Pictures from Yesterday ... continued

Our Fun for the Day

I took the girls to an outdoor expo and we had sooooo much fun!
Here are a few pics.

Update

I had posted about Becca and Ben going to the doctor's today. Ben has to wear a ankle support and get physical therapy and Becca has a splint on her wrist. She goes back in about 10 days to see how she feels. They cannot tell if there is a hairline fracture or not. Since she got this splint on, she says it is really hurting now. Hmmm....I'll give it a few days and if she still feels pain, I'm calling.

We had a rough day. But all is well, the 2 little ones are in bed and it is now very quiet. You can actually hear the dog snoring. ~smile~

I am so glad the weekend is almost here.

Good night
~Margarete~

Good Morning

Hi, everyone! We have snow again.... it's just a light covering, no big deal. ~smile~

We are about to start school this morning. Ana is already saying, "No" to whatever I tell her. It should be an interesting day.

I have to take Becca and Ben to the doctor today. Becca hurt her wrist and it seems to be making her feel sick. It's not swollen but she can feel a piece of bone (very small). When she wraps it, it doesn't do anything, it acutally makes her feel worse. Ben hurt his ankle/foot playing basketball over the weekend. He seems to be getting better but I think it's best we keep his appointment just to make sure.

Katie seems to be a little off this week. Last night she didn't want to go to her Awana class and begged to stay home. Well, while we were sitting here we had a pretty bad ice storm and thunder and lightning. She looked out the window and says, "Hey Mom, I think the flagpole across the street is on fire." Well, it was the light underneath. There was smoke, sparks and looked like a small flame. We couldn't quite tell. I called my neighbor and she even said it was on fire. Soooo...I called it in and they sent two people out and a firetruck. The two looked at it for a few minutes and everyone left. At least we did our duty. It eventually went out.

By the way, I never cleaned the dining/homeschool room. I can't get motivated. I think we need to dump everything on the floor and take out the desks. This way, I will have to clean it.
I should take a picture of the school table; well, maybe not. You can't see the top. ~LOL~
I'm sure there are others out there that have the same thing but just aren't telling. ~smile~

Enjoy your day.
~Margarete~

Riding Today

My pictures turned out horrible so I took a video. I didn't get Katie doing anything but you can see them on the horses. I'm taking my older camera with me next time. This Sony camera has not cooperated since they started riding.

This and That

Ok, who prayed for snow? ~smile~ we only have a coating but it's supposed to rain/snow tonight and snow showers tomorrow "with" no accumulation. ~Whew~ We are honestly done with snow. We need sunshine and warmth.

The girls are getting ready for the horses this morning. They missed last week because they were sick. I hope we never have to miss again. I am going to talk to the instructors because Ana has really been a stinker lately. She has been mean to her sister, mean to the dog, back talking and really being a .... brat. Maybe while they are "instructing" they can have a nice talk about kindess to people and animals.

!LOL! While I was typing this, a bird hit our large kitchen window! We can see the imprint of the bird from the rain on the glass. We must have a very dizzy bird flying around the backyard!

Last night while searching for ideas for school next year (for K & A) I remembered I had found "The Magic School Bus" lapbooks from the blog "Yee Shall Know" I will add the link later. Anyway, I thought we could do a few of those lapbooks, read the MSB books and add experiments from the 365 Simple Science Experiments Books. Doesn't that sound like a good plan? I will print out the lapbooks and cutout the booklets ahead of time. I will also get all the science material together in a box so I will not be searching for the stuff when the time comes. Yes, I have done that.

Well, time to search www.homeschoolshare.com for some "R" printouts for Ana.

Have a good day.
~Margarete~

Next School Year

I have started to contemplate school for next year. Ugh............. I'm not even done this year. Anyway, I believe Tom will continue with his American History Study. By next year he will be into the Civil War and maybe beyond.

I'm not to sure about Science. I was thinking of starting him with Apologia Biology. 1/2 the book in 8th grade and the other 1/2 in 9th grade. This way he can really concentrate on each unit, study more and he would understand it more.

I was also looking at some writing programs. I think the one program was "Writing With Ease". He doesn't like to write and I'm believe he needs a little more structure on this. I have him write alot but I think something is missing. He needs to be able to flow into his sentences. Does that make sense?

He will continue with the Editor in Chief series and with vocabulary books. He likes the Vocabulary Cartoons and the SAT Vocabulary Books.

Tom is having a hard time with math; always has. We will be having math class throughout the summer to get Teaching Textbooks 7 finished.

I'm definitely not sure about Becca yet. It will be 12th grade. :(
I do know she will continue to do Progeny Press study guides.
Her troublesome subject is Science...we will get through this.........

Katie and Ana are the easiest. :) They will most probably be doing 365 Simple Science Experiments and the 365 More Simple Science Experiments. I will probably have some "simple" notebooking pages made for them. This way they can start learnig how to keep science logs.

I'm going back and forth with history. I was thinking of continuing the American History for them but my real desire is to start Story of the World 1. I loved doing this with Becca and Tom. It was the most enjoyable time when we were using this. We crafted, did some notebooking, did a long timeline, etc. We had so much fun. I still have their pharoah death masks we made out. The link to that is on the right sidebar "Our Egyptian Death Mask"....I think that's what it says. ~LOL~ I can't remember at the moment. (senior moment)
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I'm done writing about school now...it's getting boring.

