Teen in the House?

      I officially have a teenager in my home now. My daughter turned 13 on Oct. 19th. I just can't hardly believe it. It seems like only yesterday when I recieved her in to this world. She was a beautiful bundle of joy that lit up my life. Time is traveling too fast for me. She is growing up entirely too quick.

      Anyway, let me get on with the rest of this post before I get all teary eyed thinking about my baby growing up. We feel like a child's 13th birthday is a special time in life so we wanted to make her's special for her. We had her a huge party. She chose all of the decorations, ordered them off line, sent out her own invitations, decorated the way she wanted, and decided to make her own cake. There were lots of guests & plenty of food for them all. She went with a horse theme. Here are some pics of preparation & the party.

Sarah's using her cake decorating kit that someone gave her. This was her first cake to decorate and she would not let us help her. We didn't know if she could handle this task by herself, but she had a lot of determination.

Getting closer to finishing her work of art as she runs a bead of icing around the bottom of the cake.

Everything finished but the "HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH" theme which she decided to let her aunt (a cake decorator) put the theme on the river for her.

My daugther is growing taller than me. We are at the end of the big "13th birthday" party blowout and I'm tired!

Weekly Wrap-Up2012, 2013 Week 1 Weekly Wrap Up

     Time and duties just don't always work together. I have been wanting to put a post on my blog, but time has not permitted due to the duties I have had getting school supplies ready to pass out at our church tomorrow (give or take, about 100 bags), home schooling, family life duties, etc. Hopefully, this week things will begin to slow their pace a bit and return to normal, if there is a norm for home schooling life, hehehe.
     Even with my home being bombarded with school supplies on my kitchen table, on my couch, in my living room floor, and all over my bedroom, we have really accomplished a lot this week. My daughter did one Shurley 'English lesson & three Saxon Algebra 1/2 math lessons. My son did two Shurley English lessons & two Saxon Algebra 1/2 math lessons. All other subjects were worked together, four Literature reading settings from Oliver Twist, along with working on outlines with the reading, four Appologia: Exploring Creation With Physical Science lessons, two History/Bible lessons coming from The Complete Works of Josephus and the book of Genesis, our daily Spelling exercise, & American Sign Language on Friday. It was a great week to begin our school year. One week down and 35 more to go for the year.
     Here are some pics of our week: (Oh I forgot, I also had three extra children this week, a niece & two nephews) so it really was a productive week because I also had to come up with some lessons for my nephews, who always has to do schooling when they are here and see my children working on school.

Pre-preschool for my sweet little nephews. They are gluing pasta noodles to paper to make the letter "H" after reading the Cats and Hats book.

Boys with their hats on & showing their schoolwork, "H" is for hat!

Matthew at his desk working on his Saxon Math.

Fun time! It's time for experiment 9.1 (the importance of direction) from Apologia.

Getting everything setup for our experiment. Always follow the instructions to get the best results & less mess.

Two eggs traveling one behind the other and touch at the bottom of the ramp when the first eggs speed reduced when it contacted the level surface. Miminal damage is done when the second egg still rolling full speed, taps the first egg with it's decelerated speed. Then we built two ramps facing each other and let an egg roll from both ramps at the same time, not a pretty sight! What a fun way to learn about "speed & velocity!"

Matthew gluing pictures of animals to show some of  "Gods creations" that were named by Adam.

Sarah's great artwork, showing God's handiwork to keep Adam very busy by naming many, many animals.

This is both childrens mini-creation posters.

     That our Weekly Wrap-Up! Now go to Kris's blog to see some more great homeschooling weeks around the world!

Traci

Weekly Wrap-Up "IYC"

Weekly Wrap-Up

International Youth Conference

We just got back from the "IYC" at Jimmy Swaggart Ministries in Baton Rouge, LA. We watch Jimmy Swaggart at "SonLife Broadcasting Network" on the internet.
    The four of us worked hard to prepare for our week long trip. We mowed grass, cleaned house, cleaned & did prevented maintenance on our van.

Teaching our children how to maintain our vehicle by checking all of the fluid levels.

Getting ready for our IYC week!

Our children before church with their IYC choir shirts on.

There was at least 1,200 youth here from all over the USA & beyond.

They even let us "recycled teenagers" come!

