My Personal Theme Song

Or so Mike claims. LOL

Oh Dear.

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Daily Food Journal

I'm going to try something. I set up a little area in the sidebar to journal my food each day and keep track of how many WW points I'm using. It's for my benefit, because it gives me a sense of being accountable. I'm so close to the 20 pounds lost mark and I just need a little extra mental push to get over the hump. So if you happen to notice it, that's what's going on.

Sue

I Thoroughly Enjoy This Child

Lately Baylee's been Hannah Montana crazy. She and several of her friends love the show and they all decided they're going to be singers when they grow up. Not only that, they decided they're going to start their own girl band right now...the only thing is they need to find girls who don't all want to be the lead singer. They're working on that. In the meantime there's been a lot of this going on around here:

Sue

We Could All Use a Little Jesus in Our Lives

I was looking through the pictures I've taken lately and I noticed something. Well, two things. The first is that my two younger kids hardly ever sit in their actual desks to do school. They sit pretty much anywhere and everywhere else in the entire house BUT at their desks. In fact, the other day I was looking for Baylee and I found her on the toilet with a clipboard and her science workpages. The other thing I noticed as I was perusing the pictures is that Drew wears the same shirt every single day. It's the blue polo with the yellow stripes in EVERY picture! I don't know why I never noticed it before and now I'm thinking of hiding the shirt. Anyway, here's a couple pictures of Drew doing school perched at the top of the staircase with the cat keeping him company. And there's that shirt again.

In other news, last night Mike took these pictures of Baylee playing church with her Barbies. She hung a cross up on the wall and sat all the girls down, and then the doll that came from the Christian bookstore (A gift from Grandma. "Abigail," the doll that knows Jesus and plays in a Christian rock band.) got to preach. I hope the sermon was on modesty, because the gal on the far right has some serious issues with that top.

Sue

A Simple Woman's Daybook

For Today...March 16, 2009

Outside my window...it's gray and cold.

I am thinking...about how much I enjoy a couple different Aerosmith songs. It's like my secret vice.

From the learning rooms...Zach is mastering percents, learning about realism, working on indefinite pronouns, making his way through the Middle Ages, finally done with Earth science and moving on to life science (Thank you, Jesus. I'm so incredibly sick of rocks.), and slowly figuring out typing.

I am thankful for...the great time we had with friends the other night. They had us over for dinner and we thoroughly enjoyed getting to know their big, boisterous family. Oh, and I discovered that you can actually throw your bowling ball backwards into the crowd on the Wii. I was standing there with my little controller going, "Wait. What happened? Where'd my ball go?"

From the kitchen...there's some serious Mother Hubbard cupboards right now. I need to go grocery shopping, big time. I usually do it on the weekend but I kept putting it off and then I forgot. I think there's going to be a mutiny if I don't get some stuff tonight, though.

I am wearing...a soft brown shirt and my skinniest jeans.

I am reading...nothing right now. I'm between books, but I'm excited to read The Time Traveler's Wife at the recommendation of a friend. I've got it on hold at the library.

I am hoping...to have a great, productive week of school.

I am creating...framed pictures of the family for Mike's office at work.

I am hearing...Relient K.

Around the house...the boys are just home from playing at the neighbor's house, Baylee is out with Mike picking up pizza, and the dryer is doing a load of whites.

One of my favorite things...is getting into bed and reading for a half hour or so before I sleep.

A few plans for the rest of the week...include letting the kids help decorate the house for Easter on Saturday.

Here is a picture thought I am sharing with you...

Mike celebrated his 37th birthday this past week. Isn't he handsome?

Sue

Scary Bedtime Prayer

Okay, this is my last Tim Hawkins video, I promise. This one is so funny, though, that I was sitting here by myself laughing out loud like a dufus.

Whiny Sunday Morning

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

A Homeschool Family

Back by popular demand...okay, not really. I just felt like posting it again.

Cletus, Take the Reel

I love country music!

