Quick Takes Friday

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I don't know how long it has been this way, but blogger is all different now.  It's a little distracting, actually.  I guess I just don't like change that much!

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Tonight is Charlotte's preschool program.  Every year our local preschool has a spaghetti supper, auction and program as a fundraiser.  Since I pretty much have "sucker" written across my forehead, I was called and asked to chair one of the committees - I (smartly) said no, as I have been overscheduled all year.  Of course, I assumed that we were all being asked to donate something to the dinner and help out at the dinner, so I brought in my 20 lbs of hamburger yesterday, and have an hour shift of serving tonight.  Go figure that some people who donated items AREN'T helping out at the dinner.  Oh well.  Charlotte is so excited and nervous because she is going to be on stage (In her own words "EEEKKK!!!)

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Sunday is Eva's First Communion!  I am having a hard time dealing with the fact that she is so grown up already, but First Communion seems like a very grown up thing.  I think she is ready (and maybe a little nervous!)  MIL came over this week to help me with Eva's dress.  I bought the size I usually buy for her, but we ended up having to tack in two inches on both sides of the dress, and tack the sleeves up about a half an inch.  I think it looks fine, but MIL doesn't like that you can tell we made some last minute alterations, and thought about deconstructing the dress and altering it correctly - but that sounded like way too much work - plus, the only places you could see (if you looked closely) are under Eva's arms, and along her back (and she has a long veil that will make it even harder to see the back.  Since Eva will probably get to wear her dress again this summer at the Midwest Catholic Family Conference (First Communicants are invited to lead the Eucharistic procession, with the girls in their first communion dresses) I'm glad to have something we can take out a little if need be.

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My parents are coming out for the weekend.  My dad found someone to cover his last class of the day, so they will actually make it in time for the dinner (originally, I thought they'd be getting here around the time Charlotte's program and auction starts) and they will head home sometime on Sunday.  Both girls are very excited, but Eva has written them a welcome message on the chalkboard side of the easel in our basement, and she has also made them a doorhanger welcome sign.

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Catechism classes are almost over for the year (YEAH!!!! It's been a long year...)  Next week is our final class/party.  So, to try to be slightly sneaky and educational, I told my kids that we would play "Stump the Teacher" where they can ask me any question from the material in their books (which we have used for two years, and covers all of salvation history!) and I have to answer without my teacher's guide.  One of my boys wanted to stump me this week and asked "Who is the mother of Jesus?" - if that's the level of questions I'm going to get, this should be a breeze...but we will see how ambitious they get.

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Girl Scouts is also almost over for the year.  I have one more week of Brownies (we have a speaker coming in to talk to the girls about aquifers, since that's where all of our water comes from, and we will be making ice cream aquifers) and then we have bridging...then I am done until August - when we will be taking some of the girls camping...on the weekend of my birthday.  Nothing says happy birthday quite like spending time with up to 20 hyper girl scouts and up to three other parents.

7-
While many things are coming to a close, We still have around 30 school days to go...Eva should be close to finishing her Teaching Textbooks 3, so I may make her finish that out even when we are done with our 180 days.  We are on our last unit of Connecting with History volume 2, which has a lot of Viking books and crafts, so that is pretty fun.  We are currently caught up on NOEO Science Chemistry 1 (I usually end up a couple weeks behind and having to spend most of a Friday catching up on experiments).  Eva is close to being finished with her test prep book, so she will probably be taking her CAT test next week.  I wish I knew at this point what we will be doing for school with Charlotte next year, but I am still waiting to hear back from a virtual school AND from an organization that offers grants for speech therapy.  I've been planning away for next year for Eva, though...because nothing says "this year is almost over" like spending all my free time thinking about the great curriculum we'll use NEXT year! (Okay, it's not that bad...I'm still enjoying school at the moment...I just am ready for preschool/CCD/Girl Scouts to be done so that we can stay home and do school for a change!)

More Quick Takes at Conversion Diary!

The Story of A Soul

I had started another book, that I just couldn't get into - but then it got to be halfway through March, and I needed to find a book that I could handle before the month was over, or risk falling behind schedule in month three of my plan.
For the unfamiliar, The Story of a Soul is the Autobiography of Saint Therese of Lisieux, known as "The Little Flower".  She was a Carmelite nun, entering the convent at 15 and dying at 24.  I've known the basic story of St. Therese for a number of years, but one thing I had never considered is how she became declared a Saint, when she had a short life of a cloistered nun.  Few people probably knew of her existence during her life, and it is this autobiography that introduced the world to St. Therese.

I'm pretty sure I could read this book a dozen more times and get more out of it every time.  I will admit that the flowery language was difficult for me - I'm just not the biggest fan of the style.  She also bounces around a lot (and apologizes a lot for her bouncing around!)  It is easy to see that she just wrote - she didn't think of writing a book, she just wrote about what she was told to write, and let the Holy Spirit be her guide.

I was surprised to learn that St. Therese had a lack of consolations in prayer, as I often think of Saints as having intense God experiences regularly (as some Saints did, of course!)  I loved this particular line:

"Don't imagine that I'm overwhelmed with consolations.  I'm not.  My consolation is not to have any in this life.  Jesus never manifests Himself nor lets me hear His voice.  He teaches me in secret.  I never learn anything from books, for I don't understand what I read.  Yet from time to time a sentence comforts me."

Also, when she talks about her "little way" - the little sacrifices she makes, it is clear that she does so humbly and with humility:

"You see, Mother, that I am a very little soul who can only offer very little things to God; it often happens that I let slip the chance of making these little sacrifices which give such peace, but I'm not discouraged.  I put up with having a bit less peace and try to be more careful next time.  Ah! How happy God makes me!  It is so pleasant and easy to serve Him during this life."

I wish I had some great and profound thoughts about this book, but I guess all I need to have a very little thoughts - and perhaps to work harder towards making little sacrifices in life for God.

Quick Takes Friday

I don't know if I have 7 things to say this week, so we'll just have to see how far I get!

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I'm having a bang-my-head-against-the-wall kind of day today. Enrollment for the virtual charter we are hoping to get Charlotte in for next year opened this week, and I faxed in all the documentation asked for. The complication is in proving that we are Colorado residents, because we don't have the preferred documentation (mortgage or rental agreement) or the secondary documentation because everything is either in FILs name, or sent to FILs address. I even added a notarized and signed document as suggested by one of my contacts at the school. At this point, I am just waiting for a call back to see if it is a simple fix, or if it will be more complicated. The most irritating part of all is that all four of us were born in Colorado and have never lived in any other state...and I just can't seem to prove that we are residents!!

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My CCD class was WAY hyper this week - all of them had excessive amounts of sugar before class, and were wound up from taking their state tests (which they informed me are no longer CSAPs, but TCAPs - still, crappy state level standardized tests by whatever name...) and the only way we made it through my lesson was by bribing them with 5 minutes to run around at the end of class if we got through my lesson. I don't know how, but we made it through - and they got to run around until their parents picked them up!

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Cookie drama should be over for the year. One mom returned 39 packages after the last day for sales - but on the same day she returned them, I got a call from a GS state employee, and she gave us permission to sell our remaining cookies at our local community night. In the end, we have 9 leftover packages that the troop will pay for and use for snacks. Not too bad!

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It is getting to that part in the school year when I would rather be planning school for next year than doing what we are supposed to be doing this year. I guess the good news is that we are taking Holy Week off from school, so I get a little break - maybe even enough time to clean the house better.

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I have started reading aloud novels to the girls during school. I've done it in previous years, but for the first half of this year, so much of our time was spent on PAL Reading program from IEW that I didn't have much time for extended read alouds. So far we have done "Little House in the Big Woods" (Charlotte's pick) and today we finished "The Wind in the Willows" (Eva's pick). Charlotte has picked what we will start next week, keeping with the little house books, we will do "Little House on the Prairie" followed by something Eva chooses.

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Hubby came home today with some random tickets to an Eagle's cover band fundraiser and dinner in a local town for tomorrow night. I guess a neighbor offered the tickets to hubby, his brother or his dad - and no one was interested, except hubby who said that we could use them if he got off work earlier tomorrow so that we could go to church in said town before the concert. I guess he should be getting off work a little sooner than normal tomorrow!(I don't know if I really want to go to an Eagle's cover band concert, and I am hoping that they will sell tickets at the door, since the girls will be with us...we'll see how it is!)

