This blog is my attempt to document our busy but BLESSED lives raising and educating our children for His glory. A child of God, wife to one, and mom to 6 fabulous kids. We are in our 16th year of homeschooling using a Classical ~ Literature based approach.

Come along for the good, the bad & the ugly.



Monday, June 27, 2011

Miscellany Monday ~ my first one

This is my first link up with the Miscellany Monday bunch.  I think it will be fun to get my random thoughts out of my head.  So here I go…

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1. Yesterday I decided that I am going to be re-baptized.   I was sprinkled the first time, it’s time for full submersion. 

2. Today begins our first week of full summer schedule for gymnastics.  6 days a week I will drive to the gym, thankfully we now get to carpool 3 of those days with our neighbor.  I hope I have prepared myself because the girls are all gung ho!

3. McKenzie is cutting her bottom molars…she awakes quite frequently during the night…I pray they come through quickly, this Mama is tired.

4. I am reading The Book Thief and staying up way past my bedtime, only adding to the tiredness.  It’s really good!

5. My Saxon 6/5 is MIA.  Still awaiting feedback from the DIVE company that I purchased it from at Convention.  Hopefully, it will find it’s way home this week.

Have a great Monday!

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Friday, June 24, 2011

Summer school ~ week 1

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One week down,  4 weeks to go! Really, it wasn’t that bad.  Well maybe Monday when we had tears from doing Math, but all in all it was a good week.  I had great aspirations of getting all these different things accomplished and finished up from last school year, but there are only so many hours we can fit into a day right?  And I am okay with it.

So what did we do this week?  Well, Marie and I decided to go ahead and start her new Algebra program with Chalkdust.  I know it is only week one, but can I say I love it already?  Uncle Buck is so engaging and his explanations are right on point.  I do still love Saxon, but we needed a different approach at high level math, and this seems to be working.  I will write more about it when we get to the nitty gritty of the book. 

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Madison and Mikayla each did 3 days of math lessons and one free day of computer math using various math games.  If we keep on this pace we will make my goal stopping points in there respective books.  At the beginning of the 2010 – 2011 school year Madison tested out of the first 4 chapters of her Saxon 5/4 book while Mikayla tested out of the whole Saxon 2 book and went straight into Saxon 3.  We got snagged up during the year and at first I was all in a tizzy over not finishing the books, then with some wise council from my Aunt, who has been there done that, realized that public schools don’t finish books either so why should I stress about finishing ours.  With our plan I will not have to spend the first month or so when we start back up reviewing math.  The girls only spend 45min – 1hr on math so it’s not like it’s a chore.

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Montana started her lessons in The Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading.  It’s going great!  We are enjoying learning our vowel poem and she is so ready to read.  I want to take it slow and make sure she has all the basics and knows all the letter sounds and recognition before proceeding on.  She still gets a bit hung up on some letters but that’s ok, she is learning. 

Have I ever told you of my love affair with Lakeshore Learning?  I really do heart that place.  In fact I still have a set of chunky colored pencils I bought for a project that the girls use from when I was about 12 or 13.  Anywho, I found a great deal on Ebay a few weeks ago for the daily calendar and All About Letter set.  It came down to the wire but I got both sets for more than half of the retail price including shipping, YIPPEE!!!  I haven’t set up the calendar yet, because I forgot to get the heavy duty command adhesive strips from Wally’s but I will have it up soon.  McKenzie can practice new words with the picture cards, her favorite this week is the apple.  She like the rest of my girls, loves apples.

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We did a lot of reading this week.  The girls began their summer reading projects.  Essentially the three oldest girls are to read 25 “good” books in 12 weeks, and be entered into the chance to win a prize from Veritas Press.  They also have1-3 projects that need to be completed by September 2nd that I am counting towards their English/Language Arts 1st semester grade.  I don’t think I blogged about them yet, so I will next week.

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I have been busy organizing and rearranging our school room and preparing for next school year which starts August 15th.  I am getting my order and books finalized for Tapestry of Grace so I can make my purchase next week.  I also tweaked our curriculum choices hopefully for the last and final time.  Nothing major, just decided after seeing the sample of Susan Wise Bauer’s Writing with Skill that Madison will be capable of doing it. 

The gymnasts in the house started summer practice schedule this week too.  We have had a little hiccup, but nothing major that we can’t handle.  Mikayla ended up moving to level 5, while Madison is staying a second year level 4.  Montana begs for more hours in the gym while McKenzie is enjoying her new Mommy and Me class.  She is afraid, very afraid, of the pit, but we are making progress and she is having fun otherwise with her new friends.  Tuesday nights she is lights out by 745PM and sleeps in until at least 730AM on Wednesdays.  The cheerleader of the house starts back to practice in July.  She has been stretching and working hard on jumps and tumbling.  We are hoping she will do an individual routine this year and get her Full tumbling pass down.