The annointed singing was great & the altars were full each night!

Sarah's waiting on us slowpokes while walking from the workshops.

The IYC Youth Choir ready to make a joyful noise.

No that's not red ants up in the choir loft. This place is huge. The balcony is just as big.

Youth praying for one another. Several groups of young people were all around the altars. There were several still praying when we left.

This was a special trip for us being it is our anniversary this week! We met so many people there & some were homeschoolers. Morning service, two workshops and an evening service were very hectic and tiresome because you didn't have much time to go to the hotel or town and eat between the workshops and the services.

    Jimmy Swaggart Ministries did a fantastic job and have a great burden for youth and the lost. Also there is a great Bible College here. Can't wait till next yeat for IYC 2013!

    That's it for our week, Traci.

Weekly Wrap UP

     In Our Life This Week: We/the children have had a blast. We had cousins over from Friday until Tuesday evening. The cousins were out of Public school Mon. & Tues. & thought it was time to come spend some time with us. A lot of basketball was played, along with jumping on the the trampoline, to just getting out in nature. All of them enjoyed each other's company.

     We also still have the puppy. My nephew is suppose to pick him up tomorrow. I think we might miss the little fellow.

Here are a few pics of the children having a great time:

     I managed to get to my lesson plans on Wednesday. That means two days will be pushed forward because we only schooled three days this week. Well, I say that two days will get pushed forward, actually, my children have done some of the work off of those two days, just not all of it.

     Our Schooling for the Week: Saxon 8/7, three lessons this week, yea. We also pretended like we went shopping at the store (even though it was just in our pantry/freezer) to reinforce what we were learning in our math book, Unit Price, Rate, & Sales Tax. Here's a couple of pics of our pretend shopping trip.

 

     I gave each child a certain amount of money to purchase their items with. My daughter was surprised when she reached the register and was $ 3.67 short of what she needed to pay for her items.
It was rather funny. She just went to the pantry and began to grab, not figuring. I told her that is why you always figure your bill BEFORE you go to the register. She immediately decided the dogs would not eat this week, or at least not dog food, so she returned the dog food back to the shelf so she would have enough of money. Lesson learned, learning to figure Unit Prices, Rates, & Sales Taxes in our math is something I will need in life.

     Apologia: Exploring Creation With Physical Science: We began Module 7, Factors That Affect Earth's Weather. We began the weather experiment & will be doing our observation of the weather for the next four weeks. Also, we watched some weather videos. I'll put a link to the web site in case any of you need a site that has lots of videos to use for school. It has videos for all subjects.

     History: still reading The Summer of 1787, wondering if we may toss it. Had good reviews given to us on this book, but we just can't seem to get into this book. We are about to be on chapter 6 & still just haven't took a liking to it. Usually, by the time we are this far in a book we are captivated or at least interested enough to talk about it & discuss it. But not much talk has been going on about it. We are finishing up If You Were There When They Signed the Constitution by Elizabeth Levy today.
English/Literature: Yea! we did English this week. The children wrote their book reports on Little Men. We have decided that our next Literature selection will be Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes. This is a book that we wanted to read so we decided that we would read it while we are studying the Constitution so we would be along the same time frame.

     Helpful Home School Tip/Resource: the link where we have been watching videos from, http://www.watchknowlearn.org/ There are a few videos that we have clicked on that would request payment, but many, many, many that we have enjoyed are free. Videos for all subjects. Check it out if you like integrating videos in with your schooling. I'm talking a few thousand videos.

What I'm Reading: rereading Things We Wish We'd Known by Diana Waring.

     My Most Favorite Thing This Week: watching my children battle out a debate in our Science over when the northern hemisphere is at its Aphelion point or Perihelion point. This was my favorite thing because remember my daughter has not been a Science fan until this year. After the debate, I would say she's on the Science wagon now. Even though one of them was wrong, I am proud of both of them because of the way they both were trying to prove their points.

     I think this about wraps up our week. I'm linking up with the HMJ & the Weekly Wrap UP..
If you'd like to read about some more great weeks, drop over to one of them & visit some more great blogs.

