Weekly Wrap Up : February 3rd

In my life this week…

I dug into another {amazing} book and am thoroughly hooked!  We trekked to Dallas for some fun, and we are still eating little/no sugar daily.  Woo Hoo!

In our homeschool this week…

Well, another story all together.  School days are not moving as efficiently as I would like.  I have not figured out the root of the issues we are having, or I would hope to not be having them.  Days are still too long, and kids are too distracted!  However, I am hoping this is simply a result of the crazy weather and that we are simply dealing with Early Spring Fever!!

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…

Not sure I am feeling too helpful these days, and surely not worthy of offering advice!

I am inspired by…

Why I do what I do.  If I was not inspired by the the goal at the end of this, I may just have to throw in the towel.  I am inspired by the fruit I have glimpsed, but would sure love to see more fruit daily with more of my “students!!”

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

We trekked to Irving to see the KLTY studio this week and had a fabulous time!

 

Then after a yummy lunch at Cici’s pizza (and some great Tom & Jerry on the tv there) we made our way to downtown Dallas.  I was not sure my kids would enjoy the Dallas Museum of Art, but I was so pleased when then loved it!  I heard, more than once, that this was “the best museum ever” – what music to my ears!!

My favorite thing this week was…

The DMA – and the excitement of the kids seeing an Andrew Wyeth, a Mary Cassat (we studied her) and lots more fun things!  I loved seeing how much fun they were having!

Weekly Wrap Up : January 27th

 

In my life this week…

School was hard, I seem to remember last week reporting that it was in a groove and good.  Ugh!!!

In our homeschool this week…

We schooled far too long EVERY day!  Ughh – again!

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…

Character training is far more important that math, reading, science or anything else.  I believe this is truth, I have a hard time living it though.

I am inspired …

James – the book.  I am being blown away by Beth Moore’s study of this book.  And I am loving that I am living it with the ladies in this study and my kids.

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

We stayed home this week, well when you are schooling until 2 or 3 pm daily it is hard to run around.  Today though, I am heading up to Dallas and will get to stop at Whole Foods (woo hoo) and see a few friends (more woo hoo).

Weekly Wrap Up : January 20th

 

What a glorious week we have had here in our little world.  School seems to be back into a good routine, the weather has been beyond fabulous, and we ended the week spending the day with some wonderful friends and catching up!  Does it get better?

In our homeschool this week…

we got back into a routine – and it feels so good!  We are enjoying a new chapter in our Apologia Botany Book – we are studying about fruits and seeds and all that good stuff.  Perfect timing as we discuss what it a vegetable and what is a fruit, because we are planting lots of seeds and vegetables right now in our garden!!

Helpful homeschooling tips or advice to share…

Relax and enjoy it, even when it does not go the way you think it should.  Good comes from even the bad days!

I am inspired by…

My boy.  On Wednesday at church he was talking with another boy who comes to our class somewhat regularly.  Then afterward this same boy was saying something again to my boy before we left.  I asked what was said.  On the way to the car he told me he gave his friend a $1 to get a cupcake at the cupcake sale.  I was floored.  He did this on his own, unbeknownst to me. 

Earlier we went to the table to get a t-shirt (he did) and pulled out his money to spend HIS money on a T-shirt for 60 Feet (see below) – and he saw they were $20 and he only had $9.  Well, I took his money and bought one for him.  I did not know what he did earlier.  a $1 would not have allowed him to purchase one either way, but he did not keep in in case.  Amazing.  He inspires me.

Weekly Wrap Up : 11/11/11

Happy Veteran’s Day to all who are serving and have served!!  May God bless our friends who continue to stand in harms way!!

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In our homeschool this week…

We started working on our Gratitude Lapbook – the kids are enjoying it and I am hoping to cultivate a more grateful heart in each of them! 

I am inspired by…

Podcasts – this week I have listened to several from Matt Chandler at the Village church in DFW, and Michael from Manna in NC.  I have really enjoyed both and been incredibly inspired!!

Places we’re going and people we’re seeing…

This week we stayed close to home, but next week we head up to Dallas for AG’s heart appt.  She will have an EKG & ECHO on Monday to make sure her heart looks exactly like it should.

Last Sunday I did get to take AG to a Clover Kid field trip to see many animals.  It was lots of fun!!  She got to see a Sheep, goat, many chickens and even work with a heifer!

Weekly Wrap Up : October 21st

In my life this week…

It has been a whirlwind around here!  School is in its groove, we are moving right along with our amazing Ambleside books!

Fall weather has certainly arrived, we even had our first fire in the School building stove!  It was so fun!

In our homeschool this week…

We started George Washington by Genève Foster – and it is going to be a favorite – I can tell!   JB even finished a book he is going to review about General Pershing!  I cannot wait to see what he says about the book, I know he really enjoyed it!

Helpful homeschooling reminder (I need to hear)…

Patience is key – key to my success and key to theirs.  As I am trying to teach them about patience, I am reminded that I have yet to master it myself!!

Weekly Wrap Up : Sept 23rd

In my life this week…

We had a much better week of school!  Amazing how, when you change a little thing, it can affect the whole day!!  We did not do much outside of school this week, but it was a good week and cooler weather seems to have arrived & we are all thrilled about that!!

In our homeschool this week…

We flip-flopped.  Whew.  Who knew? 

I always subscribed to doing the “hard” stuff first, and then coasting the rest of the day.  For 3 years we have done math and handwriting first, then followed by reading and other stuff. 

Our days were drifting past lunch time though, and I am not ready to offer afternoons to structured school.  I know we can get everything we need to do, done by lunch.  And not 3:00pm lunch.

Weekly Wrap Up : September 2nd

In my life this week…..

