This and That

Liz, suggested Lotrimin for Stacia’s rash. Her doc had told her to try it after 3 days of a rash…and we’d been messing with this for longer than that. I was sure I HAD some and planned to use it this a.m. I could NOT find it. Heather and I were talking on the phone about spice orders while I looked for a tube. I kept finding “athlete’s foot” lotion but not Lotrimin. When Stacia went down for a nap, Arielle and I blitzed out to Target. I bought a tube of Lotrimin – Heather it IS for athlete’s foot after all. It’s HELPING. : snort:

At Target we also picked up clay for Nolan, big markers, a big pad of paper and big pencils. Thanks all for the tips.

We then ran to the post office to mail yet more packages to the girls….they gave me a big variety of priority boxes and a huge stack of custom slips. : snort:

I began fielding questions about our co-ops spice order. We are going to order from Monterey Bay Spice Company. This is a bit of an under-taking as I’ve never ordered from them before and so I’m really not sure how they work either. LOL

I spent a good portion of the afternoon in the kitchen. I made lasagna and pull apart rolls for dinner. This time I used lots of Italian spices as well as the garlic. {smirk} I also made sausage (turkey), cooked up 3 lbs of free range turkey and divided it into recipe portions, and de-boned 3 chickens. I’m set to make 3 batches of Hawaiin Chicken tomorrow. One for dinner and two for the freezer.

We went for a nice walk tonight and fed the deer. We enjoyed having Josiah home tonight.

SCHOOL DAZE

It is so NICE to be back in a routine. I need routine. I think the children thrive on routine too….No one would ever accuse me of being “overly organized”. I’m not one with a color coded 15 minute schedule…but ROUTINE I know a lot about. We’re stifled on tight schedules but we soar with routine.

We ARE studying Year 4 of Tapestry of Grace. The NAME of the curriculum was enough to draw us to it. {g} Tapestry is great in that most of our assignments are subject specific and not book specific. This means that, other than the spine and literature books, we are free to substitute whatever books we come across. We simply need to cover the same topics. This gives us STRUCTURE (which some of our children desperately need) and FLEXIBILITY (which I desperately need if I’m to continue homeschooling another 17 years - 15 under my belt – starting year 16). In addition to our TOG studies here are a few things we’ve found this year that we are enjoying.

We continue to study the very early years of the 20th Century. I was getting a bit bored with the DK President book. Last year I broke it up by using a National Geographic book on the Presidents that the library had. I’ve found a couple of new series at the library this year. We’ve only checked out the sections on Theodore Roosevelt at this point.

The first one is titled “You’re On Your Way Teddy Roosevelt” by Judith St. George. I LOVE the illustrations in this book, they are by Matt Faulkner. This series is “A Turning Point Series”. The author searches for the “turning point” in each young boy’s life that led him to become the President. This could easily be read alone by a 3rd grader or even 2nd grader – but we like to read together so Nolan can hear too. There were six chapters in this book. This book illustrated TR overcoming physical obstacles and really portrayed perseverance well. I have no idea how many other books she may have completed – this one was published in 2004. I plan to do a library search.

For an anthology of the Presidents for Grammar stage I really like another new series I unearthed. The series is by Kathleen Krull. I suppose it’s called the “Lives Of…and what the neighbors thought” series. I picked up two “Lives of the Presidents: Fame, Shame and What the Neighbors Thought” and “Lives of the Writers: Comedies, Tragedies and What the Neighbors Thought. The books are full of short biographies and great caricatures….but when I say short….I mean 2 or 3 pages as opposed to 2 or 3 paragraphs. This book on the Presidents fleshes out the men a bit more than our DK book. I’m reading the Writers book for fun….Kathleen Krull has also written “Lives Of: the Musicians, The Artists and The Athletes”. If we continue to enjoy this book as much as we have the past two weeks, we may have to eventually buy a copy. It goes well with DK – DK has REAL photos and facts…this one has anecdotal facts and caricatures. LOL

When our oldest three were this age and we studied this time period we did our first ever unit study on “The Orphan Trains”. I simply HAD to add in at least one of the books in “The Orphans’ Journey” series by Arleta Richardson. We are reading, “Looking For Home”. I suspect the children are going to want me to read the other three books. I also think I’ll try to find the videos we watched all those years ago.

