Jul. 23, 2008 - Can't Make it to the Library?

Well, it's a rainy day so we're not heading to the library today, but using an online alternative "Lookybook".  Lookybook is a great website where you can view hundreds of complete children's books.  Of course, it's not the same as holding a book in your hands, but it's a great alternative for days like today!  It's also a great way to preview books you're thinking of purchasing - and there are direct links from the online books to online stores where the books can be purchased.  If you register (which is free and optional), you get your own "bookshelf" where you can "store" your favorite Lookybook books for easy access.  I've added a link to my bookshelf to my browser's toolbar so the boys can easily find their favorite books. 

So I encourage you to check out and use this great website!  It's not too often we come across fun freebies like this one!

Here are a couple of our favorite books the boys would like to share with you:

 

Click the eyeballs in the corner to view the larger (more easy to read) version on Lookybook.

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May. 31, 2008 - Long Time No... School

I have been a horrible blogger this year!  I long to write, but never seem to make the time to do it.  Why is that?  Well, tonight I am.  We are nearly halfway through 2008!  It's incredible how time flies!!  I haven't blogged in months so I will do a quick rewind as to what we've been up to.

One of the last times I blogged, I mentioned that I was searching for a curriculum.  Well, I ended up going back to Sonlight.  I really do love the style and especially love getting that huge boxful of books!  Caleb is doing Core I+2 with Grade 3 readers and I purchased a few of the language arts items for Christian.  We are still using Math-U-See for math and are on our own for science and other electives (music, etc.). 

It has taken a bit of adjusting on my part from doing everything on my own, to following a schedule.  I'm still struggling a bit with the amount of reading I have to do to Caleb, while trying to keep the other boys interested or occupied at the same time.  I feel like I barely get through a paragraph without having to set the book down and chase after Christian or Charlie.  It's busy, but we're starting to get into a routine again.  Or we were at least, until all of the traveling began again! 

The past few weeks have been spent mainly in our truck, and then our car.  We packed up our trailer and made the loooooong drive from Mexico up to Canada.  We drove to Manitoba, where my family is, to visit for a few days.  We spent 2 days with my family, then we went to a lake with my family for 2 more days, then up to C's parents' place for a couple more days, then back to my parents' place (something went wrong with our truck that needed fixing - hence the unexpected return there), then we left the truck and trailer (so the truck could be repaired) and packed up my new (used) station wagon and headed all the way to southern Ontario (3 more days driving).  We arrived here on Tuesday just in time for Caleb and Christian's first soccer game.  We will be staying here until the end of the month, then driving back to Manitoba in time for my brother's wedding.  The boys and I will be staying there for a month afterward, while C flies to the Dominican for July.  Then he will be back to pick us up and we will be returning to Mexico.  The weeks after are filled with several other long trips as well, but I won't get into the details as they're not that exciting and they're likely to change anyhow!

So much has happened since I last wrote!  Christian turned 4 and Caleb turned 6!!  My babies are growing up!!  Christian is doing very well with his reading now.  We purchased the 3 complete sets of Bob Books at Costco for $9.99 a piece.  He LOVES them and so do I!!  He will be a fluent reader in no time!  Caleb has started reading "in his head" now, not just out loud.  It's strange, but so nice to see him sitting on his bed or on the couch reading a book quietly to himself, page after page, sometimes chapter after chapter. 

We have had a few educational stops along our travels, including a morning visiting the temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Salt Lake City, Utah.  We are not Latter Day Saints ourselves, but had friends in Utah who were who gave us a tour of some of the buildings.  The history was fascinating and the artwork was amazing!!  It's definitely worth the time spent there.  What amazing buildings and architecture and art!  The boys enjoyed it a lot, as did we.

Today we went to the library.  It was sooooo nice to be in a library again!!!  7 months without a library was nearly unbearable for me!  We were only there about 20 minutes before closing so I didn't get to do as much browsing as I would have liked, but I'll be back very soon!  The boys signed out about 30 books so they should be busy for a little while!  On our way out of the library we had a little bit of a frightening experience.  I was checking out the books and C took the boys out the front door to wait outside.  As they were walking out, a group of teenage boys came running up chasing after another boy of the same age.  He ran into the library in an attempt to escape them and the security guards came out after them.  They had several weapons - knives, chains, even a shovel!  My boys, oblivious to what was going on, walked right through the middle of the group of angry teens!!  My husband commented to the teens something about how many children were around, but they were too busy cursing and swearing at the security guards.  One of the guards kept myself and a few other library patrons from leaving the building until the group of teens had left.  I was happy to get in my car and leave!!  And very sad that the library seems such an unsafe place now.  I'm glad the boys were oblivious as to what was going on!!  As for me, from now on, I think I will stick to the tiny little branch a couple of blocks from where we are staying!  (We had been at the big central library today). 

Because we ended up leaving our truck and trailer in Manitoba, our car was pretty stuffed (with one month's worth of 5 people's stuff!).  I ended up leaving most of our school stuff in the trailer.  I didn't want the books getting lost or damaged along the way.  I did bring the chapter book we are currently reading together and a few workbooks, but I figured we would be spending enough time at the library and reading anyway.  So, in a sense, we are taking an early summer break (I hadn't planned on breaking for summer...).  I do plan on doing a lot of field trips while we are here though!  Next week we hope to go to the Children's Museum and there are always events going on at the library.