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I'm kinda liking the fact that St. Patrick's Day falls on a Saturday. Our local parish is St. Patricks - and they have an annual card party to celebrate (not a particularly well attended event, either, as you may have guessed!) I have a little bit of a grudge against the event, as I was forced to cancel CCD classes when I was DRE and St. Patrick's Day fell on a Wednesday. At that same card party (while I was expecting Eva) I was berated for eating half a sandwich midway through the card party, because we were supposed to eat until the end. Church ladies can be so catty about things...anyway, I will admit a little bit of schadenfreude every time something goes wrong with one of the card parties...and I am extremely glad to have an excuse not to go (because I know MIL would try to convince me to come) with Saturday night Mass - and I bonus excuse with the weird concert tickets.

More quick takes at Conversion Dairy!

Quick Takes Friday

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Well, over a month and no blog posts.  I'll simply blame that on cookie season, which has been keeping my already busy self even more busy recently.  Both girls overshot their goals by about 100 packages, mostly because so many of the girls in the troop were not selling at all or not selling as many as last year.  We had to get those troop cookies sold!  My final paperwork is due on Sunday, so after that I am COOKIE FREE for several months (although I'm sure we'll start getting harassed about next cookie season before I know it.)

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Bret and I love "The Office", and while watching it off our DVR last night I had to pause right after this scene to try and share it on facebook, but sadly I couldn't find it last night.  Today, however, is a different story.  So, here's Kevin's cookie season rap:



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Monday is the day that enrollment begins for the virtual charter we are looking at for Charlotte.  So, I printed off last year's info packet to start pulling together documentation (birth certificate, immunization records, proof of residency, IEP, etc.) and the hardest thing for me is proving that we live in the state of Colorado.  What's particularly funny about this is that Bret, myself, Eva and Charlotte were all born here, and have never lived in any other state.  BUT we don't have a rental agreement or mortgage or housing bills in our name, since we live in one of the farm's houses.  So, hubby and his dad are hopefully going to sign a notarized letter stating that we live where we live.  The hoops one must jump through to get speech therapy services...

4-
I really need to get moving on my "Catholic book a month" plan if I am going to get through 12 books this year.  I was doing really well in January, reading two of my selections.  I started a third in February, but haven't been able to get motivated to read it at all - I was hopeful, since it was another historical fiction, that I'd get right into it, but no such luck.  I may have to give it up and start something else on my list instead.  February was my homeschool/everything else burnout month, so I'm hoping as the weather warms up, I'll get a little bit more ambitious.

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Hubby and I went to the Living the Catholic Faith conference last weekend in Denver.  We had a great time -left home Friday at lunch time, pricelined a nice hotel, and spent Saturday at the conference followed by Mass at the Cathedral.  I really enjoyed all of the talks I went to, and hubby liked most of his, but in the end thought that maybe he should have come with me for Jen Fulwiler's talk instead of to the talk "Engaging in the Public Square" which he thought was too basic and too much of an introduction to activism. (go figure!)  We ran into quite a few people from our rural region, and had an interesting conversation on the way home because of them.  I noticed that none of them showed any interest and in fact, were surprised when I said that I was attending/had attended Jen's talk titled "When Your Loved One is an Atheist."  I mentioned that I had a hard time believing it wasn't a talk that everyone at the conference should have heard - I just can't even envision having a life where you don't have anyone that you care about that is an atheist.  Hubby's point was that definitions like being an atheist or agnostic are a white collar thing.  Since we do live in a farming community, he mentioned that people out here are either Christians or not church attenders, but no one uses the definition of atheism or agnosticism because more blue collar workers don't have the leisure time to contemplate the existence of God or not - it is just not a question they think about, since they are busy working at a physical and physically exhausting level - not to mention that farmers tend to work way more than a typical 40 hour work week.  I had never really thought about it that way, but I guess I'll have to take his word for it, since I still don't really understand rural mentalities.

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This week the local public school had Thursday and Friday off (mostly because of state basketball, even though neither the boys or girls made it in this year, but I guess also because the teachers had parent/teacher conferences this week.)  So, we didn't have Catechism classes on Wednesday evening, or Girl Scouts on Thursday - I had a really nice and relaxing week!  Just preschool Monday and Wednesday, Bible Study last night, and a Girl Scout manicure and ice cream party tonight (as our end of cookie season celebration!)

7-
This year for history, we are doing Connecting with History Volume 2.  I haven't been as good this year about keeping up with history.  Last year we did history every day, but with our travel schedule/doing so much school in town, this year hasn't been as good.  However, in all my slacking on history it happened that we read a book and did the Hillside discussion guide on St. Valentine on St. Valentine's Day.  I noticed this week that we are about to start the unit during which we read a book about St. Patrick and do another Hillside discussion guide...and we are very close to St. Patrick's Day!  It's almost as if I planned it!  How serendipitous!

Europe and the Faith "Sine auctoritate nulla vita"

Continuing with my reading plan for the year, I decided to read Hilaire Belloc's "short" essay Europe and the Faith (available free for Kindle) - being a modern American, my version of a short essay is much shorter than this one, which I guess is close to 200 pages.  One downside of reading on a Kindle is that you don't know how many pages you have read - but I will admit that I like the percentage of the way through feature.

This essay was one of the suggested readings for the first time period of EPIC - Mustard Seed (along with Quo Vadis, and several other books that I don't have and weren't available free on Kindle.)  Belloc makes some very good points throughout the essay about the history of Europe being taught in a false way in order to fit a Protestant narrative. 

Belloc begins with the question: What was the Roman Empire?   It was united, a civilization with one mode of life for all in its boundaries.  Outside of the Empire were barbarians, but they were not a threat to the Empire, and many wanted to become part of the Empire - traded with the Empire, accepted its coins, took bits of its language into their own.  Even when there were civil wars, with multiple emperors ruling - or no emperor at all, the power, office and system of the Empire were all one.

Next, he asks: What was the Church in the Roman Empire?  The Catholic Church was "a clearly delineated body corporate based on  numerous exact doctrines, extremely jealous of its unity and of its precise definitions, and filled, as was no other body of men at that time, with passionate conviction."  It was not an opinion, fashion, philosophy, theory or habit.  The Church caught and preserved the Empire as it declined.  The Empire declined because of the increasing numbers of "barbarians" hired as soldiers, weakened central power giving way to local power by rich landowners, and the rise of the Catholic Church in the whole society.

Further, he asks: What was the "fall" of the Roman Empire?  The changes in the Empire came from within, rather than from outside forces.  It failed to keep the local government subordinate to the Imperial government.  Taxation and central bureaucracy weakened, and localities  had more independence. Much of this came from the changes in the Roman army - once an army of citizens, then it became an army comprised of slaves willing to take on military service for the benefits it would provide them and poorer freed men, then the army was made up in large parts of tribes who entered into the empire under the condition that they serve as soldiers.  Eventually, the local government would fall into the command of the local forces of the Roman Army, which were often "barbarian" because of the recruitment strategy of the Army.  The Church remained an important force throughout the Empire, even as the power became more localized.

Belloc also discusses the history of Britain (in particular), and the dark and middle ages, which I am having a hard time simplifying into a blog post!  I'll just say that there is a lot of interesting information presented in this essay about those topics.

He also asks, What was the Reformation?   The true causes were spiritual, and thus hidden, so a historian can only answer the question "what was it?" not "why was it?" Because of the faster rate of change, the Church was not able to absorb and regulate new things quickly enough.  One very important note is this: "No one in the Reformation dreamt a divided Christendom to be possible."  Those people challenging the way things were done desired to affect the universal Church and change it - they sprang up from everywhere due to a universal uneasiness of a universal society.

Finally, he discusses why Britain's split from the Church happened, and how it affected the Reformation - In Britain in particular, the economic power of a small group of wealthy men had grown "greater than was healthy for the community."  Britain had many markets and ports, so new messages were frequent.  Finally, England had the most exaggerated awe and devotion to the monarch in all of Europe.  Henry VIII wanted to put pressure on the Church in order to get what he desired - the dissolution of his marriage to Katherine of Aragon - but he did not  mean to break permanently from the unity of Christendom.  When he suppressed the monasteries, it was not to destroy (which did happen) but to enrich the crown.  Belloc argues that "England did not lose the Faith in 1550-1620 because she was Protestant then.  Rather, she is Protestant now because she then lost the Faith." 

