What a wonderful day my 11yodd and I had today! My boys went to work with dh today; since they are both wanting to work with him when they graduate, this is an "early release" program, of sorts; at least that is what we called it when I was in high school YEARS ago.
Anyway, I had the day laid out for us. We would do a modified day of book work because it is the day to "bless our home". (Any Flybabies out there know that what that means is that we clean our house today. Our "home blessing" consists of vacuuming, dusting, cleaning mirrors and front glass door, sweeping and mopping the kitchen and bathroom floors, and cleaning the rest of the bathrooms, as well.) Normally this task is accomplished by the boys, Tiffany, and I all taking a project and getting it done in much less time because many hands make light work. Well, since the boys went with Mike today, that meant Tiffany and I must pick up the slack and get all the home blessing done by ourselves.
So, I'd planned that after the guys got off this morning, we would get dressed, eat breakfast, and then we would read two of the books we are reading for her school time (Pollyanna and Quest at Diamond Peak), an audio from Homeschool Radio Shows, spelling, and a math game. The rest of her school for the day, would be Life Skills of home blessing and making dinner.
Well, we got off to a good start with getting dressed and eating breakfast. We got a little behind then and started reading Pollyanna a little later than I wanted to. We started reading with chapter 7. We were enjoying the story so much that neither of us wanted to stop. We ended up finishing the book; yes, all the way through chapter 32. We really enjoyed ourselves. Those four hours flew by!
I had never read Pollyanna before. Imagine my delight when I discovered that there is a sequel! And yes, I have already put in a request for the book to be put on the hold shelf for us at our local library. I also found that our library system also has the movie. I hope it is good; we'll see, as I have that one requested too.
During our cleaning, we found ourselves playing around with the Glad Game ourselves. This book was a delight! If you have never read it, do, it is a treasure! I'm so glad for homeschooling! I'm enjoying so many books with my children that I never read before. It amazes me that we didn't read some of these when I was in school. But when I really think about it, it doesn't surprise me because these books have some really good character lessons in them. Books like Heidi, A Little Princess, Little Britches, and so many more.
I just finished reading The Chosen with my son. Well not exactly with him but we were both reading it. It was a really good book too. I was glad to discover that it too has a sequel. I love books that I don't have to leave the characters that I have come to love with the end of the book. I also like that these books were written so long ago, so that I don't have to wait for the sequel to be written and published. (hehehe)
We read an article in Girlhood Home Companion yesterday about Precious Memories. In the article, the author was saying that many of her precious memories were of working hard with the family. Tiffany and I talked about it after reading the article and I have decided that what made the "hard work" a precious memory was because it was done with others.
This made me think about work we do. I mentioned to Tiffany that I figured she would probably end up with fond memories of us cooking together because we do that together. But I doubt she will have precious memories of emptying the dishwasher, which happens to be her task and she frequently forgets to do, nor does she enjoy it. Not that she loves cooking with me but she likes it a whole lot more than emptying that dishwasher.
So, today when I knew that we would have to take on the jobs that the boys usually do, as well as what we usually do, I did not just give her more chores. Instead, we worked together and did a good job of cleaning up the living room and preparing dinner. Of course, we do have a bit left to accomplish before our guys come home, but we are taking a well-deserved break right now.
Well, we better get finished, still have a few floors to mop and a few dishes to clean . . . oh, and some bathrooms to clean. At least I can be glad that dinner will be easy, since we did all the prep work.
Blessings,
Michele ºÜº
PS. The pictures have nothing to do with the words on the page. We took them at the aquarium last month and I just love anemone. I think they are beautiful. Anyway, Ann V. inspired me to add pictures even when it isn't directly related to what I am talking about just because they are pretty. (I remember seeing a photo of a bird of paradise on her blog and she was not talking about it. I also remember how much I enjoyed the picture and others, even though they were not depicting something being written about at the moment. They were simply a part of God's beautiful creation and she was sharing it.) So, I hope someone enjoys these.
Today I am feeling very humbled about who I am and what I do. As I have mentioned before, I have been visiting Ann V.'s blog, AHolyExperience for a while now. Today I read about Mega Memory Month on her blog. In truth, I have been wanting to commit some passages to memory and have asked my children to do so as well, but I have not been working toward this at all. So, today when I read about this challenge, I knew that the Lord had directed me to stumble upon it and desired for me to participate.
