THIS IS A STICKY POST:  IT WILL STAY AT THE TOP UNTIL THE CONTEST IS OVER, SCROLL DOWN FOR NEW ENTRIES!

The Old Schoolhouse is allowing me to give away one copy of the new Homeschool Planner.  This will be my first contest and I'm so excited.  To read my review of my planner go here.

Here are the rules for the contest.  Just leave a comment on this entry post and I will put your name in the drawing.  If you post about this contest on your blog or homeschool lounge page I will enter your name twice.  Let me know in your comment if you have posted about the contest. I will pick a random name on Thursday July 10th.  You don't want to miss a chance to win this awesome planner! 

Make sure if you don't have a blog you leave a way for me to get in touch with you, an email address would be great!

This planner sells in the Old Schoolhouse Store for  $39.00

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry.

Today I am going to review the new Old Schoolhouse Planner!  Heidi from ReviewsbyHeidi has given me a planner to review on my blog and the website.  I am so excited!  This was on my wish list for sure!  The best part is I also get to give one away in a contest!!!  I'm going to review it here and my next entry will be the contest details, I hope you all try to win!  Its such a great planner.

The first word out of my mouth as I opened my planner was WOW!  I heard how great this was but I don't think I realized how great it could have been until I saw it.  It is AWESOME!  This planner is by far the greatest one I have ever seen!

This planner is an ebook.  The great thing about that is you can print off what you want and leave what you don't, the cover would be great to print off and put in a 3 ring notebook and you could put the rest of the book inside and have a great planner for school time.  It has 247 pages in it, it's also interactive so you can work on the pages in your computer and print them off, wow-thats great. 

It has everything you would imagine a planner to have.  Calendars, charts, address pages, and dates to remember BUT it has so much more!  So much more!  It has field trip planning, sheets on your garden, the US Presidents and their wives, State and country capitals, budget, vacation planning, chore charts, Bible reading schedule, and  prayer journal.

It also has some wonderful tools to help you at home.  Menu planning, daily schedules, monthly homekeeping reminders, family health records, a sheet for the babysitter and through out your will find some great recipes.  I'm telling you it has it all!

Of course no homeschool planner would be complete without pages to help you with your homeschooling.  It has sheets on your curriculum, your schedule for the year, a measurement conversions sheet, a sheet on famous composers, and even a timeline of inventions.  Throughout the whole planner there are teaching tips, anything from why its good to teach a foreign language to solving your science struggles. 

 If you have this planner you will have a homeschool and house notebook in one.  The ones who put this together thought of it ALL!  You can tell this was made from homeschool homemaking moms!  They left nothing out.  I can think of no better gift for yourself then this, it will help you be more organized and efficient and you will be able to keep all your records in one place.  You don't want to miss out on this one.

This planner sells in the Old Schoolhouse Store for  $39.00

I will have a post right after this one on how to win one for yourself! 

We had such a great time at the homeschool convention in Columbus.  We heard some great speakers and I look foward to sharing some of it with you, also we finished buying the rest of the things we need for the next school year.  I LOVE picking out our next year curriculum and bringing it home, so fun!  We are so blessed because a great friend is loaning us a full year of MFW so we really just needed our math, handwriting, english, workbooks, and those kind of things.  That helped so much financially and we are so grateful for it!

Another exciting thing was I met Jen Igarashi at the Rosetta Stone booth, its so fun to meet another blogger and Jen has touched my heart in so many way with her writings, I never imagined I would ever be able to say I knew her, and now I can!  How neat. 

My husband and I had such a great time going over goals we had for our family for the coming year and for ourselves, I think I look forward to the trip the most for that reason.  Its a great thing if you can get together sometimes just to go over things and evaluate what is working and what is not in your family, we had LOTS to talk about, lol.  Anyway its great to be home. 

Thanks to Uncle John and Aunt Lis for making it happen, they have posted about their weekend with our kids on their blog purrsnsnorts.  If they weren't willing to take three kids every year, we would never be able to go.

Don't forget to check out the contest tomorrow for the planner and if you have any product at all you can review please join us for Tuesday Review! 

What are some of you doing this summer?  I see by reading blogs some of you are taking trips, working in your garden, swimming.  Isn't summer wonderful?  The worst part is when it gets really hot and you have no way to cool off.

