Wow....another year.  The older you get, the faster they go.  So true...

I haven't posted here since school started in August.  But, I have been posting. 

Since our family has changed so much, I decided back in the fall to post primarily on one blog.  I was finding it difficult to separate our homeschooling entries from our family entries anyway.  I mean, when you homeschool, home is school.  Home is everything!

Now that we are a split family, and by split I mean part homeschool, part public school, I've decided to continue to post on my Blogger account. 

You can read about our family, our homeschool, how public school is going, Autism therapies,  and all the nitty gritty of our lives at All That And A Box Of Rocks.

Happy, Wonderful New Year to You!

Lisa

Or should I say, it's getting close to that time!  It feels like 100 degrees here today, so it's a little difficult to think that Fall is right around the corner.  But, it really is. 

So, in honor of Fall and the thoughts of a new school year,  HsKubes is having a great giveaway.  Her blog is very soothing and gentle, with or without a giveaway.  You should definitely check it out!

This summer has flown past.  It really is true that the older you get, the faster time goes!

This new year comes with several new commitments and some big changes.

We have been homeschooling since 1998.  We started when our oldest daughter entered the second grade.  We lived in Mississippi at the time.  We have fond memories of those early years-just the two of us, my only daughter and I-living and learning together.  Of course, the boys were in the background.  Never a dull moment.

After we moved to Tennessee, it just felt natural to continue schooling at home. 

We added another student to the mix.  Despite having a speech/language delay, he was a good little student, learning to read was fun for him and exciting for me. 

When it was time to add  the next student, he threw a kink into our plans.  He wanted to go to school.  He begged and expected to go to school!  So, he did.  He went to Kindergarten and even though he was sick for much of the first semester, he managed to do very well.   He came home to school for first grade.

When it was time to add the next student, I paused.  He wasn't ready.  I knew it in my heart that he was still too much of a baby for school-at home or away.  You see, he was the baby.  Or so we thought...for nearly five years!  The decision was made to move forward with Kindergarten at home.  We knew we could move at his pace and even repeat it, if necessary.

And then the baby came along.  The REAL baby.   He came in like an unexpected storm, a surprise, with his medical issues and now probable Autism diagnosis.  He changed us in more ways than you could ever imagine:  our faith, our trust, our sense of family, our strength, our joy.  And just as big as all that, he changed the way we lived and schooled.  

So, after a very difficult two years, we felt God urging us to grow and change once again.  Change is hard, though.  I fought this change for eight months.  Last month, I embraced it.  HIS will commanded it and I found the courage to follow.  

My middle boys are now in school.  I have peace.  I know they will be fine.     It has been just one week, but the routine has been set in place.  Both boys seem to enjoy it, although it does take a lot of hours away from home.  Our house feels quiet and empty during the day...and clean.    (Yes, even with the rambunctous two-year-old!)

If that isn't enough change...

 I applied and have been accepted into a local LPN night/evening program.  There are still a few details I have to work through, like money (!) before I can say I'm a part-time student.  We'll see.

See, lots and lots of changes!

Together, my husband and I will run our home business, provide time for my possible schooling, school our older two kids, manage our middle two and their schooling outside our home, and deal with the little one's many therapies, doctor appointments and upcoming surgeries.

It seems like a lot, but we have the Lord and each other.  We're a team and a family. 

  18 "Forget the former things;
       do not dwell on the past.

 19 See, I am doing a new thing!
       Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
       I am making a way in the desert
       and streams in the wasteland.

Isaiah 43:18-19

I really don't think the words "lazy summer days" have ever been spoken by a SAHM. 

This week alone, I:

1. Spent time at the dentist, hoping to save a tooth (mine).  I didn't.  :o(  Ouch!  Tooth extraction is painful.

2. Spent time at the dentist, hoping to save a tooth (my daughter's).  Thankfully, no root canal needed.  Just a filling.  Whew!

3.  Hit a deer.  Well, the deer hit us.  It happened so fast that absolutely nothing could be done.  Now there's a major dent in the driver side door, the front corner panel-bad, and the headlight is broken.  Poor deer.   Thankfully, we weren't in a tiny little car and the deer  wasn't doing an antelope impression.  And the traffic was very light-amazing. Oh, and I was not driving (PTL).

4.  Liability  only.  *sigh*  (see above.)

5.  IFSP review for my little one.  Setting up evaluations with an OT for sensory issues, a behavioral analysis and a  psyche evaluation with an early intervention/austism center about 45 minutes away.  Also adding him to the waiting list for the classroom therapies, although we haven't really decided which therapies he will receive and which ones we will decide to participate in at the different options we've been given.  Always good to get on the waiting lists, I'm told.

6.  It's only Wednesday morning.

But, in the face of all this.......life is good!    I am always amazed at the way God works.   He is good-all the time!