The Mega Memory Month is actually the inspiration of Ann Kroeker. I had never visited her site before Ann V.'s mentioning it today. I enjoyed visiting it and the blogs of the other participants of the MMM. It was in doing so that I was really humbled. When I first started this blog I had so many thoughts about my studies in the Bible and biblical things but, to be honest, I didn't want people to think that I thought I was something. It is almost as if I failed a test or something, because I have had very little along those lines that I felt like sharing since then. After visiting these dear leadies' blogs, I feel that I really missed it back there in the very beginning when I put a hamper on the things I wanted to share because of being concerned about my image or how people would perceive me. Truth be told, there is much I don't share, so as not to be perceived poorly. And here I thought I wasn't a "people pleaser". What an eye-opener!
So, I am going to participate in the Mega Memory Month but I am going to take this to prayer before starting. I want to memorize exactly what God wants me to memorize, especially since I know that He has led me to do this. So, I may not get my passage memorized by the end of the month, but I will work diligently to get it memorized, whatever it is. AND I will post about it, as I go.
I am thankful for the encouragement of these ladies to take on this challenge, and the majority of them (okay, all but Ann V.) don't know me and have never heard of me before and yet, they have been an encouragement to me. I'm going to pray for these ladies as I begin this venture and throughout the month. I'm so glad that God can lead us and guide us by people that we don't even know in person. So to the 9 participants of MMM, Thank You!!!
I feel as if I have had a course correction and am very thankful to God for His correction. I pray that my blog will be a blessing to you; that has always been my intent. So, if there are some reading this, that have yet to take on the MMM challenge, Come On! Join Us! Leave me a comment to let me know that you too are joining in this endeavor.
For those that aren't into the cleaning aspect of the Holiday Grand Plan, there is another plan, by the same people, for you. Christmas Countdown is a 6-week Christmas planner. It does NOT include the cleaning aspect of the Holiday Grand plan but does help you prepare for a smooth, enjoyable Christmas season. It starts the last week of October and goes through the first week of December.
I'm going to make me a Christmas Preparations Notebook (or section in my Home Notebook). In it I will have both plans (Holiday Grand Plan and Christmas Countdown).
I had every intention of doing the HGP this year but with the rooms we are adding to our home and all that we have to do to get it done by Thanksgiving, I don't see it happening this year. I guess I'll have to do the detailed cleaning after the new year or next spring. Of course, there is still time to do some stuff but I just don't see it happening with the remodeling going on. (Yes, I know it is just an excuse. )
Over on AHolyExperience blog, that I mentioned in my last post, Ann talks about A Thousand Gifts and challenges others to join her in making their own list of 1000 Gifts. She had a statistic quoted that people that keep gratitude journals are 25% happier and have fewer health complaints.
This goes along with one of the "gifts" in the book The Ultimate Gift that I've mentioned before. Here is what I copied from that book on "The Gift of Gratitude".
" . . . When we parted, I asked him why he was always in such good spirits. he told me that one of the great lessons his mother had left him was the legacy of the Golden List.
"He explained to me that every morning before he got up, he would lie in bed—or wherever he had been sleeping—and visualize a golden tablet on which was written ten things in his life he was especially thankful for. He told me that his mother had done that all the days of her life, and that he had never missed a day since she shared the Golden List with him." pg 124
I have heard of many people that write in a "Blessings Journal" or such each night but I think that thinking on these blessings or things for which I am grateful, in the morning, will put me in a more pleasant mood throughout the day.
So, I will start my own list of 1000 Gifts and I will add on as time goes by. Some I may not share, as they may be private but many I will share here. I hope this challenges you to start your own gratitude list.
♥ Jesus (He loves me so much he came, took my poverty, lack, sickness, disease, and sins on Himself, so that I don't have to have any of it and can be with Him forever.)
♥ Family (husband, children, parents, siblings, extended family)
♥ Friends (forever friends, church friends, lifelong friends, homeschooling friends, and internet friends)
♥ The property we live on (9.5 acres way out in the country)
♥ Our home
♥ The new rooms being added onto our home
♥ Vehicles that get us where we need to go without suffocating us in the summer or freezing us out in the winter
♥ The breeze on a beautiful warm day
♥ My computer and internet access
♥ Wonderful giving people on the internet that make homeschooling and learning affordable (in many instances giving things away for free)
Well, I'll stop with that for today. We'll see where this goes. I suspect that I will get a bit more detailed as I go along and those first 10 may turn into 50 or more. :) I have a lot of friends and family to be thankful for.
A fellow homeschooler recommended an entry on a blog several weeks ago. I got to this website to read this article, which was awesome, by the way, and was truly blessed. This is where I first heard David Nevue's music, that I mentioned yesterday. The music definitely sets a wonderful atmosphere for Ann's words.
