Jesus and Satan were having an on-going argument about who was better on the computer. They had been going at it for days, and frankly God was tired of hearing all the bickering. 
  
Finally fed up, God said, 'THAT'S IT! I have had enough. I am going to set up a test that will run for two hours, and from those results, I will judge who does the better job.' 

So Satan and Jesus sat down at the keyboards and typed away. 
  
They moused. 
  
They faxed. 

They e-mailed. 
  
They e-mailed with attachments. 
  
They downloaded. 
  
They did spreadsheets! 

They wrote reports. 

They created labels and cards. 
  
They created charts and graphs. 

They did some genealogy reports 
  
They did every job known to man. 
  
Jesus worked with heavenly efficiency and Satan was faster than hell. 
  
Then, ten minutes before their time was up, lightning suddenly flashed across the sky, thunder rolled, rain poured, and, of course, the power went off.. 

 Satan stared at his blank screen and screamed every curse word known in the underworld. 
 
Jesus just sighed. 
  
Finally the electricity came back on, and each of them restarted their computers. Satan started searching frantically, screaming: 

  'It's gone! It's all GONE! 'I lost everything when the power went out!' 
  
Meanwhile, Jesus quietly started printing out all of his files from the past two hours of work. 
  
Satan observed this and became irate. 
  
'Wait!' he screamed. 'That's not fair! He cheated! How come he has all his work and I don't have any?' 

God just shrugged and said, 
  
JESUS SAVES

What My Mother Taught Me
Author Unknown

My mother taught me TO APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE.
"If you're going to kill each other, do it outside.
I just finished cleaning."

My mother taught me RELIGION .
"You better pray that will come out of the carpet."

My mother taught me LOGIC.
"Because I said so, that's why."

My mother taught me MORE LOGIC.
"If you fall out of that swing and break your neck,
you're not going to the store with me."

My mother taught me FORESIGHT.
"Make sure you wear clean underwear,
in case you're in an accident."

My mother taught me IRONY.
"Keep crying, and I'll give you something to cry about."

My mother taught me about the science of OSMOSIS.
"Shut your mouth and eat your supper."

My mother taught me about STAMINA.
"You'll sit there until all that spinach is gone."

My mother taught me about WEATHER.
"This room of yours looks as if a tornado went through it."

My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY.
"If I told you once, I've told you a million times.
Don't exaggerate!"

My mother taught me the CIRCLE OF LIFE.
"I brought you into this world, and I can take you out."

My mother taught me about BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION .
"Stop acting like your father!"

My mother taught me about ENVY.
"There are millions of less fortunate children in this world who
don't have wonderful parents like you do."

My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION.
"Just wait until we get home."

My mother taught me about RECEIVING .
"You are going to get it when you get home!"

My mother taught me MEDICAL SCIENCE.
"If you don't stop crossing your eyes,
they are going to get stuck that way."

My mother taught me HOW TO BECOME AN ADULT .
"If you don't eat your vegetables, you'll never grow up."

My mother taught me GENETICS.
"You're just like your father."

My mother taught me about my ROOTS.
"Shut that door behind you.
Do you think you were born in a barn?"

My mother taught me WISDOM .
"When you get to be my age, you'll understand."

Posted in Random Thoughts

If you have dropped by my blog and seen I have not added anything in weeks, it is not because I have not wanted to - we have been very busy and have had so much sickness this winter.  It has been one cold or infection after another.  Now we are in allergy season...  I have three with really bad spring allergies so there is no relief in sight.

I love Homeschool Blogger  (my #1 source for homeschooling) but I also have two other blogs that I am trying to maintain (what was I thinking?) so if you do not find anything new posted here please visit me at my other blogs.  One is a pictorial blog at Blogger and the other is at The Homeschool Lounge.  Here are the links:

The Homeschool Lounge  Your source for fun easy blogging!

Blog Worthy at Blogger  A Pictorial Journey of CakeandCam

Let me know if you stop by...

