Days in the life of a Christian homeschool mom and artist's wife trying to live in the light of eternity. I am a homeschool mom living in VA, raising 6 children in the ways of the Lord. Come for a visit! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/ en-us Homeschool Blogger Tue, 4 Nov 2008 08:39:00 -0600 Tue, 4 Nov 2008 08:39:00 -0600 My family and I love the Christmas season, with all of its decoration and excitement! So I wanted to tell you all about the party going on over at Squidoo, hosted by Melissa Telling of Lilliput Station! Online Christmas Party 2008 The following is a description of what you will find at this wonderful online party: "It is a way for homeschoolers all over the world to get together and share some Christmas spirit. It is a place to gather new ideas, new recipes, and maybe a few new traditions. It is a time of fellowship and fun, a time to share the love of Christ with all of our online friends. It is our way of making the season a little brighter for those we have never met, but still feel as if we know." So go on over to Squidoo and have some Christmas fun! Not to mention that you can also win some fabulous door prizes, one of which is my Hip2Homeschool Unit Study on the Deep Sea and Its Creatures, among many others. I also just wanted to share some of the Christmas traditions that we share as a family during this joyous holiday season! One thing that I love to do each year with my family is go to cut down our own Christmas tree. The past few years, it has been hard to do that because of finances but it is a family tradition that I just love and would love to start implementing again. We have gone to a lot to get the tree together for the past 2 years but there is nothing like going off to cut down your own! After we get the tree, we love to come back and decorate it, sipping hot cocoa or a hot cup of coffee, and playing our favorite Christmas music! Another tradition that the kids and I started a few years back was doing a Christmas Unit study the whole month of December. One year, we did a unit centered on the book by Lisa Whelchel called The ADVENTure of Christmas, which was a lot of fun. Last year, we did one centered on A Christmas Carol. This year we will be doing one on Colonial Christmases in Virginia. This is a fun way to educate and  enjoy the holiday season, all at the same time. Another tradition that we have is that we go to our church on Christmas Eve and watch A Charlie Brown Christmas with the congregation! This is a tradition that our pastor started and it is really a lot of fun. Afterwards we have treats and hot cocoa in our Children's Ministry room. We love to yearly watch Linus sharing the true reason for Christmas! These are just a few of our Christmas traditions. I look forward to reading about what others do during this great holiday season! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/614269/ Tue, 4 Nov 2008 08:39:00 -0600 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/614269/ Yes, that is what I have been up to among other things. It has been a very busy summer and it is not over yet. I am still planning out what we are going to study this year, how we are going to study it, and getting my unit studies written completely before the new year starts. We will be starting on September 2nd. I have also been trying to get a block schedule going so that I have more of a flow to my day. Cindy Rushton had some great planning pages in her homeschool e-magazine that I downloaded and have been using for my planning. I made my own block schedule to use, coming from the planning pages that I downloaded. We will be studying the Middle Ages, Early American History, and Creation Science, along with some other unit topics. We will be doing a mini-unit on Monet and a 2 week literature unit. I haven't decided on the book yet. I may also do a mini-unit on inventors, since our church's homeschool group will be doing Inventor Reports this coming school year. And of course, we will do a unit for Christmas. I think that the topic for this year will be Christmas in Colonial Virginia or America in general. I haven't decided yet. For math I am using Horizons with the youngest 4 of my children. I really want to use Teaching Textbook's Pre-Algebra with my 8th grader but haven't been able to afford it. I am hoping to borrow it from another homeschool mom, if I cannot purchase a copy myself. For my oldest, I want to get the Key To... series of booklets for Algebra 1 and maybe, Geometry. For language arts we will be using a hodgepodge of different resources. I got a book at Sam's Club called Grammar Lessons in 15 Minutes or something to that effect. I figured it might work well with my fidgety 8th grader and a good refresher course for my 12th grader. I will also be using the dictation method and the Heart of Wisdom Teaching Approach. I just bought the book last week and am pouring over it. I will be using my unit studies but incorporate Robin's methods into it. The kids will also be keeping a writing journal and using the Four Square Writing method as well to cover writing. Plus we will be doing writing for our units and Bible study. Anyway, slowly but surely, I am collecting my resources as the summer goes along. I have also been selling my unit studies on CurrClick and I will be keeping a blog journal of our Creation Science Unit that anyone would be welcome to access for free. I will be doing that on my Word Press blog. Well got to head on out. My sons have been at the library with my oldest daughter for a Game Day. Need to go and pick them up! Everyone have a blessed evening! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/573823/ Tue, 12 Aug 2008 18:35:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/573823/ It has been a long time since I have written an entry here on my blog. Life has been so bus and sometimes I feel like I have so little time to write any more. But I want to liven things up again so here I am. This summer break has been so busy. It almost feels like I am not having a break at all! Working on my unit studies, going to park days and my Weight Watchers meetings, and just every day life has replaced doing school with the kids. So it is almost like I am having no time off! Next month I plan to slowly reintroduce school work into our days with reviewing phonogram sounds and math facts, on top of the summer reading that the kids have been doing for the library's summer reading program. I have been working hard on my units studies and am now selling them on CurrClick's website. I am very excited about it. My Butterflies Unit has been the freebie this past week and I am hoping to get a lot of good exposure from it! I have also been planning out our curriculum for this year. With my 3 youngest I am going to switch all of them to Horizons Math. I only used it with my 10 year old son but think that the others kids might do well with it too. I plan on using the Teaching Textbooks Pre-Algebra program with my 8th grade son. I have heard great things about it and think that the computer aspect of it will be very appealing to him. With my 12th grader I want to use the Key To... series for an Algebra review and will probably also use the one on Geometry. For history and science with the youngest 4, I am putting together a unit on Early American History using the Peter Marshall and David Manuel series of books. For science, I am putting together a unit on Creation Science, using the book, Unlocking the Mysteries of Creation as our spine. I have dome a couple of Squidoo Pages on both of them. Below are the links: Creation Science Unit Squidoo Page Early American History Unit Squidoo Page For grammar, I want to get more into using the copywork/dictation method and possibly use Easy Grammar for my 8th grader. For writing, I got the Four Square Writing e-Workbooks from CurrClick, that I had purchased back in the beginning of summer. I have heard good things about the method from a friend who is a teacher. I have also been looking into the Heart of Wisdom's Bible-based teaching approach. I really want to incorporate the Bible more into our homeschool and this time, stick with it. I don't plan to use their units but I do want to incorporate the method into the units that I have planned to use. I also joined Weight Watchers back in late April and have lost 20 pounds so far. WW really does work! It's great and I love the accountability and the camaraderie that has come with it. I enjoy going to the meetings and learning new ways to lose the weight as well as talking with others who are going through what I am going through. The knowledge that I am going to have to get on a scale every week really helps as well. Keeps me motivated! Blessings! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/563351/ Sun, 20 Jul 2008 14:37:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/563351/ First of all, I would like to thank Jimmie for starting this whole thing (whew, what a whopper!) and Melissa Telling for tagging me at night! (LOL!) All kidding aside, this would be my 6 Word Memoir: "Forgiven in Christ, but not perfect." I am tagging the following 5 bloggers: Molly from Homeschool With Index Cards Lynn from Eclectic Education Missy from Homeschooling His Way Tina, My VB Park buddy, from Morning Star Academy Debra from Notebooking Pages Okay Ladies, here are the rules: 1. Write the title to your own memoir using 6 words. 2. Post it on your blog. 3. Link to the person that tagged you. 4. Tag five more blogs. Now off I go to work on my Prince Caspian Unit, which has been long overdue! Blessings! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/562521/ Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:53:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/562521/ I hope that everyone is doing well this week and that it has been enjoyable for you. We are in the process of wrapping up the school year, getting in those last days of school work that we need to get done. It has been extremely busy around here with the other added life's happenings that go on in a big family. I have been having a sale on my unit studies the past few weeks, a buy one, get one half-price sale. Well I have changed the offer, starting yesterday until Saturday, June 7th. It is now a buy one, get one free sale. So if anyone is interested, you can go to my website and click on the Contact Me button and put it an order. Hip2Homeschool Unit Studies Blessings to all! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/543270/ Thu, 5 Jun 2008 08:00:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/543270/ Well, I have decided to have my first sale for Hip2Homeschool Unit Studies. I am offering a buy one get one half price sale on my unit studies. The half price one must be of lesser or equal value and I am allowing up to 2 half priced units so you can get 4 unit studies, 2 full price and 2 half price, if you desire. Just go to my website at the following link, choose the ones that you are interested in, and then email me at hip2homeschoolunits@cox.net or click on the Contact Me button on my site to place your order. Hip2Homeschool Unit Studies It has also been a very busy time for me personally, with trying to wrap up our school year in the next few weeks, going on vacation for almost a week, plus having a plumbing disaster in my home to top it all off! We also went strawberry picking this past week and they were some of the most delicious sweet strawberries that I have had in a long time. My husband and I also celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary this past Wednesday and went out to dinner at The Outback Steakhouse, yum, yum! To top off my busy week, I had my 4th Weight Watchers meeting yesterday and found out that I had lost 3.4 pounds! Needless to say, I am exhausted today and in need of another vacation! Hope that everyone enjoys their weekend. I know that I plan to. Blessings! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/533731/ Sat, 17 May 2008 11:18:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/533731/ Hi All, I just wanted to let everyone know that there is a review of one of my unit studies on Heart of the Matter today, an online homeschooling magazine. I am also having a giveaway (details at the end of the review) of my Rocks and Minerals Unit study. I hope that you all will go and take a look! http://heartofthematteronline.com/ Blessings, Heather L. http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/531009/ Mon, 12 May 2008 13:26:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/531009/ Check out this great promo from The Old Schoolhouse Magazine! The Old Schoolhouse Magazine's Spring Promo is in full bloom. Subscribe now to The Old Schoolhouse Magazine and receive 25 BONUS gifts valued at over $550! The Winter Promo sold out, don't miss out on the free gifts this time! The HSB Front Porch is having a contest and you can win a $50 gift certificate just for blogging about the Spring Promo before midnight April 30, 2008. Click HERE for details. They are also giving away a $150 gift certificate to the Schoolhouse Store. All print subscribers (new or renewing) between April 3 - 30, 2008 will be automatically entered into a drawing. No purchase neccessary to win. To enter without subscribing, please send a postcard with your name, address, telephone number, and email address to: The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Spring Promo Contest PO BOX 8426 Gray, TN  37615 Visit their site today! Blessings! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/515615/ Sun, 13 Apr 2008 15:57:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/515615/ I am not sure when I will be getting my free Butterflies Unit announcement up on my website this week so I am taking orders at the following email addresses if you would like to have it before then: hip2homeschool@yahoo.com or hip2homeschoolunits@cox.net This unit will be free for the next few weeks. Hope that everyone is having a great week. Blessings! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/513610/ Wed, 9 Apr 2008 19:22:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/513610/ I want to let you all know of a great new website that is out there from SO CAL Val. Valerie has put together an  excellent selection of educational links that are sure to be helpful for any homeschool mom. I hope that if you haven't seen it that you will go there today. I think that you will be truly blessed by all of Valerie's hard work. All the links are divided up into subject headings, which makes it very easy to maneuver on the website. Great job Valerie! I also have a business button on the site, advertising my Hip2Homeschool Unit Studies, along with other homeschool friendly businesses. Hope that you are as blessed as I am to have found such a wealth of resources. Weblink Education I also wanted to tell you of a free unit that I will be giving away on my unit study website. It is a 2 week study on butterflies. I will be offering it for the next few weeks on my site, link below. Hip2Homeschool Unit Studies I will have it up for the taking this coming week and will make an announcement as soon as my husband puts up the details on my site. Have a blessed weekend! http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/511188/ Sat, 5 Apr 2008 15:57:00 -0500 http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/vahomeschoolmom/511188/