A Most Eventful Weekend...

On our way to ALR!

Two of my upline and I headed off on a road trip on Thursday (Jan 8th) to Ridgedale, MO (near Branson) for the Advanced Leadership Conference with our company, Usborne Books & More.  Our trip up was nice, trouble-free.  Stephanie and Holly had made the drive the year before in a dense fog and kept joking about how they almost died because they could not see... and there are a lot of high, mountain passes and twisty curves, so, yes... they had been in danger!  Our drive was fine, though.  We made it to the beautiful Big Cedar Lodge and had a wonderful first evening and full day of training the next.  The boys were staying with my parents Thursday evening, and Michael picked them up on Friday after he got off from work. 

Well, very late Friday night Michael started having what he thought were bad heartburn pains, and then coughing up blood.  He called me at 3am saying, "I think I have an emergency."  I tried to calm him down and figure out what was going on, but I'm not good at anything medical, so I didn't know.  When I hung up with Michael after that call, I didn't know what he was going to do... and since I didn't hear back from him, I figured it must have passed and he went back to sleep.  I didn't sleep much myself wondering and worrying, but got a text from him about 7am saying "I'm not dead yet, but at the ER.  Running tests!"  I didn't realize he had driven himself and the boys to the ER (and apparently Callen put up a big mean fuss about being woken up, yikes!)  Thankfully, Michael's parents are down for a two-month long visit and staying relatively near by, so Steve came and got the boys from the ER and brought them back to our house and they went back to bed.  I called my mom and asked her to go to the house and take over for Steve so he could go back up to the hospital to be with Michael.

After going back and forth through text with Michael and Steve, turns out the tests pointed to Michael's gallbladder and it needed to be removed ASAP.  SURGERY!  I was so upset that I wasn't there and was having a really hard time deciding between staying where I was and rushing back to Texas by myself.  Everyone told me to stay where I was, so I listened.  Michael was in good hands at the hospital, his dad was there, my kids were with my mom... there wasn't much I could do.  I tried to continue with a full-day of sitting through training, but I had a difficult time concentrating.  The word spread quickly and everyone was coming up asking questions and offering prayers and and nice words.  I even got a hug and a few words of encouragement from Randall White, our President/CEO.  I remember crying a lot, praying a lot and blowing up my phone with texts and calls all day long.  Michael's surgery kept getting pushed back, till finally about 5pm, he went in.  I could have been there had I left that morning.  The surgery went well, and this gallbladder was full of stones, according to the doctor.  He had 4 holes poked into him.  He stayed over night and was released on Sunday afternoon.

Sunday morning was the day we were supposed to leave Big Cedar Lodge and the girls riding with me agreed we could leave at 6am, so we jumped up and got in the car (in our PJs and all!), intending to miss a storm that was coming in from the Northeast.  Well, turns out we ran smack dab into the middle of one that was in Arkansas.  The main freeway was shut down and there was about a 2 hours standstill reported, so the GPS offered an alternate route, which LOOKED like it bypassed the mountains completely.  That seemed like a good idea at the time.  Well, we soon found out it steadily went right up a mountain and was far less traveled, which is NOT a good combination.  We passed many cars spun off on to the sides of the road and kept going.  Then we got to a part with a sign that read "Steep Slope Ahead."  Uh oh.  Indeed.  The entire highway was a giant sheet of ice, and there was absolutely nothing I could do anymore.... there was no way to accelerate so we just kind of came to a slow stop, and then the car started sliding sideways.  We slid, almost in slow motion, into a guard rail on the side of the road.  It was pretty much a straight drop down the other side of it, but luckily we just struck the guard rail a little.  We tried to get out, but the highway was, as I said, one giant sheet of ice, it was impossible to cross or walk around on.  We didn't see any other civilization, no real houses or businesses.  So, we sat there for a while, charging up our phones, calling 911 to let them know where we were exactly, letting our loved ones know we had a bit of delay, lol. 

Just slowly slid and stopped there.

Solid sheet of ice!

We sat on the side of the road there for about an hour and a half.  We got periodic calls from the 911 dispatch saying they couldn't come to us because all of their resources were stuck, too.  The firetruck had slid off into a ditch, the two sheriff trucks were off the roads, the wrecker was wrecked, etc.  REALLY!  We pretty much made it the farthest up the mountain out of anyone, and no one could come for us!  At one point we saw some hope!  A sand truck was making it's way up and around the corner, but then before our very eyes, it slid off the road, too.  Thankfully, the fireman who had the firetruck off into the ditch a little ways down came to check on that guy, and saw us!  He was able to make his way over to use and ask us if we wanted to come down to where he and a bunch of others were gathered in some warm work trucks.  My car wouldn't start at that point, I had ran the battery down charging the phones and such, oops!  So, we decided to take him up on that.  We gathered some stuff and blankets and headed along the guard rail with him down the mountain.  A little ways down I noticed a house across the street, and having to go to the bathroom pretty badly by then, wondered out loud if those people were home because it'd be nice to use there bathroom!!!  The sweet Fireman, grabbed his phone and goes, "Let me call them!"  We then realized we were in a town of 399 people, everyone knew everyone in Winslow, AR!  Thankfully, they were home and we could come use their bathroom, but we had to figure out how to cross the highway, which was solid ice.  Fireman Shane said he had witnessed a lady walk along on her blanket for traction, so we tried it and worked.  Was a very interesting experience shuffling along across a highway on a blanket (IN MY PJs, mind you!), but it worked. 

