Not us, just my blog.  I am reverting all of my homeschool blogger info over to blogspot.  Our new address is  http://wakefieldacademy.blogspot.com/.   I am in the process of transferring all my entries over to that blog.  I have put the original date of the entry into the title.  Thanks...

They have set in, my husband is back at work, my son's friends aren't home and I'm sitting on my new exercise ball.  Perhaps it's just because the chocolate has nearly run out, perhaps it's because my pile of laundry is almost as tall as the house.  Perhaps it's because I'm ready to do more school and my blessed son is enjoying his time off. 

We did get out last night and roamed around Target trying to figure out how to spend my gift card.  We're probably going back tonight.  I suffer from SI (Shopping indecision).  I can never make a choice while there.  I thought I had it all planned out,  I made a list from my online decision, but they didn't have my online items in the store.  Normally they do, but the threadbare racks just showed that they hadn't restocked yet.  I've already done one order from Target and it's supposed to arrive today.  I hear the UPS truck in the neighborhood or perhaps it's just wishful thinking.    So I shopped online again today and discovered the items I want cost 8.00 in shipping. These are items I did see in the store last night, so no thanks, I'll go back to the store. 

We did get in a few items today, a couple of logic pages.  Those are fun.  My son is naturally logical, he might have vulcan blood.   Now he has asked to go play with the dog.  So off we go, PE time. 

1.     How many children do you have / homeschool?  one fabulous 10 year old son

2.     How long have you been homeschooling?   We are in the middle of our 4th year, and 4th grade.  

3.     Have they always been homeschooled, or did they ever go to public/private school?   We started in 1st grade so it would be easier for me to count how long we've been homeschooling  :)  He was in private Christian school for prek and K.

4.     Do you plan on homeschooling until graduation?   Yes, unless God has anything else to say on the matter.

5.     Do you belong to a co-op?   No.

6.     Do you school all year long, or use some other schedule?  We follow a traditional school schedule for the most part.  We do a light schedule part of the summer to keep things fresh.

7.     Do you use textbooks only, or do you like to supplement with other materials?  We use a very eclectic mix.  We use a lot of living books.

8.      Are field trips included in your school plans, or are they just family time?   Field trips are done as a family. 

9.       Do you and your kids do crafty stuff together for school time?  We are a very artistic family.  While we don't do a lot of crafts, we do a lot of art, make up silly songs to go with our studies, and our history program often takes the form of a news report.

10.     Would you consider everyday household life stuff ‘home ec’? Absolutely!  For a while we did "health" class before school.  That meant picking up and getting the morning chores done, it is good for our mental health.

11.      Do you have any advice for new homeschoolers?  Don't get overwhelemed!!!  There is so much diversity in homeschooling that every homeschool family looks different.  Approaching it like everything else in parenting, utilize what will work for your family.  Yes, you can school your children!

12.      Do you have advice for homeschoolers with little ones under foot?  Well, the cat sometimes sit on the table with us for school and we put the dog outside.  Aside from that we have no little ones. 

If you are interested in entering the 12 blogs of Christmas you can find information at this blog.

http://tnmomwith3kids.wordpress.com/

May God bless you and have  a Merry Christmas.

I'm such a nerd, I still love the play on words.  My son didn't quite get it when I told him we were done with grammar and math for the rest of the year. After I explained it he laughed. 

We have been using the last three days to play catch up on a few subjects.  We have been behind in art, geography, music, and history.  So have we touched history since then? NO!  We've been having too much fun with art, music and geography.  I feel the American Revolution will still be waging over Christmas if we don't study it most of Monday and Tuesday.

We also started reading "The Magician's Nephew" from the Chronicles of Narnia.  We opted to save it until the 2nd to last book.  I read the many different thought patterns on which order to read the books in, and decided to jumble the numbers written on the spine.  I have to say I'm glad we did.  I had never read the books before and we are having a blast discovering all the.... well, let's just say we're enjoying this book the most so far. 