The past few weeks we have abandoned our boring Bob Jones History books for the Dear America series.  I absolutely love these books...the first one actually was a book on tape...that got me hooked.  Since then Cake has checked out most every book they have at our library.  Also along the same line is My America and The Royal Diaries.  These books are published by Scholastic and they also have on their website all kinds of games as well as teaching guides. 

Cam has loved listening to the tapes and cds as she is not as much into reading as Cake.  As soon as we get in the car she wants me to turn on the tape for them to finish listening to.  We have actually sat out in the car and finished listening to a tape before going into the house.  I also think because we only listen to them in the car they are much more interesting; at home their are too many distractions.

Our favorites so far have been:

The Winter of Red Snow, The Revolutionary War Diary of Abigail Jane Stewart, Valley Forge, Pennsylvania,  1777

Across the Wide and Lonesome Prairie, The Oregon Trail Dairy of Hattie Campbell, 1847

I Walk in Dread,The Diary of Deliverance Trembly, Witness to the Salem Witch Trials Massachusetts Bay Colony, 1691

Posted in Emails

Black and White

(Under age 40? You won't understand.)

You could hardly see for all the snow,

Spread the rabbit ears as far as they go.

Pull a chair up to the TV set,

"Good Night, David. Good Night, Chet."

My Mom used to cut chicken, chop eggs and spread mayo on the same cutting board with the same knife and no bleach, but we didn't seem to get food poisoning.

My Mom used to defrost hamburger on the counter AND I used to eat it raw sometimes, too. Our school sandwiches were wrapped in wax paper in a brown paper bag, not in ice-pack coolers, but I can't remember getting e.coli.

Almost all of us would have rather gone swimming in the lake instead of a pristine pool (talk about boring), no beach closures then.

The term cell phone would have conjured up a phone in a jail cell, and a pager was the school PA system.

We all took gym, not PE . and risked permanent injury with a pair of high top Ked's (only worn in gym) instead of having cross-training athletic shoes with air cushion soles and built in light reflectors. I can't recall any injuries but they must have happened because they tell us how much safer we are now.

Flunking gym was not an option even for stupid kids! I guess PE must be much harder than gym.

Speaking of school, we all said prayers and sang the national anthem, and staying in detention after school caught all sorts of negative attention.

We must have had horribly damaged psyches. What an archaic health system we had then. Remember school nurses? Ours wore a hat and everything.

I thought that I was supposed to accomplish something before I was allowed to be proud of myself.

I just can't recall how bored we were without computers, Play Station, Nintendo, X-box or 270 digital TV cable stations.

Oh yeah ... and where was the Benadryl and sterilization kit when I got that bee sting? I could have been killed!

We played 'king of the hill' on piles of gravel left on vacant construction sites, and when we got hurt, Mom pulled out the 48-cent bottle of Mercurochrome (kids liked it better because it didn't sting like iodine did) and then we got our butt spanked.

Now it's a trip to the emergency room, followed by a 10-day dose of a $49 bottle of antibiotics, and then Mom calls the attorney to sue the contractor for leaving a horribly vicious pile of gravel where it was such a threat.

We didn't act up at the neighbor's house either because if we did, we got our butt spanked there and then we got butt spanked again when we got home.

I recall Donny Reynolds from next door coming over and doing his tricks on the front stoop, just before he fell off. Little did his Mom know that she could have owned our house. Instead, she picked him up and swatted him for being such a goof. It was a neighborhood run amuck.

To top it off, not a single person I knew had ever been told that they were from a dysfunctional family. How could we possibly have known that we needed to get into group therapy and anger management classes? We were obviously so duped by so many societal ills that we didn't even notice that the entire country wasn't taking Prozac! How did we ever survive?

LOVE TO ALL OF US WHO SHARED THIS ERA, AND TO ALL WHO DIDN'T; SORRY FOR WHAT YOU MISSED. I WOULDN'T TRADE IT FOR ANYTHING.