It's funny how living in town, even if it is a tiny town, influences  your views of nature.

I didn't realize this until we moved last year.  After spending most of my life in large cities or the suburbs, our family lived right in town for 7 years.  We could walk to the park/pool, the grocery store, the beauty shop, the high school football field, etc.

Then we moved.  Now we live in a two street neighborhood in the middle of a cow pasture in a very, very tiny town. 

We hear cows mooing.  Some days it feels like one of those "Happy Cows" commercials.  There are geese that  fly over our house every day.  You can see horses from our front yard and occasionally, a few people will ride their horses down our street. 

It's dark here at night.  I mean, really dark!  You can see the stars twinkling. 

We all are so much more aware of the nature around us.  We watch the birds.  I even have a hummingbird feeder.  (!?!)  Yeah, I know!

It's actually fun to watch the flowers bloom and see the excitement in the little boys over things like bugs and birds.  They are always picking dandelions and other weeds with flowers for me to save. 

This is a bird we've been watching and hearing:

The Mourning Dove

You can click "listen" to hear the call. 

Soon it will be too hot, so for now, we are really enjoying the sights and sounds of nature.

The lilies are really beautiful this year!  Here are the pictures I wanted to share:

This is to the left of the front door.  When we moved in, this entire area was a flower bed and there was no bed to the right of the door.  For Mother's Day last year, we moved the pavers to create a waved bed all the way across the front and down the right side of the house.  My gift was the mini rosebush in the left of the picture and the $39.00 worth of sod remnants used to sod the remainder.  Notice the grass is still not fully green.  We haven't been watering enough-our water here is crazy high!

This is the same bed, but from the front porch.  The only thing I added here is the monkey grass.  It is really getting thick.  Time to spread it out.  Later in the summer, a thick ground cover comes up that looks a little like phlox, but has bigger flowers in all different colors-white, pink, orange, yellow and red.

This is on the right side of the house, taken from the front porch.  Very  pretty burgundy lilies.

These are a yellow, orange and pink combination.  Very  pretty.  I prefer the burgundy, but these are beautiful, especially in the photos.

There are still quite a few bare spots, but I think it looks pretty good.  I look forward to adding to the work the previous home owners did.  I would love to add some white azalea bushes, more hostas and a crepe myrtle.  Down the right side, I'd like to add a couple of  boxwoods and some hostas. 

Next year I'll have to separate the lilies and spread them out.  I also have orange daylilies at the mail box.  No pictures since they haven't bloomed yet.  They need to be thinned out badly.  I will add those down the left side of the house.  That side is nearly full sun, and has no flower bed yet.  That's the plan for next spring!  For right now, I have planters with tomato plants, pepper plants and a couple of watermelon plants on that side.

It's really funny to look at this and think about how 'not green' my thumb is!    It looks like I'm a garden slave!  NOT! 

The past couple of weeks have been history weeks in our house.  I do have science-crazy kids, but the history-crazy kids overrule!  Funny how that works out since I have always been more of a science-minded person myself... 

My boys love, love, love history. 

I have a war nut.  He loves anything about the World Wars and the Civil War.  His favorite right now is WW2.  He's older so he mostly reads good  historical novels with some great nonfiction titles, including a good illustrated encyclopedia with a timeline if we can find one for the time period of interest.

I also have an Ancient History buff.  His favorite is Ancient Egypt.  He's deep into the pyramids and making his own paper right now.  A little more about that later...

Then I have the American History buff.  He is young, so he is really loving the basic stories from our nation's history.  This week we are concentrating on the Native Americans. 

We use a lot of real, living books from the library and any books we can find in the Five In A Row lineup, along with anything from Homeschool Share. 

In addition, we are really utilizing the information on Time4Learning.  The Social Studies lessons are indepth, informative and downright interesting!  We have used these lessons to kick off discussions, websearches and online video viewing (think YouTube). 

We've also found lessons to go along with the social studies lessons in the Language Arts lessons on T4L.  These are great animated lessons that ask questions and really add that little extra you sometimes need to get a child's attention.

We have seen images of totem poles and beautiful handmade jewelry, videos of Native American powwows,  and even found go-along books we can read-fiction and nonfiction.

Right in the T4L lessons on Ancient Egypt, we found a recipe for making paper.  How cool is that?!?!

 And all of those tough-to-prounounce words that turn kids away from reading?  They are clickable in T4L.  When you click on the word, a sound file pops up and gives you the correct pronunciation.  In some cases you also get the definition.  (You can check out demo lessons here.)

History is exciting in our house this spring!  Just what we needed to take the dull out of the last few weeks of the year.

You see it everywhere in the homeschool world...

Planning for next year! 

I can barely concentrate on finishing up this school year!  And I am not the only one.  You can go to any active homeschooling forum and see posts about next year.