These sweet older couple let us into their home and we used their bathroom, they offered us coffee and cookies and said we could stay there as long as we needed.  Stephanie asked if they were football fans and they turned on the Cowboy game for us, lol.  They served us lunch and everything.  We had a wonderful time getting to know these people who saved our lives.  At this point I hadn't told Michael what had happened because I didn't want him worrying about me, so when I found out he was finally home with his mom, I called and told him the story.  We tried so hard to get up early and get home as fast as we could, we ended up with an extra 5-hour delay.  Finally, it rained a bit and warmed up a little, so the sand truck was able to drive backwards, sanding himself up the mountain.  We jump started the car and got it off the guard rail and everything looked fine.  The sweet couple escorted us all the way back down to the mountain and over to the main freeway again.  And we were on our way home at last.  I got home about 9pm on Sunday.

Whew.  What a weekend to remember!  Thankfully, Michael is doing much better now, he is healing very well and back to moving around and working and all that.  The dent in the car popped itself out pretty much, which is awesome.  And good grief, I learned my lesson about Arkansas back roads!

Celebrating 25 Years of UBAM, National Convention 2014...

I spent this past weekend with my Usborne Buddies in Paradise (aka Tulsa, OK) for National Convention.  Usborne Books & More celebrated it's 25th Anniversary this year and they went CRAZY for convention.  It was so much fun.  Despite hotel issues (which were themselves cray-cray), the whole experience was just what I hoped.  I was able to further bond with some of my teammates, including new ones!  We got great training, received a bunch of new titles and just had a pure blast! I am definitely motivated to promote to Team Leader in the VERY near future and am definitely gonna work towards earning a trip to IRELAND!  Oh yes, bring it on!

Roommates!

President/CEO of UBAM, Randall White

5 generations of our team!

About 100 new titles are available today and they are AMAZING.  You definitely want to check them out at www.HeyJadeBooks.com.  Also, they rolled out a new kit special.  You can start your own Usborne Business for only $69 now through July 31st.  What a great offer!  Plus, hosting a party in July gets you Double FREE Books, our best hostess benefit.  JULY is already off to a great start and it's not even here yet!

In Limbo...

Our house has been on the market for nearly three weeks.  We've had about 25 showings or so.  Most feedback has to do with it being "too small."  Not much we can do about that.  Just need to find the right young couple or empty nesters, I guess.  It is an interesting experiment in keeping this place tidy.  Getting out the door with two kids is hard enough, but now I have to do a full sweep of the house anytime we wanna go out to make sure it's pristine.  This evening I was in the middle of cooking dinner, and got a call for a showing for 6-7pm.  Problem was, it was already 6:05 and dinner was only half cooked!  We had them give us till 6:45, wolfed down our food, tidied like fools and got out.  Lol.  Such an adventure!

We've looked online at a list of houses for sale that our realtor gave us.  Narrowed down a list of about 125 to about 35.  There's not a lot of use going to look at these places until our house has some interest.  So, feeling a bit in limbo.  Waiting for something to happen.  The homeschool mom in me wants to start planning out school... normally, we'd be starting back up in a few weeks.  But, that stuff is in a tub under everything that's been piled and stashed in the closet. So, trying to let that go and not worry.

Preston has been doing Cub Scout Day Camp this week, and has been LOVING it.  I was freaking out on Sunday night.  This was our "kindergarten moment."  The first time I really took him somewhere, dropped him off with people who weren't family or super close friends, for SEVEN HOURS.  But he did great, I didn't cry, and all was well.  He has really had a great time out there, despite the 95-degree temps.  He's gone swimming, done archery and shot BB guns, and all kinds of fun things.  He's in heaven!  I'm really glad that he's doing well and enjoying this experience.  It's probably going to be one of the last scout activities he'll get to do.  The recent decision regarding openly homosexual scouts is just a bit too much.  I understand that at this age it's not an issue, however if that's the case, why did it have to be an ISSUE?!  I can only see it going further, and don't really want to have my child in the mix.  I love people of all sorts, but I do not agree with their lifestyle if they choose to live like that.  And I do not appreciate it being forced into places it doesn't even belong.  No, it shouldn't be an issue... but it is now, isn't it?  I'm very sad about it all.  Michael was an Eagle Scout.  My dad was an Eagle Scout.  And all Preston got was Tiger and Wolf?  It's been a hard decision, he doesn't even know yet - and I am not looking forward that conversation.  Mergh, it's just all so sad, really.  "Duty to God" is the scout motto... sigh.

