The Homeschool Mother's Journal- Best Laid Plans...

This week in my life...

The boys were sick this last week... :(  One Saturday evening Little One started developing a snotty nose, cough and sore throat.  Hubby and I decided we would probably not go to church the next morning and that was for the best! Over night PC woke me up and told me that his stomach was hurting.  I told him to try to get some rest.  About a half an hour later, we were awoken again to him throwing up.  It took me awhile to get back to sleep after that.  The next morning it was obvious that Little One had a nasty cold and PC had a stomach virus.  PC went on to develop a fever and  body aches.  We took it easy most of the week. 

In my homeschool...

Not much happened this week since the boys were sick.  The only activity that made it to was drama and that was only because the boys had improved enough by then. I had all of these wonderful plans, but you know how that is when life gets in the way.

What I'm reading... 

Seed Catalogs!!! Still reading these!  I've gotten a few orders done, the biggest ones, but I have a couple more to do.

In my garden...

I didn't get any gardening done this week since I am still busy with the seed ordering (and taking care of sick kids) but I did get a lamp put together that I hope to use as a grow light.  I ordered a plant growing bulb from Amazon, so I guess we will see how it works. 


I hope you all had a wonderful week! To read more Homeschool Mother's Journals, go to The Homeschool Mother's Journal.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal- Happy New Year!

This week in my life...

I just realized that I haven't posted since the New Year!  Things have been really busy around here and the new year didn't get off to the best start, but things are getting better now.  PC hurt his back the day after New Year, helping my brother and his wife move furniture and rip up carpeting.  He's better now, but boy did he complain a lot there for awhile! Then last Sunday PC woke up with an ear infection.  That caught us off guard since he hasn't had an ear infection since he was a little boy.  Hubby took him to the Urgent Care and he got on antibiotics right away, so he is feeling better now.  


In my homeschool...

The boys have been doing some various work, but no fun stuff.  I plan to start reading with Little One about Victory Gardens.  My kids are really into gardening and I thought that would be an interesting way to combine gardening with history.  I also want to continue with our gardening studies, so they are more prepared to help me when planting time comes.  The boys have started back to drama and AWANAs, but 4-H had to be canceled due to a conflict for the leader.

What I'm reading... 

Seed Catalogs!!!  I haven't had time to read much else. 

In my garden...

Right now I am busy in the planning stage.  You wouldn't think that January would be a busy gardening month, but since I have never planned a larger garden before, I am busy, busy, busy! 


I hope you all had a wonderful week! To read more Homeschool Mother's Journals, go to The Homeschool Mother's Journal.

Homeschool Mother's Journal - End of December

This week in my life...

This week has been busy, busy, busy!  Hubby has been on vacation and we have celebrated Christmas 4 times this week!  First was Christmas Eve with just our immediate family.  We went to Christmas Eve service at our church.  It was wonderful.  Then we came home, had dinner and settled down to watch the new version of Miracle on 34th Street with our children.  On Christmas day, we went to my family's home for dinner.  My brother, wife and two girls were unable to be there because they were in Florida, but my aunt, uncle, cousins and their families were there.  It had been over a year since I had seen them.  It was a very enjoyable day.  Then the day after Christmas, we went to my husband's family home.  His brothers were not there, but my mom and dad joined us there along with my husband's step dad's mother.  It was good to see her again.  All of the family that we hadn't seen for awhile, barely recognized PC because he has changed so much. lol!!!  Then on Thursday, we were back at my mom and dad's to celebrate Christmas again with my brother and his family.  We plan to go to my brother's home on New Year's day.  It has been an enjoyable week, but pretty tiring. 

In my homeschool...

We did not school this week.  PC got a portable dvd player for Christmas and has been watching some documentaries on it.  Little One has been on break all week.  I have started making LO some copywork pages for him to work on when school resumes the beginning of January.  Some goals I have are:  get PC caught up in math;  (we are lagging behind there!) do more copywork with LO;  (He really needs the writing practice) continue to work on gardening with both of the boys especially LO; work on Presidents, countries, and states with LO;  work harder with PC on biology (which he hates, but I would like him to know the basics).  