Ladies are posting about curriculum fairs, conventions, recommendations and reviews.  Everybody gets caught up in it. 

Every year I tell myself that I will finish this year before I start planning for next year.  Well, you guessed it.  I'm already thinking about it.  However, my notebook remains empty.  I am trying my best not to write anything down until the end of May. 

I sure hope I can remember all of these good ideas that are flying around inside my head!

Don't be surprised if I post "notes to self" as a cheatsheet...

Last night was the night for our local homeschoolers' Prom-Shadow of the Day.

My daughter went with a friend from church and fellow homeschooler.  Her best friend went with his best friend.  They had the ultimate night, complete with limo ride. 

They looked wonderful!  Here are a few pictures.  Sydni's date was picked up last, so I didn't get any pictures of him.   They all got pictures made at the dance, though.

This is Sam (my dd).

And best friend, Sydni.

The two of them posing together:

This is Blake and Sam. 

And one more....

I think they all had a pretty great time, even though they do not exactly run in the same circle of friends.  They all had a variety of friends present and enjoyed the night without much dancing, I heard. 

For his birthday are his two front teeth!  

He'll have a while to wait; they just came out over the past week.  It sure makes learning to read a little bit more of a struggle....  LOL

I am finally getting my pictures together for the winter study we recently completed.  We had a great time!

We started off by reviewing some of the winter themed books in Five In A Row. We looked back at our most recent studies: OWL MOON and THE VERY LAST FIRST TIME, along with KATY AND THE BIG SNOW from last fall.  What wonderful memories these unit studies create...

We watched so many movies!  Snow Buddies, Snow Dogs, Balto, Balto 2, Iron Will and a recent recommendation, Eight Below, just to name a few.  Iron Will is probably one of my very, all-time favorite movies!  I loved sharing that story with my children.

Our first lapbook experience was an A+!  It was a lot of fun and brought some extra interest to the study.  I'm sure they look simple compared to others, but we were more than satisfied with the boys' efforts.

These types of studies are such an effective way to learn.  Most days it doesn't even feel like school!

Here are the pictures:

A sampling of the materials we used.

The boys with our Iditarod Race Map at the beginning of the race.  Trent drew most of the map.

And here's a shot of Cade playing "weatherman".

Our finished, labeled map at the end of the race:

Now for the lapbooks.  First, Cade:

And Trent's:

Now that spring is in the air, the boys are ready to concentrate on a warm weather study.

Personally, I can't get enough of Alaska!

I don't believe in pushing.   I know it's common for people to think that all 5 year olds (or most) are readers.  I happen to know that it takes many kids much longer to read-try 8, 9 or even 10 years old.  I know that Cade will read when he is ready.

He is so close......so very close to being a reader!  This is so exciting to me.  There is nothing like teaching your child to read.  It's such a huge step.

I have tried three different programs with Cade, and each time, he would stall out.  He was at the point of giving up, saying he didn't want to read. 

Then we found Time4Learning.  In just a couple of months, Cade has learned so much and will soon be a READER!  Just today he read most of an I CAN READ story during his Language Arts lessons. *Proud Mom Moment...

The phonics lessons on T4L are great.  They are animated-entertaining, but not babyish.  The lessons are fun and challenging. 

T4L is a great tool for the homeschooler, no matter what your style is.  I could see this easily fitting into the schedule of a textbook user, an eclectic, or even an unschooler.

I love the fact that I can choose the level for each child.  I started Cade with Kindergarten, due to issues with immaturity.  He just flew through those lessons and has now been moved up into the first grade level. 

And Science!  Since moving Cade up a level, he now has access to Science lessons.  He loves Science!

You can go here to check out T4L's scope and sequence.

Don't take my word for it!  Look around, try the sample lessons and see for yourself.

I was going through the picture files on my computer yesterday and found a couple of  'educational moments' that, in my somewhat biased opinion, really need to be recorded for all to see.  

This is from the early fall.  We were studying A PAIR OF RED CLOGS through Five In A Row.  We learned a lot about Japan and had some fun on the last day with a meal of chicken fried rice.

This is Cade trying his hand at chopsticks in his makeshift Japanese outfit.  Cute, huh?

Ahhhhh.....Success!

This is just a small sample of art class on any given day.  This is Eli hard at work mastering ink drawing.

Yes, he's very good at it.  He can create artwork anywhere, anytime!

Notice that he created art on my last blank grade/attendance report sheet.  I'm beginning to think it's the t-shirt.  Everytime he wears the "I DIDN'T DO IT" t-shirt......he does it. 

Now, this is an example of his artwork that I can actually keep past bath time.  It is a study in pencil and orange crayon.

