A former public school teacher becomes a homeschooling mom. These are the ramblings of our homeschooling and everyday life adventures. http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/ en-us Homeschool Blogger Sun, 9 Mar 2008 14:52:00 -0500 Sun, 9 Mar 2008 14:52:00 -0500   I had to share this picture of our younger daughter Abby after her mud bath!  Or should I say her fall into the mud pit that the boys have designed in our back yard.  Of course, we told her to stay away from the large, water-filled hole.  Do you think that she listened to wise counsel?  Notice that big brother is sporting a life jacket.  That is because the mud pit has grown.  Not only in size but location.  Here's the new and improved mud pit.  The boys have corrected me and let me know that it is not a mud pit but a nice little fish pond for our backyard.  mmmm...ok... Does anyone else have children or husbands who like to change around the parts of bikes and whatnot to create frankenstein items like the above bicycle?  Unfortunately for the boys but good for property values, the hole was filled in with dirt and planted with grass last weekend.  Our house will go on the market soon (hopefully) and we thought we would let the new owners decide where to place their own mud pit fish pond.  http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/495483/ Sun, 9 Mar 2008 14:52:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/495483/ I'm a bit wishy washy with this blog thing.  Annoying, I know.  I really am coming back to blogging especially now that my camera is up and running.  I have so many pictures to share.    I see my last blog was in October. Well,  a few weeks after that post, I started feeling really yucky and didn't feel like blogging.  After trying to figure out what was ailing me, I decided to take a pregnancy test.  Yes, you guessed it.  We are expecting blessing number 5 at our house.  You would think that having done this 4 other times that I could figure out what is going on.  But I'm slow like that!  Anyway, we are so excited to be expecting again.  We are due sometime in July.    I was once again plagued with all day morning sickness and spent a few weeks in December just lying as still as possible on the couch.  I am happy to say that the morning sickness is now just in the PM hours.  So I guess that would be evening sickness.  Anyway, the yuckies have kept me away from the blog and pretty much everything else that could be put off for a while.    So that is what's been going on.  School is going well and I will hopefully soon get some posts about our schooling with Weaver and just general family things soon!      http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/465300/ Mon, 21 Jan 2008 10:54:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/465300/ I really don’t want to say this too loud.  You see, everytime I speak of how well our home school is going, the whole thing falls apart.  Maybe if I whisper it, the Murphy’s law thing won’t hear me.  Our home school is going really well this year.  Actually, it has been great!  Ok, I said it.  Hopefully tomorrow will not be one of those “what were we thinking when we decided to home school” kind of days.  I don’t know, maybe I’m the only one who has those kind of days.  Though I will say they are few and far between compared to our first year of home school.   We have made many changes this school year and it’s just been great.  Really!  I won’t bore you with all of the details of curriculum this and that.  Unless you ask me, that is…But I do want to tell you about two changes we have made that have made all of the difference in the world.   Our first change has been a mommy attitude change.  If you read my profile, you will see that I am a former public school teacher.  I don’t want to offend anyone who reads this who is a teacher.  Some of my dearest friends and family members are fantastic teachers who give of themselves daily to do a hard job.  But it took me two years to realize that home school is totally different that public school or any school for that matter.  I can not do our school at home like I would do in my classroom.  It does not work for us.  I tried and we were all miserable.  I have relaxed quite a bit and our school is so successful and fun right now that I am quite giddy.  My children want to do school and read.  We have not seen this kind of motivation and excitement these past two years.  My oldest son, B, got so excited today when he figured out a hard math problem that he was jumping up and down in excitement.  Man!  That gets me just downright giddy!    After changing my attitude, I took a look at possible curriculum changes.  I made changes across the board, for the most part.  But the biggest change was us starting The Weaver curriculum.    This summer, a friend was telling me that she bought this unit study curriculum that had similar objectives for all grade levels with slight differences for each level.  She let me look over it for a few weeks because I like to buy very few things sight unseen.  At first, I thought “no way” as I studied it.  I gave it back to her and then I asked to see it again.  This time I really studied it.  I mapped out a 3 week unit. I read through every unit in the entire HUGE binder, seriously… After much discussion with my husband and pages of notes comparing The Weaver to many other curricula, I decided to order it.  It has not been a disappointment yet!  We love it!  I know, I know…too many exclamation points.  It’s just that good.    So these two changes have made a world of difference in our home school.  We are happy and I can not believe that we didn’t start doing this 5 years ago when our oldest started school.  http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/418828/ Wed, 31 Oct 2007 23:22:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/418828/ This is just a little note for my parents and friends who read this blog.  