On a side note, I’m discovering that many of our favorites now have very brittle and yellowed pages. Beware of saying, “I’ll use this for as long as I homeschool.” You never REALLY know how long that may be now, do you? :::snort:::

The older three boys continue to speed right along. Jamin is way ahead in literature. Josiah and Jared are right where they need to be. Jared is thrilled to FINALLY be caught up in math (after his real life learning experience in 3rd grade! He was laughing about that this a.m. but I’ve written about that before). He aced his first math test of the year on Friday. Jamin is polishing the first five pages of his novel to send to Christian’s Writers Guild for critique. Josiah is working like a mad man since he told his boss he’d like more hours. He has definite financial goals he wants to reach. We wholeheartedly support his forethought in determining what he needs to leave home in “good shape” and finish college debt free.

New Schedules…

We switched our day around today. It worked…but we had no time for going anywhere to play…..I’ll have to keep playing. We went out and did the field trip first…then some hands on things – all while Stacia was up and busy. After lunch we did couch school and I helped Arielle and Nolan with their independent work, while Stacia napped. It worked – but I much prefer school in the a.m. and playing in the afternoon.

Poor Stacia has a NASTY diaper rash. I let her run around outside “au naturale” today much to the chagrin of Zander. I was hoping the sun would help.

I made 2 quarts of BBQ sauce today. We used some to pour over the meat loaf tonight but I still have quite enough for Jamin to use for pizza and for every day use.

Bible study was tonight. Two of our members couldn’t make it but we had a good time. I have enjoyed thinking about what it means to have an advocate this week. What a redeemer we have!

Musings (OK I can't get the new family photo to upload....LOL)

I can remember clearly a day 17 years ago. I was living in the Thurston area of Springfield, OR. I had Bre (4) and Krista (2). I was pregnant and tired and decided to take the two girls to Bob’s for lunch. It was a fun lunch. The girls were behaving and Bre began to really CONVERSE with me. She began to talk about things she’d like to do when she grew up, asked me questions about what I thought and what I felt (Krista stuck French fries in her ear and up her nose)….and I caught a glimpse of the promise of the future. I clearly thought, “This is a lot of work right now, but some day these girls are going to be so FUN and be my very best friends”.

I realized while they were home that that day has arrived. They LIKE to spend time with me. I heard each of them tell folks that they missed long talks with me and that I was fun to be around. They still value my thoughts; even while they actively form their own thoughts on so many new issues. One of them told me I was a great mentor to her. Another told me she REALLY wanted to know what I thought about some issues. They are fun. We enjoy each other. They are some of my very best friends now.

I was thinking these thoughts and feeling a bit lonely this afternoon. I decided to make myself a cuppa tea. I sat down and drank and stared and contemplated….and Arielle came in and asked if she could sit with me. She’s not a real tea drinker. She DOES enjoy a nice cuppa milk. I had my favorite tea cup (which Krista had used at our last tea as it is also her favorite cup)….Arielle chose the tea cup that Bre had brought me all the way from Boston. In this way I felt the memory of the girls in our party. We had a great talk. We talked about my grams, my best friend when I was growing up, what she’s been thinking about, how she feels with the big girls gone, how she feels with Dad gone…and somewhere during our tea party, I had that clear glimpse into the promise of the future again. I’m so blessed to have 4 daughters and 5 sons…yep…it’s a lot of work right now….but what a full life I’m living and will live. I LIKE the adults these children are becoming.

Silhouettes

A common pasttime in the late 19th/early 20th Century was to make and display silhouettes. In a day when photographs weren't common, people would make locket size silhouettes, framed silhouettes for their walls, and even kept scrapbooks of their loved ones varying silhouettes.