The blog is called A Holy Experience and has been very thought provoking to me. This blog has inspired me. Not only does she have the atmosphere set with the beautiful instrumental music of David Nevue but she also has gorgeous pictures. We went to the local aquarium a few weeks ago (which I will blog about later) and I had my sons take many pictures so that I would have some pictures to upload on my blog as well.
Now, I'm going to have to figure out what to do about photo storage (online) for my blog, when the homeschoolblogger photo album is full (5mb). This is why my pictures aren't real big. Also, the awesome camera that I have, takes humongous pictures and I've yet to figure out the perfect size to resize them for my blog.
I'm going to have to figure out how to make a new section on my right sidebar for special links, which is where I will link to Ann Voskamp's wonderful blog.
One day she made an entry on various websites with daily educational content. I have referred to this several times and have since bookmarked them in my own browser. She so inspired me that I searched for some more daily content and sent some to her, which she has since included some in her updated list. It was nice to be able to bless her, since she has blessed me with her words. She is definitely a writer.
Recently, I have stumbled upon some music that absolutely ministers to me. I just knew that this pianist had to be a brother in the Lord. I googled him today and found that I was right.
His name is David Nevue. He has some of the most anointed instrumental music I have ever heard. This is definitely going on my Christmas list. (Yes you read that right! We, my mother, sister and I, like to have all our shopping done by Thanksgiving, so we start about now. We start shopping in earnest next month. It is fun because my children are old enough to stay home and babysit my niece, while we go shopping together. This makes it easier to ensure that we are not duplicating gifts and we are able to help each other with gift suggestions when one of us gets stumped. I'll be blogging more about this after our first shopping trip this year.)
Anyway, I have been so stirred by his music that I simply must have a CD or two of his this year. You can visit his website by clicking here. (Click on CDs at that website or on the listen link in the next sentence.) You can even listen to some samples of the different CDs.
He has some interesting articles on the site as well. Let me know if you've heard him before. Like I said, his music is new to me but I absolutely love it.
I was listening to some demos of the CDs for some time today. It has been a beautiful day and I've had the windows open. My brother-in-law was working on our roof and after about an hour, my husband came in and asked me if I was de-stressed because they were falling asleep up there. It truly is peaceful music!!!
I got this really neat little gadget a couple of weeks ago from the grocery store (OK, it is a Super Wal-Mart). I happened to see that it was on clearance, so I picked it up.
My daughter used it for the first time Friday, to wrap a gift. We made homemade wrapping paper from brown packing paper, masking tape, stickers, and a flower die cut. (It turned out cute.)
Anyway, this cutter made cutting that paper SO easy!!! Now Tiffany wants to help me wrap gifts, but she only wants to be in charge of cutting the paper. LOL!
I've always used my scissors, partially closed, to slide across the wrapping paper, cutting it as it goes. But many times the angle would get messed up and I'd end up with a jagged cut. This just goes across smoothly and very quickly! It should make wrapping Christmas presents go much more smoothly this year. (Of course I'll get some practice with it on the three birthdays before then.)
It is a very good thing that I don't have all the rooms that are listed in the Holiday Grand Plan. Why? Because I am now, officially, two weeks behind. No big deal! I can get caught up this week.
I got a new printer, actually all-in-one unit, a couple of months ago. I have always had a bad habit of leaving my printer on all the time!!! Well, I just read part of the manual yesterday, and found that when the printer is shut off, it "caps" the print heads so that the ink does not dry up or clog the print head. Ugh!!! It would have been good if I would have read that sooner because I think I have clogged print heads that are not coming clean. Soooo, I had to order new ink cartridges.
I love a Canon printer because the ink tanks are so easy to fill. You just take the ink tank out (which looks like the ink cartridges of other machines but no print head on the bottom) and turn it upside down and drip the ink on the recessed area on the bottom. Well, I got a great deal on this all-in-one machine BUT the ink tanks are not just tanks, they are ink cartridges with the print head on the bottom. Ugh!!! Thus making them expensive!!! I did figure out how refill the cartridge but because of leaving the printer on, it did not work as well. Another thing I'm wondering about, is if it holds less ink because it was with the printer at purchase. I know other machines will put less ink in the cartridges packed with new machines, so maybe Canon does as well.
So what does all of that have to do with being behind on the HGP? I need to print some pages out to complete.