I can't believe how fast summer is going, just next week will be the 4th of July weekend, can you believe it?  I sure can't.  I set all these goals for the summer and then before I can even really start the list summer is halfway through! 

Some of the things I hope to do is organizing the place like I said in a previous post, do at least 2 great lapbooks with my preschoolers, finish up project managing an ebook on preschoolers for the Old Schoolhouse, catching lighting bugs with my kids (what kind of summer would it be without that)?  Having a few picnics under our big tree in the front yard?  Helping my dh with his garage project (boy this will be a big one)  and of course many other things, however I want to be content regardless of what I get done and just enjoy!  Hopefully above all I will accomplish that!

I was blessed enough to get a copy of the new old schoolhouse planner to review for my blog and the website.  I am very excited about this planner, its awesome!  So Tuesday during my Tuesday Review I will post my review and the BEST part is The Old Schoolhouse is going to allow me to give one copy of this planner away!  Yeah, my first contest!  So you come over and visit Tuesday and find out all the details for a chance to win this great planner! 

Most of all Enjoy your summer to the fullest!

My husband and I are going to the Columbus, OH homeschool convention this weekend-if your going to be there let me know!  Would love to meet some of you.

My middle son LOVES cars!  I mean LOVES cars, we have been to two car shows already this summer.  He loves them!  This is him and his brother, I thought the pic was precious!

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry.

Today I am going to talk about my Flylady Calendar.  This is one of my favorite things, its one of those things I ask for every Christmas.  I know there are many calendars out there but this one is a great for your Family Center to put all your important dates on for everyone in the family to see.  I love it because it has huge blocks and you can fit several engagements on one date.  It comes with stickers where you can label your cleaning zone by week and all of your special dates.  I love this, you can get it at www.flylady.net.

I can't believe all the books that I have received lately with paperback swap!  I have been organizing as you know and have donated some books as well as listed some on paperback swap so I have been getting several credits lately.  I have a two page waiting list for certain books and some have been on there awhile.  They are finally starting to pay off, I have really been getting several lately on my list.  I know most of you are familar with paperback swap but for the ones that are not you list 10 books you are willing to get rid of and you automatically get 3 credits for books that are listed, you get them for free.  The ones you request them from pay shipping and when you receive the book you mark it as received and the giver of the book gets a credit for a book.  When you send a book you pay shipping.   So the more books you have listed that get requested the more credits you will get.  I just LOVE it!  Here are some books I have received this year.

If you sign up because of my blog please put in my email and I will get one free book.  You will find my email at the top of the page.

 Some pictures of us celebrating Father's Day. 

My husband and his dad, you would never guess, huh?   

Dad and me!

My brother joining us!

My dad, his fiance and our kids-we had a great Father's Day!

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry.

THE HORSE AND HIS BOY

CS LEWIS

Well we just finished The Horse and His Boy in the Narnia Series.  I LOVED it!  Of couse what Narnia book don't we like, right?  We listened to this on audio CD, which was just so great-we had it in the car and just couldn't wait to go somewhere so we could listen to what was going to happen next.  Audio books are such a great way to get some of those classics in that you just don't have time for.  My husband enjoyed this so much that he decided we should have a couple of nights that we listen to a great book together as a family, like the old days of sitting around listening to the radio because its all people had.  I bet so many memories were made that way!  We want to start Prince Caspian so we can go see the movie!

I found this book a little harder to understand at first, I tried to play this for my son quite awhile ago and he just didn't seem to be getting any of it so I took it back to the library and we tried again recently.  It made all the difference!  I think its slower to get into at first unlike the two before it but once it gets moving I think its quite thrilling.  I loved the characters in it, Shasta  (slave boy)and Avavis(runaway girl) and the talking horses from Narnia.  They brought so much to the story, learning about each ones background and past and why getting to Narnia was so important for each of them.  There are many suprises in the story which I won't reveal in case you haven't read this one yet.  There are also some exciting battles and many other characters they meet along the way that add so much to the story.  And of course no Narnia story would be complete without Aslan himself, just like in the others, some great parallels to Christ.  I love when Bree the talking horse just can't believe that Aslan is really a lion and Aslan is telling him, "Touch Me. Smell Me. Here are my paws, here is my tail, these are my whiskers.  I am a true Beast."  It was like hearing the story of doubting Thomas! 