Of course, Belloc gives many great historical details to support his points, and there is no way for me to get across all of his ideas.  This was a challenging read for me - it took a lot longer than I anticipated because I could only read it when I was able to concentrate on it fully - not something I get to do all that often around here.  I would recommend this if you are really into Church history, but it is not light reading.

Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden - a Journey Review

Well, today I thought I should blog about something, and since yesterday was our Girl Scout day and my Daisies pretty much finished up the "Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden" Journey, I thought I'd write out some thoughts about the Journey, and some supplemental ideas we have used, or are planning to use.

A few comments about our troop - we have a multilevel troop and we have two leaders.  We have a couple of parents who help out from time to time, but aren't full-time leaders.  The girls meet every other week.  One week will be Daisies and Juniors, the next will be Brownies and Cadettes. I lead Daisies (because Charlotte is a Daisy) and Brownies (because Eva is a Brownie).  Later on, I will do a review on the Brownie Journey WOW! (Wonders of Water).

I originally planned out the year so that we would take the whole year to do the Daisy Flower Garden Journey - but it looks like we will finish early.  I have a general philosophy that girls in K-1 enjoy doing crafts, so I have added a lot of crafts to the journey.

Thoughts on the books - we ordered the Leader's Guide which came with one student book. I don't think the student books are worth it at the Daisy level.  Most of the girls are early readers, and most of the activities are "Draw...", so it could easily be done with blank paper instead (although, we haven't done any of them.)  The story line is long, and not appealing to my girls, but I went ahead and read it aloud to my girls anyway.  I feel that it could have been shorter, more fun, and taught more about the Girl Scout Law.  The leaders guide is so-so.  We enjoyed the games in the book, and I like having suggestions as a leader, so that I don't have to come up with everything from scratch.  That being said, there is a lot in the leader's guide that I didn't find useful.

I really did not enjoy the mini-garden project.  I have a distinctly brown thumb, and most of my Daisy parents confessed that they aren't too great with plants, either.  Instead of planting basil and lettuce I found some seed kits on clearance at Hobby Lobby.  I bought two rainbow plant kits, and two geranium kits.  Each girl paired up (we had 8 girls at the beginning of the year) and they got to plant the seeds in the kits.  The kits then when home with me. Of the four, three sprouted.  I then begged Daisy parents to take them.  One family kept them for a majority of the time. I had cut off the bottom of a cereal box and bag to use as a container for transporting the plants.  This week, the plants ended up back in my care.  One had died, one is almost dead, but one rainbow plant is looking pretty strong, so I think we will transplant it soon.  Hopefully I can find someone for the Daisies to give the plant to - I am thinking of asking the nursing home if they would like it.  The plants didn't come to every meeting, and we didn't water them very often as a troop.

So, for the nitty gritty details, here is how our meetings have gone:
Snack (we meet right after school, and the girls are always STARVING!)
Circle with juniors to talk about what is going on, go over motto, promise, law, girl scout sign, etc.
Attendance (with stickers - one girl takes attendance based on KAPER chart)
Read a chapter of the story (not very popular - I picked out extra picture books to read if the girls liked the story time, but I think they will be relieved to not have it anymore.)
Do a craft project (KAPER chart has craft helper and craft cleanup)
Play a game (KAPER chart has "game girl" who gets to lead the game or pick the game.)
Sing a song (KAPER chart has "song starter" - the girls LOVE to sing the "Baby Bumblebee" song - we do bringing home/squashing up/throwing up/mopping up, then end)
Meet for friendship circle/squeeze - sometimes with Juniors, sometimes alone (friendship squeeze is on the KAPER chart, too)
Girls collect their crafts and head home ("kaper keeper" moves the girls names on the KAPER chart)

I decided to plan on a flower craft for each flower in the Daisy flower garden - I've gone off track a few times this year when I didn't have the right supplies (we asked for parent donations, but have gotten none so far - so I've used what I had available).  This is the girls' favorite part of meetings and they can keep them around for reminders of the parts of the law.

We have done:
Paper Plate Bee Craft - we used markers instead of paint!  This was just for fun because the bee showed up in the story before any of the flowers.
Foam Flower Daisy Craft - I precut all the petals, and we taped a reminder of the promise to the stem.
Finger Print Lupines on regular paper printed with a reminder about Lupe the lupine reminding us to be honest and fair - no instructions, but I got the idea from this image.
Sunny the Sunflower Craft - we colored the stems, used yellow tissue paper for the petals, and used a bag of hubby's sunflower seeds for the centers.  We wrote "Friendly and helpful" on the back.
Z is for Zinnias Craft - we made these out of  dark green construction paper (I forgot to get spring green) and I preprinted stems on white paper with a reminder about Zinni the zinnia reminding us to be considerate and caring.
Origami Tulip Craft - we did the flowers only from this site, and mounted them on paper with green construction paper stems, then we wrote "courageous and strong" on them.  I have plenty of origami paper lying around, but I had originally planned on doing a different craft, which I'll link to, in case you have more finger paint than origami paper lying around!
Handprint Tulips Craft


Crafts I have planned (but could always change, if I forget to pick up supplies!):
Tissue Paper Marigolds -  I will probably make paper tags to tape to the flowers that say "Mari the marigold reminds us about being "responsible for what I say and do."
Coffee Filter Flower Craft - for Gloria, the morning glory - I'll probably make tags similar to above for "respect myself and others."
Muffin Flower Craft - for Gerri the  geranium, I probably won't use the template, I'll just give the kids green construction paper to cut a stem and leaves out of, and maybe brown construction paper to cut a pot out of. (or I may precut, and I might do two crafts per week!).  Of course, we'll probably write on the mounting paper "Respect authority."
Spring Stained Glass Craft - there are three different options for how to do this one, and I'm not sure which one to choose, though I lean towards the contact paper and tissue paper scraps version right now.  This will be for Clover, because it is hard to find a clover craft.  We will make sure to write on the craft "Use resources wisely" - although I have to admit, using crayon shavings might be what happens, since it seems like a "use resources wisely" kinda thing...
Tissue Paper Flower Rose Craft - I'm hoping the first tissue paper flowers go okay, or I'll have to rethink this - but I've done these roses for our All Saints Festival at church before, so I think it will work.  This will get a tag that says :Rosie the rose reminds us to "make the world a better place."
Foam Violet Flowers Craft - I may have to do some pre-cutting for these, as we had a little foam disaster when making our KAPER chart Daisies out of foam, and I probably won't use the hot glue.  But these looked cute, and would need a tag "Vi the violet reminds us to be "a sister to every Girl Scout."

After we have gone through all the flowers (and earned all the Daisy petals for the girls who don't already have them) I am planning on doing a "Garden Party" where the girls spend the first half of the meeting setting up, decorating and making food. Then in the second half, their special guests arrive, they eat the food and drinks, the girls tell them about the law - and get the Daisy Flower Garden patches.

So, overall my opinion on the Daisy Flower Garden Journey - it was a nice jumping off point.  I think the emphasis on books is a bit much for K-1 girls who have been in school all day (my homeschooled girls don't mind the reading as much!) and the garden was a little too much for me as a volunteer.  That being said, I think I will probably order another journey for next year as a jumping off point.  I'd like to do the animal one, but I think I'll have my Daisies that aren't bridging up vote at the end of the year (although, it may just be Charlotte who isn't bridging, I've got to check with the other homeschooled girl!)

Teaching Textbooks and Xtra Math

I hate math...I try not to say so in front of my girls, but I am not very strong in any of my basic math facts.  I love calculators, and I can do the basic math I need to do...if I have to!
My first experience with teaching math to Eva was Mathematics K for Young Catholics from Seton Home Study.  My difficulty was that it didn't have enough instruction for ME to be able to teach.  It assumed that I knew how to explain basic math facts. When I went eclectic in first grade, we moved to Math-U-See Alpha, which was a better fit.  Steve would teach the basics to my daughter, and I'd just have to supervise.  The problem I had was getting her to memorize her basic math facts.  The Math-U-See blocks were great for learning concepts, but MUS didn't have the drill that Eva needed. 