It's time I got to bed, so I will end this update with a few pictures from the past few months.  I look forward to writing more regularly and hearing back from all of you!  You have been missed!! 

Happy Homeschooling!

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Mar. 15, 2008 - Please Pray

This is not homeschool related, but please, any prayers would be more than appreciated. 

My brother-in-law's sister-in-law (how's that for a connection?) recently discovered that her daughter, Tatyanna, (who turned 5 last month) is fatally ill with a rare illness known as Batten Disease.  Please pray for her and her family.  I can't imagine what they are going through.

For more information, you can check out their website: Tatyanna's Hope, or Semi-Coherent Ramblings and Such... (her Mom's blog).

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Mar. 15, 2008 - FREEBIES: Nick Jr. Preschool Pack and MORE

Do you struggle with finding educational activities for your homeschooled preschooler?  I found this great Preschool Printable Pack at the Nick Jr. website that any preschooler would love to work on!  And the best part is - it's free!  However, it might cost you a bit in printer ink as it is 18 pages, but if you set your printer to "fast draft" or "low quality", etc. it will use less ink in the printing, but you should still have no problem seeing the pages.  Another option would be to print the first few pages and wait until they are completed before printing the next few, etc.  This package includes activities such as a Backyardigans Create-a-Story, Blue's Clues Letter-Matching Game, Diego's Animal Rescue Game, Learn to Draw activities, science experiments and much more.  It is a great way to introduce your preschooler to skills in Math, Science, Art, Music and Geography.  To see and print the Nick Jr. Preschool Printable Pack, click HERE.

For MANY more FREE Nick Jr. learning activities for ages 2 - 6+, click HERE.

The Nick Jr. website also has TONS of FREE online games - some educational, some just plain fun.  To try them out, click HERE.  All 3 of my boys LOVE this website and there are games that appeal to each of their ages (2, 4 and 5).

Enjoy!

(This is not a paid endorsement - I find these resources very useful and simply wanted to share them with other homeschoolers who may enjoy them as well!)

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Feb. 28, 2008 - Time for Curriculum

Well, it has been another busy week!  We had a rush trip to San Diego earlier to pick up a bus for another ministry down here.  That was a loooong day!  Then my husband was away for a couple of days as well as his sister and the 6 leadership students that are living here and a few other people.  They went up in the mountains looking for a community up there that my husband had heard about.  The people still live in mud huts and are really struggling to just exist.  He was hoping to find them and see what they could do to help them out a bit, but they didn't end up finding the place.  They found a few abandoned communities, but that was all.  They had  great time though exploring, hiking and camping so the trip wasn't completely unsuccessful. 

The weather here has been beautiful the past few days!  Yesterday was so sunny that the boys' faces turned a little pink despite the SPF 50 sunscreen they were wearing!  We spent most of the day outside practicing their "futbal" (soccer) moves since they have a playdate with the neighbor kids on Saturday and are planning on playing futbal at the park.  Caleb is getting pretty good, but the kids here are Amazing!!  He will have to work hard to keep up!  It should be lots of fun though.  I'm looking forward to visiting with Angelina.  She's going to help me with my Spanish.

So I'm finding myself in a new place again with the homeschooling and I'm starting to look at curriculums again.  Sigh.  I enjoy not having a curriculum to have to follow, but the past couple of months I've been struggling at keeping it all together, covering everything I want to cover and still having fun with it.  I think I'm just getting to a point where I need a curriculum to just tell me what to do.  I think the boys would benefit from something a little more constant too.  As much as I have loved being curriculum free, I don't think I can do it an longer at this point.  I'm sure we will head back this way again after a while, but for now, I just need some help! 

Last year, when Caleb was starting out, we used Sonlight.  I really loved it, but I don't know if I'm going to go that route this time around for a number of reasons.  So I'm back to trying to pick my way through hundreds of curriculums online!  I'm sure many of you have been at this place before.  My mind feels like it's going to explode and I'm still just starting to look!!  We still love Math-U-See so we won't be changing that, but I'm looking for Language Arts for both boys as well as a good Bible curriculum and Science for Caleb.  I think we're doing fine with History / Geography on our own.  I'm still concerned about spending money on something we don't end up enjoying.  Since money is tight, that's something I have to be careful about. 

I'm looking at Alpha Omega right now.  I love the selection they have!  I think Caleb would find some of the Switched-On Schoolhouse stuff really fun as he Loves anything media!  It looks like he's at a grade 3 level now, according to the curriculums I've looked at so far.  I keep thinking that can't be right (he's only 5), but it seems that he's mastered all of the grade 2 concepts that most of the curriculums are covering.  So I'm faced with the challenge of finding something that will be stimulating and interesting, but that's not going to be "too much" for him, if that makes any sense.  I'm looking at Kindergarten stuff for Christian (who is turning 4 on Monday!!).  He is doing quite well with reading short words right now and he Loves to write.  We've been doing a lot of copywork as this is one of his favorite things to do right now.  His printing, although all uppercase at this point, is even neater than Caleb's!  He's probably even capable of doing grade 1 language arts, but I think I'm going to hold back a bit.  It's hard to make the "right" choices when it comes to this.  I feel judged if I let them move on and learn what they're capable of because it's putting them "ahead" of other children their age and I'm told they're going to be "geeks" when they grow up.  "Just let them be kids!" I've heard several times, but I really don't think I'm stopping them from that in any way!  On the other hand, I don't feel right about letting them wait until they are an "appropriate" age to learn the things they're interested in right now!  Anyway, I'm not going to get into that again right now.  I'm just going to keep searching.  Any suggestions from others in this type of situation would certainly be appreciated!