Last week I made extra taco meat and have some in the freezer now. I didn't even realize that it was an HGP assignment. So, I'm not completely behind.
So I encourage you, if you have not started thinking about the holidays, check out the Holiday Grand Plan. You can still join in. Come on, join me! And let me know you are!
I promised pictures of my niece, some time ago. So, I am finally getting around to putting some up. I hope you like them. This "little" darling weighed a mere 9 pounds 12.5 ounces!!!! She was too big to enter this world via the birth canal, so she was delivered by c-section after many hours of labor. Thankfully she never made enough of an exit that my dear sister had to heal in two ways (the normal way and surgically). Much prayer went up for her quick recovery and as little pain as possible. God truly does answer prayer!
Here she is within a few hours of birth with my oldest son.
Here she is with my mom.
I don't have a decent picture of her at one month but
here she is at about two months—Independence Day.
Here is a better picture of her.
This one is at about 3 months.
This one is from last week, she is a
little more than 4 months old now.
She is a big girl! She is making her own "curve" on the growth chart. She is perfectly proportioned but just BIG! She is a little chunk. I think she weighed 16 pounds at her doctor visit last week. Yes, and she is only 19 or 20 weeks old.
Yesterday I purchased some noni (no-knee) juice from our health food store. I'd heard about it on Your Health with Dr. Richard Becker and his wife Cindy.
According to Dr. Becker, noni juice is a natural pain reliever, like ibuprophen and such, except that it is NOT addictive and not bad for you in any way.
My husband has been having bad headaches for the past several weeks. I decided to see if I could get some. I was surprised to find it.
I was having some excruciating cramps today and decided to give it a try, rather than take a lot of mg of ibuprophen, which they say can cause liver damage.
Disgusting!!! That is how it tasted BUT in fairness, Cindy Becker did say it was gross. She and her husband said that drinking water removes the taste from the mouth. I had to have something to eat to remove the taste from my mouth. They also suggested mixing it with other juice. I think I will chase it with juice next time because there will most definitely be a next time.
Within 15 minutes of taking this foul-tasting liquid, the pain was beginning to lessen. Within an hour, it was gone completely. I had taken 1000 mg of ibuprophen two days ago and it took 3 hours to relieve the pain. It is now many hours later, and the pain has not returned. Now in fairness, I do have to say that it doesn't always return (it is my prayer that it never returns) but some days it does.
I am very thankful that I found something natural that will relieve the cramping!!! I do not know what else this juice does, but I know that it took away my pain today.
We live in a 16x80 mobile home. We have 3 children and only 3 bedrooms. The boys are only 21 months apart in age, and have shared a room since the youngest got out of his crib at around 18 months old. They are now 17 and 15. Tiffany outgrew her bedroom about 8 years ago, when she was only 3. We have desired to add two bedrooms on to our home for quite some time (6 years or more but it has only be practical in the last 3½ years).
My husband's brother is one of those "everything" guys. You know the type that can do anything. He is actually self-employed and does construction for a living. He also paints some but prefers carpentry.
Anyway, my husband has been after him for years, but very determinedly for the past several months, to come here (he lives in another state about 10 hours away) and help him with some work AND add on our two rooms. Since he was looking for some work, he decided surprise us and come last weekend, which was the 11th anniversary of our move here from VA.
As I speak, he is on my roof getting it ready to shingle. The new rooms are framed in already. This was after waiting for materials to be delivered ALL week long!
This is my brother-in-law as he works on getting the wall framing up.
This is at the end of the second day of work (although it is only the first full day).
This is a view of the whole thing, so I had to stand WAY back.
Needless to say, we are all ecstatic. Well most of us. My husband is thrilled that he is getting his roof done, so that he won't hear the wind rolling across it any more. The kids and I are thrilled because they will each have their own room, with enough space to be comfortable. I'm super thrilled because Tiffany's old room will become the library/craft room!!! Whoo Hooo!!!! So, all the shelves throughout the house, will be moved into that room, thus decluttering every room in the house, including the hallway.
When all is said and done, the only two rooms in the house that will still need painting will be my room and the living room. I guess my room will probably get done after Christmas and then the living room, some time next year.
God is soooo good!!! I finally gave it over to Him, completely, as to the timing, and stopped trying to finagle how to get them. God did it and we even have the cash to do it. Now, having said that, my brother-in-law did give us an incredible deal to which I will always be grateful!!!!
Wow! We had a wonderful time at our homeschool picnic yesterday!!! We belong to Green Country H.E.R.O. and we had our big picnic yesterday. Thanks to Kay, Dawn, and Cynthia for such a wonderful, memorable time. There was an awesome turnout. I also noticed that we had a very good mix of ages in the group this year.