The owners of Sonlight say this is their favorite in the Narnia series, you don't hear much about this book compared to the others and there may never be a great Motion Picture of it but in my opinion there should be.  This is an excellent story, make sure if your reading Narnia-you don't miss it!

Well it has been 7 weeks since I broke my ankle, it seems like longer to me!  Several of you have asked how I was and I'm so grateful that you are thinking of me and praying, it means more then you know!  I am doing great.  I saw the dr. today and he said to start weaning myself off of the fracture boot.  The only issue I really have (which is really normal) is that my leg and foot are very weak.  He says that my muscles are only at 50 percent, which means of course I need to work up another 50 percent strength.  So I will have several weeks of physical therapy and exercises at home.  Please pray I will stay motivated and will take the time and effort to do this.  It’s the only way I'm going to be back where I need to be.  I'm so grateful this was a clean-cut break (if it had to be any) I avoided surgery, a cast and was able to walk around on it most of my time with it.  That is a HUGE blessing!  They say 85 percent of ankle breaks have to have surgery so Thank You Jesus for letting me avoid that! 

Anytime something like this happens to us God can sure use it to slow us down.  He teaches us to be still, rest awhile and let GO of things.  I won't mislead you though it is not been easy for me.  Sitting around when I want to be doing, doing, and doing.

  I am so grateful for the friends and family I have during times like this too, it makes me see how blessed I am that people run over a meal, a shower seat, a walker, a sister in law that cleaned my house -that many have remembered me in their prayer times for a quick recovery.  That my children have learned a little more about helping a family member out and making sure mom has a clear path to the bathroom!  I remember the day I came home with the temporary cast and my children were running around like bees trying to help me.  Can I bring you a pillow mom?  Can I get you the footrest?  How can we help you?  Ah yes, I am blessed!  And I have to mention my husband who has sacrificed his life for mine during these many weeks.  I have not been able to drive so he has come home from work to take me the Dr.’s and therapy, rearranged his morning to get my son to his piano practice and has done more laundry then he would like to count.  How blessed I am to have him as my husband, I can't thank God enough for him-I'm truly not worthy enough. 

I'm excited about moving on and real soon coming out of this boot totally!  Just wanted to update you all out there that have been checking in on me!

Well, my BIG summer project-I want to organize every room in the house.  I would LOVE to be clutter free throughout every room when school starts again!  I would love to do every drawer, cabinet, and inside place but that is not realistic.  So if I can just take care of the stuff you see in the room when you walk in I would be so happy.  Of course getting all this done by the end of summer would be a miracle but I happen to believe in miracles so I'm going for it.  I would love to take before and after pics and share it-I thought that would be fun and keep me accountable.   I started last night with my boys bookcase, oh what a mess!  I HAVE to get rid of some books, which is so hard for me.  However they have grown out of a lot of them, boo hoo!  They are getting so big!  So I'm on a mission, I would love to have an organized home by fall, it doesn't have to be super clean all the time, I just know I would feel better if there was less STUFF!  Any of you have organization projects for the summer?  I would love to hear about them!

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry.

I LOVE this mop, we bought it from the clean team.    Its called the sh-mop. It has a cloth over the bottom and you can rewash the cloths after you are done mopping.  The mop turns and swivels, so its easy to get under the cabinets and furniture.  It has a really wide bottom so it covers a lot of floor in one swipe!  The clean team sells a cleaner that is all natural, free of chemicals to use with the mop as well, however you can use whatever cleaner you like.  They recommend stopping up the sink with the stopper and dipping the cloth in that since the mop is so wide and won't fit in a standard bucket.  Even my husband loves this mop, you know when you get a man to love a cleaning tool, it has to be good.  LoL.  This is what their site/catalog says about it!

New 22" of molded foam on handle provides unparalleled user comfort.

Ideal for virtually any hard floor: vinyl, urethane-finished wood, tile, marble.

 Use it on walls, windows, ceilings, cabinets.

Rugged design lasts and lasts.

