my blessed life

I can't believe how fast this year has gone by!  Looking back over it all, it has been a really great year with lots of positive strides and so much learning.  I'm really proud of what my kiddos have accomplished this year.  It's amazing to think that they have completed 2nd and 4th grades and we're now beginning our 6th year of homeschooling (well, longer than that if you count preschool, right?).  Fifth and Third grades, here we come! I was looking over my post from the beginning of the year about our curriculum for this year and seeing what had stuck/changed/been modified.  That's always interesting to do!  And it turns out that we stuck fairly close to the plan with just a few changes. In our Biblical  studies, we ended up not using God's Great Covenant this year.  I still love it and I haven't ruled it out for the future, but the format just wasn't working for us this year.  So we continued with reading through The Bible Story...

We made it!!   Today was our last day of the 2012-2013 school year!!  Whoo hoo!!  Can you tell I'm excited for our summer break?  Just a little bit ....heehee In our homeschool this week... Mr. B has really been finished all week long and has just been doing some reading each day.  The Princess had math to wrap up this week though and has finally completed it today--thank God!!  He has helped us through this year of math, that's for sure!   We are still finishing our history book (Story of the World, volume III) and will continue reading that through the summer until we complete it.  I also plan to have the kiddos do some math activities once or twice a week just to keep them fresh.   Some homeschool advice I have is... Please take a summer break for your own sanity's sake!  Even if it's only a short summer break, I think it's just as important for moms to be refreshed as well as the kiddos have a break.  Su...

Another week of 2013 is gone~each weekend when I write this post I am reminded of just how quickly this year is going!  I so want to savor the moments, and yet I feel like they are passing in a blur. In my life these past few weeks... I have been very busy helping my husband finish up pages for our homeschool group's yearbook.  We took that project on this year and it's been a very big bite to chew.  I'm excited about how the book has come together though! We've had lots going on at our church: a weekend leadership conference, a yard sale, ladies night out, and tons and tons of planning for upcoming events.  It's exciting!  But it's also a bit exhausting--I pray for supernatural strength a lot:) In our homeschool these past few weeks... Let me be honest, we have had a few very rough days--not consecutive, thank goodness.  We are all ready for summer break around here ...especially me!  But we are SO close--about 10 more days now and subje...

{If you are visiting from Hammock Tracks this week, welcome!  I am honored to be featured by Savannah on her weekly Homeschool Review interview this week.  I hope you will hope over and visit Savannah.  She has a lovely homeschooling blog and I am so enjoying getting to know her.} Did I really say at the beginning of this week that we were having a spring break?!  This week has been one of the busiest and most exhausting weeks I've had in a long time.  The only ones getting a break around here has been the kiddos~but then that's what spring breaks are all about, right? In our homeschool this week... I gave the kids a break from any book work.  We were only going to be home for two days out of this week anyway, so I thought I'd give myself a week off from teaching as well. Places we're going and people we're seeing... We took an incredibly fun field trip on Tuesday to Chaney's Dairy Barn with our homeschool group.  I blogged all about it her...

It has been a lovely week!  One of those weeks where most things go the way they are supposed to go and you just really enjoy life.  I {heart} those kind of weeks! In my life this week... It all started with a wonderful Sunday.  We had such a great time of worship at our church.  It's incredibly exciting to see what God is doing in our community!   Lunch out with the family is always fun, especially when you find a yummy new restaurant.  I was able to finally have that pulled pork bbq sandwich that I was craving.   It has been so refreshing to my soul to have lots of sunshine this week, too.  It seems as though spring is finally here.  The winter has seemed so long, but the reward of spring is worth the wait, I think.   Lovely warm temps, much-needed outdoor play time for the kiddos, time spent loving on our sweet dog, Holly, our first grill-out on the deck, our first picnic, flying kites, park time with ...

It has been a few weeks since I've had a chance to do a weekly wrap-up.  I can hardly believe it's already April!!  March definitely was a whirlwind for us, but that's to be expected when we celebrated two birthdays and Easter all in one month! In our homeschool this week... We buckled down and really got some work done.   Shhhhh .....don't tell my kiddos but each day this week (except for today, when we have co-op) we accomplished two days of school work!!  Yea!!  After looking at the calendar I decided we need to make a little better time in order to be able to take a summer break when we need to do so.  So I am lesson planning accordingly.  We won't do this every week, but maybe every other.   (the kiddos looking at slides of winged insects for science) I am however incredibly in need of a Spring Break though.  But rather than taking off a whole week at a time, I plan to spread out some "impromptu" Spring Break days ...

In my life this week... We kicked off our week by celebrating Vince's birthday.  We went to church, went out to eat, gave gifts, made gifts, made homemade Twinkies (& Twinkie Cake!) , and wrapped up his day by watching the History channel's first episode of The Bible.  It was a very fun day! Then the next day food poisoning hit.  It was not pretty.  Vince got really sick from some leftovers-gone-bad from the weekend.  And I was soooo tired.  I'm participating in the Early to Rise challenge and am trying so hard to get up extra early every morning to create new habits.  So far this challenge is kicking my tail.   In our homeschool this week... I felt a bit lethargic.  OK, a lot lethargic.  I kept thinking about taking an impromptu Spring Break-ha!  School stayed on track though.    A couple of highlights:  We finally wrapped up the Middle Ages in history.  We really enjoy the St...

It's that time again~where are these weeks going?!  This one was particularly busy. In our homeschool this week... We persevered!  Yea!  It was a good week--one of those weeks that when you look at the planner you feel a sense of accomplishment. The Princess began her final Total Language Plus study for this year, The Cricket in Times Square .  Ironically, this is also the week that the kids have "adopted" some pet crickets. This week has been filled with things like crickets and worms and mud and ...now snow.  You never know what the weather will be around here these days! We also finished up our science chapter on "eggs" by watching March of the Penguins.  I felt like such a mean mommy as my children cried throughout the movie.  It's such a great film, but those penguins definitely have a hard life. Places we're going & people we're seeing... Last weekend The Princess was so excited to attend a Purity Ball hosted by a local...

It's time to wrap this week up! In my life this week... I have faced a few challenges, one being plain ol' fatigue.  I thought all of that "tiredness" was over with those couple of weeks in January, but this week I definitely battled that.  I guess I'm not as young as I think I am and our extra-busy weekend really wore me out:)  I am thankful that I am starting to feel more like "myself" now.   In our homeschool this week... We took an unexpected day off on Monday {Presidents Day}.  We had a friend visiting from out-of-town and decided that spending time with her was way more fun:)  She had been here all weekend and stayed through lunch on Monday.  It's always great when friends come to visit! a visit from our friend Song The rest of our week went fairly well.  We got back on track (after the flu sort of derailed us last week) and finally made that Day 100 goal!  (We haven't celebrated that yet, but I'm working on s...

In my life this week... I have felt some of that "mental winter fog" that I had back in January.  I know it's just the mid-year slump, but it can be exhausting at times.  Overall, it's been a good week though~I've had some fun with friends and family and am looking forward to more over the weekend. In our homeschool this week... It's been something of a struggle to get Mr. B back into school mode after having a few sick days with the flu.  I feel like part of that is my fault.  I need to try harder to be more creative with his learning.  He doesn't do well sitting for long periods of time or doing a lot of writing.  It's easy for me to be creative in some subjects, but not as much in others.  Gotta work on that!   We have stayed the course fairly well this week though (up until today and I am just wiped out and have a huge list of things to do before tomorrow so I'm adjusting our course for the day...shhh...I have told the kiddos ...