We've been busy with schoolwork, trying to keep Jacob fed, and with life in general.

I have a new interview to put up, hopefully by tomorrow.

In the meantime, I leave you with Jacob's observation from last night: "I think my shirt shrunk in the wash. It feels a lot tighter."

No Jacob, your clothes are not shrinking. I sure hope his friend Eric has some more clothes to pass down *soon*.

An old post, since it's that time of year again...

A Favorite Book

When Hannah was little and we were thinking about homeschooling kindergarten, several catalogs recommended this book for reading around Thanksgiving. So, trusting those recommendations, I bought "Stories of the Pilgrims" by Margaret B. Pumphrey and read it to Hannah (and Abby) that November. They loved it and I was amazed at what I didn't know about the Pilgrims! By the end of the book, I felt I had a much fuller understanding of what the Pilgrims went through not only in through their time in England, Holland and in the New World, but also in those early days after the first Thanksgiving. I had no idea that the winter after the first Thanksgiving they didn't have enough food (since more settlers from England came to join the colony). I marveled at the courage of these people in facing all that they did! After reading this book for the first time, I knew that homeschooling was for me. It showed me what "living books" could bring to an education and how much I had missed in my schooling by being given only textbooks to read. This was the book that "lit the fire" for me and I look forward to re-reading it to my children every year (even though Hannah claims she has memorized every word by now).

Even though this is a children's book, I learned so much from it. It was fun last year to do additional research into what exactly the Pilgrims didn't like about the English church. I hope to purchase a book or two on original writings of the Pilgrims to deepen our understanding, especially now that my little kindergartner from way back when is now in high school!


Other books we have enjoyed reading in the weeks before Thanksgiving:


This book is a great read aloud for the younger years or as a reader for around 2nd through 4th grade (depending upon reading ability).


I would place this book for third/fourth grade through sixth grade. Beautiful pictures, written from the point of view of the Pilgrims.


This is a fun book that should answer any questions one might have- such as "What would you eat and drink on the Mayflower?" "What could the Pilgrims take with them?" "Were the people on the ship friends?" "How did the Pilgrims spend their first Christmas?" and so on.


Nice book to read after books on the Pilgrims to show what early Colonial life was like for the children.


Another book to read about early Colonial life with lots of photos of re-enactors from Williamsburg.

We've been making Christmas ornaments out of cards received in years past. I thought we might make ten or so, but the kiddos have made more than twenty so far. We don't have many cards left now, so we'll turn our attention to ribbon ornaments next.

Reading

A neat history of cooking in America complete with various recipes and pictures.

I know several people with Lyme disease and this book was an interesting read. Since I talked to one lady with Lyme last year, we have changed our salt to Himalyan salt and have done tick checks at night during the summer.

The current "buzz" in Chronic Fatigue/Multiple Chemical Sensitivity circles is that this condition could be the result of a brain injury (from a virus, toxic exposure, etc) and that by re-wiring the brain to work around that injury, people might feel better/tolerate more chemical exposures. In this book, it is talking about retraining the brain in instances of stroke, disability, etc.

Halloween on the Windswept Plains

Brian was the only one who dressed up.

He was "Paint Man". He got ready for this role by spraying "Kilz" primer (25 gallons of it) on the basement ceiling all day long.

We mentioned that he could go out right then and nobody would think him strange.

He thought better of it, however, and proceeded upstairs to try and soak the paint off in a nice hot bath.

Cute Boys

My Fingertips Are So Sore!

The really hot glue gun worked for the pinecone wreath! Of course it looks a little off center in the picture, but that's ok. My fingers are sore from handling so many poke-y pine cones and I went through almost *80* gluesticks for this project. Each cone took at least one gluestick! Seriously, they don't make hot glue guns like they did when I did such crafts before.

The wreath was supposed to go on Percy The Shed, but I don't have any confidence that this wreath will hold up to wind, rain and snow. So it's hanging outside the kitchen door where is scares us when we walk by, thinking it's a burglar outside. This wreath COULD be used as a weapon- it is so heavy and sharp!

“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant with the weak and the strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these.” – George Washington Carver

HT: thatmom.com

History Lesson Gone Wrong

Question from Hope's book "Mystery of History": What are the names of Adam and Eve's children?

Hope's answer: Slim

We have work to do.

And today, Winter Days, apparently

What happened to Fall?

Baby, it's cold outside.

Fall Days

Balloon Boy Tweets

SpunkyHomeSchool linked to tweets about "Balloon Boy" this morning. I clicked over and posted a few of the good ones:

#Balloonboy just received the Nobel Prize for Physics! He didn't go up in Balloon, but was THINKING about doing it.

Breaking News: If this story couldn't get more bizarre, it's just been announced that Obama was awarded a prize for rescuing balloon boy.

And my personal favorite:

Beyonce to #balloonboy family: "If you liked him then you should have put a string on it."

Job Update

After months and months (and years) of a less than ideal job situation, Brian met with his boss today to ask to be transferred to a different department within the company. This would mean that he would not be working for the manager who has caused so much strife and hopefully put him around people who are more appreciative of his skills and efforts.