We have been using "Drawing Basic with Thomas Kinkade" for art this year.  We have been getting behind, but we enjoy the lessons.  Thomas Kinkade is wonderful at teaching.  Having never used lifepacs before I've been a little confused, but I get out my sketch pad and work right along with my son, it's been great.  This week he was jumping up and down asking to do more art so we spent most of Thursday and Friday on it.  I love art, and it is nice to see some of those genes got passed down as well. 

We've also enjoyed catching up on some composers.  This week we looked at Beethoven. My son also made a quite profound statement while reading about Beethoven's appearance and confidence. It was something like, "your confidence has nothing to do with the way you look". Amazed! I love his wisdome. Of course, I think he is fiendishly cute, and handsome just like his daddy. But it is so nice that he know that is not where his confidence should lie.

May you all have a blessed and joyous Christmas.

We finished this book as a read aloud a few weeks ago.  I can truly say that this is one of my favorite books ever.  I remember reading it as a child and having visions in my head of colonial Boston and the sympathy I felt for Johnny throughout the book. 

As I read it aloud to my son I pictured some of those same sentiments rolling through his head.  We had detailed conversations about the characters in the book.  We brought out some of my silver collection as we discussed the art of silversmithing.  We pulled out a tourism map of Massachusetts that we had just received.  We compared the current town of Boston with the colonial maps.  It was a wonderful study. 

Reading it as a child I never knew how much historical information was packed into that volume.  As we have gotten further into our American Revolution study I find myself continually referring him back to Johnny Tremain.  It truly is a plethora of history.  I am enjoying rediscovering the books of my youth with my son. 

I haven't posted much this month.  We are kind in that lull of our school year.  You know the one where you have the groove figured out and you feel as if you are moving along, but nothing real exciting.  We've had some great moments of hilarity and spontanaiety (sp?)  this month as well.  Those are sometimes hard to describe and sometimes best kept between mother and son. 

 I mean do you really want to know that to avoid going over the edge I break into song?  The other day my ds(that's darling with a smirk, today) told me he hates math. He was basically stating that he refused to do math.  Instead of my usual reaction I broke into song.  I came up with an "I hate math" song in several genres, tied it into our composer study, sang about the marriage of music and math and kept going until we were both laughing so hard it hurt.  Seriously, how would I know a waltz was a waltz without math?  What about a 1/2 note? Would it be a partial note? Would a whole note be a circle note or a pie note?  It just wouldn't be right. 

Okay, okay back to my little reality.  What is a nanowrimo?  It is a yearly contest where writers and would be writers compete with themselves.  We strive to reach 50k words in some form of a story between Nov 1 and Nov 30.  I'm currently close to 32k words and going strong.  I've been sucked into this alternate reality I've created with story.  My story has bits of my life throughout it.  Some of the characters and events are based upon real life, just not any of it is real, except the three legged cat (you'll have to wait to see what I mean).  So if you are interested to see what  it's all about, check out nanowrimo.org.  The only real prize is a certificate with your name on it, oh and you get to print it yourself.  You also get the deep satisfaction that goes with delving into undiscovered portions of your brain. You also get a glimpse of what carpal tunnel syndrome might feel like after typing over 3k words in one sitting. 

So I'll be back after November, before if I can slam out the remaining 28k words in the next ten days.  Or if my brain liquifies while trying to type as fast as my thoughts, or if I have to make up songs about anything besides math and music.  Oh, please, I need more coffee.

Where we live it has just cooled off.  I'm sure it won't stay that way for long, but the humidity is down, the windows are open and the a/c is off.  It's the middle of October and I'm just now starting to think about long pants.  I think I'm starting to like winter.

My hubby and I both grew up in a state where ice, snow, and freezing temps were just a part of the norm.  While I liked snow as a kid, as an adult I could so do without it.  I take no pleasure in being cold.  My hubby hates to wear too many layers of clothes and getting my son to wear a shirt to school is a major feat. 

Last year,  our first in the south, my mind kept waiting for that day to come.  You know the one where you pack up the flip flops, you resign yourself to no longer wear capris because your ankles are freezing.  It never really happened.  While I did move onto jeans, I proudly wore my flip flops while Christmas shopping.  I even wore them in February!