Do any of you use an art curriculum for the earlier years?  I've looked at a few, but really have no idea what I'm looking for!  Caleb is especially interested in art, but I have limited experience.  I've been teaching him photography and am letting him use my old camera (with some assistance), but he loves to paint and draw and I really have no experience in either so I've just been encouraging him to go ahead and do it.  He discovered the "Learn to draw" on his VeggieTales DVDs (most of them have a tutorial in how to draw one or two of the characters in the movie) so he sits down with the DVD remote (so he can pause when he needs to) and will spend 1-2 hours sometimes trying to draw the characters the way the artist does.  His drawings are actually turning out quite well!  I'm impressed!  I'll have to take pictures and post them sometime.

Oh, and Caleb wants me to mention that his tooth (finally) came out!  This was the first lost tooth in the family so everyone was very excited!!  It fell out when he was sleeping.  He noticed about an hour after waking and came running back into the trailer to search his bed where (luckily!) he found the tooth waiting for him.  We're going to start a lapbook on healthy teeth next week (if I can get everything in order by then).

Caleb's Missing Tooth:


Charlie thinks he has a "loof toof" too:


In other news, both Caleb and Christian have taken their training wheels off of their bikes in the past couple of weeks and are doing an amazing job of riding without them!  I was prepared to spend hours chasing them around, holding them up (like I remember my Dad doing with me!), but as it turned out, they were completely ready for them to come off and didn't require any help or steadying at all!  Both of them started by riding from one end of the courtyard at the house here to the other.  They were both able to do it without falling on the first try.  After they mastered that, they started riding in a circle around the courtyard.  When that was mastered, we took them to the campground so they could ride on the nice, flat road there!  They had a great day racing each other back and forth and trying out new tricks.  Christian had a couple of good wipeouts (I managed to catch them all on video so they've been watching them over and over and laughing like crazy at them), but no injuries.

Caleb:


Christian's Trick:


Charlie wishing he could be like his brothers:


Charlie and his bike:


We found 2 dead baby snakes on the road the boys were biking on.  It looks like one of the vultures in the nearby "vulture tree" must have dropped them out of it's mouth as it was flying by.  I don't know how to tell what kind of snakes they are, but to be honest, I was glad they were dead and not alive as those really aren't the kind of pets I'm looking to have in our trailer!!


I will do my best to keep you updated on the curriculum issue.  Hope you're all enjoying your homeschooling journeys!  Until next time, Happy Homeschooling!!

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Feb. 20, 2008 - Hanging in there

It has been another long week (and my Dad just unnecessarily reminded me that it is only Wednesday today), but we're hanging in there.  I really do want to keep up with this blog, but it seems that my days are getting shorter (although they feel so much longer!).  The boys have been extremely antsy lately.  I think we're all getting a bit of cabin fever as we haven't left the compound here in quite some time.  C has been away for the past almost 2 weeks (he's freezing in Canada) and we've really been feeling it. 

And I have been kept extremely busy with the newest addition to our family:
 

She is a purebred Maltese puppy.  She was my gift from my hubby almost 3 weeks ago.  He bought her from a guy selling puppies on the side of the road (she's fully Mexican - the bows were hot-glued to her fur!).  I guess he was unaware that I prefer chocolate.  ;)  I have struggled quite a bit with adjusting to this as I've never had a puppy before (both of our previous dogs were close to a year old when we got them) and I've never had a small dog before.  We are limited when it comes to living space and I am already limited in the hours I sleep (Charlie still doesn't sleep through the night), so the additional work and 1-2 hours less sleep per night have been a battle for me, but I think we're finally starting to work out a bit of a routine and get used to each other. 

We named her Chica and the boys love her, but are constantly terrorizing her - the poor thing!  They want to hold her and carry her and play with her, but don't quite know how to be gentle with one so little.  She has learned to hide quickly when she sees little feet coming!  She has, however, developed a special relationship this past week with my sister-in-law's dog Lucy (who is Much larger and a couple of years old).  It seems Lucy has decided to take the roll of her mother so she is becoming quite protective of her and loves to groom and play with her.  This is a bit of a relief for me as it gives Chica some joy (which unfortunately, the boys haven't been so good at just yet!)

As for school, we are plugging away.  I'm still experimenting as usual, but am really starting to learn what works and what doesn't work. Last week we spent a couple of days creating Valentine's Day Lapbooks.  I hope to get pictures posted soon (I haven't got around to taking them yet).  It was a really fun way to celebrate and learn about St. Valentine's Day.  C was still away then so I spent the day with the boys and my sister-in-law and the 6 students (all girls) that are living here right now.  It was probably one of the most fun Valentine's Days I've ever had.