Anyway, we finished up AWANA at church.  There is a new program going on starting next week called Art & Soul and I think the boys will enjoy that.  And, of course, we'll have VBS in July.  Hoping to do some more fun things while we're having our break.  And, Lord willing, we'll MOVE before the summer is up.  Lol.  My UBAM convention is next week.  CAN'T WAIT!!!

Spring Turns into Summer...

Well, we're on break from school.  You'd think I'd have more time to blog... but not really.  I still need to upload the pix from my real camera of our camping trip several weeks ago.  Oops.  And lots of other this and that's on my to-do list as well.

We are busy getting ready for a garage sale this weekend.  Trying to de-clutter the house.  Why?  Well, I'm sick of the clutter and everything collecting dust.  No more "maybe I'll need this someday..."  Ugh, no, get rid of it!  But, also because we are planning to put our house on the market and move.  Like soon.  CRAZY.  We've been here over 10 years.  And it's just time to get out from under it... find a bigger place in a different area and start over a bit.  Obviously, we don't want to go too far.  We are very connected to our church near here, our friends and my parents... obviously, can't wander off to far from them.   So, we're in full-swing to make this happen this time.  Talking and meeting with realtors, seeing what our options are, having a foundation company come out and fix what they can.  It's overwhelming, and honestly... terrifying.  But exciting as well.  Just praying that we are truly guided by God in all of our decisions with this.  Both of us really feel it's time to move, so... we're doing what we can to get that ball rolling.


The kids are going through their phases.  Callen is still in his "terrible two" mode despite having turned three in March.  He is challenging, and it's just a real good thing he's so darn cute.  Sheesh.  Preston pesters him like crazy and often completely lacks common sense, so he has his share of trouble.  I'm doing my best, but I often feel like such a huge parental failure with them so far.  Preston cries about everything.  Callen destroys everything.  I'm sure that most kids their age are like this, and I'm expecting too much on them and myself.  It's just hard sometimes to see the same mistakes day after day, and no real sense of them "learning" the right way to act/react.  I keep looking at myself and realizing that I'm the same exact way, though.  God must face-palm Himself a lot regarding my actions, too.  Lol. On a positive note, the boys and I have met a new family in our area that we have just fallen in love with.  They travel a lot so we have to take advantage of them when they're around, but The Stauffers have been a great addition to our friend circle in the short time we've known them.  April and I get along really well, as do Preston and her son, who is 8.  They have two girls, too... and Callen enjoys all of them! Another random, but positive, note is that the boys and I have enjoyed having smoothies lately.  Getting in our veggies where we can.  The boys have loved them all, so it's really easy to make us a quick drinkable lunch packed with fruits and veggies (spinach!).  I am loving having that option instead of always trying to come up with a lunch that they'll actually eat.  Whew!

Michael finished up his teaching semester yesterday and won't be taking on a Summer class since they wouldn't fit his regular full-time job schedule.  Hopefully he'll get to return in the Fall.  His full-time job seems to be going along just fine, no real news to report there apparently.  Other side things are going ok, and he only does pizza every once in a while when they need an extra hand and he's able.  His earache, migraine, hip/leg pains are all still present and bothersome.  As are the many medical bills arriving constantly for the things we've tried to do for those particular ailments.  I just want him to feel good again.  Is that too much to ask?  He works so hard to provide for his family, it just isn't fair that he always has to be so miserable.  The boys have enjoyed utilizing Netflix with him and they watch episode after episode of superhero cartoons.  I'm glad that Michael is good at deciding which ones are appropriate for their ages, 'cuz I have no idea.  But they're quickly becoming experts on all things superhero and comic books, haha.

I was able to accomplish this year's Connect4Challenge with my Usborne Books & More business.  I am going to convention in June for FREE!  That'll be such a blessing.  A chance to get away, learn more about making my business successful, meeting a bunch of people I only know via Facebook.  I'm really looking forward to it!  After the last four months of steady action, taking a bit of a break in May and then I have a bunch of events lined up for June to hopefully get right back into the swing of things.  Getting the commission checks for those months was definitely a nice thing, plus... now I don't have to spend out-of-pocket money and feel guilty about going to convention!  Woo hoo!

That's about all I can muster at the moment, as far as an update goes.  I do have several things on my to-do list that need to get knocked out over the next few months, so... prayers that those get taken care of easily.  And prayers that this moving business is a smooth transition for all of us.  I'm a natural worrier and get extremely stressed out with big change like this.  I'm TRYING to take it easy and go with the flow, but that is just not how I'm wired.  

Homeschool Recap, February 1st (Week 23)...