Mostly, it was normal – we schooled Mon – Wed closing out most of our stuff for this week a bit early.  Good thing, since I spent most of Thursday taking my youngest son to the ER.  Not fun, but glad my week had room for the unplanned chaos.

In our homeschool this week…

We are in week 5/4 in our home – and moving right along.  Math is going surprisingly well – I think this is going to be a stellar math year for all my students.

My youngest student AG (kinder) is enjoying her handwriting practice (like the big kids) and her math too.  She is doing remarkably well!

We are really loving our English from the Roots Up  - I would recommend this book/curriculum for all homeschoolers!  My gang is enjoying it and they are really learning!

Weekly Wrap Up : August 5

In my life this week…

It was up, it was down.  It was good to have some early betimes and that allowed for earlier wake up times.  I love to get up early and have a great good quiet time, and I had that opportunity several times this week.

We started school!  YEAH!! 

We started this week to get things kicked off and give us a week of normal school just us, before A joins us on Monday.  I had low expectations, really just trying to get back into the routine.  It went well.  We hit the ground running, with just  a few bumps.  So, so far, so good!

Weekly Wrap Up : July 29th

In my life this week…

We are busy, busy, busy – of course, who is not?  We had friends over the first part of the week for Cole Camp Session II, it was great, except that I feel like I did not make it as fun for everyone as I could because I was neck deep in school prep!  We start in 3 days!!  Oh my!!

In our homeschool this week…

We have our building/school ready to go, a few corners still need some cleaning, but we are operational at this point!  Notebooks/Binders – a new thing for me this year, are ready & waiting for little hands.  The kids are pretty excited, they love the binders and the fun stuff we have planned, I hope their excitement does not wane!

Weekly Wrap Up : July 15th

In my life this week…

We have had a good week here in our neck of the woods.  Monday we ate turkey for supper – Thanksgiving – our turkey.  You can see more about it HERE.

We enjoyed seeing friends this week too, we loved blue berry picking with a bunch of friends!!  Then we invited some friends over to make some jam and play! 

So it has been a fun week, all in all.

Weekly Wrap Up : July 8th

In My Life This Week…

I have been told my life is spiraling out of control because *40* is creeping up on my.  My sweet husband offered that explanation, then I promptly told him he was COMPLETELY wrong.  Until my dear friend said it was probably true.  Ugh!!

These week went from dreadful one day, to amazing the next.  I am not sure I can endure 10 more months of that – let along years.  Anyway….

Weekly Wrap-Up : May 6th

 

In my life this week...

We had our typical week : unpredictable; in the sense that with Robert home some days, we get thrown off schedule.  But I am starting to think there may not be a schedule to be thrown off.  You know?  Like how many times do you need to be off schedule before you consider that the schedule is to be off?

Anyway, we got some school done – we played – and we worked!

In our homeschool this week...

We are wrapping this year up quickly.  We have worked ahead on a few books so we are breezing through these last few weeks before we wrap up for the year. 

Weekly Wrap-Up : April 15th

 

In my life this week...

we had a good week, more normal than not.  We schooled most of the week, worked on nature displays in the school one day, and ran around one day.  We had 4h this week, which is always fun, too.

Weekly Wrap Up : April 1st

In my life this week...

We tried to get back to some semblance of normal – and we were able to get 2 weeks of school completed – which is always great!

We had J’s eyes checked since he is not shooting so well on the rifle team, wanted to rule out vision issues.  The result : he has his father’s eyes – perfect vision!  So now we need to refine his shooting skills!

Robert did take 3 of our broiler chickens (meat birds) to get processed and they are huge!  Much bigger than the last batch!   A good thing since one chicken at dinner is no longer enough for this brood of growing kids!  But if the chickens are bigger we may be okay!!  Next week we take the rest!  yeah!

In our homeschool this week...

We finished the last half of last weeks “week” of school and completed another.  So we are going to get caught up and finish about on time for us I suspect.  I love that I can make school work – get it done a little faster if I need to, or slow it down in we want. 

We are learning so much more than our curriculum will ever show with the chickens and the garden especially.  I know they kids are learning things that they will take with them forever!  So it is fine is we skip a day here or there – real life is a much better teacher than a book most days!!

Places we're going and people we're seeing...

We said goodbye to Robert’s folks Sunday night, they left Monday morning before we were all up.  Then my dad made a quick trip out here to drop off a lawn-mower and that was fun to show him our place!  The kids loved showing off their chickens, cats, dogs and everything else! 

Then, my uncle arrived Thursday night for a few days to bring us a tractor!! We are so excited about this too!  The kids have been playing on this tractor in his yard for years and now we are thrilled to be able to use it here on our property!!  Visiting with Uncle Ed and his friend Tony has been so much fun, the kids are loving it as much as we are!!

My favorite thing this week was...

making the most everything.  Instead of getting upset when things did not go according to the way I thought they should, we just went with the flow – not my nature!

I enjoy getting school done mostly when Robert is working, and taking the days he is home to be together.  We still do get school done many days he is home (especially when he is reversed out) but we thoroughly enjoy this schedule and having so much more time together to work in the garden, yard or something else! 

In general we are loving our Junior Master Gardener Program we are involved with!!  That has been great to add to our school work!!

What's working/not working for us...

Handwriting is not working for my oldest!  So since he does not want to do the small amount I am asking him to do well, I am giving him more to do.  This week I told him everyday he will do some form of creative writing in addition to copy-work.  Of course there were terrible tears!    But the second day he was good with it.  This resulted in getting his blog updated a bit, and getting him journaling a bit more.  All good stuff – just work!!

A photo, video, link, or quote to share...

 

My girl with one of our kittens – they tolerate her love so well!