We tried our hand at making some today. We're going to send ours to Kuwait. I think they turned out pretty cute. (Argh!!!! The photos won't load! I have no clue why it does this sometimes....I'll try again later.)

First Field Trip of the Year - Snuggle Factory

Our school day began with a field trip. We're beginning our study on the 20th Century. I LOVE this time period as my Grams was born then. I can picture her life as a girl in the midst of all the inventions etc that we are studying about. One fun thing we learned last week was that Theodore Roosevelt, the President, was a big hunter. However, he refused to shoot a bear cub on one of his hunts. An energizing young man and his wife made a stuffed bear based on the cartoon in the media, named it "Teddy's Bear" and sent it to the whitehouse. The rest is history!!!

For years I've heard some of you talk about the "Build a Bear" shops around the nation. We've never been near one. Truth be known I HATE malls - but here our mall is just the right size...there may have been a Build a Bear in Anchorage. {G} A few months ago, a shop called "Snuggle Factory" opened in our small mall. In talking with the owner, I discovered her dh is retired military. They brought their factory to town as a sort of "small town Build a Bear". When we read about the Teddy Bear's origin, I immediately thought of taking the kids to the Sunggle Factory to see how a bear is made.

First we picked the shells of the animals the kids wanted to make. Photo won't load.

Stacia loved playing with the flat bears best of all...again anything can be a teether.

Here we learn how eyes are put on stuffed animals in general.

The kids ran the "stuffing machine".

Each bear has a "wish" burried in it. The kids took the star, held it over their hearts, made a wish, kissed the star, and put it in the bear. I cried. {g}

It was fun. I suggested to her that a fun thing to do would be homeschool field trips (or school field trips). I told her she could read the little Legend of the Teddy Bear book, show how a bear is made, and then let those who want to make a bear. She liked the idea. She said she'd give us a discount if I arranged a homeschool field trip. Maybe....

P.S. Arielle and Nolan trade off playing with Stacia and Zander so that I can work independently with each of them. Stacia showed up dressed in one of Arielle’s “costumes”. We bought this years ago from Yvonne when she was doing the box specials. Stacia was hamming in up – but this is the only picture that we got. She seems to be saying, “My, but it’s hard to be a socialite”.


I forgot to mention below that I was up at 3 a.m. because of Zander “going straight to bed” last night. LOL He filled up the last few tickets on his chart today and earned Play Station time. Earlier in the week he had glued a ticket on the last slot and tried to convince me it should work. Poor kid was so tired that this is the sight that greeted me when I peeked from the kitchen. {best photo won't load} Notice what he's doing in his sleep.
I also forgot to say that Jamin heard back from the Christians Writer’s Guild. Now he is trying to decide if he wants to edit his book alone and try to shop it around to publishers, or if he wants to work through their program. They recommend that he begins the Squire program. They would pair him with an established Christian Author who would mentor him. He would have 10 assignments a year to finish. He would email work to the mentor and the mentor would respond back. This group is founded by Jerry Jenkins and they put on writer’s conferences etc. They have a big one coming up in February in Colorado Springs. They were very encouraging about the dream being possible with some mentoring and hard work….He sort of wanted to do the TOG writing and work on polishing his book…but he does see the benefit of having a mentor work on his writing with him. Before you faint from sticker shock….with the discounted price it is only $49 a month….and last time we did piano lessons over 4 years ago it was $60 a month. In other words his dream is to WRITE, to be an author….if I would pay $60 a month for piano lessons or $30 a month for football (which we did) then why not writing lessons? If anyone has personal experience with the guild we’d love to hear what you thought. I’m wondering if I should let him out of the TOG writing if he goes this route….but then the TOG writing integrates the facts he’s learning from so many sources…..I wish I'd known of this place myself about 20 years ago. LOL At this point in my life, I don't think that I could find time to write more than the blog. I have kicked around the idea of writing all my grams' stories up....it would be cool for the family to have it down...but I don't remember them all. Waaa....