Since we signed up as a private school this year, we had to name our school.  Being the creative individuals that we are, ahem...we named it (insert our last name here) Christian Academy.  I really don't want my last name on the internet so we call it WCA for short.    Just wanted to let you know that! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/418825/ Wed, 31 Oct 2007 23:19:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/418825/ Ok, that was supposed to mimic an echo in this dusty old blog.  I disappeared quite abruptly due to a lot of personal issues that needed to be worked out in my life.  It's been a few good months and a time of discovery for me.   Anyway,  I believe that I'm coming back to blogging. That sounded very noncommittal, huh?   My goal for this blog will be to have a way to document our school life and to share it with our families.  We have been having a great school year and using great curriculum that has been an answered prayer for this stressed out mom.  Not to mention, I have tons of pictures to share.  Once I remember how to do picture posting, that is.   However, I do not have time to do that today.  We spent the day on a 900 acre farm and came home exhausted.  Now I'm off to pick up a messy house and prepare for Sunday morning.  I hope to be back in the near future. http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/412123/ Sat, 20 Oct 2007 19:10:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/412123/ Here's our summer in photos.  Well for the times that I remember to pull out the camera, that is.  I'm so bad about that.    Fourth of July weekend at the lake.       Everyone loves hanging out with sunshine girl.   Big brothers are sooooo funny.   In this picture, I was cleaning the kitchen and sunshine girl was fussing.  It got rather quiet and I turned to find big brother sweetly singing to her.  Ahhhh...so sweet!   Petting the kitty during diaper change.   You think she is embarassed here?  Sunday dress over hula skirt with big brother's boots...interesting...   Ems acting out her favorite line from Bambi 2.  "And he's got these eyes."  This said in her best Thumper-like voice.     And that's it.  Not a lot this summer but vacation is coming up and I'm sure we'll have more then!     http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/202528/ Thu, 14 Sep 2006 21:25:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/202528/ Typing one handed...sorry...testing out flickr account.  Here's the reason I'm one-handed!  Picture of our sweet sunshine girl... http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/202319/ Thu, 14 Sep 2006 15:41:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/202319/ Wow!  Our life has been an amazing but busy ride lately!  I have had no time to blog and here I sit on a Sunday morning of all days!  My baby girl is sick this morning with a cold and she is still asleep!  Dave and the big kids are at church.  I don't know what to do!  Just kidding!  I thought that I'd jump on here and catch up a bit on our goings-on.   Home school is going GREAT!  I really mean, fantastically great.  I'm so glad that we toughed out last year and didn't give up and go back to public school.  After spending all summer poring over curriculum catalogs and praying for guidance, we are very pleased with our curricula.  The only change we are going to make is to math.  We are currently doing Miquon Math and it's just not a good fit for us.  So we are going back to Horizons for now until we can find one that fits us better.  Our greatest find this year so far is Calculadders.  I was very skeptical at first but it is such an effective program.  It is a timed math drill program.  My younger son does  2 minutes of addition drill and my older son does 4 minutes of multiplication drill.  They were a bit overwhelmed by the number of problems on the page at first but I've convinced them that you can do anything for 2 (4) minutes.  That's such a small fragment of time.  They truly love it now and ask me daily if it is time to do the timed test AND they are learning their facts!  Too cool!   On to non-homeschool stuff...   My older daughter is potty trained!  She, just like her older brothers, decided one day that was the day she would do it.  There's been no looking back.  She's even night trained!  Way to go Emma!  I don't know what I was so uptight about!   My younger daughter is such a joy to our family.  She is the happiest baby in the world, hands down.  Honestly, I'm not bragging.  I've just never seen such an incredibly happy baby.  She lights up our home and the big kids adore her.  We are so thankful to God for blessing us with such a sweet, happy, loving child.  She's now rolling over both ways and loves to "talk" to us.    The boys are keeping me busy.  Usually I have a rule that each child is only involved in one extracurricular activity a semester.  Of course, that rule was imposed when we were in public school.  So now we are going quite a bit.  I may have to go back to our rule of only one activity.  We'll see how it goes...  My older son will begin fencing tomorrow.  This is through our homeschool group.  He is so excited about that.  He and my younger son will begin a group on Tuesday that is similiar to Boy Scouts but is a homeschool group.  Those two activities are only 2 weeks a month.  My younger son and older daughter are taking  gymnastics classes.  My husband was a gymnast and these two love to do tricks with him on the trampoline.  We leave from gymnastics class on Wednesday and go home for an hour.  Then we head out the door to RAs and Mission Friends at church.  Busy, busy, busy.  I am a bit of homebody so this going a lot stresses me out a bit.  I also know that some people don't agree with all of this going.  