Well, now she is in second grade, and we are on our third math program - Teaching Textbooks 3.  Eva is very good at math concepts, so when she passed the placement test for the 3rd grade level program (and the lowest level that Teaching Textbooks has at the moment) I went ahead and outsourced math to my computer. (I purchased the CD-ROM only, and Eva uses a dry erase board to work out problems.) Teaching Textbooks has more math fact practice than our previous books.  Eva really loves the "bonus rounds" where she can get extra points for answering math facts, but she really seems to need a lot of drill on her basic math facts.

We have used flashcards, which are frustrating for me (I'm not a particularly patient mom), we have Math Gear: Fast Facts in Addition and Subtraction, we have Usborne Big Book of Sticker Math (that we do when we are in town waiting on Charlotte who attends preschool for speech therapy), and while they are all useful, none were improving Eva's math fact knowledge or speed very quickly.  I started to look around for a computer game to help with math drill, but I didn't find anything that looked like what I needed.  Then, I saw a suggestion for xtraMath, a free online math fact drill program.

XtraMath is all that I was hoping for - it's not very flashy, which I thought might be a bummer to Eva, but she LOVES it (as much as anyone loves math drill). She particularly likes when she gets to do "race the teacher";  Eva's only been at it for a little over a week, but her speed is improving already.

While I am still a fan of Math-U-See, and am using the primer level with Charlotte, I have to admit that every time Eva gets on the computer to do Teaching Textbooks and/or xtraMath, I am one happy homeschool mom!

Quo Vadis

The first book I tackled for my year long project was Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz (however that would be pronounced!)  I chose it because it was on both the Catholic Lifetime Reading List and the Reading List for the first time period in EPIC (Mustard Seed 33-99AD), as a bonus, it is a narrative, so I didn't have to worry about highly philosophical or challenging theological thoughts over our break from school.

The story is very compelling - I had a hard time putting my Kindle down.  It's a little on the long side - since reading on the Kindle only tells you the percentage of the way though and not the number of pages, I just checked at Amazon, where a paperback edition has 589 pages - but it was worth the time to read.

It is hard to sum up a book in just a few words without spoiling the story.  A young Roman officer falls in love with a young woman who turns out to be a Christian.  The most interesting of the historical characters are Nero, St. Peter and St. Paul, all of which interact with the young officer throughout the book.  The burning of Rome and the subsequent persecution of Christians happen within the story, and all the pain of those events is portrayed.  The Christian characters are mostly shown as loving, good people, although there is one not particularly likeable Christian character.  Some of the pagans are portrayed as brutal, but mostly not of their own accord, more out of fear of Caesar, and as products of Roman society.  You can see in the story both the fear that the early Christians must have had during the persecutions, but also the hope and the trust that Jesus would come again.  There are inspiring words from Peter and Paul, and conversions that occur.  Just thinking about the early Christians that received baptism from St. Peter or St. Paul is awe inspiring.

There have been several movies made, but I haven't seen any of them.  I checked Netflix instant download, and none are available there right now, so I guess I won't be seeing them anytime soon.  I doubt that they would be able to live up to the book, anyway.

The translation I read was free, and was put together by volunteers, so there are the occasional typos, and the language is older (lots of thous and werts, etc.)  But, I have no complaints.  I love the fact that I can read great books for free, and I appreciate the volunteer labor that goes into turning public domain books into e-books.

Reading Resolution

Well, Christine over at Good Company inspired me - I'm not really making a resolution in the traditional sense (clearly there are many improvements I could work on) but instead, I am excited about my "resolution."  She is endeavoring to read 52 books from the Washington Posts top books of 2011.  That got me thinking about reading some of the many, many, many books that are sitting around my house unread.  Honestly, I find it hard to read something intellectual after homeschooling all week long, so many of my Catholic books are just waiting for me to get to them.  So, I am challenging myself to read at least 12 books from the Lifetime Catholic Reading Plan by Father JohnMcCloskey and/or from the EPIC reading lists (available in the free downloads).

I printed out the McCloskey list to take to my bookshelves and see what I had there.  These are the books from the list that I have read (not necessarily the edition):
Rome Sweet Home by Scott and Kimberly Hahn
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

Here are the books I have on hand (again, not necessarily the edition I have):
Catechism of the Catholic Church (I use it, but have never read it)
St. Thomas Aquinas: The Dumb Ox by GK Chesterton
The Lord of the Rings trilogy by JRR Tolkien (I made it part way through the first book, once.  I enjoyed the movies.)
Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross
Mere Christianity by CS Lewis
Interior Castle by St. Teresa of Avila
Story of a Soul by St. Therese of Lisieux
Abandonment to Divine Providence by Jean-Pierre De Caussade
True Devotion to Mary and The Secret of the Rosary by  Louis-Marie Grignion De Monfort (the reading list has listed a compilation of his works, with four more included that I do not have)

Finally, the books on the list that I found free for my Kindle:
Essay on Development of Christian Doctrine by Cardinal Newman
Apologia Pro Vita Sua by John Henry Newman
Lord of the World by Robert Hugh Benson
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
The Idea of a University by John Newman
Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz
Orthodoxy by GK Chesterton
My Way of Life/Summa Theologica Parts I-II and Part III by St. Thomas Aquinas
The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni

I've finished my first book so far (I started early) and will write some about it soon.  I think that I have plenty of choices now, and that's before I spend a penny on a book, or even put any titles on paperback swap!

Quick Takes Friday - Merry Christmas

1-
Merry Christmas!  I am taking a break from my travel preparations.  We will be spending Christmas with my family in the mountains, so I have been doing a lot of cleaning and laundry.  I still need to pack, load the car and take a shower before noon - so that's not too much to do in two hours, right?

2-
We picked up Eva's glasses yesterday, and she was amazed at what she could see (like distinct headlights on cars on the way home) and she looks awfully cute, but I haven't gotten a picture of her yet, so I'll try to remember to post one here when I do get around to it.  Her glasses are purple with butterflies on them, and they make her look just a little more grown up, which makes me a little sad, since she is growing so fast anyway.

3-
I am recovering from a cold, my worst day was Monday.  Well, last night hubby went to lie down for a few minutes when the girls went to bed at 8pm.  I ended up doing four loads of laundry, getting the cat into his carrier to sleep in the house (since it was supposed to be so cold last night, and he just was neutered on Wednesday.) and going to bed.  Hubby woke up at midnight, surprised he had been asleep at all.  I think he must have caught my cold.

4-
NO MORE SCHOOL FOR THE REST OF THE YEAR!!!!!  Can you tell that I am excited about that?  I am in need of a good break, particularly from the running Charlotte into town for preschool part.  Still trying to figure out what to do for Charlotte next year, but at the moment, our top idea is a virtual charter - particularly if they do get the contract with a speech pathologist in the nearest big town that they are working on!

5-
We've let Simba, our kitty, into the house a lot more than normal in the past few days - mostly because we feel bad about him being out in the cold alone right after getting fixed.  It's pretty funny.  Bubba, our pug dog, seems to think that cats should run when he barks at them and chases them.  Simba came from BILs house, and they have a very hyperactive dog that is bigger than Bubba, so Simba isn't scared by Bubba.  Well, that makes Bubba scared of Simba - when hubby and I and the animals were home alone (the girls went to CCD with Grandma, but I skipped because she was showing a movie to everyone, and I wasn't feeling too great) Bubba kept trying to scare off Simba, but Simba would just chase Bubba around the living room.

6-
We had our 12th church anniversary on Sunday.  Problem is that I didn't remember at all that day, and hubby didn't remember at all that day (we had his extended family Christmas that day), and in fact I didn't remember until my MIL told me she felt bad about forgetting it, and I had to fess up that I hadn't remembered until she mentioned it.  Hubby didn't remember until we mentioned it to him when he got off work.  Yeah, we are pathetic now!

7-
We'll be doing Christmas with hubby's siblings (and parents) on Monday after we get back from the mountains.  I'm  supposed to stop and pick up some take and bake pizzas on the way home.  That's my kind of Christmas get together - pizza, salad, beverages, and a chance for Eva to try out her new Wii games with her aunts and uncle!