We are still working through the creation story, but have added other Bible stories along the way.  Today we read a few different versions of David and Goliath, then the boys had a blast choosing their armor and props and re-enacting the story in the yard.  I wish I'd had my camera out!!  It was very fun. 

I am blown away by how quickly Caleb (5) and Christian (3) are flying through their Math-U-See curriculum.  I think we're going to have them completed before the end of the year.  I should start saving now for the next levels!  Christian is halfway through lesson 17 of 30 in the Primer book and Caleb is on lesson 11 of 30 in the Beta book.  We only purchased these in November and might not have received them until December (can't remember the dates at all now!).  I have not regretted purchasing this curriculum for even a minute!  I am blown away by how easy the boys catch on to the concepts and how simply they are laid out for them.  Once again I highly recommend this curriculum to anyone!!

I am still reading through other homeschooling blogs for more inspiration and trying to do some planning ahead for next year so I'm not doing so much searching on a weekly basis.  It would really help if I had things a little better planned out since I have few resources here in Mexico to take advantage of (I soooo miss having a library!  Even a bookstore would be nice!!). 

Life in Mexico continues to be an adventure, but one that we are thoroughly enjoying.  We are really building friendships with the family next door and I am really enjoying the time I spend with Angelina (the mama).  We have been trading foods recently (she bakes tortillas for us, I bake bread for her, etc.).  She and her mother showed me how they make their corn tortillas (a skill I have been trying to perfect for a while!), and they promised to have me over next time they make tomales so I can learn too.  I am studying Spanish daily now (which is very time consuming!), but am getting more and more comfortable speaking it when I'm out.  I am able to say enough to kind of get what I need when shopping, eating out, etc., but do not yet know enough to have a good conversation with someone who doesn't understand any English.  I am finding that I am understanding more and more though which is exciting!  Prior to moving here, I had little understanding of Spanish.  I have come such a long way!  But I have soooo much farther to go!!

Thank-you for sticking with me and my blog - even though I haven't been doing a very good job of keeping it up!  I really appreciate all of you - all of your comments and advice and friendship!  You are all such blessings to me! 

I will leave you with a few recent pictures of our life in Mexico:

Beach Sunset

More

Charlie, loving the beach!

Christian, trying to keep his ocean-filled underpants on while he runs back to the water!

Our favorite local restaurant

Carolina and Raphael play on their new beds (the first time they'll have their own!) in their new room (our latest house-build)

Augustin unlocks the door to his new home

Alberta, the mama, moved to tears at the house dedication

Las casas de la familia (the house they were living in in front of their new home)

The family's gift to us: 2 quail

The rooster, eyeing up someone's luggage (wondering if he would survive a trip to Canada I think)

Caleb adoring Chica

Christian working on the motorbike with Daddy

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Jan. 31, 2008 - Numbers Lapbook

Here it is!  Christian (3 yrs.) completed his numbers lapbook a while back, but I haven't been able to upload pictures for the past couple of weeks because of the internet connection here (or lack thereof!).  He is very proud of his special book and excited to get started on another one.  This lapbook was made entirely from scratch (no prinotouts or ideas from online) due to the lack of internet when we were making it as well as the lack of printer.  Even the connect the dots book was made without help.  I drew the pictures lightly, made the dots, then erased them. It was a LOT of work (especially since I'm not very good at drawing!), but it was worth it because he had never done connect the dots before (Caleb never liked them so I hadn't thought much about it with Christian) and he loves them - can't get enough of them.  So he now has an extra activity to do for "school". 

Please feel free to ask any questions you might have about the lapbook, or copy any of the ideas we used.  This is a great project to do with a preschool aged or even Kindergarten student. 

 

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Jan. 27, 2008 - Failure to Blog

Once again, I apologize for the lack of anything on my blog in recent days. 

I love blogging.  It calms my mind.  It connects me to other humans - homeschoolers, moms and so much more!  This is very important to me because I don't have a lot of that in real life.  I don't have any homeschooling friends here in Mexico that I can connect with.  No group field trips, homeschool co-ops, playdates or anything of the sort.  The internet is my only connection to other homeschooling parents at this time and I find that extremely important.  I need the community, the inspiration and the accountability that comes with knowing other homeschoolers. 

So, why haven't I been blogging??  Well, there are a few excuses reasons that I can list. 
The internet has been horrible here lately.  At the moment I am not online - typing this offline and waiting for that brief moment when the computer pops online - hopefully for a long enough period of time to get this posted.

However, my husband purchased a new, and hopefully much better router this week which should be installed before the end of the weekend.  I really hope it makes a difference!

We currently have 19 people staying here.  Well, not HERE as in our little trailer, but Here as in our Mexico compound.  There is 1 large 3 bedroom house which is occupied by my SIL and whoever happens to be here working with us at any given time.  We are now staying in the back yard in our trailer.  There is an elderly couple staying here in their trailer as well (until the end of March).  And this week we had 6 young ladies join us.  They are our leadership students here to help lead the teams that will be starting to flow in very shortly, and to take a social justice course as well as to learn about the culture here in Mexico and have an amazing, incredible experience living here for several months!  4 of C's coworkers have also come up for a few days to do some work, some touring, etc.  So anyway, I have been doing a whole lot of cleaning (lots of prep for all of these guests!) and cooking (daily cooking for 19 people!) on top of the regular laundry and cleaning that I do for our family.  Add homeschooling and then just trying to raise 3 incredibly active boys (while hubby is going through an extremely busy time - working from 5:30am daily until late at night most nights) and you can see how blogging would get pushed to the backburner a bit.