In my life this week...

This week went by pretty smoothly... and I'm thankful for that.  The boys and I got some good outside time when the weather cooperated.  I've started back to using My Fitness Pal (on my phone, and it has a barcode scanner, oh how much easier it is now!) and so I've been trying to be intentionally more active as well as watch my calories and portion sizes.  We ran around the park and today we danced to some old Audio Adrenaline albums... so much fun (and without the cost of a gym membership, lol).  

Overall, the boys' behavior was better than usual this week... so I certainly can't complain about that.  In fact, there were several sweet moments between them... being helpful to each other and getting along really well.  This isn't always the case, for sure, they know how to push buttons with each other, but it was nice to see some tender moments in there.

Preston reading Callen a bedtime story.

Thursday, Jill and Steve came over to watch the boys so I could go do a book party in Lancaster.  It was really fun, a great group of women to hang out with!  And with that, I have a head start on my February sales goal (since I had already met January's, yay!).  I am working towards earning my trip to Convention for free, with a sales challenge each month January through April.

A Picture to share... Last Saturday, Preston took part in our Pack's Pinewood Derby.  His Shark car won 2nd place every race it was in, so overall for his Den, he won 2nd place and got a fun trophy.

Second Place for the Wolves.

The Shark!

The track!

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "R" for Rainforest!  We read a few books having to do with rainforests, like Up a Rainforest Tree and The Rain Forest Counts.  Callen also helped Preston with his Spelling work one more.  Preston's questions were things like, "Which word has the 'er' sound spelled 'e-a-r' and when he read that to Callen, Callen quickly pointed out the words that had e-a-r.  That boy definitely knows his letters!

Callen helped Preston with his Spelling work.

Bible:   This week's name of Jesus was Head of the Body. Preston's memory verse is Col 1:18 and we looked up verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked the church being the body and God as the head. One of the suggestions in the lesson was to make a gingerbread man and decorate it, talking about how God is the head and we are the body.  Well, at Aldi earlier this week, I saw that they had the Gingerbread Man kits on clearance so I nabbed a couple.  Today we decorated them, and the boys can't wait to eat them, of course!

Callen had some help, but told me where to put things.

Preston did his by himself.  Nice Chef's hat!

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure. Continued with lesson 52-54 in Primary Language Lessons. We continued our read-aloud, On the Banks of Plum Creek, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. 

History: This week Preston learned about four states... Maryland (read Island Boy), Missouri (read Pony Express), Arkansas (read Good Morning, Granny Rose) and Michigan (read The Real McCoy and The Michigan Counting Book).

Math: Preston continued Part B of Math Mammoth, Second Grade.  Started Chapter 8, which is adding three-digit numbers and regrouping.  We do need to work on addition facts, as he still often uses his fingers for facts he should just know off the top of his head.  Need to do some drilling!

Three digit math and a puzzle to solve.

Science:  This week's theme continued with the human body, and we covered subjects like the brain and senses in the First Encyclopedia of Science and made pages in his Science Notebook.  Also did some sense experiments from Science in the Kitchen.

Music/Art: Continued practicing "The Star-Spangled Banner."  We also continued our World's Greatest Artists, Vol 1 unit study, with our third artist: Monet. This week, we read from Monet & The Impressionists for Kids, Monet's Impressions and the Usborne Children's Book of Art. Preston colored in a black and white version of "Woman with a Parasol" and created his own version of a "Japanese Footbridge." We are also listening to and learning more about Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, and read Swan Lake.

Spanish: Continued with the next episode of Salsa. We reviewed words having to do with "El Tiempo" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish and went through some review using the Spanish Words & Phrases Flashcards. 


We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, January 25th (Week 22)...

In my life this week...

I keep meaning to spend some time blogging on things other than the boys and homeschooling, but it just isn't happening.  There isn't time enough in all the world at this point.  It's amazing how busy I feel... but what am I DOING with all my time?  Who knows?!  Anyway, the week gets away from me and here I am again, trying to mark out enough time to throw together our weekly recap.  This week?  I don't even know.  I had an Usborne book party scheduled for Thursday, but it was rescheduled for next week.  Jill and Steve came and took the boys out for a few hours anyway, since they had it already planned.  They went out to the woods, hiked, had a picnic and ended up with ice cream.  So fun for them.  I spent the time trying to get my business stuffs organized and make some lead calls.  It felt nice to have some quiet and get some things accomplished. 

Preston had his 7-year check up at the doctor, everything looked good except he didn't quite pass the eye screening.  I took him to the eye clinic and they tested him with all kinds of contraptions, and it appears his left eye is 20/40, so slightly weaker than the right.  The doc said at this age, glasses would be more trouble than they're worth because the vision loss is not even enough to notice really.  Only if he starts complaining about headaches or not being able to see should we look into glasses.  She asked him if he had trouble seeing the board at school... his answer what "huh?"  Hahahah!  Loved it.