What I'm reading... 

I haven't gotten any reading done this week.  Just too busy!  I plan to get back to reading after Hubby returns to work. 

In my garden...

I haven't gotten anything done in the garden this week except saving my coffee grounds for the compost. 


I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas!!!  To see more Homeschool Mother's Journals, check out The Homeschool Chick.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal

This week in my life...

This week has been kinda slow and weird.  I keep getting my days mixed up and thinking it's the wrong day.  Today starts Hubby's vacation and with Christmas coming, it is throwing us off.  We plan to go to a Christmas Eve service on Saturday and then come home and eat dinner (crock pot!).  After that we plan to watch the new version of Miracle on 34th Street. We are trying to get through our Christmas movies before Christmas.  We took a short break from them because Little One stayed at Grandma and Grandpa's for a few days.  Since we watch them mostly for his benefit, we waited until he got back.  While he was gone we watched Master and Commander staring Russell Crow with PC.  He loved it.  We try to watch movies that LO isn't allowed to see with PC whenever LO is not around. 

In my homeschool...

About two weeks ago I ordered the "I Ate a Rainbow Today" kit.  I thought I was only ordering it for Little One, but PC became interested in it too.  :)  Now both of the boys are somewhat competing over who has the most magnets on the chart and who has eaten the most fruits and vegetables.  They are eating (small amounts) things they wouldn't normally eat and trying to fit in as many different fruits and vegetables as they can.  I LOVE IT!!! :)  This was a great addition to our health studies.  I can't wait until we can start gardening again.  I plan to grow all kinds of stuff for my kids to try.


We're sorta on Christmas break right now, but the kids have been spending it watching Liberty's Kids. :) I got the complete series on dvd when it was on sale at Amazon.  The kids love the series. 

What I'm reading... 

Real Food Nutrition and Health and The Heirloom Life Gardener.  I am still working my way through these books.

In my garden...

I finally got my stuff out to the compost and walked around the garden to make sure everything is ok.  My compost bins are getting quite full.  I hope to have some good compost this spring.  You can follow my garden progress at: Lynn's Urban Garden Diary


I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas!!!  To see more Homeschool Mother's Journals, check out The Homeschool Chick.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal

This week in my life...

Well, on Saturday we did our annual holiday outing.  We had so much fun!  We went to a place called The Greene which is an outdoor shopping mall.  They always decorate it so pretty for the holidays and it just makes for a really nice place to go.  First we went to the movie Hugo, which we enjoyed very much.  In my opinion, it was one of the best family films I've seen in years.  It is a period film taking place in 1931 in Paris, France. The movie was a very clean movie with the only real "moral" objection was that Hugo stole to survive.  But I feel that because that really is how orphans survived back then, it is a good teaching tool for children to show them what life was like for the poor in the early part of last century.  The film is based loosely on a true story (which I didn't know until after we saw it) of the life of Georges Melies, an early film maker.  After we saw the movie, we took Little One to see Santa.  He talked us all into getting our picture taken as a group with Santa. :) So, yes, even PC got his picture taken with Santa again. lol!!!  Believe me, it's no small feat getting a 15 1/2 year old boy to get his picture taken with Santa! :)  After Santa, we went and had hot cocoa (for the kids, mochas for Hubby and me) at Caribou Coffee.  After hot chocolate, we went on a horse- drawn carriage ride through The Greene.  Very fun!  After the carriage ride, we went to a restaurant called Potbelly Sandwich Works for dinner.  Then we went home to decorate the Christmas tree.  What a fun day!  Unfortunately, I didn't get many pictures. :(  My camera was out of juice and I didn't know it.  Luckily, Hubby was able to get a few pictures on his phone, but not many. 


In my homeschool...

We are slowing down on homeschool right now for the holiday season, but we are putting in some time here and there, but we aren't starting any projects or anything.  PC was at grandma and grandpa's this last week and I sent some work with him.  Little One will be going next week, I will probably send a bit of work with him too. 

