Hi! I'm a homeschooling Mom to five GREAT kids. I'm also an Army wife! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/ en-us Homeschool Blogger Sun, 6 May 2007 23:08:00 -0500 Sun, 6 May 2007 23:08:00 -0500 Come check out my new blog.  It seems to be much easier to use, and I haven't had any problems loading my pages.  HA!  :-)  Oh, please don't be afraid of my title....it just fits my mentality much better right now.  :-)  The New Blog   Hope to see you there!     http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/324868/ Sun, 6 May 2007 23:08:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/324868/ I just read tonight that they're building an American Girl Place in Atlanta.  Slated to open later this year!  Yahoo!  I cannot wait to tell my girls in the morning.  I took Katie th AGP in New York City for her 9th birthday.  We loved it!  I told Mikayla I would take her for her 9th birthday, which will be in January.  Kind of a yucky time of year to be visiting New York City.  So, maybe she'll be happy visiting the Atlanta AGP?  HA!  :-)  It's going to be smaller than the original AGP, but I don't think she'll mind.  I can't wait to tell her!  :-)  http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/317941/ Sat, 21 Apr 2007 23:16:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/317941/ It's been a while since I've blogged, eh?  I haven't had very interesting to talk about I suppose.  :-)    Things are going well.  We've settled into some sort of routine since Mike left.  School, school and more school.  That's about all we're doing these days.  We aren't doing much for fun, but I like it that way.  The older I get, the more I enjoy staying home.  When I was in my early 20s, it drove me nuts staying home all the time.  Now, I rather enjoy it.  So much so that we skipped park day today!!!!!  We played outside at home instead.  It was a beautiful day today. Mike is doing OK.  I did get to talk to him on the telephone, which was nice.  Except for the fact that he was a grump.  lol.  We hadn't talked in atleast a couple of weeks.  He had tried to call me on Monday, but we couldn't hold a connection, so he gave up.  We have IMed a couple of times within the last couple of weeks though.  It seems as though there have been lots of black-outs at his FOB.  :-(  All in all, he's surviving.  Terri, he did get the box of books you sent.  He was very excited to see an EB Griffen book.  heehee.  Even though he's only been gone about 6 weeks, it seems like forever already. We're going to see Disney on Ice tomorrow!  We are so excited.  We've never been before.  Mikayla is already planning to wear her Cinderella dress and shoes she got from Disney World last year.  I figure she might as well wear them.  The next time we go to Disney, they won't fit!  HA!  :-)  Katie is hoping to see Captain Jack Sparrow.  Benjamin thinks Devin will like it when Ariel comes out.  heehee.  What a silly boy.  :-)  Knitting news....there really isn't any.  I'm still working on the never-ending shawl.  Honestly though, I haven't knitted much.  Must be because I can't ride in the car anymore, I have to drive.  And, I have no one bugging me to sit and watch TV with them.  I am hoping to finish the shawl soon though.  I'm a little over half-way done.  Maybe I should make a goal to knit 5 rows everyday?  I wonder how long it would take to finish if I did that?  lol School is great.  We're nearing the end in most subjects.  Can I just say how happy I am to have finally finished August Ceasar's World?  We've been reading it outloud since November.  Yikes.  lol.  In my defense, we didn't read it everday.  It was so interesting that BOTH Benjamin and Liberty fell asleep as we were reading it tonight.  heehee.  Actually, we rather enjoyed it.  But, we're glad it's done.  I'm ready to go back to the easy reading of Story of the World again.  This is our 3rd year homeschooling.  I will admit it has been my most lax year as far as keeping to a schedule goes, but I feel like it's been our best year yet.  I've got most of my curriculum for next year already.  I still need to buy Sonlight Core 7, but I can wait until October to get that.  We wont' finish Core 6 until then.  I also need to get the next Apologia book for Devin, but that's it.  I finished my 3rd week of Circuit Training class this week.  It's a Monday, Wednesday and Friday class.  I hate going, but once I'm there, I'm fine.  I can feel myself gaining some endurance, which is nice.  I thought I was going to die the first week.  lol.  Now.....if the fat would only melt away faster.  :-)  I was feeling pretty encouraged until I talked with Mike on Wednesday.  He's been going to the gym like crazy since he's been deployed.  He rode the exercise bike.  I forgot to ask him for how long.  But, wanna know how many calories he burned?  967!!!!!!!  I'm so hoping there was a glitch in the system.  Good grief.  