Quick Takes Friday

1-
Well, it's official.  I am going to have a little four eyes running around the house.  Actually, with how bad my vision is, I find it surprising that Eva managed to not need glasses before age seven.  It looks like Charlotte is following in her footsteps, too.  The eye doctor warned me that she would probably need glasses for near-sightedness in the next year or two as well.

2-
My Bible Study group just finished up "A Biblical Walk Through the Mass" series last night.  I would like to say that I finished it, too...but to be honest, I put my Bible study bag away while cleaning for Thanksgiving, and didn't get it back out until yesterday morning.  So, I read PART of the book, but didn't do any of the questions.  Hopefully I'll get ambitious sometime soon and go through and finish it up.  Good news is that we aren't starting a new study until January - just having a Christmas party.  In January we will be starting the long Great Adventure study.

3-
Our Advent program for Catechism is coming up soon.  Father scheduled the Mass for the Feast of the Immaculate Conception on Wednesday night (anticipatory) and won't be doing one in our town on Thursday.  Of course, he scheduled it 30 minutes into our CCD classes - and that was supposed to be the last class before the program.  So, on Wednesday we assigned parts, practiced, and did one run through as a group.  I begged MIL to just BUY something this year, but yet again, she insisted on writing something.  So, I spent the time figuring out lighting cues (seriously...lighting cues?  For an Advent program?) and trying to simplify things (I nixed the living nativity set hidden behind four queen sheets painted to be a backdrop...the background is now going to be a painted tri-fold board.)  I am hoping that we either use the church's nativity scene - which would require getting special permission from the family who donated it to the church (they only allow certain people to touch it for putting it out every year...hubby is one of the few allowed to touch it...so I fear it will become our responsibility to do it after the siblings who donated it pass away, since only one kid is Catholic and lives cross country, and the local kids all go to protestant churches now...) or that we can find a nice large nativity that someone else will let us use for the night.

4-
Our winter neighbors have moved in...I hear them mooing right now.  It is pretty fun to watch them sometimes, because they are cow/calf pairs and the babies can walk right under the electric fence - so they are often in our yard.  There is, however, a downside to them coming into our yard...(I'll just let you figure that one out!)

5-
I am just about done Christmas shopping.  YEAH!!!  I might get a thing or two more for hubby or the girls, and I still need to do some stocking shopping (I know it is not wise to buy candy for stockings yet...) and I still have my parents, my brother, FIL, and my secret sister from Bible study to buy for - and still struggling for ideas for all of them.  I do have the girl's St. Nicholas gifts ready (I still need to wrap them) and I did remember to buy chocolate coins when we were last shopping, since the Feast of St. Nicholas is really sneaking up on me!

6-
This year, I decided to try a Jesse Tree, so I bought an ornament kit that looked really cool.  I knew I'd have to assemble it, but I didn't realize we'd have to color it, too!  So, today (since it is the first day of Advent that we aren't running all over creation) we are going to get several ornaments colored and glittered.  I had to have MIL pick up glitter glue for me (since I forgot while I was shopping!) and she still has it, so either I have to leave my house today (which is not something I intend to do) or convince her to come over with the glitter glue and help us decorate (she LOVES to make crafty messes, so hopefully this is the option that works out today!)

7-
Last year, Eva bought a pink pre-lit Christmas tree for $5 at an after Christmas sale, so as part of their St. Nicolas gift, I decided to get them some decorations for the tree.  I found them a hot pink tree skirt and star topper, and a tube of colorful and tiny ball ornaments (thank you Target dollar spot!)  So, they'll be getting those soon.  Of course, I am intending to use the pink tree for the Jesse Tree, so they won't get to decorate it right away.  My hope is that we can do all 12 ornaments between now and the 3rd Sunday of Advent (our traditional decorating day) and then maybe do the O Antiphons?  I've never done those either...but I think the girls will want their tree decked out when we decorate our main tree...and I don't want to have to find something else for the Jesse Tree.

Quick Takes Friday

1-
I really might as well have gone to a four am black Friday sale...I honestly had a terrible time sleeping last night.  When I got up the second time (at 3 am) I noticed that our living room, which is on a different heating system of the house was still 70 degrees (the programmable thermostat goes to 62 at 10pm) which leads me to believe that hubby set the temperature in the main part of the house way too high because my family is sleeping in our usually a little cold basement.  I turned the heat WAY down at 3, and tried to go to sleep again around 4 am - succeeded, and here it is before 8, I am up so that I can be a nice host to my family.

2-
Speaking of black Friday sales - I had originally intended to go to Wal-Mart for their 10 pm start of toys, etc.  but in the end I wimped out on the two hours of driving, and my SIL who lives in the same town as Wal-Mart volunteered to go for me - in the end, she didn't get there in time for the Wii game that Eva really wants - and she called to let me know it was crazy.  Apparently she saw women throwing punches over a trampoline.  I don't know if she got anything (though I assume she probably found some of the items) and she is going this morning with a friend to  a real city to go to craft stores for their sales.

3-
Thanksgiving went well.  My turkey got done over an hour before I expected it to - but I left it in for an additional 30 minutes just to make sure it was okay.  We had 21 people and 5 dogs.  I had a little bit of a freak out a few days ago about dessert, because I wasn't sure if anyone was bringing any, so I called my mom and switched her from relish tray to pie.  They stopped at Village Inn on their way down and brought two pies.  Hubby's aunt who usually brings pie brought 2 pies.  MIL brought 2 pies because she knew I was worried about it - and I had a pumpkin cheesecake.  No lack of dessert - although 4 of the pies were varieties of pecan pie.

4-
I really haven't had much of a week off considering we took the whole week off school between having the girl's pictures done, cleaning and cooking...hopefully we have a nice quiet weekend.  My family will be heading home today after lunch, and I really don't plan to do much before Monday.

5-
I never did find a good deal on a banquet table - but in the end, we rented some tables from the local hardware store (that I need to drive in and return later today).  The lady who we talked to when we reserved them said she didn't know if they were 6 ft or 8 ft or 10 ft.  I thought that was a pretty big range.  They turned out to be 6 ft, so we rented two and put them side by side in our living room.  I figure $10 wasn't a terrible price for a decent, sturdy second table.

6-
Some of the thanksgiving activities that were enjoyed here were: blowing up a barrel with explosives, trap shooting (hubby's family), playing several games of bananagrams, some fairy uno (little girls and whatever adults they could sucker into playing), pet detectives (same thing), lots of Wii games - Just Dance and Mario Kart being the most popular, watching the movie Monsters vs. Aliens, reading books and napping on the couch.  Thanksgiving generally begins at around noon, and lasts ALL DAY  -  I think that the last people not staying overnight left when I told the girls it was time to go to bed around 8:30 or 9 pm.

7-
Being the dork that I am, I have been doing some black Friday shopping online - but there is not much I want to get.  MIL is trying to buy a new TV for SIL - so I keep calling to tell her to look at different deals, but generally she misses them.  Just found one at Amazon, called her and she answered her phone.  Of course, it's been live for 3 minutes and is 37% gone, so we'll see if she manages this one or not.  I guess I just love an excuse to look on Amazon about every 10 minutes all morning.

Quick Takes Friday

1-
Charlotte is 5 now...5!  I'm having trouble getting over that fact.  She had a really fun swimming party on Saturday, which we then followed with a trip out of town for a visit to the library, church and dinner at her favorite restaurant (she's 5, so it's probably no shock that her favorite restaurant is McDonalds.)  A pretty awesome day all around until we got home and took her temperature because she was acting really fussy, and found out it was 103.  But, we got it down, sent her to bed and she was fine the next day.

2-
This week was insanely busy - Charlotte had an extra day of preschool (for their Thanksgiving feast), we all had dentist appointments, and then there was Catechism classes, Girl Scouts, Bible study, and hubby had an eye appointment.  That's a lot of driving around.  Good news is: today is our last day of school until after Thanksgiving.  That being said, I guess I'm not feeling too ambitious today, since it is now 1 1/2 hours after our normal school starting time, and the girls are happily playing in the playroom (and I am happily playing on the computer!)  But, since we don't have to leave the house today, I have ALL afternoon to do school (YEAH!)