Today we woke up with the windows open.  But instead of dreading the impending cold, I know I won't have to pack away the flip flops anytime soon.  That's great because besides boots and workout tennies I have one pair of closed toe shoes. 

Some people may enjoy the beauty of snow the briskness of the cool air, not us.  Yes,  the summers are hot, but not anymore than where we used to live.  So now my years feel complete.  There is no longer a winter in which I prefer to hibernate.  By moving south we've added an extra three to four months of life to each year for our family.  Gotta go, I'm going to open more windows!

Okay with dh and ds out of town I now prove to my family that our house can be clean.  We are in the midst of painting my son's room, so it took me two days to get it this way.

Our Homeschool/dining room.  Normally there are piles of books here.  I even got my next two weeks of scheduling done.

While the floors are still a work in progress the red walls are done.  The "ketchup" walls as my son likes to refer to them.  No toys on the floor,  ah!, enjoy the moment.

A clean desk.  Hopefully the command center I set up will inspire cleanliness.

A clean playroom.  Check out the floor, you can see the rug!

And these last and most prestigious photos go to my honey.  Remember, a clean kitchen only means that I'm not cooking anything.

Please ignore the avacado green counters.  We are living a little retro while we do a long term flip. Drum Roll please  A CLEAN KITCHEN SINK!!

Thank your for sharing in this glorious moment with me.  Remember to everything there is a season.  This cleanliness is but for a season, even if it's the shortest season on record. :)

After two weeks with Abeka math 4 this year I was ready to pull my hair out.  My ds was frustrated and was taking a hour to do one page.  He's really good at math, so I was at the end of my rope.

After much prayer, counsel, and research we decided to switch to Singapore Math.  We've used it for two weeks and I'm so happy with it.  Most importantly we took the placement test.  I opted to start with 3A even though he did well on that test.  The 3b test showed things I knew he wouldn't get and I wanted to get a feel of the Singapore method without adding frustration again.  I wanted him to have some victory in math. 

I knew it was going to be a hit when I bought it.  I bought the Home Instructors Guide as well, which I recommend.  It suggested some manipulatives.  When it said number discs I thought of Poker chips.  Any math that my ds can use poker chips and dice will be a hit.  I didn't want to buy a whole base 10 set, so I improvised.  I used legos for part of it and a Rubic's cube to represent 1000.  Now I know the Rubic's cube doesn't have 1000 pieces but it sure feels that way when you try to solve it!  Ds loved it and got the point. 

The other day we were doing a science experiment for the planet Mercury.  It involved a bowl of flour and rocks, so i thought outside might be a good place to do it.  It was.  After the experiment ds wanted to put flour all over his body and his clean himself off with the hose.  Why not.  So we did math orally and he got them all correct.  It was great.  It was a hoot watching him slather his legs with flour while trying to figure out 4 digit numbers.  Definately a priceless moment. 

So singapore math is a hit with us.  Now I just wonder if there are any health benefits to being covered in flour.

Well, the first official hurricane to hit the Gulf coast in 2007 lands right in my area.  Fancy that, we didn't even know there was a hurricane coming! Since it wasn't declared a hurricane until the middle of the night and it was only declared a tropical storm yesterday.  If I sound a little bitter well I am.  Humberto is standing in the way of some very big plans we had for this weekend.   

Besides the inconvienience we are experiencing we are currently just getting rain.  They have called off school for most of the area and are prediciting localized flooding.  My hubby is supposed to be finishing a roof today.  It may be getting draped in a lovely blue tarp today instead. 

I plan on taking some pictures once it is daylight.  While our house doesn't flood, our ditch in our front yard does.  If we get enough rain it creates a nice lake effect and our street has flooded before. 

Please pray that this storms dissaptes quickly and let the rain head out to where others need it.  We certainley don't. 

While I don't have the pictures yet I wanted to share this creepy story.  Yesterday my hubby saw a snake sitting in the rafters of our carport that is attached to our shed.  He just uses it to store his work stuff so I don't have to go back there.  It was a little 3ft snake, according to his estimates.  I was curious, but not overly curious.  Hubby's trailer was also parked under there so I either had to get super close, or on the other side of the trailer.  I opted for the further part, not knowing the snakes intent.  Hubby said it looked like he/she had just had dinner.  I would assume that meant a bump in it belly. 