Posted in Videos

Posted in Site of the Week

Yesterday we went to see "The Spiderwick Chronicles" movie.  We thought it was a really good movie, but then again our taste runs a bit differently from some other homeschool familes.  Cake went to the library Monday and checked out all 5 of the Spiderwick books, as well as the field guide, and had them all read by Tuesday evening.  She thought they were wonderful so we decided to go to the movies for Valentines Day rather than go out to eat like all of the rest of the "masses" do.  Rabbit trail here:  We stopped going out for a romantic valentine dinner about 13 years ago.  We tried it for about 2 years after we were married and ended up fighting about where to go, how long we were going to have to wait, we would then leave, go somewhere else with an even longer wait, go back to the original restaurant, our name had already been called...we finally just decided we could be romantic on days other than Valentines Day, so we always order a pizza, stay at home and watch a movie!!

Now, back to the movie!  You can view a trailer for the movie here, you can find the field guide here as well;  this tells all about the characters.  Now if you really want to have fun you can make your very own, very cool Fantastical Field Guide that features a creature with its own field guide page as well as an activity.  Make sure you print in color because the page is really beautiful.

If you would like to print some activities such as Dressing your own Sprite you will find that here as well.  There are also writing pages to create your own story or change certain parts of "The Spiderwick Chronicles "to suit your own fancy.

Another fun thing we are doing today is making fairies out of silk flower petals.  You can get a bag of these at Wally World (as my husband likes to call it) for a dollar or so.  This is usually a big bag of mixed flower petals that have fallen off of the flower bush stem.  Here is one website that looks similar to the fairies we make. 

Here is an actual pdf description of how to make them

Flower fairy:

 

Lastly, here is a picture of one, but honestly the ones we have made are much prettier.  You can buy this book from Klutz..  The one at the bottom is a fantastic book by Heidi Boyd.  Tons of fairy crafts.  Hope you have as much fun as we did!

Posted in Emails

Posted in Emails

  A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day and
said,   "Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like."
The Lord led the holy man to two doors.

He opened one of the doors and the holy man looked in. In the

middle of the room was a large round table. In the middle of the
table  was a large pot of stew, which smelled delicious and made the holy
man's mouth water.

The people sitting around the table were thin and sickly.  They
appeared to be famished. They were holding spoons with very long
handles that were strapped to their arms and each found it possible to reach
into the pot of stew and take a spoonful.  But because the handle was longer

 than their arms, they could not get the spoons back into their mouths.

The holy man shuddered at the sight of their misery and suffering. 

The Lord said, "You   have seen Hell."

 They went to the next room and opened the door. It was exactly the
same as the first one. There was the large round table with the large pot
of stew which made the holy man's mouth water. The people were equipped
with the same long-handled spoons, but here the people were well nourished and plump, laughing and talking. The holy man said, "I don't understand."

It is simple," said the Lord.   "It requires but one skill. You see they have

 learned to feed each other, while the greedy think only of themselves."

Posted in Emails

Too Busy for a Friend

 One day a teacher asked her students to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name.  

Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down.

It took the remainder of the class period to finish their assignment, and as the students left the room, each one handed in the papers.

That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.

On Monday she gave each student his or her list. Before long, the entire class was smiling. "Really?" she heard whispered. "I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!" and, "I didn't know others liked me so much," were most of the comments.

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. She never knew if they discussed them after class or with their parents, but it didn't matter. The exercise had accomplished its purpose. The students were happy with themselves and one another. That group of students moved on.

Several years later, one of the students was killed in VietNam   and his teacher attended the funeral of that special student. She had never seen a serviceman in a military coffin before. He looked so handsome, so mature.

The church was packed with his friends. One by one those who loved him took a last walk by the coffin. The teacher was the last one to bless the coffin.

As she stood there, one of the soldiers who acted as pallbearer came up to her. "Were you Mark's math teacher?" he asked. She nodded: "yes." Then he said: "Mark talked about you a lot."

After the funeral, most of Mark's former classmates went together to a luncheon. Mark's mother and father were there, obviously waiting to speak with his teacher.

"We want to show you something," his father said, taking a wallet out of his pocket "They found this on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might recognize it."

Opening the billfold, he carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had obviously been taped, folded and refolded many times. The teacher knew without looking that the papers were the ones on which she had listed all the good things each of Mark's classmates had said about him.