Losing School Time, But Gaining Relationships

How good is this? I sit & make lesson plans on Saturday when all the rain is going on, all excited for school today & what do you know, we don't even have school today.
Cousins came Friday to spend the weekend with us, Mom was to pick them up on Sunday, & come Sunday they decide to stay until Tuesday beings they are out of school. That being the case, I knew I would not get much schooling out of my children. So, instead of fighting, I joined the party. They have been having a blast. From playing basketball, to jumping on the trampoline, to riding bikes, running & playing in the field of green grass, to hiking in the woods, oh, & how could I forget, to baking brownies, they have been enjoying each other's company. Family is great!
Beings they will still be here tomorrow, I suppose there will be no school around here then either. Hope all of you are having a nice school week.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal Week Wrapped Up

In My Life This Week:
      We slept in Monday morning with no anticipations of school work, just bringing out our Christmas decorations & putting our tree up. We did get our tree up completely by Tuesday evening. My daughter & I worked on getting the tree decorated as daddy & brother was putting up the lights on the outside. With team work both tasks were accomplished. The only thing I have left to do today is hang my wreath on my front door.

Sarah decorating the Christmas Tree.

Elton & Matthew putting up our Christmas Lights on the outside of the house.

The works finished, we have lights!

In Our Home School This Week:
      Between Thanksgiving & Christmas we don't do any strenuous school work so our next few weeks will look light.
     While we were putting up our tree we began listening to the second book in The Red Glove Series by Karen Kingsbury called A Miracle For Maggie. We listened to the first one last year & loved it. It was called Gideon's Gift. It was so enjoyable I put it on our agenda to make sure we read the second one this year. We began that book on Monday & have finished it because my children could not get enough of it. We've just listened & listened & listened this week. They want to listen to the third one now, but I'm not sure what we will do next for our Read Aloud.

     For history we began book 2, The Secrets of Vesuvius, from the Roman Mysteries Series by Caroline Lawrence. There are six books in this series about 4 children who are friends & they are traveling around to different places & living during the Ancient Roman era. I was not familiar with this series, just happened to run across it so we are going to see how it goes. So far we are enjoying it.

     For math this week we used some hands on math. We played Life & the children handled all the money, including figuring the interest when loans were taken out.

     In Literature we are still reading through Robinson Crusoe. We are running a little behind on our schedule we had planned for this year in Literature, but that's OK.

     I did not have any English/Grammar in our lesson plans for this week, but my children have been working on books they are writing. Sometimes when we read a book it inspires my children to write a little booklet similar to it with their own characters. When this happens I use that for our schooling. They write the book, illustrate it, & then we come back in & look at the grammatical structure of it. Sometimes we correct them. Sometimes we just talk about what should have been done. I try not pushing corrections all the time. I don't want to take the fun out of their desire to write. Since I have become more relaxed over their writing I have seen them have a greater desire to write. I am seeing more than usual. I would say that is working for us.

     For Science we worked in our Apologia: Exploring Creation with Physical Science Module 4. We are learning all about water. WE, that's children & Mom are all enjoying the experiments.

Brush the comb thru your hair quickly & hold the teeth toward the stream of water coming from the cup. The static charge pushes the water away from the comb.

Places We Are Going?People We are Seeing:
      Friday we went to see the musical/theatrical play of A Christmas Carol. It was fabulous! We were so blessed. We did not know it, but when we got there our home school group had front row seats, the first three rows. The children were totally captivated during the production. And what was even greater is that the cast came off stage at the end shaking the children's hands & wishing them a Merry Christmas. Here's a few pics of the production.

One of the Historic "Saenger Theatres" presentations, The Christmas Carol.

Here's old Scrooge himself.

     Friday night was our local Christmas fest. We always go there with family every year and walk around to look at all of the booths & my hubby always buys me a "Honey Bee" candle. Pecan caramel is my favorite.
     Saturday was the local Christmas parade. Our church was in it so we road on the floats.
Helpful Home School Tips or Advice to Share:
     Don't get so caught up with school that you & your children can't enjoy the holidays & all the joy that this season brings. Enjoy the season & each other.

My Favorite Thing This Week Was:
       When my hubby & I walked around at the Christmas fest by ourselves. We walked around, held hands, & had some great quality time to chat/laugh together.

I Am Reading:
     Cape Light Novel book 1 by Thomas Kinkade.

