Ha!! Not our household, just our homeschool blog. Go check us out at http://jjchristianacademy.blogspot.com
I introduced my friend, K, to lapbooking last fall. Here is our very first lapbook (we co-oped a Thanksgiving study with another friend and her 2 boys) Thanksgiving Co-Op Then, we tried a Groundhog's day thing Punxsutawney Phil together. And then, my friend gets it St. Patrick's Day Lapbooks and gets it The Human Body, and gets it Easter Lapbooks! And I could keep going, but I won't. I am telling you, I am impressed!! And then....and then......she gave a class on the secret to her success (cuz I can do all those pretty folds and such....I just don't know what to put in the lapbook!). So, here, for the first time published, is how my good friend K, develops such incredible, information packed lapbooks. Voila'!! Planning a Unit Study or Lapbook
Isn't that amazing? And she's MY friend!!!! Talk about blessed!! 
Well, life is all topsy-turvy right now anyway, and we were missing our friends, SO....I decided to "crash" the tail end of their annual Bear Lake vacation. Check out the link for lots of fun pictures and even MORE links to even MORE stuff. We had a great time and hope to visit that area again (next time we hope to be bringing DH as well!)
Thanks to the "students and staff" of Matchstick Adventure Academy!!
Summer school has just begun;
So much laughing, so much fun.
Won't you have some tea and crumbs
and join us in our playing?
Okay, so really, we haven't started summer school, but I couldn't resist rewriting that little "ditty" after seeing these happy smiley faces (the one in pink is our new next door neighbor). We've been thoroughly enjoying the beautiful outdoors in this springtime weather. We haven't fully gotten back into school since our Daddy deployed last week. But we've got 7 months to fill, so I'm sure we'll catch up!
(if that's how you spell it) She was Fonzy's girlfriend and loved bikes (motorcycles, but let's say bikes for this).
Ladies and gentlemen, introducing our own "Pinky"....we found a PINK bike at Airman's Attic (that means, free) and brought it with us to visit our friends. Pinky, who had always heavily relied on training wheels (on the few times she actually rode a bike), learned to ride the bike without training wheels in less than an hour....without any help other than trailing after her best buddy "Roo"
Hubby has off this week to get ready for his deployment, so we are doing a little "paper school" here and there, and lots of outside, doing stuff with Dad kind of things. The weather has been beautiful so we have really been enjoying the outdoors. We've been planning, or should I say dreaming all kinds of ideas for the back yard. I may actually get to have a sunflower fort this year! I can't wait!!
So, we've been a little scarce as we've been getting some great family time in!
Not much more to report on though, as school's been kind of slow. We have been playing a lot of games though, so I guess that's a good thing.
Wow! The snow is gone (again!) and the weather has been beautiful! But my friend K assures me NOT to give up on winter yet. :) But I must say, spring fever is still rumbling and bubbling in me!! This weekend I finally went out and cut the grapevines back. My backyard neighbor wasn't home at the time, and I'm sure he felt pretty "nekked" when he came home and saw almost the entire fence (it was so entangled with old vines!). But I'm assured that we'll get a good crop of tasty grapes this year because of it. I hope so, cuz I really hacked them!
We're finally all better, which is great because it's been really lonely sticking to ourselves! G still hasn't gotten his orders yet, but they'll come any day now. *sigh* We finally met our new neighbors too, and G said they seem really nice and they're children are pretty well behaved (5yog, 3yob, 10mog). So that will be nice! Just hope we can still enjoy our privacy too. (I dread having kids over all the time, other people's children, doing as they please....but that's me.)
So that's what's been happening lately. That, and, I'm already planning out next year's school. We'll be using http://amblesideonline.org and adding some stuff to that. I'm really looking forward to it!
Well, at the moment, Hubby (who stayed home sick from church) and all our little "chickies" (who have been to church and back already, and had to be reminded to change out of their church clothes BEFORE getting BACK on the sleds)are outside working on a luge (sled run) they built in the back yard. I will post pics later, but let me try to draw this picture for you. We are in the city limits, neighbors to the left of us, rear of us, and empty house to the right. Our yard is a nice size, fenced in, I'm guessing maybe 120 feet long (I totally stink at estimates though). The yard is kind of terraced with a short, maybe 3 foot slope in the middle....not really very exciting for sledding. Well, several years ago, visiting our parents in CT, Hubby spent 4 days making this huge, beautiful sled run (luge) with jumps in it and banked turns and all. So, of course, the kids realize that they really need a luge in order to sled in our yard. And so it begins! And don't laugh, cuz Hubby takes this VERY seriously! He'll be out there even when the "sledding team" isn't out there, in order to build and perfect this thing! (In CT he actually convinced my Dad to use his tractor with a bucket on it to bring more snow over to the luge for him! I have documented proof!) The luge is finally reaching a fun, usable stage (these things take time to build ya know). For a bit, the kids would start out and then just slide off the edges, so while they sled, Hubby is continually packing in snow and shaping. And don't think there's a whole lot of snow out there, cuz really, there's not. I think there's 4 or 5 inches that fell last week. So other than the sled run itself, the yard is looking pretty skimpy on snow. And you know, packing all this snow in one place, it's gonna last longer than the rest of the snow. This is gonna be cool! Maybe even sledding in t-shirts on the warmer days. Now.....if we can only shake this stupid cold, or whatever it is so that we can actually invite friends over to enjoy this thing with us (miss ya, play day buddies!!)
So, when are YOU coming to give the luge a try??
One night we went to the boardwalk in San Jose and rode the carousel, walked on the beach, walked out on the pier and saw a sea lion lounging on the beams under the pier. The children also braved some fried calamari....I tried a bite, but when I saw litte D biting and stretching "something" I just couldn't eat it....my Dad and I ate the fries! 
We got to meet many of Beeker's friends, which was very nice too! We stayed for about 5 days and though we had lots of fun, it was SO nice to return home to our own little nests. Unfortunately we picked up a nasty cold along the way, so we've all been laying low since returning home.<