We're Home

We just returned last night from our trip back home. It was sooo good to get to see the town I was born and raised in again, and to see so many familiar place. We had such a great time. It was relaxing and really filled my spirit with great joy, it was just what I needed. It was nice to not worry about whether we were getting our school work done, or if I'm using the right curriculum for this subject or that, or worrying about a million different things. It was nice just to be surrounded by people who love me no matter if my kids grow up to be rocket scientist or just a grocery store clerk. This was the best Christmas present ever!

House Fire (not mine)

This is a picture of the house I once lived in with my mom and sister from the time I was 13 until I went off to College. It was a historical home built in 1840 and was on the National Register of Historic Places. It was divided into 5 apartments. My family no longer lives here. My mom moved out over 10 years ago. Around 4pm yesterday a resident who lived on the second floor saw smoke coming from the attic and called 911. It took firefighters over an hour to put out the flames and by that time much of second floor was destroyed. Everyone who was in the house at the time got out safely. The fire department also evacuated the houses surrounding the house in fear they might catch on fire as well.

This came as very shocking and sad news to me. I would think the house would be torn down from the amount of damanage. I pray for the familys that currently live here. The red cross has stepped in and will be assisting these families.

7-Layer Cookie Recipe

This is one of my all time favorite Christmas Recipes. We always had it at my Grandma's house during the Christmas season. It brings back a lot of great memories!

1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs

1/2 cup (1 Stick) butter

1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

1 cup butterscotch chips

1 1/3 cups flaked coconut

I cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350. In samll bowl, conbine graham cracker crumbs and butter; mix well then press firmly into bottom of 13X9 inch baking pan.

Pour condensed milk evenly over crumbs. Layer remaining ingredients; press down firmly.

Bake 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool and enjoy!

Weekly Report

We haven't gotten much done this week. We Christmas fast approaching it seems that we are just busier than ever!

Spelling Princess is on step 14 of All About Spelling I or O followed by two consonants. I am learning so much myself from this program! I am happy we spent the money on it. I am still using words from BRI for Speed Racers spelling. I think we will pick up All About Spelling level 1 in January.

Reading Princess is reading The Storm by Cynthia Rylant the author of Cobble Street Cousins. I believe it's a little below her level but she is reading and I couldn't be happier!

Speed Racer has read books 28, 29, 30 and will read 31 today in BRI. I am really happy with his progress with these books! He is actually reading. The other day we went to a used book store and he picked out a book on space, he usually wants nothing to do with books so I was pleasantly surprised! While he was looking at that books I saw another that had really simple text and said let's get this one too. It's called Planets by Kim Jackson and he has read 3 times already! YEAH!!

Math We are lesson 132 in Rod and Staff Math 2. We have 5 lessons left in unit four. I told princess and Speed Racer that if we get unit four finished before the end of the year that we wouldn't start unit five until January. We'll see if it gives them enough incentive to get to work!

That's all we got accomplished this week. Not much but at least we got the basics done!

We Are Going Home for Christmas!!!

I am soooo excited, we haven't been home for Christmas in 3 years! It has been 2 1/2 years since we've even been home. It'll be so good to see my family and friends again. My mom comes to visit about every 6 months or so and my dad usually comes once a year. We live about 7 hours away from my family and as high as gas prices have been the past few years we just haven't been able to make it back home. Since gas prices have gone down, and with some help from my mom we will be able to go home! We will be leaving the 20th and probably be coming back on the 28th. The kids are so excited to get to see cousins that they haven't see in over 2 years. This is the best Christmas present ever!!!!!!!!

Like the Snow Effect?

I got the idea from Kysha over at Loves School If you would like to add snow to your blog go to Blogger Buster and get the widget!

My Wish List

Since this is the time of year when children start writing letters to Santa for all the new toys they want, I thought it would be fun to write my wish list for homeschooling! So, if I had the money to buy whatever I wanted I would probably get the following.

• 2 White Boards, one for our All About Spelling tiles, and another one to hang on the wall for demonstrating lessons
• Globe
• Bookshelf, we only have one and I desperately need another one, we are quickly running out of room.
• Table with plenty of room to spread out on.
• Chairs to go along with the table
• Math manipulates

Curriculum wise this are things that we will really need to get soon along with a few items that we could probably do without but I would still love to have.