     I think this about sums up our week. For more great weeks drop over to WUH & to The HMJ for some more great posts on other home school family's weeks.

We Did It!

  In the midst of having a sick Mamma we still met our goal. The tree was decorated & the lights were put on the house by Tuesday evening, along with all the presents wrapped. This is a record set. I've never had  my house in this much order that I could just sit back & enjoy the holidays listening to Christmas music, reading great books, spending fun time with my children, etc. The holidays have always been hectic. I'm talking there has been a time in the past when I did not even get my tree up until about 3 or 4 days before Christmas. If it had not been for my small children I would not have even put the thing up.
    At the beginning of this year I began disciplining my self with certain household chores like not being able to use the dryer until the clothes that were in it was folded, hanged, & put away, kitchen has to be cleaned before bed time, rinse the tub before or after I get in or out of it, tidy the bathroom counter & rinse the sink when brushing my teeth, swish the toilet after using it once or twice during the week, making my bed as soon as I get out of it so it is not tempting me to get back in it (ocasionally I have failed to do this one, but I'm still working on it) even have the children doing their beds (not always made up perfect, but looks better than just a wad of cover on the bed), etc. Just little things like this has caused my house to stay in a very managable state & has kept my house half way presentable should company show up unexpected. It also helped me feel like I wasn't having to clean all the time because I was doing all of these things randomly. Thanks to this discipline I did not have to stop & clean before I could get my Christmas things out. I'm so excited about the holidays & spending time with my children! Hope all of you are enjoying your family this holiday season.
  On another note, any Christmas book suggestions for my children & I. This will be the bulk of our schooling between now & the first of the year. We like all of them, children or chapter.

Getting The House Ready For Christmas

    We will have very little schooling today, if any. We are going to focus on getting our Christmas tree put up & our house decorated . We'll put our Christmas music on & have a day of enjoying each other as we pull things together. It's cold out so probably due for a game night afterwards. Making memories with my children is my goal. When they are older I want them to look back & remember the great times we had as a family in our home life. I pray the things I do with my children will inspire them to build a good relationship with their children, should the Lord choose to bless them with any.
    Here's a pic of my Thanksgiving cactus. This is the first year I have ever gotten it to bloom on Thanksgiving day, yea!

     This poor flower has been put through it. It should be much bigger, beings I have had it for about 7 years, but for some reason when my children were smaller they thought it to be a great idea to pull it up a few times a year. Thank goodness we are passed that stage & it can have a freedom to grow now, he he he. Of course, if I would show it a bit more attention it would probably help matters also.
    Well, better get to my task for the day. The tree won't jump out of the box & decorate itself. Happy Home Schooling!

Our Week Wrapped UP

In My Life This Week:
    I have had a great time getting ready for the holidays. Thanksgiving is gone now & I have just a few more things to get ready for Christmas. By Tuesday evening I am hoping to have my tree up, the lights on the house, & all of the presents wrapped. We'll see how much is accomplished Tuesday night.

In Our Home School This Week:
    We did not have any planned lessons this week We always take off the week of Thanksgiving. We like to do lots of cooking, free reading, relaxing before the holidays kick in & keep us on the go. So other than a lot of hands on in the kitchen reading recipes, using measurements, or picking up a great book or playing a game we haven't done a lot of formal schooling.

What I cooked This Week:
    We started off the week baking amish bread. It was delicious! My son baked Apple Cinnamon Raisin nut bread while my daughter chose to bake Banana nut with chocolate chips in it. For the last batch they put butterscotch morsels, along with some chocolate chips, & white chocolate morsels. It was good, but very rich.

    For Thanksgiving I cooked a corn casserole, a chicken casserole, 2 pecan pies, 2 peanut butter pies, & a German chocolate cheese cake. The cheese cake was a new recipe, but turned out great. We are adding the recipe to our family recipe files.

Places We Are Going, People We Are Seeing:
    We went to Nanny & Pa Pa's house & got to see lots of aunts, uncles, & cousins. It was such a joy to see some of them beings that most years we only get to see some of them once a year at Christmas. For some reason (which I'm thankful for) lots of the family decided to get together for Thanksgiving.
Went shopping for Black Friday & had a blast! My mother, my 2 sisters, one of my aunts, my hubby, & I went to the Tanger Outlet (a huge shopping place similar to a mall) & hit as many sales as we could, tiresome, but fun.
    My hubby & I started quite a bit earlier than the others as we wanted to get something for our children that was a door buster. So, we started in the middle of the night (not exactly middle, about 8:00p.m. to wait in line, what we won't do for our children, he he he) & met the others at Tanger Outlet around 6:30 a.m. the next morning. We did not get home until about 4:30 in the evening.