3-
Well, we don't HAVE to leave the house today, but Puss in Boots (in 3D) is showing at the movie theatre in town, so we may leave the house this evening to celebrate the beginning of our Thanksgiving break!  Bonus for me, maybe I can convince the family that popcorn is a legitimate dinner option.

4-
We are finally starting EPIC, a study of church history this weekend.  Not really sure how many people are going to be able to come this first time, but EPIC has 20 sessions, and we are planning on once a month - of course, taking off time for summer and harvest most likely, so I think it will be about a 3 year study.  I guess that works out fine, because right now we are doing Volume 2 of Connecting with History, and it is used in Volume 3, and I assume will be used in Volume 4.

5-
Monday will be Homeschool Picture Day - sad news is that I usually schedule it during our planned school time, so the girls usually get an unexpected day off.  This year, I managed to schedule it for during our break.  It should be fun, though.  The girls have very pretty purple dresses, and I am contemplating taking in their pink Christmas tree (that Eva bought on clearance last year) for the pictures, or is that too much?  We'll also be doing birthday pictures, so I still need to figure out what the girls will wear for those.  I'm only 2 1/2 months late on Eva's birthday, but for the first time, Charlotte is getting her birthday pictures taken AFTER her birthday!

6-
I'm hosting Thanksgiving this year, so I am excited about having everyone over.  My parents and brother are even coming down (and my brother finally found a job after being unemployed more than 2 years!  Yeah!)  We will have 21 people, which isn't that big of a deal (I don't think I've had a holiday with much fewer than 15 since we've been married) but we are having difficulty figuring out what to do for tables.  I'd like to get a big folding banquet table (like 8 feet long) but they all appear to be around $150.  I can find 6 ft tables for under $40, so I was contemplating getting two of those, but I bought tablecloths for Thanksgiving (because I don't own any, and I hate having to borrow and iron MIL's tablecloths) and the bigger one I bought is too short for two 6 foot tables (120 in).  We will just have to see if I find a creative solution that doesn't cost an arm and a leg!

7-
Hubby's grandpa is so funny.  He is always worried about how much I spend when we host Thanksgiving - last time, he tried to give me money for the meal (and to be honest, I think I spent less than $50 last time - since everyone always wants to bring stuff, I don't have to make too much stuff), and this time, he asked hubby if I had bought the turkey yet.  Well, no - because we just got a huge amount of beef in our freezer, and haven't had time to use it - so grandpa said that he'd buy the turkey.  Not only that, he called hubby a few hours later to ask him if a 14 lb turkey would be enough or if he should buy two (since it was the biggest one he could find).  Since I have MIL bringing an extra meat (not sure if it will be ham or prime rib, or what) I think 14 lbs will be more than enough.  So, basically, I am down to making stuffing and a pumpkin pie and pumpkin cheesecake (with the pumpkin Charlotte got at preschool) and cooking the turkey - so I think I'll buy some wine this year!

Quick Takes Friday

Still busy, busy, busy around here!

Roman Centurion Helmets

1 -
Charlotte is almost 5...5! That means that I have been blogging (or not blogging all that often) for more than 5 years. She's very excited to be having a pool party a week from tomorrow. I think it should be fun, too. The good news is it doesn't require too much out of me. Grandma will make some sort of cake, and other than writing a check and providing juice boxes, all I have to do is enjoy the pool. (Okay, there's the small matter of addressing and mailing the invitations that haven't been hand delivered...)

Simba, who wanted petting, not photographing

2-
In our super busy life right now (I am spending at minimum 15 hours per week in the car/in town) I was kind of lamenting that the girls weren't going outside to play very often at home. That all changed recently. Sadly, one of our two outdoor cats died, and we ended up getting a new cat. The girls named him Simba, and they pretty much are driving me crazy asking if they can go outside and play with the cats. On the plus side, they are finally getting outside regularly without me forcing them to go. On the down side, I know that eventually the novelty will wear off.

Rapunzel (for Charlotte) and Tinkerbell (for Eva)

3-
I really do enjoy many things about girl scouts. I think it is good for both of my girls, and I enjoy working with the girls (I'm usually pretty exhausted after meetings, because Daisies and Brownies are so hyper!) but last night hubby just delivered the last of the fall fundraiser stuff (nuts and candy) last night, and on Monday, I have to drive 1 1/2 hours with some other leaders to cookie training...Cookies start in January...that means I have two months between fundraisers. Our troop does need the money (patches are expensive, books are expensive, and some of the families have trouble even paying the state registration fees.) but I'd like a little bit of downtime between them. To be fair, I probably should have delivered the candy several weeks ago, but oh well.

Eva as Tinkerbell

4.
This is supposed to be our last week of quarter 1 for school. Things are not quite going according to plans. I don't know why I am surprised by this...I am very glad that most subjects I didn't plan out by weeks, because those that I did plan like that, I am behind in. Okay, I am behind in the ones I didn't plan out by weeks, too, but I don't feel like I am! I should finish up at least 2 weeks of science today, and Eva has a lapbook that she needs to finish up - we haven't made about 1/2 the mini books yet, but if we put our minds to it, I'm sure we can finish that up. History is a subject I didn't plan by weeks, but I had a general plan. I think there are 7 units in Connecting With History Volume 1, so I had figured on doing 2 units during 1st quarter. I'm not even halfway done with unit 1, so it looks like I probably will be carrying some of it over to next year unless I really get my butt in gear. Besides the running around all the time portion of this year, I have to admit that IEW's Primary Arts of Language is the other reason we are behind in everything. It is great - I love it, the girls love it, but it takes time - as in most of every morning. Probably 1 1/2 to 2 hours per day by the time we do the reading lesson together, play the games for 30 mins, Charlotte does her work page, Eva does her writing page, and Eva and I do All About Spelling. I guess that morning section also includes some work in their Handwriting Without Tears workbooks, but that's a pretty minimal amount of time.

Charlotte as Princess Belle

5-
Hubby offered to buy me a nice new bookcase for my birthday, but in the end I decided that it was too much money. Now I am looking around my house and kicking myself for saying that - it probably was too much money, but the books are piling up. So, my new mantra involves some nice bookcases when we get our tax refund in the new year...and maybe a new recliner, since the one we inherited from hubby's grandma keeps having random screws pop out of places.

At the park with Bubba, the pug who loves hugs...

6-
Speaking of furniture, I have a seam that has come out of a leather ottoman, and a rip in both of our couches where the back cushions attach to the back of the couch (thanks to our dog lying on top of the cushions) and I have absolutely no knowledge of upholstery repair. Any tips on what to do? I'm wondering if I can sew them all, but I know that my SIL had sewed the rip on one of the couches before for me, and it came out. My other idea is slipcovers. If there is a slipcover over the rips and seams that are coming out, I won't notice it. Of course, slipcovers aren't exactly a dime a dozen. I really should go see if I can find a youtube video on repairing upholstered furniture.

Older pic, but someone is having a growth spurt again.

7-
With about a zillion things to do this month, I decided it was about time for me to host Thanksgiving again. Actually, it worked out better than I thought it would. The preschool has the week of Thanksgiving off entirely, and I had scheduled to take it off, so other than the Christmas/Birthday pictures I have scheduled for the 21st, I have the whole week to cook and clean.

More quick takes at Conversion Diary!

Hmmm...over a month since my last post, it must be time for...

Quick Takes Friday!

The "no, I haven't given up blogging completely...I've just been running around tearing my hair out" edition!

1.
I thought about figuring out the new Quick Takes template, but I just told the girls to eat breakfast so we could start school soon (an hour later than our regular schedule, but I have a strong opinion that you should let sleeping children lie.)

2.
Charlotte (my almost 5 year old) is going to be the death of me.  She is WAY to creative for my own good when it comes to getting into trouble.  I've heard that moms with boys have to make all sorts of rules that they never would have come up with on their own because of creative misbehavior, but Charlotte seems to be doing that very well as a rather rambunctious little girl.  Of course, right now I am having trouble coming up with one of the better examples.  The most recent, however was I had to state on the way home from grandma's house last night "Charlotte, we do NOT throw dog treats or anything else in the car...particularly not at my head while I'm driving" (pretty sure she was just trying to throw the treat at our pug dog Bubba, who was in the passenger's seat...)