I can barely eat that many calories per day without gaining weight.  Until next time............... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/317545/ Fri, 20 Apr 2007 21:25:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/317545/ My Mom's visit was great!  I don't think I cooked but 2 meals the entire time she was here.  She cooked a couple, but the rest were eaten out.....at her expense.  HA!  :-)  We shopped, shopped, and shopped some more.  Oh, we went to the Montgomery Zoo too.  We've been a few times, but it was Mom's first visit.  We had perfect weather....not too hot, not too cold.  We are zoo members, so we'll probably go a few more times before our membership expires.  Can't beat a $40 zoo membership, especially since it gets us into lots of other zoos in the country for free or reduced costs.  We've went to Zoo Atlanta for half off, and the Greenville Zoo for free so far!  We've spent the rest of this week trying to get back into our normal routines.  Problem is, I'm not sure what normal is right now.  We did accomplish school this week though.  History was sporadic, and science didn't happen, but we did the most important stuff, right?  Heehee.  Knitting news....not much going on right now.  Still working on that blasted Girlfriend Shrug.  Hopefully I'll finish that soon.  I would probably finish it faster if I actually knitted, you think?  :-)  I have lots of sock plans in the near future too.  I ordered More Sensational Knitted Socks from Amazon the other day.  I'm hoping it comes in Mondays mail.  Mike is doing well.  I was able to IM with him yesterday.  He's hoping to take R&R in December.  As it stands now, he should be able to do that.  But, it's still early.  :-)  December seems sooooooo far away right now.  But, we didn't want him to take it too early in case it ends up being an 18 month deployment.  I have an address for him, finally.  So, if anyone would like to send him a little pick-me-up note or package, let me know and I'll get his address to you.  My friend Terri called me tonight to ask if Mike would like a box of books to share with his guys!  I'm sure he'll love 'em!  :-)  One last thing.  I realized tonight, even though I feel like I read to my kids all.the.time, I really don't.  I do lots of read-alouds for school, but that's it.  We have shelves and shelves of picture books, and I can't even remember the last time I read one of them to Liberty or Benjamin.  I remember reading Little Critter to Devin and Katie all the time when they were little.  Liberty climbed up in my bed next to me after her bath tonight.  I had been leafing through a magazine.  She wanted me to read a book.  So, I sent her to get one.  She comes back with a Music Theory book by Usborne.  HA!  I quickly sent her to get another.  She returned with "Mama Do You Love Me?"  I was quickly surrounded by Benjamin and Mikayla.  Benjamin brought "I Love You the Purplest" with him.  So, I read them both.  It was a sweet moment for us....until we got to the last 4 pages in the Purplest book and Katie started yelling "where's the shampoo" from the shower.  It was sweet while it lasted.  :-)  Until next time...........   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/307701/ Sat, 31 Mar 2007 22:08:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/307701/ My Mom is flying in this afternoon!  I am so excited.  Even though I just saw her in December, I am psyched that she is coming to visit.  She picked a perfect time too.  Last week was fine.  No issues with Mike being gone at all.  This week, not so much.  lol.  So, I really need the distraction of a visitor.  I'm picking her up in Atlanta around dinner time, and we're heading to Buford to go to Archivers.  She has no scrapbook stores at her house, so she loves to shop at the stores we have here.  :-)  Thursday, we're headed to the Montgomery Zoo.  We've been there a few times, the kids love it, and there's a scrapbook store in Montgomery I've never been to.  She plans to his the Scrapbook store here a few times too.  heehee.  Friday, she's go to co-op with us.  Fun for her.  :-)  She goes back home early Tuesday am.  I'll be sad to see her go, but I am not going to think about that right now.  :-) Knitting news......that shrug is taking me forever and a day.  I don't think I'll ever do a sweater on size 1 needles again.  Whew.  lol.  I do like the fabric it makes though.  I"ll share pics of it after my Mom leaves.  Becca and I ordered knew Knitpicks needles.  I'm going to show Mom how to do toe-up socks while she's here.  I told her she could just pick a sock yarn out of my stash.  I think I"ll hide my newest purchases though.  heehee.  School news.....school is going.  That's about it.  It's a short week because of our visitor.  I may have the kids do a couple of things tomorrow, but we'll see.  It'll be late when we get home, so I may play nice and just let them have the rest of the week off.  :-)  Benjamin is flying right through the Get Ready for the Code series.  He's dying to start his new math book.  I'm just not up for it right this second.  Maybe in a couple of weeks.  :-)  I'm not really sure I want him to start it right now, as we're taking the months of July and August off from school to go to NY.  So, do I really want him to take a 2 month break from his math book?  I almost would rather just start it in September.  We'll see. I've been scrapbooking this week.  I really should have been working on a swap, but instead, I decided to work on our Build-A-Bear pages from last month.  :-)  They're coming out pretty cute, if I do say so myself.  Maybe I'll share a page or two soon.  :-)  Until next time............ http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/302185/ Tue, 20 Mar 2007 10:00:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/302185/ So, I took Exploring Creation with Zoology to bed last night to look over before I went to sleep.  I.am.impressed.  Honestly, I was dreading it.  I mean, how long can you possibly spend learning about birds?  Obviously much longer than I thought.  lol.  I think the girls are going to LOVE it.  I don't think I'll mind it either.  It's broken down into managable lessons, and the experiments are fairly simple as well.  We haven't done as much notebooking as I had planned to do by this point.  I'm hoping this will really jumpstart the girls on notebooking.  I plan to have Benjamin listen and play along too.  He does fairly well with read-alouds as long as he has something to do quietly (he loves to color) while I"m reading.  I am thinking through the whole notebook thing though.  I really, really don't want to use a plain old binder.  So, I'm thinking about putting together the pages for each lesson that we'll need and taking it to Kinkos to be spiral bound with a cover.  I think the girls would much prefer that over a binder.  Let's just say they are horrible about actually putting pages IN their binders.  :-)  We're actually thinking about starting fairly soon, rather than wait until September.  They're already thinking ahead to Zoology II, Ocean Creatures.  :-)  I'm trying to give the kids more input as to what curriculum they want to do.  I spoke with Devin on the way home from our errand this morning.  I told him what we've ordered, and what I have left to get.  He's fine with everything so far.  I asked him if he wants to add a literature program this year.  I told him we could, but I didn't want to hear any whining about his increased work load.  He agreed.  We'll see how well that works.  HA!  :-)  So, I'll be ordering the Lord of the Rings literature study.  I'm actually quite excited about it.  I did tell him we wouldn't have to do it all 4 school days of the week though, we could just do it 3 days a week if he wants.  So, I guess I'll be ordering that soon.  :-)  I LOVE surprise phone calls.  Rarely do I get them.  lol.  The only people I talk to regularly are my Mom and Heidi.  :-)  I wasn't expecting to hear from my husband for a few more days.  But, he called my cell on the way home from our errand this afternoon.  Since he called from Kuwait, there was no delay!  Yahoo!  :-)  He only had 10 minutes to talk, but he sounded so good.  It's amazing how good they sound when they're away from you.  lol.  He was super excited about Starbucks.  Go figure.  :-)  He drank THREE VENTI frappucinos while he was at the base they draw tanks from.  THREE!  :-)  It's OK.....I know there won't be a Starbucks where he's going.  I hope anyway.....we might be even broker than we are now if there is.  lol.  He's super excited about the brand new trucks they were issued too.  His uparmored hum-vee has 44 miles on it.  That's it.  It's about time he gets some nice equipment.  More often than not, he gets the bottom of the barrel stuff.  He had to tell his driver to turn down the A/C today.  He was cold.  Heehee.  It's always nice to get a phone call when you aren't expecting it.  :-)  Until next time...................... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/300967/ Sat, 17 Mar 2007 13:44:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/300967/ I love box day!  What is box day you might ask?  When we are expecting a delivery of homeschool books.....we call it box day.  :-)  Here's what we got.........   Lot's of fun stuff, eh?  I can't wait to peruse it all after the kids go to bed.  We're expecting another box sometime soon.  Probably a week or two.  I order all of my BJU stuff from www.scripturetruth.com.  They offer free shipping over $99, AND they discount BJU.  Gotta love a discount.  :-)  I'm sure I'll have some comments about the new stuff tomorrow.  :-)  Until next time....................... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/300585/ Fri, 16 Mar 2007 18:38:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/300585/ Mondays are busy for me.  