The week prior to this crazy one, my parents were here to visit which was so nice!!  We all had a wonderful time showing them around, giving them the full Mexican experience, hanging out at the beach and spending time visiting and playing games with them.  Then C managed to score us free tickets to Disneyland!!!  It was a really great day.  I think my parents were more excited about going than the boys were!  It was a great "field trip" for all of us.  :)

Anyway, I'm glad to be back.  I hope to get my butt in gear and continue with blogging.  I've missed it and I've missed all of you!

I've been struggling with homeschooling a bit since Christmas.  I know you don't want to hear about that.  I think we tend to prefer reading about people's successes than their failures, but I know I'm not the only one that struggles from time to time so I'm going to be honest and admit it.  The boys' routine got so messed up over Christmas and I've had a really hard time getting back into it, as have they.  Is anyone else going through this?  Some days I really just don't want to do school.  There I admitted it.  I mean, I love homeschooling, but I don't enjoy it when my boys are dragging their feet and don't want to do anything and it's not fun anymore.  So I spent a lot of time searching this week.  Searching myself, my heart, my motives.  Searching my kids, their interests, their desires.  Searching online (when I can get online!).  I think we're starting to make things work. 

Being a Christian, the most important thing for me is that my children have a good relationship with their Creator - a God who loves them more than even I ever could!  So I have decided to make this my start.  We are now starting our days with prayer and Bible reading.  We are starting right from the beginning of Genesis.  The boys learned Genesis 1:1 last week and we started talking about creation one day at a time.  So on the first day God created Light and separated it from darkness.  He called the light Day and the darkness he called Night.  We talked about what the world would have been like without light and so on.  Then I have tried to teach most of their lessons based on what we talked about that day.  For science we talked about different aspects of day and night.  We read about earth and it's cycles - why it's light during the day and dark at night, why the moon looks like it's shining, and all kinds of related topics from solar eclipses to seasons.  It's really incredible how much you can expand on just one verse of scripture!  I could probably spend at least a week on each day of creation (or longer!).  But I have decided to go with a few days each.  We are also making a creation lapbook, which I can't wait to share with you!  The boys Loved their first lapbooks they completed over the holidays (Caleb made a nativity lapbook and Christian made a numbers lapbook - I hope to share pictures very soon!). 

We have been spending more time outdoors - learning while we play, planting (I will share more about that in another post soon), discovering, exercising and much more.  The weather has been beautiful here.  I can't even fathom that it's winter and much of Canada and the US are covered in snow right now.  I really love this climate!  It makes for easy outdoor schooling, which the boys are much happier at anyhow.

So in a nutshell, that's what we've been up to.  I look forward to getting back into blogging and hope you will stick around!  I promise I will be more interesting and share more pictures in my upcoming posts!  Please feel free to sign up to receive my blog in your inbox by entering your email address in the appropriate place at the top right-hand corner of this page, or subscribe to my RSS feed by clicking the orange RSS symbol. 

I apologize for the lack of creativity and excitement in this post as it is well past midnight and I am more than worn out from a long day!!  Be sure to refresh yourself today.  Rest, relax, meditate, pray, live, laugh, love and enjoy!!  I will be doing the same.  Take care.
Tee

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Dec. 27, 2007 - Update

Wow, it has been a loooong time since I posted!  So many times I started to type something, but had to leave in the middle and never did get a chance to continue.  I'm not even going to bother catching up on most of it.  I'll just start from where we are.  :) 

It has been CRAZY around here (and not because of Christmas!).  Hubby was gone for a week, then back a few days, then gone a couple more to pick up a team of students (just 3 actually, lol!) and then back with them to build a house.  We also moved our trailer from the campground to my SIL's yard (which is soooo handy), and then had Christmas here while hosting the group.  Oh and my brother and his wife and other brother and his girlfriend arrived here Christmas Eve and stayed a week.  Then the group of students left (and hubby for a couple of days) and we all started getting sick (sinus infections) so that kept me off of the computer for a while.  I'm still sick and desperately trying to get better as my parents are arriving in two days to visit us for a week.  I really don't want to be sick when they're here!  Oh, and yesterday was my birthday, but it wasn't very exciting as I was feeling so awful and spent much of the day napping.

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!  Mine was amazing!!  The students built a house for a sweet family here and we dedicated it to them on Christmas Eve.  What a beautiful time that was!  I will never forget it.  We brought all kinds of gifts for the family, things that had been donated from people in Canada or purchased by the teenagers who built the house.  There were clothes, toys, candies, bedding, towels, etc.  The family was so thrilled!  Then Irma (the mama) cooked a meal for us - pozole soup - which we ate in their new house, sitting on upside down buckets for chairs and using their only 2 candles for light (there is no electricity in their neighborhood - and they wouldn't be able to afford to pay for it if there was).  They were soooo happy to host us and Irma kept apologizing for not having more food or not being able to cook something else (she had really wanted to make tomales for us, but didn't have enough money for the ingredients).  It was really humbling.  Earlier in the week we had purchased groceries for the family because the only food they had left in their house was a few tortillas and some beans.  Can you imagine if that was your Christmas dinner?