Waiting for his eye exam, enjoying himself.

Places we're going and people we're seeing...
Last Sunday, my parents came over and we walked around the Paragon Outlets here in GP and then had Spaghetti Warehouse for dinner.  Yum!  Love spending time with our families!

A Picture to share...

I love my boys!!!

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "Q" for Queen and royalty!  We read a few books having to do with queens, like Isabella Abnormella & The Very, Very Finicky Queen of Trouble and Pizza for the Queen.  Honestly, we didn't spend a lot of time on tot school this week.  Callen did a really good job tracing the letter "Q" though!  And he ended with two busted lips this week.  Boys!  Oh, and he had a fantastic time playing with Play-Doh... he's never really been let loose with it before, so it was quite a delight for him!

Play-Doh-Palooza!

Bible:   This week's name of Jesus was Head of the Body. Preston's memory verse is Col 1:18 and we looked up verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked the church being the body and God as the head. 

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure. Continued with lesson 49-51 in Primary Language Lessons, this week was about letter writing and addressing envelopes. We continued our read-aloud, On the Banks of Plum Creek, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. 

History: 
This week Preston learned about Illinois, reading Hog Music and Growing Seasons.  And Alabama, reading a biography of George Washington Carver and a book on Rosa Parks called The Bus Ride That Changed History.  We also learned about wagon trains, reading from American Pioneers and Patriots and a library book called Wagons West.

Math: Preston continued Part B of Math Mammoth, Second Grade.  Finished Chapter 7 on measuring all different kinds of ways, did a mixed review, chapter review and a chapter test: got a 93% (he only missed one question).

Science:  This week's theme was the human body, and we over subjects like organs, muscles, bones and food processing in the First Encyclopedia of Science and made pages in his Science Notebook.

Music/Art: Continued practicing "The Star-Spangled Banner."  We also continued our World's Greatest Artists, Vol 1 unit study, with our third artist: Monet. We read from Famous Artists, What Makes a Monet a Monet?, A Picnic with Monet and A Blue Butterfly. Preston worked on his lapbook we're making with all of our artists and recreated a Water Lilies-style picture in the Usborne My Very First Art Coloring Book. We are also listening to and learning more about Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. 

Beautiful colors. It's all about the impression, not the details.

Spanish: Continued with the next episode of Salsa. Reviewed some of the things we have previously practiced with La Clase Divertida, like A-W, 1-20 and animals.  We reviewed words having to do with "Las dias" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish and went through some review using the Spanish Words & Phrases Flashcards. 


We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, December 14th (Week 19)...

In my life this week...

It's been a crazy couple of days.  Monday was my birthday, and it snowed just a tiny bit.  But that was a really nice birthday gift for me!  Callen and I have been sick... just a cold or something, coughing, lots of yucky drainage, etc.  Well, it seemed we were getting better.  Michael and I dropped the boys off to spend the night with Grandma on Thursday, so that we could have a date night.  We used Christmas money my Grandma Evelyn gave us to go see the Dead Sea Scrolls in Fort Worth.  That was a neat experience!  We also found a revived Bennigan's and had dinner... oh, how many times we ate at Bennigan's back when we were dating, haha!  Meanwhile, Callen threw up a bunch of times while at my parents' house... not sure what the real cause of that was, but... oops, sorry, Mom & Dad!  Eep.  Friday morning I turned Michael's TCCC grades in for him, dropped a present off for a friend who just had a baby (a month early!), stopped by Auto Zone to see why my check-engine light came on (no big deal, whew!) and then finally made it Chickfila in Southlake to set up for their last Women's Expo.

Half way through the event, I heard the news of the mass shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.  I couldn't stop shaking and my eyes kept filling will tears... 20 sweet children killed along with 6 adults at the school.  Plus the shooter's mother and himself.  Unbelievable.  I know that we can never understand such things... there is no "answer" for something like this.  It's completely unfathomable and utterly heart breaking.  Last night, as I watched classic Christmas tv shows and movies with my little ones, all I could think of was how there were so many families who weren't doing the same thing that evening.  It's hard to celebrate a holiday after losing a loved one... but to lose a child so near to Christmas.  Wow.  Their precious ones were taken from them in what is supposed to be a season of cheer and goodwill.  I can't do anything but pray for peace and comfort and that despite what they're going through right now... that the family and friends who have gone through this tragedy will turn TO God and not AWAY from Him with their grief.  And as people scream and argue about gun control, better school security, etc....A friend of mine, Layne Rogers, posted this as his status yesterday and I just love it, and I pray we all remember it forever: "We do not eliminate darkness by destroying everything that casts a shadow, we push back the darkness by increasing the light."

Anyway, a quick recap of what we did earlier this week...