Benjamin has speech therapy in the afternoon, so by time we go there and any errands I have, my day is just about over.  Tonight, the girls had an ice-cream social for Girl Scouts.  Katie had American Girl night at B&N too, but she opted to not go.  Darn.  ;-)  I"ll be glad when it's Tuesday.  :-) School went well today.  We accomplished everything we needed to get done, amazingly.  :-)  I even read both of our Sonlight books tonight!  I've been researching curriculum for next year.  I'm trying to get some in-put from the kids.  They all said they want to continue with Sonlight for next school year.  I'm glad they're enjoying it, but have you seen how $$ Sonlight is?  Ugh.  :-)  Oh well.  I want them to like what we're doing, so I'm sure it'll be money well spent.  The girls chose Apologia Zoology I.  I'm not sure I like that decision, but that's what they chose.  The only experience I have with Apologia is 7th grade General Science. That bores me to tears.  So, hopefully Zoology won't.  heehee.  I've still got some decisions to make, but I'm making good progress.  Now....to find the $$ to pay for everything.  HA!  It's funny how researching curriculum gets me fired up about homeschooling again.  I needed to be fired up too.  lol.  I heard from Mike this morning.  He woke me up with a phone call at 5:30am.  Ugh.  Good thing I planned ahead and brought the phone to bed with me.  :-)  They had landed in Germany to re-fuel.  I'm certain he's in Kuwait right now,   I'm sure he's super busy.  Gotta make sure those tanks actually shoot you know.  :-)  I'm not quite sure it's even hit me that he's gone yet.  I've barely cried at all, which isn't like me.  I'm a crier.  :-)  Oh well.  Maybe it's just that he's gone so much that it seems normal?  Until next time............... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/298537/ Mon, 12 Mar 2007 20:33:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/298537/ I should be blogging more regularly now.  My dh has deployed, so I'll have no one to keep me company at night after the kids go to bed.  Should leave me more computer time.  lol.  We had a fabulous week.  I am so glad, as it's the last memory the kids will have of their Dad for some time.  Liberty cried the entire way home.  "Daddy, I want Daddy."  Poor thing....she doesn't even know what's going  on.  We drove him to the company and she said, "is this Iraq?"  Ummmmm.....no.  :-)  We'll be fine though.  Dh hit the nail on the head....he said, "You'll be just fine.  You are capable of running things smoothly while I'm gone, you just don't want to."  Right on honey....I don't wanna.  :-)  Drive on. Knitting.....well, I ripped out the sleeve to the Girlfriend Shrug for Liberty on Friday.  I've made a bit of progress.  I have some TV watching to do tonight, so maybe I"ll finish the sleeve. I still need to rip back a couple of rows on the socks I'm making for Mikayla.  Two at a time, Magic Loop.  Fun, fun.  :-)  I'm going to do that sometime this week.  It won't be a big deal, I just need to take the time to do it. School news....we've done just the basics for the last few weeks so that we could spend time with Mike before he left.  Now that that's over, we need to hit the books hard and heavy.  BUT, you knew there was a but, right?  :-)  My Mom is coming next week for a week. So, I'm not sure how much we'll get done until after she leaves.  I'm still contemplating our curriculum choices for next year.  Sometimes I wish someone would make the decisions for me, so I wouldn't have to choose.  :-)  That's all the excitement for now.  I do have some knitting pictures to share, I just need to take the pictures.  Speaking of pictures, Mike's camera broke about 10 minutes before he had to be at bag drop.  So, I guess I'll be buying him a new one.  I was hoping for some Kuwait City pictures this time, but I guess that won't happen.  Ugh.  I have some new yarn, as well as a pair of finished socks to take pictures of.  :-)  Until next time...............  http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/297820/ Sun, 11 Mar 2007 13:31:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/297820/ So I got some new yarn today.  Just 2 hanks, that's all.  It.is.so.yummy.  I *heart* the Blue-Eyed Brown colorway.  I cannot wait to make a pair of socks with it.  I'm on the quest to find the perfect pattern.  :-)  The Purple Medley, I don't love as much as I thought I would.  I'm hoping it'll grow on me.  I'll still knit with it though.  :-) Well hmph.  I would love to share a picture with you, but apparently, I can't.  I"ll have to add it later.  Please tell me I'm not the only one who is having a ton of trouble with homeschoolblogger since the upgrade?  Ugh.  Until next time.............   ETA photo.  Finally.  :-)      http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/292675/ Wed, 28 Feb 2007 16:14:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/askellie/292675/