After the meal, we sat outside around a campfire and talked under a full moon.  It was huge and beautiful.  Someone told me it was the biggest the moon had appeared in 20 years and it wouldn't appear that big for another 20.  I'm not sure if that's true, but it was pretty big!  I'm glad I got some nice pictures of it!!  The whole night was so surreal.  I can't describe how I was feeling that night, but I know I will always remember it as one of my most special Christmases. 

After returning home, we discovered how the Mexicans here celebrate Christmas Eve - very LOUDLY, lol!  We fell asleep to the sound of constant fireworks, fire crackers, homemade firecracker / bomb thingies, LOUD music and hysterical dogs barking.  The fireworks and fire crackers are very common here on weekends, but I've never heard anything like I did Christmas Eve!  They were NON-STOP all night long.  I woke up at 3am and heard them still going.  Lying there in bed and listening, I realized I that it sounded exactly like a war movie soundtrack.  There were so many going off it sounded almost like machine gun fire at times!  Then there were really loud blasts and long ones, short and fast ones.  If it weren't for the overly loud Spanish music playing (at 3 different locations nearby - all competing with each other), I think I would've started worrying that we were under attack!  We woke up pretty tired Christmas morning (to the sound of the fireworks still!). 

Christmas Day was really nice.  The boys opened their gifts from our family in Manitoba while the family watched them with the webcam.  Technology is really amazing!  It was really special because my parents really miss their grandchildren - especially at Christmas time so the webcam really helped.  It was so nice to watch their faces (my parents) as the boys opened their gifts.  At one point Charlie was trying to eat a sucker with the wrapper on - I wasn't paying attention as I was taking pictures of the other boys.  My sister and my mom were telling me (via the webcam) to help him with the wrapper, lol.  It was almost like they were here for a few minutes... almost.

We did an adult gift exchange as well (Chinese style).  We had each been given 100 pesos (about $10) to buy something at the market for the exchange so the gifts were all really neat.  I bought a hammock, a toque and mittens with my 100 pesos and received the Cranium game (which I'm dying to play!).  It was a lot of fun.  Afterwards, we headed to the beach for the afternoon while our adopted grandparents from Canada (there are 4 of them who come down each year and stay for a few months) began dinner preparations.  They had invited nearly everyone they know here for dinner so there ended up being over 30 people!  It was quite a nice mix of Canadians, Americans and Mexicans speaking both English and Spanish, and such good food!  At the end of the day we pulled out the piñata(it was a Santa Clause, lol!) and had a great time beating him to a pulp (so wrong, lol, but my kids really didn't care as they barely know who Santa is).  We had a great time and the boys went to bed thoroughly exhausted at the end of the day!

Charlie woke up boxing day by throwing up in my bed so I spent most of the day taking care of him (the beginning of this endless sickness).  We had a few relaxing days with my brother, his wife, my other brother and his girlfriend (who became his fiancée New Years Eve!).

New Years Eve we took my brothers to a nice restaurant on the beach (which is where my baby brother proposed to his girlfriend), then returned for a good family game of poker in the trailer while we listened to the warlike sounds of firecrackers and fireworks and, of course, the LOUD music (again, at three locations, competing with each other about who had the loudest speakers I think!).  At midnight the Mexican people are allowed to shoot their guns off for five minutes (pointed upwards of course) so we listened to some of that for a while.  Of course, everyone's clock is a little different so it wasn't just for five minutes.  The tradition in Mexico is to eat 12 grapes at midnight (one for every chime of the clock) and make a wish with each one.  I went outside with my camera to get some video of the fireworks going off everywhere and the sounds of New Years Eve. 

New Years Day we headed to the beach again for a picnic lunch.  The beaches here have a really neat kind of seaweed and I can't find out what it is called.  It has large bulbs that are hollow in the middle.  It's hard to describe.  Anyway, the men discovered that it carves up nicely and started making all kinds of fun creations out of it.  It was pretty funny!  Next time we're there I'm going to bring some home and dry it to see how it turns out.  And of course we had another piñata, but this time it wasn't ours.  We have become quite good friends with our neighbors here (who speak some English - praise God!) so they had us over so the kids could help with their New Years piñata.  Our kids had a great time and I couldn't believe how much candy was stuffed in that lady!!  There were probably close to 10 kids there and each of them took home a good sized bag of candy (think Halloween!), as well as some of the adults.  We are so blessed to know this family though.  My boys are so thrilled to have some kids to play with (although the kids don't speak English) and they seem pretty happy to have some friends nearby too.  It's so fun for me to watch them communicate with each other.  I'm hoping my boys will be learning a lot more Spanish now that they have friends speaking it to them all of the time!  I can't believe how much they've learned from these kids already - how to make a kite (paplote), play sports the Mexican way, and much more!  I am going to learn how to make tortillas from Angelina - the mama.  I've been making tortillas a while, but they never come out just right.  So, anyway, that was our New Years!