Large surface area quickly covers more territory than conventional mops.

Cleans without streaking. Sh-Wipes can be machine washed and sanitized after every use.

It's like having a new, sparkling clean mop every time you clean. No need for a bucket. 

Mary over at Canadagirl is hosting Friday Show n Tell this week and she wants us to share our pets if you want to and of course I love to show them off so here goes.

First there is Max, our pure bred labrador retriever.  He is a great family dog, he is just wonderful with the kids.  Of course he loves water and one of the funny things he does is lay down to drink his water, how lazy is that!  He is a beautiful dog.

Next is Mobly, Mobly was found as a kitten in our garbage in 1997 around Thanksgiving time.  He was very cold and hungry and when we took him to the vet they felt he was around 6 months old.  He has been with us every since.  He is more my husbands cat, he loves him.  He is very laid back and doesn't have as much energy now that he is 11 yrs old.  Mobly will only drink out of the bathroom sink, where water flows out so every morning when you go in you have to turn the sink on for him!  He has always been that way!

Last is Aslan.  He is a beautiful tabby cat, I love him.  He is only 2.  My oldest son has such a bond with him.  He climbs up the steps of his top bunk on the bunk bed every night to see him, its so cute.  He loves the kids too which seems rare for a cat.  I think it helps we got him after having a house that was full.  He seems to always want to be in  room with people and loves us being home.  He will be looking at the window when we drive up.   This is a picture of him and my daughter, I know he shouldn't be on the table and I don't let him but this picture was too cute to pass up!

If you look at my first page on my blog I have a couple more cute pictures of my kitties on Wordless Wednesday!

 This is an area God is working on my heart big time lately so I thought it would be fun to participate in Sheila's Wifey Wednesday. 

My husband and I are doing The Wife and Husband after Gods Own Heart books together.  Elizabeth George wrote mine and her husband wrote the other.  One of the things that really stuck out to me was the Praying for Your Husband three times a day.  When you wake up, noon time and right before he comes home from work or you could do the third time before you sleep (which ever is easier for you to remember)  I can't help but wonder where we would be as a couple if I had done that from the time we married  almost 14 years ago.  Don't get me wrong, I have prayed for him and I feel blessed to have the marriage I have-I have said before (I know how blessed in this area I am)  but I didn't' regularly pray for him either, maybe if he was going through a particular trial or sick but not just because.  Who knows what God may have done for both of us if I would have made him a daily priority in this area?  I'm so grateful Gods grace is new each morning and it’s never too late to start a new habit.  Are you praying for your husband on the regular basis, if not join me in sending up prayers on behalf of our soul mates!

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry.

Today I am reviewing my digital camera, I LOVE this camera.   The reason I love it is its perfect for what I want in a camera.  I want a zoom lens but it doesn't have to be a huge one, I want a camera small enough to be able to easily carry and one that takes great pictures!  I also needed one that wasn't outrageous in price.  This one ranges from $300-$350, not cheap for us homeschoolers but if you really want a nice camera thats not bad compared to most!  Anytime I am going to spend $100 or more on anything, I do a lot of research.  I look at reviews everywhere I can and ask friends and family as well.  A creative memories customer I once had told me about this camera, I just loved her pictures.  I started reading about it and I couldn't believe the reviews-every site that sells it has it at least 4, mostly 5 stars.  People LOVE this camera-I was feel like its a camera you don't hear of much, very under rated in my opinion but I was happy to see it was rated as one of the best cameras in its price range in a poll I saw on AOL not too long ago!

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18K 8.1-Megapixel Digital Camera - They have it in black or silver!

 Well we are finally finishing up school this week.  Today in MFW (My Fathers World) we will write a letter to the President of the US!  I have heard from others who have done this in Adventures and they usually get a letter back so that will be fun to put in our history notebooks, I hope we get one!  It has been a wonderful school year, next week I hope to blog about our year and share some pictures of some things we have done!  We are really excited about doing exploring countries and cultures next year in our history cycle, everyone I know who uses My Fathers World have all said they LOVE this year, it should be a lot of fun!