3.
I thought having an exchange student last year was going to kill me with trips into town, but now I know that's just not the case.  THIS year might do it, though.  At least with softball season, there was an end in sight, and musical practice ended late enough that hubby was home to help with pickup.  This year's schedule for my LITTLE girls requires:  Monday, leave home at 12:30, get home at 4-4:30 (Charlotte has preschool for speech therapy from 1-3:30).  Tuesday, stay home except for one Tuesday a month when MIL has an appointment in the city.  Wednesday, leave home at 12:30, get home at 8-8:30 (again, preschool 1-3:30, then CCD from 6-7:15, of course I have to set up for my class, and to drive home and back to town would take an hour...so we just hang out in town all afternoon and evening.)  Thursday, Girl Scouts so leave home (theoretically, if I ever get better at being on time for it, which I should, since I am leading Daisies and Brownies this year) at 3, get home a 5-5:30.  Fridays at home (TGIF!!!) and then church Saturday night or Sunday morning.  And I get to keep this up for a whole year...and this list doesn't include anything irregular.

4.
Not so impressed with the speech therapy so far.  I don't blame the speech pathologist, but when I signed up, I was told that sometimes it would be group speech and sometimes it would be individual.  Well, Charlotte hasn't had any individual time that I am aware of, and there are a ton of kids in her preschool group that get speech.  Plus, half the time when I ask her if she had speech she tells me not today.  I am dragging her to town twice a week to preschool pretty much only because she is supposed to get 20 minutes of speech therapy each day she is there.  Not happening, I'm getting slightly annoyed, but on the plus side Charlotte enjoys preschool (although I do have to hear that some other kids got to paint TWICE and she has only gotten to paint ONCE!)  We will have to see if I decide to keep her in preschool all year, or if I pull her out at Christmas.

5.
Eva is doing very well...still very bossy with her sister, but her school work is all very good right now.  I was about to pull my hair out reviewing Math-U-See Alpha with her, and I wanted to finish the last 5 lessons before we moved on, but honestly, I couldn't take it anymore.  So, Teaching Textbooks 3 came in the mail the other day, and she's done all of lesson 1 well.  I am enjoying the fact that I don't really have to do anything!  I do think she is going to need more math drill with it, so I am thinking I should give her mad minutes or something once a week.  Anyone know of a free printable math worksheet site that would work for this?

6.
Corn harvest has been off and on so far - I think they are still doing wet corn (I really try to keep on top of farm details, as you can tell!) which means that I am not seeing a whole lot of hubby right about now.  I guess that's okay, as I am sure he'll be home more in the winter, when no one else wants to work (of course, he'll still have to feed the cows, but if he is just feeding, it only takes 5-6 hours a day, instead of 12.) Speaking of cows, here's a picture of our old bottle calves Flower and Daisy. I think they are even bigger now. The other day the girls asked when they were going out of the feedlot (or, going to the packing plant to become beef) and it's going to be in the next month or so. The girls don't seem too upset by it...I'm still pretending they went to a happy cow farm where they will live forever...but that's the suburban girl in me!

7.
Most exciting news in my life? (Yes, I am a dork...) Kindle books are now available to borrow through the Across Colorado Digital Consortium.  Of course, our local tiny library (where Eva and I are spending about 5 hours per week) doesn't participate, so I'll have to go get a card from the nearest city big enough to have a decent library/WalMart/fast food/whatever else you can't find out here in the boonies.  Until then, however SIL has a card number, and has welcomed me to use it - I think you can have 8 items out at a time, and she doesn't think that me getting a book here or there would push her over the limit.  Of course, I'm pretty sure with an 8 item limit, I would be pushing it most of the time, but I blame that on getting stuff for the girls.

More quick takes at Conversion Diary

Homeschooling stuff 2011

I am just about done with shopping for next school year, and I have officially sent in my notice of intent to homeschool for the very first time. So, since hubby is very sick of hearing about the deals I got on school books, I thought I'd list them here again.

Math:
Math U See Primer complete set, I got a great deal on an old comb-bound edition $17 CathSwap
Last 5 lessons of Alpha, carried over from last year.
Math U See Beta, teacher pack $30 MUS Swap
We had been looking for a price break on the MUS student materials for Beta, but haven't found any, and the shipping cost from MUS directly is insane (they need to learn about media mail for sure!)  I ended up looking at Teaching Textbooks some, to see if maybe it was something we would like better for 3rd grade (since they now have 3rd grade materials) and when I looked at the placement test, it looked like something Eva could do, so when she barged in on the demo (she loves computer stuff) she was very excited that she might be able to do the math program.  I gave her the placement test, and she got 14 out of 15 on part one, and 9 out of 15 on part 2.  Teaching Textbooks says that a score of 10 and 8 respectively is sufficient to do the program.  So, after we finally finish up the last 5 lessons of Alpha, we may end up switching to Teaching Textbooks (which will put me slightly over budget...bummer!)

Cost (so far): $47
Savings (so far): $43

Handwriting:
Handwriting Without Tears
preschool workbook and wooden pieces(carryover from last year)
Letters and Numbers for Me (Kindergarten) $5 CathSwap
Printing Power workbook and instructor's guide $12 CathSwap
Cost: $17
Savings: $5.50

Speech Therapy (for Charlotte):
Super Star Speech $18.95 Amazon

Cost: $18.95

Language Arts:
Primary Arts of Language - Reading $69
Extra Phonetic Farm $19
Primary Arts of Language - Writing Package $98.75 (I bought this partway through last school year, and it included the shipping costs and the DVD "Teaching Boys and Other Children Who Would Rather Build Forts All Day" although in my house it would be "Children Who Would Rather Play Princess All Day")
All About Spelling Level 2 $39.95 Sacred Heart Books and Gifts
Fantastic! Wow! Unreal! $6.99 Amazon
Behind the Mask PBS (Paperbackswap)
Mine, All Mine! PBS
Many Luscious Lollipops PBS
Up, Up and Away PBS
A Cache of Jewels PBS
Kites Sail High PBS
Merry-go-Round PBS (it took a couple of years to collect most of these via paperbackswap, but I think it was worth the effort since I only had to buy one)
Eats, Shoots and Leaves (children's illustrated edition) $6.18 Amazon
The Girl's Like Spaghetti $6.80 Amazon
Twenty-Odd Ducks $6.80 Amazon

Cost: $253.47
Savings: $85.42

First Communion Prep (Eva):
King of the Golden City (used for school last year)
The Weight of the Mass $7 CathSwap
Patron Saint of First Communicants: The Story of Blessed Imelda Lambertini $5 CathSwap
Study Guide for Patron Saint of First Communicants $3 CathSwap
Saint Joseph's First Communion Catechism (borrowed from Church library as they have several copies not in use)
What I See in Church Faith Folder (bought several years ago and lost in our move)
10 Commandments Faith Folder
Holy Eucharist Faith Folder
Confession Faith Folder 3 for $25 summer conference special

Cost: $40
Savings: $20.35

Music:
Music for Little Mozarts (lesson, discovery, workbook, flashcards, CDs and teacher's guide) $30 CathSwap
Additional workbook $7.95 Amazon
Alfred Piano All-in-One Book Level 1 (free from Amazon with the 4 for 3 promotion)

Cost: $37.95
Savings: $31.65

Art:
How To Use Child-Size Masterpieces PBS
Steps 1,2 and 3 Easy $10 CathSwap
Intermediate $10 CathSwap
Advanced $10 CathSwap
(We also have 4 Draw Write Now books from last year)

Cost: $30
Savings: $32 (bonus, all the cards were already put into the folders, so I don't have to do any prep work!)

Spanish:
Learn Spanish with Grace complete set $35 CathSwap, which included more workbooks than I needed that I was able to resell to other people, bringing the actual cost down a little bit.