I'm Thankful For:
    All the fabulous deals I found on my shopping trip. We really got some great deals on clothing, which my children desperately need (they are growing tooooo fast).
    I'm also thankful I have a husband that gives so much to our family, especially his time. He is so devoted to us & things that we desire, not things we need, but things we desire, you know the things that we don't have to have, but he still goes that extra mile to see that we get them. I'm so thankful for the man that God blessed me with.
    I think this about sums up our week. Hope everyone else had a marvelous week as we did.
To read about some more great weeks drop over & visit Weird Unsocialized for the Weekly Wrap UP & visit The Home School Chick for the Home School Mother's Journal. I'm sure you will be blessed & encouraged from the post you will read.

On Another Note:
    For my Christmas book give away I only have one commenter. It's not going to be very hard to pull a name out of the pot with only one. If you are interested in this drawing please click on this link & leave a comment. I will be selecting the winner ON Monday, November 28, 2011.

Getting Ready For Thanksgiving

Today has been a wonderful day. I have been doing some of my cooking for tomorrow while my hubby & son have just been enjoying some computer time. My DD is gone to herAunt Conny's for the night. She along with my niece Miranda are staying the night over there to help her cook. This has become a family tradition for about three years now. The nieces go to Aunt Conny's to help cook Thanksgiving dinner. That gives my sister quality time with her nieces.
I have gotten my Pecan Pies, Peanutbutter Pies, & German Chocolate Cheese cake ready for tomorrow. In the morning I will get up & cook a Corn Casserole & a Chicken Casserole before leaving to go to my Mom & Dad's.
I am looking forward to tomorrow. Usually it is just my mom, dad, & their children/grand children on Thanksgiving. Well, tomorrow some of my mom's brothers & stister, along with some of their children are coming. How fun!
SupposeI'd better be turning in for the night. Hope all of you have the most blessed Thanksgiving imagined. God bless you all.
Don't forget my give away if you are interested in entering. Scroll down and leave a comment on that post.

Christmas Book, Hot Chocolate, & More Give Away

     I love reading Christmas books after Thanksgiving. There is just something about the atmosphere that makes me enjoy a great book with a nice cup of hot chocolate or coffee filled with a luscious flavored creamer. I would like to share the atmosphere with another wonderful blog reader. Here's a wonderful give away to set your atmosphere and a great book for the moment.

Here's a pic of what you will receive in the give away.

    I have not read this entire book. My children & I will be working through it after Thanksgiving as a jump starter in to our family devotion. We will read the story from this book, look up the scriptures in the Bible that goes along with the story, & read the prayer that is in the book to motivate our mind toward the Savior throughout our day. The book apppears to be a great book.
    If you are interested in this give away just leave a comment below & if you know of a great Christmas book that I might would enjoy please leave the title in your comment. That's all it takes & you will be entered into the drawing. The winner will be selected on November 28, 2011. I will contact the winner so I can get your gift in the mail so you can enjoy the weeks before Christmas. Just leave your comment!

Missing My Little Sweety Girl

My Little Sweety Girl is gone for the week (& Mom is sniffling). My M-I-L fell yesterday and received a concussion from her fall, with a few other little problems & has to be watched for the next 48 hours so Sweety Girl is playing nurse for her Me Mah. My M-I-L is 76 years old so the Dr. doesn't want her doing anything for the next 4 days so Sweety Girl also gets to play house (real house, cooking, cleaning, the whole nine yards). In a way I feel blessed that she is capable of doing this & is available to step in when help is needed, but I do miss her so much. I have always enjoyed having my children right under my skirt tail. They're a part of my life & I feel so lost when they are not around. I know she is only about 15 miles up the road, but when she's not around she may as well be across the ocean from me (sniff, sniff).
So due to our new plans, school is almost not happening. Sweety Girl took her Saxon 8/7 math, Exploring Creation With Physical Science to be working on her Study Guide at the end of the Modgel, & her library books, but hasn't devoted much time to it being at Me Mah's house. Little Man & I are supposed to be working on the same thing, but it hasn't happened either. This may have to become a fall break that we did not have in the schedule.
I suppose that is all that is going on around our house. I'd better go so I can get the names ready for me to pull for my blog give away. I'll announce the winner in a bit. Happy Homeschooling!