Today was our Bible study and relaxing day. I am in the study of Revelation (Beth Moore) and enjoying every minute. I want to study this further.
After Bible study we go down to the cafe where the kids play and we have lunch. I had a good time talking with "Candy"...I enjoy talking with her every week. She has 2 little boys. Then, I had the pleasure of meeting another woman (I won't write her name because I'm not sure how to spell it. ~LOL~) Anyway, we had a nice conversation and she has two little girls Ana's age. Hopefully I will be able to sit down and talk with her again next week. :)

I need to go. I have to get dinner together AND, I have to start cleaning out my "dining" "homeschool" room. Ed will be putting in a new floor soon and he can't with 2 huge computer desks and table and tons of books in the way. (I have no idea what he's going to do with the piano).

See ya.
~Margarete~

Sickness All Around

I'm telling you, we cannot get rid of "the sickness" around here. I went on medication last week and I'm feeling much, much better. Now, the 2 girls are sick. We really need to get out of here! I don't think the girls will make it to their riding lessons on Wednesday. Our Bible study is tomorrow but I think I will just take Tom and Becca can watch the girls. We haven't been there in 3 weeks.

We did get out on Saturday for the Sparks Awana Games. Katie's team came in 2nd place. They were disqualified in 2 of the games which was very unfair. They did nothing wrong. The official must have thought they were in the Olympics or something. ~annoying~

I've been praying for the people of Japan. What devastation. I am amazed at the videos I have seen. The water pushing cars, houses, boats, even ships like they were nothing. I have been wondering, where are the children? In all the videos and news reports you see mostly adults, I've seen maybe a total of 3 children.

I finally ordered Tom's Critical Thinking "Editor in Chief" book. We lost his first one; where it went to I have no idea. It disappeared from the face of the earth. I'm baffled.

Katie's calling me. I have to go. Enjoy your family.
~Margarete~

Riding Pictures

Here are a few pictures of the girls doing their therapeutic riding. I think this is the best thing we could have done for them.
The pictures are not that great but that's ok. ~smile~
Ana talked the whole time!

Oops

I have made a mistake with the riding scholarships. So far they have the girls getting partial scholarships (1/2). That is still good. I read into some things wrong. They are still working on this so I'm going to keep praying that it will eventually be full. If you feel led, please pray for this.

Also, Tom had "minor" surgery on his lower lip yesterday. We had thought he had a pimple that wasn't going away but instead it was a cyst which kept getting bigger and bigger. He is out of it because of the pain medication and he just doesn't feel good. So if you could, would you please pray for him also? He has a follow-up next week.

I have been sick all week, mostly in bed. Of course school has suffered but I'm going to work with K & A this morning. Tom isn't going to do anything until he feels better.

Canned soup just doesn't make it on my top foods list when your sick. Ed came home last night and we made chicken vegetable soup together, kind of. I sauteed the vegetables and he cooked the chicken and made the noodles. It turned out very tasty.

The girls are really starting to seem like they are going a little stir crazy. Yesterday they went outside to play. Of course they found the mud and had to dig. Katie "saved" a worm. ~smile~

Enjoy your day today
~Margarete~

Therapeutic Riding

The girls are supposed to start riding horses next week. We are getting a scholarship for this including trying to get some autism grants. We did get the summer camp scholarships also. I'm glad I did this. I got so tired of hearing "we make too much money" that I didn't try. We actually do not make "too much money" especially with how many children we have. Well, as I searched on line for therapy I ran across therapeutic riding for children with ASD, etc. I hesitated and didn't do anything. Well, 2 Fridays ago, I went back on the website and wrote to the place and "click" I didn't hesitate. I was called back in about 20 minutes and the girls had a "lesson" on Saturday. And can you believe this?! My camera battery was dead. I always have it charged. Oh well, we will have many other changes for pictures.

We have sickness going around again. Ed was sick about 2 weeks ago, I got sick for at least 4 days last week and now we are both sick again. I don't know whats going on, but I am definitely ready for spring and summer. I want to walk in the sunshine and ride our bikes. I am excited to take the kids all around town, like we do every summer, and enjoy the creeks, parks, and coffeehouses.

This year, we may even be joining the pool. That will be so good for the kids to enjoy in the afternoon. I'm ready to teach the girls how to swim. I'm sure they will pick this up quickly.

This is an exciting summer for us. We have a nephew graduating high school, a niece graduating middle school, and our 1st grandchild due.

I was thinking about our homeschool today. I had put up a hugh timeline and science classification on the walls. Well, we really haven't done anything with them. Katie has had a hard time making it past a certain time with schoolwork. Her concentration goes. Believe me, she has learned tons of things especially from me reading and all the science videos we have watched. I worried about this but in reality we have many years to go. We just need to take things slowly and have fun while doing it. Ana's "handwriting" is also getting better. She usually traces some Bible verses. We had stopped doing this for awhile and just started again. I really noticed a difference. She is not that "shakey" anymore.

Tom is plugging away at his schoolwork. He said he would like another health book. He has been reading the Abeka health and he thinks it is outdated and he wants "real" health reading. :)

Becca is doing very well. She cleaned up the house for me today. It seems that when I'm down, the house automatically becomes destroyed.

Ben has started selling knives. I don't know the name of the company (the kind that gets college kids to sell), but he has already sold some and has many more showings. He's trying to get us to buy but they are way to much money for me.

Time to go.
~Margarete~