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "N" for Net (insects)!  We read a lot of fun bug-themed books:



Bible:   This week's name of Jesus was Lamb of God. Preston's memory verse is John 1:29 and we looked up verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked Jesus being a lamb. We also made a lamb out of the boys' hand prints and cotton balls.  They did not... um.. come out as I had hoped... Preston has a bit of trouble writing that day (due to his bad attitude about it, mostly).

Not exactly what I had hoped for.

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure.  Continued with lesson 40-42 in Primary Language Lessons. We finished our read-aloud, Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Preston wrote a short book review on it. We have been reading a ton of Christmas books as well to go along with our Advent/Christmas countdown. 

Writing the Farmer Boy review.

History: 
This week Preston learned about Johnny Appleseed, moving to Ohio and the state of Ohio.  We recreated a New England Primer, and Preston stumbled over the use of the letter "f" in place of an "s."


Math: Preston continued Part B of Math Mammoth, Second Grade.  Working on hundreds and skip counting by different numbers, using addition and subtraction.  He is zipping right through this stuff.

Science:  This week's theme was animals, so we read from the First Encyclopedia of Science on different kinds of animals.  We also played the Memory Match game included in MFW, helping to categorize different types of animals.  Oh, and we checked on and threw out our milk/bacteria experiment from last week... nasty!

Music/Art: Skipped music and art this week.

Spanish: Continued with the next episode of Salsa. We reviewed words having to do with "LaGente" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish. Unfortunately, I just realized that the box set of La Clase Divertida was incomplete and did not, in fact, include the second DVD with the last half of the lessons.  It had two audio CDs in it instead.  Oops!  So, we're on pause with that type of Spanish lessons for the moment till we figure out what to do about it.  We can order the Lesson 1 DVD set (of two discs) for $40, but dang... that's a lot of money right now.  So, considering my options and will hopefully have something figured out before we start up again after New Years.

We will take a break from MFW lessons, and do "Christmas School" next week, which will be fun things like crafts and simple lessons using the holiday theme.  And then we'll have a two week break off of school!

We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, December 7th (Week 18)...

In my life this week...

We celebrated Preston's 7th birthday this week, and had his party on Tuesday evening.  So much fun!  We also had a cub scout meeting on Monday and AWANA on Wednesday.  Friday evening we had an open-house type event for my Usborne business... trying to do some last minute Christmas sales.  Then some of the Power FM crew came over and hung out.  We had a blast, the kids really enjoyed having them over and getting to perform and do "tricks" for them all evening, oh man.  I miss those people!!! Callen and I have been under the weather... coughing our heads off.  =(

Michael put up our outdoor Christmas decor on Friday and Saturday and we also went out to Canton and got our Christmas tree!  We walked around, prepared to chop down our own tree but were really disappointed in the selection this year.  Couldn't find a good one that was the size we wanted, so we had to get one that they had all ready to go... a blue spruce.  It's pretty!  We haven't decorated it yet, but did some indoor decoration as well today.  Woo hoo!  And on Monday (my birthday!), there's a slight chance of snow... we'll see!!!

Got our Christmas cards mailed!

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "M" for Mouse!  We read a lot of fun mouse-themed books: Mouse's First Day of School, As Quiet as a Mouse, Whose Mouse Are You?, Mousekin's Thanksgiving, Cat & Mouse and Louie & Dan are Friends.

Bible:   This week's name of Jesus was Lamb of God. Preston's memory verse is John 1:29 and we looked up verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked Jesus being a lamb. 

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure, doing our Chapter 18 review.  Not sure if he wasn't focused enough, but both tests we did this week didn't go so well.  Continued with lesson 37-39 in Primary Language Lessons. We continued our read-aloud, Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. We have been reading a ton of Christmas books as well to go along with our Advent/Christmas countdown.  Preston read his little brother a night-night story the other night, and it was so sweet!

Getting along!  Yay!  Haha.

History: 
This week Preston learned about Eli Whitney and the cotton gin.  We read from our Story of the U.S. and a biography of Eli Whitney.  We studied about the state of Tennessee and read Daniel's Duck and Casey Jones.

Math: Preston continued Part B of Math Mammoth, Second Grade.  Working on hundreds and skip counting by different numbers, using addition and subtraction.  He is zipping right through this stuff.

Science:  This week's theme was living things... what makes them different.  We read four pages of First Encyclopedia of Science on living things and cells.  We created a cell model out of Jell-o and fruit chewies.  And we have an experiment going about growing bacteria.  Do NOT drink the milk we have stored in our cabinet... eww!!!

Cell membrane, nucleus and organelles! Yum!

Music/Art: Started learning a new patriotic song called "There are Many Flags."  We also continued our World's Greatest Artists, Vol 1 unit study, and our first artist is Leonardo Da Vinci. We read a couple more biography books on him (Neo Leo, Leonardo and The Mona Lisa Caper), and looked at a bunch of his art online. Preston and Callen also colored printed out sheets of the Mona Lisa and the Last Supper.  I thought Preston did a really good job coloring in the Last Supper, especially since he doesn't really like to color all that much.