Cost: $35 (plus some white out, paper and tape)
Savings: $60

Science:
Noeo Chemistry 1 instructor's manual $20 CathSwap
Young Scientist Club Set 1 $17.52 Amazon
Young Scientist Club Set 2 $18.73 Amazon
Young Scientist Club Set 3 $18.51 Amazon
Young Scientist Club Set 4 $17.55 Amazon (these include 7 extra experiment kits for future years or just for fun)
Ein-O's box kit Molecular Models $9.99 Amazon Used
What's Smaller Than A Pygmy Shrew? $6.99 Amazon
Marie Curie's Search for Radium $5 CathSwap
Super Science Concoctions PBS
How to Think Like A Scientist $6.61 AbeBooks
Simply Science Atoms $8.94 Amazon Used
Simply Science Solids, Liquids and Gases $6.66 Borders
True Books The Periodic Table $5.25 Rainbow Resource
True Books Hydrogen and the Noble Gases $3.46 Borders
True Books Calcium $3.46 Borders
True Books Carbon $5.86 Borders
True Books Oxygen $3.46 Borders
A Drop of Water $5 CathSwap
How We Use Plastic $5 CathSwap
DK Eye Wonder Rocks and Minerals PBS

Cost: $167.99
Savings: $25.18

History:
Connecting With History Volume 2 Syllabus $20 CathSwap
St. Valentine PBS
The Man Who Never Died - St. Peter PBS
Usborne Time Traveler (carrying over from last year)
A Life of Our Lord for Children $9 CathSwap
Land of Our Lady Founders of Freedom $20 CathSwap
Once Upon a Time Saints $8.50 CathSwap
More Once Upon a Time Saints $8.50 CathSwap
The First Christians The Acts of the Apostles for Children $10.17 Amazon

Mary My Mother $1.39 Sacred Heart
St. Patrick (Tompert) went out of print right before I ordered, so ended up getting it used $3.97 Abebooks
St. Peter the Apostles $1.39 Sacred Heart
Spend the Day in Ancient Rome $11.00 Sacred Heart (due to a small bend in the corner, I got a further discount)
The Apostles of Jesus $1.39 Sacred Heart
The Story of King Arthur (dover thrift) $1.70 Sacred Heart (on backorder...urgh!)
Vikings Dress, Eat, Write and Play Like the Vikings $6.95 Rainbow Resource
Ben Hur - A Race to Glory DVD $13.62 Sacred Heart
The Blackbird's Nest St. Kevin of Ireland $12 CathSwap
Caedmon's Song $11.50 Borders
Celtic Treasures CD $11.50 Rainbow Resource
Good King Wenceslas $12.20 Borders
King Arthur and His Knights CD $10.91 Amazon
Leif the Lucky $8.50 CathSwap
Mary Mother of Jesus (Joslin) $11.47 Borders
Miracles of Jesus (de Paola) $5.89 Borders
Pompeii Buried Alive PBS
St. George and the Dragon $5 CathSwap
St. Meinrad Coloring Book $3 CathSwap (was supposed to get St. Philomena coloring book, but got this one instead)
The Adventures of Saint Paul $8.45 Sacred Heart
We're Riding on a Caravan $6.69 Borders
Who Were the Vikings? PBS
Brendan the Navigator $6 CathSwap
Parables of Jesus (de Paola) PBS
Christopher the Holy Giant (de Paola) $4.99 Amazon Used

Cost: $237.07
Savings: $110.62 (not including 4 out of print books that I got used)

Misc. Books and Supplies:
Lessons in Responsibility for Girls Level 1 (carrying over from previous years)
Lessons in Responsibility for Girls Level 2 $13.75 Rainbow Resource
Choreganizers $17.75 Rainbow Resource
Battery Operated Crayon Sharpener $5.25 Rainbow Resource
Shipping on Rainbow Order $7.28 (everywhere else except IEW had free shipping, and I only bought 1 thing from IEW, so the shipping cost per item was way easier to calculate)
Reading/Thinking Skills B (I bought this over a year ago for $1 in clean condition)
Maps, Charts and Graphs B $6.50 CathSwap
Reading for Comprehension B $7 CathSwap

Cost: $58.53
Savings (on reading and maps workbooks): $11.95

Total Cost: $942.96 (currently under my $1000 budget!)
Total Savings: $425.67

7 Quick Takes Friday

Well, it has been forever since I did a quick takes-but since I should be doing any number of last minute things before leaving town, quick takes seems like something I should be able to accomplish.

1-
As soon as hubby is done with work this morning (hopefully in the next 30 minutes or so) we are off to the Rocky Mountain Catholic Home Educators Conference for our 36 hour retreat (gotta love farm life!) I'm looking forward to buying some more school books and hearing some talks - not to mention getting away from home and staying in a nice hotel.

2-
The girls are staying with their aunt for two nights (we will be getting back pretty late) and they are super excited about it...although they are a little worried about the whole "Aunt doesn't have TV service" thing.

3-
In the "I don't actually take care of my kids anymore" department, the beginning of this week the girls stayed with my parents in the mountains. I had MIL take them up to the front range and meet my parents, who had them for 3 days. They went to a day camp and had an awesome time (they are still singing all their camp songs!) and they pretty much exhausted my mom, I think, who seemed to think that they needed 20 different activities during their short visit.

4-
Eva had her first trail ride at day camp, and she was the only kid that had ever been on a horse before. When the counselors asked her if she had been on a horse before she said "Of course! I live on a farm!" They also had to go back and get her a medium sized helmet, since they assumed a group of going into 2nd graders would all need size small.

5-
Next week we have Totus Tuus, which the girls are very much looking forward to. MIL is DRE, so she is in charge of organizing everything (not her strong suit) and the local priest announced a few weeks ago that he was going on a long vacation, including the week of Totus Tuus, so MIL has called around to all the priests in the area, and we have some coming every day for Mass. The furthest are traveling 2 hours for daily Mass, which I think is really cool.

6-
My house is a pit - so bad right now. I really prefer to leave a clean house when we travel, but it is not happening right now. I have done a lot of cleaning (I did 7 loads of sheets yesterday, I just finally got around to washing the sheets in our basement from about a month ago.

7-
Hubby thought it would be fun to try to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 tonight at a city megaplex theatre. I looked it up the other day, and one theatre still had tickets available, but to buy them online, it would have been $11.50 EACH - I couldn't believe it! No wonder so many people don't go to the movies. I think our local theatre is $6 for adults, so for about the same price we can see it at home (I'm thinking maybe on our 12th anniversary on Tuesday!)

More Quick Takes at Conversion Diary!

Homeschool Speech Therapy

Charlotte, my 4 year old (isn't she cute?) has some speech articulation issues. Actually, I think it might qualify as a lot of speech articulation issues - I had her evaluated by the local school's speech therapist and she had 42 errors out of a possible 77. I guess it clearly could be worse, but I feel like I've got my work cut out for me over the next few years. For next year, she will be attending 2 -2 1/2 hour days per week at the local preschool, and we will be moving on to Kindergarten work at home (I did Eva's kindergarten over 2 years, and I am planning on the same for Charlotte.)

Obviously, the goal is to make as much progress as possible over the next year, as she will not continue to qualify for speech therapy services unless I enroll her in the school district (I am looking into alternatives like virtual charter schools, just in case I still need a lot of help!) So, I am looking for any advice or resources from anyone who has been there and done that with a child in speech therapy. Here are some things that I am aware of - I would love opinions or reviews of these, or any other programs/books/curricula/games you know of that might help with speech articulation issues.

Speech Tails - online speech learning program at a cost of $25 per month. Looks like it is mostly speech therapy videos, there is a week free, so it might be something I try, but at $25 a month, it could get pretty expensive to use!

Heads Up Now! - Has materials for all sorts of special needs. The speech articulation workshop was recommended to me at one point, but the shipping cost for just that is super high (workshop is $5, shipping is $12.58...seriously???) They also carry Speechercise level 1 and level 2, which are both significantly cheaper at Amazon. I'm never very sure about the whole CD with printables thing, so I wouldn't buy those without a firm recommendation.

Super Star Speech - These look the most promising to me, books to give me ideas of how to train speech that don't cost an arm and a leg, and don't have a monthly cost.

Speech Buddies - These look pretty cool, as most speech problems are related to incorrect tongue placement. I like the idea of something to help feel where the right placement is, but at about $300 for the professional set (includes all the speech buddies, and with Charlotte's speech issues, we would need all of them, plus would need to work on other sounds as well) it is quite a bit more money than I would like to spend. It is cheaper than a private speech therapist, though (and since we don't have any of those in our rural area, more convenient, too.)

Thoughts? Recommendations? Thanks!