Oh, and, exciting for me, I forgot to mention that when hubby went away last time, he came back with a Wonderful gift for me - a brand new CAMERA!!!!  My old one had really lived past it's time and was not taking good pictures anymore (not reading light properly, some settings weren't working, etc.).  I am soooo enjoying this new camera (A Canon Powershot S5 IS).  It's such a good camera.  I have to admit, this is another reason I have been short on blogging time - I've been taking Hundreds of pictures and trying out all of the settings.  I'm trying to remember how to be a photographer again.  :)  So, here are a few pictures from the past little while.
 

New Years Day 2008

I hope you all had wonderful holidays, and wish you all the best in 2008!!

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Dec. 9, 2007 - Loan $25 to change lives through Kiva.org

I want to let you all know about a cool non-profit that is doing great things: Kiva.org

Kiva.org allows individuals to make $25 loans to low-income entrepreneurs in the developing world (microfinance). By doing so, individuals like you provide affordable working capital for the poor (money to buy a sewing machine, livestock, etc.), empowering them to earn their way out of poverty. 

It's a new, direct and sustainable way to fight global poverty, and the way I see it, I get a higher return on $25 helping someone build a future than the interest my checking account pays. 

Anyways, if you have a minute, please check out the site: http://kiva.org.  If you need more "reputable" validation than my recommendation :), know that they have received great press in publications ranging from The Wall Street Journal to NPR to BusinessWeek.

This would be an awesome way to teach your children about social issues and how easy it can be to help out.  You can also buy gift certificates to give to friends or family as Christmas gifts (perfect for that person who has Everything!).  Please check out the website by clicking on the banner above.  It is definitely worth your time!!

Tee

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Dec. 7, 2007 - Monk-e-Mail

My sister sent me a Monk-e-Mail today.  If you haven't seen this, you should really check it out!  It's very funny!!  Click HERE to try it.

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Dec. 7, 2007 - Babble

Tonight Charlie was playing with his new favorite toys - the pieces in our nativity scene from the Usborne Advent Nativity Book. (The boys LOVE this book!  Every night they fall over themselves to bring it to me to read again and to take the next nativity piece out and add it to our growing scene.  Caleb even blogged about it HERE.)  Charlie kept bringing the pieces to me and asking me what they were called.  He was especially interested in the ox and the donkey.  However he's not very good at the whole "classification" thing yet.  He knows all of the letters in the alphabet and can recognize them in both upper and lower case.  He knows the sounds they make.  He knows numbers to 25 or so and can recognize numbers up to 10.  He knows a lot of colors.  He knows several shapes.  But when it comes to classifying them into groups, he gets confused.  He will say things such as, "The number A" or "The letter 11", etc. 

This is what our conversation sounded like tonight:

Charlie (holding the donkey and wanting to know what it is called): What color is this Mommy?
Me: That's a donkey.
C: No, it's a donkey.
Me: Yes, a donkey.
C: Yeah, it's the number donkey.

Charlie leaves the room, comes back with the ox.

C: What color is this one Mommy?
Me: That's an ox.
C: An onx?
Me: An ox.
C: No, it's an ox.
Me: Yes, an ox.
C: The number donx.
Me: Ox
C: No, ox.
Me: Yes, ox.
C: The number ox.

Charlie leaves the room, comes back with the donkey.

C: What color is this Mommy?
Me: You tell me, what is it?
C: A doxey.
Me: It's a donkey.
C: No, a donkey.
Me: Yes, donkey.
C: The number donkey.

Charlie leaves the room, returns with the donkey again.

C: What color is this one Mommy?
Me: What is it?
C: It's a hockey.
Me: It's a donkey.
C: No, a hockey!
Me: It's a donkey.
C: No, it's a donkey.
Me: Yes, donkey.
C: Donxy?
Me: Donkey.
C: The number donkey?
Me: Absolutely!

There's only so much I can take, lol!  But I certainly have compassion for him because I'm in the same situation - trying to learn a completely new-to-me language and surrounded by people who have no problem speaking it and seem to have no understanding as to how difficult it is to actually learn it!  I'm sure some of my conversations with Spanish-speaking people sound very similar to the one I had with Charlie tonight (although, in Spanish of course!). 

Oh, to have lived back in the days before the (not so) "Great Tower of Babble Babel"!

Gotta go, he's back with Joseph, holding him out and asking, "Donkey?".

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Dec. 7, 2007 - Christian's Thoughts on God

Christian is a thinker.  The day after he was born, my midwife looked at him and said, "Oh, he's going to be a serious one!"  His expressions were always very serious - as though he were deep in thought, pondering the goings on of life (at least, in the few moments he spent awake!).  However, he has grown up to be a very silly boy, like his brothers, but he still spends a lot of time alone in serious thought.  Here are some of his recent thoughts and dreams.

-----

C: If Jesus lives in our hearts, then he's always with us, right?
Me: That's right.
C: Yeah, I know that... And Jesus was with us last night.
Me: He sure was.
C: Yeah, he was sleeping on our couch... but that was after he put the bear in jail.  (Christian is Terrified of bears!).  I really love Jesus.  He's very brave.

-----

C (after hearing me explain that no one can see God while they are still alive on earth): That's not true Mommy, I've seen God before!
Me: Have you?
C: Yes!  He's really big.  And he was wearing pink glasses.  But they were broken.