Spanish: Continued with the next episode of Salsa. Reviewed body parts via La Clase Divertida, Lesson 7.  We reviewed words having to do with "La Ropa" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish. 


We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, November 30th (Week 17)...

In my life this week...

Ok, so really, I'm posting this on Monday evening... the week and weekend totally got away!  I had a two-day Usborne booth in Keller, so yeah... pure chaos at my house pretty much.  Michael did a fantastic job of taking care of the boys while I was away... they got haircuts, even!  And Preston lost a tooth!  Anyway, I thought I better make sure I get a recap posted, even though it features absolutely NO pictures.  Booooo!

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "L" for Leaf!  We read a lot of fun Fall books: Lucky Leaf, Leaves, Fletcher & The Falling Leaves, Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf and Why Do Leaves Change Color?

Bible:   This week's focus continued with Jesus as "Immanuel."  We continued learning O Come, O Come Emmanuel, the Christmas song.  Preston's memory verse is Matthew 1:23 and we looked up a couple of other verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked God being with us. 

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure.  Continued with lesson 34-36 in Primary Language Lessons. We continued our read-aloud, Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Both boys really enjoy this and ask for it (even Callen asks for it by name, heh).

History: 
This weeks main focus was life during the time of the Wilderness Road and Daniel Boone.  We read a few stories from our books about moving from New England further into Tennessee and Kentucky.  And our state study continued with Kentucky.  We read through Kentucky Facts & Symbols and the storybooks A Regular Rolling Noah and Counting On the Woods.

Math: Preston started his Part B of Math Mammoth, Second Grade.  Working on hundreds and skip counting by different numbers, using addition and subtraction.

Science:  This week's them was weather.  We read two pages of First Encyclopedia of Science on different kinds of weather.  And we talked about wind with our Science with Air book.

Music/Art: Continued learning "America, The Beautiful."  We also started on a World's Greatest Artists, Vol 1 unit study, and our first artist is Leonardo Da Vinci. We read a couple of biography books on him (Leonardo Da Vinci and Da Vinci), and looked at a bunch of his art online.  Next week we'll be trying to recreate some of his art!

Spanish: Continued with the next two episodes of Salsa. Started up La Clase Divertida, Lesson 7 about el cuerpo.  We reviewed words having to do with "El Cuerpo" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish. 


We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, November 9th (Week 16)...

In my life this week...

I am posting this recap only, y'know, 4 days late, but who's counting, right?  Hmm.  We had a great school week last week, but a crazy busy weekend.  I had three Usborne booths/events, just one after the other.  That certainly kept us hopping!  Feel like I totally abandoned my family for the whole weekend, but I really did have fun.  And the work I put in helped to further my business and get my recruit to hit her first important sales goal, which in the end, helps me too!  Thankfully, this week we are taking things easy and doing only Thanksgiving studies, and next week we'll be completely off of school to focus on Thanksgiving.  Woo hoo!

Oh, and on Tuesday, we closely watched the results of the election.  I helped Preston keep track of poll results on a map.  We wrote in how many electoral votes each state got and colored in the state as the polls were called.  At first it was great fun for him, but eventually, he was bored and I finished it up for him.  Ha!

Charting the results as the come in.

Finished project.

In our Homeschool this week...
Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "K" for Keys!  It was supposed to include other household items, but we didn't really go into that too much.  We did read a couple of abc/counting books from the library: Little Birds ABC and Anno's Counting House.

Bible:   This week's focus was on Jesus as "Immanuel."  So, of course, we started learning the Christmas song.  I only know the first verse, so we both get to learn as we go!  Preston's memory verse is Matthew 1:23 and we looked up a couple of other verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked God being with us.  We'll continue on this subject after Thanksgiving.

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure.  Continued with lesson 31-33 in Primary Language Lessons. We continued our read-aloud, Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Both boys really enjoy this and ask for it (even Callen asks for it by name, heh).

History: 
Rhode Island - Books: Rhode Islands Facts & Symbols and Some of the Adventures of Rhode Island Red (tall tales about a boy the size of an egg and raised by chickens, lol).
Vermont - Books: Vermont Facts & Symbols and The Canada Geese Quilt.  I checked out the book and audio cassette from the library, but, of course, the cassette did not work at all. Sad face.  So, I sat and read the whole book to the boys.. and it's kinda sad, but they sat and listened (while I choked back tears and my voice broke, geez).
Only two states this week, then we studied about Daniel Boone.  We read from our Story of the U.S. and Pioneers book (from MFW), along with a booked called Bewildered for Three Days.  Preston read nearly the entire book outloud to me while I worked one afternoon, he did a great job.  We also did a lapbook on Daniel Boone from here.  It's loaded with info on his life, adventures and legends.  I had a lot of fun doing this with Preston, who seemed to enjoy it as well.  After Daddy got home, he showed it to him and they talked about how our family line is connected to Daniel Boone.