The downside would be that he wouldn't be working closely with his good friend anymore, but they could still meet each other for lunch sometimes.

The tech job market is still bad here, so changing departments could be the best solution for Brian right now. We are mindful every day that there are those without employment and we are grateful for this job.

Fall Projects

While at Hobby Lobby the other day, I found a few "fall picks" that looked like they went together. So I made a wreath to replace the rather anemic one that hung there before. The anemic one looks better on the china cabinet anyway so she is not offended by the demotion.

The wonderful geraniums that graced the urns this summer have been replaced by pumpkins and leaves from the maple tree (courtesy of Hope). The front door wreath has also benefited from Hobby Lobby's bounty in the form of faux berries.

The kiddos and I are trying to make a pine cone wreath but the pine cones won't stay glued on. I tried googling "pine cones won't stay on wreath" but just found tutorials on glue-gunning on pine cones, which as I said, wasn't working for us. Sigh. I sure don't want to wire on a hundred pine cones!

And Hope is greatly enjoying all the silver and gold glitter we bought to decorate Christmas ornaments. The *whole house* now glitters, especially the kitchen table.

*Photo taken on the last day of summer*

It's a foggy day outside my window. Yesterday I sat in the sun for awhile and I loved soaking up the warmth, knowing that winter is on the way. It's getting near the time for the peak fall colors, so I hope we'll be able to take a drive to the mountains soon. We don't have many trees close by, so our neighborhood color is limited to the sagebrush which turns red, yellow and orange.

In our classroom, we finished our study of the Middle Ages and are now moving into the Renaissance period. After the Renaissance, my history lesson plans stop, so I should probably figure out what happens next.

Jacob's new science textbook is slated to arrive this week. He's in sixth grade but the book is the 8th grade text. You can guess what his favorite subject is. If he only liked writing half as much as science, we'd be in good shape.

Hannah got her ACT test results back and they were high enough for her to meet her graduation goals. They were not high enough for her to qualify for the "big" financial aid awards at the colleges we checked, so she wants to retake the test and see if she can do better. She plans on re-taking geometry with the "Math-U-See" curriculum (her original geometry was taught by a local tutor using a different method) not for school credit, but to help her on her college entrance tests.

Looking at colleges takes me back to the time when I was Hannah's age. Today there are so many more options for higher education that it can make the prospect more daunting at times. I would like Hannah to take some Bible and English/Writing classes and she is anxious to investigate Art classes. We are praying for wisdom for this next year as Hannah weighs where (and how) she would like to further her education.

Abby is thinking about writing an essay for an online publication. She is a good writer and thankfully, she has a sister who can help her with her spelling (that dyslexia, again!). I am excited to see her motivation for stretching herself academically. She has recovered from her flu and thankfully the rest of us didn't get it.

Hope is in third grade and loves all her subjects. She has been the easiest to teach so far and she reminds me of Hannah in her independent way of studying (plus a little of Abby's drama thrown in for good measure). I don't know what we would do without this little firecracker of a girl in our family!

Looking forward to a quiet week of schoolwork and fall walks in the neighborhood and the nearby park...

With Grandpa and Grandma

Camby, Grandpa and Grandma's newest service dog- in-training looked a lot like the display dog at the restaurant!

Unusual flowers...

With Cousin Doug

Grandpa and Grandma

Back Online Again

Hello there! Our computer had a major heart attack and has been in the hospital recovering. It has mentioned that it would like to upload the pictures from our camera, but it might take a few more days of pampering for it to do this.

In the meantime, we've been enjoying the fall sun and snow (!), Grandparents and the swine flu. I guess we haven't really been enjoying the flu, but what else can you do besides eat chicken soup and groan? So far it's just Abby with the flu- I think the rest of us had it at the beginning of the summer, albeit in a much milder form. In a few days we'll know for sure.

Looking forward to resuming blogging soon...

Meet Percy, our shed (and summer project)

Because of the high winds out here, Brian had to reinforce the walls so we wouldn't be chasing the shed down the street one spring day...

We are loading up Percy with the contents of our basement (one of the final steps in the basement project) and with a few things from the garage. It's not a big fancy barn like most of our neighbors have, but now we can say we have an "outbuilding"!

Hope with Mini

Yesterday was a sad day for the bunny lovers in our home as one of our rabbits, Jack, died. He started to show signs of illness only the day before and quickly went downhill. We were driving to the vet in the morning when he passed away. Now we are down to four bunnies and two of them are getting to be older. It will be strange when this stage of life has passed- breeding and raising rabbits. The kids have said they want a little dog to compensate for the lack of bunnies someday. We'll see.


Now, for you Facebook fans-

Jennifer says she is glad to be getting over a bad cold.

Jennifer is always surprised how messy the house gets when mom is out of it for a few days.

Jennifer says it's really hard to drive your sobbing children to the vet when you have a bad cold.

Jennifer is glad that the bunny died *before* we got to the vet and so we don't have a vet bill to go along with the grief.