What I'm reading... 

Real Food Nutrition and Health and The Heirloom Life Gardener.  I am enjoying both of these books.  The first is teaching me a lot about nutrition and the second was written by the owner of Bakercreek which sells heirloom garden seeds.

In my garden...

You can read about it here: Lynn's Urban Garden Journal 


I hope you all had a wonderful week! To read more Homeschool Mother's Journals, go to The Homeschool Mother's Journal.

The Homeschool Mother's Journal

It's been awhile! We have been busy, busy, busy!

This week in my life...

We are a part of a drama club.  The boys really enjoy it and they learn a lot.  We recently had our production, so the kids and I are recuperating right now.   These productions happen twice a year and they take A LOT of energy and time.  In addition to this production, LO is about to be in a church play that the elementary kids put on.   He lives for drama, so it is good for him.  Both of my boys have come so far since we have joined the drama club.  These productions involve singing and dancing and I'm not talking about a minor bit.  They really had to learn some complicated dance moves for kids that are not use to doing this sort of thing.  For LO this is especially difficult since he was diagnosed with gross motor delays.  It is helping him so much! 

In my homeschool...

What homeschool? lol!!! Seriously, we've had to take a bit of a break to recoup, but we will be back at it probably a bit next week.  We are now doing year around school, so breaks here and there when we are tired are important.  Right now we are doing a lot of our work using worktexts from Edhelper.com.  They are a lifesaver.  These sheets are easy to print out and then  I just put them in a three ring binder and they go with us to what ever activity we are doing and my kids do their work on the way or while they are waiting in a doctor's waiting room or whatever.  The yearly membership is quite reasonable and it helps us not get behind in our busy schedule.  My only complaint is they are not Christian based.  I wish there was a resource like this for Christian based material.  But the kids do still get lots of Christian based instruction especially on days when we are not on the go.  It just gets too difficult to carry their text books around. There are too many of them. 

What I'm reading...
Real Food Nutrition and Health- This is suppose to be for PC's health class, but I'm reading it first. lol!!! I hope to have more information on this program soon.  I'm really enjoying the book and learning a lot.

What I'm looking forward to... 

Christmas!!!  I totally love the season and all of the family things that we do.  My kids get pretty wild this time of year and I can barely keep up with their energy.  Some fun things that we do is we take our kids to see a special movie in the theater.  This is a treat for them.  They rarely get to see a first run movie.  If we do go to the theater with them (not often) it's usually to the cheapie theater.  But at Christmas time we take them to a first run movie in a nicer cinema, then we go see Santa and this year we will probably do a horse and buggy ride again.  The movie we are planning to take them to is Hugo.  Another thing we do during the holiday season is watch several Christmas movies.  The traditional ones for us are The Santa Clause 1-3, Polar Express and Miracle on 34th Street (new version).  We watch Miracle on 34th Street on Christmas eve.  But even though I love the season, it will be nice to get back to normal after it is over.  I can only keep up the energy so long! lol!!!  So what holiday traditions do you have?

I hope you all had a wonderful week! To read more Homeschool Mother's Journals, go to The Homeschool Chick blog.

Happy Thanksgiving!

   I hope you all had a happy Thanksgiving!  Our Thanksgiving was really wonderful.  We went to my mom and dad's for the day.  My brother and his family also joined us and we got to spend time enjoying each others company.  I do wonder how many more times we will all be together.  My oldest niece will be going off to college next year.  My oldest son is 15 and their youngest daughter is 14.  It is inevitable that the children will be going in their own directions possibly with their own families within a few years, so I love spending these moments with them all while we have it.  Don't get me wrong, I know my nieces aren't just going to disappear as soon as they become adults, it's just I doubt that everyone will get together for every holiday like we do now.  I feel blessed to have such a wonderful family. :) My sons are blessed to have relatives that love them so much.  And my husband is loved by them just like me and the kids.  I am very fortunate.  (Oh, and I should mention, my mom is the best cook in the world. lol!!!)
    So how about you?  How did you spend Thanksgiving?  What blessings has God given you?