-----

C: Is God stronger than ALL of the bears?
Me: He sure is, he made the bears!
C: So he can make them all die then!  I'm going to tell him that.  "God, can you please just shoot the bears so they won't be mean anymore?

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Dec. 7, 2007 - I've caught a bug...

the card-making bug!!  I made my first, well, second card tonight (you can read about the first one HERE).  I think it turned out okay.  I'm not entirely thrilled, but pretty good for a first attempt (on my own).  However, I wasn't really prepared for how messy this was going to be!  I hope that as I get more experienced, I won't have to make the table look like a tornado exploded on it!

I'm not going to spend a lot of money on this (at least, that's what I'm telling myself and my hubby!), but you really don't have to.  I spent about $30 at Michael's last week when I was in L.A. and I pulled out some scrapbooking stuff I've had for years (I don't scrapbook, lol - most of it was gifts from various people trying to convince me to start!).  In the end, I used mainly paper and cardstock to make the card (also a piece of string and part of the paper bag that held the pastries I devoured from the local pastry shop, yum!).  I added two of the stamps I bought at Michael's ($1 a piece) and a touch of ribbon.  It's pretty basic. 

I'm still not sure how much I like it...  I wish I knew how to do some kind of fancy calligraphy!  When we get my printer hooked up I think I will use it more than writing for these cards!

Of course, in order to make Christmas cards, I had to get into the "Christmas Spirit" (which is kind of hard, when it feels more like the middle of summer), so I hung the Christmas lights we bought this week (okay, I confess, I taped them up with scotch tape - I had nothing else, lol!), turned on the Christmas music (Josh Groban, Amy Grant, Nat King Cole, Celine Dion and Michael Bublé) and helped myself to a cup of steaming Mexican hot chocolate (which I believe is the reason I am still wide awake despite it being 1:30am - going to regret that one tomorrow!).  Mmmmm... it Finally feels like Christmas!  I'm getting excited.  There are several students from across Canada that will be joining us in building a house for a family at Christmas.  On Christmas Eve we will give them the gift of a new home.  I'm quite excited to be involved in the building this time as I'm usually not really able to get to do much (due to having three very active little guys!).  My husband has promised the boys and I that this time we can get dirty and hammer and paint since they need the extra hands and, being a smaller group of people building the house, we won't be so much in the way.

My two brothers and their significant others will be coming to spend Christmas with us as well.  They've both been here before and are looking forward to coming back.  Also, my parents will be coming in January.  Lots of company to keep us busy!!

Anyway, here are a few pictures of my card.  Don't laugh too hard! 

Sorry about the poor photo quality - I have the lights down because the boys are sleeping.

Off to clean up the tornado remnants...

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Dec. 5, 2007 - Caleb has a blog!

So Caleb has been asking me for a while to start his own blog.  Today we finally got around to it.  You can check it out here:

CALEB ONLINE

He's pretty excited to share it with all of you.  Be sure to leave him a comment!

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Dec. 4, 2007 - Love, at Christmas

I've seen this a few places now (and a few homeschooling blogs so you may have seen it as well), but I thought it was too good not to share. 

For the original 1 Corinthians 13, click  HERE.

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Dec. 4, 2007 - Want to have good, clean, FREE, educational fun while working towards ending world hunger??

I just discovered this website through Just Call Me Jamin's blog (one of my favorite homeschool mom blogs!).  At the website, you play a vocabulary game (match a word with it's definition).  For each word you get correct, 20 grains of rice are donated through United Nations to help end world hunger.  And it's free to play!!  What an awesome idea!  Please check it out - it's a great game to play for any age level (the difficulty increases with each correct answer and decreases with each incorrect).

Caleb (vocabulary addict and lover of all computer games) is going to be THRILLED when I show him this tomorrow!

For more details on how this all works, click HERE.

To play, click HERE.

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Dec. 3, 2007 - Today's Quotes

Today:
Thoughts on the color YELLOW
Caleb to Christian: "Yes Christian, the word is 'Lellow', but the 'L' is really a 'Y'!"

Yesterday:
Caleb to Auntie B: "Wow!! How did all of that mud get on my tires??"
Auntie B: "You rode through the mud?"
Caleb (sounding rather guilty): "Oh... you saw me?"

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Dec. 3, 2007 - The Homeschool Blog Awards

For those of you who are unaware, the voting has begun for The Homeschool Blog Awards.  There are soooo many wonderful blogs!  I have been browsing through all of them for quite some time.  Beware!  It's dangerous.  My Google Reader  is continually filling up with waaay too many homeschool blogs, but how can I deny myself the wisdom of other homeschoolers (most of which have been doing this much longer than myself!).  I just have to learn to limit my reading to a small portion of my day or I could find myself reading these blogs from morning to night, lol!

So, for the brave, the voting (and discovering) begins here:
The 2007 Homeschool Blog Awards

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Dec. 3, 2007 - Kindle

I discovered this today and think it is pretty cool.  As an avid reader (with Very little storage space for books!), this would be amazing!  Too bad it's so expensive.  I guess I'll have to wait for the generic brand, or until the price drops (a whole lot!) in a few years. 

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