I got out the digital camera and snapped a few shaky shots.  One turned out and you can even see the reflection of it's eyes! I couldn't even see it's eyes from my vantage point.  My son was very excited about that point but didn't want to get super close either.

So today I went out there and again the snake is up there.  I had checked earlier and didn't see it, so I either missed it or the snake now has a great hideway from the daily rains we've been having.  I was a little creeped out by the whole thing, but I'd rather know where the snakes are than not see them at all.  We seen at least 4 different kinds in our yard, that's one reason we quit trying to explore our overgrown acerage. 

So I quit watching the snakes and enjoyed a nice display from the green anole lizards who were lunching on a bunch of ants crawling all over the carport.  They are fun to watch in comparison with the snake, who didn't move at all. 

So now I'm off to research the internet to see if I can determine what kind of snake it actually is.  I'll post pictures when I get them uploaded.  In the meantime I'm not going outside with shoes anymore. 

I set my alarm today for the first day in ages.  I got around 4:30 to watch the lunar eclipse.  It was pretty cool.  Even got a "wow" out of me before any coffee.  I was also excited because this was the day we did our solar system project.  It came straight out of the Apologia Astronomy book.  I found a file on the yahoo group that talked about using feet to spread out the planets.  We cut that down to inches and still used over 98 feet of our driveway.  Here are some pictures of our project. 

the white rags under the balloons are simply so the concrete didn't pop the balloon.  It was great fun, even my son ran to get ready for school.  We made it the first subject since it looked like rain. 

Here is the sun (yellow), mercury, venus, earth and mars.  While the planets were not in correct proportion, the spacing between them was.

Here is my son using Dad's measuring wheel to measure out the inches.  (sorry the mess behind him is remnents of our remodel, the blue thing is the trash trailer my hubby uses for work.  Can you say Fema tarp) - shirts are optional for him until winter, at least at school. 

Here's the view looking back from "pluto"  back towards the sun.  The sun was at the shed.  Okay, I know technically pluto is not a planet anymore, but I just couldn't leave it out there all by itself. 

Here is my son posing with his Astronomy book.  There was no smile because he was ready to demolish the solar system using his BB gun. 

That was our science for the day.  My pictures of the eclipse are on the other camera and look like alien spacecraft zipping around since I have no tripod.  I hope you a great time exploring the solar system with us.  Please exit the craft in an  orderly fashion.  May you live long and prosper. 

(I either need a nap or coffee)

I'm finally at downloading the pictures of our new classroom.  It is in our seldom used dining room. 

Here's our school desk.  Plenty of room to spread out.  Yes, a chandelier over a school desk should be standard.

This is my desk.  It's amazing how much space you don't need when you get rid of the desktop computer.

This is from our orientation.  I set most of our books out for my hubby to look at.

I view other people's blog and I am amazed at the extra stuff people put on them.  I am not technologically deficient, but I'm more a googler than a programmer.  But I wanted to add a list of books we're reading to the right hand column of my blog. 

 I carefully entered the template area of my blog.  I've been in there before to update pictures, but the help section was pretty specific on those instructions.  I saw combinations of words, letters and characters that I've seen before.  That is usually when my hubby is sitting at my computer and I'm standing over him while he says, "This is the part of the computer you should never venture into by yourself."  I obey as the submissive wife that I am (yeah, right).  Okay I'm working on that one, but opinionated women run in my family. 

I copied the code of what I thought I'd need to use.  After a few previews and a few tweaks I had done it.  I did a little happy dance in my chair.  I made my hubby come and look.  He looked at the template language and was fairly impressed. 

So I'm happy now.  I have the books that my son and I are currently reading.  Two we are reading together.  One is mine alone and one my son is reading on his own. I even know how to update them too.  So while computer programmer may never show up on my resume I do feel like I accomplished a little learning today.