Finished lapbook and Daddy talking about our family tree.

Math: Preston finished up Chapter 5 in our Math Mammoth book, which also finished up the first workbook (there are two).  This last part was over fractions, which he has no problem with besides determining which is bigger when they're really close.  He did a Mixed Review of everything we've covered so far, a chapter review (geometric shapes and fractions) and then the test, making an 83%.

Science:  We went back to our Science with Air book, and talked about how can change the size of something (causing a bottle to expand or collapse on itself when heated or cooled) and how warm air rises.  Did some fun little simple experiments to emphasize those points.

Music/Art: Continued learning "America, The Beautiful" this week, and finished up listening to the CD of "The Nutcracker."  We also watched an online BBC version of the ballet... Callen and I fell asleep, Preston was quite bored.  Haha!  Oh well.  We tried!  We also read The Nutcracker Doll, which is a cute little story about a girl participating in the ballet.

Ninja superhero ballerinas.

Spanish: Continued with the next two episodes of Salsa. We reviewed words having to do with "La Fiesta" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish.  And we didn't do anything from La Clase Divertidas.


We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]

Homeschool Recap, October 5th (Week 11)

In my life this week...

Allergies are still killing me, but you know what?  Tomorrow's high is supposed to be 54.  FIFTY-FOUR DEGREES, y'all!!!  I don't even care if I can't breathe.  Lol.  This was a busy week... had a couple of fun outings, got a lot accomplished, yay!  Looking forward to a relaxing weekend with NOTHING to do, hooray!!

Places We're Going...

We went to the Fort Worth Zoo for Homeschool Day on Thursday!  My mom and I took the boys to the zoo for a fun field trip.  The weather was humid and steamy, but not blazing hot... we stayed for about 4 hours and saw everything... and, of course, collected all the pressed pennies we could for Preston's collection. 

And this afternoon we ran over to Central Park here in Grand Prairie to see them release a bunch of Monarch Butterflies.  That was pretty cool!  A lot of them weren't interested in leaving their box, and then when they did... they stuck close to the flowers there in the garden and the kids!  The kids loved that, of course!

They liked this one... it seemed to like them too!

In our Homeschool this week...

Tot School: We continued the 1plus1plus1equals1.net "Tot School" printables this week with letter "G" for Goat, and the other farm animals.  And so when we were at the zoo, we had to make sure to see a goat!  We read several farm-based books that we already own (didn't make it to the library for this week) like Usborne Look & Say Farm, The Complete Book of Farmyard Tales, Bright Baby Farm, I Udderly Love You, Dooby Dooby Moo and Barnyard Hullabaloo.

G for GOAT!

Bible:  We used Mama Jenn's printable up on our Morning Board to help us continue to memorize John 7:37, "Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink," and talked about how God gives Living Water. We looked up verses in The Discoverer's Bible that talked about Jesus giving water to the thirsty, or being the living water to our souls.  We also talked about the weather and how the rain isn't always a "bad thing."

Reading/Writing: We continued Spelling by Sound & Structure.  Preston aced both spelling tests he had this week, again.  Continued with lessons 19-21 in Primary Language Lessons. 

History:  We continued talking about the Revolutionary War, George Washington and the first presidency this week.  We finished Sarah Whitcher's Story. And read Discover George Washington, Let it Begin Here: Lexington & Concord and What Does the President Look Like?, which is a really neat book talking about all the different ways people got to see how the president looked like, all the way back to portraits of Washington and up to digital photos of Obama.  Really cool book!  And we did a George Washington lapbook with all kinds of information (lapbook pieces and ideas from here).

All About George...

Math: Preston continued along in Chapter 4 of his Math Mammoth workbook, adding over 10 and three-digit numbers.  He especially enjoys answering word problems, he says.

Science:  This week's focus was still on interesting things about water, using Science With Water.  We didn't do any of the experiments listed in the book... just didn't find the time or have the necessary things on hand.  We read through it and understood the concepts, but nothing hands-on with it this week.

Music/Art: We skipped our art lessons this week... had to thin out our lessons for the day at the zoo.  We moved onto the song Yankee Doodle Dandy on our Celebrate America CD.  We started listening to some of Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker from the CD.

Spanish: Continued with the next two episodes of Salsa. We reviewed words having to do with "La Granja" in our First Thousand Words in Spanish.  And we moved on to Lesson 5 of La Clase Divertida!.

We are using Adventures in My Father's World. See our curriculum here.



[This post contains affiliate links for Usborne Books & More and Amazon.com.  By clicking on those links and purchasing items, you are helping me continue to be a SAHM so that I can focus on homeschooling my children!  Thank you!]