It was so fun to have my long-time friend Tamn and her kids with us. (I think 11 years is considered a "long-time friend". Don't you?) Of course, I've known some of the ladies in the group for almost as long as well; so I am truly blessed!
It was neat to see my boys mixed up with all the teens and having a ball. It was great to see my daughter playing with girls her age and not feeling left out. It was an awesome time of adult fellowship too.
Kay had a pool and even though it was a bit chilly, some of the children still got in the water. I had to tell Tiffany to get out after about 2 hours. Sean did swim too but Brian never made it in the pool. He got there and started talking with others right away. Then they started throwing around a football AND kicking around the soccer ball at the same time.
There was a net set up for taller people to play badminton or volleyball with and one set up for the younger (shorter) ones to play at. There was a child-safe horseshoes game too. Then they started the hula hoop and jump rope contests and bobbing for apples.
They even had prizes, lots of prizes, set up for the little ones. Then they did a scavenger hunt and had bigger prizes for the bigger ones. It was so neat!!! They really went all out!
Dinner was good, as usual. HERO provided fried chicken and drinks and each family brought a side dish and dessert. After all these years, it is hard to believe that this is actually the FIRST time we've made it to the Back-to-School Picnic, when usually it is much closer to our home. Well, what it boils down to is that I decided that the children needed to have at least one homeschool group fellowship time a month, so I made it a priority to go and we went.
It really was fun!
Michele ºÜº
We did have a considerable drive, but Tamn and her kids rode with us making it seem much shorter than it was.
I wish we'd have taken the camera with us. I can't believe we forgot it!!! Oh well, we had a great time!
I wish I had a working phone number for you, or that I'd have thought about it ahead of time and got your card in the mail, but alas . . . please know that I've thought about you today and have wished you a happy birthday! (Now, I only hope you see this!!!!)
We had an awesome day! Today was the day of our first tea party based on the Fruit of the Spirit Teas. I got this as a freebie years ago and never got around to using it, until this year. I asked Tiffany which she wanted to do first and she said blueberry; so that's what we did.
It was a blueberry iced tea and blueberry scones. The fruit of the Spirit studied was peace. This was such a good study. The mom of the girls that came said that it was very helpful to her right now, and that she was going to type the verses up and read them each day. God is so good!!!!! He gave us just the right study to please these dear friends at just the right time for them.
I wasn't sure I'd like the blueberry tea, but I do like peach tea so I thought it was worth a try. I liked it a lot. It wasn't on my diet!!!! by any stretch of the imagination but my daughter would not have enjoyed it as much if I had not fully participated. Yes, there are any number of things I could have done, but I chose not to. I chose to share in everything with my daughter and our company.
Since we have been friends for 11 years, I knew that we would want a nice long visit, so we had them come before lunch and eat lunch with us as well as share in a tea, which we combined. We made a salad with a rotisserie style chicken and cheese cubes in it. (I followed the recipe card for the chicken that I got with my Turbo Cooker—purchased on clearance several years ago. But tonight I found a version to make something similar in the crockpot, linked above, which I will use in the future, since it does not have to be "babysat", just get it in the crockpot and let it cook. Anyway, we cooked the chicken last night and I removed the chicken from the bones. We put A LOT of it in the salad. It was very good. Even the girls had seconds and even thirds, I think.
After we ate and we cleaned the table off, the girls used paint pens to decorate the candle holders I had for each of them. I gave them some blue votive candles to put in them. I suggested writing something like, "Peace, Jesus gave it, follow it!" on it but they could choose to write anything they wanted to on them. I thought that the only way to remove the paint was to use a razor blade and scrape it off but we found that it dried very quickly and that rubbing alcohol cleaned it off quickly and easily. (We had a perfectionist and a mis-speller and an oops.) I chose candles as a craft because I felt that candles symbolized peace.
I also got some scratch cards from Dollar Tree. You use something hard (wood stick provided) to scrape off some of the black on the surface of an animal shape, revealing a pretty silvery prism of colors. There were a total of 10 die cuts (animal shapes) approximately the size of a 3x5 card; not bad for a buck. It is something similar to this.
I may get motivated an take a picture of it and post it; of course, I'm more apt to do that if there are comments showing interest in such.