I'll be back to post the pictures and details of our winter study  and give an update on how school is going with FIAR and T4L.  We were side-tracked by sping break this week.  We had originally planned it for next week, but decided to move it up to accommodate a birthday, friends and a trip to the Skatepark of Memphis to see a pro skateboarder!

We are finishing up a big winter study that started a while back with the winter FIAR books and ending shortly with the end of the Iditarod dog sled race.

We have had so much fun!  We I love this race so very much.  I have tried for years to get my children involved with my love for Alaska and the dogs with very little success.  They enjoy the study because of the fun books and movies, but when it's over.....well, I just don't understand! 

This year, I actually had one child get really involved with me.  My 10 year old eagerly checked the race updates, went through the daily update newsletter, asked about the checkpoints, etc.  Heaven!

We I chose 3 mushers to follow this year:  Jeff King, Martin Buser and Mitch Seavey.  All 3 finished in the top ten, so not bad!

We actually put together our very first ever lapbooks.  I used a variety of sources, but the main idea came from homeschoolestore.com. 

We will be finishing this study, hopefully Monday, maybe Tuesday and then I'll post some pictures and more details.

DD-17

DS-13

DS-10

DS-2

Four of my kids playing in our surprise March snow.  The 6 year old is missing.  He was playing with friends down the street.

A view of the first snow of this winter from our front porch.  They are predicting a total of 4-6 inches!

And yes, that is a garden gnome.  I have no idea why it is sitting on top of the Little Tykes Cozy Coupe, or why the Cozy Coupe is on the front porch....  (Kids!)

This past week was crazy!  My 2 year old had two doctor appointments.  The first one was for a hearing evaluation and was in a city about an hour away.  The second appointment was a heart evaluation and was in a city three hours away.

 Normally, this schedule would totally wipe out our school week.  But, not this time.  The three R's were covered each day.  My 13 yr old, 10 yr old and I are all reading ACROSS FIVE APRILS. 

The biggest success of the week was my first grader.   He has been using Time 4 Learning for less than 2 months.  Because I was not confident in his abilities, I opted to sign him up as a first grader, with access to the Kindergarten program. 

This child does not sit still!  If he was in public school, I believe he would have still been considered a kindergartner at the beginning of this school year due to immaturity.

Anyway, In January, we began the T4L Kindergarten program.  As of this week, he has done the full K math program and is one Review section away from completing the full K phonics program.  He really breezed through it and has learned a lot.  He is almost reading!

He loves it so much!  He loves the graphics and the setup of the program. ( You can check out the demos here. ) He loves going to the playground after his lessons are done. (I love that I can set a time limit on the playground and control our account like this!)

I love the backpack-an area I can go to see all of his completed work for the day, week or month.  I can even print reports.   Oh, and  I love the Parent's Forum.  I do not post much, but I have had many questions answered just be reading the boards.

This program helps keep me on track every week-even though all of my children are not currently using the program.  It's just easier to get everyone going when my first grader is happily chugging along on T4L!

This is a big issue in our home, because our little one has health issues and weekly appointments are the norm for us.  In the past, it has caused a true school struggle.  Since finding T4L late last December, these struggles have been minimized. 

Thanks, Time 4 Learning! 

This is a picture my husband took of the Pink Palace Mansion in Memphis, TN.  This is the home of the Pink Palace Museum and IMAX Theater, among other things.  We absolutely love to visit this museum and always come away with a new tidbit of information that we missed the last trip!

Taken from their website: 

Piggly Wiggly founder Clarence Saunders began building his 36,500 square foot dream house in 1922. He wanted a home "Memphis would be proud of, a real Southern showplace," and he wanted all materials, contractors and even the architect to be Southern. Memphis architect Hubert T. McGee designed a home built of pink Georgian marble, featuring a pipe organ, ballroom, indoor swimming pool, shooting gallery and bowling alley.

Sadly, Saunders never got to sleep in his dream home. He lost a battle with the New York Stock Exchange in 1923 and went bankrupt, losing his fortune and his unfinished mansion, which was then donated to the city of Memphis.

Can you imagine?!?!  It is such a beautiful place right in the middle of the city, yet it looks like a countryside estate. 

Here are a couple of additional pictures from this trip.

This is my 10 yr old taking a turn at the log.  Each door in the log contains a surprise.  He was the last to have a turn and kept saying he just knew he would get something gross.  He did....a beaver's tail!

This is me with the 2 yr old, 13 yr old, 16 yr old, 10 yr old, and 6 yr old.  We are standing just around the corner from the massive entry way/foyer of the mansion. 

After polling our family, the top 3 exhibits were:  The Yellow Fever Epidemic in Memphis, The Piggly Wiggly Grocery Store, and  The Medical Careers over the years area-The pharmacy, war medics, nursing, surgery of all types.  Thank GOD for medical advancement!!