All in all it was a great week, how was yours?

I am linking this post up with Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers, head on over and see what everyone else was up to this week.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Setting sail

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The Ship has set sail for another great year with TOS Homeschool Crew. I am privileged to be able to serve another year on the 2011-2012 Crew. There’s already some great review items lined up… so stay tuned!



Fellow Crewbies, be sure to leave a comment and let me know you were here so I can follow you back!


Sunday, June 5, 2011

Awards night

WHEW, today was a busy day!  Busier than our normal busy, LOL.  AWANA Awards 2011 001This morning I had Serving Hearts at church and today I choose to serve in with the Big Kids Sunday School.  What a lively bunch of kiddos, and I mean that in the nicest way possible.  You see, I am trying to find my NICHE where God wants me to serve.  I know it’s with the kids but which age group, that is the question? I’ll keep you posted.

 

Well, like I said, it was Awards night for gymnastics, cheerleading, and AWANA.  Cheer awards were canceled and rescheduled for Monday because of the storm that moved through the area early this morning, it brought much needed rain.  I think the girls and the Lt. ate enough hot dogs, hamburgers and sweets today to last them a month.  I, on the other hand stuck to my new rule of B.Y.O.F after my last bout of food poisoning. 2010-2011 gymnastics awards 002

Madison and Mikayla both received a big trophy for making it to State and for completing the season as Level 4’s.  Mikayla also received and award for best strength and Flexibility for the season out of all the team level girls, 4-7.  I think her new nickname should be Gumby instead of Lil’Bit. It is still up in the air as to whether they both will advance to level 5 or not.  No matter what happens we are all so proud of you both, way to Go!!!

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We then came home to regroup and then head off to AWANA awards.  It came down to the wire but Mikayla said her last Sparky section with 5 verses tonight to earn her 3rd book ribbon and Sparky Plaque. Madison received a participation award for this year while Montana finished up her 2nd year as a Cubbie and received her Blue Ribbon and a new Bible for Sparks.  Wow! I can’t believe Montana is going to be a Sparky next year…I remember dropping her off at Puggles just like it was yesterday.  My babies are growing up…too fast!!!

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How was your weekend???

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Make new friends, but keep the old

Today was our last day of Girl Scouts.  Yep, you will need to find a new cookie supplier.  We ended our Girl Scout career seeing our friends end of Girl Scouts06042011 002bridging to new levels.  It was fun and the girls had a great time.  Montana cried at the end because she wanted to walk over the bridge and be a Brownie.  She is not old enough to be a Brownie for two more years. 

Right now, we are in a different place in life… with different priorities.  This past year, I have been pulled in so many directions and after much prayer and counseling from others I knew something had to change.  We have had so many fun times and met so many new and wonderful people, but I needed to cut back somewhere and sadly Girl Scouts was what was put on my heart.

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end of Girl Scouts06042011 038 Cheryl and Tracey, it’s been a great year, we’ve had fun times!!!  I wish you the best in your scouting journeys and endeavors.  Cheryl, please get in touch with us come cookie time because we will need cookies.  To all the girls it was a blast to be your Daisy leader and all the parents thank you for letting me spend those two hours with your girls on Tuesday’s.  I will be seeing a lot of the Girl Scouts throughout the year with different activities so it’s not “Good Bye” forever…

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 It’s see you around!!!

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We were missing about 8 girls today, hopefully we can get a big group shot when we go to our beach day on the 14th!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Ring the bell ~ Mikayla got her kip

Ding, Ding!!!

Mikayla got her kip tonight at the end of practice,pottyand a kip 049 YAHOOOOO!!! She hit the skill two times in a row for it to count.  We are so excited that she got this new skill needed for the level 5 team.  Mikayla has been working really hard at building her upper body strength and it finally paid off today at practice.  Coach Mariah gave her a $1 bill and she got to pick a new gym monkey, the red one.

pottyand a kip 041pottyand a kip 037pottyand a kip 032 pottyand a kip 033 pottyand a kip 038pottyand a kip 039pottyand a kip 034          Way to go Mikayla, follow your dreams!!!

On another note, today was our last day of the 2010 ~ 2011 school year!  We made it, 2 years down.  I am very proud of the girls for their effort and dedication and hard work this year.  We had some pretty shaky parts but God guided us back down the right path and now we are back on track.  We start back up our summer session on June 20th for six weeks of of math, science, and LA arts.  We will be doing lots of reading as we complete our summer reading goals.  I will post our plans for that sometime next week.  I am still trying to put the last finishing touches on the project part of it. 

Next week we will be doing our yearly testing and then I will be heading to my very first Homeschool Convention on Friday.  I am pretty excited and can’t wait to hear all the wonderful speakers and experience the exhibitor’s hall. 

What have you been up to this week?