Our friends left around 5pm; what a wonderful time we had. It was easier for the girls to part because we will be going to our homeschool Back-to-School Picnic tomorrow, together, if their momma dog shows no sign of delivering her pups yet. But it was funny because the older girl said she'd bring her DVD player to watch something in the van and Tiffany "needed" to call her and tell her not to bother because she gets car sick if she even listens to a video while riding in the car. She ended up talking to her for a while on the phone. I'm so glad that God provided good friends for my dd!!! He knows just what we need and when we need it!
The only thing that would make the Fruit of the Spirit Teas Bible Study, that I mentioned before., any better would be if it included a craft for each study. But I'm sure God will continue to give me ideas as we go along.
This has been a great experience and I look forward to future teas. Tiffany is learning that hospitality is hard work but very worthwhile. I'm so glad God inspired the "course" for her education this year. I am eager to see what God will do with the rest of them.
Oh! I learned something today, that I will share in another post, about jealousy and envy
The holidays are quickly approaching! I know that some of you don't think so, but they really are. And it is time, once again, to start the Holiday Grand Plan (HGP).
In case you are not familiar with the Holiday Grand Plan, it is a plan to thoroughly clean your house AND get ready for the holidays, all at the same time, in nice little steps. Since my house is small and I don't have as many rooms as others do, I'll get extra weeks to work on the rooms I do have.
This week is List Week and Clean the Front Porch. Since I have a very tiny and uncluttered front porch, it will be easy for me to do this one. AND that is a very good thing because it is a very busy week.
First, we had unexpected company, which is turning out to be a humongous blessing.
Second, yesterday was Labor Day, making it a short week.
Third, today was grocery/errand day, meaning we were not home for the majority of it. (My Aunt and Uncle were visiting my parents and they are leaving today, so we went by to say good-bye before they left. It was so good to see them. I only wish I'd take some pictures—this seems to be something I continually say—I'm going to have to work on this.)
Fourth, my daughter is having a tea party on Thursday, so tomorrow will be a major preparations day and Thursday will be FUN!!!
Finally, Friday is our Back-to-School Picnic with our homeschool support group. Unfortunately, we will have to drive for about an hour and a half to get there but I'm sure it will be worth it. Tiffany is looking forward to swimming at the picnic.
So, as you can see, it is going to be one very busy but very fun week!
Here is the link for the Holiday Grand Plan. It is great because occasionally they even tell you to make a double batch of something you are cooking for dinner and freeze it, to eat during the busiest weeks of the holidays. But, just like any curriculum, do not make it your master. Use it as a tool, to help you get organized but remain flexible and at peace, not thinking you absolutely HAVE to do everything listed or when listed. Take a few days to look it over and see where you can change things around, for your circumstances—like, I don't have 2 living areas so I get to use both of those weeks on my ONE living area. It is a great TOOL!!!!
I'd love to hear, if you end up doing this too. It is neat because I mentioned it to my sister about a month ago and she put it on her calendar to start this week too!
So, this week I am thinking about my front porch and trying to consider how to make it inviting. I will probably look into getting some kind of fall leavy garland or something for the railing and a nice mat in front of the door. Maybe hang my wreath outside, it is a big grapevine wreath but I think I need to spruce it up a bit. I will sweep the porch, clean the glass door, and sweep the side of the house to ensure no webs are dangling. The only other thing I can think of, is to find a place to store the new boots the kids got a few months ago. They are all laying on the front porch, neatly, but there all the same.
The other thing to do is start making all those lists!!!! Looks like I'll end up doing that on Saturday, the way my week is shaping up. OR I just may have to do it next week. BUT I could do it Thursday evening. We'll see! Remember, the HGP is a TOOL not a task master.
One day this week I decided to have some fun with math and Tiffany. I had seen this easy game in “Games . . . Tools for Learning” by Janice and Mark Vreeland, so I decided to do it on the spur of the moment. Tiffany is way passed simple addition, but I thought it would be good to solidify the pairs that add up to 10.
Here's the game, take two sets of cards of 1-10, giving you 20 cards in total. Shuffle and lay them out, face side down, in a memory or concentration style; we used 3 rows of 6. Then you take turns picking 2 cards. In order for them to match, they must total 10. We played this a few times and I won each time. This spurred her on to play more and more, to finally win once. Unfortunately, that never happened; but she did end up playing it many times and got those pairs down well.