I look at it this way, my children are home with me all day, everyday.  They want to be out participating in activities with other children.  They want to spread their wings.  I want them to spread their wings. All of these activities are done under the watchful eye of me or my husband.  So I'm ok with all of the going even though I love to be at home.    The baby is still asleep, poor thing...   In less than two weeks, we are leaving to go on our vacation.  We are loading into an RV with my parents and heading north to colonial Williamsburg.  I have never been this far north.  However, I was recently informed that Virginia is still considered the south.  I guess when you live in Louisiana, anything above Arkansas seems like the north!  We are super excited about our trip though I don't know what to expect weather wise.  We are trying to pack lightly but we deep south people get cold easily since we're not used to the cold! (Cold to us is 50 degrees...just joking!) I'm thinking short sleeve shirts and take jackets and sweaters in case it's cooler than we are used to.  I don't know.    Well, that was long update and I'm sure quite boring.  I am by no means interesting but I want to document for my friends & family who do read this.  Have a blessed Lord's Day!     http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/199568/ Sun, 10 Sep 2006 09:29:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/199568/ Homeschooling is going really well considering that our curriculum is not in yet.  I ordered from Rainbow Resources and I have a feeling that we hit the homeschool rush.  But that's ok.  We've been reviewing using some of our unfinished curriculum from last year.  The only new thing that we're doing is using Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.  While I'm doing that with my younger son, my 3yod is hanging out and repeating every thing that we say!  I wonder if she will be an early reader?!   Homeschooling is going well but my housework is falling behind again.  I will openly admit that I have not figured out how to do school and keep house yet.  In good time...   Yesterday was our first day of gymnastics.  My 6yos and 3yod are both taking classes.  The only day that we could find open classes that overlapped without a big time gap was Wednesdays.  When we start mission classes again at church in September,  for which I am one of the teachers, we will be leaving straight from gymnastics and going to church.  I will have choir practice after that.  So Wednesdays will be leave the house at 3:00 and I will get home at 9:30!    Back to gymnastics, the kids had a blast!  My son was so brave and jumped right in and participated.  My boys tend to be a bit shy so that's a very big thing.  My 3yod was scared to go down the big slide from the observation deck but once she got into her area, watch out!  She had so much fun.  She flitted all over the place (even when she wasn't supposed to) so I can see where this is going to teach her a little discipline.    Tonight is our first homeschool group meeting.  I am going to be meeting some new to homeschool people who are involved in our church there.  I now have two families to find support in from our church.  I was feeling quite lonely there for a while.  I love the church we go to.  The people are some of the most loving people that I know.  But there's not a lot who understand homeschooling or our reasons for it, etc.  But you know what, I was there once myself...but that's another story!   Off to get ready for the meeting and then Praise Team practice.  Another late night for me!   http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/185750/ Thu, 17 Aug 2006 17:07:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/185750/ So I did it again!  I disappeared!   My last posts were of my daily to do lists and then ~poof~ nothing.  But I have a 3 month old who doesn't like naps and a three year old who wails very loudly when she misses hers but depends on Mommy to get her to sleep. (Try to get a 3yo to sleep while caring for a baby who doesn't. Ugh!) So I have very little blog time.  Right now, baby girl lies on a pallet at my feet and I can't guarantee you that I'll be able to finish this sentence!   In the midst of all of the adjusting to a baby in our family, we decided to start school today.  Today was the first day for public school in our parish and while I know of home school parents who purposefully don't do school on days such as today, we all were ready to begin.  We had spent much of the summer on a light schedule but took the last three weeks off.  Let me just tell you, that my kids were in great need of a school routine again!  Not to mention, I am a former public school teacher and some habits are hard to break!   So we started our morning with great anticipation and excitement over the new things we were going to do today and this year.  My three year old had her basket of activities and some lessons to complete herself.  It went so well...for about 2 hours and then it fell. to. pieces.  I just have trouble keeping 3yodd occupied and out of trouble while at the same time keeping her older brothers from trying to do her activities which makes her scream like a banshee that they have touched HER school stuff... But we made it through and I have the highest hopes that it will get better if we just persevere.    The baby, on the other hand, who most people thought would be the biggest obstacle to home schooling, was a doll.  She giggled at the boys while I  held her in my lap and worked with them.  Hopefully, when she's older and more mobile, it will still go as well.    Ok, my non-napping baby is fussing and needs a little attention.  http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/181000/ Wed, 9 Aug 2006 15:20:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/dadriane71105/181000/