Last week on Memorial Day weekend we went to Boonesborough KY where Daniel Boone's Fort is.  It was a beautiful day and we took a 2 hrs scenic drive there, going through beautiful Lexington and many other small towns.  They were having a festival where they had people dressed like colonial days and doing jobs like soap and candle making.  This was a wonderful trip because we studied this fort this year so to be able to visit it and really see hands on how they lived and fought there was a wonderful experience for my 3rd grader.  The sad part of the trip was I lost my camera!  Because I still have a broken ankle I had to stop and rest more, (I am walking on it in my boot), however I give out easier then if I didn't have it of course, I must have left it at one of the rest.  It had to be one of the last ones because I remember having it during most of the visit.  We called but someone had taken it.  I hate losing the camera, however I hate losing the photos more.  I would have loved to show you some of the great things we saw but they are lost forever!   My husband is allowing me to replace the camera, thank you so much sweetie for that!  He knows how much that camera meant to me and he loves having family photos too!  I love the camera so much that tomorrow I will be reviewing it so you will have to visit and check it out and join us, the more reviews the better!

Our last family night was also a beautiful night so we went and just old fashioned park played.  We went to two different parks and ate dinner at Pizza Hut with Uncle John and Aunt Lis.  Then me and my older son sat up in my room and watched Dog Whisperer late in the night and ate chocolate and the younger ones stayed out in the living room with dad and watched shows, ate snacks and laughed quite a bit (we could hear them) The kids sometimes camp together in homemade tents on Family nights but my oldest wanted some mom time, I think last time he had dad time.  So that’s always nice when your kids want to have quality time with you, we had a great time together.  I encourage you all to start family nights, even if its just once a month where you do something special as a family that the kids really love to do!  It doesn't have to cost money or can cost very little its just another great way to bond with your children!

Eleanor Joyce is having a contest and giving a copy of this magazine away.  I had never heard of this magazine before but this is what Eleanor has on her blog,  The magazine is of the highest quality, over 100 pages, with stunningly beautiful photos throughout, and lots of scripture verse overlays. You will recognize most of the columnists - well known writers in the Christian community. Recipes, crafts, decorating ideas - they're all here - and they're all GORGEOUS! 
Head over here to enter a drawing for a free copy!  I would love to win, I love great magazines!

If you have a product, book, curriculum, anything that makes life better  for you please write a review and then leave a comment and sign Mr. Linky so we can all see the product you are reviewing.  I love to write reviews and love to read them so I think this will be so much fun!  Feel free to copy the picture above and add it to your sidebar or just use it for your review entry. 

Today I am going to review a game.  I love to play board games and card games, they are so much fun and what a way to bond as a family! 

This is a game my mother in law LOVED, before she passed away she taught my oldest son to play, they used to play all the time.  What a memory for a child to have with his grandmother.  After she passed early this year my father in law started getting it out for us, he started to LOVE it too and now we are all hooked.  Your lost loved one will always be a part of your family, some of their traditions live through you, some of their looks(my niece looks so much like her), their faith and on and on.  When we play this game I feel that way, another part of her that will go on!  My children will probably teach their children this game and that is just a wonderful thing! 

Mexican Train Domino

A double twelve set of dominoes is used. This contains all possible pairs of numbers from 0 (blank) to 12, giving 91 pieces in all. In addition you use trains!  Everyone picks a color.  The dominoes are shuffled and each player takes a number of dominoes and stands them on edge so that their faces are visible to the owner but not to the other players. Up to 4 players take 15 dominoes each, 5 or 6 take 12 each, 7 or 8 take 10 each, and 9 or 10 players take 8 each. The remaining dominoes are left face down in the boneyard. 

You can get a great set of directions at this site.  http://www.websitelink.com/mexicantrainrules/

This game is so much fun, one of the things I love about it is its simplicity.  Its not hard to learn, even though my younger children don't quite understand it all they can easily help an adult and they really do enjoy it!  They look for the right color and the right amount of dots.  Its so much fun with a large group, last night we had family over-there was 9 of us-with the two younger ones helping adults and coming and going when they wanted.  We had a blast, laughing and competing-my father in law was there teaching my brother, sister in law and my mom.  He seemed to really enjoy it and we had a great evening, it was truly hard to quit!  If this is a game you don't own yet, you have to put it on your wish list-you won't regret it!