The other game I found that I'd purchased years ago is from Bicycle Kids, called Total It. There are 8 sets of 1-10 in the deck. The dealer deals 7 cards to each player and then turns the top card face up. This face up card is the total aimed for by each player this round. So, let's say the face up card is 5. Then each player, in turn, can either put down a 5 that they have in their hand or any two cards that either add up to, or subtract to equal 5, in a pile in front of them, called a score pile. After each player lays down their matches and total cards, the deal gives each person the number of cards needed to have 7 in their hand again and another card is placed face up for the total this round. When there are no longer enough cards to give each player enough cards for a full hand and a face up card, then the game is over. Each player totals the number of cards he placed in his score pile and that is his score for the game. The one with the most points wins. It was fun! But . . . I now have to look through my resources for multiplication and division games, as this is where she needs the most practice right now.
It was a fun math day! I hope you can use the ideas.
Michele ºÜº
Let me start today's blogging off with a note about my last post. I have since read some negative reviews of The Shack and am in the process of re-reading it, to see if it hits me any differently. I will admit that I am "put out" by the Foreward of the book; I don't think the author needed to go so far "trying to make us believe the story is real", as it is very misleading. For anyone that has not visited the author's blog yet, let me tell you that this book came about from "conversations" the author had with God himself; he even considered naming the book Conversations with God but realized that someone else had already used that title.
I still stand by my recommendation for The Ultimate Gift, 100%! It is a great book!
On to today's comic relief. LOL Last Monday, I was on the telephone with my mother when I heard a crash. It sounded like it was on the roof. I looked out the back door. I looked to my son mowing the grass but he was an acre away with the lawn mower, so he had no clue what it was. I looked out the front door and still couldn't figure it out. I decided to just mention it to my husband later that night. Well, there were so many other things we needed to talk about that night that it completely slipped my mind.
Then Tuesday afternoon I was getting ready to go to my local Homeschool Support Group meeting, GCHero, and I opened up the closet door. Well maybe I should say that I tried to open up the closet door. I couldn't figure out what was making it so hard to open. And then I saw it. My clothes rack had crashed!
Once I got the door open further, I saw that only my half of the clothes rack fell. And in actuality, it didn't fall; it bent right in the middle of the rack. The last time it fell, yes you read that right, it fell once before, my side fell and my dh's side rose, like a see-saw. When he fixed it, it was supposed to be so strong that it would never fall again. Well, that worked for his side but not my side.
Now for the lesson for all of you to learn from this little experience of mine: when you feel God suggesting that you do something, just do it. See about a month or two ago, I felt like I needed to go through my closet and dresser and get rid of a lot of clothes that I've been holding onto that are smaller than my current size. I am going to lose this weight and it will be nice to have something to wear as I do. But, what I've realized is that I have some clothes that I will NOT wear even when I can wear them and to hold onto them because they are nice, new, or I might like them, is ridiculous. So the Great Closet Clean-Out is about to commence.
Have you cleaned out your closet lately?
Michele ºÜº
P.S. I hope to put up at least one picture of the rack collapse sometime soon, but didn't want to wait on it, to post this.
When I wrote my last message, I had three other things I wanted to blog about but I'd spent enough time online already and got off. Consequently, those other things I wanted to blog about have evaporated from my mind. Well, maybe it will come back to me. I hope I will blog at least once a week, but maybe even more often. I've got to set a specific time to blog and then maybe I'll get it done more often. Well, enough of that!
What brought me to blog today was two-fold. First, I finally got to watch The Ultimate Gift movie. It was very good! But I have to say that if any of you have ONLY watched the movie, you are really missing some great points of the plot! I will caution you, although Emily is in the book, as a nameless child, she doesn't play nearly as big a role. Now, I totally understand why this is done in the movie but I want you to realize that she has a much smaller part to play in the book, as does her mother. The book is about The Ultimate Gift and how Red goes about getting this over to Jason. You will find that there are many differences but understandably so. Having said that, PLEASE read the book. It has really been thought provoking with my boys and me.
The second thing that prompted me to blog today was that I have just finished reading The Shack. Now I have to admit, when my good friend suggested reading this book and I read what it was about, I was a bit skeptical. But I have to tell you that this was an incredible read!!!!!! After reading several things that I thought were "good points" or things I wanted to remember, I began to mark a few with removable flags to use as my own copywork. I soon realized that there were too many things that were noteworthy. I would skip a few and then there would be another point that really touched me and I'd mark it. So, I finished the book and looked at the flags and found that even though I had limited my "flagging", I still had a dozen flags. I know this is a book that I am going to have to own, much like The Ultimate Gift, so that I can re-read it from time to time and highlight the dickens out of it. .
