Not mine… Mr. Stinkface. If I leave the camera down, I never know what I might find. Sometimes it’s pictures of himself, other times it’s of the desk.
Thank goodness he’s cute… that face doesn’t say “trouble” does it?!
08 October 2010
07 October 2010
Sharing…
I wasn’t sure what to blog about today, so I thought I would share a blog that I like to read. Her posts are usually hilarious… just the title of the blog should give you a hint of what she’s like.
06 October 2010
Things We Use for School…
I don’t know if many are interested, but I thought I would share what we use for our schooling. I am A LOT more organized this year. Last year we just kind of went with it and then our house sold and the ciaos of moving ensued. I wanted things to be a little more structured this year (shocker, I know). I love the blogs Chocolate on my Cranium and Homeschool Creations. Even if homeschool isn’t something you are interested in, you should check these blogs out. I refer to each of them often and not always for school stuff. Chocolate on my Cranium has some great FHE lessons.
Each child has a color, it helps keep things straight. More for me then them really. Evelyn is purple, Sam is orange and Max is green. Last year I found file boxes in their assigned color. It makes keeping track of everyone’s workbooks and fold
Here is a list of the workbooks and programs we are using this year. Some are ones I have always used and like, others are new to us this year. I am always tweaking things to fit us better. They each work at their own level in Math and Phonics/Spelling/Reading. Everything else, we do together.
Evelyn
These are each done every day.
- Horizons Math level 2 (We are more then half way through this book and will be going on to level 3 around the first of the year. Math is something that has changed every year for us. It isn’t something that Evelyn really enjoys, so it’s been hard to keep her motivated. I really like this program and hopefully we can stick with it.)
- All About Spelling level 2 (There are readers that go along with each level.)
- Handwriting (I have made my own handwriting pages for each of the kids, using quotes from church leaders for Evelyn and the alphabet and small church related phrases for Sam, using Start Write. I like to use the Handwriting without Tears font for Sam and the Italic Cursive font for Evelyn.)
Sam
These are each done every day.
Things we do together
FLL is done daily, the others are done 2x a week.
- Galloping the Globe (We are using this for both Geography and Science.)
- We have been using Story of the World volume 2 for History, but will be changing to the Mystery of History volume 1 starting next week. I haven’t minded Story of the World, we read the first book last year, but I wanted something more Bible based. We will give Mystery of History a good and see what we think.
We start school around 9:30 in the morning. We do scripture study and family prayer with dad before he leaves for work, have breakfast, get dressed and do morning jobs. We recite the Pledge of Allegiance before we pull out our school work. Even Max is getting the hang of it. We always start with math. This seems to take Evelyn the longest (because everything under the sun is a distraction to her when she is working on it), so that gives me time to do things one on one with Sam. He and I are usually done in about 1 1/2 hours. Then he has free time and I can do one on one things with Evelyn. Once we finish with that, if she isn’t finished with her math, she finishes that up before lunch. After lunch we do our together work.
I made a schedule for us to follow were we go on and off track, for lack of a better way to put it. This is our first week off. We had done 6 weeks. This week gives the kids time to play and unwind and I can make copies, reorder, reorganize as needed. We will go 6 more weeks and then it will be Thanksgiving break. We go 3 weeks on and then Christmas. I think after Christmas we go on for 5 weeks before our next break. I think 5 weeks on is a better way to go, but with holidays, we had to do 6 week stretches at the start of the school year. Everyone is doing well with their school work, for the most part. Some days are better then others, but don’t we all have days like that?
05 October 2010
Looking back…
I got this idea from my sister’s post today. I went in search of pictures of my kids as babies, all roughly the same age. It is so funny to me how much the boys looked alike @ 2-4 months of age. (I don’t think they look that much alike now.) I’m so glad that of any of my babies, Evelyn was the one that got all the hair! It’s hard to believe, after looking at these, that they are now 7, 5 1/2 and 3. Where has the time gone?!
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Sadly, most of Evelyn’s baby pictures where take with a point and shoot on FILM that I got in college (or maybe it was HS graduation), in other words a long time ago… The few digital pictures we have were taken with our video camera (like the one above). I had to do some serious tweaking to make the picture look ok… if you don’t believe check this out.
04 October 2010
Why I’m blogging this month…
I’ve added a new button to my side bar. Go check it out. They are why I’m doing 31 for 21… You should too!
03 October 2010
Keeping Busy…
Have you been listening or watching today? I find that I need to stay busy while I listen, to ward off the head bobs.
02 October 2010
Christmas…
2009… I’ve finally done a scrapbook page. Christmas last year was such a blur. We moved into our new house 11 December. (I can’t believe it’s been almost a year!) A little over 3 weeks after going under contract on our old house, with a trip to California in the middle of it all for Thanksgiving. We managed to get the tree up, but only the lights on it. This year will be much better… I didn’t just jinx myself, did I?
01 October 2010
Pesto Bread
I made this quite awhile ago and boy is it yummy!
Ingredients
Dough
- 2 cups warm water
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1/2 cup skim milk powder
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 tablespoon instant yeast
- 5 -5 1/2 cups bread flour
Filling:
- 2/3 cup pesto (I love the pesto at Costco. It’s fresh, so if you don’t use it fast it will go bad. I put a few tablespoons in snack sized bags and freeze it.)
- 1 cup grated Parmesan
In a large bowl combine the water, olive oil, sugar, skim milk powder, salt and instant yeast. Mix till well blended. Add in a cup of flour and beat with a wooden spoon till smooth. Add in another cup of flour and do the same. Now, sprinkle a half cup of flour onto a flat surface and pour out the dough on top. Begin to knead and slowly add in more flour till the dough no longer sticks to the table. Knead for about 8 - 10 minutes. Add a little olive oil into a large bowl ( about a tablespoon ). Place dough into the bowl and turn over a few times to lightly coat all sides. Cover with plastic wrap and allow to rest for an hour or till double in bulk.
Pour out the dough onto a very lightly floured surface. Cut in half. Using your fingers flatten out one of the pieces. Roll out to a 9 x 14 rectangle. Spread half the pesto and 1/4 of a cup Parmesan on top. Bring in the side by a half inch and then roll the dough like a jelly roll. Pinch the seam closed. Take a sharp knife and cut down the center length wise. Open the jelly roll exposing the inside of the roll.
Take the two cut pieces and braid them together with the cut side always facing up. Place the bread into a greased 4 1/2 X 8 inch loaf pan. Now, repeat this whole process with the second piece of dough. Then cover both loaves with plastic wrap and allow to rest for an hour or till double in bulk.
Sprinkle the tops with the remaining Parmesan cheese and place into a preheated 375 degree oven for 30 - 35 minutes. Check the bread about 10 minutes before they are finished to see if you need to cover with tin foil if they are getting to brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool on a wire rack.
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