I almost fell out of my chair.  Thank the Lord for Easy Grammar.  We are still in the beginning phase and memorizing the prepositions.  Today was bingo day.  Yes, that is in the book.  I put each of the prep into a cup and had my son draw them out.  He had to make a prepositional phrase out of each one, and I had to make a full sentence.  I had planned on stopping when we reached one bingo.

  He decided he wanted to continue until we had done them all.  Then he said, (please reference title quote here).  My heart was doing a little dance.  He had no idea that he was learning so much while having fun.  His reward was 15 extra minutes of break. 

Of course, he's fussing about doing math, but it's a journey right? 

I think my motto for this year is going to be "Blessed are the flexible for they shall not be bent out of shape!"  I call it the missing beatitude and it has worked through so much of my life.  Right now it is Monday morning and we are supposed to be doing "school".  My honey is playing catch up and run around today for work so I suggested that he take our son.  So learning is still happening but not in the traditional sense.  Daddy time is precious so I know they are having fun hanging out.

Our week went well.  I love our new dateless schedule, which I will attempt to explain in another post.  It has freed me to go with the flow more and be a little less impatient. 

In the last week I discovered that my schedule for 4th grade takes longer than 3rd grade.  So we're going to have to tweak and add a lunch break.  I also discovered the only time I saw fussing was when I made him do anything in a workbook.  I did explain that Easy Grammar will get easier.  Abeka math is going to take some tweaking.  He hates doing review and I've already crossed off several of the problems per day.  I may just make him do the new stuff and allow him to chose a certain amount of review.  I do feel I am teaching with him more than teaching at him.  We've had some great discussions already. 

He is using an exercise ball for his chair and it took me a few days to get used to the bouncing.  Although he says it's not bouncing it sure looks like it to me.  He's also discovered that he like to read while laying over the ball and with the book on the floor.  His reading time is just about snack time so for the last two days I served his snack bowl on the floor.  It's really unconventional looking, but his retention has been great and his narrations back have been very detailed.  He's currently reading "Meet Christopher Columbus". 

He has also devoured our art program, which makes me do a little happy dance.  I purchased "Drawing Basics with Thomas Kinkade".  It was my splurge for this year and I had read mixed reviews.  Well my son loves to draw and he watched the entire DVD this week.  Now he didn't do all the lessons, but we are already a few weeks ahead.  Thomas Kinkade is a wonderful teacher, he reminds me of Bob Ross.  I wish he'd do a Advanced Drawing or Painting program.

  One of the things I love about homeschooling is the life lessons you can interject along the way.  My husband and I have been pretty much transparent about some of the mistakes we've made in our lives and we try to show our son how to benefit from our wisdom.  Currently we have only car and I don't like it, but we are saving to pay cash for a 2nd vehicle.  While doing math this week I caught my son erasing a harder problem I circled for him to to do.  He wanted to do an easier one.  He told me what he was doing so it wasn't a big deal except out of my mouth flew the words, "You'll get no where in life if you just do the easy things." He stopped and looked at me with the strangest look.  I ask him if wanted his wife to not have a car at 40 years old.  He said "no."  I then told him that he needed to get used to do some of the hard things to avoid that.  I wasn't harsh and he got the point. 

So our first week was great.  I am hoping that it continues to flow well.  Sounds like the boys just got home, so gotta go.

Tomorrow is our first day of 4th grade.  I'm not sure who is more nervous, me or him. I did get all the rooms moved and the dining room/classroom is ready.  It's all new stuff this year and I am hoping to get some enthusiasm that was missing from 3rd grade. We had our orientation last night and showed off my months of research and buying to my hubby.  I told him his job was just be enthusiastic.  He was impressed and I felt a little overwhelmed. 

I'm almost as nervous as I used to be starting school myself.  Remember the new clothes, the new bookbag (I graduated before backpacks), and Trapper Keepers? Tomorrow I'll have a new computer, lots of composition books, and a new classroom.  My son will show up in shorts, shoes and shirts are not required for him.  By noon hopefully we'll be done, and this week we're even taking a day off to go out of town.  Come to think of it I love homeschooling!