"Thank you so much for doing that," Mark's mother said. "As you can see, Mark treasured it."

All of Mark's former classmates started to gather around. Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said, "I still have my list. It's in the top drawer of my desk at home."

Chuck's wife said, "Chuck asked me to put his in our wedding album."

"I have mine too," Marilyn said. "It's in my diary"

Then Vicki, another classmate, reached into her pocketbook, took out her wallet and showed her worn and frazzled list to the group. "I carry this with me at all times," Vicki said and without batting an eyelash, she continued: "I think we all saved our lists"

That's when the teacher finally sat down and cried. She cried for Mark and for all his friends who would never see him again. The density of people in society is so thick that we forget that life will end one day. And we don't know when that one day will be.
 So please, tell the people you love and care for, that they are special and important. Tell them, before it is too late.

Posted in Random Thoughts

A life lesson we sometimes forget...

A group of graduates, well established in their careers, were talking at a reunion and decided to go visit their old university professor, now retired. During their visit, the conversation turned to complaints about stress in their work and lives. Offering his guests hot chocolate, the professor went into the kitchen and returned with a large pot of hot chocolate and an assortment of cups - porcelain, glass, crystal, some plain looking, some expensive, some exquisite - telling them to help themselves to the hot chocolate. 
When they all had a cup of hot chocolate in hand, the professor said: 'Notice that all the nice looking, expensive cups were taken, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress.
The cup that you're drinking from adds nothing to the quality of the hot chocolate. In most cases it is just more expensive and in some cases even hides what we drink.  
What all of you really wanted was hot chocolate, not the cup; but you consciously went  for the best cups... And then you began eyeing each other's cups.
Now consider this: Life is the hot chocolate; your job, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain life. The cup you have does not define, nor change the quality of life you have.
Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the hot chocolate God has provided us. God makes the hot chocolate, man chooses the cups. The happiest people don't have the best of everything. They just make the best of everything that they have. Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. And enjoy your hot chocolate

Posted in Videos

I heard this song the other day, it is called "Writing on the Wall" by Mark Harris and it just struck a familiar note with me.  The husband comes home and can tell the wife has had a bad day, and then the little boy comes down the hall and the Momma says for him to show his Daddy what he has done.  As many times in my girls lives I have had this experience - of being so aggravated about the "purple crayon" incident or something similar and their Daddy only seeing the humor in it (of course looking back I see the humor in it and realize I should not have been so upset.)

I remember the incidents with tissue paper being unrolled, full boxes of Cheerios being dumped into a bowl, coloring new shoes with crayons...they are funny stories now, but at the time - NOT!  I suppose we should realize how soon these little ones grow up and we need to just treasure every minute we have with them, because before long they will grown and out on their own calling to tell us what "Harold did with his purple crayon" and we will see the humor in it then.

Hope you enjoy the video.

Posted in Videos

Today we went to see Alvin & the Chipmunks, and I must admit I did not think it could possibly be as good as I remembered from my childhood - but it was WONDERFUL!!!  The computer animation of these sweet little cuddly chipmunks makes you want to go out and find one.  Theodore was my favorite, he had such cute little green eyes (color coordinated to his outfit), also Theodore was voiced by Jessie McCartney who is quite a hit around my "tween" girls.

Still, in spite of all of the wonderful computer animation, there is still something to be said about "old school".  Check out this classic video and the "Hula Hoop" song.

Also, if you ever had problems understanding "Chipmunk" lingo, here are the lyrics.
Chipmunks:)
Christmas, Christmas time is near,
Time for toys and time for cheer.
We've been good, but we can't last,
Hurry Christmas, Hurry fast.
Want a plane that loops the loop,
(Alvin:) Me, I want a Hula-Hoop.
(Chipmunks:)
We can hardly stand the wait,
Please Christmas don't be late.

