold.  It is near freezing, literally, outside.   It is the end of October, but I am still not ready for cold weather. 

It is really to cold to even think. 

School is going good this week.  The kids are really surprising me at the amount of information that they grab and remember.  The girls and I have had some really great conversations lately that made me realize that they are really growing up.  They are able to remember things that we talked about last year.   I am so amazed at how great God created the human mind.

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Last Friday, we went on an apple orchard field trip.  It was so nice to get out.  The best part was that we met lots of new homeschooling friends.  Most are using My Father's World curriculum.  Thanks Paige for inviting us.   I tried to upload a picture, but my pictures are too big and I don't have enough room.  I will work on fixing that problem at some later point in time.

The kids loved having the cider and donuts.  The best part for me was meeting with other homeschooling moms.  We have been in SC almost a year and this is the first homeschooling mom that I have met and they all live in NC (lol).  But not to far away.  Meeting Paige was a gift from God.  He brings people in our lives just went we need them the most.   God is so good!!!

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Actually, I was home every night, but it felt like I was gone for a while.   This past weekend, (Thursday night, all day Friday and most of the day on Saturday), I was at a women's retreat at Hallelujah Acres. 

I had a wonderful time being encouraged to be healthier both physically and spiritually.   The speakers were fantastic.  Nancy Campbell, auther of Above Rubies magazine, was one of the speakers.  She really challenged me to dig deeper in the Scriptures and she opened my eyes to pratical ways to apply God's Word to my life. 

Many other speakers added to the weekend with humor and challenges, personal testamonies and medical facts.  It was a fantastic weekend.  I hope to return next year.

I had considered whether to share my long journey that I have traveled while looking for relief to my physical problems.    I suppose that at some point, I will write it here, but the journey was long.   In the end, I feel led to follow the Hallelujah diet.  I have struggle for the last 10 months trying to get on the diet, but being mostly off.  The diet is a vegan mostly raw diet based on Genesis 1:29.   Being from a dairy farm, this has been a huge struggle to change my diet so much.

Everytime I think that I will just give up the idea of trying to get on the diet, the Lord brings something into my life that makes me want to give it another try.  I don't want to get into a discussion about why certain diets are good or bad.  I just know that after much prayer and searching and reading, I feel this is God's answer to my prayers.  My husband and children are not on the diet and have no plans to be, but health-wise, I know it works better for me. 

I have re-started the diet many times, but today is day 5 without any cheating.  Hurray!  I had a horrible headache for 2 days (detox, I think), but now I feel great.

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The two younger kids had a dentist appt. today.    We hurried to get school started today, then we left for the dentist.  We got there on time (a miracle in itself) only to find out that their appts were really yesterday.  Good grief. 

I was thankful that they were able to squeeze the kids in today, so we didn't waste the trip.  I really need to find a way to get organized. 

We did get school done today with some free time this afternoon.  So the day ended on a good note.

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Today was a great day.  I feel like I got a lot done.  We had school done by 2 pm.  We had time for a library trip before it was time to start dinner.  We also had a load of clothes drying on the line outside before we left. 

After getting home, I got the house vacuumed while dinner was cooking.  Since I was able to vacuum, it means the house was pretty much picked up. 

Days like these don't happen very often at our house, so I am going to consider today a great day.  ;-) 

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Today was a very relaxing sort of day.   It is the Lord's Day and I believe it is a day to rest so I don't mind getting nothing done.  But, it does make Monday a little bit more crazy.

I am still trying to come up with a schedule for us.  Each day seems so different that it is hard to get a rough draft of a schedule.  I get so overwhelmed by the whole thing. 

I am just talking out loud here so please understand the reason for the ramblings.

My 7 year old will sleep as long a she can.  She has been known to sleep until 10:30 am.  My 5 year old is up at about 7:30.  The 3 year old is up at 7:00 am if not before.  He has been known to be beside my bed asking for food at 6:00.  UGH!  The oldest takes after me.  '-).   

The 3 year old wants breakfast ASAP and is now able to help himself to cereal if I happen to not jump right out of bed.  About a week ago, he came into our bedroom about about 4 am (who knew that there even was a 4 am?) asking for food.  I told him to go back to bed.  My husband wandered into the kitchen about 6am to find a used bowl, cereal and milk still on the table.  The little rascal had breakfast and when back to bed.

So, my problem is, do I wake the oldest at about 7 so that I can feed them all at the same time first thing in the morning.  The good thing would be that we could start school much earlier.  The bad:  I would have a unhappy 7 year old (she is a good sport and would not be mad, but she would not be happy at all).   Also,  I would not have any time to start laundry, have quiet time or exercise. 

The other side is that I get some housekeeping things done first and the 7 year old is wide awake and everyone has had at least 1 breakfast (some have 2 by this point).  But the down side is the kids are in full play mode and don't want to start school, I am busy getting things done but feeling anxious that the day is quickly passing and we have not started school.  We start school late, we have a lot more interuptions and we run right until it is time to start dinner.

I have been praying about this for quite a while now.  I have found other peoples schedules and think "Wow" this is the answer to my prayers.  Yet, I can't seem to implement any of the ideas with success.   Someday, I will get a workable schedule (I hope).

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This sign is too funny.   I can't think of anything super funny to write so I will just posted the picture.   It was taken in North Carolina.

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The weeks are really going fast this year.  Fall is really here.  There was a little chill in the air today and many leaves fell to the ground over night.

I have not posted much lately.  I can't seem to think of anything to say.  It seems like I was really tired and dragging this week.  Several days, we worked until dinner time to get school done.  But, we did get it done every day.  Hurray!!!  Other than that, I cooked dinner, did laundry and cleaned house.  Nothing to exciting to write about.  ;-)

We just finished week number 7 of My Father's World. 

Jessica made a paper canoe this week and today she helped me make bread as part of her school project.  Julia made a water filter for science today using gravel and sand.

Friday is our day for nature study.  I love to be outside with a clipboard and look for something to draw.  I can't draw at all, but I am noticing a lot of new things that I never noticed before.  The girls are enjoying it somedays and other days, they just want to get it over with so they can play.  Since I am very new to observing nature, I don't have a clue what most things are.  Funny how I always loved the outdoors, but I never really cared to identify the different types of flowers and trees.  Now, I am sorry that I missed so much.  My dad is a great wealth of information about the outdoors and I never let the information sink in.  Now, he lives 15 hours away and I am on my own.  I am trying very hard to find books at the library to help indentify things.

If you have found a book that you love and find very helpful at idenifying trees and flowers, please let me know.  I think I will have to purchase a couple, but I only want to purchase something that will be very helpful. 

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