• Galloping the Globe, this is one we could probably do with out but I that we would love it
• Five in a Row, I've wanted this for a long time but just haven't been able to afford it
• Rod & Staff math 3, we are almost done with math 2!
• Math on the level looks great but I don't think we would ever be able to afford it!
• All About Spelling level 3, Princess is halfway through level 2 so we will need this in a couple of months, hopefully I'll be able to find it used!
• Tapestry of Grace, or Sonlight, I love to whole rich literature thing but we could never afford this two curriculum
• usborne Spotter's Guide The Night Sky
• Usborne's First Encyclopedia of Space
• History Pockets: Native Americans
• Draw Write now Book 3, or any of them for that matter Princess loves to draw!
• Harmony Fine Arts along with all the books and cd's that we would need for it.
• Writing with Ease Workbooks level 1 and 2
• Some new kind of Grammar, I'm not liking FLL 3 all too well.

I could go on and on but Sweetie Pie has other plans!

So, what's on your wish list?

Busy Busy Busy!

It has been a busy week! Thursday we went to our field trip group Christmas Party, we had a great time. It's always nice to get out with other homeschoolers who you can relate to. You don't have to answer questions like, "How's the schooling going", "Do you think you are going to homeschool through high school?" or "When are you going to send your dc back to school?" We are in a great field trip group and I am so thankful for them.

Thursday night I had a really bad gall bladder attack. It started at midnight and didn't stop until 2 o'clock the next day. It was a really painful one. I went a month without having any and then in the last 9 days I've had 3! I had one when we went to a friends house for Thanksgiving, we stayed the night before. Thank goodness it wasn't a bad one and only lasted for about 3 hours. I was able to sit up in a chair with a heating pad on my back and that helped to lessen the pain. The attack I had the other night was so bad even the heating pad didn't work. When I asked my dh to rub my back he was alarmed at how hot my back was from the heating pad and couldn't believe I could tolerate it. I had pretty much had the heating pad on my back all night long on the medium setting, I guess the pain was so bad the heat didn't bother me. My dh asked me to take the heating pad off my back for awhile and I did. Sweetie Pie is still co-sleeping with us and still nurses. When I have an attack, and they always start at night, I can't leave her in bed because she wakes up so I have to bring her downstairs with me and hold her the whole time! She won't let me lay her down which doesn't help at all! I almost went to the doctor yesterday to see if they could give any pain meds that would actually work. Since I'm breastfeeding my options are limited. I have a prescription for Darvocet but it doesn't help at all. My doctor said that stuff that really works for the pain I can't take because I'm breastfeeding. *sigh*

Princess had her Girl Scout Christmas Party last night. She was so excited to get to go. She is in the same girl scout group she was in when she went to ps. She was happy to get to go back to school and see some old friends. She hasn't been able to make it to any meetings since October since the meetings are during the week at 3pm and my dh has our one and only vehicle at that time. She will get to go this Monday since my dh took the day off. I haven't told her yet but she will be so happy!

We haven't gotten much schooling done this week. I had ever intention of doing work yesterday but I was in no condition to. We are going to try to get a couple of things done today.

Hope you all had a gread week!

Planning History

I've been collecting as many books as I can from our library for our American History studies. I'm amazed at how few books there are for prehistoric America. I've found a few books on Mammoths, and sabertooth tigers but only one on the prehistoric tribes the roamed America. For me this time in history is very interesting. I want my children to know that the pilgrims weren't the first Americans. I want them to learn what life was like here during the ice age way before Christopher Columbus ever stepped foot on this land.

I did find one gem of a book at our library that was recommended to me from a lady on WTM forum. It is in a series of books called A History of US by Joy Hakim (I tried putting the picture of it below this paragraph but somehow it ended up at the top of the page) The first book in the series is The First Americans Prehistory-1600. It's an amazing book! It has a wealth of information about prehistoric America and how people came over the land bridge. It almost has too much information. I was getting overwhelmed yesterday just trying to figure out how to use it! I've decided it will be our read aloud for this part of our study. I haven't decided yet if we will still use America Alive a history. It's a great book too but doesn't cover nearly as much as the A History of Us does. One downfall is my library only has 3 out of the 6 in this series.

I will use the following for read alouds

The Magic Tree House Research Guide Sabertooths and the Ice Age

Stories on Stone by Jennifer Owings Dewey

Exploring the Ice Age by Margaret Cooper

First Reports The Iroquois by Petra Press

When Mammoths Walked the Earth by Caroline Arnold

Ice Age Sabertooth by Barbara Hehner

Boy by James Mayhew

The following we will use as our book basket selections for this week. All of these books are above Speed Racer's reading level but I'm hoping it'll spark an interest in him and I'm always available to read them to him.

Sabertooth by Patrick O'Brien

Wooly Mammoth in Trouble by Dawn Bentley

Wild and Woollly Mammoths by Aliki

Saber-Toothed Tiger the Extinct species collection

Over 6,000 years Ago in the Stone Age by Hazel Mary Martell

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