Posted in Random Thoughts

Posted in Videos

Posted in Random Thoughts

I found a real cool video on You Tube today by Schoolhouse Rock about the Constitution and the Preamble.  We have been working on this in Social Studies and I have been having the girls work on memorizing it by writing it and any other method that would help them learn it.  I was actually looking for a handwriting sheet for the Preamble and ran across this video which was a great help!  Thought I would share the link because it has a lot of other Schoolhouse Rock videos, which looks most helpful.

I cannot believe it has been two months since I last blogged.  Life has been so busy this Fall, with one trip after another.  My hubby should be at home the next few weeks, as he finished his last business trip of the year this week in Chicago.

We did not get to go on this trip with him, and oh, how we would have loved to.  Cake is a tremendous American Girl fan and the American Girl Place is in Chicago (as well as a few other major cities).  She (let's make that WE) have wanted to go there for years now, and her Dad did not tell her his hotel was only a few blocks away until after he got there!!  I guess he thought he might have a stowaway!

Being the wonderful father that he is, and knowing how much Cake and Cam (and myself) would like to go, he went there himself and took photos of all of the displays of the dolls.  He was even quite impressed and promised to take us the next time.  He bought them a few items which we will keep a secret until after Christmas because Cake is my most dedicated reader.  I thought it was very sweet of him to come home through the airport carrying a BRIGHT red American Girl Place bag.  He made sure it did not get banged up and was in perfect condition when he arrived home.  He is such a good Daddy!!!

He also went to the Chicago Shedd Aquarium.  He said it was a great Aquarium, and we cannot wait to visit it.  They have a tremendous website with tons of educational adventures.  They have Lesson Plans galore, Interactives, and Explorers Guide.  While traveling to Chattanooga last month we went to the Tennessee Aquarium and since my sweetie has to travel there frequently we bought a membership so we can go with him and visit the aquarium next time he has a trip down that way.

To sum it up, we have had a very busy, but fun Fall.  We have done a lot of schooling in a non-traditional way, we have left our workbooks behind and experience learning with our eyes, ears, and hands, and we have found out this is much more fun!

We still manage to work in our "extra-curricular" activities, like Piano Lessons, TaeKwonDo, Art Lessons, Music Makers, and they are doing a Christmas revival of "Annie" in a couple of weeks.  Life is busy around here!!

Posted in Random Thoughts

This is a continuation of our trip to Florida.   We are staying at the Gaylord Palms and are having a great time.  Dear hubby is at meetings all day while we are relaxing at the pool and touring the hotel. 

It was raining this morning so we did not leave the room until about 11:00; we had no plans, just do whatever struck our fancy.  We decided to start out in the lobby and make a complete circle so we did not miss anything.  Essentially, it took us all day to do everything.  We visited all the shops, visited the Everglades, Key West, Emerald Bay, and of course St. Augustine which is the section where we are staying in.  I really like the Everglades Atrium, Key West colorful decor, St. Augustine's quietness, Emerald Bay ritziness (I think that is a Tigger word).

The girls swam awhile after our tour, then we order room service and a movie since hubby had an of site dinner meeting.  The girls were so impressed with room service!  If you have ever watched "The Suite Life of Zack and Cody" you will understand their fascination with hotels, room service and spas.  They are always wanting to order up a massage!!!

We had a "fancy" dinner of pizza and a hamburger, but when served on fancy dishes, with fancy tablecloths and napkins and all the trimmings it is much more enjoyable.  Of course, the bill was $40.00 not including an additional tip for the waiter.  We rented a movie for $12.99 and all I could think of was "for $4.00 more I could buy it when it comes out on DVD."  It was Ratatouille and since we had toured the hotel kitchen the day before it was a fitting movie.  I am happy to report the kitchen (and we are talking 1/2 mile walk to the pastry kitchen from the main kitchen)   was very clean.  No rats cooking in there!!! 

Vending machines - they don't even take money!  You have to use your room key to charge it to your room.  A very cheap rate of only $2.00 per bottle of Coke!'

It has been a fun trip though.  The girls got to hold an alligator last night, fortunately its mouth was taped shut, but how many kids get the opportunity to hold a live alligator?  We took pictures and hopefully I will get them posted soon.  What an educational trip!!!