Life Lately

I've been really proud of Drew lately, because he's doing so well in his American history course. I have to admit I was a little concerned at the beginning of the year that he'd need my help in this subject. I took a look at it and thought, "Uh oh. This is wordy and complicated." In fact, at first I made him read his entire assignment to me every day. Finally he told me he had it under control and I decided to trust him and to let how he performed on the next test be my guide. He did just fine and he's been doing great ever since. Now he's reading about the Civil War and he's been offering his own thoughts and opinions on the issue of slavery and also on the secession of the southern states. I love that he's expanding his horizons! Another thing he's doing to go along with his study of our country's history is learning all the states and capitals. So far he has 25 of them memorized.

The gerbils are fine and are in their third cage now. The second one was okay, but it was horrible to try to clean. All those tubes and stuff...ugh. Besides, they were slowly chewing the cage to pieces. Now they're in this aquarium which we got free from some people at church who used to have a reptile or something. As you can see the cat hasn't given up hope.

Another picture of Cooper, just because I can.

My little helper. She cleaned and sorted my spice drawer awhile back, and yesterday she washed the big window in the living room. She's got such a willing spirit.

Cool guy with hat.

A prime spot to homeschool on a winter morning...right by the register!

Sue

The Future of Our Country

Tonight at supper Drew got spaghetti sauce on his elbow. He spent a surprisingly long time trying to lick it off with his tongue before he finally decided it wasn't going to work. I'm so proud.

Homeschooling Plug

I've been thinking lately that this is kind of a homeschooling blog and yet I rarely talk about homeschooling. I think that's because I've been doing it so long now that it's very much just a part of the day and nothing to write home about. But at the same time I love reading about homeschool stuff on other people's blogs, especially if it's about curricula I've used, am using, or have toyed with the idea of using. So I thought today I'd share a little bit about the program Baylee and Drew are working in, Accelerated Christian Education.

I came to ACE kicking and screaming. Okay, maybe not quite that reluctantly, but almost. You see, ACE is what you call a "work text" curriculum, and that type of thing is frowned upon in some circles. Some say it's too rigid, or it doesn't promote creative thinking, or whatever. That's it's too "school in a box." You know what, though? I love it. We started out doing literature-based curricula (Five in a Row and Sonlight) and while those were wonderful, I burned out as I added more kids to the mix. It was simply too much reading. Another thing I found frustrating with them is the child's retention is very hard to measure. I never knew exactly how much Zach was absorbing and, for a Type A personality like mine, that was hard to accept. I needed numbers on paper. Then I switched to textbooks (Saxon, Bob Jones, Abeka...man. You name it, I probably used some part of it.) and that worked fine. There's things I really like about all of the different publishers we used, and to be quite honest Saxon Phonics worked a miracle with our dyslexic son when he was 7 years old. I can't speak highly enough of it. But with any of those there's a lot to buy. You've got to buy textbooks, workbooks, and teacher's manuals for every subject. Then's there's always extras like map studies, manipulatives, and what have you. Finally I came to a point where I was barely holding my head above the water. I was spending all this money, but I had this son who I thought I was ruining. I couldn't seem to teach him anything. I was exhausted and who wouldn't be? Teaching him was like teaching 10 kids, only not as satisfying. (This was long before I knew what his true issue was.) And then on top of that I had these 2 other children I had to educate, too. So I gave ACE a try and wow. It's been more than just something that's helped me cope. It's been a program I've come to appreciate and truly enjoy.

The number one thing I love about ACE is its ease of use. The subjects are presented as worktexts, which means they're textbooks that are also workbooks. The child both reads the text and writes in it for each subject. Also, there are no teacher's manuals. Everything the child needs to know to understand an assignment is written directly to him in his worktext. Now, I do sit down and explain new concepts, but it's all right there. It's easy to find, cheap(er), and easy to understand.