Educating From Library Books To Encyclopedias To Erupting Volcanos & Even A Blog Give Away

In My Life This Week:
    My scales are going in the wrong direction. I'm not sure if it's the week I don't pay much mind to the scales because of mother nature or if I've been enjoying too much food. Regardless of the case, it aggravated me that the scales went in the wrong direction after I counted calories & carbs, 20 carbs or less each day & less than 1600 calories per day, with excercising. Can you believe that? Uhh!!!!

Uhh!!!

Me trying to thin down

I'm Grateful This Week For:
    the relationships I have with my children. I know we only have that closeness due to all the time we spend together. Here's a link to a post with a pic of the card my DD left on my desk for me.
I have special tea parties with my children (individually) to build our relationship. My DD sends me little notes & cards from time to time laying a few building blocks to the relationship. I'm grateful that we are both working on the building.

I've Been Inspired By:
    two tapes that I checked out from our local library this week. They are by Inge P. Cannon. I have not heard of her before this week. It appears that she has lots of books/audio tapes that I am interested in reading/listening to. The two that I listened to this week are: Schooling or Educating: Which Are You Doing? & Eliminating Crucial Gaps While Individualizing Education. She never mentions Charlotte Mason, but her teachings could very well pass for CM methods. These tapes were a great encouragement this week to remind me (again) that we don't have to move at the pace of the public school system. We can remain in our subjects/topics for as long as we desire.

In Our Homeschooling This Week:
    we accomplished three math lessons in Saxon 8/7. My children are enjoying their lessons right now. The lessons have had geometry & prime & composit numbers. Their words are, "This is easy. We like this." My son has decided this week that he wants him some drafting tools.
We have not yet returned back to our Exploring Creation with Physical Science through Apologia yet. Hopefully that will be next week. We chose another library book this week. It is:

Exploring The Sky By Day by Terence Dickinson

    This book is easing us in to the different types of clouds & the water cycle. Our next Module in our Physical Science is going to be on water so I just eased this book in to introduce them to the water cycle a bit more in debth than what we have studied in the past. I like to ease in a library book for a review from time to time.
    We place two different bowls of water outside for an experiment, one in the shade & one in the sun. We are checking the temp. of the water each day & measuring the debth to see the warmth & how much it is evaporating. This is to reinforce our Module that was bringing out humidity. We've been testing to see if there was already enough of moisture in the air already or not. We've also checked the sky for clouds to see if we could identify them.
    We are still reading Little Pilgrim's Progress for Literature. We should have this finished up by next week. My son said this has become one of his most favorite books.
History has been a pretty relaxed week. We finished reading our book about Pompeii & pulled down the encyclopedia for further reading. After that Sarah & Matthew drew maps of Italy for some geography skills. Here are the pics of their maps.

Sarah's map of Italy

Matthew's map of Italy

    We've done this in the past, but my children thought it only right that we do another volcano experiment since Pompeii was buried by Vesuvius erupting. Here are some pics of them recreating Mount Vesuvius's eruption burying Pompeii again.

This is the Lab Tray

They are filling the 2 litter bottles with their mixtures

Matthew's volcano erupting and destroying Pompeii.

Sarah's volcano erupting. We used to big of a bottle and not enough mixture to have a more powerful eruption. So now we are planning to do it again for the third time to get it right.

    For English/Grammar this week they wrote narrations on what they have learned about Pompeii. Here are their essays.

Sarah's Essay on Pompeii

Matthew's Essay on Pompeii

    Other than getting in a drawing lesson today, I think this about Wraps up our week.
I am linking up with Kris over at the Weekly Wrap Up & with Sue for the Homeschool Mother's Journal. If you'd like to read more about other's weeks, drop over to one of these blogs & check out the others that linked up also.

On another note, I am having a give away on my blog. Click here to check it out.