I will admit that there were a few times that I was quite concerned about some elements and almost stopped reading it. But I have to say, I am so glad that I did not quit reading it. I will be recommending this book to my family to read and have already told the boys that they must read it! I will be recommending it people in my homeschool support group and my online groups, and I have just now recommended it to YOU! It really is worthwhile reading!!!
If you read either of these two books, please email me or post a comment. I'd love to chat with you about them, I'm sooo full having just read them. But don't give out any spoilers in comments so that others will read them too. I'd hate to spoil the fun for others.
For those that take the time to comment, THANK YOU!!! I really appreciate them. It helps me know that people really are reading this blog and that it is worth the effort.
We started school two weeks ago already. It has been a really good two weeks, in spite of the fact that I didn't realize that my oldest would be as interested in the Olympics as he is. Consequently, I've lessened the requirements for school for the two weeks of the Olympics, since learning about other countries and many sports that we don't usually have contact with are educational; I think we are doing well. We record the night events and watch them in the afternoon the next day, after watching the morning events.
I am so glad that I decided to put art/crafts in my 11yodd's schedule this year. In previous years the art was just sketching/rough drawing, this year I decided to put in crafts and other arts. I purchased a stamped cross stitch kit for her. It wanted this so that she could learn the stitching and not be worried about counting.
When I was a teen, I had a printed cross stitch piece that I ended up making a pillow out of. It is a small pillow but my dd has it in her room and has talked about it recently. So, I'm glad to get her something that she can have to make that she can keep. Then I got her a very simple counted cross stitch butterfly pattern kit for her to do. It should be an easy transition for her.
The final thing I got her to begin our year was a latch hook rug kit of a Labrador puppy. It is really darling, not cheesy looking at all. This particular kit has the pattern in the directions, so there is no guessing about which color is supposed to go where, like I had to do when I was a teen. We started this kit on Thursday morning and she loves it. We've talked about finding patterns for things her relatives might like for Christmas gifts. This brought such joy to her; I'm so glad that I got these for her. Of course, she is eager to try the cross stitch too, but I'm holding her off for a few more days.
I mentioned before that past art has only been drawing and sketching, but this year we will also be doing some painting. I love One Stroke Painting with Donna Dewberry, even though I don't do it often. By putting art in Tiffany's schedule this year, I'm essentially putting it in MY schedule too, which is a good thing. I get so busy doing so many other things that I don't take time to paint. I guess I would probably pull out cross stitch, crochet, or other hand crafts quicker because it doesn't create as big a mess or involve as much when setting up or putting away. I haven't done these activities in years and am enjoying sharing them with Tiffany and even feeling the desire to do some myself, once again.
We will probably also experiment with oil pastels, which I bought several years ago, and watercolor pencils too. We may even look into doing some beading, since I saw it on another blog I like to visit. Her blog is http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/jaminacema/ Just Call Me Jamin.
Well, I gotta run and get dinner in the oven as DH is on his way home.
Oh My! I was just told about this movie by a friend. It is called Fireproof and is by the makers of Facing the Giants. It comes out September 26th. I really want to see this. It looks really good! I hope my hubby will take us to see it but if not, I will definitely have to see it in the cheap theater, second run.
I put a link to it on my sidebar over there. It even has its own countdown on it. I love countdowns.
(Me and my dd, Tiffany on an easy to climb tree limb on vacation in VA in 2007.) These are my ramblings on homeschooling and whatever else comes to mind.
Counting Down
We are starting school, so it's time to look forward to the holidays!
My boys went to work with dh today; since they are both wanting to work with him when they graduate, this is an "early release" program, of sorts; at least that is what we called it when I was in high school YEARS ago.
We ended up finishing the book; yes, all the way through chapter 32. We really enjoyed ourselves. Those four hours flew by!
I love books that I don't have to leave the characters that I have come to love with the end of the book. I also like that these books were written so long ago, so that I don't have to wait for the sequel to be written and published. (hehehe)
When I first started this blog I had so many thoughts about my studies in the Bible and biblical things but, to be honest, I didn't want people to think that I thought I was something. It is almost as if I failed a test or something, because I have had very little along those lines that I felt like sharing since then. After visiting these dear leadies' blogs, I feel that I really missed it back there in the very beginning when I put a hamper on the things I wanted to share because of being concerned about my image or how people would perceive me. Truth be told, there is much I don't share, so as not to be perceived poorly. And here I thought I wasn't a "people pleaser". What an eye-opener!
It truly is peaceful music!!!
This is at the end of the second day of work (although it is only the first full day).
This is a view of the whole thing, so I had to stand WAY back.