The second thing I love about ACE is that it promotes a love of learning. Both Baylee and Drew are constantly, probably every single day, telling me about new things they've learned. A couple days ago Drew told me all about the building of the Erie Canal, for example. Yesterday he was really excited to show everyone in the family the science project he worked on: 3 contraptions made out of toilet paper tubes, black paper, and pinpricks, showing 3 different constellations. He's learning about fractions right now in math; he's starting to diagram sentences in English; he's hearing the book Heidi in Creative Writing and Literature and then using that book to understand concepts like personification, similes, metaphors, and alliteration; he's learning American History in Social Studies and similtaneously memorizing the states and capitals; and he's been studying the solar system in science. I'm excited by everything he's taking in!

Baylee, too, is learning a ton. I love the gentle way the younger grades work. She thinks she's reading fun stories, but really she's learning all sorts of cool information. Like right now she's learning about mammals through a story about a class that goes to the zoo on a field trip and looks at several different exhibits. The other day she was excited to tell me all about flying squirrels, having never heard of them before. She's also getting lots of practice with basic parts of speech, cursive handwriting, understanding what she reads, and math problems.

So there! There's my homeschooling plug for the day. LOL I see us sticking with ACE for the long haul.

Sue

PS: It occurred to me that I talked all about how I was driven to try ACE through frustration that centered around Zach's dyslexia, but he's my only child who doesn't use the program. I did use it with him for a couple years (3rd and 4th grade) and it worked well at that time. It really taught him how to carefully read for information and answer questions in writing. After awhile, though, he couldn't keep up with the level and amount of reading a program like ACE demands. Now for him I use the eclectic textbook approach and it's a good fit, especially when I can find the textbook on CD-ROM or CD.

"Everything is Amazing and Nobody is Happy"

This clip of comedian Louis CK talking to Conan O'Brien is being passed around on Facebook, and when I saw it I thought it was one of the best things I've seen in awhile. Then Mike and I went out for a date last night (Dinner at Anthony's...take 2.) and I was telling him about it. Both of us were laughing so hard that we were starting to get glances. Really. You need to watch this.



Sue

A Simple Woman

For Today...March 2, 2009

Outside my window...it's dark now after a rainy day.

I am thinking...about how it's sort of unsettling when an author talks about his characters like they're living, breathing people and he isn't sure what they're going to do next. At the same time, though, it's fascinating and makes me wish I could create stories with characters like that. (Wow, that was random, wasn't it?)

From the learning rooms...today we started back up after our week of vacation. It went surprisingly smoothly! Baylee learned a brand new skill today, which was subtraction with borrowing. She was pretty proud of herself.

I am thankful for... friends.

From the kitchen...a dishwasher full of clean dishes is waiting to be emptied.

I am wearing...pajamas.

I am reading...a kids' book called Tomorrow's Magic, by Pamela F. Service. It's a new twist on the story of King Arthur.

I am hoping...to have a great week in which I successfully complete my goals.

I am creating...well...have created a sparkling clean house today after a FULL FREAKING WEEK of not doing a thing. Mike tried to do the laundry a bit here and there and the dishes were sort of kept up, but for the most part I fully enjoyed this week off. Of course, I paid for it today when I had to clean all afternoon. I'm looking forward to getting into a made bed tonight.

I am hearing...the dryer doing the last load of the day and Mike talking to Zach.

Around the house...everybody's winding down. This is my favorite time of day. All the work is done and the kids are either in bed or headed that way. Things are finally quiet and I get a little "me" time.

One of my favorite things...is sending my mom pictures of the kids. She always makes such a happy fuss over receiving them and it makes me feel good.

A few plans for the rest of the week...L&L Clinic tomorrow, kid exchange and Awana/Youth group on Wednesday, and that's it! It's an uncharacteristically calm week.

Here is a picture thought I am sharing with you...

5 years ago.

To read the Daybooks of others visit Peggy at her website, The Simple Woman's Daybook.

Sue